Buffy bit down tears as she let the front door swing closed, the weight of her misery bowing her shoulders.
I screwed up.
I really, really screwed up.
God, Mom would be so upset…
The clack of the social worker's sturdy, sensible heels echoed back through the door, a self-righteous staccato pushing needles into Buffy's heart and making her throat ache with rage held down with an iron fist.
What am I gonna do—
"Didn't go so well, huh?"
Buffy sighed, drowning in new depths of emotional exhaustion as she turned to slump against the front door. "Why won't you go?"
Spike blinked, seemingly taken aback by the resignation in her voice. His bewildered look of hurt coupled with a bashful half-shrug caused her temper to burst into flame, furious that he could possibly look sorry for himself in this soul-sucking moment. "I just thought—"
"Get OUT of here!"
Her words felt like they could shake the walls as hard as she'd wanted to slam the door after Doris Kroeger had offered a last condescending sneer and turned on her heel.
It didn't even seem to land in Spike's ears, however. He grit his jaw but didn't move from his spot in the hallway.
"Have a heart, luv, it's broad bleeding daylight."
"Like I care!" she screamed back, feeling herself losing control, treacherous tears starting to prickle in her eyes. "Get! Out!"
She didn't wait for the inevitable objection from him, but stormed off through the dining room and into the kitchen, picking up the pan full of congealed omelet that Willow had wastefully abandoned and started scraping it into the trash.
God, this place is so disgusting, if Super Sneer had seen this she probably would've kidnapped Dawn on the spot.
How did everything become such a mess?!
Just… Clean.
Gotta clean.
If I make it clean, and I make it tidy, then the state won't take Dawn away. They'll see I'm a good guardian and let me keep her. Just gotta clean.
"We need to talk," Spike said from the doorway, having followed her in.
"I don't want to talk, Spike," she growled, hurling the pan into the sink, and inadvertently shattering a mug. She huffed wetly, feeling like she'd shattered the last piece of her self-control instead.
"Buffy—"
"No! I don't want to talk!" She turned on the tap, hot water scorching the skin of her hands as she picked the shards of china out of the sink, narrowly avoiding lacerating her fingers. "I don't want to hear what you or anyone else think I should be doing! I know what I should be doing and at the top of the list is staying the hell away from you!"
She started scrubbing the pan too hard, removing the non-stick coating in gray, peeling granules.
"Crap," she cried, taking in a gulp of air, and yet unable to find a single atom of oxygen in the room that was closing in around her. Mom bought this pan. She bought it, and now I've ruined it, and she's not here to fix this, or buy a new one and I don't know what to do—"God, it's not fair! None of this is fair!"
"Buffy—" Spike said again, more sternly, but with no effect as Buffy began to hyperventilate.
"They're going to take her away!" Buffy moaned, burying her head in her hands. "She's going to end up with some other family somewhere else and I'll be even more alone and Mom said to take care of her, she said to take care of her, she said look after Dawn and I'm failing! She fractured her arm and it's my fault because I didn't stop Willow from going nuclear and it's so much, it's all too much, it's too much—"
"Stop!" he snarled, suddenly only a foot away from her and shutting the taps off before the sink threatened to overflow. She whirled to face him, backhanding him on instinct as blood pounded in her head, drowning out everything but her fight or flight instincts, a nauseating cocktail of cortisol and adrenaline making her gut roil.
I feel like I'm going to die.
I'm going to die.
I'm dying—
He reared back from her assault without even a second's pause—as though he'd been expecting it but hadn't cared to stop it—and took hold of the back of her neck in one hand and her forearm in the other.
He spun her and slammed her into the kitchen island, pushing her over so she was bent double, her face pressed against the countertop.
Buffy gasped, and this time the air seemed to penetrate through the hysteria clogging her lungs to bursting, a sharp breath drawn in and clearing the mental fog.
Oh…
Her eyes fluttered closed briefly as she gulped in another breath. She was sure this wasn't the way it was meant to be. People weren't meant to be pressed out of a panic attack, right? There should be soothing touches and brushed-away tears. Hushed words softly whispered.
Of course, those never worked for her—not since her mom had died, anyhow—and even if they did, she'd never ask for them from Spike.
But this was working.
This was definitely working.
Why it was working, she didn't want to dwell on. Didn't want to think about the feeling of calm washing slowly into her like a tide taking over a beach as he held her head down against the countertop, his fist tangled in her hair and an arm against her back making sure she stayed in place. Didn't want to think about how every time he touched her a cool, blissful silence washed away the fetid despair that was rotting her from the inside out.
