Woooah… my love… my daaaarling…hmm hm hm hmmm hmmmm hm.
Buffy cut herself off before she completed a second hum-through of Unchained Melody. The song had been lodged in her brain all day and it was only getting worse. As earworms went this one was persistent, and was aggravatingly accompanied by every sarcastic snipey word Spike muttered. Every eye roll and condescending sneer.
She sighed nervously, swallowing around the tightness in her throat as she anticipated the tense evening to come.
Giles had been right that the bickering was exhausting. Ridiculous and so super childish… but…
…But—and she absolutely loathed this accompanying feeling—it was also just ever so slightly fulfilling, in the way a good fight could be. It was painful in the 'during' stage, but with kind of a satisfying afterglow, especially if she managed to land a good hit or two to make the fury really tighten his mouth; the wire cut of his jaw becoming even more pronounced.
Not that her gaze ever lingered there. No way. Of course it didn't.
Definitely not, she thought with silent determination. It's just sort of impossible not to look at his face when we're all of inches apart.
She hadn't been that close to him since Willow's catastrophic spell, and seeing a comeback land and set his eyes into blue flame was, admittedly, kind of addictive. For sure, she'd been intentionally stepping on his toes by the end of the evening, but he was such an obnoxious rage-inducing ass, how could she not?!
He's fun to torture, she allowed herself to think, reliving all the microscopic twitches that crossed his face when she really got under his skin. It had almost felt the way it had when they'd fought—really truly fought, with fists flying and snarky one-liners landing just as hard as the punches.
I don't miss that, she told herself. It was just a good workout-y sort of thing.
Her feet, however, were not in agreement and were already aching at the thought of trying to avoid Spike's boots for an hour.
This is going to be the longest evening ever, pouted the pouty voice at the back of her mind.
Buffy shook her head, straightening her back. No it won't. It's only one hour, she coached herself as she strode forcefully towards Giles' home. I'll totally get the whole waltzing-round-and-round thing this time. I just need one more hour. Two tops.
She re-evaluated every accidental misstep into Spike's shins from the night before, wincing as she imagined Riley in his place.
Three max, for sure.
But it would go better this time. It would, it definitely would. Yesterday she'd been all stressy and aggravated, and Spike was like fuel to the flame of stressy-and-aggravated, and so ergo it had taken ages before she'd actually managed a single correct step.
She was determined now, though. Focused and ready for another fight—
Not a fight, Buffy reminded herself. No fighting. Dancing. Ready for the dancing. Yay, dancing.
Dancing with Spike.
She rolled her eyes. Yay.
…Okay, it's going to take so much more than an hour.
Buffy whimpered, before squashing the thought and taking a calming breath in. No, just one more hour, she thought. Could probably do it in less time even. And Giles will be there to pull us apart if we start actually killing each other.
So.
It'll be fine.
Giles' place came into view and she swallowed.
I can totally do this.
"Giles!" Buffy called out as she let herself in. "I'm here!"
Silence and an empty apartment greeted her.
"Giles?"
Nothing.
Nothing except for the tinny far-off sound of the TV droning on in the bathroom.
She scanned the apartment one more time before slipping down the hallway, grabbing the shackle keys on her way to the bathroom.
Spike's unimpressed gaze dropped from the TV to her.
"Oh good. Bambi's back."
"Where's Giles?" she asked, snapping off the TV with a flick of her finger.
"How the bloody hell should I know? I'm not your Watcher's watcher," he sneered back, before shifting up against the curve of the bathtub into a sitting position. "Heard the door close about an hour ago. Didn't tell me where he was going."
Buffy sighed. "Great."
So much for a buffer.
…Maybe this isn't such a good idea, she thought, chewing her lip. Maybe I could call Riley and tell him I broke both my legs in a super tragic study accident. Heavy book fell on me out of nowhere…
She caught the twinkle in Spike's eyes, the slight pull of a smirk tugging at his mouth, and she knew he'd read that momentary tremor of apprehension.
"Having second thoughts, luv?" he asked, flashing sharp teeth in a grin when she glared down at him. "Should probably call the whole thing off. Ain't proper for a lady to be so unchaperoned."
"Nice try," she huffed, her resolve re-solidifying as she bent to unlock his ankles. "I'm sure that was great advice a hundred years ago, but I don't need a chaperone, especially since my dance partner is neutered."
To further aggravate her, Spike snickered.
"That's the second time in as many days you've referenced what's in my trousers, Slayer." Spike snickered, offering up his chained wrists. "A bloke could get the wrong impression."
