FIC: Perfect Vengeance - Chapter Five
May. 10th, 2005 10:02 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shipperxAuthor's Note: Sorry about taking so long with this chapter. Life's been a bit out of sync in the last few weeks. But Dad's been out of the hospital for about a week now and doing just great, so I can now return to my frivolous fandom activities.
The Kink: Time travel, specifically S6 Spike and Buffy in 1880s London.
Three other requests: Spike has "replaced" William, but only he and Buffy know; Buffy acknowledges real feelings for Spike (happily or reluctantly; it's your call); and Cecily eats her heart out when she realizes what she could have had.
Previous Chapters Archived Here
Rating: Currently PG
After Spike left the house, Buffy took Spike’s suggestion and raided Halfrek’s wardrobe. Of course, she first searched for jewelry, anything that might have a vengeance hex attached to it. She dangled. She jiggled. No demonic genie appeared from any of it, so she began smashing it.
The fashionista in Buffy felt guilty for destroying exquisite gold necklaces and brooches, but, given her experience with Anyanka, Buffy knew that smashed jewelry held the possibility of breaking the vengeance curse and sending her home.
Gorbach entered Halfrek’s bedroom and flushed blue-violet. “What are you doing?!” In a penguin-like waddle-hop-shift from foot to foot, he spun in a circle, looking at the battered jewelry. “What? What? What?” He suddenly looked up and glared. “You’re insane.”
“Mad, maybe. Insane? Nope.” She flung open the doors of the wardrobe and pawed through Halfrek’s clothes -- which, unsurprisingly, contained every imaginable tint and shade of purple.
“Vandal! Thief!” He spat the worst insult of all, “Human!”
Buffy selected an amazingly soft velvet dress that had a lustrous sheen. It also had jet beading along the organza trimmed cuffs.
“No, no, no.” Gorbach pulled the dress from her hands. “Not the aubergine. That’s Cecily’s favorite.”
Of course it was. And, of course, Buffy took it. Halfrek wasn’t much taller than she was, so it would fit relatively well even if it would probably be a bit too large in the bust.
Buffy changed clothes but an hour later Spike still hadn’t returned. Growing tired, and for reasons she didn’t quite understand, Buffy decided against sleeping in Halfrek’s bed. She gravitated to the cramped maid’s quarters she had lived in for the past week. After removing the dress -- she didn’t want to ruin the silk-velvet – she laid down.
When the first blush of dawn lightened the sky outside Buffy’s bedroom window, she took a deep breath and stretched. Arching her back, she released a sigh, and rolled onto her side to see Spike, standing in the doorway across the room.
“How long have you been there?” she asked as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes.
“Awhile.” He gave a rueful half-smile. “You would say ‘too long.’ ” He stepped into the tiny attic-room just as Buffy brushed back her hair.
There was a chill in the air, and her nipples puckered beneath her lace chemise. She thought about crossing her arms to cover herself, but that would draw attention to her predicament and make Spike aware that she had noticed that ‘he’ had noticed. In their constant game of dare and denial, Buffy equated reacting with a loss, so she did nothing. She wasn’t willing to give that much.
“I’m in my underwear,” she blurted, and inwardly cringed at stating the obvious.
His gaze traveled over the orchid-colored corset that she had taken from Halfrek’s wardrobe. “You wear less at The Bronze.”
“It’s different when I know it’s underwear.”
Spike tilted his head slightly to the left and smirked. “ ‘S quite fetching.”
“Yeah well, I didn’t choose it for you.” She flushed and wondered if saying those words meant that she had done exactly that.
He crossed the room to squat in front of the small cast-iron fireplace and added coals to the embers.
Lying on her side, with her pillow and one hand tucked beneath her cheek, Buffy asked, “How is your mother?” The question seemed strange and foreign when associated with Spike.
He didn’t look up but stared at the glowing coals. “Sleeping… unlike the two of us.”
Buffy realized that Spike looked tired and distracted. If he had been anyone but Spike, she would have said that he was brooding. But he was Spike so that was impossible.
Still, even though there were worry lines across his brow, the errant, sandy-colored curls falling into his eyes caused Spike to appear boyish and lost. She almost smiled at the contrast between the picture he presented and the stories he had once told of his human self.
She couldn't help goading him. “You were always bad, huh?”
He slanted her ‘a look’ but conceded, “A slight exaggeration.”
“Uh-huh.”
Spike sat on the floor, propping his feet against the firescreen and resting his left arm on the bed. His loose-limbed pose made him look even more boyish as he warned, “Don’t let appearances fool you.”
“Never.”
His gaze drifted back to the embers of the fire. He seemed lost in thought and unaware that he traced the curve of the arch of her foot with the back of his index finger. She shivered as the pad of his thumb followed the same path.
If Spike had known what he was doing, she would have pulled away. But, because he didn’t, she sighed as his palm slid over her ankle and closed her eyes when his fingers pressed gently into the back of her calf.
“There are all kinds of bad,” he mused.
“What kind of bad were you?” She imagined his hand wandering upward, beneath her petticoat and behind her knee, sliding from the outside of her thigh to the inside, his long fingers moving softly over her skin, drifting in slow circles. Buffy’s breathing hitched, and she longed for his hand to move higher… between her legs… further still...
Her hips shifted and she tingled with want, with need.
Spike’s hand stopped moving.
Buffy opened her eyes and their gazes met… and held. She opened her mouth to say something—some confession or request-- but no words came out.
She looked away.
“The buggering foolish kind,” Spike muttered as he stood. “And I never got over it.” He playfully smacked her on her bottom. “Dress. Had an idea on the way over.”
Buffy rolled off the bed. “You? Ideas? Aren’t these things unmixy?”
“Plenty mixy.” He smirked wickedly. “Just trouble.”
Only not so much she discovered, when they left the Addams’ townhouse to cross Green Park.
The morning air was crisp and cool. The sky was clear and sunlight glistened on patches of frost. It was an almost painfully lovely day, with the wide, nearly flat expanse of grass, flushed bright chartreuse and intermittently dotted with buttery-yellow daffodils and creamy-white narcissus. If there were picture post-cards of spring, they would look a lot like this, and Spike was walking through it... which was weird and disorienting... and kind of pleasurable.
“ ’S a bit early to be fashionable,” he told her.
Buffy wished she still had hair she could flip over her shoulder. “You know I’m all about the fashion.”
“That what you call the things you wear?”
She slanted him a ‘look.’ “Hrmphf.”
“Ah, there’s the Slayer pout I remember.”
Buffy refused to rise to the bait. “Where are we going?”
“Cadogen Square.”
“Which means nothing to me. So, again I ask, where are we going?” She smoothed her velvet skirt, enjoying the tactile sensation so very different from the coarse, woolen maid’s uniform she’d worn this last week.
