It would be easier if he could talk to Buffy. Just hearing her voice would go a long way to calming him down, he knew. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t risk contacting her now and anything being said that would put her in there instead of him. Perhaps later, after things had had time to settle, he’d be able to talk to her without having to worry about something slipping.
If he would ever see her again at all… Spike couldn’t ask Buffy to wait for him. For all he knew, he was in here for the rest of his life. Best case scenario, he’d be an old man before he tasted freedom again. Buffy needed to move on, fall in love again. The very thought of it tore at him, but he knew it was for the best. Buffy needed to be happy, needed to have a chance at a real life. His sacrifice was being made for her happiness. Even if he knew there was a chance that she could have a better defense, spend less time in than he would, he’d rather suffer for a century than let her suffer for a day.
He’d give his life for her happiness. Buffy had suffered enough.
Spike laid back on his bunk, willing his mind and body not to fight against the loss of freedom.
For her, he could accept this fate.
“How did you meet William?”
Tara looked across the couch at Buffy, surprised the other girl had even spoken. She’d been nearly silent since she’d asked Tara to stay, and Tara had been reluctant to start a conversation either, unsure of what she even should say.
“Through Drusilla, sort of. Did you know her?”
Buffy nodded. “I did. I didn’t like her.”
Tara could help but smirk slightly. “I didn’t like her either. But I’m part of this group, witches mainly, and Drusilla was there for a while. She brought William along, and we hit it off. Drusilla ended up being asked to leave, but William and I kept in touch.” Tara shook her head. “I never understood what he saw in her.”
“Yeah, me either.” Buffy looked down at her hands. “Although if he’d stayed with her, he probably wouldn’t be in jail right now.”
Tara was silent, unsure of how to respond to that. This whole situation was a pretty messed up one.
Buffy didn’t wait for an answer anyway, didn’t seem to be expecting or wanting one. “He shouldn’t be the one in there now. I should be. I’m the one who killed Liam. Will’s never hurt anyone. He doesn’t deserve this.”
Tara looked at the bruises on Buffy’s face and neck. “Neither of you do.”
“That doesn’t matter,” Buffy replied, shaking her head. “I killed Liam. I didn’t mean to, but I still did it. William shouldn’t be taking the fall for me.” She looked back up at Tara, her eyes wide and searching. “I can tell them it was self defense, can’t I? The bruises are still there, and you have pictures. He was attacking me. If I tell them that, then maybe neither of us will have to spend a lifetime in jail.”
“I don’t know,” Tara replied honestly. She didn’t, and didn’t know how she could give advice on something like this. “I don’t really know how it works. Did you and William talk about what you were going to do at all?”
“No. He left when I was sleeping. When I came here, I wasn’t even sure if Liam was dead, or hell, even if I’d actually shot him.”
Tara knew she shouldn’t really ask what she was about to ask, especially since she had no intentions of bringing any information she got to the police, but she was already in as it was – what did it matter if she got a little deeper? “Buffy, what exactly happened that night?”
Buffy looked away again, and for a moment, Tara thought she was going to retreat back into herself. However, she finally began to speak, though her words were so soft that Tara had to lean forward to hear her.
“Liam came home late that night. I was already in bed, but he called me into his office and showed me pictures he’d had taken of me with William. Most of them were of us outside this apartment, kissing by the door, though there were some others, too. Liam, he…well, he’s been hitting me since last summer, but this… He was crazy, Tara. He hit me and choked me and…” Buffy paused for a moment, swallowing hard and trying to fight the tears in her eyes. “He tried to rape me. He had me pinned down, but…but I got free. And I knew he had a gun in his desk drawer, so I got it out, and I don’t know, everything after that is foggy, but I got scared, and I fired the gun. I didn’t see if the bullets hit him, but he didn’t get up. William said maybe I didn’t hit him, but seeing as he’s dead, I guess I did.”
Tara sat in silence, trying to process what Buffy had just told her. What did you say to something like that?
Nothing. There weren’t words, no platitudes that would helping the hurting lessen.
Instead, Tara opened her arms and let Buffy cry in her embrace.
Dr. Winifred Burkle had had to go back to the crime scene. The more she looked at the evidence, the less sense it made.
It was like doing a jigsaw puzzle with the wrong picture on the box. She’d been told what the final result should be, but none of the pieces fit together that way. The problem was, she didn’t know what the right picture was.
She had a lot of pieces, but she had been doing this long enough to know some very crucial ones were missing.
So she’d gone back to the crime scene, her mind whirling as she took a closer look at every inch of scene. Her focus kept going back to the wall, with three very distinct holes where bullets had been removed.
Fred stared at the wall for a moment, head cocked to the side, before she began to walk backwards slowly, her arm stretched in front of her as if she were tracing an invisible line. Her eyes widened and she turned around, facing the blonde woman in the doorway.
