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As soon as Spike entered her office the next day, Buffy was all excitement.

"Spike your book is amazing!"

He smiled wide, "you finally read it?"

"Yes! Spike it was fantastic. I read it all night. I was up until three a.m.! I
was going to call you to tell you—"

"Why didn't you? I would have loved to hear from my girl."

"At three am?"

He shrugged. "Anytime."

"Well, you'll be happy to hear that I've been a busy bee this morning. I've
called some bookstores for when it's out on the shelves and several are
interested book signings." She was beaming at him.

Spike beamed back at her. "I'm so glad you liked it."

"Liked it? I loved it. I never knew you had such a knack for words."

He smirked, "you never listened."

She laughed. "Yeah, I guess you're right. I wanted to ask you—"

"Pet, I need to tell you something." His plan to take her away flew out the
window. He just wanted to do it and get it over with.

She stopped. "Okay. What?"

"Can we sit down?"

Her expression hardened. "You can sit. I'll stand. Nothing ever good comes
when someone says ‘can we sit down?' So just say it."

Spike sighed, running a hand through his hair. "Pet. . . last night I went out
for a drink and—"

"You met someone?"

He was stunned by the frightened expression on her face at the idea. "No!
God, love, no."

"You slept with someone."

"Buffy would you stop? No, that's not it."

"Then just say it!"

"I saw Angel last night. With a girl. They were in a pretty heated embrace
and then they left together," he blurted out.

The silence and the blank expression on Buffy's face were eerie. She just
stood there, not moving and not even looking at him.

"Buffy, pet, are you all right?"

"You saw Angel with a girl?"

"Yes. Pet, I know you're upset about Angel, but you didn't love him
anyway and technically you've kind of been cheating on him with me—"

"That's not it," she told him firmly.

He had a bad feeling about this. "What is it then?"

Walking over to the couch, she grabbed a throw pillow and chucked it at
him. "You're unbelievable!"

Spike's eyes widened as he started to deflect the flying pillows. "What are
you talking about?"

"You figured – what? You got me to open up, we've shared a few kisses,
you got me falling in love with you and then just to cinch the deal you
decide to lie about Angel?

Spike's jaw dropped. "You think I'm lying to you just to – Wait, what did
you say about falling in love with me?"

"Are you not the guy that told Owen I was a hermaphrodite? Are you not
the guy who told Scott you were my brother that just escaped from jail and
you knew how to rip out someone's intestines and hang them with it? I
think you were!" "I wouldn't lie about something like that! How could you
think I'd do that?" He exclaimed.

"Why wouldn't you? I told you what my dad did to my mom, why wouldn't
you exploit that somehow?" she told him, shaking.

He walked up to her, shaking with anger. He stood inches from her face.
"You've gone stark raving mad if you think I would EVER do something like
that to you. If you think I would, then you don't know me at all. You will do
absolutely anything to guard that heart of yours. Even fling sick accusations
at me – the man who loves you more than life. Keep pushing me away
Buffy and I might not come back." With that he walked out of the room,
slamming the door behind him.



Buffy's knees were threatening to give out and she sank, trembling, into
the chair. Tears stung her eyes as the door started to blur.

"Buffy? What the hell happened?" Cordy stood in the doorway, but Buffy
could barely make her out.

"I think I just did a really bad thing," she told the girl, her voice shaking.
She stood up and made her way to the phone. "I um, I need to go for a
while."

"Buffy, you're white as a ghost. What is going on?"

"I just need to call Willow."

Cordy watched her as she picked up the phone and dialed.

"Hello?"

Buffy burst into tears.

"Buffy?"

"I messed up Willow. I messed up so bad. He'll never forgive me for this,
never."

"Buffy, what's going on?"

"Can I come over?"

"Honey, I'll come get you okay? Sit tight and I'll be right there."

Buffy hung up and sobbed her heart out, barely registering Cordy
wrapping her arms around her and trying to comfort her until Willow
collected her.



"Spike, you shouldn't have told her," Xander shook his head.

"She should have trusted me!"

"Spike. You can't expect the world of her! Yes, you shared a few
smoochies, a few truths about each other, but come on – do you NOT
remember how at each others throats you used to be? You can't expect her
to just forget it like that. Remember when you told Scott you were brother
that just got out of jail and knew how to hang a man by their intestine? The
guy was freaked AND he told Buffy her psychotic ‘brother' was gonna hang
him if he went out with her. Then, when you're steps closer to her, you
happen to see Angel with another girl and then rush to tell her. "

"You don't believe me either?!" Spike accused.

Xander sighed. "I believe you Spike. You're my best friend. But you have
to make some allowances for Buffy. You haven't exactly been the paragon
of honesty with her. You've carried a fucking torch for her since high school
and then spring it on her out of the clear blue sky. In a strip club no less
AND while she's dating someone.

"She doesn't love him. Not to mention the fact that she was KISSING me
that whole time. Let's also not forget that she was asking me for sex."

"What did she say when you asked her if she was upset about Angel?"

"That, that wasn't what was bothering her, " Spike muttered.

"Right."

"What should I have done then? Not told her? Let him make a fool out of
her?"

"No. I could have told her."

"You would have done that?"

"For the Buffster? Of course."

"Now what do I do?"

"Give her some time. Have a little faith in her, just the way you want her
to have faith in you."

"What if she doesn't?"

Xander patted his back. "She just might surprise you."



Buffy was a balling mass of tears. She must have gone through a whole box
by the time Willow had come, and another one since she'd been at Willow's.
She told Willow everything from the day Spike demanded she be his
publicist to when he left, slamming the door behind him earlier that day.

Willow rubbed her back and listened quietly.

"The thing is he's right. As much as I felt connected to Spike for the first
time, in, well, ever, I was so afraid of it too. It scared me because I felt that
now he could hurt me if he wanted to."

"Which he wouldn't want to do, Buffy," Willow said gently.

"I know. I just thought he was resorting back to all those things he did in
high school. . . I just jumped because it was like ‘oh hey! There's a window
of escape. Just jump out of there and then you won't have to deal with how
you really feel about him.' Except. . . "

"Except what?"

"I didn't expect it to hurt so bad when he walked out the door. And when
he walked away from me, I knew, I knew then that he was right and I was
just protecting myself again. It's just a knee jerk reaction and . . . I've done
it for so long and I don't know how to stop."

"I think the fact that you saw it for what it was when it happened is a
step."

"What's the step after that?"

"Go to him and tell him you're sorry."





A/N: hey guys! Thanks so much for the reviews. This was a really hard chapter to write. . . many revisions. I put myself in their shoes and ended up seeing both sides of the situation. I tried to convey both sides as best I could here. I hope it came across the way I wanted it too.





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