Awards for A Love Like Ours

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Author: Holly (holly.hangingavarice@gmail.com)
Rating: NC-17 (For language and sexual content)
Timeline: Picks up immediately after Tabula Rasa.
Summary: Buffy is broken, and Spike is determined to again make her whole by giving her what she needs most: an ear to bend, a shoulder to cry on, and, most importantly, someone who understands.
Prompt: From 20_hot_prompts, #18 romantic. This is also a gift!fic for pfeifferpack. Hope she has a wonderful birthday.


Thanks to elizabuffy, megan_peta, spikeslovebite, and dusty273 for betaing. And to spikeslovebite for the gorgeous banner.

Disclaimer: The characters herein are the property of Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy. They are being used for entertainment purposes out of love and admiration, and not for the sake of profit. No copyright infringement is intended.

He remembered the taste of her kisses well. The way they burned. The hint of her raspberry-flavored gloss rubbing against his lips. The strokes of her tongue as she explored his mouth. The feel of her heady gasps and the roll of her succulent little whimpers. The way her needy fingers wandered across his body, as though she was unaware of the unspoken barriers placed by her own decree. She explored his chest and arms, grasped his shoulders and cupped his cheeks. She touched him as though memorizing him with her hands. As though attempting to imprint him on her skin, so she could carry him with her whenever they were apart.

It was with the same aching desperation which she’d kissed him when they were under Willow’s spell two years prior, only then, her lips had curled upward then in a futile, however adorable attempt to keep from smiling. Even while under the delusion they were getting married and going to live merrily ever after, Buffy had exhibited a rich need to consume him completely. As though she’d known all along their time was limited.

Buffy wasn’t smiling now, but her mouth was more demanding than ever. She nipped at his lips, sucked his tongue desperately between her teeth, pressed his face between her hands and whimpered when he pulled away to allow her breath.

The way she gasped against him–her brow pressed to his, her eyes closed–made the ground beneath his feet tremble. She was setting him on fire, but he didn’t dust. The world was burning and he was burning with it; Buffy took everything he was and made it her own. The fan of her heady little gasps against his lips. The whispered touches of her curled fingers against his cheek. The way she thrived with need. The way she asked for everything.

Then she was kissing him again, and every inner barrier fell apart.

“Buffy…”

She couldn’t know what she was doing to him, could she? She couldn’t know how he’d craved this, craved her, longer than his memory to reach. She couldn’t know that giving him her mouth without admitting the feeling behind it—the feeling he tasted in every sinful caress, was slowly eating him away. He would dissolve. William the Bloody would be no more, done in at last by a slayer.

By the Slayer. By Buffy Summers.

The woman he loved.

“Taste so good,” he murmured, sucking her lower lip into his mouth. “My Buffy…”

“No.”

“Yes. Can’t run from this,” Spike swore ardently between kisses. “You can’t hide. I’m here, love. Let me in.”

“No.” The word was short, abrupt, but definitive. The word paid no mind to the way her lips stole one last kiss from his. Instead, it rang with profuse astonishment—the same which eventually leaked into her eyes as she tore herself from his arms, palpably horrified at her own daring. As though the solace he offered was as tainted as the demon in his chest.

Spike doubted Buffy would understand, much less believe the pain she caused simply by turning away from him. The pain which hurt more than the sting of a slap against his cheek. More, even, than her words. Hits and punches were defensive mechanisms; words often lied for the sake of self-preservation. But the blow she dealt by turning her back on him was damn near fatal.

“Why do I keep doing this?” she asked, her voice low and the question obviously not one she wanted answered. It killed him how hard she trembled. “Why?”

“You know why,” Spike replied softly, swallowing hard as his feet dared a step forward. “You need—”

“I don’t need this,” Buffy spat, whirling around, her eyes glaring daggers. “This is—”

“Wrong,” he finished for her. “I know, love. Sing me another one?”

“I just—you…” The animosity in her eyes flickered and died, falling again to the agonized despair which did little more than rip away pieces of himself. Pieces which couldn’t be healed or recovered. “Why is it you?” she asked. “Am…is there something…wrong—”

“With you?” The suggestion alone robbed his useless lungs of even more useless air, but he felt the rip anyway. As though his innards were being yanked out for everyone to see. And even though it made him ill, the devil on his shoulder whispered that if Buffy thought there was something wrong with her, she might not object to doing something wrong with him. The devil went ignored. It so often did these days.

“There’s nothing wrong with you, sweetness,” Spike insisted, daring another step forward. “Nothing.”

“I can’t feel anything,” Buffy said, her tone soft, the heavy scent of her tears washing over him. “I can’t…but when I’m…when I touch you…” She shuddered and twisted around again. “There…there must be something so…I feel…but you can’t…”

“You don’t believe that.”

The desperation in her voice had him thoroughly unmade. “Spike—”

Spike inhaled sharply and quickly sealed the space between them, seizing her wrist. “Look at me,” he said thickly, raising her hand to his face, his fingers stretching over hers so that his hand rested atop hers as she cupped his cheek. “Look at my eyes.”

He half expected her to jerk away as though scathed. She didn’t. Instead, Buffy swallowed hard and obeyed, her gaze locking with his, and he was so startled by her compliance it took him a second to collect his thoughts. To summon the words he wished to piece together. The wealth of what remained unsaid between them could fill a missile silo. When he looked at her, he had the urge to babble everything—to hell with coherency—in a mad rush to get it all out overwhelmed him.

“Do you think I feel nothing?” he murmured, fearing her answer but forcing himself to ask it all the same. “Do you really think can I touch you without trembling? That I don’t break every time you cry? Do you think it’s bloody easy for me? Seeing you need an’ not bein’ allowed to…it kills me.”

Buffy stared at him numbly but not unmoved. He knew for the way her moth fell open, closed, open again.

“Do you really think I can’t feel it when you ache? Tell me.” His fingers closed tightly around hers and held, his jaw tightening as he fought to keep control. “Tell me I feel nothing.”

The words arose behind her eyes. He saw her grasp them. Wrestle them down. Saw her fight to spit them out—the same old song and dance. The road much traveled. She knew every turn. Every twist. Every crack. Every tiny imperfection. Every stop. Every bloody talking point. Buffy was a master of this road. The hand she dealt vaguely resembled a Bible-thumper who refused to see the value in science or reason. Buffy and her jihad against the love of a soulless man.

Even if he had given her something real. The kisses they’d shared since her return had seemingly demolished the friendship toward which they were working. She hadn’t run from him before Sweet and his merry band of Broadway demons seized Sunnyhell’s vocals and made everyone warble over their innermost secrets. No more than she’d run from him after discovering to which lengths he was willing to go in order to protect her. To protect her and Dawn. Buffy had been friendly to him then. Accepting. Open.