"I could make an impression on your face instead," Buffy retorted without pause, yanking his hands closer so she could unlock them, dropping the shackles with a clatter into the bath once they were off his wrists. "I like when your nose makes that crunchy sound."
She headed back to the living room as he climbed out of the bath. The sofa was still pushed up against the desk, leaving a large swath of rug open to twirl across, and she took a slow steadying breath.
On the coffee table was a note.
"Buffy," it began in Giles' precise handwriting. "I'm attending a private viewing at your mother's gallery. Don't let Spike break anything. Giles."
"Perfect," she huffed sarcastically, and dropped the note on the sofa. She turned as Spike joined her in the living room, hand at his neck working out a knot at the base of it.
"Ready?" she asked in a perkily aggravating tone.
"Gimme a minute," he huffed, leaning back until his spine clicked. "Been stuck in the tub all day, my back's starting to break. I'm like the bleeding Hunchback of Notre Dame."
"Well, stretch it out," Buffy muttered as she dropped the CD in the player, pressing 'next' through the tracks until she got to Silence is Golden, (in case he needed reminding). "You're already way shorter than Riley as it is," she added under her breath.
Or not quite under her breath.
"That'd be the fellow you're trying to impress by not standing on his feet with what I'm going to estimate are burly size tens?"
"Size eights," Buffy bit back as the first verse began.
"Oh don't it hurt deep inside,
To see someone do something to her…"
"Whatever you say, luv," he replied with a mocking grin that insinuated he was more than pleased with the bite. "Nice, normal boy is he?"
Oh don't it pain to see someone cry,
How, especially if that someone is her.
Silence is golden,
But my eyes still see…"
Buffy firmly and silently dismissed revealing the commando training, the secret double life, the military special ops as Spike's eyes bored into her and said, tightly, "Yep." Tersely popping the p. But her eye twitched as the song's lyrics seemed to marry perfectly with the drop in her gut.
"How could she tell? He deceived her so well,
Pity she'll be the last one to know…"
"That do it for you?" Spike asked, as the song wound on without either of them making any move to begin the dance. "What did you opt for, big and brooding but without the bit of nasty on the inside? Blandest of both worlds, eh?"
"Do you see me very much not discussing my boyfriend with you, Spike? Eyes glaring? Hand curling into a fist? That's your cue to stop talking."
"Just curious why he isn't here, Slayer," Spike said, shrugging lightly like he wasn't even particularly interested in the answer. "Shouldn't getting stepped on be his privilege?"
"He's busy."
"Right." He nodded. "That's your type, isn't it?"
"What is?"
"Unavailable." He waited a beat to let the sting blossom under her skin. "Be in a right pickle, you would, if you actually picked a bloke you could be in the same room with."
Buffy smiled, but it was an 'already-so-sick-of-you' smile. "I guess I could pick someone who stalks me and follows me around all scary teeth and death threats. Wonder where I could get one of those?"
Spike raised a goading eyebrow. "You wanna try me on for size, honey, all you gotta do is ask."
Buffy snorted. "And yet, somehow, she resisted his charms. Can we get on with it?"
He pursed his lips, and she waited a second, before narrowing a last pointed look at him and raising her arms into the dancing position, waiting for his hand and his shoulder. A pump of her eyebrow insinuated it was this or back in the bath.
After a momentarily rebellious pause, Spike moved into her, flexing his shoulder as her fingers held on to him lightly, closing his hand around hers.
"...my eyes still see,
Silence is golden, golden,
But my eyes still see…"
"Two, three," he muttered under his breath and stepped forward as she managed to smoothly step back, only a slight wobble as they began a circle, her fingers digging in for a second when she overbalanced and brushed too close to him.
Another turn and she collided with his hip. She cursed as Spike grinned, adjusting his posture to bring her a flustered centimeter closer, taking advantage of their lack of audience.
"It's easier if you get a bit close, luv," he murmured. "Feel each other moving."
"Feeling you is the last thing I want to do, Spike."
"Oh?" he chuckled, cruelly. "The last? But I made it on the list, huh? Not sure how I feel about having to wait a turn."
"God. Thank you for that incredibly revolting insight into your mind," Buffy growled as she stumbled in his grip. "There's only one name on the list, and you're not it."
Spike smiled and leaned in. "You and Riley? I give the pair of you a month," he whispered into her ear. "Two tops if he manages to make any sort of a crease in your sheets."
"You know, if you keep trying to wheedle information about my sex life," Buffy said blithely, "a girl could get the wrong impression. Fishing for your own set of bruises?"
Spike sneered at the obvious jab at his brief sparkling moment in the sun—post Parker—and tugged her closer.
