Sins Series

Title: Lust (1/1)
Author: Tisienne
Series: Sins (#7)
Rating: NC-17 for language and sexual acts/themes; also for reference to violence.
Disclaimer: I am not Joss Whedon. I am also not God, which… same diff. No money made, but I will accept payment in the form of yummy FB. :D
Summary: The truth comes out. How will it affect the boys?
P.O.V.: Spike yet again.
Notes: This is the last and final story in the Sins series. I apologize for the overall angst, but what can I say? I’m an angst-whore. Thanks for sticking with me. :D

* * * * * * * * *

My boy. My poor, poor boy. All bleeding out on the inside, thinking I don’t know what he is.

Do know, though. ‘Course I do. Problem is, he doesn’t.

Thinks he’s evil, doesn’t he?

Prat.

Know a thing or two about evil, right? And Xander bloody Harris isn’t it. Especially not now, when he’s crying in my arms, sobbing like his heart’s not only breaking but slicing through him, gnawing its way out.

Can’t do anything to help him now, so I do the only thing I can think of. I hold on and whisper to him, and it’s nothing that matters, just whatever comes to mind, yeah? Need him to know I’m here. Not letting him go.

Need him to know I’m not afraid of him.

Am I afraid of what he might do if I let go of him? Yeah. But afraid of my boy—my Xan? Not bloody likely. Done worse things for fun than he’s done of necessity, and so what if he enjoyed killing that bitch and the fuck-puppet who hurt him so bad? Didn’t eat them. Didn’t roll around in their blood and string their innards ‘round that bleeding shack he mentioned, so… Yeah, done worse than he has, hands down.

Not going to tell him that, though. Not now. My bloke’s got enough going on in that head of his. Besides which… don’t really want him pulling the ‘demon’ card and making himself feel even worse, do I?

So I don’t say anything about that. I just go on muttering and rubbing his spine, holding him against me and focusing on the most important part of everything he’s said so far.

He loves me. My boy said he loves me! And when he talked about that bloody fucking shitwad ‘Wave’, I… Well, yeah. Wanted to kill the bastard myself, just for hurting my bloke the way he did, but… Xan took care of that already, right?

Makes the demon in me right proud, it does.

He shifts a bit in my arms, but he’s not trying to pull away so I let him. Let him sniffle and sigh a bit, let him hide his face in the crook of my neck, and I don’t mind.

Fuck, almost love it, to tell the truth. Could stay here all night and all day, just like this.

* * * * *

I hold him as long as he lets me, and even with it being close to an hour, it’s not bloody long enough, is it? Wish I could put this off, just go on holding him, but I can’t. He needs to get this out of him, needs to say the words…

Needs to know that what he did was bad, yeah, but… he was right to do it. Strong, even. And if he doesn’t do it now, we’re going to have to go through all this mess again and that… bloody hell, that would break him even worse and I won’t let that happen! Can’t sit by and watch him start all over, no hope and all full of despair. Not again. Not my boy.

Wish I could take him out to the couch, make him more comfortable for the rest of it, but this feels like a kitchen kind of thing; don’t know why. Just does. So when he pulls back a bit, putting a couple inches between us, I swallow my sigh and drop my arms.

“Right, then, luv… tell me more…?”

Won’t look at me now, but then he hasn’t actually done that since he ate. See his eye close tight, still red and swollen from the crying and I can’t keep myself from sitting down at the table beside him, taking one of those strong, broad hands in mine.

“Xander,” I say when he just breathes roughly, “”Think it’s time, yah? Been so lost, so hurtin’. Ya need ta say it out loud, luv. Even if it scares ya, right?”

I get why he doesn’t want to. Makes it that much more real, doesn’t it? And the last time he told someone what happened, I’m betting it was his so-called friends, and look what happened there. They pushed him away-- chased him away, maybe, and…

Bloody hell. Bloke probably thinks I’m going to do the same if he tells me the rest, and… much as I want to tell him he’s wrong, I don’t think he’d believe me. Not now. Not ‘til after he’s through.

So I tighten my fingers on his and try to catch his eye when it opens but he’s still avoiding that. “Xan…”

Feel the shivers racing through him, even though I’m just holding his hand. See the moment he steels himself to losing me, too.

“Fine,” he says, and his voice is so dead I almost want to stop him. My boy… my boy shouldn’t sound like this. Hasn’t sounded like this in months. Not this bad. Not since a few days after I found him, at any rate.

