The Penny Series

Ficlet 18) If I had a Penny For Every Time That Happened...
Summary: You know they always say that they'll kill you or what naught but do they ever come through on their promises? No!

He watched her struggle with the fluidity of the movement. The fact that he was watching her proved that he wasn’t really doing the exercise himself, it was just a way to be closer to her for a longer period of time.

Even after Xander’s true nature had been revealed and his subsequent death, she had kept his return a secret. Somewhere in the back of his mind he felt that he should care, but the truth was he didn’t. He actually liked her desire to keep him all to herself; it created a very intimate atmosphere---

It created a very intimate atmosphere---

Like now.

Stepping up behind her, he touched her hands lightly and smoothly guided the movement of her arms. He forced her to be more patient, to go slower to reach the final destination. As their arms lowered, his brushed seductively against hers, a light friction that hitched her breath. Slower still, and when their arms had traveled as far down as they could go he suppressed the urge to drown her in kisses.

He cupped her hands in his ready to bring them back up in the completion of the fluid arc when she turned slowly in his arms. Surprised at her movement, he stilled, her breasts grazing the insides of his elbows as she faced him. Slowly, she tilted her head up, the movement a punishment for his earlier unhurried guidance of her arms descent.

Buffy’s eyes were half mast, her breathing deep. A wonderful tension built inside him as he lowered his head to her upturned lips. Her small pink tongue darted out to lick her parted lips in an attempt to alleviate the sudden dryness.

She was here with him, and the world fell away.

A hair's breath apart, and she suddenly giggled, startling him.

“I know in old age you tend to move slowly but this is ridiculous,” Buffy teased, wrapping her arms around his neck.

“I’ll show you old age,” he taunted grinning, his hands curling around her hips as he tugged her closer to him.

The lines of their bodies brushed intimately against one another, her breasts pressed against his sweaty chest, here sre stomach gliding against his, her thighs opening to create space for him. With a groan he attacked her mouth, urging her closer with the pressure of his hands on her firm round butt.

He bit hard on the inner flesh of her bottom lip, and she moaned. Soothing his tongue over the indents his teeth had made, he faintly tasted the coppery overtone of blood. His beast rose up within him, and he wanted to bite her again. Harder. Hard enough to draw a warm spurt blood.

Instead he jerked his mouth away, and panted heavily against her temple.

“I think I got you winded,” shesperspered in a sultry tone, her lips brushing back and forth against his protruding Adam’s apple. “An amazing feat considering vampire’s don’t need breath.”

His eyes abruptly shut, a fine tremble ran through his limbs.

Even now he had to be wary.

Happiness wasn’t his for the taking.

Her lips were not his to plunder.

A howl caught in his throat at the unfairness of it all, but she wouldn’t let him mourn alone in his misery. Her hands passed over his biceps, her mouth lowered to the hollow at the base of his throat and she gave him a gentle lick. He shuddered again, as the aphrodisiac of her unflinching love presented itself to him again.

Buffy did not care that he was of the undead.

But she should… Buffy was the slayer.

“Mmm,” Buffy hummed, licking at the faintly damp skin, her mouth traveling down his chest to the dark disc of his nipple and wrapped her teeth around it.

“Buffy,” he said mindlessly, his hands coming up to clench in her hair. He held her there at his chest, as her warm moist salvia traced patterns all around his puckered nipple. A growl erupted from him as Buffy marked him with her teeth, biting hard to leave indents before she soothed them with her tongue, as he had done to her bottom lip.

“Salty goodness,” she said huskily around the flesh she had pulled into her mouth.

“Buffy we can’t love- I can’t-” he gasped, his stomach muscles quivering as she raked her nails lightly down the shallow indent of his abs.

How was one to resist such temptation? He didn’t know.

But he had to, because where her hand was about to wander would cause him to lose any ability to think coherently, if at all.

Shaking violently, he gripped Buffy's hand in his fist as he twisted himself from her grasp.

She looked up pained at the expression on his face instantly chastised. “Oh Angel! Oh no I’m sorry.”

He shook his head, not trusting himself to speak at the moment.

She placed her hand on his neck, pressing her fingers into the left side of his jaw. At first he refused to face her, but he succumbed when Buffy softly kissed his chin.

“It’s hard,” she murmured, resting her forehead against his throat.

Yes it is.

“But before you lost your soul we did more, and I just thought we could keep doing that.”

He cupped her head in his hands, combing the locks of her hair with his fingas has he slammed down on the thoughts of his demon being free. “Buffy,” he started, having thought on the subject for the last week, “I don’t think that’s wise.”