She’d looked him in the eye and spoken to him as she spoke to her friends.

She’d made him feel like a man.

How was it only two glorious kisses could rip that away? Was he getting too close? Had he gotten too close? Perhaps she was seeing that he could be what she needed. He was the only one who could make her laugh these days—that much had definitely not escaped his attention. He was the only one she actively sought out…or he had been until he confessed it was killing him: being so close to her and not having her. Until that sodding chorus line wanker of the underworld decided to muck up his life by taking away the very thing which made getting up worthwhile.

Even if seeing Buffy everyday without touching her had been slowly doing him in, there was nothing he’d looked forward to more.

“Tell me I feel nothin’,” Spike whispered again. “Tell me it din’t happen…seein’ you lying in sunlight. Knowing…knowing everything I’d ever wanted to be was…you were so bloody far from me. From all of us. An’ I couldn’t stop staring at you. I think…fuck, I can’t remember who dragged me away. Who pulled me…’cause I would’ve dusted there. The sun was coming…an’ you were gone.” His eyes fogged with unwanted tears, and he sniffed the sniff of one who was trying to maintain dignity while recounting the single-most painful incident of his life. He held himself upright, bidding away tears to little avail. Spike wasn’t one for waterwork sympathy; he never had been. And he didn’t want to cry and force Buffy to manufacture responses which had no feeling behind them.

He’d cried his weight in tears since she left, and a good bit more since she returned.

“Living in this world without you in it,” Spike continued, haunted. “Walkin’ by your grave every night an’ knowing there was something I could’ve done to make it so you wouldn’t’ve jumped. It’s my fault, see. I bollocksed everything up. I could’ve…an’ then you’d’ve never been raised, ‘cause you would’ve never died. An’ you wouldn’t be in such pain now. Knowin’ I could’ve done something…could’ve prevented it…”

“No, Spike…”

His brain registered the soft protest in her voice. His heart did not. His heart was dragging him down a path of unwanted memory.

It had been a night funeral. Spike hadn’t requested it—in fact, the days following Buffy’s death, he’d barely put two syllables together. The prospect of saying his final goodbyes to the woman he loved had loomed over him, condemning the shattered remains of his heart to starve for the lack of her warmth, leaving him thoroughly bankrupt at the mere thought. He couldn’t stomach the idea of watching her sink beneath the ground. He couldn’t fathom how the world could continue now that her light was extinguished.

Willow and Tara had shot down Xander and Giles’s protests over the funeral arrangements. Always the pragmatic gits, they’d known that a nighttime funeral would attract attention from local baddies—unwanted attention—therefore the Scoobies had unanimously decided to employ the bot to keep local demons fooled. But Willow and Tara had desperately wanted Spike to attend. He deserved it, they said. He’d risked everything. He would have died in Buffy’s place were he given the chance.

He was, according to them, one of the gang.

Xander had quickly used the nighttime arrangements as means to invite Angel. It made sense: if there was going to be an extra measure taken for the sake of a vampire, the boy would want the vampire he loathed least present. He would want to pretend the arrangements weren’t for Spike.

It didn’t bother Spike, this mentality. The fact that Xander had ceased making jokes about dusting him was about as much as he felt he could expect. There was simply too much bad blood between them to expect a fix of any sort. So Angel had attended, looking regal and very important. He’d laid flowers on her grave, a wiser-looking Cordelia at his side.

He hadn’t looked like a man in his shoes ought to look. He hadn’t looked like the love of his life had died.

He’d looked sad, but resilient.

Spike, on the other hand, couldn’t remember a blessed word anyone said. He vaguely recalled sitting beside Dawn, who had clutched his arm so tightly it would have otherwise taken a crowbar to pry her off. There had been a fleeting moment of satisfaction in the Bit’s refusal to accept Angel’s hug or respond to his questions with anything more than a clipped, often monosyllabic retort. She’d made it clear she was in Spike’s corner, and that meant more than he could rightfully express.

After all, had it not been for his mistakes, there wouldn’t have been a funeral. Buffy would be alive. Dawn had forgiven for it, no matter how much pain it caused.

When it came to the funeral itself, the only thing Spike remembered distinctly about the funeral was his part. The part where he’d gotten to speak. To spread flowers across her casket. Willow had asked him to say something. She said Buffy would have wanted it.

And so, for the first time in as many years, he’d written. He’d written endlessly about her. He’d written until his hand cramped. Until he couldn’t see the parchment for his crying. Until ink bled with tears. Until the words he wanted were secure.

It would be the first time he’d read his work, or had his work read, since the night he was sired. He wanted to do her justice. And though Spike had initially rejected the idea of penning something himself—William the Bloody Awful Poet’s work could never hope to honor Buffy—there was something so impersonal about flipping through his many poetry anthologies. There were ideas and concepts which seemed to touch the very fringe of Buffy’s inherent grace and strength, but nothing which embodied her completely.

Bloody awful work that it was, at least it came from the heart.

He’d read for her. He’d read it in front of a congregation of people who either hated him or hadn’t the slightest idea who he was. Giles had dabbed his eyes. Angel had given him a look of mixed confusion, disgust, and admiration. Dawn and the lover Wiccas had wept openly. Afterward, Xander had shaken his hand.

And none of that—the acceptance, tentative and fleeting as it was, of Buffy’s best mates—had mattered to him. They allowed him to patrol with them—asked it, really—and made a point to tell him it was just as much because of what he’d done for them as it was his super-strength. They handed custody of Dawn to him at every opportunity—something which told him just how much he’d earned their trust. All summer, they’d fought side-by-side.

Buffy returned and the camaraderie disappeared. It was as though none of it had happened…at least among the menfolk. He hadn’t seen much of the witches since the Slayer’s raising, and for good reason; every time they were near, his temper flared and his demon roared to explore the boundaries of the chip. How could they have done this without telling him? How could they have ripped Buffy from the afterlife without trying to sodding find her first?

If little Red had enough power to raise the dead, she bloody well ought to have the power to try and find the girl before she tried to raise her. They hadn’t cared; none of them had cared a lick, as long as Buffy came back.

And now…she was standing just feet away from him, her spirit broken, her eyes lost, the warmth he’d so treasured sapped into nothingness. Having Buffy back was likely the closest thing to Heaven he would ever reach; at the same time, he loved her too much to wish this for her if she didn’t wish it herself. Had she not come back, he would have fought tooth and nail to keep her where she was. To him, there was no doubt to where she’d gone after the jump.

Any ninny could’ve pieced it together. A soul like Buffy’s didn’t go to any incarnation of Hell. Had the blessed Scoobies bothered to chat him up, they would’ve known it instead of justifying their presumption based on what had happened to Angel. To a vampire.

