CHAPTER 1 –

A/N: Yes, here’s another WIP for you. Yes, it’s rated PG-13 for now but, if you know anything about my stories, you know it will be NC-17 eventually. Consider yourself warned.



Buffy Summers yawned, re-crossing her legs in the plush leather chair she perched in. Wishing she would have brought a magazine, she took to glancing about the room, searching for some aspect that she hadn’t noticed before. The rectangular office she sat in was more than familiar. She could map it out in her head – a wooden door led into the deep red toned room, an appropriate color for its dramatic owner. Its décor was minimal. A fireplace was built into the wall behind her. Swanky was an appropriate term. Only in New York.

Across from her, behind his mahogany desk sat her editor, William “Spike” Giles, both elbows on the smooth top as he hunched over her latest manuscript, thin frames perched on his nose.

Buffy fidgeted her hands in her lap. No matter how many chapters of her writing he read, and he had read every word she had written since she arrived in the Big Apple four years ago, she was still nervous for his opinion.

Seeing movement out of the corner of her eye, her gaze shot to the man in front of her. When he did nothing but turn the page and continue reading, failing to acknowledge her annoyance, she sighed deeply.

Why she subjected herself to this torture time and time again, she didn’t know. A sadist when it came to her writing, Buffy always chose to hang around his office while he poured over her writings. She wouldn’t let him go home to read it, like he did so many of his other clients. She wanted him to read her stuff right then and now and give her instant responses. She had tried leaving her manuscript with him overnight once, but she was so nerve wracked that she couldn’t sleep. Would he spill something on it? Or would someone steal it while he was at the gym? What if he read it and forgot to tell her some important aspect of his review the next time he saw her? He would have read numerous transcripts by then and would have forgotten the whole ambiance of the piece!

Ten minutes later, Buffy held her breath, straightening her spine, and waited for his final verdict.

He looked up at her.

“Your last sentence doesn’t make any sense.”

Making a noise of protest, Buffy stood defiantly, coming to lean over behind him, reading the sentence he was pointing to. “Yes it does,” she said finally.

Spike shook his head, “It’s grammatically incorrect in so many ways it makes my head spin.”

“I’m experimenting with language,” she defended haughtily. “Who was Shakespeare if not a daring wordsmith?”

He shot her a look, “You’re hardly the Bard. And the fact that you would stoop so low as to use my idol against me does nothing but show your desperation.”

“Well other than the last sentence . . . which we’re keeping,” she added determinedly, moving back around the desk.

He sighed, pushing the chair out from under him and standing up, “Yet another brilliant manifesto on how all men are pigs who take pride in nothing but sowing our wild oats and lying to you fairer sex.”

“Really?” She squealed, “Brilliant?” she asked, ignoring the rest of his tirade.

“I’m sure you’ll sell millions, yet again, to the bitter women of the world,” he waved his hand toward the large window to his right, gesturing to the potential buyers that walked the streets ten floors below them, his voice lacking in excitement.

He walked around the perimeter of his desk, gathering up piles of papers and sliding them into his briefcase, Buffy hot on his heels and making her way to follow him out the door.

“So when you say ‘brilliant,’ is that more brilliant than my last book? Or is it a different kind of brilliant, because I think this one has a much different tone. Do you think I may loose some people or am I only in a situation to gain?”

“Summers,” he interrupted, “you are the only writer that I edit who I am also friends with outside work. You are the only one I have given my home address and phone number to. Please don’t make me regret it.” He made his way around the group of people exiting the elevator, entering and pressing the down button. Buffy came to a rest next to him.

“I’m dedicated,” she commented.

“You’re neurotic,” he answered as the doors closed.

Leaving the building, they waited for the light, crossing the congested New York street, Spike in his dark grey Armani suit, coffee in hand, and Buffy hurrying along side him as much as she could in her sensible brown skirt, suit top, and heels.

“It’s Friday, Summers, why don’t you take some time off and relax? That’s what I plan to do.” They safely navigated the zigzagging taxis and reached the sidewalk. Spike spun in front of her, “Come out with me tonight,” he requested smoothly.

But not smooth enough, as Buffy easily dodged his statement with ease, “I’m afraid your idea of relaxation – a/k/a whoring your way around New York . . .”

“How many years have I known you, Summers?” he interrupted.

“Four, and you’ve been trying to get into my pants for three of them,” she countered coolly. “I’m sorry, Spike, but it’s just not my idea of a good time.” She moved to go around him, but he blocked her path.

