Buffy Summers sipped a milkshake placidly as she waited for Willow to arrive. It had been three days since the interview and she still had yet to hear of who’d been chosen. In all honesty, the blonde needed the job—who wouldn’t want a few hundred dollars a month for simply posing?—but would much rather take it sans creepy employer man.
It was majorly wigsome that Liam Angelus had spoken of her father, and even more so that he had been checking her out like she was the proverbial piece of meat. Sure, as an attractively petite blonde, Buffy had been looked at before, her derrière even once pinched by a rowdy customer when she worked at a diner right after coming to L.A. But those harassments had been on a superficial level, not the deeply penetrating—invasive was a better word—gaze her potential future employer had given her. It was best not to get too worked up about it, Buffy resolved as she slurped at the ice cream in her nearly-empty cup. If she got the job, she would figure something out, but until then…
“Sorry I’m late!” Willow said, interrupting Buffy’s thoughts by leaping into the chair opposite hers on the café plaza they were sitting at. It was on one of L.A.’s more hidden streets and they often met there before Buffy headed to work; the Bronze was only a few blocks away. “Xander said he had to show me something really important—turned out it was a construction… thing.”
Buffy let out a laugh, the thought of Willow’s best friend since childhood and his strange obsession with tools. It was probably to be expected, as he was one of the biggest contractors involved in California’s numerous public works projects. “How long is he in town, Wills?”
“Until Tuesday night. Which reminds me, d’ya think we can head out to the club one night when you’re not working? Lots of drinky goodness, plus employee discount?”
“Sounds good. I’m game. Tonight bad?”
“No, it’s great! Hello, Party Friday! What time do you get off?”
The blonde gave her friend a wicked smile. “Tonight’s my early night—I’m off at eight. Usually to be used for studying, Miss Buffy Summers is going to take tonight to partay!”
The two sipped their drinks and chatted for several minutes until the sun sank behind one of L.A.’s huge buildings. “Uh-oh, Wills, work calls,” Buffy said, checking the time on her phone. “So we’re on at a bit after eight?”
“Most definitely,” Willow answered, gathering her things and giving her friend a hug. “See you later, Buff!”
The said blonde began to stride down the street, reaching the club just before her shift started. The Bronze was one of the less-frequented nightclubs in L.A., but it had enough of an audience to stay open (albeit sharing the property with a community of cockroaches). Most of the human frequenters came to see the local bands play live, and on Friday and Saturday nights the warehouse-turned-club was often pretty packed.
Buffy went to the back to get changed into her uniform, glad that she had brought an extra change of (sexy) clothes with her, and then headed out into the main room, which was packed with bodies despite the early hour. Couples were swaying seductively to the music, the sparsely-placed colored lights setting an eerie glow about the place as she strode up the steps to her section.
Upstairs was a bit quieter than the music-sex-fest of the dance floor; most who came up there were either too depressed to find someone to dance with, or too voyeuristic to care. She moved from table to table methodically, bringing drinks out on a large tray to the numerous people seated in the shadows. The work could seem mundane to some, but Buffy loved it—there was something about the drink a person ordered that exposed their personality, and to be able to look into so many people…
The blonde held a belief that art exposed humanity, but it wasn’t just limited to paintings and pictures. Even the most everyday things showed Buffy the truth of a person’s self. And she loved seeing it.
Her mind quickly became distracted by a whirlwind of thoughts, some serious and some comical, Buffy didn’t hear the order given by a young man sitting in one of the darker corners. All she could see was the strange glow of his white-blonde hair. “Sorry, what was that?” Buffy asked, leaning closer and raising her voice to be heard over the loud music.
