Buffy didn't sleep well, and the coiling in her stomach woke her up. She shot up to sit ramrod straight on the bed, mouth open in a silent scream. Then she had to breathe, and realized that there wasn't a vampire in the room about to kill her. There was a vampire in her room sleeping on her floor, and she had put him there.

Stupid, Buffy thought. She had been stupid. She'd fallen asleep with Angelus, whom she'd been sent to dust, roaming free in the room. How had that happened?

She looked down. The bed and luggage filled most of the tiny room, and the longest free floor space was between her bed and the radiator. He had stretched out there, stomach down and sheet pooled once again about his hips. He had taken off the T-shirt. She hoped to God he hadn't decided to strip his pants off, too. By the light of the early evening sun filtered through the heavily curtained window, she could see his profile and the gryphon on his back.

She resisted the urge to trace the tattoo. He was so pale, and the planes of his back were so smooth and hard they looked like marble, like something in Rome. His face was that way too, except that in sleep the hard cast of it fell away, and he looked peaceful. Buffy sucked in her breath at the beauty of him. He was something she could look at all day, had she never had to meet the disconcerting darkness of his eyes. With the white lids drawn over them, the eyelashes dusting his cheeks, he looked young, like a man, like someone she could throw off her covers to lie down beside.

Gritting her teeth, Buffy threw off her covers and swung her feet off the opposite side of the bed. As she swiftly tip-toed to the bathroom, she reiterated to herself how stupid she had been. She had slept with a demon beside her without chaining him up, and now she had to use the restroom. What was to stop him from leaving? What had she been thinking last night, when she'd shut herself into the bathroom to change, giving him free rein of her hotel room? What had she been thinking, period? She hadn't even asked him about alfalfa. Now she was stuck having to trust him while she temporarily left the room.

Buffy sighed. If she showered quickly she might be able to get done before he woke up. That would have to do. Besides, a treacherous part of her didn't want him to see her until she'd had at least half a chance to get pretty. She closed the door and hurriedly undressed. The shower was surprisingly clean. Last night she hadn't bothered to get a look at it, but all that gunk and grime on Angel couldn't have been pretty going down the drain. Turning the tap to 'hot,' she looked around, hoping for clean towels. She picked up the Wal-Mart bags so that extra T-shirt she'd bought him didn't get wet, and couldn't resist peeking inside. None of the packages of underwear were open.

She slammed the bags down and stepped into the shower. The water hadn't had time to heat, and she was glad. He had stood here, naked, in this shower. She wished it was her own shower, so she could huddle on the floor of it and not worry about diseases and other weird things people might have left in it. She would have wrapped her arms around her legs and let the water lash down on her unguarded head.

It was true, what her friends had said after she came back to life almost three years ago now. She was a slut. No one but Anya had used that word—though Darla had used worse—but they had all thought it. None of them had judged her for it. They had thought she had been in Hell, and when they learned the truth, her feelings were even less fathomable to them and so even more forgivable. Not all of them had approved of her actions, but they had understood that she was angry, in pain, full of aggression that she refused to take out on any one innocent soul, so she took it out on many. One had not been enough to satiate her anyway, not with Slayer strength and not with the memory of Heaven intense in her head, graying out the world around her into something brutish and harsh.

She had slept with guys. Lots of guy, both boys and men. She'd gotten violent sometimes, and it had bordered on abusive. Most of them had liked it, and if they hadn't, she'd stopped in time and the night had come to a quick end. But even if they did like it, even if they could make her forget her pain and herself while they were inside of her, she always moved on after a night or two. She didn't want feelings to get involved. Feelings would only get hurt.

And too many nights with one guy meant the danger that she might start to care, too. She might want to tell him things, to somehow share this misery that she couldn't dump on her friends, and that was something a Slayer just couldn't do. How does the Chosen One tell the ordinary Joe that she needed to fuck because Heaven had been too beautiful and she hated having to come back, even to save the world? And if she told anyone that, if she could somehow magically make a normal person understand—if she found another Riley, who dealt with demons for a living—the combination of confession and copulation might trick her into thinking she was in love again. And wasn't love just another form of torture?

