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Author's Chapter Notes:
Happy Thanksgiving!!! Gobble, Gobble, Gobble!!
A/N: So I forgot to put this in the last chapter, but I know everyone was kind of shocked at the sudden intimacy between Spike and Buffy. In my own defense, though, I tried to warn you. I believe I made reference to ‘picking up the pace’. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. Cryptic.

BTW, have I told you guys yet how much I love all of your reviews? Maybe I’ll say it again in the spirit of Thanksgiving. I am so grateful that you all enjoy my writing, so this one’s for you!



Spike stared at her with rapt attention. What ever he thought she would say after his small confession, this was not it. He had truly believed he had bollixed up any chance of getting the truth out of her after the stupid stunt he had pulled earlier.

“Only if you want to, luv. I won’t push,” he told her, hoping that she didn’t change her mind suddenly.

“No, I want to, really,” she replied.

Determination took over her features and she leaned forward so that her forearms were resting on the table. “After mom and Giles died, I-”

Out of the blue, the phone rang and Spike jumped. He just stared at it for a moment, debating whether or not to answer the damn thing.

“I better get that,” he said in frustration.

Leaning over, he grabbed the phone and pushed the talk button. “Yeah?”

“Spike, its Xander.”

“Yeah, what’s up?”

“Anya wanted me to call and find out if you are still coming over tonight. She’s gonna cook dinner.”

Spike glanced over at Buffy. She seemed fine now, but maybe that would change after she told him about her reasons for running away. On the other hand, he needed her to meet the Harris’ since he had to go back to work the next night.

“Yeah, we’ll be there.”

“Great! Seven, then?”

“Yeah, see you then.”

Hanging up the phone, he turned his attention back to Buffy. Her eyebrows were up in a questioning expression.

“Gonna have dinner with the neighbors tonight, sound okay?” If she said no, he would call Xander back up and cancel.

She nodded. “Okay.”

Now that their conversation had been interrupted, Spike wasn’t sure Buffy would continue. Maybe she had lost her nerve.

“So, luv, you were saying…”

She took a deep breath. “I got sent to live with my dad in LA. I wanted to stay with Jenny, but Social Services wouldn’t let me.”

He remembered Jenny. His uncle had brought her on vacation to England a couple years before he married Joyce. Nice lady, Jenny was. He couldn’t blame Buffy for wanting to stay with her.

“I hadn’t seen my dad since I was seven and so I guess I really didn’t know what to expect. He got remarried and I remember instantly not liking Missy or my step-sister, Harmony. I know they really didn’t want me around to steal my father’s attention away from them.

“Things were kind of tense the first couple of weeks and I figured it would take a little time to get settled in, so I didn’t think anything about how distant my dad seemed to be. Then one day, he called me into his office and started accusing me of stealing from Missy.

“I didn’t steal anything, Spike, I swear,” she said vehemently.

Grabbing her hand, he rubbed his thumb over the small patch of skin between her thumb and forefinger. “Don’t have t’ convince me, pet. I believe you.”

She gave him a sad smile and looked down at their hands. “Well, apparently, he didn’t have the same confidence in me. There was some yelling and then he hit me.”

Spike’s breath caught in his lungs. It wasn’t as if he didn’t already know or have a pretty good idea of her reasons for leaving her father’s, but knowing and hearing the words spoken outloud were completely different things.

The anger and rage that he had felt earlier at the store returned and doubled. That sodding bastard! How dare he touch her! It made him want to hop on his bike and drive out to LA. To teach the bastard a lesson he would never forget.

“Spike?”

His fists clenched, his hand squeezing Buffy’s tightly. He was swimming in a sea of vengeance, his blood boiling in his veins. The way he had reacted to Kyle’s thoughtless remarks was nothing compared to how he was reacting now. Sure, he had wanted to damage the kid, rough him up a little. But Buffy’s piss-poor excuse for a father, he wanted to obliterate, tear into little bloody pieces until there was nothing left to identify him.

“William?”

His given name on her lips broke through his thoughts. Realizing, she could probably see his emotions playing on his face and feel the tension coursing through his muscles, he made himself calm down.

“Sorry, baby,” he said through clenched teeth, still trying to cool his temper. “I’m not scarin’ you am I?”

“A little,” she replied quietly. “But I understand.”

After a moment, his rage had simmered down a bit. “So, I’m guessin’ it wasn’t the only time that happened, right?”

“No, it wasn’t.”

Trying to keep his temper in check, his jaw tightened. 10, 9, 8, 7, 6..., he counted down. Although, if he had really wanted to cool himself down, he should have probably started at 1000 because he was pretty sure that he had never felt this kind of anger before. Not even his last meeting with his estranged father had produced half of the fury he felt now.