Spike sounded unhappy. “To find the stodgy lodgings of stodgy old men.”
“Sounds fun, only not.” Buffy adjusted her hat, and had to giggle that she was wearing ‘a jaunty hat.’ Plus… it had feathers.
Spike rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah, well, no one ever called the Council of Wankers ‘fun.’ Or if they did, they were probably wankers themselves.”
When they exited the park, Buffy noticed that the morning had grown late enough that people were now on the street. Not many, but there was a horse-drawn cart carrying coal, a footman with a small dog on a leather leash, and a maid with a white mop cap and wool shawl. The city was waking up and beginning its day.
Buffy adjusted her jacket. “So, we find the Dickens-era Giles. A little presto-chango-mojo, and we’re back to the twenty-first century.”
“Cold comfort,” Spike muttered.
She stopped walking. “What?”
He sucked in his checks and held his tongue as he glanced up the street at the footman with the dog. “Nothin’.”
=Uh-Uh. Not ‘nothing’.= Something was up with Spike, but she had no idea what it was. She didn’t often spend time figuring out Spike. Actually, she spent no time figuring out Spike. Usually whatever Spike felt was visible on his face, and whatever Spike thought came out of his mouth in most blunt way possible. Buffy wasn’t used to Spike keeping his thoughts to himself.
“Why are you so peeved?” she asked.
“Not peeved..“
“You sound peeved.”
Spike stopped walking. When she turned to look at him, he confronted her. “Doesn’t really matter what I sound like, now does it?”
What did he expect her to say? Was she supposed to stop worrying about the mess they were in and wonder what made Spike tick? The likelihood of her understanding Spike was nil. Most of the time, she couldn’t understand herself.
Buffy crossed her arms impatiently. “No, it doesn’t matter.”
“Fine then.”
“Fine!” Seeing Spike moving ahead her, Buffy rushed to catch up with him. “You know, if someone has the right to be pissy here, it’s me. You cursed me, remember.”
“So it appears.”
She wished he hadn’t agreed so quickly. It was easier to fight when he was being hateful. Buffy demanded, “What did you curse me with, anyway? Dishpan hands?”
“I would have thought you’d guess chamber pots.”
She gasped. “Did you?!”
“What? Curse you with chamber pots? Wasn’t exactly the first thing on my mind, no.”
“So what was it?”
Spike ignored her and moved down the sidewalk.
Buffy grabbed his arm and swung him around. “What did you do this time?”
The muscle in his jaw twitched when she said “this time.”
Spike’s gaze hardened. “You know, a bloke might—if he was feeling a bit put out and particularly vengeful for being burned out of house and home—“
“Because he totally deserved it.”
“Because his motives had been misjudged.”
“Because he could have gotten us eaten in our beds by baby Sue-whatever demons.”
“Which he had no idea were dangerous.”
Buffy snorted. “Oh, right. How silly. Who would expect you to know... Doctor?”
Spike flushed --a gift of his newly re-human status-- and looked exasperated. No, actually, he looked outraged. “Because he was not the Doctor!”
“Huh?”
Spike ran his hand over his forehead and hair and began rubbing his neck as he shook his head. He walked in a circle around her. “Because he was stupid enough to do a stupid thing, for a few quick quid to give a girl who needed money.”
Something inside Buffy lurched, but she ignored it. “You expect me to believe that?”
Spike glanced at her but, seeing her unmoved, sniffed and raised his chin as he straightened his shoulders. “’Course not,” he dismissed. “I expect you to punch me ‘cause it’s a truth you don’t want to hear.”
=Bastard.= “You’re going to deny being The Doctor?” Angry and defensive, she glared at him “It’s a little late for that, considering you admitted it before.”
“What? I never did.”
“Yuh-huh,” Buffy protested weakly. She could have sworn that she remembered him confessing. “You did.”
“Never.” Spike looked at her with disbelief. “Come on, Buffy. Think! How exactly was I supposed to be an international black market dealer when—“ He began counting off points with his fingers. “One, I don’t own a phone. Two, I never leave the country. Three, I am the pariah of Sunnyhell’s demon community because I’m always helpin’ you kill ‘em off. Four, I’m more broke than you are. For God’s sake,” he spat out, “I couldn’t pay off a kitten debt.”
Buffy squirmed a little. Spike was convincing. What he said was true, and even when evil, he wasn’t a good liar. “You weren’t The Doctor.” She said it aloud, testing the words, but she wasn’t ready to stop sounding doubtful.
Spike watched her intently, looking… earnest. “I’d never take on the name of the creature who killed you.”
She believed him.
He told her, “I’d never heard of The Doctor. I boarded those eggs ‘cause a bloke said it’d be a way quick way to make money.”
“Those eggs were dangerous,” she insisted. “Dangerous people asked you to keep dangerous eggs -- eggs that would kill people. Did you even care?”
“Evil, remember? And rather myopic in the ways of love.” He looked at her with pained blue eyes. “I only saw you.”
Buffy swallowed and told herself to breathe. “Gee, thanks. I’m flattered. Except not.”
Spike moved his head in a motion somewhere between a nod and a shake. “ I know I was stupid. I was on the cusp of causing a catastrophe. I… just wanted you to know.”
“That it was for me.”
“And Dawn.”
Buffy didn’t know what she felt. She didn’t know what she was supposed to feel. Amorphous emotions swirled inside her, confusing her as she pushed them away. “What to give to the girl who has nothing-- dozens of endangered monsters who kill.”
Silence stretched between them. =Oh god,= she thought, =what if I have to think of a way to carry the conversation?= She didn’t know… a lot of things. But in this instance, she specifically didn’t know what to say to him.
“Don’t know about that,” he said gruffly.
“Huh?”
“The critters.”
Buffy’s brows drew together sharply.
“Look, “ he said. “Exactly how rare and endangered can a species be when they reproduce like bunnies?”
=Good question.= “Are you saying that Riley lied?”
Spike shrugged. “Maybe. Don’t know. Maybe he was wrong, or maybe I had critters that would have devoured us all in our beds. I don’t know.” His gaze locked with hers, and he was so full of intensity that she couldn’t look away. “The point I’m making is-- I don’t know. The Doctor would. Blame me for being a hundred kinds of buggering fool. Hate me for being sodding evil if you like. But don’t suspect me of betrayin’ you.”
He hadn’t. He wouldn’t. Except. . .
She asked, “What kind of curse did you wish on me?”
“Oh, that.” He stepped to the side, allowing a young woman in a plain gray dress and straw bonnet to pass them. When the stranger was out of earshot, Spike said in a low voice, “A bloke might --if he was feeling somewhat peeved and perhaps blind drunk and not being as attentive as he should be-- might say to an old acquaintance… ”
“Just spit it out.”
