#btvs x reader

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐓𝐖𝐎 𝐅𝐀𝐂𝐄𝐃 𝐃𝐄𝐕𝐈𝐋 • 【 sister barnes 】 🦇 ⊹ ࣪ ˖

sister barnes, often prided herself in doing the right thing, what was expected of her. so, it never crossed her mind that, in all of her years of almost blind devotion, she’d find herself tangled in between the sheets with a being, that was the closest thing to the demonic, that walked this earth.

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐌𝐘 𝐆𝐄𝐍𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 • 【 taissa turner 】 ⊹ ࣪ ˖ 🍷

tempering with elections is about fifty flavours of illegal. tampering with the people who vote however… well, there are very few laws regarding that particular loophole, especially when creatures of the night are involved. so, it’s rather simple really, you get what you want and she gets what she wants. no harm, no foul. except for that pesky election tampering of course. but you’ve both done worse things. what’s another?

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐒𝐎𝐅𝐓𝐄𝐑, 𝐒𝐎𝐅𝐓𝐄𝐒𝐓 • 【 jackie taylor 】 🦇 𓉸 🍷

seeing jackie frozen, cold and fragile in the snow was the worst day of your life, and simultaneously the best, because it was the day she became like you, the day the two of you fled the wilderness together and became one. but fleeing wasn’t enough, you wanted to give your wife closure, in the form of the person who caused her death, right in the middle of the reunion and the dance that was supposedly hosted in her honour.

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐏𝐒𝐘𝐂𝐇𝐎 𝐌𝐀𝐆𝐍𝐄𝐓 • 【 misty quigley 】 𑣿

in which your favourite nurse catches you red handed, or rather red mouthed, while you’re having a midnight snack at her place of work, or rather misty quigley has such a lack of friends that she ends up willingly feeding your local friendly neighbourhood vampire.

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐃𝐔𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐘 • 【 natalie scatorccio 】 🦇 𓉸 ⊹ ࣪ ˖🍷

being undead is a tricky job; there’s many things to look out for: sun, garlic, mirrors and the most annoying one— vampire hunters. the first three are pretty easy to deal with especially in a town like whiskyaok where the sun only comes out to play once in a blue moon the last one, however, is a little more complicated. especially because the girl you have a massive hang up on is one of the youngest, most gifted hunters in the area.

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐂𝐄𝐌𝐄𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐘 𝐆𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐒 • 【 lottie matthews 】 𓉸

staring down your own grave is never easy, looking at the stone from above, knowing your body isn’t where it should be. it cuts you up inside. staring down your own grave, with your maker breathing down your neck however, that should be illegal. or, at the very least, punishable by death (pun intended).

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐏𝐋𝐀𝐘𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐒𝐎𝐍𝐆 • 【 jackienat 】 𓉸⊹ ࣪ ˖🍷

for years you, jackie and natalie roamed this world together, hiding from the blinding light of the cruel sun and feeding on the blood of the innocent by nightfall. until, one day, your natalie was cursed by witches, cursed with a soul, a filthy soul. after that, natalie, all consumed by guilt, shame and remorse left you and your girlfriend to your wicked ways. what happens when your other half comes back after decades of time apart? will everything be as it were?

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐒𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐀𝐋𝐊𝐒 𝐎𝐍 𝐌𝐄 • 【 faith lehane 】 🦇 ⊹ ࣪ ˖

is there a rule where vampires with souls fall for slayers? one would think so, given the fact that both you and the only other ensouled vampire in the world each have a thing for those who kill your kind. problem? other than the natural enemies thing, faith isn’t as open to you as buffy is to angel. doesn’t matter, you’ve always liked a challenge after all.

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐋𝐊𝐄𝐑 • 【 travis martinez 】 🍷 𑣿 𓉸 ⊹ ࣪ ˖

travis martinez was the kind of guy that kept to himself. the kind of guy that sat alone in the far corner of the cafeteria with his headphones in during lunch time. the kind of guy who, during breaks was only ever seen talking to his little brother. so, he was a little more than thrilled when the new girl in town showed a little more than a bit of interest in him. little did he know that her affections meant the end of his life as he knew it.

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐄 𝐑𝐄𝐅𝐋𝐄𝐂𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 • 【 iris 】 𑣿 🦇 ⊹ ࣪ ˖

after running away from josh’s crushing and suffocating embrace iris found herself in the outskirts of europe, where she would meet someone who was like her, someone who would never die, the only difference is that her new friend ran on blood rather than circuitry.

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐆𝐔𝐓𝐋𝐄𝐒𝐒 • 【 shauna shipman 】 🦇 ⊹ ࣪ ˖ 𓉸

in which shauna sees her paramour from twenty five years ago at the high school reunion. except, something isn’t right, you look exactly the same as you did the day you were all rescued from the wilderness. like time kept on moving but you were stuck, unmoving, forever young, forever beautiful just like jackie in the snow.

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐂𝐔𝐑𝐒𝐄𝐃 𝐌𝐎𝐎𝐍 • 【 van palmer 】 𓉸 𑣿

after being bitten by a particular vicious wolf van starts going through certain… transformations. luckily, for them there’s one other person in the wilderness who knows exactly what they are going through (well not exactly per se) but definitely knowledgeable on the subject of all things supernatural. even if it’s their teammate now turned natural enemy.

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐔𝐍𝐇𝐎𝐋𝐘 𝐔𝐍𝐈𝐎𝐍 • 【 natalie scatorccio 】 ⊹ ࣪ ˖🍷

natalie scatorccio was the worst vampire who ever lived, tales of her treachery were told across countries, across continents even. natalie didn’t care for anything, or anyone, especially not sweet, pure and chaste little you.

﹒†˖̣̣̣ ͜𝅄𝅄 • 𝐃𝐎𝐋𝐋 𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐒 • 【 faith lehane 】 🦇 ⊹ ࣪ ˖ 🍷 𓉸

the slayer: the chosen one, the one girl in all the world born to fight the vampires, the demons and the forces of darkness. but what happens when the slayer stops being the hunter and becomes the hunted? what happens when the person you love gets turned into one of them? because you were too late? more importantly, will you be able to do what needs to be done?

It was no secret to anyone your favorite time of day was long after the sun went down. A full-time college student who worked a part time job on top of that was no easy feat. Your time during the day was never your time, it was your shitty professors time who assigned reading after reading that needed to be read for the never-ending stream of papers and theses, it belonged to your shitty boss who piled on tons of paperwork and demanded you be at his beck and call even after you clocked out. As much as you loved them, your time off belonged to your friends; patrolling, looking through dusty-old books, trying not to die every time you stepped out of your apartment.

When you got home (if there was no patrolling to be done), it was your time and while you were tired, you made time for your nightly routine. You'd slip off your shoes and walk in the dark to make it to your room to turn on your lamp, because you'd be damned if you were turning on one of the big lights this late.

You would usually strip down and dig a pair of pajamas out of your drawers before taking a scalding shower. You'd brush your teeth and wash your face, maybe if you had the energy, you'd do a face mask and paint your nails. You'd turn on your stereo or switch on your TV to fall asleep to the fuzzy sound and soft light. This, of course, is what you'd be doing right now had you not walked into your house with company.

You could see him lounging on your bed, the darkness of his attire somehow darker than your unlit room. His duster slung on the back of your desk chair, only clothed in some tight navy shirt and jeans.

"What are you doing here, Spike?" You crossed your arms over your chest, annoyed when you realized he had his dirty ass boots on your bed.

"M' paying my favorite Scooby a visit." You walked over to turn on your lamp, giving you enough light to see how smug he was. His arms sat behind his head, his eyes glittering with amusement. He was doing this to annoy you. He did most things just to annoy you.

"Pay another Scooby a visit." You were dead tired, practically forcing your eyes open. You had just gotten back from work, your bag still in your hand which you used to knock his legs off your bed. He could've been stubborn, but he let you.

You stripped off your hoodie, flashing him your stomach as your undershirt rose with the movement. He whistled, "Scandalous."

"Get out of my apartment." You tossed your hoodie at him while rolling your eyes. He caught it midair, bringing it to his nose to sniff it.

"Smells different. You using a different bodywash?" You hummed as you walked around your room to find something suitable to wear to bed. It was dreadfully hot out, even worse than what you'd expect from a California summer. You had at least 3 fans going anytime you were here, especially since your landlord could never seem to find a permanent solution to the junky A.C unit.

"Midnight Rose. Real fancy stuff." You hadn't even noticed a difference, but of course Spike would. Vampire senses had a way of being intrusive in a way that was only helpful when it came to your cycle and saving you bed sheets.

"I like the other one better: the cocoa butter one. It was fainter. You smelt more like you." You scoffed.

"Duly noted." Your hands roamed over the old t-shirts from high school and camisole tops so old the straps had snapped on a couple of them.

Spike sat up on your bed, untying the laces on his shoes haphazardly before setting them by your bedroom door. He roamed around like you had been, picking up bottles of nail polish and flipping through one of the books on your shelf.

"You could spare me a bit of your attention, love. I mean I did go through the trouble of-"

"Breaking into my apartment?" You interrupted.

"On second thought, it was a bit easy. I pushed it a bit and the window came right out. Are you leaving it open for somebody?" His tone was supposed to sound much more teasing than it did. There was a pang in his chest, probably of jealousy. Much to his chagrin, he was jealous a lot these days and he couldn't quite tell if his frequent visits were enabling that or the very cause of it. Either way, it was hard not to just crawl through your window anytime he pleased.

You acted like you were annoyed and if he had a dollar for every time you threatened to call Buffy on him, he wouldn't need to dumpster dive for furniture. If he had another dollar for every time, you never followed through, he'd be even richer. You said it's because you could handle yourself without her help, but, admittedly, you didn't hate his company that much.

As far as house guests go, it could be worse. It's not like he eats all your food, talks your ears off, or is unfunny. He was just there. A pain in your ass sometimes, like when he insists on being half a step behind you during patrols and never fails to tell you how great your ass looks from behind. Never a malevolent presence, just annoyingly noticeable.

His boots were clunky, and he smelled of faint cigarettes and alcohol. He also hated silence. He was fidgety and anxious, even if his intentions were stealth, he couldn't help but break the tension and open his mouth. At times against his will, he just wanted to be noticed that bad. He just needed to be around you that bad.

"I keep telling the landlord to fix it, but he insists it's just fine. 'Nothin' some glue won't fix'." But you had tried gluing it. Had it not been for the clear shit jammed in the lock, the window would've just come right open with the flick of a finger.

"I could fix it for you." He went ignored while you had made your way to your bathroom, taking your hair down from the claw clip it had been stuck in for the past few hours. A slight moan of relief slipped through your lips as your fingers carded through it to massage your scalp.

"You know how to fix windows?"

"Well...no. But it can't be that hard. I've been around a few hundred years, surely I can figure out how to fix a bloody window." What he meant to say (if he had the balls) was that he would be more than happy to learn how to fix a window for you. It would give him an excuse to hang around, it would keep him in your good graces for a solid month, and he wouldn't have to break an entering anymore. Granted, his preferred place of entry had long been broken and he could always come through the front door, but it was a matter of principle.

You looked him up and down, trying to decipher if this was a set up for a joke or if he was actually serious, but he kept his head down. He hadn't been able to blush since he was a human, but the habit had a way of rearing its head for you.

He was so pretty too. With his high cheekbones and the way the warm light made his complexion look less ghastly. As ironic and cliche as it would be to say, he looked slightly angelic. Like one who fell from Heaven and donned the dark and mysterious charade to make it hurt less. He would burn away under a cross just to make it back to Heaven. Nearly break his spine falling out of windows and bleed out taking stabs if it meant he was closer to your doors. If there was one thing Spike did well, it was devotion.

"You wouldn't even know where to start. I'll just call Xander or something."

"What're you gonna do that for!"

"Because, Spike," you laughed incredulously, confused as to if this was going to become an argument or form a chip on his shoulder. "If I want something fixed, I'm going to call someone who does it for a living."

"But would Xander do it for free?"

"Would you?"

"I wouldn't charge anything of monetary value." You snorted, not surprised at all with his answer.

"You are such a whore, you know that?"

"What can I say, baby?" He leaned against the door frame of your bathroom, where you stood staring at your reflection in the mirror. He was happy that his nonexistent reflection could betray him. He was grateful to be a part of this routine - your routine- in a way that didn't disrupt your peace. It was soft. Almost domestic.

You were so meticulous about the way you scrubbed your face and brushed your teeth. He liked how when you took off your makeup the glitter remained. You sparkled at the right angles, really fucking sparkled. Of course, he was going to sit and stare at you; mascara still not completely wiped away, hair tied back with a fuzzy headband, lips agitated from being bit throughout the day. It was poetic. Second nature to him. He didn't need to breath, but it came to him then, overwhelming and filling his lungs like water until he was full as he stared at you in the mirror with not even his own reflection to judge him.

"I'm gonna hop in the shower."

"How rude, without me?" Damn, he sounded like a bloody idiot. You only looked him up and down, trying to appear deeply disgusted but stopped just shy of mildly annoyed.

"Get out of my apartment before I stake you." You slammed the bathroom door in his face, hiding your blush behind the wood.

"That's not a no." His voice is muffled behind the door, and as much as you'd like to believe he didn't hear it, you did laugh.

***********************************************************

Spike had to have been a cat in a previous life, is what you decided when you found him still on your bed, nose in some magazine he found pretending to care about the newest Natasha Denona palette.

"That crypt must be uncomfortable as hell for you to still be here." You skated around your room to sink beside him. He reaches across his side to pull out a bottle of water and hands it to you.

"Your showers are hot as hell; I'm surprised you didn't pass out in there." He flips through the pages nonchalantly, pretending not to be incredibly fixated at the water dripping from the nape of your neck and disappearing into your shirt.

"You would've loved that, wouldn't you? Getting to play 'knight and shining armor' while I'm conveniently naked." The sound waxy pages being torn was a surprise. So much of you and his banter was contingent on the assumption that neither of you meant anything serious so nothing would become anything.

Spike, who spent most of his mortal adult life swallowing his feelings until his stomach became an endless chasm where his feelings went to fester rather than die, was more than okay with this unspoken arrangement. Sarcasm was a second language to you. You were used to your words not mattering, especially since in your group of friends, your existence seemed to matter far less than everyone else's. You wondered if that was why you and Spike got along so well.

He just got you. Maybe a side effect of him being around you whenever he could. He just got you. In a stupid way. In an annoying way. The kind of way that made you worried that reading minds was also one of his vampiric powers. He wormed his stupid way into your brain, slithering around in his own sort of Spike way til you didn't know where his influence began.

He did sort of have this hypnotic way of speech. Maybe because he was a poet. Poets have to have some sort of hypnotic power, right? Surely, there was some connection between rhythms and brain waves that made the effect of Spike's voice so persuasive. Maybe it's not the rhythm and it's just the honesty. Ironic, since the basis of your "relationship" was built on never assuming that the other meant what they said, but who cares. It gave you guys flavor. Something to keep things interesting.

"I'll have you know; I am a very old-fashioned guy with manners." You snorted as his response. He talked about his "old-fashioned" ways a lot. Maybe to convince you that he was a gentleman. Gentleman your ass, you'd seen what he kept in his crypt.

"My deepest apologies for assuming that a guy that used railroad spikes as a murder weapon of choice wouldn't be above jumping at the opportunity to see me naked."

"Am I that transparent?"

"When it comes to mirrors, yeah." His scoff was lost in the sound of a car horn going off across the street. Damn, you needed a new place. He had complained to you about the noise before. If you didn't leave near a busy street, he would try his luck spending the night far more than he already did. Each blare deepened the scowl on his face as he flinched at the sound, even louder from where he sat in front of it.

"Those death buggies have to be the worst thing to come out of the 20th century. So obnoxious, and for what?"

"I imagine they are more convenient than horse drawn carriages."

"Yeah, more convenient and not even half the charm." He turned his head to gaze out the window. "It's not even a nice car! I'd rather ride around in the fucking Angel Mobile than drive around in that thing."

"You are so dramatic. Usually I just," you swing your leg over his waist, straddling and reaching over to close the window. He swallowed hard at the feeling of your chest pressing against the magazine, the only boundary between him and you, and the nonchalance of the action. "Shut the window." You felt him tense beneath you, his right hand awkwardly meeting your hip, blue eyes staring up at you through dark eyelashes. "Then again, I'm not a pansy who needs complete silence to sleep."

He cleared his throat before he spoke. "I sleep in a cemetery, love, ain't much noise around those parts." His eyes wandered everywhere they could but the worst part about beautiful people is that there is no unsightly place to avert your gaze. He couldn't stare at your gorgeous eyes, or your stunning nose, or your lips to distract himself from the steadily growing boner that you were sitting right on top of. You were no better than he was.

Within the context of the unspoken agreement, this meant absolutely nothing. The boner was just a normal reaction, that didn't have to mean anything. The way he was looking at you was a bit hard to ignore, but that was the way he always looked at you. He was a lot closer right now, sure, but that stupid lovesick look that you have spent years trying to ignore, totally just a joke. Not real at all. A trick of the light, in fact. The hard-on was very real though.

After sitting there for a few seconds too long, you shift your weight to move back to your side of the bed, but his hands keep you in your place. " 'm cold", he mutters, his thumb rubbing circles between where your shorts meet your bare skin.

"Yeah?" You feel him pressing up against your core. "I didn't think you could get cold."

" Me either but-", you lowered yourself completely on his clothed dick and the groan he let out was salacious. "Here we are." The frigid way he moved made his lie believable. Incredibly cautious, hesitant. No idea what to do with himself. He ran his hands along your thighs, up and down your side, one cold hand sliding underneath your shirt, rubbing the hem of it between his pointer finger and his thumb.

You leaned forward, warm breath fanning against his nose. It smelled like mint. You smelled like some sort of cocoa butter. Smooth and soft on top of him and he didn't know if you were going to roll right off or melt into his skin. Your hands come to the sides of his face, and you stare intently at him. He felt like he was under a microscope with the way you looked at him like you were committing each detail of him to memory so that even when you closed his eyes, it was still him burning in the forefront of your mind.

"You gonna kiss me?" You whispered, pressing yourself further into him. He let out a breathy laugh.

"What, a guy's always gotta make the first move?" With that, you leaned down to give him what was meant to be a quick peck. A tester. A tease. But when you give Spike an inch, he takes a mile, and he took the opportunity to devour you. Mouth open, sloppy, wet kisses while his hands worked as eagerly as his tongue did. You were a calming presence, slow and sane as you grabbed fistfuls of his shirt to try and ground the both of you.

Breathing through your nose, you inhaled him. The faint smell of smoke, the fresh smell of whatever he washed the gel from his hair with, the distinctly Spike musk. Your thighs wrapped him more closely, subtly grinding into his lap, ignoring the slight burn on your knees from the friction between them and your sheets. His large hands covered swathes of skin, cooling you where you grew too hot from his touch. When he had his fill, he broke away from you, still nose to nose, a string of saliva still between the two of you.

"Do you wanna spend the night?" Your voice was somehow meek as if there was any way in hell he would say no to you. He breathed out, turning his head into the crook of your neck, leaving searing kisses on your silky skin, worshipping at his altar, and thanking who or whatever got him here tonight. He kisses you from your neck, along your jawline, to the corner of your lips.

"Yes", he whispers against your skin. He bucks his hips into you, the imprint of his cock and the rough material of his jeans kissing your pussy through the thin layers of material. You nearly choke on his tongue at the feeling. Fuck.

Your eyes are closed, hips moving furiously against his, too blissed out to even care about the steadily growing wet patch in your underwear. You're lost in kisses, kisses that overwhelm and confuse and steal your breath until you wonder how much you need to breathe anyway. Along with not needing to breathe, you learned they must have incredible resolve. He chases you. Not like how a wolf chases a lamb but how the sun chases the moon.

He pulls and you push for breath, some sort of reprieve, some time for your mind to catch up with your body because right now everything but the way the seams of his jeans catch your clit is one of the only things on your mind. He pulls you, still, his hands squeezing at your waist, moving up to cup your breasts, thumbing at your nipples, and flicking the already hard peaks. And you push, still, not in protest but in harmony. Your hips pressing down, his jerking up. Your hands tugging his hair, his squeezing your waist. It was good. It was so good.

"What is the point", he starts breathlessly, "of these damn shorts if they're so thin. You're leaking right through, love." He smiles against you, sharp teeth grazing against your cheek as he smirks.

"Take 'em off me then." For once in his life, he takes his time. The desperation of his prior movements forgotten as he looks at you as he trails a finger from your chest down between the valley of your breasts, to your navel. He draws invisible shapes along your stomach, diamonds, hearts, and letters spelling m-i-n-e. And he stalls there. Looking from beneath you, smug as you ground yourself onto his dick in an attempt to move him along.

He was amused. Fascinated. You in your own world, mewling, moaning, putting on a show just for him. Choosing to ignore how sticky your panties had gotten, how much they stuck to your cunt as you wiggled your hips as if you could get any closer. Your tits moving with you, the way your mouth was slightly agape, the way you keened when you rubbed against him just right. It was no motivation for him to move his hands at all, not when it was much more rewarding to angle his hips up and make you see stars. "You gonna cum like this?" He crooned, full of fake sympathy.

"You're really gonna make me get myself off." You rolled your eyes, maybe out of pleasure, maybe out of faux annoyance. Either way, his hand slithered to the waistband of your shorts and dipped even deeper. He left feather-light touches on your clit which sent jolts of electricity up your spine. Overcome with the tightening feeling in your belly, your hands grabbed at his shoulders as your hips worked and worked you snapped. Impossibly wet and dazed, you rocked into him until the high had passed and the stars had left from behind your eyelids leaving only Spike.

His fingers still, in your panties, he moves to slide them and your shorts off your body. You hover slightly, still too sensitive to rub your bare pussy against him. You fidget with the button of his jeans and zipper, Spike's hands coming to cover yours to ease the shakiness. Maybe to give the appearance that he was much calmer than he was. He was painfully hard, and you felt it when you palmed him through his boxers after getting his pants down enough. Where his tip sat was a wet spot. You smirked.

"Did I get your dick that wet?" A shiver went down his spine. The heat from your palm was felt through his boxers. Your hand was barely big enough to cover it. Before either of you was prepared for it, he flipped you on your back. His hands sat on either side of your head while yours removed him from his boxers. He was so big.

You tore your gaze away from his cock to meet his gaze. He still looked at you the same. Pupils widened from lust, cheeks with a slightly pink tinge, lips puffy, eyes looking down at you with the same look they always had. It's then he leans down to kiss you for the millionth time. No urgency, less messy, a kiss like he was trying to wake you from a thousand-year slumber.

Your hand still on his cock, you pumped it a few times, swiping your thumb against his tip to lubricate his dick. He groaned into your mouth, humming in pleasure. You try to line him up to sink in your hole, but he slaps you on the wrist. "Don't want your cunt tonight," he mumbled in between kisses, "Jus' let me feel you."

He pumped his cock a few times before slotting it in between the meat of your thighs. The veins and ridges of his dick would occasionally slide between your folds, but that wasn't the focus. No matter how much you wiggled for him to plant his cock so far deep it kissed your cervix, you were ignored as he squeezed your thighs together, panting as he fucked them.

The juxtaposition made your head dizzy. The softness with which he kissed you and the fervor of his dick between your thighs, them getting wetter with the accumulation of precum leaking from his dick. It only forced him to press harder, leaving handprints from how hard he gripped. "Such a pretty thing, aren't you." He sighed out, his pace still even but his breaths far from it. "Go ahead and touch that pretty cunt f' me."

As much as your brain wasn't working, it wasn't needed to do what you were told. Bleary-headed, your hand traveled from the outside of your leg to between your folds. Still wet from your previous orgasm, it didn't take much to just slip a couple fingers in, moaning as you did. One hand toyed with your tit as the other toyed with your clit, your hips wanting to buck into your hand had it not been for Spike's palm on your stomach.

Had he had the composure, he would have made some sarcastic comment. Slow down, love, what's the rush, is what he would've said had his thrusts not been as sloppy as they were. He pulled away from your lips to see the mess he was making. White beads pooled on the skin of your stomach, dripping down your thighs like liquid pearls. And you. Low warm light bouncing off your skin, lip tucked in your teeth, staring right up at him. It took all of him not to cum at the sight.

Not before you did, he decided, which by the way your moans pitched up wasn't that far away. Each "accidental" slide into you was met with a jerk of your hips. "Stop it", you squealed, the bucking of your hips screaming otherwise.

"Feels too good, doesn't it." Then he did it again. His large hand drifts around before grabbing your abandoned tit, groping it until you hit your limit again. Your chest heaved unevenly as you tried to catch your breath as Spike's hips sped up, stuttered, then stopped as his cum splashed on your stomach and breasts.

