The Key to Christmas (co-written with vikingprince

(co-written with Vikingprincess)

December, 2004, Italy

Dawn, her eyes red and sore from weeping, crept down the stairs from her bedroom to the obscenely cheerful Christmas tree and its stacks of presents. It was impossible, it had to be impossible. Spike had come back, but he hadn’t come to them. He’d gone to Los Angeles. Become a part of a law firm so evil that the Watchers had an entire encyclopedia of references dedicated just to Wolfram & Hart. And then he’d died all over again, along with Angel and all of their friends, fighting their own demonic overlord bosses. And Giles had waited until now to tell them?

It never should have happened. Never, never, never. She sniffled, and shoved the doors open to the patio, the soft scents of Italy assaulting her nose with beauty that just made her sadder at the moment. Somebody should have done something.

Somebody… should have… done something.

Somebody still could.

She looked up at the velvet dark sky, spangled with stars, and focused in on one that was actually three, currently together from their usual triangle-relationship in a configuration and brightness that hadn’t been seen for over two thousand years. Her Key senses tingled at the power that was there, made of faith and hope and love. Superstition had a part in it too, what with whole wishing on a star schtick, and her sore heart hardened with a reckless determination.

Being supernatural and a force of opening and closing had to be good for something, right? Right.

The Key closed her eyes, and didn’t see the green energies that flared around her as she recited a modified child’s rhyme with all the longing and love that she could muster, heavily seasoned with sorrow, and the utter surety that things could have been different. Could have been better.

“’Star light, star bright, star that matters most tonight. I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight.’ Please, please… make things come out better this time.”

High in the heavens, blue-white light flared around the Christmas Star, in sympathy with the throbbing green pulse around Dawn, who fainted.

And woke up in Los Angeles, one year and four months earlier.

*

September, 2003, Santa Monica Pier

There was music and laughter. The smell of hot dogs and hamburgers permeated the air, mixing with the scent of ice cream and cotton candy. Children ran screaming down the length of the Santa Monica pier despite the late hour, demanding a ride on the Ferris wheel, or the merry go round. Music blasted out of radios and competed with the piped sound of an out-of-tune calliope.

And yet… it all went silent for the Vampire. She was here.

He’d know her scent anywhere. He stood there, frozen like a statue, just as he had a month before.

Angel had assembled the group in the lobby just as the watchers and the slayers walked into Wolfram and Hart, lead by The Slayer, with Giles at her side and the Scoobs flanking them. They’d returned from Italy, and they were no more happy with the developments in Los Angeles, than they had been when Andrew brought his message from Rome.

Spike didn’t give a fuck about any of that. What did it matter if they worked through an evil firm or a good one if their goals were the same? What he did care about though was the look in her eyes. She never really looked at him, not directly. Never said an intimate word meant only for him. It was nothing like the meeting he’d always imagined.

Stilted words. Anger from both sides. Angel put them in their places though, right and proper. Told them Los Angeles was his… and that they could work together, or not, their choice.

Then they’d left. Nothing resolved. Oh… there had been a few smiles, and nods. Even a hug here and there for good old Spike, and a squeal of joy from the Bit to see him all unburned, but they’d still left. She’d left him, again.

Spike looked down at the ground and struggled against the urge to find her, to catch one glimpse, to follow her for a short bit. One part of him asked what it could hurt. Another remembered the look on her face. He couldn’t take it, not again. And too much separated them now, anyway. Time. Distance. Work. No… best that he find another place to save lives. The Slayer had staked her turf for the night.

Turning reluctantly, he straightened his trench coat and headed away from the ocean and the people, toward the beach and parking lot.

Across the pier, Buffy's head went up. She didn't scent vamp, exactly, but there was one there, and her Slayer-sense went all tingly with it. Not a fledge, that was for sure. And it was moving away from the center of activity, which could only mean... stalkery badness with fangs. "I don't think so," she said to herself, planting her palms on the pier railing and vaulting over it to the tide-packed sand below. It was headed north, so she did the same, moving fast.