“He might say he wished a girl to be treated like crap for a while and for him to see it.”
Buffy’s brows rose. She wondered if they could reach her hairline. “You’re just full of warm, fuzzy prezzies today, aren’t you? Thanks. Not like my life didn’t suck enough to begin with.”
“I didn’t mean it.” He kept pace with her when she began walking again.
“Yeah, you did.”
He sucked in his cheeks, then blew out a small breath. “Okay, maybe. A little. But--sonofabitch!” Spike looked at a cleared construction site on the corner of the square.
Buffy got a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She laughed, then cringed when she realized that the laugh sounded frightened. “From a reaction like that, I’d almost think this was where the Council was supposed to be.”
Spike gave no surly response to calm her nerves.
Her shoulders drooped. “It is where you thought the Council should be.”
“It‘s where the council is. Now.” He frowned. “In the future. “
Buffy didn’t like the aching wave rising inside her. “So where is it now now? In the past.”
“Don’t panic.”
“I’m not panicked. Do I look panicked?“ She glared at him. “Where is it?”
“How the bloody hell should I know?”
“You’re the ‘bloody’ British vampire!” Noticing that a footman, at the house across the street, stood on the front stoop staring at them, Buffy lowered her voice and whispered, “Aren’t you the one who spent a century hunting Slayers?”
“Slayer hunter, not Slayer historian. Didn’t discover there was a Council for another eight years.”
Now Buffy panicked. “But the Watchers have to be here. There’s a building going up. The Council’s got to be building it. We just have to ask around.”
“ ‘cause secret societies are easily located by networking,” Spike snarked.
Buffy frowned. “Watchers aren’t secret.”
“To you. For most of the world, real vampires, Slayers, and the blokes who keep track of them aren’t common knowledge.”
“So what do you suggest we do?”
Spike shoved his hands into his pockets and shrugged. “Dunno.”
Buffy started across the street. “Unless you’ve got a better idea, we ask.”
“What? Are you serious?” Spike pretended to stop an imaginary passerby. “Hello, sir. Are you a Watcher? Could you perhaps assist us in locating a missing vengeance demon so that she can return a misplaced Slayer and an erstwhile vampire to the beginning of the twenty-first century?”
“Ignoring you,” Buffy called out. “See me ignoring you.”
”Bloody hell. You can’t go around pestering strangers!”
“Why not?”
“ ‘Cause they won’t listen to you any more than you listen to me.”
They passed a newsstand where a boy stood hawking the morning headline “Murder in Mayfair!" “Grisly deeds among the Haute Ton!” the boy announced. “Death dealt in ones and twos!”
“What?” Buffy pulled at the paper.
“ ‘ere now,” the boy protested.
“Hold still.” Spike pulled a penknife from his pocket to cut the pages of the newspaper loose from a larger sheaf. Buffy had never seen uncut newspapers, but Spike must have since he seemed familiar with the practice of slicing the paper and pulling it free.
“Let me read it.” Buffy ripped the newspaper out of Spike’s hands.
The Daily Telegraph recounted the details of Mrs. Harold Desmond’s murder and theorized that an enraged lover had sliced her throat. They were wrong, of course, but given Irving’s words last night, Buffy wasn’t surprised that the constable had reached that conclusion. It was the next paragraph that made Buffy gasp and pale.
She felt sick. And the morning, which had felt so bright moments earlier, suddenly seemed very dark. She dropped the paper and walked blindly toward the park.
Buffy heard Spike behind her. “It’s not your fault,” he insisted.
Right. He’d said that before, when she’d tried to confess to killing Katrina.
Spike caught up to her and whispered harshly in her ear. “You didn’t kill this girl.”
Clearly, Spike had also read the second paragraph of the article, the one following the description of Isobel’s death, with a description of the murder of a seventeen-year-old girl named Lisette Fachon.
“I let the goat-thingie get away!” Buffy insisted. “It jumped into the river, and I didn’t go after it. I had a chance to kill it. I didn’t, so someone else -- a girl -– died. “ Buffy faced Spike angrily. “Don’t tell me I couldn’t have done more. I could.”
Spike stared at her. She could see the muscles working his jaw. “You want to blame yourself for this.”
“No, I don’t. But I do anyway.”
He caught her arm. “Even if you had jumped in the river, you might not have stopped it.”
“But I would have tried.”
Spike shook his head. “You are not responsible for everything that happens around you.”
Buffy jerked away. He didn’t understand. How could he? He didn’t know that she had thought herself free of consequences. Nothing was supposed to be real here. Nothing was supposed to matter. It was supposed to be guilt-free costume drama, a masquerade with no-one to see what she did and judge her for it.
But mistakes were mistakes even if no-one knew. Consequences were real, even if they came without Giles polishing his glasses or Xander being a smart-ass. There was someone whose opinion mattered more than the Scoobies or the Council… her own.
Spike reached for her when she tried to walk away. Maybe he meant to hold her back; Buffy didn’t know, so she turned around, swinging.
Anticipating her attack, Spike dodged the punch and quickly stepped out of her reach.
Buffy saw red, and launched herself at him. He grabbed her shoulder, turning her with lightning speed, wrapping his arm around her and pulling her against his chest. “We’ve had this dance, luv. And beating the shit out of me doesn’t change a thing.”
=Oh God.=
He let go of her.
Wrong was wrong, even if no-one knew.
Wrong was wrong, even if it came without Giles’s or a Scoob’s censorious glare.
Wrong was wrong because she felt it. She knew it. She didn’t need anyone’s standard but her own. And it was wrong to beat someone because she couldn’t beat herself.
Buffy nearly doubled over in pain. It wasn’t physical. It would be so much easier if it was physical. She wanted him to fight her so that she could feel her anger, so that it wasn’t boiling inside her –- unformed and uncontrolled -- a cauldron of liquid emotion she couldn’t cool with reason and couldn’t release without pain. She hurt, so she wanted to hurt someone.
=Oh, God.= What was she?
Buffy glanced at Spike, who waited for her next move. She shook as she turned away. Her hands tingled. There was a burning sensation behind her eyes, and she concentrated on controlling her breathing. The last thing she wanted was for her face to reveal her dismay.
Steeling herself, Buffy strode across the park without looking back.
“Buffy!” Spike called.
She didn’t slow down. She had to do something. She had to...
Her only ideas involved finding a demon and beating the crap out of it, and that seemed to run counter to the epiphany she’d just had. She hadn’t liked the mental image of herself that had formed in her head. Violence shouldn’t always be her first, last, and only choice.