"Just breathe, Buffy," he commanded and she drew in another shivered breath, closed her eyes, and let the air out of her lungs under the weight of him, and with it another shard of panic.
"Good girl," he murmured, the hand in her hair loosening enough to rub a thumb over her scalp, but maintaining the pressure holding her down. "It's going to be alright, luv. Say it. It's going to be alright."
Buffy swallowed. "It's going to be alright," she whispered, squeezing her eyes shut around the tears threatening to spill.
"They're not gonna take the Little Bit away. You'll handle it, won't you?"
The tone of his voice made it evident it was a rhetorical question, that he had no doubt in her abilities to undo the damage that had already been done.
She nodded in answer, her lip wobbling dangerously, the confidence in his statement feeling far too hopeful and out of her reach.
His hand re-tightened around her hair. "Say it."
"I'll handle it," she croaked, holding in a groan as he put slightly more pressure against her back.
"You can do better than that."
She could, and she took a fortifying breath, letting herself hate him just a little to put fire into her words. "I'll handle it."
"Good," he repeated and removed his arm from across her shoulders. She jolted as his hand reached around to the front of her jeans, deft fingers digging into her pocket.
He extracted his lighter and stood it with a clack in her eyeline, the chrome silver catching the filtered light encroaching in through the kitchen's blinds.
She flushed a deep, embarrassed pink, feeling like she'd been caught red-handed.
"Keeping it for a good luck charm, were you?" he asked as his hand returned to her hip.
"No," she answered too quickly. He carded his hand through her locks, sweeping them back from her face, to gather at the back of her neck, tilting her head up to him as he raised an eyebrow. "It was in the sofa cushions," she explained.
Spike nodded, his lips tight around a suppressed grin, remembering the early hours of the morning after Dawn had her arm broken, still dark outside, and Willow comatose upstairs. Remembering how he'd let the front door close firmly behind him and after no more than a heartbeat Buffy had come running. How he'd goaded her into riding him, buck naked, her knees tucked inside his coat with both her hands clinging to the back of the couch.
He'd held her by the rib cage as she'd bounced and writhed, one of her nipples pinched between his teeth until she'd bitten the fleshy base of her thumb to muffle the shriek of her release.
"Mm. Right nice way to lose it, that was," he snickered, and slid her feet an inch or two wider to allow him to stand between them. "Now, then…" His fingers curled under the waistband of her jeans and Buffy shuddered in anticipation as he dragged her back into his crotch.
"Spike…"
He held her there, letting her feel the hardness start to throb underneath his jeans.
"Tell me what you need, sweetheart. Let me give it to you."
Buffy choked back a moan—lightheaded from the sensation of his hand tenderly gripping her neck—and pinched her thighs together to feel the wet heat already starting to pool from barely more than a half-grind.
Why do I need this so bad? What's wrong with me, what's wrong with me, what's wrong with me? But even the litany of internalized shame wasn't enough to tamp down the fire that was starting to warm the pit of her belly.
"Tell me," Spike insisted, pressing more insistently into her.
Buffy bit her lip, and let the last piece of restraint evaporate.
"Tongue," she rasped, shivering violently as arousal deepened.
He said nothing, but moved his hand to the button of her jeans and undid them with a practiced flick, tugging the zipper down. He slid his fingers underneath the waistband of her underwear, his fingertips brushing momentarily over her mound, teasingly close to her clit, before easing her jeans off her hips onto her thighs, leaving her bare from waist to knees.
He took his hand out of her hair and Buffy bit down a groan, missing the pressure. The disturbingly visceral part of her mind suddenly wished for two Spikes; one to hold her down as the other brought her to the brink of release and threw her off it. But the conjured imagery was fleeting as he sank to his knees behind her, the rustle of leather pooling on the kitchen floor reaching her ears.
He moved her legs as wide as the jeans around her knees would allow, and Buffy held her breath, feeling his gaze caress her skin as he took his time. He spread her cheeks and at the sudden contact of his tongue on her labia, gently nudging her folds apart, she let out a full-bodied groan.
"Quiet down," he growled, laying a nip against the back of her thigh. "I'm not stopping even if you wake the wicked witch upstairs."
He pulled her backward so she was more directly on top of him, pressing his tongue into her, and Buffy yelped from the intense fluttering feeling, legs shaking from the strain of keeping herself upright in a half sit.
Spike lapped at her mercilessly—curling his tongue inside her until she was aching to be filled fully—before pulling out and shoving her forward to reach her clit, whorling his tongue across the sensitive bundle of nerves.