Spent and not knowing what to do, he kisses you again. He smiles into it, and to his surprise, you do too. Like it was the only thing that made sense to do. The fuzz gradually fades from your mind, the noise from the multiple fans running and the faint humming of electricity apparent again. There's a breeze coming in from your window and you giggle.

It snuck up on him, this softness.

It didn’t happen in a bolt of lightning or some earthshaking, Slayer-slaying sort of moment. No, it crept in slow, easy, like a song he half-remembered from before the demon, some long-forgotten lullaby winding its way through cracked ribs and ruined veins. Now, he’s got it stuck on repeat, and the worst part is, he doesn’t mind.

He used to think love was all fire and pain. Should be, right? He was made for ruin. Got his heart broke by that stuck-up bint Cecily, fought for Dru like a rabid dog, wore rejection from the Slayer like a second skin. Hell, even Darla and ’Gelus tossed him aside at the earliest convenience, not that he ever gave a tinker’s damn about their esteem. Every bit of love he’s ever known came sharp-edged and blood-slick, costing him pride and sanity and skin.

But you—

You giggle from the bathroom, the sound bright and clear over the faint hum of the pipes. It burbles up like champagne, a little drunk-sounding, and he can hear the splash of water as you shift in the tub. Knowing you, you’ve dragged a wine cooler in with you, meaning you’ll be too-hot and chatty the moment the water’s wicked from your skin—and he’ll listen to every word, because he never wants to miss a thing.

You’re different. Love with you is bubbles, is towels too warm from the radiator, is kisses pressed to the corner of his mouth when you think he’s not quite awake. It’s honey on his tongue instead of gore, comfort so sweet it should rot his teeth.

“Spike,” you call, sing-song, full of that mischievous lilt that always makes something in him go more than a bit half-witted, blood that ain’t his rushing down south. “C’mon. Water’s gonna get cold.”

He smirks to himself. Big Bad, brought low by bath time.

“Not happenin’,” he calls back, lifting his fag to take a long, slow pull. He smokes with his head stuck out the window, not wanting to infect your breathing with all that rot. Bloody tosser, he is, now, thinking about things like that. “You’ve already stolen my dignity. You’re not gettin’ my last shred of masculinity too.”

Another splash.

“But it’s all foamy,” you say, wheedling, “and warm. And my boobs look fantastic.”

He snorts. “They always look fantastic, kitten.”

“You’re missing the view…”

“Got the whole soddin’ thing memorized,” he mutters under his breath, though his hand is already twitching—itching—to toss the cigarette aside and slink toward the siren-call of your voice.

The Scoobies―stupid nickname, matches their bloody stupid personalities―they like to joke about him now. Xapper, mostly, talking up a big game about how he’s been defanged. The Slayer grits her teeth every time Spike drives to her house to pick you up, engine running too loud, making some muttered comment about him being your personal chauffeur. Even Little Bit’s been caught whispering “whipped” behind her palm, not knowing he hears everything. They think he’s been neutered all over again, tamed, domesticated.

Let ’em think it. Let ’em imagine he’s some shell of himself, panting after you like a lapdog. Truth is, they’re just jealous. Jealous of the way you smile when he passes you your tea, jealous of how you whimper his name like a hymn, hot little body writhing as he runs his hands all over. Jealous of the way you curl into him at night, muttering sleepy little secrets into his skin, affectionate, and meaning every last one. He’s never had someone to himself the way he has you: untouched ’til he got there, singularly devoted, all for him. And that kind of commitment—real, chosen, lasting—makes the rest of it fade: the flames, the chains, the clawing need to be anything but alone. You make the past almost worth it.

“Please?” you croon, dragging out the vowel sound like it’s foreplay. “I’ll scoot forward. I’ll be good.”

And that’s the problem, innit? You’re always so bloody good.

With a muttered curse and a flash of irritation at himself, he tosses the butt of his cig out the window and heads for the bathroom, already peeling off his shirt. You’re gonna gloat, he knows it. Already sees the smirk on your face, the way you’ll tuck yourself between his knees like you were made to be there, all curves and warm, slippery skin.

God help him. He’s gone.

The bathroom’s a bit steamy already when he slips in, fog clinging to the mirror. You’re lounging back in the clawfoot tub, knees poking out of the water, bubbles piled so high it’s a miracle you haven’t disappeared completely under them. You beam when you see him, unabashed and shameless, playing the smug little nymph who’s just summoned her favourite demon with nothing more than a giggle and a moan.

“Took you long enough,” you say, budging over as promised, making room like this was always going to happen.

Spike huffs, tugging his boots off one at a time. “You really are a menace.”

“Your menace,” you correct, chin tilted up with the kind of confidence that drives him mad. “Now get in before I change my mind.”

“Oh no. Not that,” he says sardonically. “Anything but the dreaded mind-changing.”

He strips slow and dramatic, knows you like the show, even if you pretend not to. Your eyes dart down when he pushes his jeans down, and your teeth catch on your bottom lip as though you’re trying to hide how much you’re staring. That look—just that—could bring a man to his knees. He’s killed for less. Sliding in behind you, he hisses a bit at the heat, then exhales once he’s settled, your back flush to his chest. Your hair tickles his chin, your skin damp and flushed, the tub too small and too full. Perfect. You let out a satisfied hum and melt against him, like it’s the most natural thing in the world, and maybe it is.

“I swear,” he mutters, arms folding around your waist beneath the water, “you’ve got me completely bollocksed.”

You laugh, leaning your head back onto his shoulder. “Yeah. That a bad thing?”

He kisses your temple, then your cheek, then lower, just under your jaw where your pulse flutters—a secret only for his ears. “Not complainin’. S’just a bit of a come-down from eatin’ hearts and evisceratin’ priests, yeah?”

You roll your eyes, but you’re smiling. “You’ll survive. Big Bad can take a bubble bath now and then. You’re still scary. But, y’know, in a sexy kinda way.”

He groans into your skin. “M’never gettin’ my reputation back.”

“Nope,” you agree cheerfully, reaching forward to pluck a handful of bubbles and plop them onto his head in a crown of soapy foam. “Too late. You’re mine now. My cozy, bath-loving, emotionally-attached vampire boyfriend.”

Spike scoffs, but he doesn’t move to brush them off. “You’re lucky you’re cute.”

You tilt your head to look back at him, lips curved up. “And?”

“And I’m bloody buggerin’ ruined.”

His hands roam beneath the water, not looking to start anything—yet. They rest low on your hips, then glide up your belly, like he’s checking you’re real. You sigh, a soft, contented little sound, and that’s it. That’s the stake through his heart. There’s no pain or fire, just a noise of ease and trust. In him.

“You know,” you murmur, eyes fluttering shut, “you’re really good at this.”

“What, bathin’?”

“No. This. The whole… making-me-feel-like-I’m-worth-it thing.”

His breath catches slightly. “That’s because you are.”

You shift, twist a bit so you can see him better, water sloshing a bit over the side. He cups your face with one hand, bubble-damp and still dripping, and leans in, pressing his lips to yours. It’s warm and solid, like a promise.

“You really love me,” you whisper when you pull back, eyes wide as if it still surprises you.

You say it like you still can’t quite believe it. He can’t, either. Deep down, the doubt still sleeps. He watches your face, waiting―always waiting―for the laugh, the flinch, the way it all usually goes. But you don’t. You smile, stunned and real, as though you’re feeling it settle in your chest too.

There’s a beat where everything holds, and there’s no laughter, no flinch. It’s only you, looking at him like he’s something you chose, like you’d do it again.

“More than anything,” he says simply, truth so heavy it sinks straight to the bottom of the tub. “More than I’ve ever loved anything. Ever.”

He means that. Means it in the kind of way that terrifies him: quiet, vast, swallowing. And that’s because he’s had obsessions, addictions; people he’d burn the world for, starve himself for, kill for without hesitation just to hear their praise. But this isn’t the same. You don’t demand things, don’t test him the way Dru did or spit in his face like Buffy. You look at him, with those soft eyes and that stupid little smile, and he wants to be good. It isn’t even about redemption. It’s the fact that, for the first time in ages—maybe ever—he matters.

You blink a few times, like you’re overwhelmed—maybe you are—but the next thing you do is reach for the mostly-empty wine cooler sitting on the rim of the tub. You take a sip, then turn and offer it up to him with a cheeky little tilt of your head.

“Want some?”

He looks at the bottle like it might bite him. “What, and ruin my street cred?”

“You’re in a bath full of bubbles, Spike.”

“… Fair.”

He takes it, drinks, and grimaces. It’s toxic—or nearabouts—sickly-sweet and full of something artificial, just like most of the swill humans poison themselves with. You grin as though he’s passed some kind of test, though, and suddenly he doesn’t mind so much.

“Tastes like shite, baby. Not sure how you choke this down,” he says for the hell of it. “Gonna drink piss, it oughta be the real stuff.”

“Ew. No thank you. Smells like paint thinner.” The scrunch of your nose and the way you shudder is cute as anything. You waggle an eyebrow at him. “I shouldn’t even be drinking, y’know. Not legal.”

“Would be in the homeland,” he mutters, prompting an ‘oooooh’ sound the way you always do whenever he does something you find stereotypically British. He jabs a finger into the sensitive divot of your belly-button, a low bark of laughter escaping at your loud squeal. “Whoever got you ’em must be a real bad influence, then.”

You giggle again, soft and indulgent, and lean back against him. “The worst.”

Your hair sticks to his skin. The air’s thick and hot and wet, clinging to both of you, and it should be uncomfortable, cramped, undignified… but it isn’t. It’s peace, and that’s the part that guts him.

Peace is fragile, he knows that. Spike’s not supposed to have this. Somewhere deep down in the bones of him, he’s waiting for the moment it breaks, when you wake up and realise you could have more, when the Scoobies stop whispering and start prying, when some prophecy tears its way through your front door and takes him out like trash.

But if it’s coming, let it come. Let it try, because if this is all he ever gets, then it’s more than he ever had any right to ask for. While he has it, though, he’ll hold you like the last warmth of sunlight before night falls.

You sigh, all sleepy-soft and trusting, and tip forward again.

“Okay,” you say, “soak time over. You can wash my hair now.”

“Oh, bloody hell,” he gripes.

He’s already reaching for the shampoo.

There’s something heady about watching you open things he’s bought you. Sure, the credit cards are the great poof’s way of making sure you’re provided for, but it’s about time Spike got back in on the family money. Ain’t exactly his, ain’t exactly come by honestly, but if anyone’s owed compensation for generational trauma, it’s him. The bloodlines of hell still recognize sire-claim even if the soul-havers don’t, and with Darla somehow returned from dust and kicking ’round again, the Order’s financial backers have been bending arse over to avoid a power dispute. Not that the old bitch seems keen on taking up her place of seniority: a woman of her time, that one, too willing to go along with Angelus to take charge of her line. That, and Dru’s re-siring her makes the chain of command too confusing to figure out.

Oh, well. Sod ’em. It’s Peaches’s problem. Always is.

The Aurelius estate is a fortress of trust funds and ghost accounts. And Spike’s got access again, courtesy of the little plastic rectangles bearing the name William P. sent by post along with a letter from his grandsire. Didn’t even bother with pleasantries, did he? No, just a line about responsibility and a warning not to spend it all on ‘foolish pursuits’, as if loving you’s somehow a waste. Wanker. Not only that, but the added indignity of the bloody thing is it opening with a curt ‘as promised, Pratt’—always ready to throw in a dig ‘bout his poncy human name.

A small price to pay in the name of lasting security, he thinks. Now, he’s finally free to follow through on a little spoiling.

You gasp when you find the velvet-lined box on the bed, wrapped in brown paper and sealed with a red ribbon made of real silk. He likes the drama of it all: leaving little gifts like kills for you to find, emblems of his love for you, eyes tracking as you tear them open to find the treasures within.

“Spike,” you breathe, drawing the chain up to the light. It’s gold, the real stuff, none of that low-grade plated junk. Delicate, with a long, tapered charm, it has a nice big garnet studded in at the top. Reminds him a bit of a railroad spike, though he’s not telling you that. “You didn’t have to―”

“Yeah, I did.” He leans against the doorframe, staring with that stupid too-tight feeling in his chest, like his heart wants to start beating again at the sight of you. “Saw it ’n thought of you. That’s the deal, innit?”

He almost didn’t buy it. Too fancy, maybe. Too much. You get squirrelly about this sort of thing, still mucked about from your dad’s neglect. But he wanted to see that look on your face again—the one you wore when he laid that coat on your shoulders, the one that said you couldn’t quite believe someone thought you were worth the dosh.

He sees that look now.

You gaze wide-eyed at him, as though you aren’t sure what to do with his statement. He shrugs, casual as ever as he enters your personal space, sidling in behind you.

“’Sides,” he adds, swiping the necklace from your grasp and lifting your hair over your shoulder. The clasp takes him a few goes, tiny as it is, but it comes free with a little click, allowing him to fasten it behind your neck. “You deserve nice things.”

Turning to him, you lips curve softly as his fingers trace the pendant resting beneath the hollow of your throat like a collar. Marked. The garnet catches the light, blood-bright. He wants to kiss it, wants to press his mouth where it lays and bite down to feel the truth of it. Of you.

“So do you,” you whisper back at him.

But he doesn’t need you to get him things to be happy. He doesn’t know how to explain to you without sounding like a pillock that you’re the only thing he needs. You’re young—in a way that would probably make him feel guilty for corrupting you if he was more like one of your little pals—and still swayed by shiny baubles. It’s not about buying you, though. Been there, done that, got him nothing but pain and trouble. It’s different. You love him with or without the trinkets. It still eats at him, how someone like you can look past the monster in him, past the chip and the history and the bodies in his closet. Not disregard, no, but deciding that they’re not worth the cost of leaving. When you look at him, when you kiss his knuckles as if they’ve never torn anyone open, he believes it, or wants to. Mostly, Spike just enjoys providing for you. It reminds him that he can give more than grief and gore, makes him feel manly in a way that doesn’t require claws or carnage or cruelty. A claiming bite, made in cash.

’Course, your merry band of morons don’t see it that way.

At first, they think he’s stealing it all. Shove him up against the wall, stake to the chest, demanding to know where he swiped it from or whose corpse he filched it off. He’s not that bloody pathetic, and he says as much before you yell at them to back off, li’l hand sneaking into his back pocket and copping a feel before withdrawing his wallet to show off his newly regained fortune. There’s grumbling after that, a few nasty things said about the souled prick who set him up―he’s keen enough on that line of discussion, if the Slayer wasn’t always so defensive of her one true love―and that’s the end of that. Threats turn to taunts, and he’s never minded words when fists and feet, whips and chains hurt so much worse.

The truth is, they’re probably seething mad. Spend all their time playing goody-goody and all they get are a bunch of bruises and scrapping by in a 9-to-5 just to afford three square a day. Meanwhile, all you gotta do to live the good life is love him. It makes him smug enough to show off whenever he can.

When he drops a new pair of boots at your feet at the Magic Box―soft leather, real Italian make, fit you like they’re tailor-made―Zeppo snorts into his coffee.

“Wow. Sleeping with Spike comes with perks, huh?” It’s a little too defensive to be a true wise-crack, pointed with an edge of mean. “Should’ve tried it back when he was living in my basement. Might’ve scored a matching set.”

Too easy. He takes bait like no-one else.

“Please. Gotta offer more than a hole to get into my wallet, mate.” Spike glances at you, smirking when your face goes warm. You know what’s coming. One of the best bits about you? You don’t flinch, don’t get shy when he runs his mouth. “My girl’s sharp as hell, deadly where it counts, and tight in all the right ways. You? Just a bobblehead with knees that click.”

He’s rewarded with a face turned the colour of a sunburned tomato, the boy choking on his coffee so hard it sprays all over a stack of bridal magazines he’s been made to look through. He sputters, glaring daggers, but can’t seem to get a word out past the sound of his own dignity combusting. The Slayer makes a strangled sound—half gasp, half growl—and bolts for the back room before she blows her self-control all to hell.

Next to the boy, demon girl lets out a snorting chuckle.

“He’s not wrong,” she says bluntly, flipping a page. “Your knees do make that weird crackle when you get off the couch. Very unsexy, like old popcorn.”

A second later, the rhythmic thump-thump-thump of fists hitting the punching bag starts up, hard and fast. Spike smiles. He knows exactly who Buffy’s picturing with every hit. Didn’t miss the way her shoulders tensed when you laughed, the way she watched your hand when it found his without hesitation, as if it’s a betrayal. It burns her up inside, he reckons, that he’s found peace where she’s only ever had war.

He still remembers the day he found out. Learned before the rest, though it didn’t keep for much longer. He was trying to sneak through the back of the magic shop to spend some time with you in the basement. Stumbled on the Slayer instead. Tried to play off his presence, act casual. Lingered too long―long enough for her secrets to start spilling.

“Everything here is hard and bright and violent. Everything I feel, everything I touch. This is Hell. Just getting through the next moment, and the one after that. Knowing what I’ve lost.”

He figured then that she was strugglin’, looking for something to seek shelter in. He’s no genius, but he’s pretty sure he gets how that story would’ve ended: rage and ruin, him all but destroyed, her no better. Stayed away after that, let the Scoobies do the heavy-liftin’. Not interested in kissin’ her woes better when he had―has―far more interesting places to kiss on his baby. His girl.

He shakes off the memory. Bad omen.

“You good, Harris?” Spike drawls in Lackbrain’s direction, mock-concerned. The boy coughs, wheezes, waves him off—like that’s going to repair the shrapnel of his pride.

Worth it.

Red mutters something about capitalism and exploitation under her breath, but even she doesn’t refuse the takeout when Spike foots the bill. Something nice from the restaurant down the street, not the usual filth they drag in from pilfering through pockets for the last tarnished penny. The others make their fun, but his baby’s gotta eat well. That, and Captain Forehead gets the statements on his spending—and he wants that bastard to know he’s treating you the way you deserve. Another nail in the Buffy-and-Angel coffin. He might not feel anything for the chit now, but anything involving riling ‘Gelus up is motivation enough in his books.

The Magic Box is all mildew and musty shelves, stale incense and the stench of dried demon guts, but you kiss him like it’s Versailles: soft and grateful, a little bit hungry, uncaring of the complaints you get from the rest. You kiss him like there’s no one in the room but him, like you aren’t ashamed of him, don’t think he’s anything less than enough. It shuts him up, takes all the clever little comebacks and bitter asides and melts them into something warm behind his ribs.

You’re… achy. That’s the word Spike lands on after trying a dozen others. Achy, squirmy, soft-eyed and irritable in the same breath.

You curl up on the bed in one of his threadbare old shirts—black, holes at the hem, still smelling like smoke and him—towel laid out underneath, clutching a heating pad and looking like heaven in bare legs and frustration. You’ve been this way all day: overwrought and oversensitive, caught somewhere between a whimper and a tantrum. It’s making him feral.

S’like this every time it comes around. Makes him feel like he’s never wanted you more.

You make a noise, a sort of sighing growl, and Spike shifts his eyes from the telly. From his vantage point on the sofa, he can just see you through the crack of the bedroom door. You wriggle again, curling onto your side. He catches the scent, rich and warm, sexy as all hell, like rust and sugar, or rain hitting hot pavement. It’s the kind of smell that makes the demon in him rise below the surface, temples tightening and fangs prickling at his gums like they know what’s coming.

He swipes the remote from beside him, turns off the noise. Slinking down the hall, he pushes the door open fully, quiet and careful. Then he walks over and sinks onto the edge of the bed with you.

“You alright, baby?” he asks.

You pout, eyes glassy and desperate. Close, now. “No.”

“S’wrong?” He lets his hand drift idly to your knee, purposefully vague, grin threatening at your subtle attempt to widen your legs a touch in silent invitation. Not the game, though. Gotta say it.

“Everything hurts. I’m bloated,” you complain. “My back’s killing me. And you’re—you’re looking at me. Like you wanna do something about it.”

“I do.”

You squint up at him, half-hearted protest at the ready. “It’s gross.”

He tilts his head, brow lifting in amusement. “It’s not. Say it every time, don’t I?”

“Spike…”

Easy, easy girl. The indecision’s performative now, innit? He can smell it on you, the salty tang combining with copper sweetness to form a potent elixir. Arousal and blood, tucked up between your thighs like a pressie just for him. He needs it.

“Want you.” Spike leans over you, voice dropping into something darker. He lets the yellow bleed into his eyes a bit, just to hear the pitter-patter of your heart reach fever pitch. “Want all of you. Always. Doesn’t matter what time of the month it is.”

Your mouth twists, unsure. He sees you want to give in. Not yet.

“Got a nummy treat for Daddy, yeah?” He doesn’t often voice that fixation of his plainly; hits too close to home for you, reminds you of what you don’t have. Gotta ease you into it real careful, get you used to it. And bugger if it doesn’t make a little whine sound in your throat, tears well up a bit. Desperate. “Gonna bleed for me? I’ll lap it all up, promise. None to waste.”

You choke on your breath, fingers clutching at his nape as he noses against your pulse, gives the vein thrumming through your skin a quick lick to get you going.

“Bet you’re sensitive,” he purrs. “Little thing like you, all full ’n sore. Could probably make you cry just from touchin’ you.”

He withdraws, relishes the pleading noise you make when you think he’s leaving, but he’s got a different goal in mind. Moving down, he kneels between your legs like a man praying for absolution. You resist at first, soft and trembling, legs warm against his palms as if they’ve got second thoughts—but he’s stronger, and he’ll win. He witnesses the shift of emotions play out on your face: the uneasiness, the desire, the pride and shame and need fighting it out in your head.

When he starts peeling your knickers down slow, you don’t stop him, and that’s how he knows victory’s assured. You stare at him, pink-cheeked and trembling, as he slips them off, holds the gusset up and takes a deep inhale from the crinkly pad stuck there, fang flashing at the aroma. He tosses them away; won’t need them when the source is about to give in.

“Lemme have a taste,” he says, a bit coaxing. “Make you pop like a rocket. Take the edge off.”

A second of hesitation, then you nod, tiny and mindless and obedient.

“Nuh-uh.” He shakes his head, thumb slipping down to circle whisper-soft against your clit, all but purring at the stifled cry you let out. “Gotta use your words. Tell ol’ Spike: yeah or no?”

“Ye—yeah,” you sigh, crumbling like a house of cards. Beautiful, the way you break. “Please?”

Don’t gotta say much else. He settles back against the headboard, already stripping his shirt off, chest bare and hungry-eyed as you struggle to your knees beside him. Scooting lower, he offers you a lazy curl of the lip, hooded gaze running down your body as he reaches for you.

“Come on,” he says, the invite you’ve been waiting for. You’re already crawling up, up, over by the time he adds, “Sit on my face, baby, yeah.”

Your knees are planted firm to either side of his head, thighs trembling, hands braced on the wall as he puts his mouth to your red-slick folds. He laves flat and slow and filthy through your slit, hands holding fast to your hips like they belong there—they do—when you try to jerk away. His tongue catches the first drop, thick and metallic, and his whole body thrums. You cry out, thighs flexing, and he can smell the salt in the air as your eyes spill over.

The blood is hot, a bit syrupy in its nutrient-rich form as it coats his lips and chin and throat like a lolly. You’re a delicacy, and he’s consumed by consuming, eating you as if he’s starved―as if this is what he’s for. S’like a rich wine, aged to perfection, tasting like heaven and ruin and life. Nose brushing your clit, his tongue laps and curls at your tight little hole, scooping up the flavour and feeding as though it’s his last meal. He growls, low and constant, the demon rippling into view and catching against your skin.

As always, it makes you shake, naughty when you chase the scraping of his fangs against your innermost thigh, keening high and clear. When he snags on slick pink flesh, you come fast, too fast, hips jolting and breath hitching on a sob.

Spike doesn’t stop, doesn’t slow down, keeping you pressed against him while he licks and licks like he can’t get enough, listening to you cry and moan. It’s the best kind of music, a symphony in his ears.

“Can’t—” you gasp, legs shaking. “I can’t—Spike, it’s too much—”

You tip forward, only the headboard holding you upright, and lift your hips as though you mean to leave. He’s a bad, rude man; doesn’t let up, purses his lips around where you leak slick and hot and sucks, sending you shrieking into another orgasm. He dips a finger into you and finds you clenching, pulsing, too snug for anything more.

“No, no…”

You’re whining, dithering between grinding down and lifting off, a weak protest. He pulls away only to graze at the skin down your thigh, smirking at the winking of your entry when you catch sight of his face, ridged and monstrous and covered in blood.

“Can take it, baby,” he purrs, licking his finger clean. “You always do.”

He returns to his meal.

This time, when you finish, your whole frame goes taut, hips rolling, knees locked against his skull, wail caught in your throat while your nails claw at the wall as if you’re trying to anchor yourself to the earth. You ride out the wave, rocking frantically against his mouth, and he moans like he’s tasting god herself, sin and sacrament, the first kill after a fast. It’s only when you reach down, grab his hair at the root and wrench away, your signal to stop, that he gentles his touch, withdraws to soft kisses against your folds.