"Does he like the ones you give him, Slayer? Does he take it so nice?" He leered when her cheeks warmed into a darker pink. "Does he make you burn?"
Buffy snorted, rolling her eyes at his audacity.
"He gets the job done. Okay?" she added with an acerbic glower. It did nothing to deter Spike. It never did.
"Oh, thrilling," he hissed. "Good thing I'm not the jealous type."
"You're the psychotic type," Buffy replied, bristling, moving seamlessly along with him now that her attention was firmly off her feet.
"And ain't that just your bag, sweetheart." His hand splayed across her lower back as they spun. His arm snaked tighter around her until she was fully crushed against him. She almost tripped as she felt his fingers brushing over the stake she'd tucked into the waistband of her jeans.
"Does he know about this?" Spike asked and Buffy's heart thumped.
He meant the stake, and everything it represented. Of course he did. But with how close their bodies were his words could easily have meant… something else…
"He knows," she replied. (Or lied, depending on which implication they were discussing.)
Spike's lip curled, an unexpected look of smug satisfaction crossing his face. "Took it well, did he?"
Buffy glared in response. It was the only safe option. Loudly proclaiming how well Riley had taken what amounted to a whole lot of destiny with a side helping of superpowers would be an oversell.
And—if she was being honest—a lie.
There had definitely been a stammer when he'd found out. A slight hesitation that said all too clearly he was about halfway to "freaked".
It was the awe that had been the first red flag. The "what are you?" initial reaction that he'd rushed to cover with words like "amazing" and "incredible" and a lot of other adjectives that basically amounted to "not human". Of the reliably undateable variety.
So it had been a shock when he'd persisted. When he'd gone after her hard and oh so winningly called her stupid for not giving him a chance, right before impending doom had become rather less pending and turned into full blown imminent.
Buffy frowned to herself, hardly noticing the song drawing to a close…
"How many times will she fall for his lines…"
In the aftermath of Sunnydale's weekly brush with falling into the Hellmouth she'd sort of sidestepped dealing with that second red flag…
"And if I tried I know she'd say I lied,
Mind your business don't hurt her you fool…"
To her dismay, Spike laughed, startling her out of her train of thought.
"Then I give it three weeks, regardless of how adequately he performs in the sack."
Buffy blinked, mentally changing trains and getting on board the Rage Line, Destination: Punch. "What, Slayers can't date? Is that your point?"
"I'm saying the reason you lasted as long as you did with the Ancient Sulk was because he got it. He was as much of the dark as you are, luv. As much a part of it. Dealing with death and destruction and global annihilation like it's a goddamn nine-to-five isn't conducive to date nights on a Friday and tedious sex with the lights off. Sooner or later you're gonna need some sort of release."
Buffy's hand curled into a fist (not altogether realizing it meant holding Spike's hand that much tighter).
"Like you're the expert on release," she countered, her blood beginning to boil, refusing to let any more of what he'd said penetrate deeper or else she might crush the shoulder gripped in her other hand.
Spike grinned. "I get the job done."
Buffy snorted, barely hearing the music over the pounding of her pulse in her ears. "You can't bite, can't fight, and you live in a bathtub. 'Release' is so not the word I would use. You're about as constrained as it gets."
His smile faltered, dropping into a snarl. "Get this chip out of me, luv, I'll show you constrained."
"Promise?" Buffy took a step forward as the chorus surged again, and Spike just about managed to move his foot out of the way. "Because you talk a lot about being the Big Bad-" another step and an ember of malice warmed her gut when his eyes hesitantly dipped to their feet as he stumbled back. "But I'm pretty sure you're nowhere near as bad as you say you are."
Another step nearly tripped him and he glowered at her. The hand around her waist dug in just shy of ripping a hole in the fabric of her shirt. She took one last step forward, and Spike bumped up against Giles' bookcase, his jaw sharp as glass.
"Or as big," she added.
"You think, huh?" he growled through gritted teeth.
"Oh, I do think. I think a lot of things. But do you know what I know?" His nostrils flared as she pinned the hand clasped in hers to the shelf by his hip, his shoulder with the hand over his collarbone. "You couldn't take me on, even if you tried."
She watched as Spike's eyes dilated in outrage. She was so close to him she could feel his lungs rising and falling, panting in anger. A mirror of her own.
High on their shared fury she leaned in, lips parting as his head dipped, seemingly just as hypnotized as she was.
What am I doing? she thought, a single brain cell of sanity trying to batter its way into her consciousness. What am I…?
She glanced up at him. At the ravenous look on his face. The murder in his eyes.