They’d thought a vampire and a slayer would meet the same fate in death.

Different strokes for different folks.

Perhaps had Buffy disappeared completely, Spike could have understood this line of reasoning. But she hadn’t disappeared; she’d left her body behind. If Hell had taken her, there would have been nothing to bury. Nothing at all. The circumstances were as different as bloody night and day; how anyone could study two thoroughly independent lines of thought and arrive at the same conclusion was astounding…and it made him believe, on some level, that the red witch had known.

She’d known what the others could not, and she’d concealed her knowledge for her own benefit. The rest of the Scoobies, perhaps, had told themselves that Buffy and Angel’s independent deaths were the same thing at the core, merrily ignoring that Angel was consumed in a hell dimension entirely; he hadn’t been killed by his banishment. Buffy had been killed—and therein laid the difference. The difference no one paused to consider.

Had Buffy not left a body behind—had there been nothing of her after the portal sealed—there would’ve been no need for a sodding spell. Spike would’ve gone after her. He would’ve found a way. He would have traipsed the planes of Hell, battled demons, challenged Lucifer himself, and gotten her out. He would’ve saved her—the rest be buggered.

Only it hadn’t happened like that. Buffy hadn’t been lost to a hell dimension. She’d jumped. She’d found peace. Those left behind had grieved, but their tears were for themselves, not for Buffy. They were tears of pity. Her light was gone.

Her light was still gone. Heaven hadn’t allowed her light to escape with her. And here she was, looking at him strangely; unaware of how much he wanted to say but couldn’t put into words. Not knowing how to rightly make up for his fault at her being here. He maintained: had he been quicker, cleverer, stronger…had he done anything just a hair differently, she wouldn’t have jumped. She wouldn’t be here. She wouldn’t be wading through endless pain.

She wouldn’t be so cold.

“Spike?”

“My fault,” he said again, his voice empty.

“No. No, Spike, it wasn’t your fault. It was no one’s fault.” Buffy’s thumb tenderly stroked his cheek, surprising him out of his reverie. And without warning, she was close. God, she was so close. For a second he thought she might kiss him again, but instead he found her in his arms.

“It was no one’s fault,” she whispered. “I…but thank you.”

He had no bloody idea for what she was thanking him, but he wasn’t about to piss away the opportunity to hug her tightly. It was a once-in-a-lifetime thing; he knew it. Buffy might turn to him for passion and physical comfort, but hugs were above the physical. Hugs implied comfort on levels no one ever entrusted with him. He wasn’t even certain if she could understand the significance of her own action.

“I was just…” she murmured into his shoulder, sniffing. “I was so happy.”

“I know, kitten,” Spike replied, resisting the urge to bury his face in her hair while still inhaling her scent as though it held the antidote to every poison ever concocted. “She din’t mean it.”

Buffy pulled back, but only slightly. “How can you say that?” she demanded. “I thought…I thought you would…aren’t you mad?”

“Outraged,” he agreed. “But she din’t know what she was—”

“I can’t believe you! Of course she knew what she was doing! Tara said she…she thought about doing a spell to take my memory of Heaven away. Well, she did.” Buffy laughed bitterly. “She took it and everything else away, and I was happy. I was happy not being me. I was happy being free to…” Her eyes met his but darted away just as quickly, her cheeks reddening. “I was happy being someone else.”

Understanding crashed over him. They weren’t discussing the resurrection now; they were talking about what had happened tonight. They were discussing tabula rasa.

He couldn’t help but be surprised. For what he and Buffy had shared while thinking they were other people, he’d thought she’d never refer to it again. Granted, it hadn’t been much, but it was a lot.

“Oh, that spell,” Spike said, pulling her into his arms again before she could manage another inch away. “Sorry, love. Our Sabrina’s been castin’ all kinds of wonky mojo of late; ‘s a damn bitch keepin’ up with which spell you’re—”

“You thought I meant the resurrection.”

Spike fell silent and he nodded. Buffy didn’t try to wiggle away. He took comfort in this, if nothing else.

“I was happy tonight,” she said again, her eyes growing distant. “I…everything was so…so normal. Didn’t it feel like that to you? Like everything was normal?”

He offered a half-smile. “Not sure I know what normal feels like, love.”

“You thought you were human.”

“Don’t hold it against me.”

Buffy shook her head. “You…you said…you said you didn’t want to bite me.”

Spike frowned, appropriately flustered. This wasn’t the sort of thing he wanted blabbed around; the fact that he was so in love with the girl that even upon forgetting he was in love with her, he had no desire to be the vampire he once was.

“I don’t,” he said softly. “Not like…not like that, anyway. I haven’t for a long bloody time.”

It was the truth, and he knew she knew it. That didn’t mean he wasn’t astonished when she nodded. When her eyes reflected only acceptance and no argument. If her casual acceptance was surprising, what she said next absolutely floored him.

“I’m sorry.”

Spike inhaled sharply. “What?”

“You’re the only person who’s been decent to me since I got back. Who hasn’t asked me how I’m doing every five seconds.” A soft, sad smile nudged her lips. “I just…I’m so…God, Spike can you…I can’t sleep ‘cause they’re worried. And they want me to tell them it’s okay, that I understand and forgive them when all I wanna do is scream and cry and curse and demand how the hell they could’ve done this to me. After all I’ve done…all I’ve…sacrificed for them and they…they thought…” Fresh tears blinked in her gorgeous eyes. “How could they think that?”

“Bugger if I know, pet. Always figured the lot of them to be rather thick.”

Her eyes brightened with an unexpected flash of mirth but she didn’t laugh. Her anger was too strong to be killed by a quick line. “And then tonight…” Buffy shuddered, at last easing herself from his embrace. He missed her the second there was air between them, but he was sharp enough to know when she needed space. At least she wasn’t running; she was staying right here. She was still with him. “Willow…what she did…she keeps doing it. She keeps trying to fix everything. ‘Whoops! Buffy’s dead, let’s bring ‘er back.’ And then when that doesn’t work as she planned, it’s all, ‘Better make sure she can’t remember how happy she was before I fucked everything over.’”

The harshness of her tone, not to mention the unprovoked use of the f-word—something Spike had never before heard her say—nearly made him fall over.

“And I was happy,” Buffy repeated. “For a few…for a little while tonight, even with the wigginess of not knowing who I was or…or you or any of…it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered, because I didn’t have this thing on me. I could be a responsible sister. I could smile. I could even flirt with a vampire without it being a big thing.”

Spike managed a weak, hopeful smile. “Nothin’ stopping you now, love.”

“Do you have any idea how happy I’d be if it was that simple?”

“I can make it that simple.”