“Detective Lockely, you’re a little over five feet tall, right?”
“Give or take,” Kate replied. “Why?”
“Come stand here and take out your gun.”
Kate looked skeptical for a moment, but she did as Fred asked, her curiosity piqued if nothing else. Fred moved in and began positioning Kate, moving her arms in different ways, glancing between the wall and Kate’s gun.
“Mrs. Angelus shot the wall,” Fred announced after several moments.
“What?” Kate asked, confused by what exactly Fred was doing – and why.
“Mrs. Angelus shot the wall,” Fred repeated. “These bullet holes were made by someone about your height, and she’s about your height, at least according to your report.”
Kate nodded. “She is.”
“So she shot the wall. She didn’t shoot her husband.”
“She’s not who we have in custody,” Kate replied.
“But you’re looking at her as a suspect,” Fred countered. “Besides, I don’t think the son did it either.”
“How do you figure that from bullet holes in the wall?”
“Because if he did shoot his father, then he’d confess with the real crime, right? He wouldn’t confess to what was actually the shooting of a wall and not a person at all.”
Kate stared for a moment, trying to sort out what Fred was saying before she finally admitted she couldn’t. “I’m not following you.”
“The story the son gave when he confessed was he shot his father three times. Well, his father was shot five times, not three. But the wall was shot three times, which makes me think Mrs. Angelus really shot the wall, but she told the son she shot her husband, and then he went to the cops using her story as his. Only her story wasn’t accurate because she never shot her husband.”
“Why would she claim she killed her husband if she really only shot the wall?” Kate asked with a frown.
“Well, you said she was roughed up, right?”
“Yeah. She looked pretty bad.”
“So she was hysterical,” Fred answered with a shrug. “I mean, if my husband attacked me and I grabbed a gun and fired, I probably wouldn’t know what I hit either. If I had a husband.”
Kate nodded. It was a roundabout way of thinking from her point of view, but what Fred was saying made sense. Which meant they definitely had the wrong guy. And whomever had killed Liam Angelus was still free.
Unless the son was screwing with them entirely, which was also a possibility.
“We should call the ADA in,” Fred said suddenly, pulling Kate out of her thoughts. “He needs to look at this stuff, because we may not even be able to hold William Angelus much longer if there’s evidence negating his confession.”
Kate looked over at the wall again and sighed as she reached for her cell phone.
Why couldn’t something be simple for a change?
Buffy lay awake in bed, staring at the ceiling. She’d told Tara she was going to try to sleep, but rest wasn’t coming. It had been two days now, two days that William had been locked away for a crime that was hers not his. She couldn’t even begin to think about what he could be going through, every prison horror story she’d ever heard running through her mind.
He was the last person in the world to deserve something like this. His entire life had been full of suffering and isolation. He needed a chance to live, a change to experience everything that had been denied to him.
Buffy had happiness once. William had not.
She understood what he was trying to do, but she couldn’t let him do it. The guilt was too heavy, too much of a burden for her to bear. She couldn’t live a life of freedom knowing the price for it was the life of the man she loved.
Hopefully, William would understand.
Buffy rose from the bed and dressed, her features set with determination. Whatever fate she faced now, she’d accept it without regrets. Even if she spent the rest of her life behind bars it was better than being at the mercy of Liam Angelus.
In that, she could take comfort.
Tara sat up straight on the couch when she saw Buffy walk out of the bedroom. She started to speak, but Buffy stopped her.
“I’m turning myself in.”
“Are you sure you really want to do that?” Tara asked.
“I have to. I can’t let William suffer for what I did. I love him, Tara. That’s not something you do to someone you love.”
Tara nodded, making no move to stop Buffy. She didn’t like the idea of either of them in prison – both ways hurt someone who didn’t deserve it – but it wasn’t her call to make.
“Can you talk to William for me?” Buffy asked. “Tell him I’m okay with this, and that I’m happier facing any consequences than I would be knowing he’s bearing them for me. And…and tell him I love him. More than anything in the world.”
“I will,” Tara promised, surprised she could talk with the lump in her throat.
“Thank you. And thank you for helping me, too. You didn’t have to do that.”
“You needed help, Buffy. That’s not something I can turn my back on.”
“Still, I appreciate it.” She gave Tara a half smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “I’ll write you from prison.”
“I’ll get copies of those pictures and get them to you,” Tara replied. “They’ll help with your defense.”
“Thank you,” Buffy replied with a nod. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Okay, I need to go before I change my mind.”
“Do you want me to drive you?”
Buffy thought for a moment. If Tara took her, that could ensure she’d get there, since there’d be less of a chance to panic and run if she wasn’t behind the wheel. “Yeah, okay.”
Tara stood and the two women left the apartment.
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