“Fine,” he says again, and I don’t stop him because… bloody hell, I hate it that he’s hurting like this, hate that he really thinks I’d only want the good parts of him. Only way to prove I want all of him is to still be here when he’s done taking, right? Right.

“I killed them,” he’s looking down at the table, or more properly at our hands on the table, and his voice gets a little stronger. “Shayna was first. She had to be first. It was her fault.”

He swallows hard and shudders. “I… God, I hope it was her fault. I… if it was Wave who… started it, then… fuck, Spike, I thought I loved him and if he had that inside him all the time, then how could I have ever… and why would he have wanted me unless he saw something… twisted in me even then, and…”

His voice drops to nearly nothing and even my hearing can barely make out the words when he begs “God, please let it have been her…” before he clears his throat and goes on.

“The table was small. More like a crate set on end than a table. But it was big enough. Big enough to hold all their… toys,” he says, a sickly grimace on what I can see of his face. “Not much else. We… weren’t really in a civilized part of the country, so they’d had to…”

“Make do?” I suggest softly when he can’t seem to find the right words.

His hand squeezes mine hard-- hard enough that I can feel my fingers cracking just a bit. Don’t care, though. He can mash my hand to a bloody pulp if it helps him get through this.

“Y-yeah…”

Close my eyes as his voice gets stronger still, fury and loathing building under the anguish and… I can see it all in my head.

I can see my Xan, worried, jealous, afraid he was losing the bloke he loved to the girl he loved like a sister… see him standing outside the shack, back against the rocks while he listened.

I know exactly the look that must have been on his face when he tore open the door. Betrayal, pain, sorrow… And I can imagine the sudden shift from those feelings to darker ones.

Hatred, repulsion, disgust… and more betrayal on top of it all because… he’d been wrong about them.

Yeah, they were naked, and yeah, they’d been happy. They’d also been covered in blood. Streaks and splashes on them, on the ramshackle wood-slat walls…

Puddles of it soaking into the dirt beneath the children… thick around the edges where it had started to dry over the last few days… flies buzzing about, feasting on the carnage and effluvia of humans tied in place for far too long.

The small whimpers of the ones still alive must have shattered my boy, even while he slashed the edge of his knife through the Slayer’s throat… while he jammed that same blade deep into his lover’s gut and twisted before dragging it up until it got caught in the fuckwad’s sternum…

“Hush… hush, luv,” I tell him, and it’s only now that I realize my own voice is thick with tears. My free hand lifts, fingers finding the back of his neck as his bowed head drops lower, his sobs silent now, but not even remotely dry. “Did what ya had ta, yah? Couldn’t let them go on doin’ what they were, an’… they would have gone on. Ya did a good thing, Xan… ya stopped th’ monsters. Proud of ya, pet. So bloody proud of ya.”

And finally, finally, he looks at me. First time in close to three hours and the look in his eye is… worse.

He actually looks worse and I know he’s not through, know he’s got more to tell me… and somehow I know this is the part that’s made him believe he’s evil so I just… meet his stare and try to let him see how much I know he’s a good bloke and not a monster, for fuck’s sake! Been a monster. Know what we look like, don’t I?

His voice, when it comes, is shaky and raw but he doesn’t look away, doesn’t try to hide from my reaction even though he obviously expects me to be shocked.

“Th-the kids, Spike… th-they… three of th-them were s-still…” he swallows hard, takes a couple deep breaths and I’m lucky I already know where this is going. Figured it out seconds after he started speaking again.

“I… I killed them, too, Spike,” he says, looking sicker than he’s ever looked in all the time I’ve known him. “I tried… to tell myself I had to. They… God, you don’t know how… they were hurt so bad, I… so much blood and the little boy, his… God, something was… coming out of his… s-stomach, and the girls… Christ, they were so… I think Wave… so much blood, Spike, too much b-blood, and I couldn’t… it was too far and I couldn’t take them back, couldn’t c-carry them all and they… God, I could hear them screaming behind the gags and… two hours, Spike! Two hours back to the village, then another hour explaining why I was covered in blood, and two more hours to get back to the shack, and… by then it would be t-too late, and, and I c-couldn’t just l-leave them but I… I couldn’t h-h-help them, and…”

And he can’t breathe. My boy can’t breathe! He’s gasping and trying, and turning red and purple, and fuck this! Fuck all of this ‘not crowding him’ shit! Worked himself into bloody hyperventilating, heart pounding harder and faster til I think it’s going to explode, and I’m not having it!

