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Body and soul made all the difference.

It was true, Buffy realised. The sex, wow, it had been good before but now it was so much better. She and Spike connected, and in so many more ways than just two bodies grinding together seeking release. Maybe it was Spike and the way he had changed so fundamentally; when she looked into his eyes she saw a realness there, his soul smoothing out the harsh edges of the vampire until a person now looked back; or it could have been her and the way her own feelings had mellowed that made all the difference; perhaps it was a bit of both, but something new sparked between them, something so, so right that had been missing before.

Wound and wrapped around each other, skin against skin, arms sought and supported as they moved together in both love and lust. She had never felt this close, this intimate, with anyone else, sharing something between them that felt so much more naked than just a trivial lack of clothing. For once they were making love; there were no secrets or emotions held back; some inner barrier had fallen between them and now her soul spoke to his in total honesty. He was to have no more doubt. She told him everything her heart confessed with every touch, over and over. She could love him now and she wanted him to know she was his for all the time they had left, however short those hours would be.

She told him none of this in mere words. They spoke in a language primal and instinctive, a conversation in caresses, sighs and lingering looks. Like this, nothing could be misunderstood. When she clutched at him, reminding herself that he was real and firm and back and here, tracing his strong arms with her tiny hands, rounding his strong bicep possessively as she moved in his lap, he replied, pushing deeper as he pulled her closer still, showing her yet again how deep his own love went. She threw back her head and gasped as he hit spots so sweet, moving her hands to his shoulders, making him grunt with satisfaction as her fingertips dug into the hard, solid muscle and drew blood: a lot of things were different now, but some things never changed. He would always get off on the blood and the bruises.

Sex as good as this was easy to get lost in, but that was nothing new to Buffy; it had always been oh so very easy to lose herself this way with Spike. After she'd returned from the dead, they'd picked up their edgy new friendship where it'd left off and she'd started to see him as someone she could go to, to unburden herself of the pressures of just trying to live after losing Heaven, because he'd understood. Only he knew what it was like to die and live once more, to crawl from the earth of the grave into a harsh world of light and fear that would never feel the same again. As isolated from her friends as he was, she could trust him to never tell them the terrible truth that she was dying inside. With him she could be quiet and not have to lie every time she opened her mouth just to pretend she was happy.

He’d made it so easy for her, to escape the world and run from reality when all she’d wanted was to not think about how crappy her life was, and sex became just another way of denying it all. With added bonuses. Sensation was an easy, temporary fix that couldn’t last; but somehow Spike had made her feel when everything else in life had seemed so violent or raw. She’d needed it back then, to penetrate the numbness that had smothered her.

And that was it; good or bad, with him she had always felt something: anger, hate, desire denied and then vented, love, eventually. Always a potent mix of extreme emotions right from the beginning.

Little wonder then that after she’d given in to those lusty thoughts she had started to feel and kept going back to him, exploring for a handful of long, exhausting nights the full breadth of her sexuality for the first time, laying it out so open and bare that she could no longer deny the darkness of her desires.

Yet that was all their relationship had been or could ever be. She’d known ever since Angel had lost his soul one dark and stormy night the cost of soulless boyfriends, and with only one tarnished soul between them, she could never trust Spike, not really, not in a way that could ever make her overlook what he was. Oh she'd trusted him when she'd really needed his help in the fight against Glory and he'd always come through for her, more or less, but his vampirism would always rise like a wall between them, an insurmountable obstacle that could never be conquered; he could keep his word, for as long as it suited him, but long-term it wasn’t worth the risk. When her relationships fell apart there was a steep cost: people died.

Spike had learned not to question the way she’d used him, making do with the little she offered, but he knew not to dare risk what he could have for anything more. Some of the things they’d done together had appalled and terrified her, but they weren’t the worst of it, they weren’t the memories that made her flush with shame. She had used him as if he was nothing and she wished she could forget all those times when she’d lain beneath him, moaning gently with the glide of his cock, when she turned her face away from the look in his eyes because the love that shone there was too much to bear. Rejected again, in defeat he would bury his face in her hair while she imagined that she was somewhere else, anywhere, with someone else, anyone. It had been better that way, keeping her distance even as she let him fuck her, so sure that his very nature would make him fail. And he had, spectacularly; but for that and all the rest of their history she’d forgiven him long ago. He’d done the impossible and changed everything.

How ironic it was that Spike had been the one who was right all along. He had always asserted that he felt something between them, that connection of heat and desire. He'd been so convinced; enough to stake everything on that belief, his pride; his well-being, even his own existence; he would sacrifice his own happiness for hers over and over. Yet she'd always scoffed at the thought, slapping it back into his face with a stinging retort, but she’d been the one fooling herself. Maybe the tardy love that was churning inside her always had been there, bubbling under the surface, waiting for her to take that reluctant look inward to notice that he was all she wanted.

A gasp, a crushing kiss, a last thrilling tremor sluicing through her for a moment before he too released, and it was done. Pleasantly achy and gasping for air in a really, really good way, she stayed cradled in his lap, still connected and shaking, her head and breasts pressed close as she could get to the hard muscles of his chest.

She clung to him, unwilling to let him go, and he held her wordlessly as his hand wandered loving yet aimless through her mussed bed-head.

“I’m still doing it,” he said, reaching for a breath he always seemed to forget his body didn’t need.

“I know,” she replied in little more than a reluctant whisper. His voice had broken the still, satisfied silence, letting in unwelcome reality again. She’d thought for a moment of denying knowing what he meant, but denial could only delay facing the truth, not prevent it. “I hate it, but I know.”

