Author's Chapter Notes:

A/N: Sorry it's taken me so long to update - it was a one-off, updates should be back to weekly-ish from here on out.

I have written an Angel crossover episode - Double or Nothing - that can be found here: http://archiveofourown.org/works/2401940/chapters/5311313.

Chronologically, its Chapter 1 comes before Chapter 39 of Family, so read that first if you want to!

Buffy was standing outside the training room door round the back of the Magic Box. She knew she should just go in, but she couldn’t quite bring herself to put the key in the lock. The anger that had threatened to overwhelm her that afternoon had passed, but it had left a biting unease in its wake.

Spike just ... he made no sense.

This morning, Buffy had been sure he was dead and she’d never been so angry at anyone ever in her entire life. No one. She knew part of that was in response to him being mad at her last night – ‘cause really, double standards much? But part of it was … it was definitely worry.

How did that even happen?

It’s not like she loved him or anything. Because that way lay badness to the point of world-endage. Spike was just really easy to be around right now, that’s all. Relaxing. Un-demanding.

And although she accepted that he loved her … a soul-free, still-kinda-evil-in-a-totally-lame-way vampire in love with a Slayer? It’s like those psycho women who want to marry serial killers!

Except for the part where I’m the serial killer….

Never mind.

And it’s not even like Spike was that attractive! He looked like a bobblehead doll. And he was so short.

I was actually looking him in the eye when we—

Buffy bit down hard on her lip.

Let’s really not go there again. It was a spell. It’s in the past.

He was disturbingly un-masculine. He had more hair products than anyone else in the house – possibly combined. I mean, god, vain much? He has, like, three inches of hair. Tops. Covered in gel! Who needs to a ‘hair masque’ to ward off brassiness with hair like that?

And then there was the makeup. Real, honest-to-god-makeup in a little leather zip-up bag. Okay, so she didn’t remember ever actually seeing him wear any … but guys were not supposed to even own makeup. Especially ones who couldn’t use mirrors! Cologne was acceptable, maybe – although, weirdly, that seemed to be the one thing Spike didn’t have – and, like, a single hair product.

The guy is not supposed to be the pretty one.

I absolutely did not just think that.

Then the training room door slammed open, revealing Spike in the doorway, just beyond the reach of the late afternoon sunlight.

Buffy felt a totally unexpected – and deeply unwelcome – pang of guilt when she saw the state of his face. Being confronted by bruises she’d inflicted was new and unsettling.

Then his eyes were flashing and his chest was heaving and she could see the flex and pull of every single muscle through his too-tight shirt and her tongue was remembering far too well exactly how his skin tasted.

She licked her lips.

And nearly missed the fury radiating from him in waves.

Wait – Spike was angry?

He’d been cheerful – smug, even – when she’d left the Magic Box that afternoon. And now he was angry? How very dare he? It couldn’t be because she’d hit him. She’d been doing that for years. It felt like … like cheating – changing the rules, even – for him to get mad about it.

“Would it have killed you to watch telly with her for a couple hours?” he snapped.

Huh?

“She wasn’t asking you to talk. Wasn’t even asking you to listen. All you had to do was sit in the fuckin’ room with her!”

Oh.

Buffy’s insides twisted, but she tried not to let it show. “She … Dawn called you?”

Spike gave her The Look – not deigning to answer.

They stared at each other for a few seconds. Buffy wanted to yell at him, accuse him of … of something really bad. But what? He comforted my—

He comforted Dawn when she was scared, and he did it because I didn’t. I couldn’t. I’m a terrible—

Guardian. I am a terrible guardian.

Spike must have seen something in her eyes because he seemed to suddenly deflate, slumping back against the doorframe. He scrubbed one hand over his banged-up face. “She saw your hands and thought some nasty’d tried to kill you.”

Buffy felt her all-too-obvious inadequacy cut that little bit deeper. Of course signs of a fight would make Dawn panic. I should have noticed she was upset; I should have known. Hating herself even more when she heard the whine in her voice, she said, “If she’d just said something, I would’ve—”

Spike snorted, muscles tensing up again. “You would’ve what? Told her the truth? When have you ever done that?” He watched Buffy half-collapse against the wall of the alleyway, curling into herself. He softened his voice slightly. “You need to tell her.”

Buffy went rigid; she stopped breathing and her heart rate skyrocketed. “Tell her what?”

