Cracking the door open, Buffy peered out, her eyes falling immediately to William’s sleeping form.
She had slept longer than she would’ve liked, but since William wasn’t awake yet it didn’t really matter. As long as she got out of the apartment and to the bus station she would be fine.
With her duffel bag hefted over her shoulder she tiptoed out of the room and made a quick shuffle to the front door. She started opening the locks hoping they wouldn’t make too much sound.
Seeing movement out of the corner of her eye, she jerked her head to the couch and found William missing.
“Going somewhere, luv.”
Buffy spun around to see him leaning against the door effectively halting her escape. “Uh, yeah, I was just going for a walk.”
He rolled his eyes. “What do you think I am? Bloody stupid? Try again, Buffy, an’ this time try telling me the truth.”
Her breathing was coming in short puffs, her heart was thumping in her chest, and she scrambled backwards into the back of the couch. She braced herself against it and shook her head.
“I am telling you the truth. I was coming right back. Geez, what is your problem?” She tried to sound tough and confident, but her voice was coming out highly pitched and rushed.
Stalking towards her, a predatory gleam in his darkened blue eyes, he closed the space between them until they were touching. He tilted his head so that his mouth was next to her ear and whispered, “my problem ‘s that you don’t trust me enough t’ tell me what the bleedin’ hell is goin’ on.”
She could feel his warmth being soaked in by her skin, his hot breath at her neck. Her eyes shut and for a minute she just let herself experience what it was like to be so close to another person. It had been so long since she’d had any real physical contact with anybody, save being smacked around by her father, that she was a little overwhelmed by William’s presence in front of her.
“Oh, God,” she breathed, resisting the urge to wrap herself around him to bring him even closer to her.
He pulled back to stare at her. “What?”
Coming to her senses, she placed her hands on his chest she pushed him away from her. “Please, just let me go, okay?”
“No, Buffy, it’s not okay. I can’t jus’ let you walk out of here,” he told her, folding his arms.
“But you have to. I can’t stay here, William. He might find me and I don’t know what he’ll do to you,” she finally confessed as she sunk to the floor. Some of the weight she had been carrying on her shoulders lightened and she felt relief.
Kneeling down, Spike asked, “who, luv? Who’ll find you?”
When she didn’t answer him he dragged her face up to his gaze. “I can’t help you ’f you don’t tell me.”
She let out a snort. “What makes you think you can help me even if I did tell you?”
“Why’d you even come t’ me then? If I can’t help you, then what the hell was the bloody point of lookin’ for me?” He was pacing now, barely containing the frustration that was straining to find a way to expend itself.
“I thought you could at the time, but I was wrong.” Her voice was small and sounded like it belonged to a little lost child.
He paused, looking down on her as she drew her knees to her chest and hugged them close. “Luv, you may not want t’ tell me, but make no mistake, I will find out. The sooner you let me in, the better off we’ll both be.”
She shook her head, but didn’t say anything. They were running around in circles and it was making her dizzy.
He’s just like Giles. The thought made her want to laugh. He wasn’t going to let it drop she knew that for certain. Eventually, she would tell him, but not today, not like this.
“I can’t let you go. I know you don’t ‘ave anywhere t’ go otherwise you wouldn’t have come here,” he told her, still waiting for her to respond.
She nodded. “What do you want me to do?”
A short bark of laughter escaped his lips. “Pet, I thought we already established what I want you t’ do.”
The only reply he got came in a form of a nasty glare.
“Okay, okay,” he said, holding his hands up in surrender. “I want you t’ stay with me until we get whatever this is figured out. I can’t let you go wandering around out there by yourself.”
“I’m not a child, William. I can take care of myself.” All right, now even she knew how ridiculous that sounded. It was pretty clear she was having problems on the whole self-reliance front.
To his credit, he didn’t make any smart remarks about it though. “I know that, but t’ the whole other world you are jus’ a sixteen year old girl. Lot’s of nasties out there wouldn’t mind taking a piece out of you.”
“I’m almost seventeen. It’s my birthday in a few months.” She felt the need to tell him that.
“Tha’s good, luv.”
She felt a smile warm her lips. He was starting to ease up on her and she had a feeling that he would let it lie for a while. Of course, she could be wrong. After all, she had proved to herself she wasn’t the best judge of his moods last night.
“Are you hungry? I’m feelin’ a mite peckish myself,” he asked her, offering his hand to help her up.
Getting to her feet she said, “yeah, I guess I am little hungry. I haven’t eaten since yesterday’s lunch.”
He grinned. “Well, unfortunately, I can’t cook so I guess we’ll have t’ go out. Sound okay?”
“Great. It sounds great.”
“Steak and eggs, as rare as you can make it an’ over easy with white toast an’ coffee.”