“I’ll show you enough good times to fill two of those books of yours,” he stated cockily, giving her a promisingly heated look that, for a slit second, had her thinking twice. But years of practice had her brushing off the notion as ludicrous within seconds.

She looked at him, astounded by his persistence, “Where does this misguided optimism of yours come from?”

“Who was it?” he challenged, ignoring her question.

She shook her head in confusion, “Who was who?” She continued her way down the street.

“The man who ruined you for the rest of us,” he said, following her.

“For the rest of you?” she balked, “Like I’m some kind of buffet?”

Truthfully, there hadn’t been that many given the chance to ‘ruin her’. But those who had had been doosies. Firstly, there had been Angel. Who, to make a long and very melodramatic story short, left her after they graduated because he knew ‘it was best for her’. For about five seconds, there had been Parker, who had come closest to breaking her spirit. And then there was Riley, who had had the misguided notion that men were to protect women. When he discovered that Buffy was strong and independent enough to take care of herself and didn’t need to rely on him in any way, he bolted to places unknown. All these men and, as some New York shrinks would suggest, her father, left her with her jaded and some say bitter outlook on romance. But the common factor of all of them? She had been perfectly content until they had decided it was over.

“Well you just wait for my next chapter,” she warned Spike. “It has to do with my friend Willow’s first love. First, she catches him in bed with another woman. Actually, it was the floor, but anyway, he up and leaves her without so much as saying goodbye and . . .”

The ringing of her cell phone interrupted her.

“Hello?” she answered, only for her voice to drop into an annoyed anger, “Oh, hi. She’s what!? When? No, I absolutely cannot. This is unacceptable.” There was a pause as the person on the other line stated their case. “You know what? Fine.” She slammed the phone shut.

“Arch nemesis?” Spike questioned nodding to her phone, noting her hostile tone.

“Mother,” she answered in a huff. “I have to go home for my sister’s wedding in two weeks and this is the kind of warning I get.”

“Shotgun wedding?” he questioned the abruptness of the nuptials.

“No, we all had a pretty good idea this was coming. Since they met two years ago they’ve been joined at the hip.” Spike detected a hint of snarl in her voice.

“You don’t sound very happy for her.”

“They’re twenty -- much too young to be getting married.”

Spike shrugged, “They found each other and want to start their life together sooner rather than later. What’s so wrong with that?”

“They can’t even legally drink to their own toast,” Buffy merely grumbled in response.

“Well, good,” Spike remarked, “You can get some well-needed relaxation and fax me those chapters by the end of the week.”

Buffy’s jaw dropped, “I can’t do that!” She shook her head, “No, way.” She whipped out her cell, “I’ll just call my mother back and tell her I can’t make it. There’s just no way . . .”

Seeing she was serious, Spike grabbed the phone out of her reaching fingers, “You will do no such thing. You are going to your sister’s wedding,” he told her sternly. “You’re just going to have to suck it up about those chapters of yours because I will not be there to hold your hand.” She didn’t pitch the fit he thought she would, and instead cocked her head to look at him strangely. “What?”

“I have a proposition.”

TBC

CHAPTER 2 –

“Are you daft? Buffy, I am not going to your sister’s wedding with you. I don’t even know your sister.”

“Neither will half the random relatives there,” she defended.

Her nonchalance flabbergasted him, “Summers, it’s on the other side of the bloody country!” He whipped his arm out for effect, drawing the attention of the tourists who weren’t accustomed to the crazy locals. “Chances are you’ll whip out a pen in the middle of the ceremony and start taking notes on all the wrong reasons to be getting married in this day and age. Turn it into a book,” he grumbled, beginning to walk away.

He was crumbling and she knew it. He always averted those expressive blue eyes of his when he was weakening. “Which is all the more reason for you to be there with me,” she argued. “We will have been working on the book all they way up to the ceremony itself, therefore I will feel no need to be working on it during.” She gave him her winningest smile, satisfied she had stated her case.

“You’re off your bird,” he threw out, shaking his head.


ONE WEEK LATER . . .


“Buffy! You didn’t tell me you were bringing your boyfriend!” Joyce Summers exclaimed after the front door of the house on Revello Drive swung open.

“He’s not my . . .” Joyce’s eldest tried to explain but was unceremoniously pushed to the side by her relative. Buffy was left to stand idle in the doorway as her mother fawned over her new houseguest, ushering him into the kitchen with promises of hot chocolate with little marshmallows. Buffy jumped as a pair of long arms banded themselves around her waist.

“You came!” Dawn squealed.

“Of course I came,” Buffy replied, as if there had never been a question of her attendance.

Her sister didn’t seem so convinced.