He kept his face expressionless, his voice toneless. “Where you were.”

“I won’t put that burden on her.”

“Christ!” Spike shouted. “You are some piece of work, you know that?” His careful neutrality had slipped, revealing cold, flinty eyes – and an expression that hadn’t been pointed Buffy’s way for a very long time. “Won’t burden her with the truth, but you’ll let her keep thinkin’ you hate her?”

Buffy’s eyes widened. “What are you talking about?”

“Every time you pull back, she thinks it’s because you blame her for your ‘horrendous torture’. You remember that, right? Happened when you were in hell!”

“She can’t think it’s her fault – I told her. I told her it was my choice, that I was okay.”

“Sweetheart,” Spike said, mocking and bitter, “whatever you said is irrelevant. ‘S what you’re doin’ now, today, that matters.”

“I—” Buffy’s voice cracked. She looked lost.

Desperation supplanted the anger in Spike’s voice. “I could tell her, if you—”

“Don’t you dare!”

Spike wanted to shake her. How could she not get this? “This sort of secret never keeps. Someone’s gonna work it out eventually.”

“You promised me!” Buffy hissed.

“What if she finds out on her own? Again? You want her to go through that?”

Buffy looked up at him, eyes anguished. “Stop doing this to me! You promised you wouldn’t push! You promised.”

“Not every soddin’ thing is about you!”

Buffy reeled back. He’d said it so casually.

And it was so obviously true. Spike’s orbit – the one that had once circled around Buffy and Buffy alone – had now expanded to include Dawn.

It rocked Buffy’s foundations.

In a fit of desperation she couldn’t understand or control, she grabbed onto him with both hands and she kissed him.

 

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Willow felt so much surer after talking to Angel. He wasn’t like the rest of them, who seemed to think she was still that weak, defenceless girl she’d been back in high school.

She’d coordinated a fight against a god. She’d rescued Buffy from hell. She was a strong, powerful woman now.

She’d led the Scoobies for so many months – even had the plaque to prove it! With sparkles! And she’d done it without Buffy, without Giles. But as soon as they came back, she was straight back to being the sidekick. The one who helped with research and was smilingly supportive of whatever bullcrap she was told to support.

Couldn’t they see how she’d changed?

But Angel got it. He’d expected her opinion to be the deciding one. And he’d been so grateful and appreciative for Buffy’s rescue. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t exactly said anything directly. But it was Angel! He practically invented tall, dark and mysterious. Maybe literally as well as figuratively, given how old he was.

Getting the validation she’d craved was like balm to Willow’s soul.

And she wanted to return the favour.

So as soon as she hung up the phone, she’d started rifling through her moving boxes. Somewhere in there was her cache of backup disks. And somewhere in there was Miss Calendar’s floppy – the one with her research on vampires and souls.

The original re-ensouling curse, Willow knew by heart. It was the first spell she’d ever done and she could still feel the words resonating inside her if she concentrated hard enough.

But Miss Calendar had gone further than that. And although Willow had never read all the files – she’d been majorly time-crunching last time – she was sure there had been a file with ideas on how to remove the no-happy clause.

When Willow finally found the backup disks, she pulled out her laptop and put in Miss Calendar’s disk.

I have the power to do something good and important. For Buffy. And Angel. For the world, even! ‘Cause guaranteed no-more-Angelus? If it’s possible, it’d be like … like a public service. Civic duty, even!

And maybe it’ll prove to Buffy that I’m not too dangerous to be around Dawn anymore.

Willow smiled to herself.

This is gonna make everything better.

 

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The second Buffy’s lips touched his, Spike’s brain shut down.

It was only when one of her roving, grasping fingers accidentally dug into the hole in his shoulder that he formed his first, all-too-brief, reacquaintance with coherent thought.

“Buffy?” he said, pulling away from her burning lips, wanting reassurance that this was real and not some dream. His entire body was screaming, Yes! Please! More! so loudly his ears were ringing. He could feel her heat, smell her arousal, and it took absolutely everything he had not to just tear off her clothes and drive into her. Drive home.

But there was something … she’d done something … had he been angry?

Then a still-slightly-jagged fingernail scraped across his jugular and he gave up trying to think.

The next time Buffy came up for air, one of her hands was under his shirt and his back was against a wall and the door was shut.

He had no memory of moving.