Until the July moon caught the gleam of fair hair... she'd know that bleached blond 'do anywhere! And he seriously owed her some answer-time! Starting with why he hadn't called when he'd found himself all resurrecty and stuff, and still in possession of, you know, fingers to dial with!

She would have called him! Probably. Okay, maybe. Possibly. But how was she supposed to have known that the pretty lie she'd told him as their fingers caught fire could have actually been the truth?

"Spike!"

Spike's boots hit the wooden planks a bit faster. She was on the move, and moving toward him. He'd best move it if he didn't want to come face to face with The.... Bloody hell. "Slayer."

Emulating her stance, he stood with his legs apart, returning her stare. This had to be the part where she tried to beat him to a bloody pulp.

"You bastard," she gritted out, wishing that seeing him didn't send little butterflies fluttering by in her stomach. "You're working for Evil, Inc.," she accused, one of the names Xander had given Wolfram & Hart. "Is that why you didn't call when you ended up really not all that sincerely dead?"

"You think I'm evil, is that why you're sad I'm not, sincerely dead, that is?" he demanded, crossing his arms. Already, she was pegging him as the bad guy. Judgmental as always, some things never changed.

"Hello, evil law firm?" She glared at him. "Kind of a come down, even for you," she sneered, knowing it was unfair even as she did it. He'd died to save the world. Just like Angel. Except... that Spike had been a willing sacrifice, and Angel an ignorant one. She pushed logic aside in favor of betrayed emotion. "You talked him into it, didn't you? Cushy life, corner office, and probably even real human blood, huh? It's not exactly a Shanshu, is it?"

"Even for me." Something snapped inside him. In a few steps, he was in her face, steadfastly keeping his hands at his sides to keep from shaking her. "We've been through too much together, you and I, for you to come back to that... to talk to me like that," he ground out. Fucking hell... why didn't he just walk out into the darkness? Why could she rile him up like this, and still make him want her in ways no human could understand?

Buffy's pulse leapt in her throat, and it took everything she had not to capture his face between her hands, to drag his mouth to hers and make him give her exactly what she wanted... except that it wouldn't, couldn't be enough. Not anymore. "Damnit, Spike! How could you do it? Come here, work for them?" How could you not have come looking for me? "What the hell were you thinking?"

"What was I thinking... what was I thinking." His jaw muscle visibly throbbed as he tried to answer her with something other than mouth to mouth contact to stop the questions. Questions that were hard to answer, complicated. Answers that he knew would sound like excuses.

"Well, for starters, I was thinking I had nowhere to go." He raised his finger up to her mouth, to silence her. It was that or... Dragging his gaze back up to her eyes, he continued. "I didn't have a body, not a real one at first. I was a ghost... a sodding apparition. Couldn't control when I came or left. But there I was, with good old Angel, and his do-gooder brigade. And it was just like... home." Only he had no home.

Buffy's mouth tried to tremble beneath his finger, and she gritted her teeth to stop the fragile, betraying movement. "Do-gooder brigade," she said flatly, slapping his hand away. "I'd tell you to pull the other leg, but my kick would just break your arm."

"Wouldn't be the first time," he shot back. Memories flooded his mind, memories of their first time. Passion and pain... it had been bloody glorious. What if he pulled her down under the boardwalk? What if she remembered too? Would there be few broken pylons? Would the beach look as if gangs had torn it up?

A breeze stirred the air and brought him back. His face hardened. "Right, because you and Giles are the only ones who know how to make the world safe. There's one way... yours. Everyone else is what? Evil? Open your mind, Slayer, if you try real hard, I know you can." There was only a hint of mockery in his voice. He wanted her to see... to know. "Or is that too much to ask?"