Shuffling from under you—you’re frozen, panting for breath, locked in tremors as you try to find equilibrium—he holds himself against you, chest to spine, running his hands up and down your body to ground you, bring you back. He’s still got his game face on, and he knows he’s looking at your side profile like you’ve hung the stars.

“Did so good,” Spike says against your temple, throbbing in his jeans at the streak of red adorning your face. “So good for me.”

You crane your head to look back at him, blinking and vacant. He brushes your hair back, kisses your sweaty cheek, your ear, your jaw, the crown of your head. His hand maps your contours, cupping your breast before descending to settle against your belly, the warmth of you absorbing into his cold flesh. It matches the heat of your blood filling his gut, glutting his hunger and making him dozy as a cat after a hunt.

“All wrung out,” he coos. “Nearly creamed me pants, havin’ you up there. So proud of you.”

A small, broken noise is his only response, your throat too dry, too sore, too strung out to offer more than a whimper. That’s alright, though.

“C’mon, kitten,” he says eventually, nudging at your side. “Let’s get you to the loo. Gotta go, yeah? Then I’ll run a shower. Get you all cleaned up.”

You nod, barely. He slides off the bed and lifts you with care, arms cradling you bridal-style even though you mumble something sleepy and offended about being capable. He lets the corners of his mouth lift. “Yeah, yeah. My capable girl with jelly legs and a twitch in her thighs. Let’s not test gravity just yet, alright?”

The bathroom’s chilly, even for him, so he turns the big warming light on that floods the room in brilliant gold. The glow catches in your hair, in the damp of your skin, making you shining and radiant. Venus, come to life in his dodgy flat on the Hellmouth. Setting you down on the closed toilet lid―blood’s easy to clean off the surface―he turns to the shower faucet, turning the hot water on and adjusting until it’s comfortable. He kicks off his jeans, while he’s at it, freeing his poor chafed prick from its denim prison.

“You okay?” he asks, crouching in front of you. “Need anythin’ else?”

You look up at him, lashes wet and cheeks still flushed. You shift a little, then wince. He sees it immediately.

“Still hurtin’, huh?”

Nodding, you bite your lip. Ah, game’s not over yet, then. That look―wide-eyed, wanting, just a little helpless―always gets him going.

“Say it,” he tells you, already rising to his feet, already stepping into your space. His cock bobs with the movement, your eyes snapping to it like a hound to scent. He leers down at you, grabbing himself at the base and giving it a good few passes with his fist, locking at the head to eke out the bits of white fluid beading up. “Say what you want.”

You swallow, nervous as though you aren’t familiar with this part of his body, as though it’s your first time. It half gives him a mind to keep going, to wank off until he coats your face and make you lick it all away. Wouldn’t be new for you.

“I want you,” you whisper, peering up at him through your lashes. Your mouth drops open as he brings himself in close, tongue peeking out to lap at his tip.

He grunts. “Yeah? How bad?”

You kiss where saliva is cooling on him. “Bad.”

Spike growls. It’s low and barely restrained, the sound vibrating through the room. That’s how he remembers that he never shifted back to his human visage; that all the while you’ve been gazing up with something like worship, you’ve really been looking at him. Who he is, underneath the man he pretends to be. It knocks the wind out of him.

Helping you to your feet, he spins you slow, gentle hands pushing you forward until you’re braced on the edge of the sink. He takes in the sight of you through the mirror as you pant against the counter, thighs still trembling, body already knowing what comes next.

“Look at you,” he murmurs, voice low as he rubs his prick through the mess between your legs, huffing amusement at your little shiver and the arch of your spine. “Bleedin’ and cryin’, so bloody wrecked you can’t stand straight—but you still want me.”

You make a noise of assent, hips tipping up to catch him where he’s needed. “Always.”

“Gonna be rough, kitten.” He can already feel it: the bloodlust, the thrill of the hunt requiring satiation. “Not gonna be sweet.”

You don’t quite catch his eyes given his lack of reflection, but the plea is clear. “Don’t want sweet.”

Well. That’s it, then.

He grabs your hips and thrusts in hard, one callous push that makes your mouth fall open on a soundless cry. You’re soaked, tender and slick, walls fluttering from the last time, and he can feel everything: every spasm, every pulse, every sweet ache still echoing through your cunt.

“Bloody―fuck,” he snarls, digging his fingers into your hips. “Tight little thing. Always so good for me, yeah?”

You whine, tears falling once more.

He snaps into you again and again, rutting rough and deep, pace relentless and angle brutal. You scrabble for purchase on the spout sticking up from the basin, the tap handles digging into your ribs as you’re jostled up and up and up. Calling out with hurt little ah-ah-ahs, your hand slaps against the mirror, driving back against him. The wet sound of it echoes, melting together with the hissing of water on tile. Shower’s still running, but the bill’s unimportant compared to having you like this. You’re leaking all over his prick, over his belly and his legs, honey-soaked blood that’s all you, and he’s so far gone he doesn’t care if he dusts here and now.

“Filthy girl,” he groans, fixated on the curve of your neck as you twist to watch him, eyes stuck on his face and heart thundering at the sight before you. S’not fear that’s making it race. “Let me work you open, let me feel it all. Want me to hurt a little, don’t you? Want me to fuck the ache away.”

“Yes, yes,” you gasp, the words distorted from the force of his thrusts, spine hunching as you clasp your head in your hands like it’s the only thing keeping you from losing your mind. Bruises are already forming under his palms. “Spike, please―don’t stop―”

“Never,” he vows. “Never gonna stop takin’ care of you.”

He stares at your expression in the mirror, sees every shudder and sob, every time your mouth falls open as you constrict around him as though you’re trying to keep him inside forever. Wishes he could see himself too, see the devotion in his own eyes. But the glass stays empty, like always. You’re the only proof he’s real.

Spike reaches around and rubs your clit, forceful and fast. You come again, screaming, legs giving out as you shake under him. He catches you and holds you close, hips still moving as he rides it out, chasing his own high now.

“Inside?” he asks, breath ragged. “Want Da―want me to fill you up, baby?”

You nod frantically, words gone. Slamming into you twice more, he groans harsh and grating as he spills inside, chest pressed to your back, arm banded tight around your waist to keep you upright. He buries himself to the hilt as if he’s trying to brand you from the inside out. You’re his. All of you.

The last of it washes over him and he stirs himself deeper in you, forcing you up on tiptoes. You like the hurt, so he keeps going, rocks in until you’re squealing and writhing, begging without words. Finally, spent, he falls still.

For a long second, there’s only the rattle of your breathing, yours faster than his. Not like he needs to, really. Just fond of the sound of it. Your heartbeat in his ear, your lungs pulling air through your battered little body… there’s no better noise to him.

Then, he leans down, mouths at your neck, your ear, lips sticky. “Still hurtin’?”

It makes you laugh, exhausted and winded and drunk. On him. He could bottle and drink your laughter for a century, sustain himself on your joy alone.

“Not that way,” you say.

He grins, kisses your shoulder. “Didn’t think so.”

His grip tightens. He doesn’t want to move, doesn’t want to pull out and lose the heat of you, the weight, the ruin he’s left on your skin. He’s never been good at quiet, but now? He’d stay here forever, buried and blood-warm. Finally, finally belonging.

“Mine,” he murmurs, voice low and gutted. “All mine.”

And there’s no one left to argue. Not now. Not ever.

Famous last words, eh? Got too confident, too sure that there’s nobody standing in his way, in yours. That’s why he’s not expecting the visitor that shows up at the door.

Spike hears it before you do: those three sharp raps, knuckles stiff with self-importance. It’s the kind of knock that’s used to being answered promptly, that thinks it deserves to be. You’re in the kitchen, humming to yourself, shirt creased from sleep and bare legs swinging as you sit on the counter eating your little seedless grapes straight from the stem. It’s domestic as anything, pretty in a way that makes him wish Peaches taught him to draw way back when, to create instead of destroy. He’d been about to drag you back to bed, or maybe spread you across the marble and feast, if not for the knock interrupting the peace.

It comes again, more forceful this time. Spike stands.

You frown. “Was that someone at the―”

“I got it,” he says, already moving. He notes as he passes by that the sofa bed’s been folded back in, bags gone. Glinda must’ve decided to head back to the dorms after all. Probably for the best; no one there to hear her cry.

As he approaches the entry, he can tell it’s not a vamp or some other nasty. There’s no weight behind the sound, and the heartbeat’s easy enough to hear through the wood grain. The scent hits him first—rich cologne, too polished for good ol’ Sunnyhell—and something else buried under it. The trace of blood not spilt, not yet. And it’s familiar. Family.

Spike opens the door and there he is, tall and tanned and money-washed. There ain’t a hint of the smalltown vibe he gets from everyone else ’round here. Pressed linen, Rolex gleam—Hank bleedin’ Summers, right here in the flesh. Spike recognises him from the dusty photos tucked at the back of the shelf in the living room, the place you and your mum and your sisters dumped everything to do with the useless sod. Out of sight and out of mind, just like he’s been all these years. He’s holding a manila envelope in his too-soft hands, his expression stony. Doesn’t have the effect he’s after―too doughy. Niblet’s scarier than this one, and she’s just a kid.

“Can I help you?” Spike asks with a raised brow. He doesn’t need to turn; he can feel the shift in the air, the thrum of your heart stuttering into worry. Bugger.

Hank doesn’t blink; barely even acknowledges him, the wanker. Instead, his gaze shifts past him, somewhere behind as he steps forward like he owns the place. “How could you be so stupid?”

No foreplay, then. Straight into the bloodletting.

You’re right behind him, breathing coming unevenly, the scent of the shampoo you use wafting his way. Double bugger.

“Huh? Dad?” you say. Spike looks at you―legs and loose shirt, hair a mess of slumber and long-past satisfaction―and sees the moment the fire dims in your eyes. “What… what are you doing here?”

“What am I doing here?” Hank repeats, volume rising like it’s the most obvious question in the world. “What are you doing here? Shacking up with a guy twice your age―this―this thug―and acting like that’s normal?”

Spike snorts. Not the worst thing he’s been called. Tame, even.

“Sorry, mate,” he says, tone light as he moves an inch or two into the tosser’s space, a hint of a threat seeping into his posture. “Missed the part where you got visitation rights. Or where I let you know my address.”

“Not all my daughters are reckless chumps,” Hank tosses out, unknowing or uncaring of Spike’s tacit intimidation.

The barb stings you as intended. You flinch. “Buffy told you where I live?”

“Yeah.” He laughs, but there’s nothing funny about what’s happening. “Stopped by earlier. Seems she’s got a lot of thoughts about this set-up, too.”

Spike files that away. Buffy. Should’ve figured that. Twice now, she’s handed you over to someone who hurt you. Gonna have words about that.

“She called you?” Your question’s slightly hysterical. “So what―you won’t pick up when Mom’s dying, but you’ll fly here because I’m in a relationship? Jesus, Dad.”

He’s glad to hear some of the grit back. Got worried for a second that you’d fall apart completely.

Hank stares at you like you’re something he’s stepped in. “Nice try, kid, but you’re not throwing that in my face. And no, Buffy didn’t call. I got something interesting in the mail a few days ago. Mrs Greenberg is very concerned about you.”

Spike feels the wave of ire wash over him. ’Course it’s that manky old biddy. Always nosing over the shared fence into your front yard, back when you lived with your sisters. Always with snide comments about the Slayer’s ripped clothing, or all the people walking in and out of the house, or how cropped Little Bit’s shorts are. She’s had a bloody field day with him since first capping eyes on his hair, his duster, his car. Hates him, and the feeling’s mutual. He wishes the chip’d give him a freebie, just one. He’d pick her.

“She sent me some photos,” Hank continues, tossing the envelope in his grip at your feet. It lands with a dull thwack. “And a note that said ‘thought you should know what your daughter’s up to.’”

Your face drains of colour as you crouch to pick it up, pull out its contents, rifle through the pages. Spike can’t see the particulars, but he can certainly imagine them. You, in his coat, laughing next to him on the pavement, his hand on your waist and mouth on your neck—all of it damning if you squint at it with the wrong kind of eyes.

You’re silent. Spike pushes down the urge to speak, to defend you, ’cause this isn’t his fight. Not yet. His job is to be here after.

Hank’s shoulder knocks his as he edges further inside the flat, uninvited. “Do you have any idea how this looks? How this reflects on me?”

What a wanker.

You laugh, brittle and sharp. “Of course. Of course it’s about you. Not about me―not about how I’m doing, or what I want. Just your reputation.”

“You… Don’t talk back to me!” Hank snaps. “I took you in when you needed it. I paid for the best school, gave you everything―”

“Everything?” you cut in. “You dropped me off at Thacher and forgot I existed. I was fourteen, Dad! Fourteen years old! And scared out of my mind. All you gave me was a checkbook and a dorm room before you disappeared.”

“I did what I had to,” he says coldly. “You needed discipline. Direction. God knows your mother didn’t give you any.”

“Don’t you dare―don’t you dare bring up my mother.” Your words are shaky, eyes wet. And yet, no tears fall. “You don’t get to say stuff like that. You don’t get to walk in and act like you have a right to judge her, or me. You left me. I needed a parent, and you left.”

Spike would tear the old man’s throat out if you asked him to. The chip’s not what holds him at bay. It’s the knowledge that no amount of violence would fix this, would make you feel like you weren’t left behind. Besides, this ain’t about today, and it ain’t about Spike. It’s a lifetime’s worth, spilling out all at once.

Your shoulders are curving in, your voice growing thinner around the edges. “I wasn’t the screw-up, remember? That’s the only reason you bothered. Because I was the one most likely to turn out alright. To make you look good.”

“That’s not true―”

“Isn’t it?” You scoff. “I spent every year trying to be perfect, trying to make you proud, and it was never good enough. So don’t you dare come into my home and call me stupid like I’m some lost little girl who doesn’t understand what she’s doing.”

“You don’t,” Hank says, face red. “You’re sleeping with a man who belongs in a mugshot. No job. No prospects—”

“Right. Because money and status are the most important things in life.” You smile, vicious, and let out a bitter laugh. “Who the hell do you think you are, trying to lecture me―”

“I’m your father!”

“No.” You say it soft. It lands like a gunshot. Even Spike flinches.

A hush falls.

He’s starting to hate these bloody family rows always going on in front of him. Feels like watching himself, years ago, all rage and grief with nothing to show for it. Only difference is, no one ever stood beside him back then. Now, he always seems to end up looking on, unable to toss himself into the ring lest he risk his impulses overriding his common sense.

“Dawnie… You know how many nights she cried herself to sleep after Mom died? I don’t. Hard to remember. But I do remember how she’d keep asking me where you were. Why you weren’t picking up our calls. Why you wouldn’t come.” The anger’s eased up, leaving only a sort of resigned sadness that makes you sound so much older than you are. Spike hates it. “Where were you, Hank? Where have you ever been when we needed you?”

Hank’s mouth opens, but nothing comes out. Eventually, he gives up, staring back at you. Spike can hear him grind his teeth beneath his closed lips. Not sorry, then.

“I think we should just be honest here,” you say, quiet. “You… you stopped being my father a long time ago.”

Spike’s seen a lot of screaming matches, started more than his fair share. But this? Watching you peel yourself open like this, letting old pain see daylight for the first time? This one cuts different, deeper. It makes his fists curl with something more than rage. It makes him ache.

Hank sighs, wiping a hand over his face. “I did my best.”

“Then your best sucked.”

Glancing down at the envelope you’re clutching, you appear to make a decision: your spine straightens, your shoulders squaring back out. You throw the contents back at Hank in the exact same manner he did, the stack landing at the man’s feet.

“Leave, Hank,” you tell him. “It’s the only thing you’re good at.”

Hank’s mouth curls, examining you like he doesn’t recognize you. Maybe he doesn’t. Maybe he never did. A light in your eyes sputters out; abruptly, you turn and leave the room, a door creaking open behind you as you disappear down the hall. The air shifts.

“I’d get goin’ if I were you, Summers,” Spike says, stepping forward slow and smooth. “Not wanted here.”

Hank glares. “You―you ruined my girl―”

“My girl, actually.” Spike’s fingers dig so hard into his palms that he can feel the damp of blood starting to well up. “Shouldn’t have chucked her away if you planned on havin’ any sort of say in who she shacks up with. Between you and me? I ain’t the one who ruined her. You did the job well enough on your own.”

Hank snorts derisively. “Enjoy it while it lasts. She’ll wise up soon.”

“Maybe.” Spike shrugs. “Maybe not. Either way, has nothin’ to do with you anymore. She needed a dad. Got a ghost instead. Now make like one and disappear.”

One more long moment―then Hank turns and leaves without picking up the evidence he’d trekked all this way to shove in your face, door slamming behind him. After, silence.

Wanker.

Spike collects the packet from the ground, tossing it onto the kitchen counter as he retraces your steps. The door creaks open as he steps into the room, sees you curled up on your side at the edge of the bed, facing away from him. He crosses the room, kneels by your side.

“You alright, sweetheart?” he asks. Already knows the answer, though.

You don’t respond, staring at him with wide, lost eyes that gleam with the promise of an impending meltdown. He reaches forward, strokes your hair, flattens his hand to the contours of your arm until his touch meets your wrist. Your fingers dart out to grasp his like a lifeline.

He makes a vague soothing noise, a sort of hum that he wishes would ease that horribly wounded expression you’re wearing. “What d’you need?”

Finally, you whisper, “Hold me. Please.”

That he can do.

Spike crawls over you and crowds to your back, arm wrapping tight around your middle and legs winding with yours. You pull him even closer, an unspoken demand to squeeze harder, mould himself to you to the point that your bodies cannot be separately distinguished. He does it. It’s all he has to offer.

“Got you,” he murmurs in your ear. You shudder, then relax, boneless.

You lie there, quiet and tucked close, like the silence itself is a bandage. Spike doesn’t tell you it’s not your fault, doesn’t tell you it’s okay. He waits, steady and present. Yours.

Because that’s the point, innit? He’s staying.

The DeSoto’s headlights sweep across the curb and up the pavement as he pulls in to 1630 Revello Drive, engine idling low. You sit in silence beside him, backpack at your feet, hands wringing themselves to death in your lap. Outside, the streetlights cut long shadows over the bonnet, blinking amber across your face. You look calm—too calm—and it eats at him.

It’s funny how strangely time passes when you’ve got no end in sight. Decades pass in a blink, half-forgotten. But the hours since Hank’s nasty li’l turn-up? Endless. Truth is, Spike’s been waiting since the man left for you to completely break apart. Long time coming, and you deserve a release of a different kind. Instead, it’s this: quiet, withdrawn, something melancholy that he can’t touch, can’t save you from.

“You sure about this?” he asks, voice rough. Not hesitant; just making sure.

You nod. “Dawn needs help with her history project. I’ll… I’ll deal.”

Yeah. Deal.

S’not often that he has no idea what’s about to happen. Spend enough time kickin’ ’round, you learn some things about people, the way they behave, how they’re going to respond to finding stuff out. But you? Ordinarily, he’d say you’d go in swinging, maybe not with fists but with words. Now, though, you seem so… so defeated, like fate’s gone ahead and cut all your strings.

This is what moves him to follow you to the front step instead of hanging back in the car. Wednesday nights are for you and Little Bit, usually, but this time, he’s coming in too. You flick him an odd look, saying nothing. He wishes you’d say, do something, tell him to bugger off or send him packing back to the flat. But nothing. Is he the corpse here, or are you?

Before you knock, the door swings open.

The Slayer’s expression flickers between surprise and wariness, gaze skipping from you to Spike and back again. “Oh,” she says. “It’s you.”

Figures she’s the one answering. Red’s probably off somewhere knitting or meditating or whatever it is witches do when they’ve sworn off the mojo. Maybe with Zeppo, making sure he’s not drinking his weight in cheap beer after making the biggest mistake of his life leaving demon girl at the altar. Prick.

You don’t answer as you step past Buffy, impassive but for the way your chin folds into your chest a bit, subtle enough to be missed by anyone not looking for it. He is. He sees it all.

Her eyes narrow. “Did he show up? Dad?”

Your head jerks up, down, a spasmodic nod. No words still.

“Well?” she asks. “How did it go?”

Now you’re paying attention. Your gaze snaps to her, and for a second Spike can see intensity there, a burning set to consume. Then it fades, replaced by an ache too deep to name.

“I’m… I don’t think I can be around you,” you say. It’s not quite an answer. Comes out strangely. Stops and starts, like you’re fighting the urge to scream or cry. “I’ll come by for Dawnie. But I—I need space from you, Buff. Indefinitely.”

“What are you—”

It’s all you can say, it seems. You turn your back on her and head upstairs, white-knuckled grip on the rail. Buffy’s forehead creases, smiling in clear confusion.

“Wait—what?” she asks after you with a short bark of laughter. “You’re mad at me? Seriously?”

You don’t answer her, instead disappearing up to the landing. Gone, and all that’s left is the rage thrumming in his chest like the heartbeat he no longer has.

Spike remains in the entry, waiting for the telltale creak of the door at the end of the hallway. The sound cleaves through the silence, dull and echoing. He pictures you on the other side, face buried in Niblet’s quilt as she watches on with bewilderment, trying not to cry loud enough for Buffy to hear. A helplessness claws up his throat, bitter and sharp. He’d give anything to follow, but someone’s still got to fight your corner down here.

He clears his throat, shifting his weight. Buffy turns to him, arms crossed tight across her chest.

“What?” she snaps.

“Oh, don’t play dumb now,” he says, temper flaring.

He advances on her, gearing up for a beating. More shouting, like last time. Typical. Another spat at Casa Summers. Bleedin’ place might as well be cursed. Never just tea and telly; always ends in blood or somebody stormin’ off in tears.

“Thought I’d have a little chat with you, Slayer,” he continues. “‘Bout how you sicced that deadbeat old bastard on her like a bloody trained hound.”

Her face tightens. “He’s her father, Spike. And you’re just—”

“Yeah, yeah.” He rolls his eyes. “A demon, evil, some thing. Heard it all before. You keep sayin’ it like it still means anything. But I get it now. Why you hold onto it so much. Eats at you, doesn’t it? Me an’ her. Makes you lie awake at night, wonderin’ what could’ve happened between us.”

She flinches, tries to cover it with a scoff. “Oh my god. Don’t flatter yourself.”

He steps closer, smirk flashing. He can feel the coil of it winding in his spine. The pressure in the room surges hot, close, electric. The Slayer bristles like a cornered thing, Spike leaning in like a wolf scenting blood. His hands flex at his sides, itching. Always comes to this with her, doesn’t it? A beat too long, a breath too fast, and then—

“I’m not,” he says.

Doesn’t want to say it. Doesn’t want to open the door to that memory—her, eyes full of anger, heart tapping out a maybe. Maybe. But she never did. Never would.

“I’m tellin’ you the truth you won’t admit,” he adds, following through. “You got her hurt just to hurt me. ’Cause you can’t stand the fact I found something real before you could figure out if you even wanted it―me―first.”

“I didn’t―I didn’t mean to upset her!” Buffy’s voice rises, but the aggression’s hiding something vulnerable, insecure. She won’t make eye contact with him. “She’s just a kid. She shouldn’t be with you. You know it, I know it. Everyone does.”

“Funny,” he growls. “You keep sayin’ it’s so wrong, but she’s never been as happy with you as she is with me.”

There we go. The look, all wrath and malice, the one that promises a world of suffering. “What the hell would you know about her happi―”

“You think you’re doin’ all this to keep her safe, yeah? But you’re not. You’re just twistin’ the knife in her back, over and over. Callin’ it love.” He chuckles. It sounds nasty to his ears. “Coward.”

She gets in his face, hissing at him like a viper spraying venom. “Shut up, Spike! You’re dangerous! I have to protect―”

“I am dangerous! You, though? You’re worse. Least I’ve never made her cry so hard she passes out. You don’t care what it costs her, so long as you get your digs in. And you call me soulless.”

From the way her eyes begin to shine, that last bit landed hard. Good. S’time she understood how bad she’s been treatin’ you. How bad all her pals have been treatin’ you. Sure, they don’t jump you the second you walk in the door or anything, but they don’t do a great job at hiding their contempt, either. You’re too content with your lot to make a fuss about it right now, but he knows where this goes: another big blow-up, and maybe one you all can’t walk back from.

Spike tilts his head, lets his leer fill in the gaps between his next words. “Good goin’, luv. Didn’t even have to lift a finger. You’re the one makin’ it so easy for little sis to crawl between my sheets.”

