“It’s nothing--”
“What I wouldn’t give for some time alone with him,” Spike muttered. “Baby, how are you knees?”
“What?” she blinked at him, confused.
“Your knees, baby. Remember you cut them last night?”
She looked down and lifted her pants leg. Riley had obviously dressed her. She wore wide leg black pants and an oversized plain white t-shirt. Holding up her pants legs, he saw that she had bandages on them. “I forgot about them,” she told him honestly. “Riley,” she wrinkled her nose, “He must have fixed them for me.”
Seeing Angel bounding up to them behind her, Spike pointed and she turned in enough time to have Angel catch her in a hug. He held her tight, swaying side to side. He pulled back, cupping Buffy’s face in his hands. “I was so worried about you. Are you all right?”
“I’m all right,” she assured him nodding. “Just really want to get out of here. I want a shower.”
“A shower?”
“I spent the night with Riley,” she said dryly.
Spike tensed, glided up to her and spun her to face him. “What?”
“What?”
“You spent the night with him? Did he…touch you?”
“No! Not like that, I didn’t mean it like that!” She shuddered at the very thought.
Spike let out a breath of relief and tugged her back into his side, burying his face in her hair.
“Who got shot?” she asked him.
He looked up at her, “What?”
“I felt a shot; it just clanged right through my body. Who got shot?”
“The wall.”
Buffy looked up and over at the white wall with a gaping hole in it, shards of it falling down in small clumps. “Oh.” She looked back at Spike.
“You ever pull a move like that again--” he told her sternly.
Angel tugged on her arm, making her look at him, cutting Spike off. “Thank you for that. You put my heart in my throat. I know now what it feels like. Don’t do that again.”
“Yeah, cause that’s what I plan to do again. Get kidnapped by a whack job. I don’t think so,” and she shook her head adamantly. “Were you hurt?” she asked Spike, concerned.
“Just a flesh wound,” he told her, grinning slightly.
“Where?”
“Shoulder,” he told her and peeled away his t-shirt a bit. He had gauze taped on and a little splotch of blood had seeped through.
“Oh, Spike…”she said mournfully and then burst into tears without warning. “I’m so sorry.”
Making her look at him, he gazed at her, “Why are you sorry?”
“I got you hurt…I got…everyone…hurt…. and…. killed,” she sobbed, having a hell of a time getting the sentence out.
Rayne strolled up to them then. “Hey, we need you down at the station,” he told Spike. “She’s gotta answer some questions.”
“Can it wait?” Spike snapped, holding Buffy protectively. The last thing he wanted was for her to have to deal with anymore of the damn case.
“No, it can’t. We need statements from the lot of you, let’s go,” Rayne said sternly. He paused, seeming to have noticed Buffy for the first time, crying in Spike’s arms. “She all right?” he asked, concerned.
“No, she’s not, she’s upset and rightfully so,” Spike told him, annoyed. “I want to get her home.”
“After she answers some questions,” Rayne told him. “I have a nut job in my custody, Spike. I need statements. It’s a necessary evil and I’m sorry, but it can’t wait. You know the drill.”
“Yeah, I know,” Spike grumbled. “We’ll be right there, okay?”
Rayne nodded and patted him on the back. “You did well,” and he sauntered off, barking orders as he went.
Leading her away, with Angel by them, the three walked out of the airport and into Spike’s car, Spike keeping her close by his side the entire time. He figured it was going to be quite some time before he was willing to let her out of his sight and out of arms reach.
Needless to say, Buffy was more than just a little shell shocked over the next week. And rightfully so. She’d been through an ordeal. And with Riley having been caught, she had to answer questions, find out answers that were more than just a little disturbing to her, and live through the deaths of Parker and Gwen all over again. Now that she knew who did it and why…it made it all that much sadder for her and this time, she truly did mourn. Guilt drove it mainly, but to Buffy, they were just senseless deaths. All of them. She had a hard time mustering up some sympathy for the murderer Riley hired, but it was just all so…senseless. She wasn’t worth people having to die like that. It certainly gave her something to chomp on. Like how you never really did know someone and how so many turn to crime to get by. It was frightening when the ones you were supposed to trust were crooked themselves.
Spike was there by her through it all. He held her, talked with her, comforted her and most of all listened to her. It was really just all she wanted: to get the bad out so she could move past it. He even returned to his apartment with Buffy as his guest. She had been adamant about the fact that she did not want to be in her home for possibly forever. Her parents were looking into a way to arrange that for her, despite her protestations that she would figure it out.
“I think you should just live with me,” Spike told her one night. They were lying side by side in bed together, she in a tank top and shorts, and he just in boxers.
“What?”
“I mean, we’d have to get a bigger place and add some features I don’t currently have, but it would work.”
“Spike….”
“Yeah?”
“You…you want to live with me?”
“Yeah, I want to live with you. I wouldn’t have said it if I didn’t want it.”
“What happened to ‘I’m my own man’ and all that crap.”
“I am my own man. But I’m my own man with you,” he said, grinning proudly.
Buffy smiled broadly. “By George, I think he’s got it.”
“I love you, Buffy.”
“I love you, too.”
“And yeah, you were right…it took me a while to get that I didn’t have to become someone else, and that loving someone didn’t mean I had to sacrifice who I was.”
“Nope. It just means that you share who you are.”
“Right. And…when you love someone, truly love them and know its right…then it’s not so scary anymore.”
“I think when the right person comes along, you know.”
“Exactly. And you know with Dru…I guess on some level I knew. I just didn’t want to know.”
Buffy smiled. “I’m in touch with that emotion.”
Sidling up to her, Spike pulled Buffy closer to him so he could feel the warmth of her body against his. “I know I waited until a real crap time to tell you I loved you.”
“Spike--”
Pressing a finger to her mouth, he silenced her. “But I felt it the entire time, Buffy. I think I fell in love with you the minute I saw you. Something about you just drew me to you like a moth to a flame.”
“Maybe the fact that I was a damsel in distress?” she teased, smirking at him.
“Or just my heart and my soul knew. It recognized you somehow; saw you as the one I needed. You have all of me, you know. All of me.”
“Does that terrify you?” she asked on a whisper.
“It does, but…I trust you.”
She smiled. “If you’re absolutely sure about living together--”
Pouncing on her, Spike settled between her legs and flipped her hands over her head with his hands. “I’m more than sure.”
“Mmm…you are showing me a benefit right here.”
Kissing her fiercely, he whispered, “Allow me to show you some more benefits. In fact, I’ll show you some benefits all night long…”