Chapter 18
Buffy had pulled away from the window as soon as she saw that man lean over and kiss her sister on the cheek. She didn’t want to overanalyze why it had bothered her so much to see that, to see them, but it had. Much more than she was ready to admit and for much different reasons than she would have expected. She’d tried to deny to herself that meeting him hadn’t impacted her in any way, except by angering or scaring her; she’d tried to deny that he’d made her feel more alive than she’d ever felt, that she’d felt more when he’d looked at her than she’d felt when she’d seen Angel, the man she loved, after all those years. And now, after seeing him with her sister, she felt betrayed and she had no idea why.
She forced herself out of those thoughts. After all, it wouldn’t do her any good to keep thinking of this. She was going to take her vows in a few months and after she returned to the convent, there were little to none chances of seeing that man again. And now she had more pressing matters to take care of, whatever it was that she was feeling, it would have to wait until she talked with Aimée. There was no way she’d allow her sister to sully her family’s good name. Decisively she walked out of her room and into her sister’s, to wait for her.
* ~ * ~ *
“Have you gone completely insane?” Buffy asked when Aimée finally entered her room.
Aimée started, clutching a hand to her chest. The last thing she’d expected was to find her sister waiting for her in her room, especially since she’d said she would return to the convent that morning. “What is the matter with you? You scared me.”
“I saw you on the garden with that man! Have you lost all sense of decorum, of decency? How long did you think you could keep lying to us?”
“Stop right there, sister,” Aimée said, venom instilled in her words. “You’re the last person to be throwing stones about lying. You are lying not only to the world but to the Church. Or is it really true that being a nun is your vocation?” Buffy blanched and Aimée smirked. “You don’t need to answer that, I know perfectly well it isn’t. I imagine it was the only thing that you could think of to hide the fact that Angel refused to marry you, wasn’t it?”
Buffy looked at her surprised. How did she found out? Did their mother tell her? “Who told you that? Anyway, th-that’s not true! That’s a lie!” she tried to cover up.
“Oh, please, Elizabeth, I know everything that happened and I know because Angel told me last night that he wants to marry me!” she said smugly, smiling inwardly as distress settled on her sister’s features, but covering it with a seemingly concerned look.
“Listen to me, I’m very sorry to tell you this, but Angel didn’t even know that he was supposed to be engaged to you. He said that he fell in love with me when we saw each other in Boston. I didn’t do anything to encourage him, of course. I didn’t even suspect his feelings until last night when he proposed.” She extended her left hand, showing her ring to her shocked sister, as she softened her features and her voice. “Look, this is my engagement ring. Maybe if he’d seen you first, things might have been different, but… please understand, I love Angel, too. I have since we were children. And he loves me. Please, don’t ruin my life. And about William, there’s nothing but friendship between us and I promise I won’t see him again.”
Buffy stood shell-shocked as she heard her sister’s speech. She felt as if her world had come crumbling down all over again. All her fighting spirit, all that she’d thought she was going to tell her sister, lay forgotten as she realized that Angel had never loved her, that he never had any intention of marrying her, and that all that she’d been told since she was a little girl had been a lie.
Knowing she didn’t have the strength to stay in the house any longer and listen to her sister tell her that all she’d dreamed of was lost, she just nodded and walked out of the room through the French doors that connected to the garden.
Aimée waited until she saw the dejected figure of her sister walk down the stairs to the garden, before she let a big smile blossom on her face. Not even in her wildest dreams had she pictured that Elizabeth would be so affected or how absolutely ecstatic she would feel to see her so broken.
* ~ * ~ *
In the meantime, at Giles’ office
“I haven’t seen you in a few days, boy. I thought you’d left on your trip without saying goodbye,” Giles said, patting the back of the man he considered almost like a son.
“Yeah, I know, sorry for that,” William replied sheepishly. “But I was getting everything ready for the trip.”
“When do you leave?”
“Tonight, but I’ll come back in a week. This trip will be sort of a trial to test how much we can trust our new port contact.”
“You know I don’t agree with your activities, William. You could get apprehended by the authorities or someone could kill you.”
“I know, Mr. Giles. But I need to make this last trip, you know that, afterwards I promise I’ll become Campo Real’s Administrator and focus on my revenge against Snyder.”
“All right, that’s something I’m actually looking forward to helping you with. Just promise me you’ll be careful?”
“Aren’t I always?” Spike smirked.
“Is that supposed to reassure me?” Giles arched an eyebrow at William, smiling condescendingly when he nodded.
“Before I go, I have a favor to ask of you, Mr. Giles.”
“Certainly, William, what can I help you with?”
“There’s an orphan girl that lives at La Cantina del Tuerto. Her name is Faith and I need to find her a different job, maybe working at a house as a maid. Do you think you can help me?”
“Well, I can try to find her something. In the meantime, she can work here if you want.”
“Oh, thank you, I owe you one. I will tell Xander to bring her over in the afternoon, is that all right for you?”
“Sure, no problem. I have a room in the back that she can use, so there’s no need for her to go back to la cantina.”
William smiled widely, “All right then. We have a deal! Now I have to go, because we leave at night and I still have a few errands to run. See you in a week, old man.” He pulled Giles into a tight embrace and lowered his voice, “I promise I’ll be careful.”
Giles cleared his throat, deeply touched by William’s promise. “You better. I’ll see you soon, son.”
* ~ * ~ *
On the way back from Galveston to Spike’s cottage
‘God, why don’t you love me anymore? Is this a trial to prove my faith in you, to prove that I’m worthy of being one of your wives?’ Buffy thought as she stood at the edge of a cliff, overlooking the sea. Her eyes were filled with unshed tears that she was trying to contain. ‘I’ve always tried to be a good daughter; I’ve followed your teachings all my life. Why did Angel have to choose her? What does Aimée have that I don’t? Didn’t I suffer enough already with his rejection that now I have to go through with this even bigger humiliation? And she knows, she knows how much she hurt me, she enjoyed twisting the knife she put through my heart with each of her words. I could see it in her eyes, even as she tried to hide it, faking a concern that she didn’t feel—’
“What’s wrong, Santa Elizabeth?” Spike asked. He’d seen her from afar and when he recognized her, he’d been unable to resist seeing her up close once again.
Buffy, startled by William’s sudden appearance, turned on her heels quickly to see who had dared interrupt her. But the abruptness of her movement, made her lose her balance and she fell backwards into the chasm.
Spike blanched and cursed himself for scaring her as he grabbed her by the arms and pulled her to his chest, jumping backwards as he moved them away from the edge of the cliff.
Thanking God for his quick reflexes, he hugged her tightly to him as she clung back to him, still too scared over what almost happened to realize whose arms she was in or to think of the propriety of her actions.
tbc
I will try to post another chapter this week, since my muse seems to be playing nice, I'm trying to keep her happy, just don't get too used to the frequent updates, because once RL interfers I can't do anything about it.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Thank you to my sweet reviewers, jt (who was nice enough to review at BSCentral, too) :D, Amelie-Jane, Devin, Klai, SarahandJamesFanatic and Dani D. Hmm, btw, I don't know if you've noticed but I respond to all of your reviews, so if you ask a question, it might have been responded there. As you might have guessed for the new chapter, your wonderful reviews seem to have reawaken my muse. Thanks again. :DAnd thank you, Jen and MarzBar, for the wonderful editing job they did on this chapter. :D