The Slayer draws herself back and swings. Her fist crashes hard into his cheekbone. The blow lands with a wet crunch, pain blooming like a struck nerve beneath his eye. He grins through the deep-seated throbbing of bone fracturing apart, because it’s familiar, a reminder that some things still break the old-fashioned way. Letting the punch sit a mo’, he rubs at his cheek—then returns it twofold, skin on his knuckles splitting from the force he uses. She slams back into the wall with a cry, clutching her jaw. As she catches her breath, shock blooms across her face.

“Ah,” he says dryly, just to rub it in. “The pain.”

She’s off-balance, eyes wide, the realisation crawling over her like cold fingers. He watches her swallow, sees the tremble in her lip before she catches it. Emotion flashes across her expression: confusion, then dread. For the first time in a long while—maybe ever—she looks at him not like a mistake, but like a threat. Something inside him leaps, then curls in on itself. He shouldn’t like it, shouldn’t want her to flinch. But bloody hell, it feels good to be stronger for once.

“You… you hit me.” Her stance has gone slack. “How?”

“Got me first, didn’t you?” His hand is throbbing. Worth it. “‘Sides, you copped one a few weeks back too, remember? Night you tried to rake my girl across the coals?”

Thought it might’ve been a fluke, actually, or maybe that the memory of the zap wiped itself from his mind the second after. But nah, this here proves it.

She stares. “But the―the chip…”

“Still got it.” He shrugs, but it feels hollow. “Still works―on humans.”

And that’s the thing, yeah? All this talk of him being beneath you, but he’s been fighting the good fight for a while now. Maybe it’s not something he chose at first, but he’s choosing now. He’s been choosing since you came into his unlife. Wants to be better, for you. Not ’cause you want that, necessarily, but ’cause how else will he ever be enough? Still, still, the Slayer doesn’t see it, or won’t. Too blinded by her power to see she’s using it to crush you.

He tries to chase away the sting by doing what he does best: cruelty. “Guess Red wasn’t as good as she thought. Didn’t bring you back right. Maybe that’s why you’ve been such a monster since you clawed outta your grave.”

Breathing unsteadily and shaking her head, still pressed to the wall, Buffy whispers, “Get out. Get out.”

“Piss off, Slayer.” He’s had enough. Started like a thrill, but now it’s just noise. “Get off your high horse. Think I’m the evil one―then what the bleedin’ hell are you?”

He turns away, jaw aching and knuckles bleeding. It doesn’t feel like a win. Nothing ever does, not really, when it comes to her. But he’ll take the scrap of justice, even if it’s come at the cost of a little more of himself.

Spike doesn’t wait around. He heads upstairs, the thud of his boots on the steps grounding him again. As he draws closer to you, the anger melts away. Your scent calls him, and like a planet orbiting the sun, he’s bound to the path, up and up and up. The hallway stretches ahead, filled with the sort of quiet that comes after a storm. The weight of what just passed clings to him like dust, but your voice―soft, threadbare―pulls him onward. There’s blood on his hands, and still, he reaches.

For the first time today, the atmosphere’s peaceful. There’s no shouting, nothing being thrown, no limbs flying. What remains is the dim light, the muted rustling, the creak of the pull-out as you set it up. Your movements are practiced, careful, a trajectory on autopilot.

Niblet dumps her backpack on the floor beside the sofa, muttering curses under her breath like willpower alone could bring karmic justice down on the Slayer. “I mean, seriously. I can’t even look at her right now. She actually told him where you were? Like that was ever gonna end well.”

You nod faintly, tucking a fitted sheet over the mattress corner. She hasn’t noticed that you aren’t throwing your own complaints in yet, hasn’t noticed much beyond the burn of betrayal bubbling up in her voice.

“And then she tried to act like it wasn’t a big deal. Like I was being dramatic. She lied to me! Said she didn’t tell him where you were. But she did.” She huffs, tossing her still-damp hair as she looks at you. “And now she’s acting like you’re the one who blew things out of proportion?”

While it’s no small thing to have her on side―the ringing in his ears after listening to her shriek at big sis is proof enough―Spike knows you’re maybe a half-hour from complete breakdown, and this isn’t helping. He leans against the kitchen counter, watching, not getting involved. Not yet. Not until he has to.

“And Xander?” She goes on, flinging one of the throw pillows onto the sofa like it’s personally offended her. “He still talks about you like you’re some helpless little idiot and Spike’s a predator, and Buffy and Willow never call him on it. Especially after the whole wedding thing.”

She shudders, and Spike can picture what she’s thinking. That godawful get-up demon girl made you all wear, though he still thinks you can pull the green off alright. The boy taking her hand, speaking softly to her. The way he slipped out, letting her walk up the aisle by herself. Still raw, it all is. Not a thing to mention at your li’l gatherings, like it never happened.

“Yeah.” Your shoulders twitch, eyes downcast.

“I just…” She drops onto the edge of the pull-out with a frustrated grumble. “I thought after—after everything, they’d all back off. Let you be happy. But no, it’s all fake smiles and pretending that they’re okay with it when they’re clearly not. And they keep putting me in the middle of it, acting like I’m supposed to be on their side. I’m not.”

“I know, Dawnie.” You pat her head and busy yourself with smoothing out the creases in the duvet, trying to conceal your sniffling.

“They don’t see how you are together. They think it’s some… some creepy sex thing, but it’s real, isn’t it? It’s love. They don’t get it. It makes me wanna―”

“Alright, Bit,” Spike says, gentle as he can make it. “That’s enough.”

She freezes, startled. “Huh? I’m only―”

“Tellin’ the truth, yeah.” He pushes off the counter and crosses to her. “S’not what’s needed right now, is all.”

You still don’t look up. You simply stand there, fingers twitching at the corners of the blankets piled generously on the makeshift bed. Spike tugs it from your hands, palm to the small of your back.

“Go start your shower, baby,” he tells you. “Yeah? Let me finish this.”

You hesitate, but then your lip wobbles and you nod. His gaze follows you down the hall, your arms hugged to your torso like they’re the only thing keeping your insides in, like you’ve been gutted. In a sense, you have. Hank, Buffy. An absolute shite day. The bathroom door clicks shut; the taps creak; the water heater hums to life, a low buzz through the thin walls. Without you, the flat feels smaller.

Dawn pulls her legs up, chin resting on her knees. “I didn’t… I didn’t mean to make her sad.”

“I know.” Spike kneels to grab the last of the pillows. Too many of the bloody things. “She knows, too. S’why she let you say your piece.”

No response. One’s imminent, though―the real source of her explosion tonight. Sure, some of it’s about the Slayer, about her little lapdogs and the way they treat you and him, but he reckons it’s a front. An ugly, angry wall she’s using to hide from reality. So he lets the silence sit for a while, fetches a glass of water for the small table beside the sofa and draws the curtains closed in the meantime. Lets her work through her feelings.

Then it comes.

“I…” Little Bit sighs, hands fiddling with the hems of each pant leg. Her nose is turning red, a sign that she’s about to cry. “I thought he came to see us. For real. Said he was gonna take me out for ice cream later. I wanted to ask if we could go to that place by the promenade. The one with the waffle cones? And then he just… didn’t show. Didn’t even bother to call. Now I know why.”

Her confession cracks the fount open, tears winding down her face. He crouches before her, catching her line of sight with a sympathetic twist of his lips.

“You’re too good for him, Bit. Always were.” He tries to inject as much surety as he possesses into his words. It’s not enough to fix what Hank broke, but better than letting her believe she’s to blame for his failures. “Nothing to do with you.”

Bit glances away, wiping her eyes. “I know. It’s ’cause of Buffy.”

Not exactly. But not wrong, either.

“I―I had one chance. To spend time with my dad. And she wrecked it, just to stick it to you. To hurt her.” She frowns, turning back to him with beseeching eyes. “Why?”

Part of him’s always touched by how much she trusts him to have all the answers. To a kid like her, he’s seen everything, understands everything. Doesn’t have the heart to tell her that there are some things he can’t explain. He can try, though.

“She’s… she’s got her own demons, see? In her head. Playin’ with her feelings.” Crude analogy, but it works. “Doesn’t know what to do with them, not since she―”

“Since she was snatched outta Heaven,” Niblet says. Some of the ire’s burnt itself out. “Yeah.”

He curses himself for feeling sorry for the stupid bint in this moment. But he can’t even begin to imagine what it would be like, goin’ about day by day down here after being at peace. Knowing it was friends who tore him from his final rest, brought him back only to shove him into the same old endless fight. It doesn’t excuse her actions. Makes them easier to forgive, maybe.

Little Bit interrupts his musing. “I wish… I wish she’d deal with it, instead of taking it out on all of us. She’s not the only one suffering.”

He snorts. “Careful. Wishes in this town don’t go down well.”

Wouldn’t do to play those games out loud, what with demon girl back to her former glory―not that anyone else has figured it out. He certainly ain’t gonna dob her in. Let her get her jollies cursing Xapper; not much of a loss there, the miserable sod.

“But―she loves you,” he adds, more sincere. “You know that, right? Both of you. Not showin’ it all that well at the mo’, but she cares. Enough to risk everything to do what she thinks she has to.”

That’s what’s getting him the most about all this. It’s love. How the worst pain gets doled out, innit? For that feeling. Kill for it, die for it, destroy everything to make sure that love lasts another day. And the irony? That ruin is the very thing that turns love into hate. He knows best. He’s love’s bitch, after all.

“Doesn’t feel like love,” Bit mutters, wiping her face with her sleeve.

“No,” he agrees. “Doesn’t always.”

Like the kept man he is, he takes a while to hush his girl’s little sis, help her dry her tears and settle herself for sleep. Tucks her in good and proper, soft goodnight falling from his mouth and echoed by a frail, weary whisper. Turns off all the lights, except for the plug-in at the outlet in the kitchen to remind her that she’s not alone. He leaves her be, heads toward the bathroom. A yellow glow spills out from the crack where the door doesn’t quite meet the ground.

Spike knocks. No response.

Heat curls out like mist from a dream when he steps inside, warming his cool flesh to sweltering. The tap’s dripping again, but that’s not important. No. What’s important is the way you’re hunched over yourself in the corner by the bath, swamped in your towel as though you’ve tried to strangle yourself with it. Water makes a puddle beneath you.

“Oh, baby,” he murmurs, already moving.

He doesn’t care about the damp soaking through his shirt, not when holding you feels like life itself. You turn into him as though gravity’s lost its meaning, seized by silent sobs, hours and days and weeks’ worth―a lifetime’s worth―of pain rushing out. It’s a pain he can’t fix with antiseptic or plasters. He can only catch you while you fall, banding arms around you so tightly that there’s bruises come morning.

“Take me away from here,” you choke out against his chest, cracked and distraught. “Please, Spike? I don’t wanna be here anymore.”

He presses his lips to your crown firm enough to leave a mark, letting your words tear at his unbeating heart. “This won’t last forever. Promise. Give it a bit.”

“I can’t, I can’t―”

He rocks you as though you’re a child, shushing you in low, soothing tones. Anything to get that manic sound out of your voice. His hand cups the back of your head, palm against soaked strands, and he lets your scent fill him, steadying his frayed edges. Every tremble in your frame hits him like an aftershock.

She’s safe, he tells himself. She’s safe. Just broken in all the softest places.

“I swear it, kitten, on the poof’s soul.” Can’t bloody well swear on his own. Nothing holy left in him anymore, but you believe him anyway. Always have. “If it’s still too much, if you still want out… I’ll take you anywhere you want.”

There’s a pause, broken only by the drip of the tap and the sound of your breath hiccupping against his chest.

“Anywhere?” The question is small, childlike, full of something he recognizes too well: hope, starved and shaking. “A place you’ve been?”

He nods against your hair, never loosening his hold. “Sure. Or it can be somewhere different. New. Just for us.”

You lean back slightly to look at him, lashes clumped with tears, cheeks blotchy and mouth quivering. But your eyes… there’s a flicker in them now. It’s faint as the first star after sunset, but it’s there.

“Not trying to erase the past,” you mumble, voice thick. That easy acceptance shatters him all over again. “Only create the future. With you. We can make memories of our own.”

He smiles, lips twitching. One hand lifts, brushing along your jaw, his thumb catching a droplet rolling down your cheek. “Never shagged a girl standin’ in the Eiffel Tower, you know,” he says, casual as anything.

The sound that escapes you is uneven, half-sob and half-laugh, but it’s real, and it undoes him. You shake your head, resting your forehead against his collarbone. “If you want. Anything, if it’s you.”

He holds you tighter at that, his cheek resting against your temple.

There’s silence in the flat. It isn’t the kind that comes from peace or contentment, though—it’s what settles when there’s nothing left to say. The heater ticks, spitting dust into the air, gold creeping through the curtains like it’s sneaking in on tiptoe.

Spike lights a cigarette at the open window, sun not quite high, and tries not to let the smoke drift back down the hall toward the bedroom. You’re asleep, cozied into his pillow like you’re trying to disappear inside it. Happens more and more. You sleep mornings, patrol nights, and talk to no one in between—mostly him and the Bit. Maybe Red, if she manages to catch you outside the house before you shut her down with a polite smile and a tighter grip on your keys. Demon girl too, when she comes ’round for a drink and a bitch, her friends few and far between. And Glinda, always poppin’ over. Nice bird.

Alright, so maybe it’s not no one. Just Buffy and the boy.

You’ve withdrawn from your Scooby meetings, from anywhere the pair frequent. From everything outside this little home, this late-night life you’ve carved out between the cracks. Once upon a time, you’d cram into Buffy’s living room with the rest of ’em to plan a demon hunt, always with popcorn to spare. Now, the silence between you and them feels sharp enough to cut with a blade.

Spike knows how it looks to those two, knows what they’re surely whispering now he’s not there to hear—that he’s isolating you, keeping you locked away so he can feed off whatever pieces of you that still remain. Sometimes he wants to. Could picture it, too. Keep you safe, tucked away from the nasties and the harm your so-called friends dole out like party favours, telling themselves it’s love. Keep you for himself. But love’s gone and twisted him soft, hasn’t it? Couldn’t bear to hurt you. He doesn’t get them, how they can stand it.

He’d tell them they’ve got it all backwards, that you’re the one who stopped showing up, who stopped answering their phone calls, who stopped listening whenever they caught you out at night and called your name to beckon you over. That he’s the only one you don’t brace yourself against anymore. But there’s no point. People see what they want to, and they want him to be the villain.

Fine. He’s been worse.

There’s a muted thump as Gus, one of his winnings from last week’s poker night, drops from the top of the fridge and glares at Spike like he’s the intruder. Bloody thing’s barely bigger than a toaster, but it’s got fangs and attitude and a mean swipe. Spike bares his teeth at it and mutters under his breath.

“Oi. Kitchen’s my territory, furball.”

The whole bleedin’ place is, but that doesn’t matter to Gus—he just hisses in response, flicking his tail like a whip.

They tried playing for kittens once. Demon girl, couple nice Brachens, Clem and his buddies from Willy’s; good, safe company. Clem swore the fluffballs wouldn’t stick around. He lied. Now Spike can’t make his mug of blood with Weetabix in it without risking a bite to the ankle, so it’s back to chips and cash next time. You, of course, love the li’l bastard, named him after that old cartoon mouse from the pictures. Spoil him rotten, too. He’s got a little fish-shaped dish on the counter and a cushion by the space heater in the living room. Spike’s own cushion, mind you, not that he’s bitter about it.

The rap at the door lets him know that Glinda’s come by as she said she would. He waits for the sound of the spare key in the lock, the squeak of the hinges as she steps through. Sees her pop her head into the kitchen, eyes gentle. There’s a canvas tote slung over her shoulder and a shoebox tucked under one arm.

“Thanks, Spike,” she says, moving into the room. “For this. Didn’t have to leave it all by the door. I would’ve sort–sorted it myself.”

Spike nods. “S’fine. Least I could do. That everything?”

She hesitates, then sets the shoebox down. There’s a few books, a candle, one of those horrid tea mugs with an inspirational quote on it—all the things she’d left behind when she moved on. Her fingers reach out to stroke down the kitten’s back, and the little prick purrs all the while.

“Yeah.” Her gaze drifts to the hallway, to the closed door of the bedroom. “Is she…”

He exhales smoke through his nose. “Still knocked out.”

“I wanted to see her, but… I get it. She’s not up for it, huh?” From anyone else, it’d sound like pity, but the witch has more magic to her than spells and curses.

Spike sighs, watches the cat take a flying leap off the counter—brave for a beast so small—and dart away, stumbling over too-big paws. “Not these days, no.”

The corners of her mouth turn down, all compassion, but there’s no hiding the sparkle in her eyes, the creases in her face from a fresh spot of laughter. She looks more alive than she has in a good while. The weight she’s been carrying seems lighter now.

“You look happier,” he says, and it’s not a dig. Tired still, yeah, but the grief’s gone.

She grins. “I’m—I’m moving back. To the house.”

He arches a brow. “So that means…”

“Yeah.” She glances away, expression exposing the delight she’s trying to restrain. “Me and Willow. We’re… trying again.”

“Good for you, luv.” Stubbing out his cigarette, he offers her a grin. “Ain’t love grand, eh?”

Not much more to be said after that. Glinda thanks him again, picks up her stuff and shuffles on out, the lock clicking shut behind her. The spare key’s left on the counter, polished metal gleaming in the morning light. Spike lingers by the window, listening to the hush that follows her absence. Nothing sad. Not for her. It’s the sound of the world waking up after a storm, quietly relearning what it means to live. Somewhere in the flat, a sound shatters the stillness—Gus knocking something over, probably the remote. Bloody cat’s been on a warpath, especially where his boots are concerned.

The rustle of sheets draws his attention. He slips down the hall, cracks open the door and slips through. You’re stirring, bleary-eyed and slow-limbed, a little frown forming between your eyebrows as you push yourself up on one elbow.

“W’ssat Tara?” you mumble, yawning.

“Yeah.” He slips off the duster, hanging it on the stand in the corner. “Came for her things.”

You rub at your face, the edge of your voice still full of sleep. “She say anything?”

“Movin’ back to Revello,” he says as he crosses to the bed, drops his jeans. “Her and Red are givin’ it another go.”

Your lips part around a little oh, and then you nod again, lids fluttering closed as you sink back into the mattress. “Comin’ back to bed?”

Spike slides down beside you, starkers, tugging the covers back up over you properly. “’Course. Gotta get me beauty sleep.”

You reach for him, lips upturned. “Pretty for the vamps later?”

“Nah.” He lays close, hands sliding along your skin, feeling you warm and substantial in his grasp. “For you.”

True, more or less. Patrol is mostly just foreplay. Not even his job, but he started when the Slayer’d shuffled off the mortal coil and you insisted on steppin’ up. You work out some frustrations on the first couple beasties—like last night’s fledge, first stake you didn’t hesitate to drive home—then spend the rest of it watching on as he gets a nice spot of violence in. As far as you’ve come, you’re no heavy hitter, so you hang back with a cross and stake as ol’ Spike shows off for you, throws extra ferocity into each swing. Gets you all hot and wet, him rippin’ apart some poor demon, but you’re always good in waiting ’til he’s done, ’til the fire in his gut’s enough to make him feel truly alive. Bloodlust turns to randiness, then. He gives it to you hard, bent over a headstone or crowded up against a crypt wall, sets you squealing. It makes his head buzz for hours after.

Worth it. Double worth it if he catches a flash of goldilocks hair in the moonlight, Slayer scent all furious and embarrassed as it fades with distance.

Your fingers find his jaw, thumb stroking lightly over his cheekbone, and he kisses your palm without needing to be asked. There’s nothing urgent in it, only small reassurances, familiar maps retraced.

“Love you,” you tell him. “Know that, right?”

Spike’s voice is a whisper, rough around the edges. “Love you more.”

Knows you need to hear it more than ever. Need his touch, his care, his protection. Ironic, yeah? He’s a million times better at the things a father gives his girl than Hank ever was. Hell, it was why he was turned in the first place: to be Dru's dark prince, her guardian. Now, yours.

The soft hum of the heater fills the space, and you nuzzle into him, breaths coming slower and slower. For a bit, he thinks you’ve fallen asleep, starts to sink into a light doze, but you interrupt the serenity.

“They think it’s because of you,” you say quietly. “That I’ve—that I’ve pulled away.”

“Yeah.” There’s no venom to it. Just fact.

A brief lull, and then: “They’re wrong. If I have to lose them to keep you… then I will.”

He doesn’t answer that. Speaks for itself, yeah?

Sometimes he thinks that you can read his mind, that you know all his darkest thoughts and worst impulses. His fears. How else can you get him the way you do? Get what he needs to hear, even before he realises it himself? He’s never had faith in anythin’ before. Never could. Couldn’t trust anyone enough for that. If he had faith left to give, he’d put it in you.

“Go back to sleep, sweetheart,” he mutters. “I’ve got you.”

He feels your lips curl up against his chest, feels that phantom thud between his ribs again, the skipping of a heartbeat. Your body relaxes against his, all trust in him—in him—and you and he both let the world shrink down to this bed, this quiet, this warmth. From the living room, Gus yowls at nothing, or maybe something only he can see. Spike stays still, content to bask in what he has while he has it.

But it’s inevitable―the shift in the tide. Humdrum doesn’t last forever. It’s shattered by the ringing of the phone, of all things.

It’s a jarring sort of noise that doesn’t belong in the quiet of afternoon some days later, shrill and sudden, slicing through the peace. Spike jerks from sleep, clutching his chest like the shock of it might’ve jumpstarted his pulse. You stir more sedately, breath hitching as you push yourself up on an elbow.

Warm and sluggish still, you roll toward the nightstand and fumble for the receiver, blinking blearily. Your voice is thick when you answer. “Hello?”

A beat of static—then sound crashes through, tinny and high-pitched and hysterical. “She’s not—she’s not moving. What do I do?”

He recognizes the speaker, and his gut turns to stone. Bit’s voice, cracked and panicked, stabs through his ribcage. Beside him, your body goes rigid as you bolt upright, hand white-knuckled around the phone.

“Dawnie?” you ask, sharp and scared, fumbling with the covers twisted up around your legs.

“I—I don’t know what to do—she’s just—oh god, she’s so cold—”

“Who’s cold? What’s happening?”

“Tara. She’s—she’s not moving. She’s cold.”

Spike’s already heard all he needs to hear, feels it like a coffin lid slamming shut. Death. Real death, not the kind that unearths itself days later, not the kind he came back from. He gets out of bed, tugging on a pair of jeans, already thinking of how to get to the girl without turning to ash. Hunts for his boots. One’s missing. Dragged off down the hall, likely.

When he returns, you’re asking her where she is, calm as anything. Always admired that, he has: how straight you are when the going’s tough.

“In Willow’s room,” Bit sobs. “I—I found her like that. I tried to wake her up and she just… wouldn’t. There’s blood. I think there was a gun or something? I don’t know, I don’t know—”

“Okay, Dawnie, okay.” You’re up now, tugging yesterday’s hoodie over your—his—shirt, scrambling one-handed into a pair of loose-fitting track pants. “I’m coming. Don’t move her. Just—stay where you are, okay?”

You hang up before she can respond, tossing the phone to the bed. By the time you’ve slipped into your trainers, he’s swung his duster on, running through ways to get to Revello Drive in daylight without charring his arse to cinders.

“We don’t have time to black out the windows,” you say, shuffling through the bottom drawer. You toss the fireproof blanket at him, heading out of the room. He follows you to the kitchen, watches you snag his keys out of the bowl. “I’ll drive.”

“You hate stick,” he mutters. More correct to say you can’t drive stick at all, but it’s not the time. No other option, is there?

“I’ll figure it out,” you say.

And you do—sort of. The DeSoto jerks and bucks the whole way, stalling at every red like it’s trying to fight you off, but it moves quick enough. Spike huddles low in the back, wrapped in a shroud, and says nothing. Every turn sends sunlight spilling through the cracks, stinging like a cattle prod, though he doesn’t complain. Can’t. Not when you’re gripping the wheel as if your life depends on it, eyes wide and wet, near unseeing. His stomach turns like it’s trying to crawl out of him at the sight of you, so small in the driver’s seat, so close to splintering. He’s seen you nervous, angry, devastated. This kind of fear, this kind of panic is new, though.

“Easy, kitten,” he lets himself murmur when you nearly clip a parked car taking a corner too hard. “Don’t need both of us a pile of ash.”

You don’t answer. S’like you can’t hear him at all. He wants to tell you to slow down, pull over, that he’ll take over once the sun dips—dead is dead, and speed won’t change a thing—but he keeps his mouth shut.

When you screech to a stop outside the Summers house, you don’t wait for him. You’re out of the car before the engine’s off, racing up the drive and through the front door, hair wild and loose, calling Bit’s name as you vanish up the stairs. Spike stays low, crouched under the blanket, and makes a break for the porch as fast as he can without combusting. Slips inside slow, careful. The air is thick with something cloying. Grief, maybe, already settling in the walls.