“Why?” Buffy asked surprised, her eyes widening as her hands squeezed his waist tighter, the line of her body pressing closer refusing to let him go.

The look in her eyes had his erection jump against her stomach. She wanted him desperately, almost as much as he wanted her, if not more.

“Because, I know I can’t make love to you. Making love to you was perfect happiness, what if pleasuring you or you---” he licked his lips and eased a breath away from her trembling body. He couldn’t take the fell of her tightly pebbled nipples against his chest anymore, not when her every breath created a sinful thrill as they brushed against him. “What if that becomes all I need? Being with you Buffy is like being in heaven, no man can not be happy in paradise.”

A tear splashed onto his throat, her body sagged into him, eliminating the distance between them. Wrapping his arms around her, he rested his cheek onto her hair and murmured soft incoherent words to calm her. The frantic fluttering of her heart matched the painful cinch of his ow
H
Happiness with her was inevitable.

He had to be careful.

Not let anything get too far.

A whimper stuck in his chest as Buffy reluctantly eased away. “I should probably go then, I can still come to see you?” She asked hopefully.

“Oh Buffy,” he lamented. “We can still be together---”

“Just not together,” Buffy finished tearfully. Quickly she backed up hastily making an excuse to leave. “I better go patrol, and meet Faith to discuss strategy on hunting this new demon coming to the hellmouth in search of a glove of mygone.”
gos?gos?” he asked abruptly, his eyes snapping up to hers.

“Yeah for some mygone glove thing.” she said shrugging it off.

He looked at her, not understanding her indifference. “What do you know about him?”

Buffy shook her head, shrugging again. “Giles and the gang can’t find anything that isn’t myth.”

“Myth always has some line of truth in it,” he countered, stepping closer to her and taking away her book bag. “I know of Lagos, he’s not bad, but he isn’t good either. Let me draw him for you to take to Giles. My sketchbook is in the kitchen.”

Buffy looked up at him for a moment debating, finally she asked, “How am I to explain the drawing to Giles?”

He refused to allow thoughts of the old man to cross his mind. Shrugging, he offered lamely, “Well you could say it was left on your doorstep?”

Buffy laughed at him, her face glowing in mirth. “On my doorstep? I’d be better lying and say I found it on the Internet, but I don’t know how to scan the picture it. I’d ask Willow but she-” Buffy stopped abruptly and shook her head.

“Could you just say you found it in one of my sketchbooks? I can sign an old date on it and use older paper? Would they believe that?”

“They should. They know I’ve been here a lot, they still think I’m moping over you’re sudden entrance into hell-”

“Which I wasn’t-” he interrupted.

Buffy nodded, “Yes I think I can pull that off.” Suddenly she planted a hard swift kiss on his lips, before sashaying towards the kitchen. “I refuse to be guilty over wanting to kiss you and acting on that want.” She murmured glancing up from under her lashes, at the doorway. When he said nothing she cocked her head to the side. “You coming?”

“Yeah,” he mumbled, watching her disappear into the kitchen, his fingers touching his lips as he enjoyed the view before him.

When he entered the kitchen he saw her there, opening his fridge, her derriere curved enticingly. Mentally he cursed himself before grabbing the sketchbook he had left there on the table from earlier that evening. Hastily he thumbed past the sketches of Buffy, and then flipped by some blank pages to hide the shadowed nude of her sitting on his kitchen counter spread open for him.

After flipping past six blank pages he felt a little foolish and stopped. With an air of false calm he picked up the pencil lying beside a stick of charcoal and began the rough shape of Lagos. A subject not worthy of his paper, since the object of his affection was sitting on the precise space of countertop that he had drawn that previous nude of her on.

Buffy sat on the e swi swinging her feet, as she snacked on a few pretzels that she’d taken from his pantry to go with the grape juice she poured herself. Now if only she had less clothes on…

Bad vampire. Bad.

Determined not to think on the subject of all her golden flesh he forced his hand to draw the lines. They came out rather thick, probably pressed into the papers beneath it for quite a ways. Damn. If he couldn’t figure out how to made the dent in the pages after work for him, he wouldn’t get to fill them in with drawings of her.

“You know,” Buffy mumbled around a pretzel she’d just popped into her mouth. “Tai chi looks so easy, but in a thirty minute workout you burn a lot of calories. I’m practically starving.”

He glanced up and smiled at her, his eyes traveling down to her sweaty skin and the perspiration that had started to drip down into the shadow of her cleavage. For a moment he imagined it was a drop of sweat gathered there after a different type of thirty minute workout… and that he could lazily pursue the salty droplet.