Buffy’s laugh rang without any humor. “Spike—”

“It kills me,” he said abruptly, his tattered heart foreseeing the gentle dismissal and ducking out before she had the chance. Not that he minded the gentle dismissal. It was a step above the pop in the nose to which he was so accustomed. “Watching you. No point in askin’ when a blind man can see it’s…there’s nothing a one of us can do. Your mates wanna pretend like they know what Heaven was like for you…that they can know what it feels like…bein’ where you were.”

“Do you?”

“I’m a vampire. Told you I know a thing or two about torment. About Hell, even if I’ve never been there.” Spike paused. “Live as long as I have, an’ it’s a stretch to find somethin’ you haven’t done, yeah? Well, I know how I feel about hell dimensions versus here. Figure the fall from Heaven to…not much of a stretch.”

Buffy grinned, fully this time, and the sight was so beautiful his knees about buckled. “So earth is your heaven, huh?”

“’Course it is. It’s where you are.” Spike glanced down and released a long, trembling sigh. “An’ it kills me to see…to see someone so…someone with your light as you…lookin’…so…an’ if it’d be…I don’ know what to do when I’m not touching you, Buffy. Especially now. Now that I’ve…” His hand migrated upward as though it operated in a separate sphere, his fingertips gently caressing her lower lip. “…kissed this mouth. Felt your heart beating against mine. Even if I…but if this is…if being near me is makin’ it hard on you…makin’ it…”

“Being around you isn’t making anything hard on me,” she replied.

His hand fell to his side again. “Could’ve fooled me.”

“Being me is hard on me. When I’m with you, everything seems clear…” The revelation should’ve made his heart jump. It didn’t. Even with the new light in her eyes, she couldn’t hide the cloud of confused despair. Spike might make everything clear, but she was out of her mind trying to piece together why. Why him and not someone else. Why the soulless vampire and not her soulful friends. Why not anyone but him?

“But you don’ want it to be me, right?” Spike said softly.

Buffy sighed, blinking tears out of her eyes. “I don’t know what I want anymore. I…” Her voice broke again, her attention drawn to the sudden openness of their surroundings. They were still under the stairs at the Bronze. The air was compiled with noisy chatter and the soft tones of the singer on stage. They were surrounded by people. And yet, while no one did anything more than cast uninterested glances in their direction, he could tell she felt on display. He did a bit, himself.

And without preamble, he felt something hard crash in his chest. This was it, then. She would run off, bid him goodnight, and the next time she saw him this monumental thing they’d shared might as well have never happened. The openness. The honesty. The communication. She’d be back to pretending he was dirt beneath her boot. Like his lips had offended her by daring to approach hers. Like he was anything but the friend he wanted to be. The companion.

The lover.

God, if she’d only let him, he would make sure she knew she was the most cherished woman on earth. She was so close but miles away. He could touch her without feeling her. Her kisses made him weak—her tears even weaker. And while he yearned to be near her always, the prospect that his continuous cameos were making things worse, making her feel even lonelier, was damn near crippling.

“Do you wanna get out of here?” Buffy asked suddenly. And her words were so startling he had to give himself several long seconds to process them.

“You…you wanna…with me?”

She nodded, shifting her weight from one foot to another in such a manner that a dumber man would assume she was nervous. “Yeah,” she replied. “I…I can’t go home. Willow’s there with the thousand apologies and I don’t…I can’t deal with that right now. I don’t wanna stay here and I…I don’t really want to be alone.” Buffy met his eyes timidly. “We could…patrol. Or…just, I dunno…walk? We could—”

“Sweetheart, is there a single scenario running through that head of yours which features me turning down spending time with you?”

“It might be Opposite Day.” She smiled weakly. “I—uhh. But…don’t, ummm…about the you and me and the kissage. It’s…I’m still kinda confused and…well, confused sums it up nicely. So…could you not—”

Spike held up a hand. “Anything you ask. I’m yours to command.”

“Good,” she said, then froze. “I mean about the…lack of pressure. Not the other thing.”

“Got it.”

Buffy licked her lips subconsciously, thankfully missing the hungry way his eyes followed that magical tongue of hers and the shadow of a pout to cross his face when it disappeared inside her mouth again. “You…wanna walk or patrol or—”

“Let’s grab some food.”

“Food?”

“Y’know…the stuff you eat?” Spike nodded at the door. “Know of some dives in this town that are surprisingly good without bein’…well, beneath you.”

His luck was going to run out. Whatever had possessed the Slayer was certain to come back and seize her personality, warping her back into her detached, melancholy self. The version which turned down any semblance of help he had to offer. Buffy would never—

“Lead the way.”

Spike tried hard to keep his jaw from hitting the floor.

Never say never.

“Right then,” he said, seizing her hand without thought. She didn’t pull away. “Come on, then.”

Then he turned and was dragging her through the crowd. She kept close, her fingers tightening around his whenever a thoughtless couple tried to separate them by crossing paths.

She held onto him like he was her anchor.

And for the night—for the rest of their lives—he was determined to be just that.

His fantasies couldn’t hope to touch reality. Spike saw that now. And while he’d known it since the moment he surrendered to his love for her, there was something about her acceptance which couldn’t be denied. Reality never played out the way one imagined it, and he was glad. Very glad. For no matter how many times he’d dreamt of getting Buffy in his bed, there was something about the soft quiet between them now which no amount of hot sweat and heavy grunts could ever replace.

Not that his mind wasn’t on overload entertaining very naughty images. God, he was only a man, and she was the woman he loved. The woman for whom he’d sacrificed everything. He only lamented he didn’t have more to give. But his own needs were on hold—unimportant. He’d made her a promise and he was damn well determined to keep it. This was about being a friend. A listener. Being anything she needed.

He wanted to do this right by her so badly.

Judging by where he was now, he must be doing something right. Buffy hadn’t fled and he hadn’t awakened alone in bed, his will collapsing at the crushing blow it had all been a dream. He was on his back, two pillows propped under his head, and Buffy was in his arms. Her sweet little cheek was pressed against his shoulder, her left leg draped over his right, her body molding into his as though she wanted to crawl up inside him. As though she hadn’t already.

For his part, Spike had an arm around her waist, and his other hand kept debating whether or not to cover hers where it rested on his chest. He was fairly certain she hadn’t meant to snuggle up to him in her sleep and, while he was far from unhappy about it, he worried about how she would react upon waking.

He didn’t think she would blame him; oh no, if anything, the night had eased his worries that the wrong word would remind her who—and with whom—she was. Buffy was incredibly alert—even accepting—of him, which gave him more hope than he was rightfully owed. He knew their relationship couldn’t progress as he wanted if he kept treating her like an active minefield. That didn’t mean they couldn’t meet somewhere in the middle. In order to keep from treating her like said minefield, she needed to stop acting like one.