She stalled, her brain trying desperately to find a foothold on the situation as she leaned back a half inch—
But in a lightning flash Spike's free hand was off her lower back and around her neck. Too fast for her to react, too fast to do more than blink, Buffy braced herself as he pulled her forward in a sharp tug.
And crashed his lips against hers.
xXx
"You couldn't take me on, even if you tried."
Spike's throat tightened in fury. His teeth ground together, aching to flash out and sink into her artery. Her pulse was beating so loud, and her neck was so close, and all of it was just begging to be impaled on his fangs!
Christ, her presence burned, it burned, and something inside him was screaming for that heat to sear him inside and out, to swallow him whole. And then she'd leaned in just an atom closer, and her hand had tightened its grip on his wrist just to force the point home, and God, it was too much!
Something snapped.
He bit her.
Except he couldn't bite her and the part of his brain that knew that changed the action without warning, deftly avoiding a million volts coursing through his gray matter by way of an equally reckless decision. His hand grabbed her by the back of the neck and his mouth crashed into hers in a kiss that might as well have been a punch.
Buffy froze in his grip, but she took it, breathing in sharply through her nose before instinct kicked in and she started fighting back. Fighting back with lips and tongue and teeth, kissing hard enough that his head clipped the bookcase from the force. The hand on his shoulder dropped to grip his hip, her fingertips digging into a dip over his pelvis that sent electric fireworks surging downward.
He groaned, and pushed his tongue into her mouth. She shuddered out a gasp, and hell but that little shiver rippling up her spine was so delicious he wanted to eat it. Wanted to cause it again, and again, until the muscles pinning him to the bookcase melted and she was liquid in his arms.
Fuck…
He briefly twisted the pinned wrist her out of her grip but she recaught it, pressing his arm into the books behind him as she sucked his lip in between her teeth and bit down. Spike jolted.
Fuck!
His hand tangled harder in her hair, but she was already kissing away the sting, already dancing her tongue with his—
Oh Christ, he thought as the kiss turned frantic, feverish, his lips devouring hers in a way that was more addictive than blood, simultaneously too much and not enough—
She jerked back and Spike thought for a second he must have bitten her after all from the look of horror on her face.
Except she was turning to look over her shoulder.
To see Giles walking in through the front door.
Spike blinked at the situational U-turn. The pair of them were panting so hard, clearly interrupted from tearing each other to pieces, and in one of Buffy's heartbeats, the vision of the scene hit him like one of her uppercuts.
…Fuck.
Giles glanced up from the art catalog in his hands.
"Buffy," he sighed, dropping the catalog onto his desk with a thwap. "When I said don't let Spike break anything, I was also implying don't use Spike to break anything. That bookcase is an antique," he added heading through to the kitchen and filling the kettle.
"...Right," Buffy croaked, releasing her hold on Spike's hip, taking a half step back to allow Spike enough space to sag out of her grip.
"The dance lessons are going well, I take it?" Giles asked as he pulled a mug from the cabinet.
"Yep," Buffy answered tightly.
"Swimmingly," Spike snickered under his breath and she shoved him back into the bookcase in warning.
He grinned wider, staring without restraint at the way her lips were plumping to fullness from how hard he'd kissed, at how a delicious pink hue was coloring her cheeks.
Oh. Made the Slayer blush…
He shivered. He'd known the girl could kiss. He'd been on the receiving end of more than a few under her pet witch's mis-spell, and as much as he'd protested after the fact, the memories of her tongue in his mouth had been a nice little kick for when his hand was round his cock and the thought of Dru's fangs in his neck hadn't been enough to get him over the finish line.
But he hadn't known she could kiss like that. That had been almost as violent as the fierce brawls he'd recently been denied on a permanent basis. Had felt as wild and out of control as every time he'd almost had her by the throat. Decadent in the way complete loss of control often was.
He choked down a sick chuckle. Bloody hell, maybe I really am covered in her…
He could still taste her. Could still feel the burning warmth of her like it had blistered his skin. Could feel the indents her teeth had left on his lip, and a ravenous voice in his head was growling more.
She caught him staring, and he straightened, smiling smugly, before wiping the corner of his mouth with the back of his thumb, ignoring the way her eyes flashed full of venom.
What I wouldn't give to be a bit more covered in her, he thought with an internal leer.
"We'll…pick up again tomorrow," Buffy muttered pointedly to Giles as she took hold of Spike by the arm and frog-marched him towards the bathroom.
"Perfect," Giles sighed sarcastically into his tea.
Perfect, sneered Spike to himself.