Spike watched as Buffy’s eyes widened at his choice of breakfast. He chuckled and handed the menu to Stella, his favorite waitress at Peg’s Diner.
“What’ll you have, hun?” Stella asked, her mouth smacking a piece of pink bubblegum while she talked.
“Um, I think I’ll have the short stack and some orange juice.”
“Alright.” Stella took Buffy’s menu and left their table.
“So do you come here often?”
Shrugging, he replied, “yeah, they serve breakfast twenty-four hours an’ they don’t hassle me about takin’ stuff to go. Most of the time I grab something from here to take home with me after work.”
She paused for a minute before saying, “So, Xander said you were a bartender.”
He frowned. “You talked to Xander?”
“Uh, yeah. I went to your apartment first, but I guess my mom had written down the address wrong and I ended up knocking on his door instead,” she replied.
Well, that was interesting. Looks like he’d have to go talk to his favorite neighbor.
Stella arrived with their drinks and Spike set to making his coffee. Four sugars and two creams later…
“I’ve worked at the Blue Temple for four years now. Of course, I wasn’t always a bartender. Had t’ work my way up t’ that,” he said, taking a sip of his coffee.
She stared into her orange juice for a few seconds before taking a leisurely drink of it. “Sounds like a cool job.”
He shook his head. “You’d think so, but it isn’t as glamorous as it sounds. It’s actually kinda depressing watching people get so drunk they can’t keep themselves upright and then leave with people they’d only met three seconds earlier.”
Scrunching up her nose, which Spike thought was the cutest thing he’d ever seen, she put her glass down.
“You’re right, that doesn’t sound very glamorous.”
Their food came and they spent the next twenty minutes in a comfortable silence. That was something that apparently came very natural to them. Spike remembered that at the funeral, they had shared something similar.
He watched as she ate up every last bit of her pancakes. It was nice to see a girl with such a healthy appetite. Even as gluttonous as Las Vegas was, the women there were still the pick and nibble kind. Well, at least all of the ones he seemed to have met had been.
And he’d been out with quite a few. It was a true fact that he was known notoriously for his love ‘em and dump ‘em style of dating. He wasn’t very proud of it, but it wasn’t as if he’d had too many of those women fall into the ‘keeper’s pile’. The women he seemed to be most attracted to were very shallow and more often than not were more interested in his money than him.
There was no way he could ever be considered rich, but he was living quite comfortably. His mother had left him some inheritance and coupled with the money he made at The Blue Temple, there was more than enough to sustain his lifestyle.
As soon as a woman found out he had a little money to play with she tended to try and worm herself into his life. And Las Vegas women were bloody smart too. They knew exactly how to get what they wanted from a man with clever tactics and flat-out lies.
He’d seen many a good man fall to the Harpies of Vegas and it was a damn shame.
Buffy was grinning at him, her hazel eyes sparkling with mirth.
“What?”
“Well, I was just watching you put about sixteen sugar packets into your coffee,” she said, finally letting her laughter loose.
Glancing down at his coffee, he realized that he had, in fact, poured packet after packet into his cup. “Oh, bugger.”
His remark made her laugh harder and Spike couldn’t help but to join in.
Seeing her happy, he felt like he was meeting an entirely new person. When he’d first met her there hadn’t been anything for her to be happy about and he imagined when he’d seen her again last night the same had been true as well. It was good to see her laugh even if was at his expense.
She was a beautiful girl. Looked a lot like her mother who was a beautiful woman in her own right. He could admit that when Giles and she had come to visit him during their honeymoon he had been a bit smitten with Joyce. Like mother, like daughter.
Reaching across the table, he grabbed her orange juice and took a drink. He wasn’t sure he liked the direction his thoughts had been going. How attractive Buffy was probably the last thing he should have been thinking about.
“Hey! That’s mine, you thief!” She exclaimed, trying to get back the stolen glass.
“Sorry, luv, but I stole it fair an’ square. ‘f you want it back, you’re gonna have t’ come an’ get it,” he told her with a smirk.
Okay, he didn’t like the look in her eyes and just as he was about to tell he was surrendering, she slid under the table.
“Buffy? What’re you doin’ down there?”
Suddenly, he felt her pinch his thigh. Letting out a very unmanly yelp, he reached down to pull her up.
When she was seated next to him and away from his exceedingly sensitive parts, he watched her capture the glass and take a long sip from it before turning to grin at him in triumph.
Bloody hell. This girl was going to be the death of him.
A/N: Okay, I know everyone is very anxious for the Spuffy to begin (so am I), but just be patient with me. Obviously there are some age difference issues to address and that will take a little time to work through. I promise I won’t drag it out forever, it will happen soon enough.