Her classes were done for the day at three in the afternoon, and so she took it upon herself to pay Mr. William Giles a visit at work. She’d gotten the name of the marketing firm he worked for and found it with ease. She was a woman on a mission.
When she stepped off the elevator on his floor, she found him coming toward her and a delighted smile bloomed across his handsome face. Her heart lurched and she had to wonder if confronting him was going to be harder than she thought, but then his eyes darted nervously around, and knowing the reasons why, just fueled her fire. She was a secret in his world, not someone he could go to work and talk about, she was nothing more than his mistress for the weekend; his whore.
He barreled into the elevator before she could get off, and quickly pressed the ‘door close’ button, pressed the lobby button, which was thirty floors down, allowing them to have the elevator to themselves.
He gathered her in his arms immediately, kissing her senseless, pulling her close against him, grinding his burgeoning erection against her and pushing her against the wall. “Missed you so much, pet,” he whispered. “Couldn’t stop thinking about you.”
“Really?”
“Mmm…I was hard as nails all night thinking of you.”
“That so?”
“Reach down and check,” he suggested huskily.
Buffy obliged, stroking him gently through his pants while he moaned and dropped his head to her shoulder.
“I want you right here and right now,” he told her, groaning.
He’s married, she reminded herself and instead of stroking him gently, she gripped him hard, as hard as she could through his pants.
His head whipped up and his eyes popped open. “Buffy, that hurts.”
“Does it?” she asked innocently.
“Yes,” he gasped.
“Did you know…” she murmured, brushing her lips across his lips lightly, “That I can’t stand liars?”
“N-no.”
“You know what it makes me want to do when a man lies to me?”
“N-no.”
“It makes me want to yank off their dick and shove it up their ass,” she hissed and let him go, backing away and glaring at him.
He coughed, wincing at the pain between his legs and Buffy took sadistic pleasure in it. “You’re scum, did you know that?”
Pushing the button to stop the elevator from moving at all, Spike turned to her, trying to talk through the pain. “Buffy, I can explain—“
“Oh, really?” she said, sarcastically, crossing her arms across her chest. “Then by all means, if you can explain. How about I take a shot at it?”
He watched her, waiting expectantly.
“Let me see if I can guess what you’re about to say…” she said mockingly, “’She’s so mean to me, Buffy, she treats me like crap, Buffy, we don’t love each other Buffy, she’s fucking around on me, Buffy, we barely talk anymore, Buffy, our marriage is over, Buffy, I’m going to leave her, Buffy.’ Did I nail that one on the head or what?”
“Buffy, it’s true—“
“Of course it is. Because it’s you, right? And you’re so different from every other man who does the same exact thing and gives the same lame ass excuses for their disgusting behavior!”
“You don’t know what it’s like. It’s not that easy—“
“It’s not? So you can’t just leave her if you hate her so much?”
“She’d end me.”
“Really? She a mafia princess or something.”
“Pretty close to it,” he muttered.
“Well, I wonder how she’d react if she knew about your extracurricular activities?”
“Buffy, listen—“
“No,” Buffy said, pushing the button to make the elevator go, “I’m not going to listen. You’re going to listen to me. You’re a fucking asshole and I hate your fucking guts. Men like you make me sick. You know what it is with guys like you that can’t keep it in their pants? You’re proving how many women you can pleasure, you’re just proving how you can’t pleasure just one woman. You’re sad and you’re pathetic—“
“Got you off, didn’t it?” Spike said bitterly. “I might be bent, but I got you off just the same, didn’t I? Maybe you should be more careful about who you take home, little girl. You certainly don’t fuck like the sweet and innocent girl you show the world--”
Marching up to him, she slapped him hard across the face. “I hope you rot in hell.” The elevator doors dinged open just in time and Buffy marched out into the lobby, heading for her cab.
Spike watched her go, the doors slowly closing in on him and he thought, I’m rotting in hell already.
God, why had he been such an asshole to her? For finding out? For being disgusted by him? She had every right to be disgusted by him…and he had nothing to offer her to begin with. He was a lost cause. He could give her him, and that wasn’t much at all was it? He wasn’t his own man; he was a pathetic sod whose life was led by others. It had hurt that Buffy, whom he associated with something akin to an angel, had seen him as nothing more than scum. So, in classic Spike attitude, he lashed out in his hurt and attacked her. It was so much easier to deflect blame and responsibility than to take it on the chin yourself.
Pushing his floor number on the elevator control pad, Spike whipped out his phone and hastily punched in Xander’s number.
“Hello?”
“Who the fuck told Buffy about Cecily!” Spike barked into the phone.
Silence for a beat, then, “Excuse me?”
“Who. Told. Buffy. About. Cecily?”
“Dude, I don’t know!”
“She just came here, to my office, all hell fire blasting me for being married –“
“Well…can you really blame her?”
“Xander, you know—“
“How unhappy you are, yeah. But…Jesus, man. Grow a set and divorce the bitch.”