Buffy had gotten over it, of course. Life was too special to embrace death. She no longer used people and threw them away; the idea had grown so repellent to her that she hadn't had sex in almost two years. She hadn't wanted to die in almost as long. She had regained what Xander affectionately termed, "her old sparkle." In return, she had lost her innocence. She hadn't lost it when she'd lost her virginity to Parker, nor when she'd found out he was a slimeball. She hadn't lost it with Riley. Maybe she hadn't even really lost it sleeping with all those guys. Maybe it had finally slipped away from her when she'd actually decided she wanted to live a real life again.

She only knew that it was gone, and the fact that she was standing in this shower, arms wrapped around herself as if trying to save herself from her own body, proved it. She was thinking of the vampire in the other room, his sleeping profile, the gryphon on his shoulder, the planes of his bare back, the fact that he wasn't wearing anything under his sweats, the way he looked at her, the way his hands moved, the way his voice sounded. She was thinking of the ache between her legs, thinking of how sweet that ache could be, how she'd forgotten it didn't always have to be violent. She was thinking of how much she'd missed it, and how its sudden resurgence now proved that she really had lost more than she could ever hope to regain.

What would Anya have said to what she was feeling right now? Buffy knew the answer, also knew the others would be gentler. They'd kindly say that physical desire for a vampire only meant that she still needed to work out her 'anger' and 'aggression' and 'pain'. But they'd all be thinking it . . .

Slut.

It didn't matter that she didn't want to fuck the vampire outside the bathroom door the way she'd wanted to fuck all those guys. It didn't matter that this wouldn't be about aggression or pain. It didn't matter that he had a chip and couldn't hurt her, that he was beautiful and seemed really nice. It only mattered that he was a vampire, and a vampire had killed her once; vampires were her worst enemies; vampires had tried to end the world on occasions too numerous to count. And she was being careless, letting this one slip through her fingers. She was being stupid, because vampires couldn't be really nice or feel the things she was feeling. She was putting more than herself at risk.

Buffy sighed. So much for a short shower. The water had turned hot, and was stinging her now with its heat, turning her skin red. It didn't matter, now. The sweet-sharp ache was gone, reasoned into a part of herself she no longer liked to go. She finished up, deciding not to bother with make-up and her hair after all. The steam was too thick to see anything, anyway. She wrapped a towel around her and opened the door to go out and fetch her clothes.

Angel was in front of the door, his hand up to knock. He froze when she opened the door, his eyes darting over her quickly. He didn't miss anything—the cleft between her breasts the pressure of the towel created, the hip exposed where it was too small to wrap all the way around her, her wet hair, clinging to her neck. Her skin was still red, and dripping. Puffs of steam drifted lazily behind her. His mouth opened. His jaw worked. Nothing came out.

She moved coldly past him, and said, "You can use it, if you need it."

His head moved so his eyes could follow her.

"Yes?" she asked, raising a brow.

He pressed his lips together, eyes now firmly fixed on hers, but just as searching. "Are you done in here?" he asked finally, gesturing.

"Why?"

"I wanted . . . I was wondering if you'd mind if I took another shower."

"What? Why the hell for?"

Running a frustrated hand through his hair, he looked into the steamy bathroom and then back at her. Suddenly thinking better of it, he hastily reverted his eyes to the bathroom again. "It's been a long time since I had a . . . hot shower. It's been a long time since . . . anything." His eyes swung back to hers. "You have no idea how long it will take to feel clean again."

His eyes were burning holes into her. She was suddenly sure he meant more than one thing with his words, and it annoyed her. She wasn't in the mood for subtlety or underlying meanings. "Go ahead," she said dismissively, waving an arm. "But you used up all the soap, and all my shampoo, and all my conditioner. It was thoughtful of you, really. I don't know what you plan to use this time around."

The somewhat helpless, slack-jaw expression returned. "You said I could—"

"Never mind that," she said. "Make it snappy. And I'm going to be changing in here while you're in there, so don't come out without knocking."

His mouth closed as his eyes swiftly took in her body once again. For a moment, he was very still. Then he turned decisively on his heel, walked in the bathroom, and shut the door.

Buffy sighed and went over to her luggage. Unable to resist packing dozens of little dresses and strappy shoes, even though she was in New York for Slayer purposes only, she had brought five suitcases. She'd thought that even if she had to spend all her free time researching or getting stuff ready in her hotel room, she could still wear something pretty, to at least make her feel like she was somewhere special. Now, however, she wasn't in the mood. She pulled on a pair of leather pants and a black camisole. Then she sat down to sharpen stakes.