Buffy searched his brilliant blue eyes with her own. That last night together... it had felt like more than just blindly trying to find something worth living for in each others' arms. It had felt real. It had been both bitter and sweet, the feeling she’d been chasing for so long and finally captured, only to know that it was going to be torn to bits in the service of being the Chosen One the very next day. But she hadn't expected it to be Spike that died, and not her. She'd just figured, third time's the charm, or whatever. But no.

"Maybe it is," she replied at last, anger drained away and replaced by... what? Regret? Hurt, that he'd come back and never bothered to tell her? Whatever it was, she didn't like it one damned bit.

"Why," he demanded, gripping her shoulders after all. He squeezed them, in the process bringing her closer and unlocking more memories and feelings. "Why, Buffy," he asked as his throat closed up on him.

"Why," she echoed, incredulous. His hands at her shoulders were cool and strong, no reflection at all of the fires that burned inside of him. That had destroyed him, and seared her heart. "What do you mean, why? How about why should I? You saved the world; you chose that! How can you turn around and choose... them?" Why couldn't he have chosen her, instead?

The pain reflected in her green eyes almost undid him. "I didn't choose. Wasn't a choice... I landed there. I don't know how or why, but it happend. Somehow, it must have been meant to happen, yeah?" He cocked his head to the side. "You had your path, it took you to Rome. There was something that you had to do, and you knew it... here." He touched her heart, lingered a little too long because he just couldn't pull away. "Someone or something put me on mine, and here I was, at Angel's. I didn't want to stay at first, but I couldn't leave. Destiny? Karma? I don't bloody know what to call it." Abruptly, he released her and walked to the railing to lean on it as he searched his pocket for a smoke.

She wasn't walking away. She was listening, that was something. He was silent until after he blew out a comforting puff of smoke. "Still here. I must be saying something right." Turning, he looked at her.

"Had to happen sometime," she quipped feebly, totally unable to rise to her usual level of banter after the touch of his hand between her breasts. Above her heart. "But believe me when I say that helping the Watchers assemble a branch office in Rome was not something I felt called to do. Not even close." She just hadn't had anything else to do with her life, that suddenly looked like being longer than any Slayer's in history. And more lonely, too. The others hadn't had anyone to lose.

"Believe me hanging out with Wesley into the wee hours of the night wasn't something I felt called to do, either," he responded with a flash of humor. And yet the big white elephant was still in the room with them, wasn't it? "The Wolfram and Hart bit... we really are using them, their offices, their information. I wasn't here to kill people, I was here to save them. If I were lying about what we're doing, you..." he pointed at her with his cigarette still between his fingers, "and the rest of the watcher/slayer union would have been crawling up our arses by now."

Buffy wasn't about to tell him that he'd hit on the exact purpose of her being there, along with the rest of the original Scoobies. It felt like a betrayel, but she wasn't sure of whom exactly, or why. "Good point," she said, nodding as though he were a genius... the most snark she could muster when what she really wanted was something that, once again, she couldn't have.

"Guess... guess the coffee break's over," she told him.

Should have seen that coming. He gave her a nod. "Breaks over." Without looking, he tossed the butt of his smoke over the railing and headed her way. "See you sometime?"

"Have your people call my people," she grinned, feeling miserable. "Or, on second thought, don't." She took a deep breath. "I'll call you. You know. When I can."

"Sure." That was it then. With a parting glance, he walked in the opposite direction.

*

October, 2003, Orange County

Too many people had gone missing in this one park in Orange County, where the Slayer had put down her roots. Now, thanks to nominally harmful services offered by Wolfram & Hart, Spike had known exactly where the flesh eating Serparvo Demon had taken to hunting. In fact, he knew exactly where it would be waiting, where it had left a covered pit, and how it would try to lure him this warm October night.