He hears your voice upstairs, muted and shaking. Hears a sob that doesn’t belong to you. He climbs the stairs one step at a time, blanket over his head, and turns toward Red’s room.

You’re huddled in the corner, braced against the vanity. Bit’s crumpled into you, clutching at your waist like a little kid, face streaked with tears and staring at the floor. He steps in, follows her line of sight, and on the carpet—

Glinda.

Tara.

She was the good one, the warm one. The first one before you who looked at him like he was… like he was a man. And now, her arms are splayed out like a doll dropped mid-play, a hole torn through her chest, already crusting at the edges. All bones and blood, leaking out on a carpet he’s walked a hundred times. A stain no one will ever scrub out.

“I didn’t know what to do,” Niblet’s whispering. Her hands are covered in blood, up her arms and smeared on her jeans. Not wiped away so easily. “The others aren’t here. I didn’t know who to—to call.”

“You did good.” You move then, knee-walking in front of little sis to shield the view. “Come on. You’ve got—let’s clean you up.”

Dawn lets you tug her to her feet, push her toward the bathroom. You tell her to start the shower, then crack open the door to her bedroom. Spike leans against the doorframe, cautious, waiting. You rifle through the wardrobe, grabbing a fresh top and skirt, body moving automatically. Nothing behind the eyes. It’s when you turn to face him, startled by his presence, that emotion bleeds back in.

“Who—who do I call?” you ask him, taking a trembling breath. “Never done this part before.”

He’s across the room before he even realises it, hands framing your arms as though his body knew before his mind did that you needed grounding. You look up at him with a red-rimmed gaze, cracked porcelain seconds from smashing to pieces, and you ask him—him—what to do. That lands harder than the body in the next room. You’re relying on him to be steady when everything else isn’t.

 “Ambulance, sweetheart.” That’s right, innit? He’s the one who dropped vics, not the one who stuck around to pick ’em up. But the answer seems to satisfy you; you nod, making to dart past him. He stops you. “You deal with Niblet, yeah? I’ll do the speakin’.”

Some of the tension eases at that. He feels it under his palms. It reminds him that you’re still painfully young. Too young for all this.

“Okay. Okay.” You set your shoulders, lift your chin. Always good at that—forcing resolve. You lean in briefly, press your mouth to his chest. “Thank you.”

He wants to respond, but the words clog in his throat. You’re off again by the time he boots back up again, already speaking in hushed tones to Bit. Girl’s shut down. He listens in on you narrating each step of the process, the rustle and slip and creak as you take over washing her like she’s an invalid. Anything to fill the silence.

Downstairs, the phone feels heavy in his hand. His voice sounds strange giving the address. Feels like a cruel trick; after centuries sending people to the grave, he’s the one left trying to explain the body. He’s used to them. Seen piles of them. But this one… this one doesn’t fit, doesn’t belong to some alley scrap or battlefield. This stuff doesn’t happen to someone he knows. Knew.

It’s only when you’re urging Little Bit down the stairs, snugging her up on the couch like bundles layers might keep the shock at bay, that he realises how much time’s passed. He won’t interfere with the pair of you. Gives you something to do, the fussing. The telly clicks on, filtered sound echoing through the house, a remnant of normality. He ventures out of the kitchen, eyes your front damp and tinged pink, hands clutching Dawn’s bloodied clothes.

“Gonna start a load,” you mumble, hugging the material. “Hopefully it’ll come out easy.”

“You should change too,” he says, extracting your quarry from you. Shouldn’t be a task for you, this. “Make yourself all neat.”

Just a suggestion, but you take it like a command: let him have Dawn’s things, strip down right there in the entry, pass your own stuff over. Lights on, no one home. You wander back upstairs, naked, and he heads down, starts the machine.

You’re in the shower when the paramedics arrive, so Spike handles it. Wants to yell at the two blokes as they move Glinda about, try to find some sign of life. There’s none. He knows. They offer meaningless condolences, use their li’l units to call in to the coroner, tell him someone’ll be by to pick her up. You’re all done by the time the next lot arrive, hair damp and stare vacant as strangers poke through your mum’s room—Red and Glinda’s room—and take their pictures. It’s all very clinical. Callous. He wonders how this detachment isn’t a sort of evil, too. Only nice thing about them is that, by the front door, they unzip the bag, let you say your last goodbyes.

Niblet weeps and hugs the body, plastic crinkling as she squeezes tight. He tugs her into the crook of his arm when she steps away, letting her cry. You stroke Glinda’s hair back, fix the flyaways. A wistful smile ghosts across your face as you lay your lips against her forehead.

“Love you, Tara,” you whisper.

His turn. Can’t say anything. He’s surprised at himself. Never got all that close, but there’d been… a quiet kind of truce between them. Respect, maybe. She saw more than she said, was warm and kind in that quiet, seeing way that made him uncomfortable. When he reaches out and brushes her shoulder, she doesn’t shy away. It’s the first time he’s ever touched her, he thinks. First, and last. Bit was right. Feels like ice under skin. He sees them load the gurney up, slam the back of the van shut, start the engine, but it’s just background to him. All he can feel is the absence of that heat, that life, long after her body’s taken away. Her soul’s probably long gone by now, but he hopes she felt it—him—somehow. Hope she knew that he was here, right ‘til the end.

Afterward, you ferry Dawn upstairs, tell her to pack a bag. The light’s faded out, giving way to a dusk that paints eerie shadows across the walls. While you’re busy, the washer downstairs beeps its little tune. Done. He sticks the clothes up on the line running under the basement stairs, just finishing up with a sock as the front door bangs open.

Voices crash in: the Slayer, sharp and frantic, calling out for Dawn. Xander’s right behind her, heavy footsteps and ragged breath like he ran the whole way here. Spike sprints, intercepts them before they can stampede up the stairs, ruin the tenuous calm you’ve created.

“She’s upstairs,” he says, tone low and measured, “gettin’ her stuff.”

Buffy halts, halfway to shoving past him. For once, she doesn’t look like she wants to dust him where he stands. She stops, looking lost. “Where—where’s Tara?”

“Gone.”

The stairs creak behind him. He turns to see you coming down slowly, drawn and hollow, borrowed clothes hanging off you wrong. Big sis’s wardrobe suits you poorly.

“Spike called it in,” you add, knuckles cracking against the banister, speaking in that oddly flat cadence. “Coroner came.”

Buffy exhales unsteadily, eyes glistening. Unsurprised. She knew, then. So did the boy, if his lack of shock’s anything to go by. He frowns, pained-looking, gaze sweeping over you and then up, like he’s trying to will it all to be a dream. Spike’s torn by the urge to throttle the pair of ’em—who the bloody hell leaves a pair of teen girls to clean up after a corpse?—‘til he sees you sag against the newel post. He reaches for you, steadying you before your knees give out. You fall into him like it was inevitable, like you were always going to seek him out, reflexive. His arm spans your waist, hand slotting into its natural place at your hip.

“She was—Warren.” She glances down at her shoulder, swallowing as she spots the splotch of rust-dark drying on her jacket. “He was… aiming for me.”

Spike jerks his chin toward it. “Didn’t just miss, then.”

“You alright?” you ask softly, all worry. Instead of going to her, though, you shrink into him. The other two notice. He wants to be smug about it, but the victory feels empty right now.

“I wasn’t. For a while, I wasn’t.” Her voice catches, like it hurts to speak it aloud. “I don’t even remember falling. Just… black.”

Spike’s jaw tightens. You flinch beside him.

Buffy’s hand drifts toward the stain, brushing it lightly. “It should’ve been over. It was over. But Willow—” She swallows. “She saved me.”

A chill rolls through the room. You stiffen in Spike’s arms, breath snagging on a sharp inhale. He feels it. Your fear. Not of death, but of history, of the way it keeps repeating like a curse no one’s figured out how to lift.

“She brought you back again,” you whisper.

“Yeah,” Buffy says, quiet. “She didn’t even hesitate.”

No one speaks for a moment. Even the house feels like it’s listening.

“Using again, then?” Spike asks. Tries to keep the rattle of fear out of his voice. “Magic.”

A dumb question, but he has to hear it for himself.

Buffy nods. “Yeah. She was here. When—when it happened.”

Bleedin’ Christ.

Spike’s throat works around a tightness he can’t name. He thinks of how your body’d feel, lifeless beneath him. Thinks of the Bit when he found her with Glinda. Thinks of Red reaching past the veil without blinking, again and again, destroying little pieces of herself every time.

He’s been on the wrong end of her rituals and incantations before. Nearly got hitched to the Slayer ’cause of her. Forgot everything and thought he was a tosser named Randy Giles for a bit, too; only lucky part of that whole cockup was the li’l photo of you an’ him in your purse, no mistaking his connection to you. You might’ve ripped his bollocks off if he thought himself attached to one of the other birds. And both those times were the result of her mistakes, of accidental magic. A helluva witch, to be able to chalk up the bending of reality itself to mere misfortune. On purpose, she’s performed feats that anyone else might call impossible: re-ensoulment, enjoining, resurrection…

How much more can she take before the world breaks for good? he wonders.

Zeppo only adds to the worry. “She’s not herself,” he says, rubbing a hand down his face. “She’s after Warren.”

Spike’s no idiot. Body upstairs when he got here means Red couldn’t revive her. If Red’s back on magic—back doing stuff as powerful as patching up bullet holes in a Slayer’s shoulder after weeks without so much as floating a pencil—then what the bloody buggerin’ fuck is gonna happen next?

You’re tense beside him, probably thinking the same thing as he is. “Think she’s turned to black arts again?” you ask.

“Most likely.” Buffy all but stares you down. “I’ve never seen her like this. Not even… not even then.”

That sits out in the open for a bit. Spike lets himself consider it. He was there, wasn’t he? A favour for the Slayer when she stopped by, asked if you or he’d seen Niblet or the witch. He figured helping out with the search might force her to speak to you proper. It didn’t, not when faced with what Red had done. The car, the demon. Her, eyes black, off her face high, sobbing on the ground. He thought that was the lowest she could get.

“We—we’re going after her,” Buffy continues. “We have to…”

“You have to stop her.” You meet her eyes straight on. “Should we come with?”

“No!” Big sis shakes her head vehemently, hand reaching instinctively toward you. He knows where this is going, steps back a little. Buffy flashes a look at him, acknowledgement, and takes the space he’s offered. “Take Dawn with you. Keep yourselves safe. I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

That last bit, she directs at him. Message’s clear. ‘Protect them.’

He doesn’t need a request to shield you or Bit from anythin’, but he’ll accept the peace offering. Dips his head. ‘I will.’

“Okay,” you whisper.

It draws her attention back to you. She focuses in on your face, demeanour melting as her palm brushes your cheek. When you lean in, her eyes brim, her aura of strength diminishing. She’s not the Slayer right now. She’s just a girl. Drawing you into a hug, her chin settles in the crook of your neck, her frame slumping. You don’t recoil, don’t falter―you rest your head on her shoulder, hands linking around her middle in muscle memory.

“I almost died again,” she murmurs against your temple. “And I just… God. I’m so tired of being this person.”

“I know.” Your voice is muffled. “We’ll deal with all that later.”

Time seems to halt for as long as you share the embrace, an endless instant. Spike doesn’t know how long passes―only sees the laxness in the curve of her mouth as it grazes your forehead, the scrunch of her brows like she’s savouring this final manifestation of love between siblings. He wonders if she’s expecting this fight to be her last, again. Then she’s gone, bolting up the stairs. Spike hears Little Bit’s sobs start up again, Buffy’s voice shushing her, trying to soothe.

The boy shifts forward then, arms half-raised like he’s unsure if he’s welcome. If it were up to Spike, he’d toss him out on his arse, but you’re too good for grudges. You don’t stop him, let him fold around you like he has the right to seek comfort after all he’s done. There’s no surprise or forgiveness, but instead a sort of fatigue that’s bone-deep. Spike can see it in the way you slip your head under the boy’s chin like a kid clinging for warmth―that you need this, too. When Xander pulls away, he nods in Spike’s direction and trudges up the stairs after Buffy. It’s solidarity, or perhaps recognition. Could never be gratitude, not from the likes of him.

And then it’s just the two of you again.

As activity ignites above―drawers opening and closing, plans being made, digits being plugged into someone’s mobile device―you turn back to Spike. Something in your expression is breaking open, giving way.

“Is this the price?” you ask, plaintive. It reminds him of little sis, the way she hangs on his words as though he’s some sort of prophet. “For loving you? Everyone else suffers?”

Sounds like something he’d think, and that’s what stings the most: watching as your light’s snuffed out time and time again by the cruel hands of fate. It’s like looking at you and seeing his own face―young, human, still worth something―staring back at him. His fingers itch to break something, but not you. Never you.

“Nah, baby.” Gathering you up, he tucks you close. He imagines that if he’s solid enough, broad enough, he might block out the rest of it. “It’s not the price for loving me. S’only the price of livin’. Gets heavy, even hurts… but it’ll pass. Always does.”

You don’t respond, settling into him and pressing your face to his chest. Letting your breath even out against him, you accept what little he has to give.

He should’ve bloody well known better.

Spike took you both back to the flat. Two traumatised girls—barely speakin’, blank-eyed and morose—made him uneasy. He’s not used to grief. Spent more years than not kickin’ about with Dru, and sure, Angelus getting a soul shoved in him and subsequently abandoning his family was a knee to the bollocks. That was more rage, though, the hurt dressed as a pressing need for vengeance against the ones who cursed Spike’s grandsire. He hunted down the lot of ’em, down to the last child, but didn’t change nothin’. And yeah, deep down, it still stings. The rejection. Being chucked away by the one who made him who he is. But that wasn’t the same as this, because at least Angelus wasn’t really gone. Not like Glinda.

He was the one fixin’ the bedding this time, settin’ Bit up on the sofa, pattin’ her goodnight on the head. He was about to turn off the light when the phone rang; not the one in the bedroom, but the cordless landline in the kitchen. Shrills loud since you dropped it in the sink the other week, stuck itself on speaker mode and won’t work otherwise. Snatching the receiver off the cradle, he barked, “What?” before it had barely rung thrice.

“Spike?”

The Slayer. Figured.

“Yeah.” Tried not to sound pissed off. Niblet had just closed her eyes, but the noise got her all wound up again, sitting up like she’d been struck by a bolt of lightning.

“You know that warlock―Rack—the one who got Willow hooked.” Buffy’s voice was tight and breathless, as though she’d been sprinting for miles before finding a payphone. “How do I find him?”

Shite. Dawn’s heartbeat picked up behind him, rabbit-quick. He was tempted to disappear down the hall, take the conversation away from prying ears, but there’d been no point. Could’ve heard it from two floors down, probably. He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Why―lookin’ to score?”

“Not funny,” Buffy snapped. “It’s important. Willow broke into the Magic Box. She’s―”

“Lemme guess.” He hummed, unimpressed. “Nicked all the bad mojo?”

“Absorbed it,” she corrected grimly. “All of it. Anya said the books disintegrated in her hands.”

You appeared at the bedroom door, face stricken as you ventured up the hall with light footsteps. He thought you were asleep. Must’ve been wrong.

“After,” Buffy continued, “Willow, she―she found Warren. We were too late. She…”

Spike finished the sentence for her. “Killed him.”

“Worse.” She didn’t elaborate. He was glad for it, what with present company listenin’ in. “We… we think she’s gone to Rack. He gave Warren some… some protection thing-y. Made her really mad. She has to be―stopped.”

Before he could respond, Little Bit sidled up beside him, blanket and jammies ’n all.

“Rack’s place is cloaked,” she said quietly. When he arched his brow at her, interrogative, she added, “Willow took me there. That time. There’s some kinda spell―she said only demons and people with magic could find it.”

He nodded, eyeing you as you moved toward her, took hold of her arm. She leaned into you, awkward with the height difference. Little sis towered over you.

“Try Clem, Slayer,” Spike said. “He’ll know. Won’t get you inside, but he’ll take you to the door. Tell him I sent you.”

“Okay.” Distorted whispers undercut Buffy’s voice, delaying her next words. “Spike… Thank you.”

The line clicked dead.

No worries, then. Didn’t get a chance to say it aloud. He replaced the receiver with a thunk, the only sound other than the typical sputtering pipes and humming heater being the low purr emitted by Gus on the pillow in the corner.

“You okay, Dawnie?” you asked, drawing the girl back to the makeshift bed. “Need anything?”

She was a little too quick with the reassurance, now he thinks about it. Insisted she was fine, that she just wanted to sleep, dream the horror of the day away. He could blame you and the way you took it at face value, patting her back and fixin’ the covers over her when she asked to be alone—but really, he should’ve known better. He shouldn’t have allowed you to drag him to the bedroom, coax him into lying down next to you, dressed ’n all; shouldn’t have shut his eyes and let the thud-thud of your pulse lull him into oblivion. He should’ve known it was suspicious.

That’s probably why he’s not surprised right now. Furious? Sure. But waking up a couple hours into nightfall to utter quiet―not soundless, but instead, the kind of quiet that just doesn’t happen when you’ve got an extra human in the joint―he only feels the curdling of disappointment in his gut. Disappointment in himself. It feels blisteringly hot, or maybe that’s the urge to rip her foolhardy head off.

Still, “Niblet?” he calls. There’s no answer.

You stir beside him, but he’s already up and at ’em, prowling about the place, tryin’ to uncover some sort of clue that’ll tell him where she went. As he moves about, you’re rolling off the bed, cracking the sleep from your limbs and shuffling after him gracelessly. You get with the program quick, confusion turning to panic as your cries of her name grow to a fever pitch. He barely registers it, too busy cataloguing the obvious: Little Bit’s ransacked backpack. Missing keys. Shoes gone.

Spike has to move the bloody cat off the kitchen counter before he finds the folded note, the familiar chicken scrawl American schools teach kids in this century:

Gone to find Willow. I have to try. Don’t be mad.

– Dawn

He crumples the note in his fist, yellow bleeding into his eyes as he lets out a snarl, turning abruptly. Gus skitters off, tail swishing angrily. “Bloody stupid, stubborn, heroic little snipe.”

You blink at him, ashen. “What? Where is she? Has Willow taken her?”

He tosses the note in your direction; you fumble as you catch it, unfurling the paper and reading its contents. What little blood’s left in your face drains and you look back up at him.

“Oh my god,” you mutter, tiny breaths coming fast. The note falls from your fingers. “Oh my god. We―we have to go, we have to find her, before―”

“No,” he snaps, cutting you off before you can reach your coat. “I’ll find her. You’re stayin’ here.”

Shoving at him’s no good. He’s too strong, especially compared to your human frailty. He remains unmoved, captures your wrists and brings them to his chest, holds ’em firm. After a bit of struggle, you slump, defeated.

“Glinda’s dead. Red’s gone ’round the twist. Bit’s disappeared.” Can’t help easing his grip, reaching for you good ’n proper. His hands trace a line down your back, settle at the dip in your spine. He tries not to let the desperation colour his tone. “Won’t lose you,” he murmurs. I’ll dust meself, he doesn’t say. Rather die than see you dead.

The hard line of your mouth softens, muscles relaxing in his grasp.

“Spike. Honey.” Pet name always gets him. He shudders, melts like wax against the heat of your fingers sweeping up the ridge of his cheekbone. “I understand, I swear I do. But”—your eyes become flinty—“you can either know exactly where I am, or you can spend the rest of the night wondering.”

For a second, he thinks about grabbin’ the handcuffs from the bedside drawer and shackling you to the bars on the window beside the sofa. Then he thinks about what you’d do to him when he came back and released you. If he came back. Nah. A losing game, there. He growls, torn between his fury and a grim sort of admiration, though the display of his temper doesn’t scare you. You give him no reaction. It’s not that pitying way the others look him up and down when he bursts out in anger, but simply an undaunted blankness—the kind of daring that comes from a lifetime of pushing past fear just to be seen and heard for who you are.

He rolls his eyes. “Fine. But you bloody well stay behind me. Got it?”

You nod, taking advantage and darting up on tiptoes to press your lips to his jaw, relief flickering across your face. You’re already pulling on your boots by the time he grabs his duster from the peg, though you let him help you button your coat over your nightwear.

“Come on then, kitten,” he says, listening to your heart thudding like a war drum. “Let’s go save the Bit’s stubborn hide.”

It’s not hard to find the place. Spike starts by stickin’ to what he remembers from talk around town, lets his nose do the rest. Should be near impossible to get to, but the air tastes wrong tonight. There’s a buzz to it, makes his gums ache like his fangs’ve torn through in the midst of a vicious kill. Magic, thick and crackling, ripe with rot—and it’s everywhere. It coats the back of his throat.

You walk beside him, hands fisted in your pockets, the set of your shoulders stubborn, determined. Part of him hates the grit in you. It’s not that it’s ugly—never that—but it means you’re about to do something far too dangerous, all in the name of love. And he gets that; oh, he gets that. He just wishes you didn’t understand him so well that you’d pull the same suicidal stunts.

“You sure about this?” he asks you anyway, the third time since you left the car parked two blocks down the road.

You don’t answer, shooting him a look. He can tell what it means: that you’ll be going with or without him, and that he should shut up about it already.

“Yeah, alright.” He kicks at a bit of loose gravel as you round the corner. “But if she’s found Red―if the witch is there―you run. No cleverness, no speeches. Just run.”

“I’m not leaving you,” is your response, matter-of-fact ’n subject closed. He doesn’t argue. What’s the point? Not gonna win.

Halfway down the alley, he pauses. The heat’s gone, the usual whisper brushing across the back of the neck whenever he gets near particularly dark mojo. When his eyes adjust, he can see it―the door, nestled in among the dinky back entries of shops long since closed. The windows are blacked out, sigils sprayed in grime on the glass. S’not a place he’s supposed to be able to observe with his own eyes… which means the wards are broken. And a nasty like Rack ain’t the type to bring ’em down willingly.

There’s a subtle shudder in the ground as he nears―of shadow-magicks, rippling through the threshold. He grabs your wrist, yanks you close. “You hear that?”

You dip your chin once in acknowledgement, head tilted. Listening. There’s a muffled voice, familiar, but the tone is cruel, sneering. With some focus, his enhanced senses pick up the thread of conversation.

“… the one where you lie to your friends when you’re not trying to kill them? And you wreck everyone else’s happiness just so you don't have to be so miserable alone? And insane asylums are the comfy alternative? This world? Buffy, it’s me.”

The witch. The Slayer.

Red’s still going. “I know you were better off when you were in the ground. Ah-ah, Dawnie―”

Niblet.

He doesn’t wait. One solid kick and the door splinters. His body moves on instinct, dragging you in by the arm, shielding you as the power inside the room slams into him like a train. Red’s warping space, bending reality in on itself, folding sharp corners where there shouldn’t be any. Light refracts sideways, gravity pulses, and every cell in his body screams.

Red turns her head.

Christ. Any other time, he’d find the new look delicious: black-eyed, skin ash against tar-dark veins creeping up her neck and across her face, hair dyed to pitch by sheer force of will. The magic she’s swiped coils around her, fogging up the air like mist in sub-zero temperatures. It’s unnatural. Profane. It’s exactly his type, once upon a time―but it’s only a mirage, a crutch she’s using to hide from her pain.

“Great,” she says, sighing. “More of you. Can’t you all just mind your own business?”

Spike doesn’t answer. Dawn’s beside her, wrist held loosely in her grip, frozen. Girl’s face is white, tears glimmering in her lashes but not falling. She’s not struggling―she’s staring at him, you, Buffy, something like grief in her expression.

“Bit,” he calls, free hand reaching out. “Come on. C’mere, luv. We’ll take you home.”

He hoped there’d be enough of Willow left in the witch to let her go. Instead, Red laughs, bubbling up oily and sweet and mocking. It’s not a sound that belongs in a human mouth.

“What’s wrong, Spikey?” she asks, pouting exaggeratedly. “Scared of a little magic?”

He wonders what she’s pulling ’til he sees the world around him begin to shift, to blur into abstract colours. The room’s vibrating hard enough to make his eyeballs itch. He’s the only one who can feel it: neither you nor your sisters are showin’ any discomfort beyond the emotional.

“I keep forgetting,” she continues airily, picking up on his uneasiness. Can’t tell if she’s just good at reading people or if she’s picked up telepathy. “Trip’s kinda rough, huh?”

Something locks into place―everything sharpens, settling into a new configuration. A new location, with the familiar smells of candle wax, dust, the faint trace of incense. His ears ring as his vision levels out, taking stock of his surroundings. The Magic Box.

Red steps forward, grinning. “Well. If you’re not me, that is.”