“It was here and there for a while, but soon it seemed like it was once a week and then every other day. I never kept track, but it was a lot.”

Yeah, he got that. When he was younger the days seemed to blur together until it was only time between beatings that counted.

“One day, I guess I couldn’t handle it anymore and I ran away. To Jenny’s. But I didn’t stay long since she called my father pretty quickly after I got there and he sent someone to pick me up and haul me back.”

“Did you tell her? I mean, what was goin’ on?” If Jenny had dismissed her story, Spike wasn’t sure he could ever forgive her.

But Buffy shook her head. “No, she wouldn’t have believed me anyway.”

“Why do you think that?”

“C’mon, Spike. My dad is like a pillar of the community, why would anyone believe he was hitting me?”

“Because it’s true,” he replied, his fingers brushing against her wrist. “Good standing in the public eye doesn’t mean shit, luv. Look at all of the politicians who are supposedly perfect citizens that turn out to be liars and cheats and worse. Someone would have believed you, Buffy.”

“You don’t know that. You don’t know him. He’s powerful, Spike. He owns half of California and most of the people in it. Even if someone did believe me, he would have just bought them off,” she replied, her anger finally coming out to play.

If he was anyone else, he would have thought her to be exaggerating. But Spike knew how power often corrupted the good and decent. Money had a lot of sway when it was flashed in front of someone who didn’t have any. And there were people in this world that had the kind of power Buffy seemed to believe her father had. Alistair Pratt was another.

There were too many similarities to count between Buffy’s father and his own. Difference was Buffy had remained pure and good while he had turned into an angry, bitter man. If it was the last thing he ever did, he would see to it that it stayed that way.

She had too much to live for to be consumed by anger.

“So you came here. To me?”

“Yeah. I mean, I didn’t even know you, but somehow I knew. I knew that you would believe me,” she said, her voice full of honesty.

“Then why did you try t’ run from me?” It was a question that had been plaguing him ever since yesterday morning. If she had believed in him enough to come to him in the first place, why had she tried to sneak out?

“Because he’s not going to stop until he finds me and I didn’t want you to get hurt.”

Her words went straight to his heart, all at once filling him with both fear and joy. He did care a lot for her despite their short time together and the underlying tone to her words proved that she had feelings for him as well.

But her father was still out there, posed to strike and take her away from him at any given moment. And if he was as powerful as Spike believed he might be, he wouldn’t have any trouble locating his wayward daughter.

“Why does he even want you?” Spike realized how harsh it came out, but couldn’t think of a way to correct his mistake.

Tears began to form in her hazel-green eyes. “I don’t know.”

“Buffy-”

“Tell me why, Spike,” she said in a watery voice. “Why does he hate me so much? What did I ever do to make him hate me?”

She was sobbing now, her body convulsing in heavy shudders. It broke his heart to see her hurt this way. He grasped her wrist and pulled her out of the chair and into his lap. Wrapping his arms around her, he reached up and smoothed her golden hair away from her wet face.

“Don’t worry, sweets. We’ll figure it out, I promise. He’s not gonna hurt you again,” he told her softly.

“P-Please don’t lie to me. I need to believe you and I couldn’t handle it if you were lying,” she replied through stuttered cries.

“Never, baby. I’ll never lie to you.” He kissed her forehead and hugged her closer to his body.

Her arms came up around his neck and she clung to him tightly. She cradled her head on his shoulder, her lips pressed against his neck. He continued to kiss her, again on the forehead then her cheek until he was hovering dangerously close to her mouth.

He knew he had promised himself not touch her like this, but he couldn’t stop his lips from brushing against hers. She tasted of pain and salty, hot tears as his tongue swept across her lower lip.

A moan escaped her and he deepened the kiss, his tongue seeking entrance to the warm cavern of her sweet mouth. His hand slid down her back to rest on her tailbone as he pushed her body up his lap, bringing her closer to his erection.

It was so wrong to take advantage of her like this. Using her misery as an excuse to touch her under the pretense of comfort. But even as he knew it was wrong, he couldn’t stop himself from letting his hands roam her soft body or from sampling her mouth.

Pulling away, he tried to catch his breath. God, how she affected him. She probably didn’t even know what she was doing let alone what she was doing to him.

Her forehead came to rest against his, eyes closed and chest rising and falling with each deep breath. She had stopped crying at some point during their snogging and Spike was at least glad for that. He couldn’t stand to see her cry.

A small hand grabbed his own and their fingers laced together. He could stay there all day like this, holding her. In fact, the thought of letting her go tore at his insides.

Well, so much for bloody friendship.





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