Sometimes these tips failed, but not tonight, or so he thought when he heard the cry of a baby coming from some distant bushes. That was the lure. Without letting his gaze flick to the ground, he avoided the most direct route to the sound and avoided the hidden pit. The sound of footsteps following him had him wondering; had the client left out a detail? They’d been told the demon would be making the baby sounds, which meant it should be behind—

A high pitched, thin scream pierced the air. Spike turned on a dime, his trench coat billowing behind him. Moments later, he was looking down at a pony-tailed girl who’d landed on her arse in the pit. “You al—“ Before he finished, the demon decided to make an appearance and tried to shove him down with her.

Spike shoved his elbow into its scaly body, and struck it in its face. The thing roared, but before it brought its razor sharp teeth close, Spike injected it and watched it curl into itself and die. He sighed. This was the bloody trouble with working for a company that had a big lab. Took the fun right out of fighting sometimes, they did.

“Come on luv, let’s get you out of there,” he reached down and found that the athletic young woman easily scrambled out. “Right… Slayerette,” he said. After all that time with them, he knew one when he saw one.

“Th… thanks,” she answered, rubbing her injured side. “I missed the spear by a few inches.”

Looking down into the booby trapped pit, Spike agreed, “Close. What the bloody hell were you doing out alone if you knew that thing was out here,” he demanded. It was one thing to be armed and ready for it, another for a new slayer to try to take something of this size on by herself.

She squared skinny shoulders. "I was... patrolling," she told him defiantly.

Just then, Buffy emerged from the bushes beyond the sludgy mass that had been a Serparvo demon. "A world of euw," she commented, making sure none of it got on her shoes.

Spike turned. For an instant, he was in Sunnydale again. That was the benefit of a small town, if you patrolled, you couldn't help but run into each other. "Lo. Looks like you lost something," he smirked, pointing his chin toward the Slayerette. "She was about to explain what she's doing here."

Buffy wrinkled her nose and turned away from him to look at the demon goo. "I'd kind of like to ask a few questions myself," she agreed, leaving out that it was Spike she wanted to ask, and not the Slayerette who'd been following him to see if he was as evil as working for Wolfram & Hart implied.

"Thought you might," he said, walking over to look at the melted creature. "See something interesting?" he asked.

Running footsteps, fading into the distance, signaled the unceremonious departure of the Slayerette, and Buffy smirked to herself. That was one way to avoid answering Spike's questions, she supposed. But if he tried to run from hers, there would be major stoppage. "How did you kill it? Serparvo Demons can only be killed by drowning!"

"You'll have to ask Fred, Head of Research at Wolfram and Hart," he said, slipping the syringe out of his inner pocket to show her. "She said aim for the lungs and something about magical expansion of liquids, but I stopped listening after I heard there wouldn't be a fight. Didn't seem quite sporting." Putting it away, he stared at her... drank the sight of her in. She hadn't called him. He hadn't called her. And here they were, still worlds apart.

"You look...." What was that in her eyes, a warning glance? He didn't care. If she was going to strut about town in skin tight pants and a strappy top, then she'd best get used to expecting a compliment. "Stunning."

To Buffy's great surprise, she felt a blush rising into her cheeks, and a desire to do something... anything... so that he'd keep looking at her just like that.

"So... a girl named Fred, huh?" That hadn't been it.

He smiled and looked in the direction that the Slayerette had taken off, before turning back. "Jealous?" Right, he didn't have a prayer.

"Of a girl named Fred?" She scoffed, even as her eyes drank in the sight of him hungrily. "A world of no."

If he didn't know better... "Slayer?"

She swallowed. "Spike?"

He turned a quarter step, and somehow she did too, eyes still locked together. So long... so many months had passed since the last time he'd held her. The last time he'd kissed her, tasted her. The last time he'd awakened with her scent marking him.

She had no idea how much he'd yearned for her... wanted to call her when he'd first appeared. But what good would he have been to her as a bloody ghost? And then things had come up... destiny... and the flack from the watchers over the Wolfram and Hart thing. But through it all, he'd never stopped wanting her. He'd pestered Andrew to death asking questions about her life in Rome and biting his head off when he didn't like the answers. But here she was... so close... so close.