The effects of her spell finally hit―you fall, knees buckling, and Spike barely catches you as your legs go out. Across the room, Little Bit’s collapsed, the Slayer rushing to with a cry of her name. The witch ignores it all, turning to eye the shop’s other occupants: Zeppo frozen behind the counter, the two raw-boned geeks at the table, sweaty and wide-eyed. She smiles.

“Jonathan. Andrew. You boys like magic, don’t you?” Her words seem to conjure violet energy so ferocious it whips her hair into a froth, lightning crackling. She lifts her hands. “Abracadabra.”

Spike braces himself for the release, crouching over you to shelter you from the worst of it. The magic explodes forward, hurtling toward the boys―but it never reaches them. Something’s blocking it, a flickering dome flaring around them.

Red stops, darkly amused. Might be worse than frustration, because it means she’s still playin’. “Huh. Didn’t see that coming.”

The pair seem just as confused as she, cowering in their seats.

“Aw. You guys wanna take it slow? I can do that.” The witch’s mouth is still curved up, still light. A cat playing with its prey before going for the kill. “Ask Warren. Oh. Wait.”

Beneath the roaring of her renewed attack, Spike hears a soft stream of chanting. Sumerian, he thinks, though it’s heavily accented. American. Demon girl, hidden somewhere in the room. “Gurumē ninginme, nugul-gula, gurumē ninginme, še-me dul-dul-e. Gurumē ninginme, nugul-gula, gurumē ninginme, še-me dul-dul-e…”

Somethin’ about shields, protection from black arts. Smart bird, he thinks, but says nothing. He doesn’t want to give her away. Meanwhile, the geeks are scrambling up out of their chairs, shoving at each other.

“Let’s get out of here,” one of ’em exclaims. Can’t tell which.

They run toward the open back door, which slams shut on them.

“Come on,” Red says, strolling toward them all casual. “Stay a while. We’re just getting started.”

While she’s distracted, Spike takes his opportunity. “Let’s go, kitten,” he mutters, nudging you along. “Gotta move.”

You stumble to your feet, barely keeping up with the speed at which he pushes you to the counter, to where Xander’s hiding. Slayer’s takin’ his lead with Dawn, and you grab little sis’s hand as the pair of you converge on each other, huddle down where you can’t be seen. Buffy turns to him, locking eyes. ‘We’re fighting,’ her look says, and he lets himself nod in response. Understanding. An accord. They move into the danger zone, a buttress against the witch―who’s still yappin’, high off her own power.

“Doesn’t matter, really. I’m just curious.” Shrugging, she points to Jonathan and Andrew. “But just ’cause I can’t do magicks on you, doesn’t mean I can’t do them on myself.” She bends her head, muttering, “Da mihi vim.” Latin. Give me strength.

Spike tastes it before he sees it. The magic rolls like a storm front, thick and dirty, acrid as burnt ozone. He feels it rattling like dying breath as a pillar of swirling light surrounds her, sending him and Buffy to the ground. Gettin’ real sick of this li’l trip, he is. From the floor, he watches as the spell dissipates, as Red looks at her own hands and grins.

“Alright. Now, I’m pretty sure I’m strong enough”―she nearly glides as she heads straight for the geeks, grabbing hold of the table they’re using as a barrier and sending it flying across the room―“to beat you to death.”

The Slayer darts into the witch’s space, blocking her path before she has the chance to act.

“I don’t wanna hurt you,” she says.

Red responds not with words, but with a punch so hard it sends Buffy crashing through the candle rack. “Not a problem.”

Right, then.

He’s already moving, letting the skin of the demon ripple over his body. Knows this is gonna hurt―if not from the chip, then from the brawn she’s imbued herself with. She smirks, gaze trailin’ up and down like she’s assessed him and found him lacking. He recognises that look. Doesn’t matter who it’s aimed at. It’s just a blind need to destroy.

“You up next?” she asks, flexing her fists teasingly.

But he’s not payin’ mind to her. Should be, but can’t―because he sees it. You. You’re moving out from behind the counter, twitch in your arms and catch in your breath. He knows what you’re about to do, and his stomach drops. He lurches in your direction, but it’s too late. You bolt from where he hid you, all reckless and stupid with your palms raised in surrender.

“Willow!”

Fuck.

“Willow,” you repeat, soft and pleading, sticking your fingers straight into the flame. Behind you, Xapper’s taken control, herding Little Bit and the other two toward the edge of the room. “Please,” you say. “You don’t have to do this.”

For a second, he thinks he sees a glimpse of her. The girl, the one who loves computers and books and fuzzy sweaters. Timid, human, too much heart and not enough boundaries. Only a second—then she vanishes, replaced once more by something vicious, meaner. Her sneer brims with lashed fury.

“You know what I hate about you, kitten?” she says, head tilting as she examines you. “You think you have all the answers. That you can fix everything with a few high-and-mighty words.” Her eyes glint obsidian. “But you didn’t fix Ta―fix her. So much for that superiority complex, huh?”

You stand stock still, lower lip wobbling once. Then nothing. “I know… Willow. I know you’re hurting. But this isn’t—”

“Oh, please.” Her voice drops, thick with venom. “You don’t get to pull the sweet little sister routine on me. Not when you’ve got him”—she jerks her chin toward Spike—“on your leash.”

His gaze meets yours, sees your terror before some kind of resolve pushes the weakness out. He shakes his head. “Don’t.”

A warning, a plea―but it doesn’t stop you. Your steps are cautious as you pick your way through the debris, stare sliding back to the witch. He feels the heat of you next to him. There’s defeat written in the tense jut of your shoulder-blades, the anticipation of certain doom. You meet Willow’s gaze head-on, even as everything in Spike tells him to get you out.

“This needs to stop.” You sweep your hand through the air, motioning to all the chaos surrounding you. “Do you think Tara would’ve wanted this? That she’d be happy about any of—”

“Shut up!” Any trace of laughter is gone at the utterance of that name. A curse. Red stalks forward, veins seeming to darken and spread their terrible poison, intent on exacting justice for invoking her lover’s ghost.

Spike’s in motion before he even thinks. It doesn’t matter if it fries him, doesn’t matter if she tears him limb from limb, if it means you live. He’d take it a thousand times over. He’d crawl across glass, dive into sunlight, rip himself apart to keep you breathing. And you’re in her sights, in mortal peril, and he has to move―

His instincts clamour, putting him between you and her in half a second. Shoving you back, he bares his teeth, reflex driving him onward. It ain’t elegant or smart, but it’s all he’s got. All that matters is shielding you, stopping Red’s wrath from touching your skin. He almost feels the pain before it hits, just waiting for one wrong move to sink its teeth in him, but he’ll do it anyway because it’s you.

He doesn’t even feel his fist connect—only the detonation behind his eyes. Through a wall of static, he hears you scream his name.

White-hot fire cascades through his head, sizzling down his spine like the aftershocks of an explosion. Roaring, he drops, clutching his head. Something liquid drips from his nose, but it’s almost secondary to the fear―because if this chip kills him now, who’s left to protect you?

You collapse beside him, fingers scrabbling at his shoulders like you could physically hold him here, anchor him to this world by touch alone. “Spike. Spike!”

It was always going to end like this, wasn’t it? All the strength in the world, and he still can’t do the one thing that matters. Still too weak to protect you.

Red straightens slowly, rubbing her cheek and looking down at him with unholy delight.

“Oh, Spikey,” she purrs. He barely hears it. Can tell she’s gettin’ closer, though. “Still trying to play Big Bad?”

Like a wounded, snarling animal, he hisses, tries to rise, but his body won’t obey.

“You’re so pathetic,” she adds. “You think this―this―is love? You and her?”

‘Know it is,’ he’d say, if he could remember how to make words, but there’s nothing. Nothing exists outside the agony.

“You do realise she’s going to die, right? Maybe not today, but someday. You’ll outlast her. You’ll lose her. Maybe that’s what you’re really in love with: that pain. Figures.”

Your fingers clench down on the neckline of his shirt, involuntary. He can’t tell if the stab of nausea’s from her li’l speech or from the repeated zapping in his skull. Either way, he thinks he might bring up the blood he forced down earlier. Still, his body tries to rise. Through cloudy eyes, he sees the witch’s arm raise, point straight at him.

“Here,” she says, lips peeling back like flesh from bone. “Since you love pain so much―let me help you feel really loved.”

Her fist snaps closed.

For a breath, Spike’s numb―then it hits, so sharp that his senses flatline. Not a bomb, this time: an entire universe, collapsing in on itself as the sun eats each planet whole. Someone’s poured acid into his brain stem, crushed his skull to pulp. He’s been tossed in acid-soaked barbed wire, the corrosive wet of it pouring down his chin and out his ears. Can taste it, the metal, and he barely hears his own scream, guttural, shorting out in staccato beats. He convulses, seizes, everything he knows blinking in and out in flashes, white, red, black.

The chip’s never felt like this before, like more than pain. Like divine punishment.

There’s shouting―yours, maybe his, maybe both―but it’s underwater. Endless infinity rolls itself into seconds, millennia passing in instants. Can’t see. Can’t breathe. Can’t―can’t tell if he’s on fire or if he’s been got for good, but he knows where you are. He feels you, smells you, the weight of you flung over him, touch on his face like a whisper through smoke. He promised. He―

“Stop! Willow, please, stop!”

Your voice streams through like water to a man dying of thirst. You’re crying because of him. Because he was too slow, too old. He wants to reach for you, tell you he’s okay―but even his thoughts are unsteady, falling like teeth from a shattered jaw. His eyes roll as the next spasm takes hold. Through it, the blur of your face, pink ’n tear-stricken, streaks of pale crossing up over him as he’s grabbed at, dragged along the ground, voices fading, fading.

Can’t die, he thinks muzzily. Not yet. Not while the witch could still…

He swore he’d protect you, that he wouldn’t let anything happen to you, but now your hands are slick on his chest and he’s going under, failing again. Would rather die than see you dead… and now it’s you watching him slip away.

Spike tries to speak, to say your name, to tell you he loves you one last time, but his mouth won’t work. And then—

It’s all gone.

He wakes to the taste of copper. It’s not quite blood, but rather something watered down, dragged through a rusted pipe and sour on his tongue. His head feels like it’s been split open, stitched up with silver thread and set on fire for the fun of it. He groans.

Am I dust? he wonders. If he’s gone to ashes, then this has gotta be hell. There’s no other place for a demon like him. But where’s the eternal suffering? The rack, the flogger, the echoes of screams in the distance? A little anticlimactic, all things considered. Blinking up at the ceiling, he’s struck by how familiar it looks. Been here before. Can’t remember, though. Can’t…

There’s movement beside him, rustling fabric, the sound of slow, deep breaths; an arm draped across his ribs, heart thudding to the beat of sleep nearby. Your scent. You, curled into him, mouth parted. Alive.

Thank Christ.

Relief shudders through battered muscles, throbbing but responsive. Good. He forces his neck to arch so that his eyes can settle on you, tucked against his side on the bed, hair messy and clothes mussed. You’re safe. He can smell blood, but it’s not yours. Overlapping that scent is the familiar vanilla-smoke of the flat, the prickle of cat hair in his nostrils, the sting of the disinfectant you use to scrub the bathroom. Home.

Spike tries to ground himself in his own body, lets himself feel all the li’l aches and twinges that come with wakin’ up after a cosmic thrashing. He forgot what it felt like to be in control. The witch can’t have had him under for long, but pain has a way of transcending time. It could’ve been a moment, could’ve been an age. His gaze wanders, taking in the dim light from the lamp in the corner, Gus at the foot of the bed. Across the room, in the threadbare armchair by the blacked-out window—

Giles.

“Watcher,” Spike rasps, all cracked like gravel run over by a compact roller.

The man doesn’t startle, the newspaper lowering to his lap as he looks up. His face is busted up, expression unreadable. “You’re awake.”

“Yeah. What gave it away? The moaning, or all the moving around?” When the old boy doesn’t rise to the bait—instead, keeps on staring like he’s found an interestin’ specimen locked up in a zoo—Spike grunts. Didn’t come for another round of beat the vamp, then. He changes tack. “When did you show up?”

Giles’s nostrils flare. “From what I can determine, not long after you were… rendered unconscious.”

“Right.” Rendered unconscious. Nice way to put his whole being-almost-dead. “An’ Red?”

“Dealt with.” At Spike’s eyebrow raise, he clarifies. “She—briefly—attempted to bring about another apocalypse. Suffice to say, she did not succeed.”

Huh. Must’ve been a hell of a plan to talk her down from that ledge. When Spike asks, though, the bastard smiles. It’s not a happy thing.

“Xander,” he says softly, eyes misting over. “Xander got through to her, in the end.”

Spike rolls his eyes. Hell, even that hurts. “Really. Zeppo?”

“He is not so useless as you believe,” is Giles’s response. His tone’s a shade cooler this time. Figures.

“S’pose he was bound to get it right eventually,” Spike offers, reluctant.

Giles makes a vague noise of agreement.

There’s a lull after that. Spike’s not blind—throughout the conversation, he noticed the man’s stare linger a bit too pronounced on you, on the way you’ve wrapped yourself around him so obviously in your slumber. He’s clearly gearin’ up to speak his mind, seeing as he’s the only one who hasn’t weighed in on you and Spike yet. At least, not in person; he’s surely pestered you over the phone at some point, but you’ve never mentioned anything of the sort.

Spike takes the chance to observe you a little closer. You’ve shuffled around a bit what with all the noise he’s been makin’, but that’s about as far as you’ve got to being awake. He can see your face now: dark circles beneath your eyes, pallid skin, lips dry and cracked. There’s the faint tang of dried sweat, the musk of unwashed hair. It’s not unpleasant in itself, but for what it means—that you’ve been running yourself ragged.

“She’s scarcely moved from your side for days, now.”

He glances up to see Giles leaning forward in his seat, hands clasped, pensive.

“There were moments when it seemed… likely that you would not survive,” he adds. “But she refused to accept it.”

Spike feels his mouth lift at the corners, throat tightening. “Stubborn girl.”

Giles nods. “Quite. She’s been feeding you. Human. She persuaded Buffy to procure it from Willy’s.”

That explains the smell, then, and the crinkling whenever he moves: blood bags strewn across the mattress, drained to emptiness, a matching crust smearing his chin.

“Didn’t think the Slayer gave a toss,” Spike murmurs.

“Oh, she doesn’t.” Giles chuckles, a short, grim sound. “But she would do anything for those she loves. It seems that is a Summers trait.”

Gotta be. Spike doesn’t know what to do with the ache in his chest—not a physical one, but the pangs of old wounds scabbing over. It’s strange, for someone to care enough about him to… to push their limits, to risk their peace, to do whatever it takes to keep him around. There’s always some ulterior motive, like the Slayer settin’ him up for your sake. But you? S’not explainable, not in the language he understands―of violence, trickery, egotism. It upends belief, to have stumbled his way into love. Real love. Wild, passionate, dangerous, yeah. Bein’ all broke in this bed’s proof enough of that. But it doesn’t hurt, doesn’t break away bits of himself ’til there’s nothing left. Instead, it makes him whole.

“Yeah,” Spike says finally, a little choked up.

Giles sighs. “I admit I… this. It’s not what I expected.”

“No?”

“I thought it was the same as everything you’ve done previously. Manipulation. Obsession. Perhaps a ploy for leverage.”

Spike expected the jab, but it’s still a sore spot. He can’t help himself. “That’s the problem with you lot, yeah? Always expect the worst of me. Really any wonder that I feel the way I do—when she’s only ever seen the best in me?”

Rather than incense the man, it seems to make him thoughtful. A moment passes, and then he murmurs, “Indeed. You nearly died for her.”

“’Course.” Spike’s jaw clenches. “Not lettin’ anything hurt her.”

“You attacked Willow,” Giles says carefully. “A human. With your chip still active. You had to know what that meant.”

“I knew,” Spike says. “Didn’t care.”

There’s another beat of silence. Giles looks older and worn down―less righteous, somehow.

“She loves you,” he says at last.

Spike’s eyes flicker down to you, the flash of an unwelcome voice resounding: “she’s going to—”

He swallows. “I know,” he says.

“And you—”

“I’d burn the world down for her.” Simple. Not even a second’s thought. The Watcher’s clearly surprised by it. “Haven’t you figured that out?”

Giles’s lips part, then press shut again like he wants to argue, but the words have abandoned him.

“Demons cannot love without a soul,” he says. It’s stated factually, like someone raised on a single version of the story.

Spike barks a laugh, dry and humourless. “Yeah? And you’d know that how? Just ’cause you spent a couple hours as a Fyarl demon a while back don’t mean you’ve got a clue what I feel.”

Giles doesn’t answer.

“You don’t get it,” Spike says. His voice lowers, something fervent bleeding into it. “It’s not some game. Not about possession, or revenge, or any other shite you lot try to lay at my feet. It’s…”

It’s quiet days in. Laughter. Watchin’ Passions ’cause he likes it, even if you don’t. Listenin’ to him ramble on about knocking off those Slayers, or the biggest beasties he’s slaughtered. Cleaning his duster, bleaching his hair for him, and getting his brew right. Beggin’ him to write you poetry, melting adoration when he reads his measly scrawls aloud between kisses, spreadin’ your thighs for him in the moonlight. It’s you, lookin’ at him like he’s hung every star in the night sky just for you.

It’s… it’s bubbles.

That’s not what he says, though. Some things are meant only for you and him. Sacred. “It’s wanting, all the time: her smile, her happiness. It’s waking up thinkin’ of her. Feelin’ like… Like I don’t exist without her. Love, true as it gets. I’d tear out my fangs if she asked me to.”

Giles studies him. It reminds him a bit of how his grandsire would look him over, intense and unreadable, which usually ended in a sneer and a beating. At least this old man treats him with a scrap of respect. There’s nothing judgemental in the Watcher’s stare. It’s the look of someone who’s built his life on doctrine that doesn’t hold up, as if he’s trying to reconcile something he’s never seen before. Honestly, it probably is.

“I watched Tara love Willow that way once,” he says finally. “Not with your flair for theatrics, of course, but with her whole heart. And Willow lost herself in that.” A pause. “You’ll forgive me if I fear that sort of love is something no one survives.”

Almost an acknowledgement, innit? A sign that one of the more hostile of your mates might come around. But even as that possibility makes itself known, so too does the flash that threatened before. The memory.

“You do realise she’s going to die, right? Maybe not today, but someday. You’ll outlast her. You’ll lose her.”

He’s thought it before, but the witch’s words brought it all back into the light, a raw nerve with a cattle prod plunged straight into it. All the more powerful in its cruelty.

Words stick in his throat. What can he say? No nobility in him, let’s be real. He knows he’s too selfish, too soulless to attempt to swear off you if it means you’ll be safe. There’s a hundred other routes he’d take before givin’ you up, a thousand deals with the worst scum on the planet he’d rather make than to watch you walk away from him. He won’t promise it—not even as a lie.

Giles takes pity on him, then, sees the truth he won’t hide.

“She deserves joy,” he says. “Not tragedy. Not… all this.”

“Then I’ll make damn sure she gets it.”

The Watcher nods. “See that you do. Because if you ever hurt her—”

“You won’t get the chance.” Spike doesn’t shy from strength of Giles’s stare. “Trust that.”

The man exhales. A fragile accord settles in the room. After a moment of stillness—then two, three—he rises, joints popping. “I’ll give you both privacy.”

As he limps toward the door, Spike calls after him. “Watcher.”

Giles pauses.

“Thanks. For not stoppin’ her from loving me.”

Giles glances back, hint of a challenge in his eyes. It’s not threatening, though—more sardonic. Playful, even, if that were the sort of thing he shared with Spike.

“I didn’t say I wouldn’t try,” he says. “But I’m not blind.”

He exits, door clicking shut. Gus starts purring as soon as it’s you three left.

Spike lets his eyes fall on you once more. He brushes a strand of hair from your cheek with shaking fingers, weak and clumsy from the way Red took him apart. That hollow buried in his ribcage swells again, the kind he’s only ever known with you. Because of you. He’s never had anyone watch over him like you’re doing. Not Dru. Not Angelus. Not even his mum, too sickly to risk her own fragile health to care for her only son. Nobody’s ever sat vigil like this. Nobody’s ever cared enough to choose him like this. And that’s love, isn’t it? Not burning or consuming, but choice.

You can’t hear him when you’re this deeply asleep. That doesn’t stop him from whispering, “Still here, sweetheart. Still yours.”

The next few days pass in a blur of rest, routine and restless dread.

You barely leave him be, not that Spike’ll let you go far. He’s treated to your single-minded—almost manic—focus: your insistence on feeding him, changing the sheets after the Slayer and Zeppo lug him off to the bathroom, helpin’ him peel off his casuals as he lay prone in the tub and scarcely able to move. There’s a begrudging silence that follows whenever the rest shuffle off to obey one of your orders, not resentment but something else. Muted, lacking vitriol. And he… he’s useless. Can barely lift his own arms. It reminds him a bit of the days when the chip was brand new, him half-starved to dust and out of his mind—only this time, he’s not surrounded by idiots eager to kick him while he’s down.

It's just you.

You, wiping his chin when blood spills after his lips slacken around the straw. Filling the bath with all that scented stuff you like—an’ that he likes but’ll never admit aloud—and getting in with him, less like a nurse sponging down an invalid and more like it was before. Calming. Vanilla foam and warmth. Doing your best to imbue sensuality into the way your lathered palms slide along his skin, as if it’s heavy pettin’ and not service. You, pressing a damp cloth to his forehead as the aftershocks of Red’s spell burn him up, muttering soft apologies each time he flinches.

S'not all sweetness. He can’t escape the pain he’s in, though he never says a word about it. Doesn’t tell you when the little metal wafer in his brain sparks behind his eyes, simply clenches his jaw and takes it. Feels wrong, now. Spike’s not sure if it felt like this before—like he could sense it digging in where it doesn’t belong, a splinter lodged someplace he can’t claw it out from. A ghost, branded on the inside of his skull. It flares when he dreams, sometimes. Especially when he dreams about the witch. Of you, screaming.

But, when he wakes, it’s always to the sound of your voice; to your hands on his chest, counting the seconds between tremors. To your breath, hitching when you think he’s still out.

You’re knackered, bone deep. He can see it, hear it in the rasp of each word as they tear their way from dried lungs. The tremble in your fingers when you bring him his blood, only half-heated because you didn’t leave the bag in hot water long enough before pouring. Skin’s too pale, eyes sunken, limbs too thin. You sleep next to him, but never well, jerking awake if he so much as shivers. Makes him want to yell at you, tell you to bugger off for a while in the hopes one of your sisters might get you to lie down and have a proper kip. For a half-hour, he intends to go through with it. But then you come in clutching the mug like it’s solid gold, steps slow and careful, face—tired, haggard, beautiful—beaming with pride.

“It’s perfect this time,” you tell him, sticking one of your curly straws in and swirling the contents once. “Pinch of burba weed, heated ten minutes, and a dash of water to make it go down easy.”

You look so proud of yourself. He can’t do it. Can’t crush the genuine joy glittering in your expression, even if it’s for your own good.

“Thanks, baby,” he murmurs instead, heaving onto his side so he doesn’t risk choking like he did a few feedings back. “Just how I like it.”

And when you grin in response, all teeth and radiance splitting through fatigue, he gives up on the idea entirely.

So he lets you fuss over him, and not only for your sake—but for his own. He might make gruff comments, roll his eyes and find it hard to muster up a smile, but he never pushes you away. He drinks what you bring. He takes the meds Buffy forced on him—strong enough to knock a human out, though it only gives him the tiniest relief—and allows you to micromanage every inch of his life while he’s recovering. You joke about it only once, saying, “Don’t get used to this, or I’ll have to start charging by the hour.”

You don’t laugh, and neither does he. It’s not funny. There’s too much love in the silence to pretend.

But the flat doesn’t stay quiet for long.

Once he looks marginally less like roadkill, Little Bit drops by. She bursts in like old times—clearly coached—with arms full of snacks and DVDs she swears aren’t nicked. Thank God. He’s not up for playing moral compass. Chattering loud enough to wake the dead, she gives him a once-over, says nothing about the ruptured vessels spiderwebbing his face. Nah―she kicks off her shoes, flops next to him, starts rifling through DVDs.

“Don’t worry,” she says, flashing him a crooked smile. “All G-rated. You’re all scrambled, and she’s sleep-deprived. No emotional damage allowed.”

Spike’s lips twitch. “No flayin’? No disembowelment? Thought that was our thing.”

She snorts, fluffs his pillow. “Not this week, Brain-Burger.”

Meanwhile, Rupes stops in only twice more before catching his flight back to England, back to keep an eye on Red. She’s doin’ some magic rehab plan with some coven near Devon, last Spike heard. Watcher’s vague on the details. Too soon to put words to everything that happened, maybe. He doesn’t say much after that initial conversation, simply making small-talk and dropping off books he thinks you’d like. But, on his way out, he sets a hand on Spike’s shoulder.