Biting back a groan, he forced his attention back to the drawing of Lagos: an eccentric chap he had once met in Ecuador while trying to find Drusilla who had gotten onto the wrong seafaring barge. He groaned then, annoyed that Angelus couldn’t just be ignored in his life.

“What?” she asked, pausing in her swig of grape juice.

The look that she gave him made him squirm. He randomly drew another line, before looking up. “I started thinking about how I know of Lagos.”

“Really? Was it bad? I thought you said he wasn’t evil per say.”

“Angelus met him while trying to find Drusilla in South America.” He answered shifting again, his gaze fixed firmly on the image who’s lines blurred and merged before staring bleakly at him.

Disgusted with the first attempt he ripped it off the pad and started on the page beneath.

She wet her lips, a soft sound escaping them. “Oh.”

“Lagos is in charge of keeping the Glove of Myhnegon safe. When Angelus appeared to be to interested in the glove, Lagos fought him. They ended up calling a truce as the sun started to rise.”

“Is Lagos a vampire?”

He nodded, keeping his eyes on the page, shading in the armor plate on Lagos’ chest. “It’s why he’s been around so long.”

“How come he isn’t evil?” Buffy asked curious. She jumped off the counter and ambled around the island to stand behind him.

She was so close.

Now he was nitpicking on details with the work to avoid her. Gently, her hand covered his as she whispered in his ear. “Perfectionist are we? Hm… this is from memory?”

She picked up the pad and he almost snatched it back out of desperation. He stood from the chair, and placed the pencil onto the table with precision as she chewed a piece of her hair eyeing the drawing.

“I wonder how you draw from a model.”

Hesitantly, he asked her quietly, taking the sketchbook from her. “You want me to draw you?”

“Would you?” Buffy asked her eyes lighting up. They were going to make this work without the perfect happiness thing. It was reassuring that he hadn’t closed in on himself as he had tended to do when they first started talking about what happened with Angelus.

“Is there anything you want me to wear? When shall I pose! Oh this is exciting.”

He chuckled at her eagerness, and carefully tore out the picture before handing it to her. “Make sure Giles knows that the glove is safe from Lagos and that he’s going to find it to try to protect the glove from being used. Someone’s here in town that has intentions of using it if he’s come to make his presence known.”

“Okay. I wonder if he’s still in the library tonight.”

“Probably not,” he told her gently as he followed her out of the kitchen. “It’s three in the morning.”

Buffy shook her head and disagreed with him, a teasing smile on her . “W. “Well when he’s in research mode he tends to fall asleep on the books.”

“Still,” he started, “probably best to let him sleep.”

She nodded, and bent to pick up her gym bag. They stood there for a moment or two before she spoke again. “Can I mooch another kiss off of you?”

“You never have to ask,” he whispered smiling. His tongue traced her lips, opening the seam with slow lingering swipes. Buffy mouth opened eagerly to his seeking tongue, and captured it with glee in her mouth to suckle sweetly before releasing it with a soft moan.

He pulled her closer to him, keeping a small space between their bodies, as he deepened the kiss, changing the angle of his assault. Buffy rose up on tiptoe, her hand on the back of his neck steadily pressuring him down to her. He went eagerly almost desperately to her.

They parted much too soon, but her lips were wet and swollen as she licked away the moisture. All to soon he let her out of his embrace and she bent to take her gym bag.

Heaving it onto her shoulder, Buffy waved goodbye at him before walking toward the door. And just before she disappeared he heard her whisper, “I love you Angel.”

She was gone already when he answered her. “I love you Buffy. Sleep well.”

But the words fell onto a room suddenly void of life and spirit.

Buffy was his light, without her presence the mansion felt dead, curiously emptier then it should with him there. He gazed at the doorway through which she had just left, watching it swing slowly back and force in the night breeze. He went to shut it with a sound click and wondered what he was suppose to do now.

He didn’t like being confined to the mansion for one reason only. If she left, he couldn’t follow. When she was awa was was stuck inside unable to distract himself from constantly dwelling on thoughts of her and of Angelus--- life when he couldn’t tell remember more than her death and pain--- and how he was less of a man now than he had been before.

Fucking A.

He didn’t deserve her.

Damn it.

When had he ever?

But less now.

Buffy had met his demon, literally face to face, and she had always been full of fire and anger. So strong, so full of life - she deserved all the pleasures this world had to offer her, not some dead body with a blackened heart and a soul. Buffy deserved a living breathing man. A man who could make love to her. A man who could hold her. A man who could be with her in every way. A man he’d kill on sight.

A growl trickled past his throat and he slammed his fist into the wall.

The sound of the bones in his fingers crunching stopped him from hitting the wall again.