Last night she had. And while Spike wasn’t naive enough to think the morning sun wouldn’t chase Accepting Buffy away, something told him the revelations they’d reached together would not be forgotten. Her eyes had been clearer last night than he’d seen since her return. She’d looked more like herself.

She’d laughed as he spun her around his crypt.

She’d been happy.

Now she was asleep. Buffy was asleep in his arms. She was wearing his t-shirt and nothing else, save the white cotton panties he’d admittedly spied as she’d crawled into his bed. And Christ, he was fortunate she’d already noticed his erection and decided to blush but otherwise ignore it. The damn thing had refused to abate when they moved their snogging session downstairs, long after her lips finally parted from his. He’d donned a pair of cotton sweats to serve as pajamas, and though he’d been slightly bewildered to discover he actually owned cotton sweats, he wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. He truly hadn’t been looking forward to sleeping in jeans. His typical nighttime attire was nothing at all, the much-too constricting confines of denim had seemingly been his only viable option until locating the mystery sweats.

Thin cotton was a horny man’s worst nightmare. His erection readily apparent to Buffy, she’d dragged her eyes from the tent in his pants to his abashed expression, turned a cute shade of pink, and wiggled under the covers.

Spike had slept, too, which surprised him. He’d settled into bed beside her—awash in her scent and positively buzzing on the high of her warmth—convinced that sleep would be impossible: not with Buffy in his bed, her taste in his mouth, her skin just inches from his eager fingers. He’d wagered he’d spend the night just watching her. Memorizing the way she looked and felt at his side. Under his sheets. Peaceful. Quiet. Those lips he’d kissed so thoroughly taunting him with their proximity. The heat of her burning him into a Spike-shaped hole in his own mattress. In his mind, sleep was far away. Unattainable. Not while Buffy was with him.

He was wrong. The second his head hit the pillow, he was out cold. Emotionally exhausted. Physically drained. More at peace than he’d felt in months. Instead of awkward and new, falling asleep with Buffy at his side had been breathtakingly natural. Like they did this always. As though every night of his existence had been nothing more than waiting for her to come home.

He was wide awake now, and Buffy was still with him. Her hand still rested on his bare chest. Her soft but lethal leg still draped over his. The molten heat of her center pressed against his hip. He felt everything. Felt the blood rushing beneath her skin, the echoes of her heartbeat, and the gentle wisps of her breath. She would occasionally murmur and shift, but she never made a move to leave his arms.

It was daylight now. He felt the sun rise as well as he felt the blanket of night. Judging by how drowsy he was, he wagered it was relatively early. He and Buffy had had a late night; from battling ol’ Sharky’s minions to the confrontation in the Bronze and everything that had happened afterward. The walk, the ice-cream, the bloody irritating discussions about her past loves and how sodding influential they’d been. But then, his temper when it came to Buffy and other men wasn’t exactly forgiving. He’d been harsh, rash, and while he stood by a lot of what he’d said, he knew a good bulk came from jealousy.

Buffy hadn’t minded his jealousy. She hadn’t turned away from him the second he stopped being sweet and kind. No, she’d sat there with him and they’d chatted it out. Like adults. Like two people working to be in a relationship together. She’d put everything on the table for him and trusted him to know what to do with it.

Trusted him not to break her.

And everything which followed. The crypt. The poem. Christ, her tears at the poem. Her incredulity that anyone would want to write anything for her. That she could inspire such feeling. Such sorrow. Such heartache. That he truly loved her as much as he promised he did, and his love for her hadn’t died when she jumped.

His love for her couldn’t die. It was the one thing he knew was everlasting. His love for her would survive him, her, the world—hell, the whole sodding universe.

Buffy knew it. She hadn’t run.

Instead, she’d danced with him.

Now all he wanted was to plan a day around her. Take her out, maybe to the local food mart to pick out some of the things she’d like him to keep at his crypt. Ironic as Big Bads Who Grocery Shop might be, it didn’t change what he wanted. He wanted the atmosphere he created to be as warm, open, and Buffy-friendly as possible. While he didn’t particularly entertain the notion that he would find himself playing the gracious host all that often, it was better to be prepared than to be taken off guard.

Spike was more than aware that it could all end when the blanket of night no longer covered them. Trying to peg Buffy’s mood was a dangerous game—one with which he was similarly through playing. After all, she’d gone from kissing his lips off outside the Bronze as her mates finished off a group sing-along to treating him like a leper. Time apart had given her mind a chance to poison itself against him. There was no reason to hope this morning wouldn’t have the same turnaround.

There was no reason, but there was hope.

Spike sighed, brushing hair out of her face with his free hand, his lips unable to keep from stealing a kiss off her brow. He loved her like this. He loved her always, of course, but he especially loved her like this. Cuddled against him, peaceful, at rest, and so trusting of him. So incredibly trusting. Just allowing him to hold her like this placed more trust in his arms than anything he could have imagined.

“Let me keep you,” he whispered into her hair.

Buffy murmured and shifted at that, but didn’t awaken. And God, the feel of her moving against his body, so innocent in her intent, so completely weightless in her rest, unwound him from the core.

That was until she whispered something unintelligible and stirred again, this time the hand at his chest slid unceremoniously down his abdomen and rested over his cotton-clad penis.

Because the Powers had a bloody rotten sense of humor. A curse rolled off his lips. “Bugger.”

It took all the willpower in this sodding universe and the next to motivate his hand to take her by the wrist. To lift her soft, blissfully warm touch off his rapidly-swelling cock. Just as it took all the willpower in this universe and the next to keep from thrusting up until he was cradled in the tender heat of her palm.

He didn’t. He was good. He was so good. Molesting Buffy in her sleep, or sanctioning her unconscious molestation of him, was definitely on the blacker side of the grey area around them.

That was all well and good for his head. His cock, however, had been touched—unintentionally but touched nonetheless—by the woman it craved beyond craving. By the woman he loved. His cock didn’t care that she’d been asleep and blissfully unaware of the fire she’d provoked.

His cock was joined by his brain, which immediately turned traitor and began assaulting him with lavish images, tainted now with the intimate knowledge of her taste. He still had her in his mouth, and with as close as she was—the scent of her filling his nostrils and the warmth of her small, perfect body consuming him entirely—it was impossible to keep his thoughts chaste.

His erection wasn’t going anywhere. It never did around Buffy. And now that he was awake and had her in his arms, he found himself in a rather hopeless place.

The last thing he wanted to do was start the day off on the wrong foot—especially if he could help it. He was not going to be responsible if all went to the bloody dogs. Thus with a long sigh, he carefully extracted himself from Buffy’s arms, ignoring the wail of every natural instinct in his aching body. The nerves which screamed at him for daring to put space between himself and perfection.