“Come on, I wanna show you something,” Dawn started up the stairs with Buffy at her heels.

Dawn made a ceremony of opening up the door of Buffy’s childhood bedroom. Whereas the eldest Summers daughter expected to be greeted by her dated New Kids On the Block poster, she was instead met by a big conglomerate of white silk and lace taking up the majority of the bed.

“Isn’t it beautiful!” Dawn exclaimed, picking up the wedding dress and twirling about the room with it.

“It’s something alright,” Buffy replied noncommittally.

Dawn plopped herself and the dress down of the bed dejectedly and Buffy instantly regretted her lack of enthusiasm.

“Buffy, I know weddings are your thing and stuff, but can’t MY wedding be an exception? I really want you to be okay with this.”

“I’m happy for you, Dawnie, really,” Buffy said with true sincerity, wrapping her sister in a hug.

“Good,” she nodded breaking the embrace, satisfied for the time being, “Now, who’s the sex on legs downstairs?”

“Dawn!” Buffy said appalled.

She received a well-practiced eye roll from her sister, “Oh, come on, Buffy, I’m getting married in mere days. You don’t think me and Connor have never . . .”

Buffy’s eyes widened comically, “I am so not hearing this.” She placed her hands over her ears in emphasis.

Dawn laughed at her sister’s discomfort. “Come on, who is he? And don’t tell me he’s just your editor. I know you just told mom that.”

“Really, that’s all there is,” Buffy insisted, running her fingers over Dawn’s dress. She got a doubtful look from the bride-to-be. “Believe me, he’s only showing interest because I’m uncharted territory.”

“I don’t think so,” Dawn sang, prancing out of the room.

Buffy sighed, moving to clear the bed of wedding paraphernalia so she would have somewhere to sleep. The clocked glared a quarter past midnight, and Buffy yawned, exhausted from their numerous connecting flights.

A light knock on the doorframe brought her attention to Spike leaning in the doorway, the top few buttons of his sky blue dress shirt undone, showing off his collarbone.

“You’re family’s great,” he noted, entering the bedroom, not bothering to hide his blatant examination of her belongings, “Though your mother won’t stop trying to feed me.”

He reached around behind her, extracting some long ago forgotten item. With a quirked eyebrow he brought to her face a stuffed pig that had seen better days.

“Mr. Gordo,” she answered his unvoiced question.

“Of course,” he replied. He tossed the pig into the air, “I bet this little pig has witness all sorts of goings on in this room, curled up in bed with you at night . . .” he let the suggestive remark hang there.

“No, Spike, only your girlfriends would take part in bestiality,” she shot back.

Spike tilted his head, as if considering her for the first time and entertaining an epiphany simultaneously, “You say I’m a whoring bastard like all the other men in the world. What have I ever shown you that would lead you to crown me with that dubious title? Have I ever paraded girls in and out of my office? Received numerous phone calls in one night?”

No, he hadn’t done any of those things. In all reality, she couldn’t even name one of his girlfriends. Had he even had any since she’s known him? Well, she had caught him flirting with another author, Faith, but Buffy knew Faith flirted with everyone and it hadn’t gone beyond that. Besides, the dark fiction writer had moved out to L.A. since then and nobody had heard from her.

Buffy shook her head, unable to come up with a response, “You’re a pig, Spike.”

Spike smiled, “No, I believe that honor goes to Mr. Gordo.” He handed the stuffed swine to her. “Just something to think about, Summers. Goodnight.”

He turned his back on her and shut the door, leaving her confused.

TBC

CHAPTER 3 –

“What do you think of the word ‘choleric’?” She was sprawled out on her bed, laptop in front of her, contemplating her newest chapter on the unjustified anger of men when their cheating is discovered.

“It’s pretentious,” Spike answered, his eyes never leaving the display of yearbooks and photo albums he had found in her room. He was reclined on the floor with his back against her bed, lazily flipping through each of them. “Who’s Will?”

“Huh?” she asked, only half paying attention to him.

“Buffy,” he recited out of the yearbook in front of him, “I love you more than anyone and I’m so glad I met you. Blah, blah, blah. Love Will.” He craned his neck to face her, “Who’s Will?”

“My high school lover,” she answered absentmindedly, concentration not leaving the computer screen.

“What!? Buffy, this is your sophomore yearbook,” he pointed, “It’s says here he loves some bloke named Xander too. What kind of freaky shit were you into, Summers?”

At his tone, Buffy tore her eyes from her Word document. He was really starting to get worked up.

“Will,” she emphasized, “Is short for Willow. I was joking about the lover thing.” She reconsidered, “Well, she is gay now so . . .”