“Fuck,” he cursed, nursing his ring finger in his mouth, wincing at the pressure his tongue applied but resolutely continued to suckle soothingly as he glared at the small barely noticeable dent in the stone.

Mental note--- get a padded room or plaster walls for bouts and fits of jealous anger.

Buffy would never know the touch of another man because they weren’t him.

Stalking from the room, he marched up the stairs to the master bedroom. His knees brushed against the black coverlet on the four poster bed as he walked straight into the bathroom and kicked the door shut with a bang.

The harsh florescent lights showed the extent of the damage he’d done to his hand. It really irked him that he’d hurt himself since he’d spent so much time in constant agony. The cynical part of himself was laughing at him asking him what mattered to a little more pain? In jerky movements he set about to set the bones in his middle and ring finger.

He gritted his teeth and mentally cursed himself again for being the moron who had smashed his fist into a stone wall. Especially when he wasn’t to full strength yet. Damn fucking runt. He blamed Xander for this mess when really he should probably be sticking a bunch of it on himself and his demon. Although those damn gypsies should get a swift kick in the ass too.

Hissing in pain, he watched in horror as he set the bones wrong… “Damn it!” he cursed realizing what a toll the mental monologue had taken by distracting him from the task at hand.

Forcing himself to be utterly still and then he popped the bones out with a yell of pain. He’d have to get Buffy to set no no matter what he did now. Vampire healing abilities sucked on a whole new level, because his hand would heal quickly with the blood now in his system, but it would heal wrong by the time she got out of school.

Damn.

On that note he left the bathroom and made sure he had all the things Buffy would need to reset the fingers on his hand and put them on the little black table in the open living room downstairs. Wiser to the fact that his thoughts would probably lead him to another incident of setting his bones wrong, he decided to wait until Buffy got out of school.

Settled now, he relaxed into a chair and stared at the wall until finally falling into a light doze. In what seemed like no time at all, he awoke abruptly. Suddenly he felt cold, a deep seated chill in the marrow of his bones. Hesitantly he looked around, a subtle tension tightening his shoulders.

As he started to look behind him he was attacked by a blond blur and a shriek of laughter. Caught unaware by her, he fell with her riding him all the way down. A grimace curled his features as he landed with all his weight onto the broken hand. By now he knew the diminutive form that had jumped his bones was Buffy.

It’d only been about three hours since he last saw her, yet that small time apart was more agonizing than his tim the the sphere this last summer. It was enough time apart to make him glad for her speedy return.

“Why are you out of school?” he asked, his voice rasping, tinged with barely laced pain. “It’s barely seven ten.”

“School assembly first period, to be followed by a lot of boring for the rest of the day. I skipped out. Faith wanted to do something but I ditched her back at Starbucks.” Buffy told him, happily running her hands over his shoulders, and up and down his neck. He shuddered under her touch, silently begging for more.

“She wasn’t suspicious?”

Buffy cocked her head to the side, her hands pausing in their journey on tracing his spine as she kneaded the hard flexing flesh. “Faith probably thinks I’m off to meet some boy to have sex. It would be what she’d ditch someone for.”

A growl ticked past his throat, and she laughed again getting off of him so that he could sit up. He missed the warm weight of her body, but schooled his features to not to show it as he turned to face her.

“What are you all broody about now?” Buffy asked, leaning over backwards to get her backpack and pull out a few spiral notebooks, a pen, and two thick textbooks.

“I broke the fingers in my hand,” he said dryly.

“What?” she exclaimed, jerking his wrist to her, panicked.

Not wanting her worry to increase, he muttered sheepishly. “Stupid really, I’ll be all right if you could set and bandage the fingers.”

“What did you do to yourself?” Buffy asked, her eyes catching his and holding him there. Her fingers trailed lightly over his middle finger, softly caressing the broken bones, her touch light -- he gasped as she cracked the setting bones and repositioned them, gently kneading the knuckles into place.

“That hurt,” he accused, his eyes golden as he stared at her.

“No kidding hun? Who knew,” Buffy stated sarcastically, not bothering to be kind on the next finger, instead using the pain from the first to numb and shock him for the next finger. “Now how did you’re fingers get broken?”

“Punched a wall,” he deadpanned.

“Angel!” Buffy growled threateningly, yanking the bandages off the table, ripped a few pieces and wrapped them hastily and tightly around his fingers. “That is beyond a doubt the most stupid thing I’ve ever known you to do! What on earth possessed you to do such a thing?”

He was about to answer, when the deep setting chill crawled up his spine, making him shiver. Buffy felt the tremors from the hand she still was holding and looked up sharply. Instantly her gaze softened, and she pulled him closer to her, cooing to him softly. He laid his head on her breast, hiding a smirk as Buffy pressed him closer to her bosom, her soothing voice whispering his name and telling him it would be all right.

