Buffy regretted not having told Spike to downplay Angelus's attack on them today before they entered the house. She'd done what she always did and said nothing really important had happened when Spike gave her one of those "Are you bloody daft?" looks and jumped right into the story. Now Buffy was watching her mom's face grow paler and paler as she heard how much danger they'd been in. Especially because Spike had a way with words; he could really tell a good story. Buffy thought she'd like to hear Spike tell her stories while they cuddled so she could just get lost in his voice… maybe about his past, the non-murdery parts anyway. She shook her head. Now was not the time to get lost in thoughts about things she'd like to do while alone with Spike. No, she had to stop this before her mom had a heart attack.

"It's fine Mom, we made it out of there okay. Spike and I make a really great team, you don't have to worry." Joyce looked at Buffy like she was crazy.

"Buffy Ann Summers, if you think I don't worry about you every time you walk out that door at night until the second you walk back in, you're crazy. Of course I'm worrying. I met that horrible monster last year and I'm not looking forward to meeting him again."

"Hopefully you'll never have to. I want this over as soon as possible. I'm super sore, Mom, and we have to get up early. I think I'm going to get ready for bed." Joyce walked up to Buffy and cupped her face to get a good look at her.

"That sounds like a great idea. You look tired, sweetie. You should take a nice bubble bath and soak your sore muscles." Buffy closed her eyes and sagged in relief at the thought.

"That's the best idea I've heard all day, Mom."

"Good. I'm going to get to bed myself. Spike, everything is still set for you in the spare room, so make yourself at home."

"Thanks, Mum," Spike said, feeling weird.

He'd never been in a situation like this before; well, at least not since he'd been a vampire, anyway. His version of family was a lot darker than this, obviously, because hello, vampire. Still, he was thinking this was nice and would enjoy it for however long it lasted. Though he'd been planning on staying in town, he was going to have to find his own place to live. Somewhere that was not under his girlfriend's mom's roof. Maybe a nice crypt. Then again, if he was going to be with Buffy he wanted a nicer place than that; she was already spending too much of her time in cemeteries.

He had money stashed away that he'd made over the years but he doubted Buffy would be too happy with the way he'd gotten most of it. Then again, there was the money from when he was human; he was pretty sure with the interest on that he'd be well off. He just didn't like the idea of spending his human family's money while he was out doing things he knew his mother wouldn't approve of. He'd have to think on this more later on, he decided, because Joyce had gone upstairs and now Buffy was looking at him with a cute little pout.

"What's wrong, luv?"

"I haven't been able to do much normal teenagery stuff since I've been called. I get to play hooky tomorrow and it's to do slayery stuff, not anything fun like going out with my boyfriend," Buffy said and pouted again. Spike walked up to her, leaned in, and kissed her, hoping to kiss the pout off her lips.

"It's alright, sweets. I'll be there, I'm sure there's all types of fun we can have together. When things slow down, I'll help you play hooky and we'll do something fun." That must have brightened her spirits because she smiled brightly at him and gave him another quick peck.

"Good. Okay, I'm going to take a bath and then go to bed. I'll see you bright and early in the morning, Spike."

"Night, kitten. I'm going out, I'll be back in a while."

"Where are you going?" Buffy asked, sounding suspicious, even though she really didn't mean to.

"I'm jus' as beat up as you are, I need to feed to heal."

"Oh, right. Well uhm, be careful. Angelus is probably having the house watched," Buffy said after a second. Even though she knew he wasn't hurting anyone, it still wigged her out and made her staking hand twitchy.

"Ta luv, get some rest," Spike said and walked out the door.

When he got back an hour later, he heard the steady heartbeats of the two Summers women fast asleep. He was still wide awake but forced himself to try to get some sleep because tomorrow he was going to have to wake up around the time he normally closed his eyes for the day.

They were all in Giles's apartment getting ready to go to the vineyard to take out the minions that were there and try to get to whatever Angelus was digging for before nightfall. They were loaded up with weapons because they didn't know exactly how many vampires would be there working in the daytime.

"Okay, I'll go with Spike in his car and we'll go in first to try to take everyone out. Hopefully, they're far enough along in the digging that we can get the rest done today," said Buffy.

"Do we even know how to use the equipment they have to get to whatever we have to dig out?" Willow asked.

"Yeah, all good. Before I came back to Sunnyhell, I was reading up on this stuff. I'm gonna do some good old-fashioned treasure hunting soon, so I needed to know how everything works."

"You're going to leave to go hunt for a treasure?" Buffy asked in a small voice, which had the rest of the scoobies looking at her strangely. Spike moved to cup her face but stopped himself at the last second because he remembered she didn't want to tell the others about them yet.

"No, I already told you I'm sticking around. The treasure is close. Supposedly, anyway…" He cleared his throat when he remembered everyone was listening to them. He might like the group well enough but he didn't know if he trusted them enough to tell them about the Amara gem. The watcher might be friendly enough right now, but give Spike a ring to make him invincible, he bet Rupert's watcher training would kick right in. "Either way, that's not important right now, we're burning daylight. Plus, Lawson will be here tonight."

"Quite right, let's go. I would like to hear more about that treasure, though. I must admit, as a boy I was quite taken with the thought of treasure hunting."

"Sure thing, watcher." Spike said after a second, deciding he'd worry about that later and hoped Rupert would forget about it.