Buffy’s other had curled around his neck, fingertips still brushing against his throat in a way she had to know damned well would reduce him to a gibbering idiot.

She looked at him – smug, certain, licking her lips like they were covered in cream.

He didn’t much like that look. It had everything to do with power and nothing to do with love.

Still smiling, she recaptured his mouth, devouring him, making him hers – as if he had ever been anything else.

 

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The Magic Box phone was ringing. Anya reluctantly took her ear away from the training room door.

She’d so wanted to use a glass – it was the eavesdropping tool of choice in the movies, after all – but all the dishes were in the back office, and she’d been afraid she’d miss something if she went looking for one.

Still, Anya thought smugly, I heard the most important part: I was right and Willow was wrongThank goodness neither one of them seems to have grasped the concept of  “inside voice”!

She grabbed up the phone on the seventh ring – slightly surprised whoever was calling had waited that long. “Good afternoon, Magic Box,” she said, a trifle breathlessly. “Premiere supplier of all your magical needs.”

“Is that Anya?”

“Yes. Who is this?”

“Wesley Wyndam-Pryce. We met several years ago. Er, when you came to tell Buffy about the Ascension?”

“Oh! You’re the useless Watcher!”

Wesley made a vaguely affirmative grunt. Giles and his ‘please help them with research after I’m gone but best not endanger anyone by trying to offer physical aid’. Wesley wondered why it was that his erstwhile colleague had taught them to adhere so strictly to the Council dogma of ignoring or denying change. He’d always believed Giles prioritised what worked. Wesley sighed. Bet you lot wouldn’t recognise a shade of grey ‘til it bit your bloody arse off.

“Did you want magical supplies?” Anya asked finally, puzzled by the long silence.

“No, no,” he said hurriedly. “Nothing like that. I … I run Angel Investigations now.”

Anya was dumbfounded. “But … but you’re … I thought – you got knocked unconscious more often than Giles!” Anya blurted. “And that’s saying something. Why would anyone ever accept orders from you?”

Wesley seriously considered banging his head against the desk. “I thought Willow and Cordelia still talked!”

“Well, yes, but … oh! Is it some scam to get you to do all the boring leadership tasks? Like expense accounts and tax returns? I thought for a while that that was why Giles asked me to be a partner in the Magic Box, but then I realised it was only because he was too depressed to care so it was all okay.”

Wesley was momentarily struck dumb.

“Are you still there?” Anya asked, after several seconds of silence. “You haven’t told me why you called yet. I don’t see how it can be to catch up on old times, since we only met the once, and I doubt you care any more about me and my life than I do about you and yours.”

Wesley could suddenly see why Angel thought conversations between Anya and Cordelia were so amusing.

“Can you hear me? Hello?”

Then Wesley could hear what sounded suspiciously like Anya banging the receiver against something hard.

“Yes!” He shouted. The banging stopped. “Sorry. Um. Look, I realise that when you spoke to Angel – and, er, Cordelia – earlier, there was a certain….”

“Flat-out refusal?”

“Yes. Quite. However, on reflection, we felt that your concerns merited further investigation.”

“So the answer is ‘yes’ now?” Anya asked hesitantly.

“Mmmm,” he said carefully. There was a short pause. “Conditional upon sufficient payment, of course.”

Anya’s eyes lit up. She loved the haggling part.

 

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Spike buried his nose in Buffy’s hair, breathing in the scent of his shampoo. It was almost enough to fool himself into feeling that some part of her belonged to him. Even if it was really just one more thing that now belonged to her. “What is this, Love?” he asked thickly.

“Um … kissing?” she mumbled into his throat, suddenly frozen rigid with embarrassment. What the hell is wrong with me? Not long ago, Buffy had caught herself thinking – smugly – that she’d made him stop thinking about Dawn. Is that what this is? Is this who I am?

Spike could hear her heartbeat gaining speed. Not in the good way. He wanted to wind his fingers through her hair at the nape of her neck in that way he now knew she found comforting, but was afraid she was gearing up to run again and he didn’t dare give her an excuse. He let his arms fall away from her. His voice dropped to a whisper: “Buffy?”

Of course Anya chose that moment to burst into the room.

“Angel’s decided to help!” she called out gaily. She stopped cold in the doorway. “You’re not naked?” she asked, definitely surprised and quite possibly disappointed. “I was so sure you’d be naked.”

Buffy jerked away, her face mimicking a fire engine. “Why would we be naked?” she snapped.