Spike followed Buffy through the park. She knew it. She could feel it. He was the black shadow always guarding her back –- only, at the moment, he wasn’t in black or in shadow -- but he still guarded her back as she made her way to the Addams’ townhouse.
“Bloody pointless trip this was,” Spike muttered when he joined her on the front stoop. Buffy refused to go through the servant’s entrance this time and knocked on the front door.
The butler answered.
“Do not allow anyone in!” Gorbach, in the guise of Mr. Addams, yelled.
The butler glanced between Gorbach, Spike, and Buffy. He adjusted his sleeves and announced in sententious tones, “Master Addams is not at home.”
Buffy’s brows rose. “He’s right there.”
“Master Addams is not at home to visitors.”
“Did you forget that I’ve been working here for the last week?”
Gorbach approached the door with his usual waddling gait. “Go away!” he ordered. “You aren’t wanted here.”
Buffy pushed past the butler, causing Gorbach to back away. Like partners in a permanently backward cha-cha-cha, they crossed the foyer until Gorbach stumbled back, onto the stairs.
“Lookit,” Buffy said impatiently. ”I’ve played nice up until now. And lucky for you, I’m still playing nice. Extra nice. But my patience is running out. I want to go home, so where is--“
“Cecily,” Spike interjected before she could say ‘Halfrek.’
Gorbach rolled over and began crawling up the stairs. “Gone away. She isn’t here. Isn’t likely to come back.” He turned his head and glared down at them. “Now, go away.”
Buffy went up the stairs. After climbing over Gorbach’s prone body, she sat on the tread above him. “Not going anywhere until I get what I want.”
“No-one gets what they want,” Gorbach said in a strained whisper. “Don’t you understand? Uncle took her. Uncle was displeased and he took her.” He rolled his rotund body over one more time and sat on one of the lower treads. He looked defeated with his head in his hands. “It’s all a mess. Wasn’t supposed to turn out like this.”
Gorbach raised his head and looked at Buffy. “There’s going to be trouble. Complications, entanglements, a quagmire.”
“We can bloody well get a thesaurus on our own,” Spike snapped.
“ ‘tis best not to be here when Uncle comes back.” Gorbach stood. “I know I won’t be.” He hurried up the stairs.
Buffy couldn’t believe it. “But Cecily… “
Gorbach grabbed the balustrade. “Forget about Cecily. Forget about me. I wasn’t here.” As he disappeared around the corner, Buffy could hear Gorbach say, “Oh dear, oh dear. I hope Mother can calm him down.” Suddenly, the man-demon peeked around the corner, giving Buffy one last look. “Go away!”
Buffy felt glued to the stairs. “I can’t be stuck here.”
“You aren’t stuck here,” Spike reassured. “We’ll find another way. We’ll find the Council.”
She turned around. “It’s not just me.”
“I don’t mat—“
“It’s the goat-thing.” She blinked. “We’ve got to do something about the goat-thing. It’s killing people.”
“And we’ll kill it.”
Gorbach came down the stairs, dragging a trunk. The butler moved quickly to take the burden from his master, since the demon looked winded when he reached the foot of the stairs.
“Why are you still here?" Gorbach demanded. "I told you to go. I’m. . . I’m. . . ordering you to go. If you don’t go, I’ll. . .” He was clearly at a loss.
Buffy crossed her arms. “You’ll do what, exactly?”
Gorbach drew himself up to his full, but still somewhat squatty, height. “I shall call the constable.”
Buffy sniffed and was about to respond when Spike tugged at her elbow. “Right, let’s go.” He tiled his head toward the door.
She blinked. “Are you serious? Since when do you give a damn about cops?”
“I don’t. ‘S just time to go.”
“Why?”
Spike flushed. “Calling the coppers would make a spectacle.”
“So? Not like we’re afraid of scandal.”
Spike snorted. “That’s rich, comin’ from a girl who can’t tell her friends anything she thinks, feels, or does because they might disapprove.”
“That’s not true. And even if it was true, that’s different.”
“ ‘Cause it’s you and your Scoobies.” He stepped up to her. “We’re not accomplishing anything here. If the bobbies were to arrive, what would you say? Hmm? What could you say? Nothing, that’s what. And no-one would listen even if you did.” He glowered at her. “I will not bring scandal down on me mum’s head ‘cause you’re spoiling for a fight. We’ll find another way.”
“But—“
Spike stood facing her, toe-to-toe. “I’d ask you to do this for me, but we both know how much weight that would carry.”
“None.” She was kind of pissed off, now. She knew that she was being mulish, but Spike had a unique talent for pushing all her buttons until she went berserk.
“I’m not askin’ for me,” he insisted.
“Because I’d tell you no.”
“I’m asking you to do this for my mum.”
Buffy glanced away from Spike and looked at Gorbach. Given her past experience with the whirling Dervish of a blue demon, she admitted that Gorbach probably didn’t know anything anyway.
“Okay,” she conceded.
“Finally!” Gorbach pushed her in the direction of the door. “Close it behind them!” he ordered the butler.
Five seconds later the door slammed shut behind her.
Buffy sighed. “Guess I’m bunking at Casa Spike.”
Spike’s head snapped up. “What?” He shook his head. “No.”
Buffy rolled her eyes. “Right. Like it’s not your unfulfilled dream.”
“No, you don’t understand. You aren’t in Sunnydale any longer.”
“Oh, I get it.” Indicating her long, velvet dress. “Sort of hard to miss.”
“Still don’t get it.” He shoved his hands into his pockets and loped down the steps. “You’re no-one, Buffy.”
=Ouch.= “Gee. Thanks. And I always thought that I existed.”
He turned around and gazed at her with a fractious expression. “An unmarried man cannot bring home a girl no-one has ever heard of. Not here. Not now. People will think I’m installing my doxy under my mother’s roof.”
“People will think I’m--“
“My whore.”
Buffy shifted on her feet and felt… well… kind of offended. She wanted to say that Spike and his ‘mum’ could just suck it up and deal. But, the idea that nothing that happened here mattered had already been shot to hell. She really didn’t want people to think she was a whore. “Think of something else,” she demanded.
“I thought you enjoyed mocking my ability to plan.”
Buffy tapped her foot against the pavement. “Are you wanting me to live on the street?”
“ ‘Course not.”
“Then think of something, Mr. Victorian Man.”
He cracked his neck as he tilted his head from side to side, looking aggravated and impatient. After a moment he said, “There is one other possibility.”
“It had better not involve my being a maid,” she warned.
A long silence greeted that remark. She looked at Spike suspiciously.
“I’ll think of something else,” he conceded.
An hour and one change of clothes later, the two of them bumped into Spike’s mother in the downstairs hall of William the Bloody’s home.