“Newcaster Ale, love,” the voice purred. At that moment, the deafening roar of music calmed to a drone, everything dulling to a simple, primal beat. She felt it in her blood, a pounding, throbbing need building inside of her. Without even thinking, the blonde nearly let herself fall victim to the warmth of his voice, craving to feel something on her, his skin on her, inside of her—and all from three little words he spoke…
“I-I’ll get that to you in a minute,” Buffy said, nervously backing away from the man in the shadows without looking at his face. She felt lightheaded and dizzy, the lights making her feel as if the ground was spinning beneath her. Slowly making her way down the stairs, Buffy gave the bartender her drink orders and leaned against the cool wooden surface, panting slightly from the feelings wracking her body. God, what was that? The simple sound of the sweetly seductive voice and she was gone, head over heels.
The bartender handed Buffy the tray and she nodded her thanks, standing up straighter and trying to regain her composure. Now was not the time to be dissolving into lovestruck giggles like a schoolgirl seeing a cute boy for the first time. She was twenty-one, damn it, and not going to let that sexy, drool-worthy British accent interfere with her very important work.
“Hey Buff, it’s almost eight. Want me to take over?”
“Oh thank god,” Buffy said, shoving the tray into her coworker Sophie’s hands with a sigh of relief and dashing off to the employee’s room to change for her friends’ arrival.
~*~
Exiting the back room, Buffy made her way through the throng of people, looking about the crowded room for Willow and Co. It had taken her longer than she expected to change, something about the relative simplicity of her clingy black dress making her curse the heavens for the lack of a plentiful bank account; the uncomfortably soaked thong she’d been wearing was a bit of a problem as well, its wet lace rubbing against her in deliciously pleasurable sensations. That quandary was now resting nondescript in the blonde’s locker, hoping that the other employees wouldn’t discover it.
God, why had she had such a reaction to a mere voice? For all she knew, he could be one of those British men with famously bad teeth and… bad hair. Yes, that was it. Bad teeth, gross hair, watery eyes, a totally un-sexy accent that she just had misheard through the din of the club. That was definitely the case.
Suitably un-horny, despite her rather wicked panty-less situation, Buffy spied a familiar flash of red hair and hurried over to her friends seated around one of the ridiculously small and high-up tables. “Buffy, you’re off already?”
Not exactly, a naughty voice smirked in Buffy’s mind, but she ignored it and answered with a nod-plus-smile, settling herself down between Tara and Xander, giving the latter a hug. “How’ve you been? Are you liking Fresno?”
“How could anyone like Fresno?!” A blonde with curly locks sitting at Xander’s other side said, her potentially rude comment brushed off by the others at the table. “It smells like manure and McDonalds all the time, and there’s absolutely nothing there!”
“Buffy, this is Anya. My girlfriend,” Xander said, the two blondes shaking hands amiably. She looked quirky, but there was something about Anya that Buffy liked. Granted, she’d heard only negative statements from her thus far, but she seemed like the kind of person who would be brutally honest when needed. “And as Ahn so aptly stated, Fresno is of the ‘oh my god why would anyone want to live there’ variety.”
“That bad?” Willow asked, quirking an eyebrow. The five laughed and began talking, all of them having a great time. That is, until the inevitable was suggested.
“We need to dance.”
“Huh?” Xander asked blankly at Anya’s sudden outburst, all the eyes of the table turning towards the blonde, who simply rolled her eyes.
“It’s a simple matter of being a demanding consumer. We have spent a reasonable amount of money on drinks while we socialized, but now in order to truly get our money’s worth of the alcohol provided, we need to dance.” At five very blank stares, she desperately continued. “This establishment makes a large portion of their money through the sales of drinks. They provide a space for dancing, as well, but this part is free. Therefore, we must partake!”
At Anya’s command, she and her apologetic boyfriend made their way out to the dance floor, the three women left at the table staring uncertainly at one another.
“Do you wanna…?”
“Sure,” Buffy said, getting up and leading the way for Tara and Willow. They stood near one another as they began to dance, but the song quickly ended and the band began to head off the stage. The three eyed one another skeptically at the ensuing silence, until the sounds of a guitar filled the room, a recorded song beginning to play. Buffy turned for a moment to see Anya’s reaction to the finished set, expecting an amusing scene to play out, but she was unable to find them, and when she turned back around, Willow and Tara were gone.