Oh, God, they hadn't been this close since... the basement to Hell, in the new Sunnydale High. Side by side, facing down the legions of uber-vamps that would eat the world. Their fingers laced, his burning and hers blistering. Phantom pain scraped her nerves, but it didn't hurt nearly so much as being this close and not touching him. Not kissing him. Not—

They inched closer, another quarter turn toward each other, and the coolness of his skin wafted against her in the warm night, like some kind of air conditioner that was too sexy for its bad hair and battered leather trench coat. Her nipples pebbled, and her lips parted. "You—" she started.

"Me," he agreed, bringing his mouth down over hers. He didn't have to make sense, not any more sense than the feelings coursing through him. Need. Desire. Want. Love. Those where the things that were missing from his life, and those were the things she was to him. Brought to him.

Sliding his hands down her back, he molded her to him as he dipped his tongue inside her mouth. She tasted just like he remembered, felt just as he recalled. Sinking deeper inside her mouth, he demanded she remember how they were together, how they could battle and fight each other, and win together. Come on Slayer, show me your fire.

His mouth tasted like everything she hadn't had in forever, and had never expected to taste again. A fierce little growl rumbled in her throat, more moan than menace, and Buffy's fingers dove into Spike's hair, always so much softer than it looked. She slanted their mouths together harder, deeper, and her slim body arched against him with a starvation that shocked her even as she strained for more of him.

Fire. He'd asked for it, and here he was, bloody burning up in her arms again. He moved his mouth back and forth, devouring her, taking everything she gave him and more. It wasn't enough. "Buffy." Lifting her off her feet, he walked forward until he had her pressed up against a tree.

He said her name again, all of his loneliness for her reflected in the way he said it. His hands were on her waist, traveling up and down her sides as he kissed her again with all the passion of a man who'd found the woman he dreamed about for so long.

Her legs went around his lean waist with an instinct stronger than any sense, and she broke for a ragged breath, gasping his name, before diving back into the kiss. This, this was what it was to be alive! How could she have gone on without this? Without him?

Bloody hell, if they weren't careful... some trees were going to die. He ground his hips into her as he felt her nails drag down his back. Need slammed into him full force, and she wasn't doing anything to slow it down. He rained hungry, hard kisses on her mouth, and her throat... God he'd missed this... missed her.

Buffy moaned into Spike's mouth, hands shoving beneath his trench coat to claw at his back, and then to pull at his shirt, desperate to touch the alabaster skin that covered all of that compact, gorgeous muscle. She was practically vibrating with need for him, her whole body thrumming with it, and—

And that was her pager on vibrate.

"Fuck," she groaned, reluctantly loosening her thighs from around him instead of thrusting back as her body and her heart were screaming for her to do. And the damned electronic leash just kept on vibrating, until she slapped it off, cracking the plastic covering. "I'm late," she said, in a dismal, small voice.

Disconcerted, he blinked. "You... what now?" He didn't want to give her up, not yet, even if he'd known she'd push him away sooner or later. "Throw it away," he said, looking at the device as if it were his enemy... and it was.

"I wish," she said dolefully, and licked her swollen lips, tasting him there. "I... have a meeting," she admitted, not moving from the circle of his arms. "And, with the late."

Still reeling with need, he stepped back. "Tomorrow. Meet me?"

How could losing contact with a cool body make her suddenly feel cold and alone all over again? "I— can't. There's this cult of yak-sacrificing demons that we have to handle. Endangered species, love the planet, right? Could take a couple of days. Maybe Tuesday?"

"Tuesday... sodding hell... I'm on sweeping duty. How about Saturday?" He wasn't sure he could or wanted to wait that long.

Buffy gnawed her lip and shook her head. "The Friday after?"

He stared at her. "I'll call... or you call... we'll figure it out."

"Yeah," she said, her heart sinking. Because they'd done so well with the calling.

"Yeah," he echoed, turning to watch her leave him. Again.

__________

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