“Oh,” he replied, considerably calmer. “Well then who’s Xander?”

“Xander and Willow were my best friends from high school,” she gestured to a photo next to him on the floor for proof. “I haven’t seen or talked to them in years,” her sentence trailed off, a flicker of sadness behind her eyes, but she quickly shook it away, back to her writing.

Spike lifted the picture in the air, studying it, “You going to look them up while you’re in town?”

Buffy nodded, “I should. They are coming to the wedding.”

Spike raised his brow, “Sure are a close knit bunch around here, aren’t you?”

“Part of our small town charm,” she answered, noticeably unimpressed by her home.

Spike glanced at the clock, “Wait, weren’t you supposed to be shopping for bridesmaid dresses or something?”

“Not until tomorrow,” she answered, “I didn’t want to go, but unless I want to get stuck with some tapioca nightmare, I’m going to have to suck it up. Dawn’s agreed to let me pick it out myself if I grace her with my presence.”

“Buffy! William! Dinner’s ready!” Her mother’s voice floated up the stairs.

Buffy turned to him in shock, “William? You let her call you William?”

Spike threw the books he was pouring over aside, getting up from the floor, “I told her she could call me that if she wanted to,” he shrugged, offering her a hand to help her up from the bed.

“You don’t let me call you William,” Buffy accused indignantly, following him down the stairs.

He shook his head, “I never said you couldn’t. You just don’t.”

“Huh,” Buffy huffed, mulling over his words in her head.




Thirty minutes later, her family was predictably engrossed in the many facets of William “Spike” Giles. Buffy poked at her mashed potatoes while questions were volleyed around the table.

“Where did you go to school, Spike?” her mother asked, all eyes on him.

“Oxford. I majored in English Literature,” he replied, relaxed. Too relaxed for being in a room full of nosey people he’s known less than twenty-four hours, Buffy thought.

“And you chose to be an editor? Why didn’t you become a writer?”

Buffy scoffed, “If you saw the office he has and his bank statement you wouldn’t be asking that question.”

“You make good money?” Joyce inquired after shooting her eldest a motherly look at her rudeness.

“Yeah, and half of it’s due to me,” Buffy teased.

Spike rolled his eyes, “Yes, Joyce, the money is good, and I do freelance on the side. Being an editor allows me to write only when I want to and about the subjects I choose. It allows me to be picky and takes the pressure off. That way,” he added, a mischievous smirk on his face, as he looked at Buffy, “I don’t turn into an irrational phobic mess like your eldest here.”

“Yeah, who’s laughing all the way to the bank in Jimmy Choos,” Buffy shot back, making a show of forking her salad into her mouth. “If my current lifestyle has been working so well for me so far, I see no need to change it,” she snipped.

Her mother leaned into the table, “Yes, but Buffy, when are you going to settle down and get married?”

“When I find a man who has more balls than I do,” she deadpanned.

Buffy was used to these remarks. When she had first told her family she was moving to New York to be a writer, you would have thought she had denounced God and declared herself a Satanist. The big city was a big scary thing for her family – a mysterious place. For months afterward, Joyce had told the inquisitive neighbors that her oldest daughter had gone to visit relatives, hoping her daughter would see the light and return home. And, just in case Buffy needed any more encouragement, every few days another envelope from her mother would arrive with newspaper clippings inside from the New York Times she had picked up from a bookstore. All the headlines were about rape, murder, or larceny.

“Can we be excused?” Buffy asked. Not waiting for a response she grabbed Spike’s arm, wrenched him out of his chair, and led him out of the kitchen.


Hours later found them outside on the side porch nursing beers. Buffy sat on the railing and Spike across from her, leaning against the house.

“What about your dad? Is he coming to the wedding?” Spike took a swig from his bottle.

Buffy huffed, “We’ll see,” she said doubtfully.

“Don’t you want him to pull through?”

“I don’t want him to suddenly pull through, no,” she looked off into the trees of her backyard.

Spike smirked a little. Buffy’s capacity to be self-centered amazed him sometimes. So did her capacity for complete selflessness. It was all or nothing with her. “Well good thing this wedding has nothing to do with what you want then, isn’t it?”

She whipped her head around, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

He shrugged, “Means your sis and mum want him there, so he should be.”

Buffy squared her shoulders, “But it’s the same thing every damn time he comes! He disappears to Spain for a few years with some secretary, shows up for one family event, and instantly he’s the most wonderful father and man on the planet! It makes no sense!”

“So glad you didn’t come out of the divorce bitter,” he commented dryly.