Anya gave her a withering look. “It makes sex less awkward and prone to accidents,” she said slowly, as if speaking to a particularly stupid child.

Spike couldn’t help it – he started giggling.

Anya thought she detected a hint of hysteria. She was suddenly deeply annoyed at Wesley for forcing her to miss what had clearly been an Important Development.

 

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They’d left the Magic Box through the basement sewer entrance – one neither Buffy nor Spike had noticed until Anya pointed it out – and were maybe halfway home.

It was dark; it smelled awful; and Buffy was already wishing she’d let Spike talk her into going home aboveground and meeting him there. Then she stepped in something oozing and thick that ran over the tops of her sneakers and filled them up. She groaned. “You totally owe me new shoes.”

“Wasn’ me chose to wear the stupid things,” Spike’s voice ghosted back from where he was walking a few feet ahead.

She couldn’t even see him – just a vague slightly-less-dark patch she assumed was his head.

“This is disgusting,” Buffy whined.

“Didn’ have to come,” Spike said, his disembodied voice now echoing slightly.

Neither of them were entirely comfortable with her adamant refusal to let him go home unaccompanied.

Buffy sighed. “Do we really need to revisit last night’s unconscious lump that was you?”

Spike grunted.

They kept walking. Buffy was squelching obscenely with every step.

“You need army boots,” Spike said finally.

“I have a pair,” Buffy replied. She could practically hear Spike’s eyebrow go up.

“Since when?”

“Since forever. But they’re useless for slaying: I can’t pass for helpless in them.”

It had never before occurred to Spike that “practicality” and “clothing” could ever occupy the same space in Buffy’s mind. But the notion that she’d worn two-inch skirts and four-inch heels as some sort of vamp-attracting uniform? It was pure fantasy come true. “You still have those light brown boots – knee-highs? Soft leather, bonkers heels?”

“You don’t have a foot fetish, do you?” Buffy asked guardedly.

“Why? Do you?”

“Of course not!” Even over the stink of the sewer he could smell the blood rushing to her cheeks.

“Got some very memorable views associated with those boots,” he continued thoughtfully.

“Of what, imminent death by pointy heel?”

“Not of the boots, pet.”

Buffy frowned, confused.

He grinned. “Just when did you stop shavin’ your—”

A mortified squeak escaped before she could stop it.

Spike laughed.

 

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Outside the front door, Spike grabbed her hand before she could put the key in the lock.

“You gonna tell Dawn?”

Tears pricked at Buffy’s eyes. She stared down at her ruined shoes. “All I ever wanted was for her to have a normal life.”

Spike dropped her hand like it burned. “You blind from self-pity or somethin’? That ‘normal life’ bollocks was never her perversion.”

“Wanting to be normal is not perverted!”

“‘S certainly perverse.” He pursed his lips. “Thought you’d decided to accept you weren’t gonna live that lie – so sorry, that life.”

Buffy scrubbed at her eyes. “I did. I am.”

“The Bit lives in your world, Slayer. Don’t make her weak by pretendin’ she doesn’t.”

“I am not making her weak! I’m keeping her safe.”

“She deserves better.”

“Like what, dying at seventeen? And again at twenty?”

“It was always your choice!” Spike practically shouted. He paused. “You may not have chosen to be the Slayer, but you chose to embrace it. You have never chosen to be safe. You ever ask her what sort of life she wants?”

Buffy slowly shook her head no.

“She wants to be like you. Wear a white hat and charge in to save to day. Idiot.”

Their eyes met.

Buffy looked away first. “Better than wanting to be like you,” she said.

Spike scowled. “Tha’s right. Put me in my place.” He looked up at the house. He still didn’t really believe he mostly sort-of lived there. “Wherever the fuck that is.”

Buffy shifted uncomfortably. “Some parts of you are okay, I guess.” As soon as she said it, she regretted it – she’d practically begged him to make some sort of crude innuendo.

Instead, he turned back to her, eyes seemingly wider and bluer than before. “Yeah?” Despite the gruffness, there was a naked vulnerability to his voice that she’d never have thought possible.

Then again, she didn’t think she’d ever paid him a compliment before. “Yeah,” she said.



Chapter End Notes:

Chapter 2 of Double or Nothing follows chronologically from this chapter. It can be found here: http://archiveofourown.org/works/2401940/chapters/5619668




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