It already was but he wasn’t about to let the opportunity to be fussed over, much less cop a feel, pass by. Especially since he’d take Buffy’s attitude on the subject- he wouldn’t fuss over the little flirtatious sparring and innuendo just make sure it didn’t get to heated.

Let her think for one more minute that his hand was the result of pain filled memories from the Sphere of Agony. Tilting his head slightly, he gazed up at her with wide eyes and wrapped his good hand around her side, covering up her ribs. Slowly, very slowly, he dropped his gaze and swiped his thumb upward to brush underneath her right breast.

“Angel!” Buffy said in mock outrage, having caught on to his sly scheme. She dropped her hands from his hair, and he lifted his head to watch her parted lips tremble under his smoldering gaze.

The day went swiftly, as they cuddled in the armchair before the fire. He stroked her arms lazily as they talked about everything and nothing and stole kisses when he could. It had been lethargic and peaceful to spend a day he started out hating in such a way.

“Buffy,” he whispered, leaning up and capturing her lips in a heated kiss just as his thumb brushed her peaking nipple.

She squirmed against his palm, a soft sigh escaping from her parted lips. Gently he plucked her pearling point between the thumb and forefinger on his undamaged hand, and she moaned low in her throat. He broke the kiss with a soft suction noise, trailing his lips down the line of her neck.

Buffy tilted her head back so willingly, so trustingly, and his arousal heightened significantly because of it. How easily he could taste her life nectar to find a release of a different sort. Carefully, he wrapped his lips around a pulsing point and suckled the flesh into his mouth.

His good hand traveled lower, to sit at the swell of her abdomen, before dipping underneath her waistline. The second his fingers traced reverently along the line of her panties, he jolted losing the dreamlike quality that had descended upon them both.

“I’m-- we-- I can-” he started to say, before jumping to his feet swiftly, his vampire features glowering menacingly at the dark long haired figure.

“A pleasure that we meet again Angelus,” Lagos said, hinting with dark sarcasm that it was just the opposite.

“And you must be that notorious Lego I’ve been hearing about,” Buffy quipped, pretending to be a blonde airhead to annoy the vampire in front of her.

“Lagos.”

“Lay-go.” Buffy repeated in a saccharine voice.

“Lagos,” the demon fairly growled.

Hiding a smirk, he casually stepped in front of Buffy and gave Lagos a brooding g. “W. “What the hell do you want Lagos? I’m not interested in the glove.”

“Hmm, not what my sources say.”

“Your sources shouldn't have anything on me, technically I’m dead.” He muttered dryly.

“Angelus you are dead. Now where’s the glove?” the vampire demanded, tightening his grip on the handle of the broadsword.

“Wait!” Buffy interjected, stepping in front of him. He bit back a groan, opting for a sigh of defeat, and kept Lagos in his sights. “Aren’t you suppose to know where the glove is?”

“No,” Lagos growled, “I am its guardian, I protect it.”

She raised an eyebrow, “And how can you protect something if you have no idea where it is?”

“I didn’t say I had no idea,” Lagos hedged, looking at her grumpily, his hands twisting on the handle in a way that wasn’t friendly.

“But you think I know?” He inquired, almost amused, had it not been for the anger brewing in him over Lagos’ audacity to threaten his mate in his home.

Even if it was subtle.

“I had a premonition that you would hold the glove. Those who would wear it and use it for its power are the only ones I ever see. You want the glove Angelus.”

Buffy started angrily around him, her eyes snapping, shooting daggers at the vampire making such unseemly accusations, but before she could do anything rash he snagged her hand and pulled her into his embrace. “Calm down Buffy love,” he murmured into her ear.

She fairly spit at the overly dressed vampire before her. “Let’s get one thing straight. This is Angel not Angelus, Leg-loss.”

“L-A-G-O-S.” Lagos spelled out, darting a look up into his eyes before asking him. “Is she always this stupid or is it a lapse from sanity?”

He didn’t have time for a pissing match, althohe rhe really wanted to club this guy one. Setting Buffy aside he started walking in slow measured menacing steps over to the shifty master vampire, when the demon spoke again. “You’re not swaggering around annoyingly cocky Angelus.”

He raised an eyebrow wondering what the hell that had to do with anything.

“So it’s true you really have a soul. And I thought my curse sucked.”

“Curse?” Buffy asked, tilting her head to the side.

The vampire nodding, still staring intently at him, before relaxing his grip on the broadsword. “My existence is tied to the glove. If its used even once during my time protecting it, I die. It’s the only way to kill me.”