“Mother!” A startled Spike suddenly straightened his shoulders. Glancing worriedly between the two women, he took a deep breath, and announced. “Mother, I would like to introduce you to Bu—“ He coughed. “Buford. My new valet.”
Chapter Six
The Kink: Time travel, specifically S6 Spike and Buffy in 1880s London.
Three other requests: Spike has "replaced" William, but only he and Buffy know; Buffy acknowledges real feelings for Spike (happily or reluctantly; it's your call); and Cecily eats her heart out when she realizes what she could have had.
Previous Chapters Archived Here
Rating: Currently PG
CHAPTER FIVE
After Spike left the house, Buffy took Spike’s suggestion and raided Halfrek’s wardrobe. Of course, she first searched for jewelry, anything that might have a vengeance hex attached to it. She dangled. She jiggled. No demonic genie appeared from any of it, so she began smashing it.
The fashionista in Buffy felt guilty for destroying exquisite gold necklaces and brooches, but, given her experience with Anyanka, Buffy knew that smashed jewelry held the possibility of breaking the vengeance curse and sending her home.
Gorbach entered Halfrek’s bedroom and flushed blue-violet. “What are you doing?!” In a penguin-like waddle-hop-shift from foot to foot, he spun in a circle, looking at the battered jewelry. “What? What? What?” He suddenly looked up and glared. “You’re insane.”
“Mad, maybe. Insane? Nope.” She flung open the doors of the wardrobe and pawed through Halfrek’s clothes -- which, unsurprisingly, contained every imaginable tint and shade of purple.
“Vandal! Thief!” He spat the worst insult of all, “Human!”
Buffy selected an amazingly soft velvet dress that had a lustrous sheen. It also had jet beading along the organza trimmed cuffs.
“No, no, no.” Gorbach pulled the dress from her hands. “Not the aubergine. That’s Cecily’s favorite.”
Of course it was. And, of course, Buffy took it. Halfrek wasn’t much taller than she was, so it would fit relatively well even if it would probably be a bit too large in the bust.
Buffy changed clothes but an hour later Spike still hadn’t returned. Growing tired, and for reasons she didn’t quite understand, Buffy decided against sleeping in Halfrek’s bed. She gravitated to the cramped maid’s quarters she had lived in for the past week. After removing the dress -- she didn’t want to ruin the silk-velvet – she laid down.
When the first blush of dawn lightened the sky outside Buffy’s bedroom window, she took a deep breath and stretched. Arching her back, she released a sigh, and rolled onto her side to see Spike, standing in the doorway across the room.
“How long have you been there?” she asked as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes.
“Awhile.” He gave a rueful half-smile. “You would say ‘too long.’ ” He stepped into the tiny attic-room just as Buffy brushed back her hair.
There was a chill in the air, and her nipples puckered beneath her lace chemise. She thought about crossing her arms to cover herself, but that would draw attention to her predicament and make Spike aware that she had noticed that ‘he’ had noticed. In their constant game of dare and denial, Buffy equated reacting with a loss, so she did nothing. She wasn’t willing to give that much.
“I’m in my underwear,” she blurted, and inwardly cringed at stating the obvious.
His gaze traveled over the orchid-colored corset that she had taken from Halfrek’s wardrobe. “You wear less at The Bronze.”
“It’s different when I know it’s underwear.”
Spike tilted his head slightly to the left and smirked. “ ‘S quite fetching.”
“Yeah well, I didn’t choose it for you.” She flushed and wondered if saying those words meant that she had done exactly that.
He crossed the room to squat in front of the small cast-iron fireplace and added coals to the embers.
Lying on her side, with her pillow and one hand tucked beneath her cheek, Buffy asked, “How is your mother?” The question seemed strange and foreign when associated with Spike.
He didn’t look up but stared at the glowing coals. “Sleeping… unlike the two of us.”
Buffy realized that Spike looked tired and distracted. If he had been anyone but Spike, she would have said that he was brooding. But he was Spike so that was impossible.
Still, even though there were worry lines across his brow, the errant, sandy-colored curls falling into his eyes caused Spike to appear boyish and lost. She almost smiled at the contrast between the picture he presented and the stories he had once told of his human self.
She couldn't help goading him. “You were always bad, huh?”
He slanted her ‘a look’ but conceded, “A slight exaggeration.”
“Uh-huh.”
Spike sat on the floor, propping his feet against the firescreen and resting his left arm on the bed. His loose-limbed pose made him look even more boyish as he warned, “Don’t let appearances fool you.”
“Never.”
His gaze drifted back to the embers of the fire. He seemed lost in thought and unaware that he traced the curve of the arch of her foot with the back of his index finger. She shivered as the pad of his thumb followed the same path.
If Spike had known what he was doing, she would have pulled away. But, because he didn’t, she sighed as his palm slid over her ankle and closed her eyes when his fingers pressed gently into the back of her calf.
“There are all kinds of bad,” he mused.
“What kind of bad were you?” She imagined his hand wandering upward, beneath her petticoat and behind her knee, sliding from the outside of her thigh to the inside, his long fingers moving softly over her skin, drifting in slow circles. Buffy’s breathing hitched, and she longed for his hand to move higher… between her legs… further still...
Her hips shifted and she tingled with want, with need.
Spike’s hand stopped moving.
Buffy opened her eyes and their gazes met… and held. She opened her mouth to say something—some confession or request-- but no words came out.
She looked away.
“The buggering foolish kind,” Spike muttered as he stood. “And I never got over it.” He playfully smacked her on her bottom. “Dress. Had an idea on the way over.”
Buffy rolled off the bed. “You? Ideas? Aren’t these things unmixy?”
“Plenty mixy.” He smirked wickedly. “Just trouble.”
Only not so much she discovered, when they left the Addams’ townhouse to cross Green Park.
The morning air was crisp and cool. The sky was clear and sunlight glistened on patches of frost. It was an almost painfully lovely day, with the wide, nearly flat expanse of grass, flushed bright chartreuse and intermittently dotted with buttery-yellow daffodils and creamy-white narcissus. If there were picture post-cards of spring, they would look a lot like this, and Spike was walking through it... which was weird and disorienting... and kind of pleasurable.
“ ’S a bit early to be fashionable,” he told her.
Buffy wished she still had hair she could flip over her shoulder. “You know I’m all about the fashion.”
“That what you call the things you wear?”
She slanted him a ‘look.’ “Hrmphf.”
“Ah, there’s the Slayer pout I remember.”
Buffy refused to rise to the bait. “Where are we going?”
“Cadogen Square.”
“Which means nothing to me. So, again I ask, where are we going?” She smoothed her velvet skirt, enjoying the tactile sensation so very different from the coarse, woolen maid’s uniform she’d worn this last week.
Spike sounded unhappy. “To find the stodgy lodgings of stodgy old men.”