Somehow Buffy, Spike, and Wesley ended up in the DeSoto and no one in the car was really happy about it. Wesley might have stopped trying to get everyone to turn against Spike but he wasn't happy that Spike was there. If anyone wasn't sure of that, the cross and vial of holy water he had in his hands in the backseat was proof enough. They parked near some shade, close enough to the vineyard that Spike would be able to use his duster to get in but far enough away that the vamps inside wouldn't see them.

"Are you ready?" Buffy asked and they both nodded. Wesley had a crossbow, and Spike just had his fists and fangs while Buffy had Mr. Pointy. "Okay, let's go!"

They began taking them out systematically, starting with the few vamps that were upstairs. They made sure to stay quiet so as not to alert the ones downstairs. They heard machines running, which they knew helped them remain undetected. Before they went downstairs, Giles, Willow, Oz, and Xander came in, all having weapons of their own. That was good because Buffy and Spike could feel there were way more vampires than they'd expected, upward of two dozen more, downstairs alone. Buffy hoped that meant they were getting close to finishing, and that Angelus wanted to get it done as soon as possible.

Buffy went down the stairs first, with Spike right behind her. Buffy could feel what Spike was talking about when he'd originally scoped out the place. Instead of its feeling dangerous like it did to him, whatever was down there felt welcoming, like it was calling to her. Buffy knew it was hers and that she needed to get to it. It took a half hour to finally take out the rest of the vamps that were there, and all the humans were tired, but at least there were no serious injuries, just a few people being sore and a little banged up the next few days. When they finally got to the room where the digging was happening, they saw a big rock with a handle sticking out of it. Buffy knew that handle was what she was looking for. Without thinking too much about it, she walked right up and started reaching for it.

"Buffy, wait!" Giles said, and Buffy stopped right before her hand touched it. "It could be dangerous! Let Willow and I do a cleansing spell and make sure there are no other magical influences on it before you touch it. It would not be good if you got cursed just by touching it."

"If you insist, but I know there's not. I know this is mine Giles, that it was meant for me, for the Slayer. This must be what Spike was feeling before."

"Yeah, it's definitely what I was feeling, and it's much stronger now. Like it's warning me to stay away."

"That's good Buffy, but let me do this for my peace of mind."

"Have at it," she said and walked away.

Buffy felt all twitchy now. She just wanted to grab her weapon and have it on her. It was calling to her but she understood her watcher's hesitance. She took a deep breath to calm herself down and walked out of the room while the magic people did their thing. Spike noticed and followed after her. When they were far enough away from everyone else he grabbed her by the waist, turned her around, and pulled her close.

"You alright, luv?"

"Yeah, just feeling a little twitchy. Whatever that is, I know it's mine. It's calling to me."

"I know what you mean because it's doing the opposite to me, warning me to stay away. They'll be done soon and then you can have at it. I doubt Angelus could have done anything to it before he had it in his hands, and I doubt whoever put it there for the Slayer wanted to harm her if the thing's meant to help you."

"Do you think he was getting it for Faith?"

"Dunno, if it's calling to you, it'd make sense that it's doing the same to her."

"Either way, it's good we have it, if only to keep it away from him."

Spike nodded and leaned down to kiss her. She was hesitant for a second because all her friends were so close by, but eventually got lost in the kiss anyway. She let her hands begin exploring him shyly, and when she got to his chest she decided she couldn't wait to see him topless. Well, see him without a shirt again, this time preferably without a gaping ax wound. He started tentatively exploring her too. Spike didn't want to push too far considering how much emphasis she'd put on taking things slow.

She was surprised when a few minutes later the kiss ended abruptly and she was no longer holding onto him. When she opened her eyes she found him standing across the room. She was breathing deeply and realized he was too, which was funny considering he didn't need to breathe at all. He got himself under control quicker than she did. She looked at him with a question in her eyes, but he didn't need to say anything because Giles walked into the room a second later.

When Giles walked into the room, he could tell he'd interrupted something but he had no idea what. Had they been fighting? He hoped not but it might be preferable to whatever else they might have been doing… he'd have to think on that later. For now, he gave them each a long weighing look, making it clear that he knew something was happening before he'd come into the room.

"All clear, Buffy. No spells or curses on the weapon. There's still a lot of work to be done before we can get it out of the rock, though. It's still pretty deeply embedded in there but we should be able to get it done before the sun sets."

Buffy cleared her throat and walked back to the group with her head held high using what she called her Slayer stride, ignoring Giles's questioning looks. "Okay, well, let's get to work, then!"

When they got back to the group, Xander was looking over the machinery and the tools, trying to figure out the best way to get the job done fast. Buffy couldn't ignore the urge anymore, so now that it was deemed safe she walked right up to the weapon that had been calling to her since she'd arrived at the winery, grabbed it by the handle, and pulled. It came right out of the rock. Now that it was free, they could see that one side was a stake while the other was a sharp red ax.

"Holy frijoles! I know you're super strong but we've been trying to get it out since Willow and Giles gave the all clear."

"Yeah, it just came right out for me. It feels like it's mine."

"You must be careful Buffy, this calls for research. We need to know what this is."

"Giles, you know how to take the fun out of anything. Found a cool weapon hidden underground? This calls for hours of reading old smelly books!" said Xander with an eye roll, and all the teenagers except Willow laughed.

"Hey, I think that brings up the fun factor by five, at least." Willow said with a shrug.

Oz put his arm around her and nodded his head supportively with a quirk of his lips. Most decided to pack up and go back to Giles's apartment to get the research underway. Spike had to go meet Lawson, though he waited until everyone had left to move all the machinery far enough away from the vineyard and made sure it was hidden safely until he could use it.