Nevertheless, Spike gasped with relief when whispers of air separated his skin from hers. The fog clouding his conscience dissipated and he was suddenly able to think clearly. He swung his legs over the edge of the bed and fortified his will with a long, hard sigh. Then he cast an accusatory glare to his cock, which strained unrepentantly against his cotton sweats.

“You ruin this for me…” he said sharply, his shoulders rolling back with a long groan. “Lady told us, din’t she? Hands off. Give her what she needs.”

The tented fabric stared at him. Every inch of his body strained with want.

“Right,” Spike continued, exhaling deeply. “No matter. She saw it last night, yeah? Din’t make her run. I’ll take care of it. I’ll…”

The mattress dipped and whined under the pressure of sudden movement. Buffy was awake.

Of course she was awake. He was speaking rather loudly.

“Spike?” came her voice, rough with sleep but lacking condemnation. The sound lightened his heart. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, pet. Not a blessed thing.” He tossed a cautious glance over his shoulder, forbidding himself to meet her eyes as though such intimate contact would serve as the catalyst to his control’s demise. “Go back to sleep.”

Spike didn’t really expect her to listen to him. It would’ve been a first, after all. Tell Buffy to do something and she almost always did the opposite.

This was no different. She threw her arms over her head and yawned, and though he wasn’t looking at her, the visual his mind provided of her luscious body stretching on his bed didn’t do much to ease his erection. “What time is it?” she asked.

“Early. No need to get up jus’ yet.”

“I’m awake,” she replied, her voice slightly apologetic. “Symptomatic of being a single-big-sis-parent. You get used to getting woken up and staying up.” She paused. “What are your plans for the day?”

Spike perked a brow. “Not exactly one for makin’ plans. I’m more of a ‘go with the flow’ sorta bloke.”

“I guess that’s true. Kinda funny picturing you making a to-do list.” The air burst with a sweet, musical giggle. “And now I’m picturing it.”

He chuckled and ran a nervous hand through his hair. “Yeah. What’s it got? Things like ‘get blood,’ ‘pick up smokes,’ ‘do something evil’?”

“Pretty much. It’s all cute…your little list of evilness.”

“Don’ rightly think anyone’s ever called me cute before.”

“I didn’t call you cute. Just this imaginary list I’ve made up.” Buffy sat up completely, raising herself up on her knees and inching toward him. “Are you going somewhere?”

Spike shot another futile glare to his cock; it did little more than twitch in reaction. Then her hand was on his naked shoulder and it was all he could do to keep his moan from escaping. “No,” he replied shortly. “No. Jus’…ahhh, Buffy, you better not—”

But it was too late. She’d made the discovery. He sensed the moment she realized it. Realized from what he was trying to protect her. Her breath drew up sharply and the hand on his shoulder went rigid. “Ohhh…” she said, her voice naught but a breathy little sigh.

“Buffy, I didn’t—”

“No. No, it’s okay.”

Any other time, he would have laughed himself silly at the notion of anyone giving him permission to sport a stiffy. But this wasn’t any other time, and Buffy most certainly wasn’t just anyone. She was his sodding everything and she was touching him. Her bare hand was on his shoulder, her skin imprinted with the scent of his own from both the tee she wore and the sheets in which she’d slept. Her delectable little quim was just inches away, nothing but a sliver of thin fabric separating her body’s deepest secrets from his desperately curious fingers. From the tongue which yearned to lick her up.

“I’m not good to be around,” Spike warned her. It was the courteous thing to do. “Not…not when you…”

“It’s okay,” she whispered again. And then he felt the soft touch of her heavenly lips whispering against his throat, her nails ever-so-gently etching a path down his back and around his side. In seconds, her hand was pressed to his belly, and it was making a fast-track southward.

Spike swallowed hard, sirens in his head ignited in a brilliant blaze. “Buffy? What…what are…”

She wasn’t coy. She didn’t tease. Her fingers encountered the waistband of his sweatpants and slipped beneath them without ceremony. And then she was touching him, her hot hand wrapping around his length with a cautious tenderness which set his body aflame. She was suddenly everywhere—oh God—her breasts pressed against his back, her legs splayed on either side of his. She had his cock in his hand and was exploring him slowly, gently, stroking the hard length of him with such sweet innocence he wondered for a minute if she was truly aware of what she was doing.

“Oh…God…”

“Is this what you need?” she whispered. He wondered maniacally if it was a trick question; as it was, his lungs had forgotten they didn’t actually serve a purpose and were ingesting oxygen so fast it was a miracle he didn’t choke. “I’ll give you what you need.”

It was the sort of thing every bloke lived to hear, and his Id roared in victory. But there was another voice—a louder one. The one which had conquered the devil last night—the one he was determined to keep in control. The voice of the man rather than the monster. The man who loved her.

“Not…Buffy…what you need…oh, such a hot…little hand…” He hissed and threw his head back as her fingertips skimmed the underside of his erection, her other hand coming into play. She had her arms completely around him now, and both hands were in his pants. Both hands were playing with him intimately, knowing him as he’d always dreamed she’d know him. One hand occupied itself with his cock, the other dropping to explore his testicles, and without warning, his body went on sensation overload.

Then she started peppering his neck with kisses again and the world about came apart.

“This is what I need.”

“Buffy…”

“I need it. I need you.” Her left arm wiggled free and suddenly his balls were without a companion. That was, until, she rose up on her knees and resituated herself so that she was curled around his front. Suddenly, she drew the swollen head of his erection between her lips and sucked hard.

“BUFFY!” He went on autopilot. His Cognitive thought bid him adieu. His hands wove through her hair, drawing it back out of her face as his hips subconsciously thrust upward, demanding more. More of her. More of her mouth. More of the wet haven to which she’d introduced him. She was so hot—Christ, she was going to burn him up. He was going to dust here with Buffy’s mouth around his prick. He was going to dust.

And hell, he didn’t care.

“So hot. So hot,” he gasped, arching up. Her mouth was rich, molten perfection, and if he burned up now, it’d be well worth it. Just to have her mouth around him—her tongue swirling, massaging him as she drew him in deeper, God deeper, until he brushed the soft back of her throat. “Buffy—oh God, yes. Jus’ like that…ahhh…”

She murmured, and the vibrations of her mouth sent electric shivers through his body.

Then she contracted her throat muscles around him and sucked hard when he hissed and bucked, his grip on her hair tightening as a long, tortured moan ripped through his lips.

“Buffy! Oh Buffy. So good. So bloody good. Love this. Love you. Love your mouth. Buffy…”

She released him with a wet plop, rubbing her cheek along his length before taking him into her hand again. “Wow,” she said. “Either I’m really good or you’ve just not had any in a long time.”