“Whatever this”—he waves aimlessly at the room, but there’s no mistaking what he means—“is… it’s changed you.”

Spike meets his gaze. “For better or worse, you reckon?”

Giles smiles, brittle and strange. “We’ll see.”

Somehow, that’s not the dodgiest shift from the lot of ’em. Xapper goes from wordlessly hoisting Spike from the mattress to guiltily shuffling into the bedroom, empty-handed.

“I, uh… don’t do the whole Florence Nightingale thing,” he says, awkwardly adjusting the chair near the foot of the bed.

You’re sprawled on your belly next to Spike, dosed up to your eyeballs with the melatonin Niblet swiped from the medicine cabinet back at hers. Crushed it up in your cocoa like a proper little partner in crime, wheedled you into drinking it all up before she left for the night. Clearly works: he’s shaken you gently a couple times, but there’s no rousing you. In her defence, he was the one who asked for help getting you to stay asleep.

The boy glances at you, relief clear to read in the laxness of his mouth. “But I figured,” he continues, “that I could do moral support. Or something.”

What self-respectin’ vamp lets that stand? Pity, ’n from an idiot human, no less. Spike opens his mouth—maybe to bring up the fact that Xapper ain’t exactly a paragon of comfort or conviviality—but that’ll only start a row. He’s more interested in seeing how far he can push this weird period of indulgence. Instead, he lets the pointed arch of his brow do the talking. Xander picks up on it, huffs.

“Still alive, huh?” he asks awkwardly after twiddlin’ his thumbs a bit.

“Yep. See you are, too,” Spike replies. “Heard what you did.”

It’s as close to a compliment as he’ll ever give the boy, and Xander knows it. He nods. “Yeah. It… it put some things into perspective. Made me realise”—he shakes his head—“well, that doesn’t matter. But I guess the world’s ending a lot these days. Might be… nice, having someone around who’s a little less breakable than me.”

Perfect opportunity to toss in a dig about Spike’s laid-up state. He doesn’t take it—just leans back, sprawls himself out and gets some shut-eye, leaving Spike to his own devices. Eventually, Spike feels tired enough to slip into unconsciousness with you. Each time he wakes, tormented by the fire ricocheting in his skull, the boy’s there. Silent. Watchful. There’s a sort of security to it, knowing he’s there.

When the faint glow of gold seeps through the very top of the curtains, Xander stands, knees poppin’. Sighs, stretches. Turns. As he leaves, he pauses at the door, looking back at Spike.

“I’m not saying I like you,” he says. “But she does. And it… maybe that’s okay.”

It’s the closest thing to a truce they’ve ever had.

But the biggest surprise is Buffy. She takes the longest to come ’round, though when she does, there’s none of the awkwardness of Zeppo or Rupes. Only that rigid saintliness she wears when she thinks she’s bein’ particularly self-sacrificing.

There’s no fanfare, no incitement. She hovers in the entry like a storm cloud trying not to make rain, watching him intently as you help him hobble slowly to the couch. Took him longer than usual to get on his own feet, though it’s far accelerated compared to a human. When he’s dropped onto the sofa with a grunt of effort, she hands over the customary brown paper bag from Willy’s, mumbles something about type O and sealing lids tight. Her arms cross, as though she doesn’t trust herself to relax around him. Even then, she lingers.

It’s after you leave to go rinse out one of Spike’s mugs that she makes her move. Stays behind. For a second, he thinks she’s going to say something sharp. Tension’s there, taut across her shoulders, jaw clenched. But instead, her eyes track over him—the fading redness, the hollows of his cheeks filling out from an abundance of blood. Wavers, like she’s not sure if she should voice what she’s thinkin’.

“Y’know,” she says at last, “I used to believe you were some sorta… roach that wouldn’t die.”

Spike snorts. “How touchin’.”

She shrugs, unrepentant. “Still kinda do. You’re annoying. Evil. And so, so gross.” A pause. “But…”

He tilts his head. “But?”

“But… it wasn’t just that.” She lowers her gaze, something small and vulnerable taking the place of the woman who’d faced off against gods and won. “You… being with her. It—I thought I could pretend. That I hated it ’cuz you’re a vamp, or because you’re you. If I’m honest, though? It’s— Truth is, I guess I never thought you’d stop being there.”

Spike stares. Not so long ago, this girl tried to stake him mid-rant. Now she’s confessing her worst fear in his living room.

“Not like that!” Buffy’s quick to say. “I didn’t, like… want-want you. I just—got used to you. How you looked at me. How I could be awful, and you’d still be around. Waiting for me. It’s stupid”—she huffs, shakes her head—“but sometimes I thought you were the only one who would. Stay.”

She shifts her weight, eyes flicking to the ground, then back up. “So… yeah. It stung. That it all stopped. That you moved on, didn’t look back. Like I was a—a placeholder while you searched for something better. Story of my life, huh? Everyone leaves.”

Spike swallows. “Wasn’t like that.”

Never really had an honest chat with her before. He’s assumed a bunch, generalised based on what he knows. Sure, this li’l confession ain’t out of left field. And yet, it strikes him as strange. Startlingly mortal. He forgets that, sometimes: that there’s a person beneath all that superpowered brawn and go-getter destiny.

“I know,” she says, surprising them both. “I know. She’s it, or whatever. Your person. And you… love her. Maybe it’s not the same as what people feel, but—I get it, now. That I was being unfair. Just ’cuz Angelu—” She chokes on that last bit, unable to force the rest of the word out. He doesn’t blame her. Grandsire screwed her up good an’ proper. “But, uh… yeah. It’s real, for you. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt a little.”

There’s a long silence after that—not hostile, but heavy. Bittersweet.

Then Buffy lifts her chin, a shadow fading from her face. “I won’t stand in the way anymore. Of you, and her. If—if she wants you, and you fight for her the way you did… then I guess I’ll support that. You and her, and the whole togetherness thing.”

Spike can barely process it. He blinks, taken aback. “Slayer—”

“Don’t confuse things, though,” she interrupts snappishly. No heat to it, though. “This isn’t some—some declaration of friendship. You’re still you. But you’re… alright. For now. Just don’t hurt her.”

Last bit sounds more like a plea than a statement. It makes the sanctimony of it all a bit less grating. That, or he’s tired. He was made for the fight, yeah, but there’s no victory where he winds up winning. If he keeps you despite Buffy’s vitriol, then it means you lose her, means you’ll never be happy. And if he can’t keep you… Then it’s simple, isn’t it? Means he’ll dust himself. End it. What’s the use in anythin’ if he’s not with you?

“Don’t hurt her,” she said.

“Never,” he replies, voice hoarse. And maybe he could tell her all the things he’d rather do than ever risk your happiness, your safety, your love—but he’s done explaining. Done defending.

Buffy seems to accept that without speaking. Nods. That’s it. There’s no teary apology, no promise to be someone she’s not, no demand for the same from him. Only truth laid bare, once and for all. A sort of poetry to it, to mending fences with someone who’s hurt him as much as he’s hurt her. It ain’t forgiveness—they’re both too proud and too jaded for that—but it could be a new beginning.

For a good while after that conversation, he sits there, pretends to doze off for a bit. He hopes it’ll force you to stop hovering so much, get a chance to catch up with big sis properly. Works, somewhat. When you come back, he hears you settle in the ratty armchair, the frame creaking under the slightest weight. There’s more shuffling, then a brief lull.

“You emailed them, then?” you ask Buffy suddenly, tone light. There’s an edge, though.

She lets out an exasperated noise. “Yes! I said I would, didn’t I?”

“And?”

“They’ll do it. They’re in—” She cuts herself off. Spike feels that tingle of awareness, the sense that eyes are watching him closely. S’possible she’s caught onto his act. “I’ll just… write down the address.”

“Good. Thanks, Buff.”

“Yeah. I only… I hope you know what you’re doing.”

Buffy leaves it at that, quickly changing the subject before he can begin to figure out the context. He feels the temptation to grill you—bein’ cooped up’s made him nosy, ’n you’ve got an unwitting penchant for getting into trouble—but that means coming clean about the faking, and you get proper shirty when he listens in on stuff that ain’t his to hear. Not worth it. All he can do is heal himself up and wait for whatever you’ve got planned to reveal itself. Besides, topic’s turned to plans for a morale-boostin’ shopping trip, and that’s easy enough to tune out. If only he hadn’t trapped himself in a situation of his own making.

With nothin’ else to do, he thinks about earlier. About the Slayer’s words, turning over and over in his mind. She didn’t want him—just liked being wanted. Yeah. He understands that a bit too bloody well, if he’s honest. Stings a little, that old hurt. Never good enough, never worth the risk, a tool to be used until discarded. It’s the principle of the thing, though. Not the girl herself. No fresh wounds from it, but a faint, detached pity, the kind you feel for someone wandering blind. Must be terrible, to be so alone.

That, more ’n anything, is why he keeps up the lie. Keeps his eyes shut, drifts to the sound of voices in his ear, your pulse thrumming through his skin. Doesn’t keep track of the time. He’s only barely aware of the shift—rustling, farewells, door opening and closing.

What’s left is the low hum of the fridge, Gus’s paws scratching at the mat outside his litter box, the sound of your breathing. What’s left is relief, and the peace of finally letting go.

Usually, he’s stickin’ his head out the kitchen window and finishing off his cig at this time of day. You in bed, the light arcing over the curtain headings to dapple the ceiling. Close as he comes to seeing the sun, and it never comes low enough to burn him.

Bit different at the mo’, what with the near deep-fryin’. Can’t be bothered with the effort of it all. He might be walking alright now—mostly—but not for too long, and even now his fingers struggle with the lighter. Has to make do with getting his nicotine fix through patches or those bloody stupid inhalers. It’s not forever, though. The aches and pains are gone; his head throbs only rarely; he doesn’t get tired as quick.

For now, this is his new normal: lyin’ in bed, watching you reading or doing one of your little crosswords, thinkin’ about stuff. Today, he’s takin’ stock of all the changes to his social life—namely, the Scoobies. How they’ve stopped treating him like a ticking bomb, like he’d explode if they so much as let their guard slip.

Not all the way, of course. He’s not daft. They’re wary, but the edge has dulled, glares softening into sidelong glances and jokes lacking their usual bite. Almost… banter, ’til they realise who they’re palling around with. And that realisation doesn’t come with upset or horror, or any of the old defaults—more a shy nervousness, as if they’re worried about his reaction. As if they’re waiting for him to turn on them. As if he’s the one with the upper hand. Dawn and Anya remain more or less unchanged. Guess when you start out fond of a monster, the bar’s lower to begin with.

Annoyingly, earning the esteem of the others seems to have come with a hefty price: they’re over his all the buggerin’ time. Can barely go a minute without hearin’ someone banging cupboards, or callin’ across the place, or screwing around with his stuff.

Little Bit’ll eat all the food and put her sugary crap on the shopping list so that her supply doesn’t run out, hog the bathroom and keep leavin’ her tweeny-bopper CDs all around for him to trip over. Walking’s already hard enough at the mo’—when he yells at her, she’ll smirk and say, “Bite me, buzzkill,” and cackles when he snarls. Demon girl seems determined to open a new magic shop straight outta his kitchen if the rancid smells are anything to go by, and spends the rest of the time updating him on the latest goings-on with the locals or ranting about the couple wishes she granted while he was out. It’s oddly touching, even if it is bloody irritating. The boy takes delight in putting on his science fiction shite, content enough to sit in silence beside Spike for hours racking up the electricity bill. Angel’s cross to bear, innit? Not Spike who has to cough up the goods. In fact, that tidbit seems to put as much a smile on Xapper’s face as it does on Spike’s. And Buffy? Well, she’ll never be comfortable around him. Too much history. But the forced ease and measured civility she brings to bat whenever she’s in company is a sure step up from breaking his nose every time she sees him.

They have their little meetings here now. There’s no apocalypse to stop, no big evil to slay—only regular ol’ vamps and the kind of fledge-tier riff-raff that’s inevitable when living on the Hellmouth. Perfectly doable for the Slayer and her merry band of misfit children. And yet, there’s awkwardness in the air, though for once it ain’t because of him. No one says it aloud. But it’s obvious, innit? The empty spaces. Holes, left behind by the witches that should be here. That aren’t.

Spike hasn’t asked, not once. At first, it was just survival, everything else on shut-down mode while he fought to stick around. Then, it was ’cause he couldn’t face the memory of it—the call. The house. Glinda. Blood everywhere, Niblet sobbing. You. Almost tempted to let the silence continue, let time deaden the sorrow like it always does.

That’s not who he is anymore, though.

He clears his throat, waits for you to shut your book and set it down on the bedside table. “What… what happened? With Glinda?” he asks.

The look on your face—it’s not shock, or anguish. More a quiet, resigned sadness, a waiting that’s come to fruition. Your breath hitches, brows furrowing as you seem to search for the right words. The lull stretches on, too long for comfort.

“Do anything?” he asks, tryin’ to help you out. “For—to send her off?”

You hesitate, then shake your head.

“We, um. Buried her. Said goodbye. You were—Clem sat with you for a bit.” He grabs your hand, squeezes. You get worked up thinkin’ about those first few days. “But,” you continue, “there hasn’t been anything detailed. Felt wrong without Willow.”

“When she’s back, then?”

“Yeah. Probably.”

He knows you’re nervous about that, ’bout Red returning. The rest of ’em are already planning on how to manage her when she gets home: supervision, restrictions, therapy. But you? You think he’s chomping at the bit to get his own back after she tried to turn him into sludge. Explained it before, but there’s some things that language can’t express right. He’s done worse himself, hasn’t he? Gone dark, let love curdle into something ugly. Difference is, she came back from it. Just like he’s trying to. And violence doesn’t stick to demons the way it does to humans, ’specially when it’s among allies. Nothing to do with keeping score. It’s hierarchy. Power. Red had it, he didn’t, and she showed ’em all that fact. Sure, he’s brassed off by her arrogance and her choice to put you in danger, but seems like she’s learned her lesson if the snippets he’s caught are anything to go by. Sick with guilt an’ nearly took herself out when she realised what she’d done.

Not the point. The point is that he doesn’t care a whit about the witch comin’ back, provided she’s screwed the lid tight on her megalomania. Not interested in having a repeat of all this.

Beside him, you turn the lamp off and shuffle under the covers properly. His arm doesn’t hurt anymore, so he relishes in folding it around you, letting you burrow into his chest with a sigh. His chin settles to the top of your head, the scent of vanilla shampoo wafting pleasantly.

“The others are grateful, you know,” you murmur, cutting through the quiet. “For what you did for Tara. Means a lot to them.”

He says nothing in return, kissing your crown.

Doesn’t have it in him to complain after that, though ponderin’ on it too long makes his pride wilt. Bloody mother hen, isn’t he? Adopting all these sad li’l orphan chicks. Lettin’ them run all through his coop like they own the place. If the big bads could see him now, they’d laugh so hard they pissed blood.

And yet—

It’s far more than he ever thought he’d get, this unsettled acceptance. They’re not his friends—never will be, not properly—but the war’s over. And that’s something.

Healing’s always been odd business as a demon. Wounds don’t last long, so it doesn’t hurt much, either. Broken bones right themselves in a matter of days, the occasional scrape or swelling even less. And the more blood drunk, the quicker the whole thing goes.

Spike’s more familiar with it than most—get beat on, drain a vic, sleep it off and Bob’s your uncle. No aches or pains when you wake. Mightn’t be fully up to form, but at least it ain’t lyin’ around for weeks and waiting. Only real difference is if the hiding’s less one-on-one and more a mob deal, or if magic’s involved. Got plenty of history with the former, with Dru after that mess in Prague. Now, thanks to Red, he’s got experience with the latter, too.

Different, innit? Less passive. It’s like he can feel the damage she did, feel the grey matter reforming from mush into something resembling brain again. Whole body copped it, too, what with the seizing. There’s an awareness there he’s never had before, as though he’s actively paying witness to the knitting together of what was undone. More or less finished now, though a phantom flashing remains. A memory of what it was to be brought low, turned into a hunk of char-grilled meat.

But with recovery comes clarity, comes noticin’ stuff he hadn’t before. Or maybe things he was too wrapped up―in you, in the newness of attachment, in excitement envisioning some kind of future where you’re always there―to see.

Like how easily you trip on thin air or drop things, always coming away with some new cut or bruise in your attempt to catch them. The underlying scent of infection coursing through your blood when you forget to apply mercurochrome to open wounds. The wince you think he doesn’t catch when you move from one side of the room to the other, the slight limp from that old track injury of yours. So fragile. So breakable. So temporary.

Red could’ve done away with you with next to no effort. Any creature worth its salt could take you out quick. And that ain’t even countin’ all the regular human ways to go: slippin’ on the stairs at Revello Drive, gettin’ hit by a car crossing the street, drownin’ in the tub. Droppin’ dead for no reason at all, just because. Happens, doesn’t it? Humans stop, sometimes.

In the blink of an eye, you’ll be gone. A name in a county record, words on a headstone. All that stubborn, brilliant fight that makes you so bloody glorious―gone. But Spike? He’s forever.

Never had to deal with it before. Dru’s the same as him, and he didn’t really get enough of a shot with the Slayer to worry about it. But it’s more and more clear as the days go by that, eventually, the difference between you and him’ll catch up.

His first impulse is to go for the immediate fix. He can’t be human again, but you could be like him. For a second, he imagines it: your eyes glowing yellow, ridged brows and razor-sharp fangs, fast and strong and safe. That idea’s tossed away almost immediately after, though. Knows all too well that turning’s a gamble. Might not get the same girl back at the end of the road, and that defeats the whole point. S’you he wants to keep, not your body.

If only there was…

Catching sight of you, he immediately loses his train of thought.

You’re standin’ in front of the mirror, midway through stripping off for your shower. Started it as a tease months back―undressin’ in the bedroom instead of right before hopping under the stream, gives you the chance to strut starkers up the hall ’n give him a good show―but now you do it out of habit. He lets himself ogle: smooth skin, the flare of your hips, the dip above your arse. The good bits are covered, hidden from view by your practical, full-coverage underthings. Pale, girlish pink. Not one for fuss and frills, you are. Makes him feel as barmy as his sire, all that cotton innocence. Cute. Wreckable.

“Think I’m all better,” he says from his place on the bed, sprawled out with a cocky little smirk that hasn’t made a proper appearance in ages. His stare sharpens, blatant, when you turn to face him, eyes lingering on your exposed body. No mistakin’ his meaning. “Mm. Much better.”

Your nostrils flare in amusement, though you arch a brow at him. “You still flinch when the cat jumps on you.”

“Bastard’s got needles for claws,” he mutters, transfixed by the spill of your tits as they’re released from your bra. “You get your bollocks shredded by that furry li’l demon, see how casual you are.”

That makes you giggle. “Sure”―the humour fades into something more sober―“but you nearly died. It’s not a good idea to risk it. Set you back.”

“Bit o’ rough-and-tumble won’t knock me flat, kitten.” He might be erring into begging territory, but that’s no knock on him. Doesn’t take much convincing on his part to get you to cave on most things, ’specially if he’s clear he’s desperate for it. “’Sides,” he adds, “I’m a vampire. Near-dust experiences come with the package.”

“Not when it’s because you tried to fist-fight a witch hopped up on dark magic.”

“That counts,” he insists.

“You had seizures.”

“Yeah.” He pushes himself up onto his elbows, playfulness vanishing from his voice. “But I didn’t lose my bloody mind. And―most importantly―I didn’t lose you. Worth it all, for that.”

You soften slightly at his words. He pounces on it.

“Tell you what,” he says, eyes gleaming as he settles back, folds his arms behind his head. “If it’s too soon for a good, proper shag―how ’bout a lazy one? You on top, I don’t have to move a thing.”

You shake your head. “You’re impossible.”

Sure, he’ll cop to that―but he’s noticed that you haven’t moved to the open drawer yet. Haven’t picked out your night wear, or shuffled out the door. He grins. “Not what you were saying last time you were ridin’ me like I owed you money.”

“Jesus Christ, Spike,” you hiss, blushing furiously.

Easy to read between the lines, though: that bolt of shocked pleasure whenever he reminds you how hot you get for it, how deep you throw yourself into the feeling of your body under his, him inside you. Still got a smidge of that prissy shamefulness. Used to get all tangled up in guilt over spreadin’ out for him, ’til he started reminding you that the best girls are always ready to go for their bloke. Ramps up the overachiever in you like nothin’ else.

“C’mon, baby. Just a little ride. You set the pace.” He spreads his legs a bit, lets the line of his prick straining against his sleep pants emphasise his intent. “I’ll even let you finish first.”

Sighing, you slip your knickers down, kick them off onto the floor. Padding toward the bed, you say, “S’pose I should thank you, huh? For saving me.”

“Mm. Thought you might say that.” He drops a hand to his waistband, lazily palms himself through the thin fabric. “Deserve some gratitude, I do.”

You kneel between his legs, slow and deliberate, fingers ghosting up the inside of his thighs before tugging down his sweats. His cock springs free, hard and already weeping, ruddy from his earlier meal. It’s been too long since you last touched him, since he’s felt you wrapped ’round him. Hell, he misses it. Misses you.

You take him in hand, leaning forward.

“Oh, I’ll give you gratitude,” you say with a grin. “But if you start seizing mid-thrust, I’m taking your wallet and leaving town.”

He chuckles low in his throat. “Deal.”

Your grip is confident, the right side of too-much as you gather spit in your mouth and part your lips, letting saliva trickle onto him. He curses under his breath as he watches you coat him in it, slick him up, lickin’ ’round the head like Lolita with her lollipops. Right sight more sinful, too. You open wider, sinking down. Warmth surrounds him, pressure, and wet, velvet suction. Your tongue flattens against the underside, lashes fluttering as you take him in bit by bit. Gotten better at this―so much better―but he still brushes the back of your throat too fast, and you gag. Your eyes water, hand tightening around the base as you draw back with a gasp.

“Not perfect yet,” you rasp, stifling a cough. “You’re too big.”

It’s said almost accusingly, like it rankles you to be anything less than immaculate. He doesn’t have the words to tell you how that’s the whole point, the part that makes it so bloody superb. Instead, he groans, all shaky pride.

“Beautiful,” he croons, sincerity couched in lewdness. Reaches down, curls his fingers through soft strands. “Li’l human mouth wasn’t made for it, yeah? But you try anyway. Look so gorgeous when you choke.”

You glare up at him―cheeks flushed, no real ire to it―then go back in. Slower, less force in the pull of your cheeks. Sucking and swirling, your tongue teases the slit, fist working what you can’t take. Spike sinks into the mattress like he’s been shot. It’s too much: you, your mouth, the way you moan around him like you’re the one getting off. He hisses, fangs brushing his lower lip. Wouldn’t take much to let himself go, but he doesn’t want that. Wants more.

“Up.” He tugs you off his prick with the hand in your hair. “C’mon now. Get that cunt on me.”

“You’re lucky I’m into you,” you say, mouth red and swollen, climbing up to straddle him. You brace yourself, rub your slick folds against his shaft, grinding slow and rhythmic. A tease, but not much of one―your arousal’s written all over you, soaking him, making him twitch beneath you.

“Christ,” he grits out. “So wet I could slip right in. Don’t need prep at all, do you?”

A lie, that last bit, but one that’s fun to tell. You knot straight back up if he’s not gotten inside you for more than a day, and it’s been a fair while longer than that. Makes you huff, though, bite your lip like you’re not sure if you should melt into him or tell him off. He jumps his hips once to catch at your entrance, just enough to let you feel the breadth of him there. Like he thought, you’re sealed up like a vault, barely givin’ ground.

“Not too fast.” He slides his palms up your thighs. “Been a while.”

Nodding, you reach down, angling him in one-handed. A pop of pure heat surrounds his tip, forcing him to curl his toes hard to keep from grabbing at you too tight, keep from taking over. You wiggle onto him, sinking an inch, two inches—then you stop, panting.

“Too much?” he asks, voice low and careful.

“Hurts a little,” you whisper, wincing. “But—I like it.”

That gets him: his control fractures, his nails digging into your flesh, and he can’t tell if his head’s pingin’ from the chip or if it’s the phantom twinge that’s hit periodically since waking up. Nerves misfiring. Either way, he’s too distracted to worry ’bout it. Too focused on the iron band of your inner muscles squeezin’ on him as you work your way to the base, the way your brows furrow and your lip catches between your teeth each time you pause. He might blow just from this.

“God, baby.” He stifles the bestial noise threatening to rumble from deep in his gut. “So tight ’n hot. Gonna tear you apart on me.”

“Yeah.” You’re trembling as you rock in increments, easing him in. “I want that. Break me, lemme feel it—”

“Then take it,” he says, thumb pressing circles against your clit. “All the way. Show me how bad you want it.”