“How did you get so lucky as to have bestowed such an honor?”

“By trying to take the glove from some Monks back in the day, got cursed to protect it by one of their chants as I was making my get away. Hence I never know where it is, because the Monks think I’ll use it but they gave me glimmers into who’d try to touch the glove and use it. Angel here was seen with a frumpy woman both holding onto one side of the glove. I just figured what with before---”

“That I’d try to take it again, or rather Angelus.” He shook his head in negation.

Buffy whistled, and rocked back on her heels. She talked as she made her way back over to him. Mocking Lagos she tossed over her shoulder with a coy look. “Dense aren’t you, a good guess, but dense nonetheless.”

“I’m going to make you eat dust.” Lagos snarled, but made no move with his body or weapon to make good on the threat.

“Promises, promises,” Buffy singsonged, her fingers trailing along his arm before gliding up to brush along his neck to his jaw. He finally caught her hand and held it tightly against his five o’clock shadow, glaring at Lagos.

“Buffy, our guest here has stayed well past his welcome. I shall take care of him immediately.” Reluctantly he let go of Buffy’s deceptionally petite hand and walked with a purpose over to the vampire. None to gently he herded the demon out of the front hallway and out the door.

“Think I wore out my welcome too?” Buffy asked, her tiny hands coming to rest on the small of his back, her lips lingering on his shoulder blade, the breath of her words warming him.

Deliberately he turned around very slowly, making sure that her fingers trailed along all his skin above the line of his trousers. She blushed prettily and snatched her hands away. “Guess not,” Buffy mumbled.

“I would love for you to stay, but we need to find that glove and find it fast before Lagos or that woman does.”

A confused look passed over her face and Bufskedsked with bewilderment. “Why can’t Lagos get the glove himself?”

“Weren’t you paying attention Buffy?” he asked with an exasperated smile. Patiently he explained what he meant, “He was cursed for trying to get the glove, the glove is temptation to him. It’s power like you wouldn’t believe Buffy. Enough power to destroy cities in their entirety. He guards it, but if he finds the glove of Myhnegon then he’ll take it for himself. The curse is to be so closely linked to what he wants so badly to possess and not allowed to have it.”

His gaze darkened with lust as he gazed into her inquisitive eyes. Buffy blushed and looked away first, but he grabbed her hands and lead her out through the living room past the fireplace out back through the garden. They were enveloped in rays of moonlight as it filtered down through the jasmine bushes to alight on them. Buffy sighed wistfully, looking up at the star studded night.

“I think I know where it is,” he murmured, watching her stare at the starry night with hooded eyes.

“Where?” Buffy asked, her tone business like as she snapped to attention and out of whatever night dream she’d been entertaining a moment ago.

He slipped his hands into his pockets to keep from touching her, and kissing away that no nonsense attitude. “In the Von Hauptman family crypt on the west side of the Restfield cemetery.”

Buffy raised an eyebrow at him a grin crossing her lips as she teased him lightly. “And you would know this how?”

Shifting uncomfortably under he gaze he looked away, his voice giving away nothing. “Angelus had more unpleasant ways of finding out all this little hell mouth has to offer.”

“Oh,” she whispered quietly and started to leave via the stairs leading up out to a lawn.

Hastily he grabbed her arm, his eyes pleading and his voice earnest. “Let me come with you. Lagos is out there trying to find this too and he will most certainly follow you if he had the chance.”

A look of yearning passed through her eyes before she shut it down and shook her head firmly in negation. “No, Angel you can’t come. You can’t. Someone will see and word will get around and then I can’t keep you safe.”

“Buffy, I killed the boy who was trying to hurt us. I don’t think we can get any safer.”

Buffy’s nostrils flared, her eyes shooting daggers at him. “That doesn’t mean that others won’t try to hurt you.”

“Stop protecting me Buffy,” he growled, his demon peeking out through his eyes. “Stop hiding me from your friends… unless of course you’re ashamed of me… of us.” The last he said quietly, his body tense as he prepared for her to hurt him with the words that would shatter him.

The look in Buffy’s eyes and thus into her heart, was enough to warm him and enough to chill him.

“No,” she murmured taking a step towards him her arms raising over her head, her hands cupped his face and laid her lips passively against his before he gave in and started to kiss her. She let him kiss her for a moment before pulling away to look into his eyes. “Angel, you’re everything to me and just because he’s dead doesn’t mean it’s safe. My friends don’t understand and I don’t want them to make me feel guilty for being with you. And they would try. Eventually it would come down to them or you. I don’t want to lose them.”