Spike laughed, gently coaxing her head upward so he could see her eyes. His body protested but he ignored it; their first time together, he wasn’t going to come in her mouth. “You’re amazing,” he whispered truthfully, kissing her lips. “So amazing.”

“Nuh uh,” she replied, flushing.

His lips, not content with only a sample of hers, wandered reverently across her cheek and peppered her brow. Buffy drew up, her eyes heavy with intent. She began inching backward where they’d lain before. And Spike followed, hopeless to do anything else. Every time her lips slipped from reach, he reclaimed them with fervor.

It occurred to him out of nowhere that this wasn’t a dream. The flesh beneath his was truly Buffy’s flesh. The mouth he kissed was truly Buffy’s mouth. The hand stroking his cock was truly Buffy’s hand. He had her in his bed and she was devouring him—starved, ravenous, and painstakingly open. Her mouth. Her hands. Her precious body. The heat of her burned his nostrils and drained his throat, and she was the only fount which could quench him.

He sighed. The air buzzed with tantalizing hints of her flavor. She was positively drenched. If his hand wandered between her legs, he would feel just how wet she was. How much she wanted him. And God, she made it so bloody hard to remember to be good. Was he still supposed to be good? She hadn’t announced a change in the rules and open invitation as sucking his cock might be, Spike had gotten this far by letting her define the relationship to this point. Even now with Buffy under him, welcoming him to lie between her legs, with his lips exploring her face as she stroked his erection, he was at an irrevocable standstill. He wasn’t about to bugger it up, no matter how warm and welcoming her body was or how blatant her signals were.

She might have touched him intimately, but she hadn’t asked him to touch her in kind.

“Buffy?” Spike murmured, dragging his lips from her skin. “What are we doing?”

“I’m seducing you.”

A nervous chuckle tickled the air. “No bloody seduction needed,” he gasped, his eyes rolling back as her mouth took chart down his throat. “I’m—ohhh. I’m yours…whenever you want…”

“I want you,” she whispered, her tongue lapping his skin. “I want you now. I want you right now.”

The words were a fantasy come to life. The roar of the devil at last dominated the cautious poet within, bursting through the glass in which he’d been contained all night. And yet, Spike managed to throw a lasso around the beast’s neck at the last second. He had to be careful. Had to make sure she was sure. He had to, but bugger if he remembered why. All he wanted to do was have his wicked way with her. And for the way she smelled, the little sounds she made, the way her body moved beneath his…she wanted it, as well. She wanted it and she wouldn’t say no.

Not now. But after…

The devil halted. The poet raced forward. “I thought,” he continued, even as his will withered into nothing. “I…I thought you…you said you weren’t…weren’t ready.”

“I know what I told you, but that was last night and I’m ready now.”

There had never been sweeter words. “You are?”

Buffy’s lips curved upwards against his throat. “I have my hand around your…thing—”

Spike laughed, grateful for the reprieve. “If you’re gonna stroke it, you should be able to address it properly, love.”

“Hey! Easy for you to say.” An adorable pout fell across her face as her wandering mouth began nibbling on his chin. “How do you even…address a…your thing?”

His hands began a slow slide down her arms. “I rather liked the way you addressed it a minute ago,” he said with a smirk.

“You would.”

“Well, yeah. Guy here.”

Buffy rolled her eyes. “Men are all alike.”

“Oi!” That comment definitely deserved a ravenous kiss as punishment. In fact, Spike mused as he greedily sucked on her heavenly tongue, he should enforce this sort of punishment more often where she was concerned. “What changed?” he asked, releasing her breathlessly. “Why now?”

To his amazement, she burst into a fiery red. “I…I needed to be sure.”

His hands were becoming increasingly boisterous, now at her thighs, one slipping dangerously close to the hem of the tee. “Needed to be sure of what, pet?”

“That you would…that you weren’t confusing love feelings for lust feelings.” She blinked rapidly when his eyes narrowed and hardened into a glare. “I know,” she said. “I know. I have no reason to doubt—”

“I should think not,” Spike replied, his voice clipped.

“But I needed…it was for me, okay? I knew it but I needed to…I dunno, really know it?”

“If I just wanted into your knickers, I would’ve—”

“Last night. Or after the musical demon. Or any of the times I’ve been alone with you and all vulnerable-girl. I know.” She worried her delicious lower lip between her teeth, and what little rush of irritation had seized his spine relinquished its hold almost immediately. “I just needed it. I can’t explain why. Like a last little test for the hardened cynic within? Every time I think of you…or thought of you…and the way you look at me, I know it’s…I know you love me, Spike. But my inner Giles keeps trying to talk me out of it by saying vampires are driven by their earthly pleasures or whatever, and if I just…if I proved to myself that you’d…the cynic’s gone. Completely gone. You did nothing to make me think you don’t love me.” She blinked again, and for a horrible moment he thought she might cry. The last thing he wanted was tears. “I’m sorry.”

His anger receded, and his hands resumed their efforts in getting her bare skin beneath his once more. “It’s all right, kitten,” he whispered, brushing his lips across her chin. “I understand.”

And the thing was, he did. He truly did.

Love’s a funny thing.

“I’ve known it since you let yourself become Glory’s punching bag,” she said quickly, her voice dissolving into what he easily identified as the Buffy Babble. She was apparently determined to make up for her blunder, however slight the offense was. “That night on the stairs…both nights…when I went up and came down…and then in your crypt, I knew it. I’ve known it forever, I just—”

“Shhh. It’s all right.”

“I’m lousy.”

“You’re gorgeous,” Spike countered, at last finding it safe to fist the material of the tee she wore with intent which couldn’t be mistaken. And yet, he had to allow her this. One last out. After they did this, after this step was taken, there would be no going back. None. He wouldn’t let her shove him away after last night, after this morning; not after the emotional highs they’d reached, and not after making love.

“Buffy,” he said softly, his fingertips gently caressing the soft skin where her thighs joined her hips. “You know this is gonna change everything, right?”

She trembled and nodded, but there was no fear in her eyes. “Everything’s already changed.”

His breath caught in his throat. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” A pause, and then the world spun off its axis. “I love you.”

Spike froze, locked, elated and terrified in the same instant. His eyes flooded with tears and for an erratic second, he could’ve sworn his heart was thundering. The air both chilled and burned. There was nothing but her in that moment. Nothing but Buffy. The pillow under her head dissolved. The bed, the crypt, the cemetery—the whole bloody world amounted to nothing. He saw nothing but her. Knew nothing but her. And the words—God, the words—over and over again. Repeated. Needed.

“You…”

“I love you,” Buffy whispered again, and he realized with a start it was her eyes that were watering, not his. His were too wide, too astounded. She was going to cry, and she loved him. “I do, Spike. I really do.”