“Sounds fun, only not.” Buffy adjusted her hat, and had to giggle that she was wearing ‘a jaunty hat.’ Plus… it had feathers.
Spike rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah, well, no one ever called the Council of Wankers ‘fun.’ Or if they did, they were probably wankers themselves.”
When they exited the park, Buffy noticed that the morning had grown late enough that people were now on the street. Not many, but there was a horse-drawn cart carrying coal, a footman with a small dog on a leather leash, and a maid with a white mop cap and wool shawl. The city was waking up and beginning its day.
Buffy adjusted her jacket. “So, we find the Dickens-era Giles. A little presto-chango-mojo, and we’re back to the twenty-first century.”
“Cold comfort,” Spike muttered.
She stopped walking. “What?”
He sucked in his checks and held his tongue as he glanced up the street at the footman with the dog. “Nothin’.”
=Uh-Uh. Not ‘nothing’.= Something was up with Spike, but she had no idea what it was. She didn’t often spend time figuring out Spike. Actually, she spent no time figuring out Spike. Usually whatever Spike felt was visible on his face, and whatever Spike thought came out of his mouth in most blunt way possible. Buffy wasn’t used to Spike keeping his thoughts to himself.
“Why are you so peeved?” she asked.
“Not peeved..“
“You sound peeved.”
Spike stopped walking. When she turned to look at him, he confronted her. “Doesn’t really matter what I sound like, now does it?”
What did he expect her to say? Was she supposed to stop worrying about the mess they were in and wonder what made Spike tick? The likelihood of her understanding Spike was nil. Most of the time, she couldn’t understand herself.
Buffy crossed her arms impatiently. “No, it doesn’t matter.”
“Fine then.”
“Fine!” Seeing Spike moving ahead her, Buffy rushed to catch up with him. “You know, if someone has the right to be pissy here, it’s me. You cursed me, remember.”
“So it appears.”
She wished he hadn’t agreed so quickly. It was easier to fight when he was being hateful. Buffy demanded, “What did you curse me with, anyway? Dishpan hands?”
“I would have thought you’d guess chamber pots.”
She gasped. “Did you?!”
“What? Curse you with chamber pots? Wasn’t exactly the first thing on my mind, no.”
“So what was it?”
Spike ignored her and moved down the sidewalk.
Buffy grabbed his arm and swung him around. “What did you do this time?”
The muscle in his jaw twitched when she said “this time.”
Spike’s gaze hardened. “You know, a bloke might—if he was feeling a bit put out and particularly vengeful for being burned out of house and home—“
“Because he totally deserved it.”
“Because his motives had been misjudged.”
“Because he could have gotten us eaten in our beds by baby Sue-whatever demons.”
“Which he had no idea were dangerous.”
Buffy snorted. “Oh, right. How silly. Who would expect you to know... Doctor?”
Spike flushed --a gift of his newly re-human status-- and looked exasperated. No, actually, he looked outraged. “Because he was not the Doctor!”
“Huh?”
Spike ran his hand over his forehead and hair and began rubbing his neck as he shook his head. He walked in a circle around her. “Because he was stupid enough to do a stupid thing, for a few quick quid to give a girl who needed money.”
Something inside Buffy lurched, but she ignored it. “You expect me to believe that?”
Spike glanced at her but, seeing her unmoved, sniffed and raised his chin as he straightened his shoulders. “’Course not,” he dismissed. “I expect you to punch me ‘cause it’s a truth you don’t want to hear.”
=Bastard.= “You’re going to deny being The Doctor?” Angry and defensive, she glared at him “It’s a little late for that, considering you admitted it before.”
“What? I never did.”
“Yuh-huh,” Buffy protested weakly. She could have sworn that she remembered him confessing. “You did.”
“Never.” Spike looked at her with disbelief. “Come on, Buffy. Think! How exactly was I supposed to be an international black market dealer when—“ He began counting off points with his fingers. “One, I don’t own a phone. Two, I never leave the country. Three, I am the pariah of Sunnyhell’s demon community because I’m always helpin’ you kill ‘em off. Four, I’m more broke than you are. For God’s sake,” he spat out, “I couldn’t pay off a kitten debt.”
Buffy squirmed a little. Spike was convincing. What he said was true, and even when evil, he wasn’t a good liar. “You weren’t The Doctor.” She said it aloud, testing the words, but she wasn’t ready to stop sounding doubtful.
Spike watched her intently, looking… earnest. “I’d never take on the name of the creature who killed you.”
She believed him.
He told her, “I’d never heard of The Doctor. I boarded those eggs ‘cause a bloke said it’d be a way quick way to make money.”
“Those eggs were dangerous,” she insisted. “Dangerous people asked you to keep dangerous eggs -- eggs that would kill people. Did you even care?”
“Evil, remember? And rather myopic in the ways of love.” He looked at her with pained blue eyes. “I only saw you.”
Buffy swallowed and told herself to breathe. “Gee, thanks. I’m flattered. Except not.”
Spike moved his head in a motion somewhere between a nod and a shake. “ I know I was stupid. I was on the cusp of causing a catastrophe. I… just wanted you to know.”
“That it was for me.”
“And Dawn.”
Buffy didn’t know what she felt. She didn’t know what she was supposed to feel. Amorphous emotions swirled inside her, confusing her as she pushed them away. “What to give to the girl who has nothing-- dozens of endangered monsters who kill.”
Silence stretched between them. =Oh god,= she thought, =what if I have to think of a way to carry the conversation?= She didn’t know… a lot of things. But in this instance, she specifically didn’t know what to say to him.
“Don’t know about that,” he said gruffly.
“Huh?”
“The critters.”
Buffy’s brows drew together sharply.
“Look, “ he said. “Exactly how rare and endangered can a species be when they reproduce like bunnies?”
=Good question.= “Are you saying that Riley lied?”
Spike shrugged. “Maybe. Don’t know. Maybe he was wrong, or maybe I had critters that would have devoured us all in our beds. I don’t know.” His gaze locked with hers, and he was so full of intensity that she couldn’t look away. “The point I’m making is-- I don’t know. The Doctor would. Blame me for being a hundred kinds of buggering fool. Hate me for being sodding evil if you like. But don’t suspect me of betrayin’ you.”
He hadn’t. He wouldn’t. Except. . .
She asked, “What kind of curse did you wish on me?”
“Oh, that.” He stepped to the side, allowing a young woman in a plain gray dress and straw bonnet to pass them. When the stranger was out of earshot, Spike said in a low voice, “A bloke might --if he was feeling somewhat peeved and perhaps blind drunk and not being as attentive as he should be-- might say to an old acquaintance… ”
“Just spit it out.”
“He might say he wished a girl to be treated like crap for a while and for him to see it.”