Angel didn't take nearly as long, this time. He knocked; she told him he could come out, and he entered the room, wearing only the sweat pants, a little wet from putting them on just after showering. He was still toweling his hair. Buffy had to resist the urge to ask him whether it was good for him, knowing it might reveal to him just what kind of mood she was in.

"I need more clothes," he said, breaking into her thoughts.

"There's another shirt in there," she offered.

"No." He gave his hair a last, vicious rub and left the towel around his neck. "I need real clothes."

"Real clothes?"

"Slacks. And . . ." He looked away from her, thinking. "Shirts with collars. And I need other stuff."

"Other stuff?"

"A razor. Shaving cream. A toothbrush—"

"Vampires brush their fangs?"

He turned to her, looking startled and slightly offended. "Of course. Things get stuck in your . . . ." He looked away again, uncomfortable. "You don't want to know."

"You're right," she said, giving her stake a shave. "I don't."

"And I need a comb. And a brush. And gel. And mousse. And there was this spray they used to have—"

"Do I look like Walgreen's to you?" she demanded suddenly, slamming the stake down on the table beside her. It clattered and then proceeded to roll off the table. "I can't leave you here and go buy all those things. And I'm certainly not taking you with me. You were happy looking like demon vomit yesterday; why the sudden burning need for shirts with collars and shaving cream?"

Angel looked at her steadily, but a thousand things passed behind his eyes before he at last opened his mouth and said, "Something's changed."

"Since yesterday?" she asked skeptically.

"Since this morning," he corrected.

She rolled her eyes. Technically, she had found him this morning. He'd had his first hot shower "in a long time" this morning. "Talk about a severe case of 'if you give a mouse a cookie,'" she said.

"Huh?"

"Never mind. Let's talk about alfalfa."

His mouth pursed. "Buffy . . ."

She stilled. Her name did sound good on his lips. Heat flowed through her veins, and she felt herself melt a little. Sighing, and trying to cover the sound, she took a book out of the duffel bag in front of her. She opened it to the marked page, and, trying to be all business, she walked over to where Angel stood looking at her, confusion written on his face. "It's this demon thingy," she explained, holding the book out to him so that both of them could see while she pointed to the drawing. "You really never heard of him?"

He stepped closer, and Buffy trembled as the hairs stood up on her arms, as if reaching out to touch him. He peered at the picture and then took the book out of her hands. His fingers were cool when they brushed against hers. "Acathla," he whispered.

"What?" she said, distracted. He was so close.

He looked down at her. His face was very near to hers, but his eyes were not. They were distant, and worried. "The Immortal has Acathla?" He frowned back down at the book. "This could be bad."

"Yeah. Big bad." She turned to look at the book, too, trying to focus on the matter at hand. "So you do know what it is?"

"Yes." He paused at her expectant look. "Don't you?"

"Of course," she said, crossing her arms over her chest, "but I want to hear your version."

He raised a brow, but did not dispute her. Instead, he launched into an explanation. "Acathla the demon came forth to swallow the world. He was killed by a virtuous knight who pierced the demon's heart before he could draw a breath to perform the act. Acathla turned to stone and was buried."

"Okay, yeah. That's what I've got, too," Buffy agreed. "So tell me again why the Immortal needs you? Does he need like a spell or some mojo to reanimate the do-hickey? Because if so, I can't see why he'd want you. Maybe my friend Willow, but . . . well, sorry, but you're just a bum."

Angel went to sit on the edge of the bed, bringing the book with him. He leafed through it for a moment, his brow furrowed. Then his eyes met hers. He closed the book onto his knee, resting one long, square hand over it. "If someone could withdraw the sword, Acathla would be reanimated."

"So, why doesn't the Immortal just—"

"It would have to be someone worthy," he said steadily, eyes still fixed on hers, as if waiting for something.

"A sword in the stone thing. I get it. But who . . . ?" She blinked into his burning gaze. "Oh no," she breathed, her eyes widening as she stared straight at Angel.


A/N: Thanks everyone for your comments. It's both surprising and pleasant to know what you think.

Thanks once again to a2zmom for the excellent beta. This'd be harder to read without her.

Whitewolf: You're right; it's never revealed whether the Immortal is a vampire. But since it's never stated either way, I chose to make my Immortala vampire (among other things). I'm interested in your opinion—do you think the Immortal is a god?