Buffy's fingers curled into her palms as she braced herself on her forearms, wishing she was in a position to reach down and hold him by the hair as his fingers dug into the flesh of her ass, working her over until her breathing fractured into desperate gasps. Without warning he sucked her hard, and she let out a low-throated scream, feeling herself climbing into the dizzying peaks of release, dancing on the precipice of it and craving the near-painful stretch of him inside her to make the fall all the more consuming.
"Spike, I'm close, please… please—"
With a last brutal suck and a roll of his tongue to soothe the sting, he pulled back from her and rose off his knees, the clinking of his belt burning her ears before he'd suddenly notched himself at her core and slid fully into her.
"Oh GOD—" Buffy bucked as her orgasm hit, cinching so tight around him he could barely move as he pushed her off the edge and into the velvet abyss below. "God, Oh God, Oh God—" His hand wrapped over her shoulder to stop her slumping forward as he thrust into her at a more punishing pace, and she screamed.
"That's it, baby," he purred, his voice barely affected by their exertions. "You take it so nice."
Buffy gasped, hands scrabbling for purchase on the countertop as the misery that always seemed to permeate her whole being from morning to night was pushed out, no room in her body for it as he fucked her hard enough to leave welts in her skin from where the lip of the kitchen island pressed against her abdomen.
"Harder," she pleaded and he provided, pounding into her with enough force to send her pitching forward.
He pummeled into her until the only thing she could feel was the stretch of her walls around him, the sharp snap of his hips meeting hers, and the ache as he filled her to breaking point, throwing her bodily into a second orgasm.
She was still twitching and shivering when he pulled out, dragged her jeans fully down her legs and off her feet, and spun her, raising her thighs to his hips and thrusting back inside her in one breath-stealing slam, seating himself fully. It didn't surprise her, he always preferred to finish face-to-face, the blue of his eyes searing her heart, occasionally obscured by the flutter of his eyelids when she clenched her pussy around him.
Free to chase his own end, he pounded into her, one hand gripping the countertop for stability as the other dug into her waist, nails scratching into her skin and bowing her back.
"Say my name, Buffy," he implored her, and she didn't hesitate since it was already lodged in the back of her throat anyway.
"Spike!" she moaned, her voice strained in an effort to keep the volume down. His thrusts became frantic, and she threw her arms around his shoulders as he threatened to overbalance her. "Spike… Spike—"
He bit her shoulder as he came, his teeth tearing through the black mesh of her top and stopping just short of puncturing her skin, a low growl vibrating deep into the muscle and making her pulse jump.
Hard panting turned to long breaths, and after a minute or two he pulled back from her and sat down heavily on the kitchen floor, yanking her down by the wrist into his lap. She wriggled, conscious of the pooling wetness at her core threatening to leak onto the denim of his jeans, but he banded an arm around her middle and kept her seated on top of him.
"Stay here," he said, and this time she didn't fight him on it, sinking down against him as her pulse returned to its normal tempo, her heart miraculously free of the wild mania that had made her feel like it was climbing up her throat.
"Feeling better, luv?" he asked as she let herself be cuddled, his arms linking at her hip as he laid a kiss on her shoulder. "Never seen you like that before."
Buffy shrugged sadly, still shaken from the disastrous morning, and dreading the looming misery of unpacking it that was yet to come.
"I don't know how to fight this," she said eventually, too exhausted to protest as he let his knees fall open enough for her to drop down and be able to lean against his chest. "I just feel so useless… it's like, monsters; no biggy. Super-mega-apocalypse; no a problem. Social workers and school-skipping teens…" She trailed off, shaking her head. "God, I'm a failure."
"You're doing good, honey," he murmured, brushing the hair away from her face and tucking it behind her ear. "It just takes time."
Her eyes stung like she'd been punched in the nose and she scrunched them tight to keep from crying. "The social worker put me on probation."
"She had it out for you."
Buffy gulped back a sob. "Maybe," she conceded, though truth be told she hadn't been the exceptionally competent adult she'd intended to be when she got the letter informing her of the visit. "I don't know what to do."
"Appeal," he said with a dismissive shrug. "Fight it. And if that doesn't work, burn the place to the ground." He chuckled when she shot him an unamused glare. "Bonfires are always nice."
She pinched her lips shut around a chuckle. "Maybe I can borrow your lighter."
Spike laughed, and brushed his nose over her ear, catching her earrings on his tongue. "S'all yours, pet," he said, shifting closer so she couldn't miss the way he was rehardening beneath her. "It's always been lucky for me."
AN: Written as a (late, late) birthday present for my good friend and loyal reader Spikelover4ever, who also provided the super cool banner (EF only, folks).
Expertly beta'd by RavenLove12 and Doublemeat Palace, thank you both for so much, you lightning speed demons x