“Then choose them Buffy,” he told her without emotion, not looking at her.

Her lower lip quivered before she bit it harshly between her teeth. “I would lose them because I choose you. If they make it an issue, force an ultimatum, it’s always going to be you. I don’t want to lose you.”

“I won’t sit around anymore,” he warned, “I won’t let you patalonalone without me. I won’t let myself play it safe. Buffy there’s always danger, and it’ll always be directed at us because we guard the hellmouth. Because you are the slayer and I’m the slayer’s willing lapdog, the traitor of my species. Trust me to look out after myself.”

Buffy suddenly seemed to deflate, her posturing disappeared and she looked like a wilted flower. Part of himself slightly regretted making her see that he couldn’t be cuddled and coddled anymore. The other half of him wanted desperately to tell her that he’d stay behind if only she’d smile, but he couldn’t do that. It was his duty and privilege to keep her safe, to defend her back against attackers.

“Von Hauptman right?” Buffy asked.

“In the Restfield cemetery. Here I’ll show you.” He offered, holding out his hand.

A sigh of relief left him when Buffy placed her warm damp palm in his. He flashed her a grin and curled his fingers around hers. She gave a weak fleeting grin in return before walking them out of the garden. This was it. No more hiding.

The streets of Sunnydale were quiet, the demonic hidden away in the dark recesses of the town. The two of them made their way to Restfield in silence, walking hand in hand in sink with each other. He opened the gate for her, it swung with a low groan. When Buffy had walked through and closed it after he had entered the graveyard, the two of them proceeded down the sidewalk through the main row of graves to the mausoleums in the back. The Von Hauptman family crypt was the second from the end on the right and together they proceeded through the opened door.

“Surprisingly well decorated,” Buffy muttered sarcastically, taking in the empty beer bottles and cigarette butts that littered the floor.

He ignored her to look around at the names on each of the tombs. The name he was looking for the great grandfather Angelus had met in Brazil.

Buffy ambled around the perimeter of the medium size mausoleum before looking back at him to ask, “So which one is it?”

He pointed to the one on her left. “That one.”

“Oh! Well that was easy.” Buffy cast the tomb a disgusted look before turning back to him. “So now what?”

“We take the lid off and hope that the glove is inside or we’re going to have to search the rest of the Von Hauptmans to see if he gave the glove to any of them.”

“The world’s ugliest fashion accessory.”

“Probably why none of them used the glove in the first place,” he told her, motioning for her to lift up the one end as he heaved up his own side.

“For which we can all be thankful for,” Buffy commented before stepping up behind the stone coffin.

Buffy grunted, using all her strength to lift straight up, and he smiled to himself. She could be adorable at the oddest of moments. They removed the lid, and Buffy’s nose crinkled at the rotting corpse. “Can I say how grateful I am that vampires come out looking like a rose?”

He gave her a narrowed look before granting herroadroad wink. “I’ll won’t take offense, promise.”

Buffy gave him a sheepish smile. “Sorry.” She looked back at the skeleton with moldy pieces of flesh still hanging limply on the bones. “Does the absence of the black glove mean we have to search in all the others?”

He would have teased her but the pout on her lips told him it probably wasn’t a good idea. “No, there’s a clothed covered package by you near his feet. Unwrap that and see if the glove is inside. Don’t touch the glove.” He instructed as she gingerly unwrapped the slimy scraps of fabric away from the object beneath.

She sighed in relief when it turned out to be the glove and started to wrap it back up again, when a sinister laugh echoed around them. He glanced up to see a strange woman standing in the doorway and concluded it must be the woman that Lagos had talked about.

His hand went in front of Buffy and pushed her behind him as he took a protective stance. He was entirely confused when Buffy snarked, “Hello Ms. Post. Who would have thought you’d be here?”

“Now, now Buffy,” Ms. Post said patronizingly holding out her hand. “You really shouldn’t be in contact with such a large source of power, the slayer in you might be greedy enough to be tempted by it. And should that go on the wrong hand, well, it would be disastrous.”

“I doubt Buffy is greedy in any way,” he growled, his eyes rimmed with gold, as his heightened senses geared towards a fight.

“Why thank you,” Buffy said with a honeyed voice as she stepped around him. “However I think I can handle the watcher bitch.”

Ms. Post raised an eyebrow. “Really, there’s no need for name calling. Now give me the glove.”

“No,” he and Buffy said sharply together. He slanted her a look, and she grinned before looking away.

Lagos entered the crypt looking wicked with his vampiric features elongating his face.

“Eeew,” Buffy sneered taking in Lagos’ yellowed teeth, “Couldn’t you have brushed your teeth? All that plaque makes the blood spoil.”