When you finally settle with a sharp cry, it’s with some measure of his cock left to go, no room to fit. Should’ve licked you open, maybe. Got you off. Would’ve relaxed you, made sure you could take him whole. S’no matter, though—you’ll open up. As it is, he can barely think. You’re a bloody vice around him, wound as far as you can be, insides fightin’ his presence with everything they have. Rippling, wringing. It’s torture.

He groans your name as you brace your hands on his chest, dragging up and dropping down leisurely, gettin’ yourself used to the stretch. You don’t lift high―just enough to push a little noise from your throat each time you fall back. Best part of this position is watchin’ you move: hips winding, tits bouncing, head tippin’ back like you’re seconds from passing out from the pleasure-pain of it. Tremors run through your thighs as you work yourself, sweat coating you in shine. You lean forward a bit, and on your next downward plunge, you swallow up his remaining length with a low whine.

“Good girl,” he says, grunting when the praise makes you flex ’round him. Always loved that: how hot you get for his approval. “So sweet, jus’ look at you.”

You moan, deep, as if it’s come straight from your cunt. The flush is spreading down your neck, painting you bright, and the corners of your eyes glisten, overwhelmed. He's right in to your cervix. Can feel the little bump of it right at the head of his prick, threatenin’ an early finish each time it rubs up against him. Shooting zaps fizzle in his brain every time you bottom out, but the ache ain’t stoppin’ you; if anything, it’s fuellin’ you, making you ramp up. Your pace is gettin’ a little clumsy, less steady and more lurching, like you need it more than you can bear it.

Beautiful. Beautiful, perfect girl.

“Got the best li’l snatch, baby.” His hands are unable to settle on any one place, trailin’ down your spine, cuppin’ your arse, grippin’ your thighs. He wishes he had more of ’em, could touch you all over ’n leave no place uncovered. “Feelin’ nice, yeah? Hurtin’ good?”

“Yeah, yeah,” you say, mindless, arms shaking with each stroke. Your legs are quivering too hard to hold your weight for long. “Please, Spike―”

On the next thrust, you lose your balance, pitching straight toward him and just barely bracing beside his head with an elbow.

“There we go,” Spike purrs, voice honey-thick and wolfish as he catches you. He bends his knees, plants his feet against the mattress to roll up into you, teeth bared in a smile. “That’s it. Can’t even hold yourself up, can you?”

One arm around your waist, other palm at your arse, he pulls you up higher ’til your tits are in his face, nipples within reach. He wraps his lips ’round the nearest, sucking slow, almost sweet. Makes you keen, back arching to push yourself into the pressure of it. Takes a couple deep pulls, tongue swirling around the hard tip―then bites, hard enough to make the saltwater spill from your eyes, get you pulsin’ around him.

“Oh―oh, god,” you call out, warbling, hips moving wildly now. “I―’m gonna―”

He doesn’t stop, keeps hummin’ round your nipple, worryin’ it between his teeth and letting his hand drift between your legs to stroke where you’re swollen and sensitive. You shudder in his grip, heartbeat racing and breath coming in short little bursts, whole body starting to tense up.

All it takes is one firm pinch to your clit, and you break.

You grind down onto him as your cunt spasms, drawing him in even further. A flood of wet soaks him, burning hot and coating the air in richness. You crumple fully, slick and wrecked, wracked with convulsions.

Spike snarls. “That’s my girl.”

He flips you, your limbs pliant and uncontrollable, and your lips fall on a gasp as you hit the mattress. You barely have time to blink before he’s buried in you again, pressing your thighs to your chest as he drives into you hard and fast, his pelvis all but crashing against yours. The sound is filthy: skin slapping, lush squelching as your cunt continues to throb around him, your cries comin’ thick and loud. He can feel the demon showin’, his fangs digging into his lower lip as his face twists with pure, animal hunger.

“You like that?” he asks, hips snapping into yours. “Daddy’s cock makin’ you feel all messed up? Nice ’n deep?”

Regrets it for a mo’―remembers how unsure you’ve been when that name’s slipped out during past romps, the way you cried for days after Hank’s visit ’n avoid bringing it up since―but you either haven’t heard him or you don’t care anymore. You nod frantically, incoherent with sensation, fully weepin’ now. His cute li’l crybaby. “Yeah, yeah, I love it, love it loveitloveit…”

He grits his teeth, pounding at you even harder. The bedframe slams against the wall with every motion, threatening to crack the drywall. He feels the chip spark in warning, but he pushes through it. Doesn’t stop. Won’t. Not when you’re squealin’ and beggin’ like this, nails scratching into his shoulders and ankles digging into his back like you can hold him here just with that.

“Gonna wreck you,” he pants, hammering in ’til he hears it punch the air from your lungs. “So bloody sweet for me, takin’ it all even when it hurts.”

Tears streak your cheeks and he licks them away, growling against your jaw. “Such a good girl, lettin’ Daddy have you like this, all stretched out and sobbin’ for me―”

Your cunt flutters at that, and his control finally shatters.

It hits him like a bat to the bollocks, blinding and all-consuming, every nerve firing up as he comes. With a guttural groan, he thrusts one last time and holds, grinding in as he spills inside you. The pleasure is too much, too big for his barely-healed body, and he nearly howls with the force of it. Still buried to the hilt, he slumps into you, chest heaving despite the fact that he doesn’t need oxygen. This close to you, the thud of your heart feels like it’s his own.

For a long moment, he doesn’t move―just breathes you in, all salt and sweat and tears and heat, quiverin’ beneath him. Then, finally, he reaches up to cradle your cheek, soft to counter all the roughness. His nose nudges yours, staring into your half-lidded eyes, lingering there before leaning in to kiss you. It’s not hurried, not greedy like the rest of him’s been. It’s slow, careful, his tongue gliding past your lips to taste the tiny sounds you’re trying to catch your breath around. There’s a hint of him, too, bitter beneath the sweetness of those lollies you’ve been swiping from little sis’s stash all day. Your fingers twine into his curls as he licks into you, drawing him closer, and he lets a sound from low in his throat loose.

When he finally breaks off, he lets himself brush his lips along your cheekbone, press firm against the corner of your eye, your temple. All that earlier boldness has melted. You’re soft now, quiet in that way you get sometimes, like you’ve been undone to your foundations and all that’s left is the barest version of you: fragile, small, safe.

“You did so good,” he murmurs. “So brave.”

You hum, a little dazed. “S’nice. Full.”

His chest swells. “Know you like it when I make you feel like that.”

Nodding, you say, “I like bein’ yours.”

Gently, he folds you back out, massages your legs to get the blood flowin’ properly after being pinned up over his shoulders. Doesn’t pull out, though―not when you’re like this. Makes you sad ’n pouty like a little girl. But he rolls you back on top of him, arranging you all proper so you’re comfy. You sigh, wriggling about until your contours fit his perfectly. He wraps his arms around you, holds you tight, listens to your pulse return to a leisurely rhythm.

You go silent for a long stretch. He thinks maybe you’ve nodded off.

And then you sniffle loudly.

“Hey, now,” Spike says, instantly alert. He cups the back of your neck. “What’s all this?”

You bury your face into him, shaking your head, but you’re trembling, and this time it ain’t in a fun way. He shifts you up a bit so he can see your expression, see what’s botherin’ you so much. His palm strokes your spine.

“Sweetheart. Talk to me,” he says.

Your voice is tiny when it comes. “I… I thought I lost you.”

His breath catches.

“I―I didn’t say it. Didn’t let myself think it, but… you weren’t waking up, and I didn’t know what to do, and I was so―so scared, Spike.” You hiccup on a sob. “You were shaking and bleeding and you looked dead-dead, and I had to keep pretending it’d be okay so no one else would panic. But I thought―I thought you were gone.”

“Oh, baby.” He hugs you closer. Your fingers clench against his shoulder like he’s a lifeboat on stormy waters. “I’m here now. I’m alright. Don’t have to hold it in anymore.”

“I did, though,” you whisper, voice thick. “I didn’t cry. Not once. Not with Tara, not with you. I just… kept going. Couldn’t fall apart.”

“You were brilliant,” he tells you, kissing your forehead. “Strongest girl I’ve ever seen.”

“I didn’t want to be strong,” you whimper. “I wanted you.”

Christ, that stings. He pets your hair, soft as he can manage. “I’m sorry. Didn’t mean to scare you like that.”

You pull back enough to look at him, eyes glossy and red-rimmed. “Thought you were gonna leave me. Like everyone else.”

His throat aches. His heart―whatever’s left of it―twists violently.

“Never,” he says. “Not me.”

Red was never gonna stop him from being at your side, but he can’t put into words how far he’d have been willing to go to make sure of that. Wherever vamps end up after they’re dust, he’d have crawled limbless out of there just to get back to you. Nothing to hold him back: not death, not pain, certainly not a bit of metal or a witch.

You blink hard, and then it comes. A weak, uncertain whisper.

“Daddy…”

It’s the first time you’ve used it yourself. Never thought you would, and he was fine with that. Can’t help what you can’t help, and it’s not your fault that Dru’s obsession with Angelus―with her daddy―warped him irreparably. A need to be someone else’s everything, the way Spike’s grandsire was her everything.

But here you are. Callin’ Spike Daddy. Accepting everythin’ he’s been dyin’ to give.

Something in him shatters.

His voice catches at the end as he murmurs, “Daddy’s here, princess. So proud of you. Not goin’ anywhere.”

That’s a promise he’s willing to swear by everything he is. Blood and guts and filth and rot. Vampire, man, killer, poet. It’s all yours.

Your cheek is wet where you nestle into his neck, damp lashes tickling. Your breath is still shaky, puffing hotly against his flesh. “Gonna be with me forever?” you ask.

He squeezes his eyes shut, thinks of crystal pools and sun-warmed hotel beds and train rides down the coast. Thinks of demons and spells and impossible wishes. Thinks of your hands in his hair, smile direct at him and the way you always choose him, even when you shouldn’t.

Forever. Somehow, he’ll find a way to make it true.

“Yeah, sweetheart,” he says, letting his chin alight atop your head. “We’re forever.”

You nod, cling tighter. And Spike? He lies there, wrapped around you, anchoring you to him like a prayer―because that’s what you are. An invocation of all his most desperate desires. Hope made flesh. You’re his future.

Eventually, your tears subside, and you drift into slumber. He stays awake for a while longer, staring at the ceiling, trying to imagine a future that doesn’t end.

The first thing Spike notices is the stillness.

You’re asleep beside him, curled into a loose sprawl that hasn’t shifted in ages. One arm’s nestled under the pillow, the other draped across the bed like you’d reached for him and forgotten to pull back. Breathing’s even, heavy. No crease between your brows, no twitch in your fingers. Purely rest.

That’s new.

He watches you for a long while―longer than he should, probably―but he can’t help himself. You look softer, lighter, like something inside you’s been unhooked. There’s no hovering or fretting, no rattling off questions about whether or not he’s finished his blood or reminding him to nap. Been annoying, yeah, but he realises now that you’d never really stopped moving. Not once. And it wasn’t simply about taking care of him. It was armour, wasn’t it? The only thing keeping you from unravelling. Gotta keep going, stay useful, stay in control.

Should’ve known. How many hits have you taken already? Lived a fraction of the time he has, and yet you’ve faced so much loss, so much pain. Bloody hell. You’re just a baby.

The bedsprings creak as he eases out from under the covers, tugging on yesterday’s jeans and heading barefoot to the kitchen. Floor’s cold, early evening givin’ him the barest hint of light to see without switching the overhead globe on. Gus is sunnin’ himself on the windowsill, soaking up the last dregs of heat before night comes; little prick stares at him for a second before apparently deciding he ain’t worth the fuss, immediately closing his eyes again and noddin’ off.

He opens the fridge, grumbling a bit when he sees there’s only one egg left. Still takes it out, though. Bread’s nearly gone, too, so he chucks the last two slices in the toaster, fishes ’round the cupboard for a saucepan. Cracks the egg and scrambles it with a pinch of salt and a splash o’ milk, bit of pepper over it like he’s seen you do a hundred times.

While he’s waiting, he examines the list on the little notepad you keep stuck to the fridge door.

Tea (English breakfast) Soap (vanilla) Blood―go to Willy’s Chocolate Plasters Crushed garlic

Unclipping the pen from the top of the pad, he crosses out the last one with a mutter of, “Oi,” and then writes underneath:

Eggs Milk (cow’s, not oat) Bread Juice

Satisfied, he returns to his task. He gets out the crockery right after turning off the burner. Butters the toast, piles on the egg, pours the rest of the orange juice. He carries the plate into the bedroom and sets it down gently on the nightstand, glass next to it.

The smell rouses you―you make a little sound, eyes opening a smidge. Hair’s wild, face all scrunched like a sleepy kitten.

“Time s’it?” you ask.

“Half-past too early,” Spike says. “Made you breakfast, so you’re not allowed to complain.”

You blink at him, then smile. A real one. He notices the difference: how it doesn’t waver at the edges, doesn’t look like it’s trying too hard to seem put-together. It’s the first proper smile from you he’s seen in ages.

“You cooked?” you ask, sitting up and rubbing your eyes. No mention of what happened before you went to sleep. Probably for the best.

“Don’t sound so surprised. I’m a kept man now.” He settles back on the mattress beside you, nudging his thigh against yours. “Got responsibilities. Grocery lists. Toast mastery.”

You giggle, craning your neck to reach his lips. He brings himself down to you, tucks a finger beneath your chin, presses his mouth against yours. No need to deepen it―not about lust. It’s unhurried, drawn-out, a silent declaration of love. When you pull away, you say, “Thank you, kept man.”

More loaded than it needs to be. That’s how he knows you don’t just mean for breakfast―but for last morning, too. For all of it, maybe. Stayin’. So he gives you a smile of his own and looks on as you reach for the plate, tuck in to the grub he’s made you. Sees how the last few shadows drain from your face, nothin’ left but light and laughter, the way it should be. You don’t even notice when he brushes your hair out of your face while you guzzle from the glass, heavy-lidded. Just sigh a bit when his mouth brushes your temple, contented.

“Eat the rest, princess,” he says. “Can’t have my girl wastin’ away.”

Your lips curl up at the edges, drowsy and grateful, and you mumble a thank-you. Don’t comment on how natural it sounds, how gentle his bossiness is. It’s just fact. He remembers what the Watcher said: joy, not tragedy. This? This is joy, innit? The kind you do whatever it takes to keep. The cavity in his ribcage feels weighted, like there’s a balloon expanding past bone and muscle. Not painful, but full.

He doesn’t tell you ’bout the thoughts in his head. The ideas, half-baked, gathering like mothballs. The rumours passed from other continents that promise the unattainable. His wish, turning and turning itself over, tryin’ to figure out a way to become real. Immortality, no drawbacks, no complications. Just you, and him, and whatever stretches beyond the end of the world. But none of that’s for you to hear, not yet.

 “After breakfast―wanna talk about that holiday?” he asks instead. He’s already planning it. Not in the way you think, though.

You nod, all happy and golden. Clueless.

And Spike—self-proclaimed monster, eternal outsider—grins like a man who’s finally found a cause worth fighting for.

Read on AO3:

The night air carried a faint chill, the kind that made you grateful for someone to lean against. You'd driven out past the edge of town, where the streetlights gave up, and the sky opened wide—like someone had punched holes in black velvet just to let the light spill through.

Spike had insisted on the spot. "None of that poncy observatory rubbish," he'd grumbled earlier, cigarette dangling from his lips as he leaned against the hood of his DeSoto. "Real stars need real dark. Trust me, pet. Been lookin' at 'em longer than your great-great-grannies were in nappies."

Now the two of you were stretched out on a thick blanket he'd somehow produced from the trunk—black, of course, because Spike. A half-empty bottle of cheap red wine sat between you. He'd called it "plonk," but he'd still poured you the first glass with surprising care. The grass was cool beneath the fabric, and every so often a breeze rustled the leaves overhead.

You tilted your head back, tracing constellations you half-remembered from school. Orion. The Big Dipper. Nothing fancy, but beautiful in their quiet way.

Spike was quiet beside you, unusually so. No quips about how humans romanticized twinkling gas balls, no mocking poetry references. Just the soft rhythm of his unnecessary breathing, slow and steady, like he was trying to match yours.

You turned your face toward him. The moonlight caught the sharp lines of his cheekbones, turned his bleached hair almost silver. His eyes—those piercing blue eyes—were fixed on the sky, but you could tell his thoughts were somewhere else.

"Penny for 'em?" you asked softly.

He huffed a small laugh, the sound low and fond. "Dangerous currency, love. Might bankrupt you." But he rolled onto his side, propping his head on one hand so he could look at you properly. The motion brought him closer; you could smell the faint leather of his duster mixed with smoke and something uniquely him.

"Been thinkin'," he said after a moment, voice quieter than usual. "About you."

Your heart gave a little skip. "Yeah?"

"Can't seem to help it." He reached out, brushing a strand of hair from your face with the backs of his fingers—gentle, almost hesitant, like he was afraid he'd break something fragile. "Day or night. Awake or… whatever passes for sleep with me. You're there. In my head. Under my skin. I can't stop thinking about you."

The words hung between you, simple and unguarded. No grand declarations, no dramatic flourishes—just the truth, raw and quiet, the way only Spike could deliver it when the walls were down.

You felt warmth bloom in your chest, soft and steady. "Spike…"

He gave a crooked half-smile, the kind that didn't quite hide the vulnerability underneath. "Soppy, yeah? Big bad vampire gone all soft over a girl and a few stars. Dru'd laugh herself sick. Or stake me. One or the other."

You shifted closer until your shoulder pressed against his. "I like it. The soft part."

His gaze dropped to your lips for a second, then back up. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." You reached for his hand, threading your fingers through his. His skin was cool, but the contact sent warmth racing up your arm anyway. "I think about you, too. All the time."

He exhaled, a sound that was half-laugh, half-relief, and tugged you gently until you were curled against his side, your head resting on his chest. No heartbeat, but the rise and fall was there if you listened close enough, like he was breathing just for this moment.

"Look," he murmured, pointing upward with his free hand. "Right there. That bright one? Venus. Evenin' star. Bloody poetic, innit? All glow and mystery. Reminds me of you."

You smiled into the leather of his coat. "Flatterer."

"Truth, pet." His arm tightened around you, thumb tracing lazy circles on your shoulder. "Whole bloody sky full of stars, and all I see is you."

The night stretched on—quiet, endless, perfect. No apocalypses, no demons, no pasts clawing at the edges. Just the two of you, a blanket, and a universe that for once felt kind enough to let you have this.

You tilted your chin up, pressing a soft kiss to the corner of his mouth. "I can't stop thinking about you either."

Spike's eyes softened, the smirk melting into something real and tender. He leaned down, capturing your lips in a slow, lingering kiss that tasted like wine and starlight and forever possibilities.

it was probably actually the sound of the sex pistols' "Anarchy in the U.K" blasting halfway down the street that really reeled you in. Sure, they might have been insanely popular, but if this joint played sex pistols like it was just  any  old thing,what other goodies might they have in their rotation? you had to find out, maybe you would even wind up seeing some up and coming punk band--  a bunch of sweaty, shouting British boys.

pushing the door in and noticing the thump of  the music, the people swaying on the floor, the  lack of live music- skillfully replaced by a throbbing speaker connected to a radio playing a CD. The disc in the corner of the room sputtered and the song changed as the first few notes of dancing with myself by Gen X began to play throughout the bar. You make your way slowly to the counter, eyeing the crowd of punk, goth and alternatively dressed people on the floor and the sidelines.

A nervous lightweight, you find yourself shifting your weight and taking the smallest sip from the glass in your hand, your cold fingers wrapped round the glass. slipping from the bar stool and feeling the effects of the drink almost immediately, you step over to the dance floor with an excited sway in your step.  fueled by the sound of the jumpy and rushed music flooding the crowded space around you, you quickly shimmied your way around the dance floor, body moving naturally to the beat. 

You dance for a moment, letting yourself get lost in the familiar sounds and melodies and allowing your body to sway and move along with the music. This wasn't all that bad, the music was all good picks and the crowd wasn't as violent as you would have expected. Plus, who would've guessed there would be a decent club on the outskirts of Sunnydale? Dancing along to the rugged beat, you found yourself sliding over to the other side of the room, your body guiding you like it had a mind of it's own. Slowly, you looked around, noticing you were in an unfamiliar part of the surprisingly large crowd.

seeing a figure looking to you from across the floor, you make your way slowly to them,  the curiosity overtaking your body. you allow yourself to sway gently to the beat as you move, hips shifting along to the music as you draw closer to the figure. Not wanting to  get too close, worrying that he might realize you noticing him, you decide to stand in a crowded area a safe distance away to try to get a read on what he might want. 

He looked. . . vaguely dangerous, though you couldn't tell. he had a strangely imposing air to him, and the way he had been relentlessly staring at you, then blinking away like he expected you not to notice wasn't helping him much. With his long leather duster and his sharp gaze, he didn't exactly look like the most friendly guy ever, not that the crowd of people thrashing around you left you much room to see anything.

the stranger takes a deep drag of his cigarette, letting out a sharp exhale, letting his cold eyes meet yours "Bloody hell." he states, seeming to be looking you up and down, something between sizing you up and checking you out. you take a small step back.

leaning down to your level, the man said "Now."

"what's a bird like you doing in a trashy place like this?" he shook the ashes off his cigarette, stamping it out under his foot.

you blink. For some reason, you hadn't expected him to actually notice you, much less confront you. Yet, with one glance behind you, you were certain he could only be talking to you.

"Well, what's everyone else doing?" you opt for sarcasm as a small way to hide how anxious you were "Dancing. This is a club, I assume"

"y/n" he repeated, his eyes trained on your face as he tried out the sound of your name, enjoying such a simple thing "rolls off the tongue real nice, doesn't it?"

you nod, slightly unsure of yourself. "And you are?" you wince, realizing you sounded more scared than you wanted to, hoping to come off as confident

"Spike." he paused "the name's Spike."

when he says this, you look up to face him, having to crane your neck up a bit to do so, taking notice of how short you were compared to him. Finally getting a good look at him, you notice it-- the pale skin, almost translucent; the mysterious atmosphere he has. He's a vampire. Oh my god, he's a vampire. And a surprisingly  nonchalant one too. He didn't seem to be acting all bite-y, wasn't immediately lunging to kill you, like most of the vampires you had met had done. Though, in your years of being a witch, you hadn't gotten the chance to meet too many vampires, not for a proper conversation, at least. Usually it was just the average vamp interfering with your magic or attacking you in the middle of the night, no tension, no words exchanged, stake to the heart, then it was all over.

This one was different, it seemed.

you shuffle a little, leaning back on your feet unsure of what to do with your realization, yet deciding it would be best that he knew you knew. 

"So. . . you always kick off your days at punk themed bars?" you shoot the stranger a small smirk, trying to hide it by covering your mouth with one hand.

"Days?" he moves further into the dance floor, something that makes him look almost like a bird circling its prey. Oh, you were interesting, picking up on his nature so quickly-- he just had to know you, had to know why you had him so captivated in this moment.

"Well. . .You're perceptive, I'll give you that." he blinks down at you, aiming a quizzical glance your way. "yes, I guess it would be morning for me right now" Spike shrugs "What of it? It's not like I'm planning to hurt anyone. Well, not now at least"

you shake your head. He was way too casual, too calm in  a way that felt out of place when met with the pale skin, coppery smell lingering on him, and obviously vampiric nature. You had encountered many vampires, staked a good handful of them, though none that would hang around in human places, enjoying oddly human things.

The vampire sighs "besides, this place has got some bloody good tunes" he gestures to the music with a wave of his hand 

You found yourself smiling and nodding, feeling light. It was almost surreal-- He had good taste and he talked like he was a regular human, and was treating you like you were one, too. It felt like something unreal, vampire and witch, enjoying one another's company.

The night came and went far faster than you could have expected-- you saw Spike one other time, when he met you on your way out the door. Pushing a hand between you and the outside, he had offered to walk you home, said his was on the way. you declined. You weren't about to die tonight.

 You left the flashing lights and pulsing music only a little more tipsy than you had been, and with only one strange vampire encounter for the night.

As you made your way home, the long night took it's toll on you and pushed exhaustion to your whole body, you couldn't shake the feeling that something was off, strange. the feeling didn't go away as you reached your house, turning the key in the lock. 

The thought had crossed your mind that the vampire from the club could have been following you, he was a vampire after all, a creature of the night whose intentions were unknown to you. He had acted nice enough,  but with the way he had been staring and lurking around the club, who knows what he might have in store for you? maybe a protection spell would be necessary once you got settled inside.

The chill of the night air around you mixed and mingled with the chill running down your spine, and as you turned your head around to check for anyone, you catch sight of a stray cigarette dropping next to a tree, but no sign of the smoker.