“Buffy-“

“Don’t,” she cut him off, pulling back and looking up at him, hoping the complicated maelstrom of emotions she felt were easy to read in her eyes, because there was no way she could express so much in just words. This should have been a happy moment, a cosy and relaxed celebration of their reunion, but this was her love life after all, so of course something evil had to ruin it. “I know.”

He seemed to understand. He nodded and laid her gently back onto the bed and withdrew, settling beside her. But for all the intimacy they'd just shared and the bittersweet smile playing on his lips, he felt more distant now. The closeness she’d felt as they were entwined began to dissipate as he avoided her eyes, distancing himself as he prepared for his end.

Knowing this made the deliberate separation no less difficult and Buffy tried to bridge the divide by moving closer, letting her head sink back into the pillow beside her vampire. She tried to focus on the good things, on the way this vigorous workout had, as always, left her as breathless as a marathon runner. That was the one thing about this that hadn’t changed; whether it had been a quick fuck against a dumpster or an epic night of ecstasy among his Persian rugs, after sex with Spike it had always taken awhile to get to get her breath back.

She'd need a moment or two to recover; which suited her just fine. She wanted to bask in this fragile afterglow for as long as she could, for if this was to be all the afterglow they would ever get, then she wasn’t going to waste it.

Still slightly breathless, but recovering Slayer-fast, she rolled onto her side, hooking her leg round his thigh and propping herself up on an elbow to admire the view, taking the time to really study him for once. She’d always known that he was pretty in a male way, scimitar cheekbones were hard to miss after all, but the whole goth look was so not her thing. She had never taken the time to look beyond that.

Spike lounged brazenly in the firelight beside her in all his pale glory. Well, mostly pale, his face was still carried a hint of pink from his touch of sunburn, but it was fading fast. His chest though, as always, was now disconcertingly still. She thought that this just might be the way she would love him best, naked, tousled and all happy for once. Even his hair, the unnatural snowy blond usually gelled so precisely into gentle spikes so it didn't twist into sissy curls, was in debauched disarray. The hard angles of his face that were so striking in the moonlight seemed soft in the gentle firelight and she was struck, not for the first time, at how much the shadows loved him. He looked otherworldly in the flickering half light; eyes as clear as the sky at twilight, rich and blue, skin carved and sculpted and as pale as stone. He looked as if death had chosen him as its angel; too perfect and dangerous to touch.

She couldn’t keep her hands off.

Her most recent orgasm was still throbbing nicely between her legs, which were jellified and nicely tingly from her big O, but she already felt up for another go. How much she needed to satisfy her itch still shocked her sometimes, but she wasn’t going to be ashamed of it anymore. And if he was up for it, she wasn’t going to argue.

But when he finally looked at her, his eyes were hooded and sleepy. They flickered as he tried to stay awake, and although he met her coaxing kiss, she could tell by half-hearted way he groped her that he was exhausted.

She snuggled into his side again instead, tucking herself under his arm and letting her hand roam the muscle of his chest. It was smooth and hard under her palm as she tracked the line of his abs, and lightly sheened with an uncanny sweat. It twitched as she traced a line under a pectoral and across his quiet heart. She was fascinated that a dead heart could love with more fervour than her living one could ever generate. He might think he had nothing to offer her, but she didn’t need anything else.

She was sore and the room was cold. Where her skin was turned away from the fire, the air licked the sweat from her back with a frigid tongue, but despite the chill somehow she couldn’t imagine being anywhere better. There had to be some god or a lucky star that she had to thank for returning him to her, or more likely, some darker deity that thought it funny to mess with them, offering him up only to snatch him away again so soon; but for now she was just grateful that the body pressed against her this time was him, the one she thought she'd ruined and lost. For once, he really mattered, yet if she was honest, she couldn't imagine what a serious relationship with Spike might be like, and she doubted he’d had any idea either. Pampered definitely, she'd want for nothing if he could get it for her, and he probably would. But they would not get to find out.

Spike absently stroked her back in return, offering her a hollow comfort she would never feel and it made her angry that once again she had found something good only for it to be snatched away. The thought made her stiffen under his soothing hands, rejecting the salve his touch promised and he snatched his hand away.

“Don’t stop.” She caught his wrist and placed his hand back on her shoulder.

He smiled and kissed the top of her head. “Yeah, pet. That’s why you shag me,” he whispered, his voice, a vocal sundae of sweet riches; a sprinkle of sugar seduction. “Ruined you for anyone else.”

Grinning into his chest, she squeezed him firmly, just a little teary. She couldn’t believe he’d said that, but then this was the man she loved: brave and sexy and rude!

She bit her lip to keep the tears back. She’d move on, she knew she would somehow. But anything compared to this would somehow be only second best. Love would never again burn like a furnace or survive anything and everything that a cruel fate could throw at it. Relationships would have to stand up to the normal pressures of normal people, and she didn’t want normal anymore. Stupid normal.

But… but she couldn’t just accept this or swallow down her objections. They were all wrong; they had to be. There was always another way and they could find a different way to stop The First, they were good at stuff like that. If Spike would let them stop him playing the martyr.

Buffy kept her silence, saying nothing to Spike about her objections. Telling him would be pointless and would waste the good time they’d spent the day having. There was so little time left as it was and she didn’t want to waste it on restarting an argument they would never resolve.

But the argument wasn't settled, far from it. She would take The First on alone if she had to, but she wasn’t going to let The First take from her any more people she loved. Not Spike. Not anybody.

She would die first.


tbc





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