“It’s not that easy!”
“It really is that easy.”
“You’re supposed to be my best mate here, Xander.”
“I am your best ‘mate’, Spike, but you can’t expect me to be okay with what you do. I just never say anything because well, it’s easier to not say anything than to have this discussion with you constantly. You know…I’ve got Anya now and I really like her. I might even love her, and I can’t imagine doing something like that to her.”
“Aren’t you all of a sudden just so fucking noble,” Spike spat.
“No, I’m not. Not really, cause I let you do it and never said anything. I even aided you by saying you were single, but…but I don’t want to do that anymore, man.”
“What the hell do you know, Harris?” Spike shouted, feeling that he was very much starting to unravel.
“I don’t know a lot, Spike. I don’t claim to, but some things seem pretty simple to me.”
“That’s because you are simple,” Spike said between clenched teeth.
“What’s it matter what I think anyway?” Xander said angrily, “When does what anyone thinks ever matter? You’re just gonna do what you’ve always done; only this time it won’t be Buffy. Which actually makes me glad cause that doesn’t look good for me having such a bastard for a friend,” and with that, Xander hung up.
Immediately, the phone rang again. “What?” Spike barked into it.
“You wouldn’t be yelling at me, would you William?” Cecily’s snooty voice came over the line, warning him.
“Of course not, why would I do something like that?” Spike bit out sarcastically.
“What’s gotten you all wound up?” she asked haughtily.
“What do you want, Cecily?”
“We’re having dinner at Daddy’s, did he tell you?”
Perfect end to a perfect day.
“No, he didn’t,” Spike said wearily, feeling suddenly very tired.
“Well, we are. Don’t be late coming home and don’t smell like liquor either. Wear something nice and please try to comb your hair, you know how I like it when your hair is all slicked back... ”
He remembered how Buffy had run her fingers through his curly locks, how she said how adorable he was with them.
“Cecily, are you my goddamned mother now?”
“Don’t be crass. Just because you lacked social grace growing up, doesn’t mean you can’t learn to have it now. Is it wrong of me to want my husband to look nice? Don’t be late.” And she hung up before Spike could respond.
Yeah, Buffy, I’m rotting in hell already.
Spike hated going to Cecily’s parents for dinner. He hated how snobby they were; how they talked about things they knew nothing about and passed judgment.
Currently, Cecily’s father, Morgan, was discussing a rival marketing firm and how young the wife of the President of the company was.
“He’s a cad,” Cecily’s mother, Ellen, said disgustedly, “I hear he visits the local bars.”
Who the fuck cares if he goes out for a drink? Spike thought, and just because his wife is younger, doesn’t make him a cad…and who the fuck says ‘cad’ anymore?
“I hear she’s pudgy,” Morgan said, sipping his Scotch.
“I think she’s pregnant, Daddy,” Cecily added, “I ran into her on Newbury Street. You know where she shops don’t you? At The Gap,” she wrinkled her nose and said The Gap as if it were a dirty word.
Spike rolled his eyes and sat back, taking a long drink of his own Scotch.
“Something wrong, William?” Morgan asked, and the question sounded almost like a dare.
“Nothing at all, sir,” Spike muttered.
“He’s been a little grumpy today,” Cecily told her father, reaching out and patting Spike’s head as if he were a puppy. “I think he just missed me this weekend, didn’t you darling?”
“Of course, sweetheart,” Spike said, monotone.
“Well,” Ellen said, “Maybe you two should go away for a nice weekend together? Maybe it’d help in getting me some grandchildren.”
Spike nearly choked on the sip he just took at the thought of that. It never failed, so he wasn’t sure why it bothered him so much anymore. They brought up the grandkid thing every time they came over for dinner, which was at least twice a week. He didn’t care if they’d been married for ten years compared to the five they’d actually been married, he was not having kids with her. Ever.
Five years, he thought. My God, that is a long time…What the hell was I thinking? We met when we were 20, started dating a year later, graduated on the five year plan at 23, got engaged, and got married at 25. What the hell is wrong with me? I’ve wasted nine years of my life with this woman. Nine fucking years.
Looking over at his wife, he thought how once upon a time she had been the most beautiful woman he’d ever met. She had been so much more fun then, or had that all been for show? Had it all been her way of trapping him? Were women everywhere like that? She’d had those snobby tendencies then, but she was much more willing to try new things, much more accepting then. How had his love-addled mind been so swept up by it all that he’d just overlooked how she really was?
Now all he saw when he looked at her was someone he could barely stand, a snob, a prude, a bitch, someone that was with him just to say she had a husband. Those brief moments of affection she’d show him were all for show, all for pretense to make him think…think what? That she was just as happy in this hell-hole marriage as he? To keep him there, he supposed, to remind him that if he should ever leave, he’d have nothing because he’d sold his soul to the Devil.
He wondered how long he had to sit there before he could go out for a while and get the disgusting feeling he had about himself out of his system.