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Chapter Twelve



January 2002


Spike stared at Buffy wondering for a moment if this was some kind of sick joke. He’d worked for Mr. Summers even before he’d met Buffy. How could she be his boss’s daughter?

Angel nearly choked on the champagne he’d been drinking when Mr. Summers introduced them to his eldest daughter. From his side, Darla clapped his back, her own eyes wide in recognition. But, as usual, she kept her cool in a stressful situation and nudged Spike foward. "Nice to meet you," Darla called to Buffy from behind Spike with a smile.

Buffy couldn’t believe her eyes. The man she’d searched for five years before was standing right in front of her. She cleared her throat before extending her right hand to him. "Hello, Mr. Giles. I’m Buffy Summers." Spike grasped her hand, but still made no move to speak. Buffy shot a look over her shoulder at her sister, who in return mouthed something Spike couldn’t make out. Buffy cleared her throat again before turning back to her father. "Dad," she started quietly. "I just realized I left something for Sarah at the hotel." She kissed Hank’s cheek before picking up her daughter.

Spike could only watch as Buffy fled from the building, Dawn at her heels. Hank and his wife shared a look before returning to their many guests milling around the banquet hall.

"Would you excuse me? Need to have myself a smoke," he told his date before rushing out of the hall after Buffy.

Spike didn’t have to go very far before he found her. She was standing off the curb hailing a cab while her daughter and sister waited patiently on the sidewalk. "Buffy?" he called.

Buffy quickly turned. She didn’t know why she was surprised that he’d come to find her, she had run out as fast as she could to avoid him. "Mr. Giles, right?" she asked sheepishly.

"Don’t Mr. Giles me!" he exclaimed now standing in front of her. "What the hell are you doing here?"

Buffy sent him a glare as a taxi pulled up next to her, annoyed that he’d curse in front of a four year old. She ushered Dawn and Sarah inside before turning back to him. "I was attending a party. Now I’m going back to my hotel."

Spike felt like pulling his hair out of his head. "You know what I mean. Where the hell have you been for the past five years? You just left that summer, leaving me with nothing but a soddin voicemail! I think I deserve some explanations!"

"Spike, I’m tired," she told him with a sigh. "I can’t talk about this right now."

"Well when can you talk?" he asked trying his best to be patient with her.

"Tomorrow. I’m staying at the Four Seaons."

"Okay, I’ll be there," he agreed watching her step into the cab next to her daughter. He was still standing out there twenty minutes later, but now he was leaning against the wall smoking a cigarette.

Spike was so lost in his thoughts he didn’t notice as Angel approached him. "I thought this is what you’d be doing."

"Sod off." Spike took another drag of his cigarette before throwing it to the ground. As soon as it hit the pavement he had another one in his mouth.

Angel rolled his eyes. He had to admit he was getting tired of Buffy randomly showing up in Spike’s life and leaving Angel to tend to Spike’s bad moods. "You guys talk?"

Spike shook his head. "Tomorrow."

Angel watched as Spike disposed of another cigarette. Before Spike could pull out another from his pack, Angel grabbed his arm and started pulling him back inside the hall. "You still have lots of guests who want to congratulate you, William," he said grinning as Spike scowled.



Darla wished Angel would hurry back with Spike. She and Drusilla were sitting by the bar and Darla was trying to engage her friend in any other topic besides the blonde mystery that had just walked back into Spike’s life.

Spike hadn’t exactly been a social butterfly since Buffy had left him all those years before. He’d cried the entire first week, or so she imagined, since he didn’t leave his apartment once. The week after that he spent searching for her to no avail. Then came the drinking. Spike got drunk every night and the only contact he had with women was to resort back to several one night stands. There had been more than a couple of nights where he’d exploded in a drunken rage, which had been the reason he’d been evicted from his cushy apartment. He quickly found another one, one that didn’t remind him so much of Buffy. Angel had stayed with him for an entire week, helping him stop drinking and to get over Buffy. After that, Spike had gone back to a somewhat quieter version of himself. He could still be funny and sarcastic and mean as hell, but there was a sadness in his eyes that wouldn’t go away. Spike refused to engage in a relationship with another woman, saying it was ‘nothin but bloody pain’. Finally, years later, Darla had managed to talk Spike into taking a date to his big party and so she’d introduced him to her friend, Drusilla. They’d been on a couple of dates before the actual event, and that had been going okay until Buffy showed up out of nowhere again.

"Who was she?" Drusilla asked finally, interrupting Darla’s rant over another woman’s poor fashion sense.

"Huh?" Darla asked, pretending she had no idea who Drusilla was talking about.

Drusilla gave Darla a pointed look, and Darla relented. "Oh, her. She’s sort of a, um, I guess she’d be, well she’s his ex-girlfriend," she fumbled, leaving out the part where Spike had been completely in love with Buffy. As much as she hoped Spike could work things out with Buffy, she somehow doubted that would happen. More realistically, Buffy would leave again and Spike would fall to pieces. Again. Hopefully, this time he would have a budding relationship to fall back on. "But that was a long time ago," she added quickly.

Drusilla nodded, taking a sip of her Cosmopolitan. "I see," she replied, a frown marring her pretty face. She’d been a little wary of Darla setting her up with one of Angel’s friends, she usually didn’t need to go on a blind date to get a man. But on their first date, she and Spike had really hit it off. He was everything she’d been looking for, sexy, easy to talk to, not to mention rich with a great job. He was perfect and she had no intention of letting his blonde ex get in her way.

Drusilla looked up with an immediate smile plastered across her lips when she felt a hand on her back. "Is everything alright?" she asked.

Spike returned a forced smile. "It will be."



"She asleep?" Dawn asked from her place on the sofa.

Hank had gone all out, insisting they stay in one of the largest suites at the Four Seasons. The suite was almost the same size as Buffy’s apartment in Miami.

Buffy nodded and joined her sister in front of the big screen television. She tried to take the remote, but instead Dawn turned off the TV.

"So, Spike," Dawn started. "Can’t say I saw that one coming."

"Actually, you got there before I did," Buffy replied. "You could have at least warned me."

"I wasn’t sure it was him," Dawn defended herself.

Buffy snickered in disbelief. "There aren’t two of those in the world."

Dawn turned to look at her sister seriously. "Do you still love him?"

Buffy looked away. "I don’t know," she said quietly. "It’s been a long time."

"Well, you’re seeing him tomorrow. What are you going to tell him?"

"I have no idea," Buffy admitted. "Where do I even start?"

Dawn rolled her eyes. "How about, I was madly in love with you, got pregnant with your child, and was devastated when I couldn’t find you five years ago."

Buffy wished she could laugh at her sister’s antics, but all she wanted to do was cry. Why couldn’t she have found him five years ago when she needed him? She had kicked herself everyday for the past five years for never finding out enough about him to be able to track him down.

Dawn reached over to hug her sister, snapping her out of her reverie. "Good night."

Buffy turned the TV back on, there was no way she was getting any sleep tonight





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