Buffy’s brows rose. She wondered if they could reach her hairline. “You’re just full of warm, fuzzy prezzies today, aren’t you? Thanks. Not like my life didn’t suck enough to begin with.”
“I didn’t mean it.” He kept pace with her when she began walking again.
“Yeah, you did.”
He sucked in his cheeks, then blew out a small breath. “Okay, maybe. A little. But--sonofabitch!” Spike looked at a cleared construction site on the corner of the square.
Buffy got a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She laughed, then cringed when she realized that the laugh sounded frightened. “From a reaction like that, I’d almost think this was where the Council was supposed to be.”
Spike gave no surly response to calm her nerves.
Her shoulders drooped. “It is where you thought the Council should be.”
“It‘s where the council is. Now.” He frowned. “In the future. “
Buffy didn’t like the aching wave rising inside her. “So where is it now now? In the past.”
“Don’t panic.”
“I’m not panicked. Do I look panicked?“ She glared at him. “Where is it?”
“How the bloody hell should I know?”
“You’re the ‘bloody’ British vampire!” Noticing that a footman, at the house across the street, stood on the front stoop staring at them, Buffy lowered her voice and whispered, “Aren’t you the one who spent a century hunting Slayers?”
“Slayer hunter, not Slayer historian. Didn’t discover there was a Council for another eight years.”
Now Buffy panicked. “But the Watchers have to be here. There’s a building going up. The Council’s got to be building it. We just have to ask around.”
“ ‘cause secret societies are easily located by networking,” Spike snarked.
Buffy frowned. “Watchers aren’t secret.”
“To you. For most of the world, real vampires, Slayers, and the blokes who keep track of them aren’t common knowledge.”
“So what do you suggest we do?”
Spike shoved his hands into his pockets and shrugged. “Dunno.”
Buffy started across the street. “Unless you’ve got a better idea, we ask.”
“What? Are you serious?” Spike pretended to stop an imaginary passerby. “Hello, sir. Are you a Watcher? Could you perhaps assist us in locating a missing vengeance demon so that she can return a misplaced Slayer and an erstwhile vampire to the beginning of the twenty-first century?”
“Ignoring you,” Buffy called out. “See me ignoring you.”
”Bloody hell. You can’t go around pestering strangers!”
“Why not?”
“ ‘Cause they won’t listen to you any more than you listen to me.”
They passed a newsstand where a boy stood hawking the morning headline “Murder in Mayfair!" “Grisly deeds among the Haute Ton!” the boy announced. “Death dealt in ones and twos!”
“What?” Buffy pulled at the paper.
“ ‘ere now,” the boy protested.
“Hold still.” Spike pulled a penknife from his pocket to cut the pages of the newspaper loose from a larger sheaf. Buffy had never seen uncut newspapers, but Spike must have since he seemed familiar with the practice of slicing the paper and pulling it free.
“Let me read it.” Buffy ripped the newspaper out of Spike’s hands.
The Daily Telegraph recounted the details of Mrs. Harold Desmond’s murder and theorized that an enraged lover had sliced her throat. They were wrong, of course, but given Irving’s words last night, Buffy wasn’t surprised that the constable had reached that conclusion. It was the next paragraph that made Buffy gasp and pale.
She felt sick. And the morning, which had felt so bright moments earlier, suddenly seemed very dark. She dropped the paper and walked blindly toward the park.
Buffy heard Spike behind her. “It’s not your fault,” he insisted.
Right. He’d said that before, when she’d tried to confess to killing Katrina.
Spike caught up to her and whispered harshly in her ear. “You didn’t kill this girl.”
Clearly, Spike had also read the second paragraph of the article, the one following the description of Isobel’s death, with a description of the murder of a seventeen-year-old girl named Lisette Fachon.
“I let the goat-thingie get away!” Buffy insisted. “It jumped into the river, and I didn’t go after it. I had a chance to kill it. I didn’t, so someone else -- a girl -– died. “ Buffy faced Spike angrily. “Don’t tell me I couldn’t have done more. I could.”
Spike stared at her. She could see the muscles working his jaw. “You want to blame yourself for this.”
“No, I don’t. But I do anyway.”
He caught her arm. “Even if you had jumped in the river, you might not have stopped it.”
“But I would have tried.”
Spike shook his head. “You are not responsible for everything that happens around you.”
Buffy jerked away. He didn’t understand. How could he? He didn’t know that she had thought herself free of consequences. Nothing was supposed to be real here. Nothing was supposed to matter. It was supposed to be guilt-free costume drama, a masquerade with no-one to see what she did and judge her for it.
But mistakes were mistakes even if no-one knew. Consequences were real, even if they came without Giles polishing his glasses or Xander being a smart-ass. There was someone whose opinion mattered more than the Scoobies or the Council… her own.
Spike reached for her when she tried to walk away. Maybe he meant to hold her back; Buffy didn’t know, so she turned around, swinging.
Anticipating her attack, Spike dodged the punch and quickly stepped out of her reach.
Buffy saw red, and launched herself at him. He grabbed her shoulder, turning her with lightning speed, wrapping his arm around her and pulling her against his chest. “We’ve had this dance, luv. And beating the shit out of me doesn’t change a thing.”
=Oh God.=
He let go of her.
Wrong was wrong, even if no-one knew.
Wrong was wrong, even if it came without Giles’s or a Scoob’s censorious glare.
Wrong was wrong because she felt it. She knew it. She didn’t need anyone’s standard but her own. And it was wrong to beat someone because she couldn’t beat herself.
Buffy nearly doubled over in pain. It wasn’t physical. It would be so much easier if it was physical. She wanted him to fight her so that she could feel her anger, so that it wasn’t boiling inside her –- unformed and uncontrolled -- a cauldron of liquid emotion she couldn’t cool with reason and couldn’t release without pain. She hurt, so she wanted to hurt someone.
=Oh, God.= What was she?
Buffy glanced at Spike, who waited for her next move. She shook as she turned away. Her hands tingled. There was a burning sensation behind her eyes, and she concentrated on controlling her breathing. The last thing she wanted was for her face to reveal her dismay.
Steeling herself, Buffy strode across the park without looking back.
“Buffy!” Spike called.
She didn’t slow down. She had to do something. She had to...
Her only ideas involved finding a demon and beating the crap out of it, and that seemed to run counter to the epiphany she’d just had. She hadn’t liked the mental image of herself that had formed in her head. Violence shouldn’t always be her first, last, and only choice.
Spike followed Buffy through the park. She knew it. She could feel it. He was the black shadow always guarding her back –- only, at the moment, he wasn’t in black or in shadow -- but he still guarded her back as she made her way to the Addams’ townhouse.