“Shut up slayer bitch or I’ll fry the flesh off your bones.”

Buffy turned to him and asked, “Why do they always say that? If I had a penny for every time one of the baddies said that I’d be rich as sin. Why do they try to be so cool in their dialogue? Don’t they know that they always end up jinxing themselves and then I win? It gets old after awhile.”

He gave her a gallic shrug, never taking his eyes off the pair in front of them blocking the entrance.

“Lagos,” Ms. Post said with a gasp as she took a step back.

Lagos turned toward her eerily slow, making the movement menacingly. “You,” he growled and lunged at the instantly shrieking watcher.

Neither he nor Buffy went to her aid as they let Lagos take care of her. The woman was vile. Evil.

With the blood of Ms. Post still clinging to his lips, Lagos straightened and pulled out his sword.

“Do you have a stake?” he asked, shifting his weight.

“Don’t I always?” Buffy quipped.

“Good, don’t enter the fight until I have him pinned.” At that he lunged at Lagos receiving the sharp edge of the sword across his arm as he pulled away from the direct attack. Rolling to the side, he lurched up and swung an uppercut at the Lagos’ mandible.

Buffy hadn’t listened to him he realized with anger at her defiance. Her leg shot out and landed solidly into the vampire’s nose. Blood spurted out from the broken bridge and Lagos roared. A woman’s trinkling laugh started to dance around them and he looked backward with dread. Ms. Post had the glove on her hand, her head thrown back with laughter.

“NO!” Lagos screamed as she took aim and shot lightning at him. Lagos sizzled into dust, his sword landing on the floor with a clatter.

“Well, that was entertaining. Can you let me know if it hurts slayer?” Ms. Post cackled with glee, aiming the glove once again at Buffy.

“Duck!” he shouted, pushing Buffy out of the way as more lightning filled the small mausoleum. His sleeve got singed as he landed on top of her in a tangle of limbs. Buffy’s hand scrabbled for the beer bottle before connecting as she gripped it.

The watcher lady was behind them, the power in the glove building up for another strike. He pushed himself away from Buffy, and she sat up the empty beer bottle in her hand. Forcefully she smashed it against the floor, and staggered to her feet.

“Buffy duck!” he shouted as another lightning bolt shot out from the glove.

Buffy threw herself to the floor, and shot up to her knees and threw the broken top of the green glass bottle at Ms. . Th. The sharp edge sliced through the watcher’s arm with the glove on. The gloved incased limb fell to the floor and a strangled scream erupted horrifically from Ms. Post. A bolt of lightning struck her and she vaporized, leaving charred marks on the stone floor.

Quickly, he went over to Buffy and gave her a hand to pull her onto her feet. She sagged against him, and he regretted the few moments it took for him to place the glove back into the bits of rags. Taking a step toward her, he held out his free hand. “Let me walk you home.”

Buffy nodded, before asking with her eyes what he meant to do with the glove. “Destroy it in living flames,” he said disinterestedly.

“That makes sense,” she said with a sunny smile, indicating she hadn’t a clue.

She walked beside him, hugging her arms to her chest as they ambled away. The hair at the back of his neck prickled and he stopped dead in his tracks looking around. A brunette came from around the nearest mausoleum with a stake in her hand.

“Hey B, I saw the pretty lights and thought I lend a hand, but I see Mr. Studly here was more than willing to help out. Bad guys dead?”

“Fried.” Buffy nodded, confirming the brunette’s suspicions.

The girl looked him up and down, and he shifted awkwardly under her persual. “You aren’t going to introduce me to your friend?” She asked coyly, gazing up at him from beneath long brown lashes.

“He’s off the market Faith.” Buffy muttered defensively, as she took a step in front of him.

“Hello,” he greeted Faith.

Faith rolled her eyes, shoving the stake back into her pants. “Well at least introduce your honey to me.”

Buffy sighed reluctantly before turning to make introductions. “Faith this is Angel, he’s the vampire with a soul. Angel this is Faith, the new slayer.”

“New?” He questioned softly, looking at the brunette with renewed interest as he sized her up.

“The Angel!” Faith asked incredulously, her eyes popping out of her head.

“Yes Angel.” Buffy pouted, her little foot stamping into the dirt.

He placed a hand on her shoulder, when she looked up he asked about the other slayer. “What happened to Kendra?”

Faith and Buffy shared a look and in unison said in soft reverence.

“Demonic fight.”

“Plane crash.”

They said nothing, all of them quiet as death, as they reached Revello Drive. He left them at her doorstep, said goodnight to Faith before planting a chaste kiss on Buffy’s lips and disappearing into the night.