Love and hate, get it wrong
Cut me right back down to size
Sleep the day, let it fade
Who was there to take your place?
“Great,” Buffy muttered, turning to leave the dance floor before she felt someone firmly grasp her hips and pull her against them, her back flush with their front and something quite large rubbing against her center rather delectably. Without thinking, the blonde let out a moan and grinded against the man harder, reaching her hands into the air and letting the movement add to the rhythm of her hips and her ass against his bulge. What am I doing? Buffy asked herself, but all thoughts were eradicated when his strong hands began sliding beneath the thin fabric of her top to stroke the flushed skin of her stomach.
No one knows, never will
Mostly me but mostly you
Do you say, do you do
When it all comes down
Cause I don't wanna come back down from this cloud
It's taken me all this time to find out what I need
“Oh, god.” Buffy let out a moan when the man’s cool hands came in contact with her hot skin, stroking her in all the right places without crossing any of the ‘inappropriate stranger erotic dancing touching’ lines. Her hips moved harder, swaying against the hard denim of his jeans, her short skirt riding dangerously higher on her legs. The cool hands on her waist dragged slowly down the sides of her body, moving past the hem of her skirt and caressing the firm skin of her thighs. She ached from his touch, the sweet sensation of his absently tracing fingers burning symbols into her flesh. The fact that they were sharing such a sensuous dance to the not-particularly sexy song made the situation even hotter to the blonde, who finally remembered to breathe when the stranger’s teeth gently nipped at her neck.
There is no blame, only shame
When you beg you just complain
More I come, more I try
All police are paranoid
So am I— so's the future
So are you— be a creature
Do you say, do you do
When it all comes down
Cause I don't wanna come back down from this cloud
It's taken me all this time to find out what I need
I don't wanna come back down from this cloud
It's taken me all this, all this time
There was a scent in the air, of spice and cigarettes and a strange mix of liquor. As Buffy’s head lolled back against the man’s shoulder, the strange perfume engulfed her senses and completely washed away the world. All that existed was the two of them, and their movements—his hands on her legs, hips, waist; the firm curve of her ass rubbing tantalizingly against his hardness; the way every possible inch of their bodies was touching, making as much contact as possible. The entire experience was so erotic that the blonde couldn’t help but wonder whether he could feel the wetness seeping from her parted thighs when his hands dipped oh-so-quickly beneath her skirt, then traveled back up to rest firmly on her hips.
Love and hate get it wrong
cut me right back down to size
Sleep the day let it fade
Who was there to take your place
No one knows never will
Mostly me but mostly you
Do you say do you do
When it all comes down
Buffy’s arms dropped to cover his hands on her waist, when she jumped into the air in surprise, the vibration of her cell phone in her pocket breaking her out of her surprisingly brazen trance. “Shit,” she muttered, pulling her phone from her pocket and seeing Giles on the caller I.D. Pulling away from her seducer, she started to hurry away, but hesitated and turned back around to say… something. Yeah, because you don’t want to miss out on the chance to mack on some hottie with that yummy, hard—
The inner vixen within the blonde quieted when she saw no one standing where only moments before there had been a god of sexy dancing. Sighing, Buffy quickly hurried outside of the club and redialed Giles, her answering machine having picked up long ago.
“Miss Summers?”
“Hey Giles, sorry I missed your call. Clubbing and all, and couldn’t exactly answer with the music on.” The sexy, passion-inspiring music that made you dance with a mysterious man in jeans, her mind told her, but she brushed her wicked side aside. Work came first. “What’s the what, with the what?”
“Erm… I’ll take it, you’re wondering how the interview went?”
“Yeah, about that…” At the moment, Angelus had been so obviously arrogant that Buffy couldn’t help but display her most defiant side, but in hindsight… “It wasn’t the best, I’m sorry Giles.”
“Quite the contrary, Buffy. You’ve got the job.”