“Just like you handled your mother’s death so well?” It was a low blow but she didn’t care. That was a dicey piece of his history that not many were privy to and she knew it. “He left and turned my mother into a statistic.”

“You convince thousands of women a year to leave their husbands just with one of those little books of yours!” he marveled.

“They are in unhappy marriages! They are desperate . . .”

“No,” he drawled, “you’re desperate. They are in flawed relationships. The first sign of a problem, even if it’s as trivial as leaving the toilet seat up, you’re running scared. And you’re teaching millions of women to do same.”

“What? Am I teaching the women you date to not put up with your crap and you’re all pissed? For a man who goes through women like socks, you fight and awful lot.”

“And for a woman who claims to have no intimacy problems with men you’re awfully quick to give up on them.”

“I help women get out of flawed and abusive relationships.”

“But you don’t write for that crowd. No, you write for women like you,” he looked her up and down, “mid to late twenties and unwilling to stay and work for it. You want it handed to you with a nice little bow.”

“I do not.”

“Oh, but you . . .”

“Stop it,” she ground out, holding up her hand. “Stop pretending you know every little facet of me because you don’t,” she stood and pushed past him into the house.

“Fine. ‘Cause this fight we’re having is probably going to be a chapter in your book!” he shouted after her, cursing under his breath. He took a couple long gulps of his beer, emptying it. He looked at the bottle, not really seeing the label. It was that tone. That cold tone she used. Shouting he could stand. She could yell at him all she wanted, it didn’t faze him. It was when she turned all ice queen on him that really pissed him off. Channeling all his frustration and rage, he chucked the bottle into the woods, hearing the satisfying shattering of the glass.




An uneasiness Spike couldn’t explain woke him a couple hours later. He lifted his head from the mattress on Buffy’s floor. There had been an argument about his sleeping arrangements earlier in the day. When Buffy’s mom found out Buffy had banished him to the cot in the basement, she chastised her daughter for a good solid hour. Buffy had given in, apologized to her mother for such blatant mistreatment of their houseguest, and offered to make him a bed on the sofa. Joyce had shot down that idea right off the bat because A. There was a draft in the living room and B. The rest of the family (Buffy excluded) were early risers and would be disturbing his sleep that he so honorably earned in his nine to five desk job. So, here he was on an extra mattress piled full of more pillows and blankets than one would ever need in California, next to Buffy’s bed.

Which, at the moment, she was not in. A glance at the clock, proved his suspicion of the late hour. Even Buffy, who heralded the genius that came to her late at night, usually forced herself into bed by now.

After their fight, possibly one of their ugliest (and that was saying something) Spike had stormed upstairs and fallen into a fitful sleep. Spike stilled and listened for any rustling in the house and heard absolutely nothing. He tried to force himself back to sleep. She probably bunked with her sis for the night, too pissed off to be in the same room as him. But something propelled him up and off of his comfy bed and his bare feet hit the cold wood floor of the hallway.

He thought of peeking in Dawn’s room to see if Buffy was there crossed his mind, but the potential shadiness of the action convinced him otherwise. Padding down the stairs as quietly as he could manage, he hit the foyer and hung a right to the living room. He was rewarded by finding a lightly snoring Buffy asleep at her laptop at the desk in the living room, her head and arm over the keys and her screensaver (a series of pictures which included some of the two of them) floating across the screen.

He stood and watched her for a moment, but took mercy on her for the crick in her neck she was likely to have in the morning. He approached her and gently rubbed her bare arm, whispering her name. When she didn’t budge an inch, he repeated her name a little louder, accompanying it with a brush of her hair out of her face. Her face scrunched up in agitation, the little crinkles appeared between her brows and her lips visibly pouted. A small growl made its way from the back of her throat. Spike decided that he was getting nowhere fast. And even if he did succeed in waking her, he wasn’t sure he wanted to deal with the mood she was likely to be in.

Mind made up, he softly slid his hand under her head, trying not to jostle her too much. Clearing her head from her keyboard, he powered off the notebook and closed it. Now without the light from the screen, moonlight singularly illuminated the room. Sliding her from the chair, he easily scooped her up into his arms. Still sleeping, Buffy leaned into his chest, one hand bunching into his t-shirt. He carried her upstairs and back into her bedroom. Pulling down the covers, he managed to slide her into bed without waking her. But just before he settled himself back onto his makeshift bed, he tucked the hair behind her ear and kissed her forehead.

“‘Night Buffy.”


TBC

A/N: The “more balls than I do” line was taken from Salma Hayek.