They were making their way slowly back to the office, when Spike pulled Buffy to one side. Wrapping his arms round her, kissing her deeply, he sighed with satisfaction, a deep purring sound emanating from his chest. “You’re an incredible woman.”
“You’re not so bad yourself.” Buffy said, then, pulling back, she stared at him seriously, “I love you.”
Caught in mid smirk, his breath hitched in his throat and a flippant phrase died on his lips. He gave a wordless groan and placed his forehead against hers. “Oh, love; you don’t know what that means to me.”
Buffy realised that she hadn’t said it directly to him before. She’d told everyone else, but not him. She was astonished at how easily the words came to her, after all she wasn’t exactly well known for sharing her feelings. But everything about this seemed easy and right. Spike would always be there for her, always love her, sacrifice anything for her – something that she’d found frightening before. But now she felt the same, and it was liberating.
“Never stop loving you,” he paused as if searching for the right words, “but it’s not gonna be all bows and butterflies, right? It’s been a hellava time since I did any courting. No, let’s face it, never really done any, you know, courting.” For a second, he looked so shy and awkward that Buffy’s heart did a dance in her chest.
“Courting? There’s gonna be courting?” She grinned up at him, her eyes dancing with merriment. “I don’t exactly have a good track record myself, Spike. We’ll make it up as we go along.”
“No, I mean – vampire here.” He said pointing to his own chest, “I’m gonna make mistakes. Maybe not treat you right and not know I’m doing it.”
“Oh, don’t worry, I’ll soon let you know,” she said with mock severity. “Anyway, let’s take one day at a time. Okay?”
Encouraged, he grinned at her, “bound to have fun along the way, eh?”
“Yeah, now let’s get back to the others. We need to get out of here.”
Spike hugged her again, “Can’t be soon enough for me.”
_________________________________
Back in the office, Buffy moved towards the witches, Spike was about to follow, when Giles intercepted him.
“A word.” The Watcher looked grim.
Spike sighed in exasperation. “What now?”
“If anything happens to Buffy because of you, vampire, I promise I’ll hunt you down, to the ends of the earth if necessary, and end your miserable unlife.”
“We’re singing from the same hymn sheet, Watcher. I just got through telling you that I’d never hurt her.”
“I’m just letting you know where I stand in all this.” Giles said stonily.
Spike gave him an appraising look, “I’m not taking your place y’know. She’ll still need someone to guide her, plan for her, do research for her.”
Giles was torn between surprise and rage at the vampire’s insight. How had this unsouled, demonic being, known what he was thinking?
While Spike had been talking to the Watcher, Hilda received a phone call from the Professor, inviting them all to stay with him now he had been discharged from hospital.
“He wants to speak to you.” Hilda said offering Spike the phone.
“Me?” Spike looked askance at the instrument, as if it was a poisonous snake about to strike any moment. “What’s he want with me?”
“He didn’t say – why don’t you ask him?” The witch said testily.
Spike reluctantly reached for the receiver. He considered the professor to be a right wanker, but on his travels with Buffy, Mackness had attacked a vampire in a novel and amusing way – a screwdriver in the eye, no less - so maybe he’d give him the benefit of doubt.
“What.” He said rudely. Buffy poked him painfully in the ribs and gave him a glare. “What can I do for you Professor Mackness?” he said with exaggerated politeness, grinning at his Slayer.
He then listened with sharpened interest at what the professor had to say, just grunting every now and again. He eventually passed the telephone receiver back to Hilda and pulled Buffy into a tight hug. “The prof has told me where to find the place that the Scribe used for his forging. He says it has all the equipment necessary to make me a passport.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It was decided that all the others would go to the professor’s, while Spike and Buffy would follow later once they found the Scribe’s hideout.
The two renegade witches were carefully escorted to their car and magically bound again. Hilda elected to drive them, along with Willow as backup. Giles, Selena and Tara would follow in the watcher’s car, leaving Hilda’s for Buffy and Spike.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Using the instructions that Mackness had given them, the forger’s hideout wasn’t hard to find. Buffy proceeded to take Spike’s photograph
“Come on, let’s get with the photos.” Buffy said.
Spike immediately struck a pose, and giggling, she took several photographs, one after the other.
“Um, how are we going to get these printed?” She asked after a while.
“No problem, luv, this is a digital camera, we just connect it with the computer and away we go.”
She looked at him in astonishment, “Hey, wonder boy, how’d you know that?”
“It’s my innate intelligence and canny know-how,” he said with a smirk.
When she just raised her eyebrows, he gave her a sheepish smile, “Well, I did see a programme or two about it, on the telly.”
She smacked his arm “Come on canny, show me.”
They had some more fun, playing around with the images on the computer screen. “This one’s good.” Buffy said.
“What! It makes me look like a right loony.” Spike wailed.
“Everyone’s passport photo does that,” Buffy told him patiently, “if yours actually looks like you, they’ll be suspicious.”
The searched the room and found drawers full of blank passports from different countries. “What nationality do you think I should be? A sexy Swede?” Spike grinned at his Slayer.
“I think we should stick to the truth, as much as we can. You’re useless at accents; remember when you pretended to be American?”
The vampire shuddered as he thought about that time, when he had just escaped from the Initiative and was forced to trail along behind the whelp and the witch. “Yeah, luv, only too well.” He said soberly.
Then Buffy’s arms were around his waist and she whispered, “Sorry, I shouldn’t have been all big mouth Buffy. Forgive me?” He took a long time showing her his forgiveness in various, inventive ways.
“Come on,” she said breathlessly after a while, “the sooner we get this done, the sooner we can get out of here.” She reached down and picked up a small red passport. “Why don’t you be my beautiful Brit?”
TBC
WOW!!! I have over a hundred reviews! Thanks to you all - it gives me such a boost.
[Reviews - 137]
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story | 
Chapter or Story
Has been viewed 1490 times
- Text Size +
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story | Chapter or Story - Text Size +