“Bloody pointless trip this was,” Spike muttered when he joined her on the front stoop. Buffy refused to go through the servant’s entrance this time and knocked on the front door.
The butler answered.
“Do not allow anyone in!” Gorbach, in the guise of Mr. Addams, yelled.
The butler glanced between Gorbach, Spike, and Buffy. He adjusted his sleeves and announced in sententious tones, “Master Addams is not at home.”
Buffy’s brows rose. “He’s right there.”
“Master Addams is not at home to visitors.”
“Did you forget that I’ve been working here for the last week?”
Gorbach approached the door with his usual waddling gait. “Go away!” he ordered. “You aren’t wanted here.”
Buffy pushed past the butler, causing Gorbach to back away. Like partners in a permanently backward cha-cha-cha, they crossed the foyer until Gorbach stumbled back, onto the stairs.
“Lookit,” Buffy said impatiently. ”I’ve played nice up until now. And lucky for you, I’m still playing nice. Extra nice. But my patience is running out. I want to go home, so where is--“
“Cecily,” Spike interjected before she could say ‘Halfrek.’
Gorbach rolled over and began crawling up the stairs. “Gone away. She isn’t here. Isn’t likely to come back.” He turned his head and glared down at them. “Now, go away.”
Buffy went up the stairs. After climbing over Gorbach’s prone body, she sat on the tread above him. “Not going anywhere until I get what I want.”
“No-one gets what they want,” Gorbach said in a strained whisper. “Don’t you understand? Uncle took her. Uncle was displeased and he took her.” He rolled his rotund body over one more time and sat on one of the lower treads. He looked defeated with his head in his hands. “It’s all a mess. Wasn’t supposed to turn out like this.”
Gorbach raised his head and looked at Buffy. “There’s going to be trouble. Complications, entanglements, a quagmire.”
“We can bloody well get a thesaurus on our own,” Spike snapped.
“ ‘tis best not to be here when Uncle comes back.” Gorbach stood. “I know I won’t be.” He hurried up the stairs.
Buffy couldn’t believe it. “But Cecily… “
Gorbach grabbed the balustrade. “Forget about Cecily. Forget about me. I wasn’t here.” As he disappeared around the corner, Buffy could hear Gorbach say, “Oh dear, oh dear. I hope Mother can calm him down.” Suddenly, the man-demon peeked around the corner, giving Buffy one last look. “Go away!”
Buffy felt glued to the stairs. “I can’t be stuck here.”
“You aren’t stuck here,” Spike reassured. “We’ll find another way. We’ll find the Council.”
She turned around. “It’s not just me.”
“I don’t mat—“
“It’s the goat-thing.” She blinked. “We’ve got to do something about the goat-thing. It’s killing people.”
“And we’ll kill it.”
Gorbach came down the stairs, dragging a trunk. The butler moved quickly to take the burden from his master, since the demon looked winded when he reached the foot of the stairs.
“Why are you still here?" Gorbach demanded. "I told you to go. I’m. . . I’m. . . ordering you to go. If you don’t go, I’ll. . .” He was clearly at a loss.
Buffy crossed her arms. “You’ll do what, exactly?”
Gorbach drew himself up to his full, but still somewhat squatty, height. “I shall call the constable.”
Buffy sniffed and was about to respond when Spike tugged at her elbow. “Right, let’s go.” He tiled his head toward the door.
She blinked. “Are you serious? Since when do you give a damn about cops?”
“I don’t. ‘S just time to go.”
“Why?”
Spike flushed. “Calling the coppers would make a spectacle.”
“So? Not like we’re afraid of scandal.”
Spike snorted. “That’s rich, comin’ from a girl who can’t tell her friends anything she thinks, feels, or does because they might disapprove.”
“That’s not true. And even if it was true, that’s different.”
“ ‘Cause it’s you and your Scoobies.” He stepped up to her. “We’re not accomplishing anything here. If the bobbies were to arrive, what would you say? Hmm? What could you say? Nothing, that’s what. And no-one would listen even if you did.” He glowered at her. “I will not bring scandal down on me mum’s head ‘cause you’re spoiling for a fight. We’ll find another way.”
“But—“
Spike stood facing her, toe-to-toe. “I’d ask you to do this for me, but we both know how much weight that would carry.”
“None.” She was kind of pissed off, now. She knew that she was being mulish, but Spike had a unique talent for pushing all her buttons until she went berserk.
“I’m not askin’ for me,” he insisted.
“Because I’d tell you no.”
“I’m asking you to do this for my mum.”
Buffy glanced away from Spike and looked at Gorbach. Given her past experience with the whirling Dervish of a blue demon, she admitted that Gorbach probably didn’t know anything anyway.
“Okay,” she conceded.
“Finally!” Gorbach pushed her in the direction of the door. “Close it behind them!” he ordered the butler.
Five seconds later the door slammed shut behind her.
Buffy sighed. “Guess I’m bunking at Casa Spike.”
Spike’s head snapped up. “What?” He shook his head. “No.”
Buffy rolled her eyes. “Right. Like it’s not your unfulfilled dream.”
“No, you don’t understand. You aren’t in Sunnydale any longer.”
“Oh, I get it.” Indicating her long, velvet dress. “Sort of hard to miss.”
“Still don’t get it.” He shoved his hands into his pockets and loped down the steps. “You’re no-one, Buffy.”
=Ouch.= “Gee. Thanks. And I always thought that I existed.”
He turned around and gazed at her with a fractious expression. “An unmarried man cannot bring home a girl no-one has ever heard of. Not here. Not now. People will think I’m installing my doxy under my mother’s roof.”
“People will think I’m--“
“My whore.”
Buffy shifted on her feet and felt… well… kind of offended. She wanted to say that Spike and his ‘mum’ could just suck it up and deal. But, the idea that nothing that happened here mattered had already been shot to hell. She really didn’t want people to think she was a whore. “Think of something else,” she demanded.
“I thought you enjoyed mocking my ability to plan.”
Buffy tapped her foot against the pavement. “Are you wanting me to live on the street?”
“ ‘Course not.”
“Then think of something, Mr. Victorian Man.”
He cracked his neck as he tilted his head from side to side, looking aggravated and impatient. After a moment he said, “There is one other possibility.”
“It had better not involve my being a maid,” she warned.
A long silence greeted that remark. She looked at Spike suspiciously.
“I’ll think of something else,” he conceded.
An hour and one change of clothes later, the two of them bumped into Spike’s mother in the downstairs hall of William the Bloody’s home.
“Mother!” A startled Spike suddenly straightened his shoulders. Glancing worriedly between the two women, he took a deep breath, and announced. “Mother, I would like to introduce you to Bu—“ He coughed. “Buford. My new valet.”
Chapter Six