“Oh God.”

A beat, and then she arched a brow. “Is that all I get?”

The moment unfroze, and he growled, lunging for her mouth. He kissed her ruthlessly, wildly, both drowning in the taste and starving for more. His hands slipped entirely under the shirt, feeling her without seeing her. Oh God, the soft skin of her belly, hardened with muscle but still tender, the gentle rise and fall as she took every breath. She breathed, and he loved feeling her as she breathed. She was so soft and his hands couldn’t stop. They inched up. And up—up until his fingertips brushed the underside of her breasts, and nearly collapsing at the way she shivered at his touch.

“All you get, she says,” he retorted roughly. “I love you, you daft chit.”

Buffy laughed. “So poetic.”

“Not really known for my poetry.”

“Which is stupid. Did anyone ever read it? I mean really.” She grinned and raised a hand to his face. “Do you have more?”

His breath caught needlessly. “You don’t want to see it.”

“I don’t?” she replied with a frown, her brows bunching together adorably. “What? Was that supposed to be some vampire version of the Jedi Mind Trick?”

“I just got you. Don’t wanna scare you off.”

“You remember I’m the Slayer, right? I think it’ll take more than a few words to scare me.”

Spike chuckled appreciatively and drew away. Much as he loathed spending a single second not touching her, he didn’t fancy their first time together featuring him with his sweats around his ankles. He was going to do this right by her if it killed him. “Wouldn’t be sayin’ that if I were you, pet,” he replied, holding up a hand and winking when her face fell and she reached for him. “Ah, ah. Patience is a virtue.”

“So says you!”

“Well, if I’m not mistaken, the invite said this was a strictly naked party.” He arched a brow and slipped to his feet, feeling slightly ridiculous with his pants around his hips and his cock bobbing out, though not at all embarrassed. Not even when her frown turned into a giggle. Fuck, the sound of her laughter was an aphrodisiac all in itself. He was determined then and there to make her laugh as much and as often as possible, even if it meant forsaking his pride. “You got to work, but you din’t finish the job.”

Buffy’s eyes narrowed.

“I mean the…clothing removal,” Spike said hastily. “Not the other…job. But now that I think of it, if you ever want—”

“You’re a goof.”

“Oi!”

“You’re a goof and you’re the one who stopped me from finishing either job.”

Spike feigned a sigh, kicking the offending material down his legs. He didn’t miss the way her eyes widened as they took him in for the first time, or the way they lingered on his erection. For a girl who had explored that particular part of his anatomy with her mouth, she certainly did seem surprised…though at what he couldn’t say. “Is it my fault,” he continued, his voice drawing her eyes back to his. “That your mouth is so bloody kissable?”

“So you’d prefer my mouth on your mouth rather than…” She glanced down again, blushing but not looking away. Then, brightening, she straightened as though solving a riddle. “Hey…you’re not circumcised.”

Spike stared at her blankly before dissolving into a rich laugh. “Jus’ now figure that out, have you?”

“Well, forgive a girl for being a little dazed. First there’s the whole ‘having been dead’ thing, followed by the ‘haven’t had sex in a bajillion years’—” She met his eyes again, shrugging, “—though I’m figuring in the time I was in the other dimension in that calculation.”

“More than fine with me.”

“Plus there’s the whole thing where you’re all…big and stuff.” She blushed again and looked away, and Spike reacted as any man whose equipment had just been appraised and complimented.

He leered.

“I’ll fill you up in all the right places,” he promised, taking himself in his left hand. Babbling Buffy was such a turn on, and he hadn’t been prepared for Babbling Buffy to join forces with Overly-Analytical Buffy. The combination was lethal.

Whatever she’d been prepared to say died on her lips, her large eyes following the strokes of his hand as he pumped his length. The scent of her arousal thickened, which only made him harder. She was turned on by watching him wank. There’d never been a more perfect woman.

“Well…I…uhhh…”

The poet whispered that the gentlemanly thing to do was to stop and let her collect her thoughts. The devil countered that the poet was a right git who’d never gotten near enough a woman to know what was and wasn’t gentlemanly, and if Buffy was drooling at watching him touch himself, it’d be a sin to stop.

“…not…thoughts…have…kinda gone away.”

Spike smirked. She was too bloody adorable for words. “See something you want?”

She nodded numbly. Then she met his eyes again and offered a shy smile. “So, are you gonna make with the lovin’ or stand there and tease me all morning?”

“Me? Tease you?” he replied, releasing his cock as his knees edged up on the mattress again, worming their way between her open legs until he was perched between them. “I think this is the part where I use some overworked cliché to make a point.”

Buffy grinned and made to toss the tee off once and for all. The grin faded when he seized her wrist, stopping her. “What?”

“Our first time, sweetheart. I get to do all the touching.” He batted her hands away, capturing the black cotton in his fist. “Waited too bloody long. Wanted to undress you like this. Jus’ like this.”

“You have fantasies starring me and your t-shirt?”

His eyes narrowed. “’Course I do. I have fantasies starring you an’ tubs full of baked beans. I have fantasies starring you an’ every sodding combination of everything you can possibly imagine. More over, there’s not a bloke living or dead who doesn’t get hard at the idea of the woman he loves wearing his clothing.” The fabric inched slowly up her abdomen, revealing bits of flesh to his hungry eyes. The dip of her stomach. Her cute little belly button. Up, up, and then her breasts were bare. Small, soft, firm…his mouth watered, his eyes caught, ensnared. He was going to suck them tender before the day was out. Ripe little nipples like hers should always have a mouth around them—as long as the mouth in question was his.

The t-shirt was gone in seconds, and they were both panting. He’d never before gotten so hot in the simple act of removing clothing. Buffy was a war-zone full of firsts, and every explosion was more delicious than the last.

And she was lying before him, wearing only those white cotton panties he’d admired the night before. Her breasts heaved. Locks of golden hair tumbled over her shoulder. The look in her eyes embodied the spirit of a woman both lost and found. Scared witless but so entirely trusting of him at the same time. She had no idea how beautiful she was. How just looking at her could take up a whole afternoon. He hadn’t even touched her intimately yet—this was foreplay to foreplay, and he loved it.

“Baked beans?” she whispered, apparently desperate for words. “You have fantasies about me in baked beans?”

“What?” Spike retorted, unable to drag his eyes away from her breasts. His hands were no longer content to just sit. He skimmed the length of her stomach until he had one cradled against each palm, and he and Buffy both shivered on contact. “I s’pose some ninny told you baked beans were for eatin’, is that it?”

“Th-they’re not?”

He shook his head, his body falling forward. Reeled in. Captured. Caught. He brushed a tender kiss across one of her nipples and trembled when she trembled, moaned when she moaned, then turned to