And fuck the kitchen table, too. Don’t need it, we can eat on the couch for a while, and it’s a good bloody thing because the wall is stronger than the lightweight metal when I kick the sodding thing out of the way and drag my bloke onto the floor and into my arms.

Hold him tight again, his head to my chest. “Slowly, luv… slowly… deep breaths, now; not so fast… ‘s goin’ ta be alright, Xan… slow, pet… in… out… c’mon, luv, ya can do it. In… out… in… out…”

Bloody hell, if my heart could beat it’d be going like a sodding jackhammer by the time he starts breathing with my words, falling into the rhythm of it as he shudders. Know he’s going to be alright when he whispers against my shirt, and I can’t help the thrill of joy that races through me then. Never heard of a human dying from hyperventilating, but with the way his heart was going, could have given himself a bleeding coronary.

“I… I killed them, Spike. The… the kids. I… God, I killed them and… fucking Shayna and Wave… how… how could they d-do th-that to k-k-kids…? And… how c-could I… I… I’m a monster, Spike. And I… you’re right to l-l-leave m-me…”

Yeah, that’s what I thought he thought was going to happen. Guess me having a soul now means I’m a fucking moron, yeah?

“Not goin’ anywhere, luv,” I murmur against his hair, my hands stroking up and down his spine, “ ‘cept maybe ta L.A., but only if you’re comin’ with me, yah?”

His whole body stills for a moment. Think even his heart stutters before starting up again, faster this time.

“You knew,” he accuses, but his voice is so tired, so worn and nearly petulant, that the tone doesn’t do anything but make my lips twitch into what would be a smile at any other time.

I shrug a little, as much as I can with his body draped heavily over mine. “Knew some of it, luv,” I admit softly, rubbing my cheek against slightly shaggy brown strands of silk. “Not th’ part ‘bout how ya helped th’ kids, but th’ rest? Yah. Made a point of findin’ out, didn’t I? Couldn’t let ya go on like ya have been. Knew ya wouldn’t get any better for real if’n ya didn’t face it, pet.”

Not sure of how he’s going to take that. Might think it’s none of my business, right? But it is my business. He’s my business. My boy, my… human.

So I wait for him to get all offended that I went sticking my nose in where it didn’t belong, and… he surprises me yet again.

“Why?” he says, his face still buried in my shirt. “Why do you even care, Spike? W-why don’t you h-hate me?”

And those are possibly the simplest questions in the world to answer, so I do.

“Because I luv ya, Xan. Didn’t always, but ya know that. Luv ya now, though. Have done for a while. But even more today, knowin’ how ya looked after the wee ones.”

Can feel him starting to sob again, but this time it’s less… wrenching. Might be he’s relieved to find out someone understands.

“Had a choice, luv,” I go on gently, stroking his hair. “Leave them hurtin’ an’ bleedin’, most likely ta die slow while ya left for at least five bloody hours… or stop their pain, yah? Ya know what a mortal wound looks like, pet. Know ya do. Seen enough of them in your time. Ya would have helped them if ya could have, but ya couldn’t. So ya gave them what ya could. Swift an’ merciful.”

I don’t mention that those kids probably would have died anyway, after who knows how many fucking days tied up there, wounds open to all sorts of bloody parasites and bacteria and whatnot. Even if they’d managed to hold on until my boy got help, bleedin’ Kenya doesn’t have sodding good medical care outside the major cities.

No, my boy did them a service, and… he’ll get it once he thinks. Once he’s past the horror of what he had to do; past the immediacy of remembering it now. And then… well, maybe then he’ll really start to heal.

For the moment, though, I say nothing about that and just… soothe him as best I can.

My hands move on his spine again, slower this time, pressing into the tight, thick cords of muscle along each side.

“Must have been so bloody scared, luv… so afraid of hurtin’ them more. But you’re a good bloke, Xan. Forced yourself ta do what ya knew was best for th’ chits an’ th’ little bloke, no matter how it made ya feel. An’ if there’s any bloody justice in th’ world, luv… they’re thankin’ ya from wherever they are now.”

And he’s still sobbing as he lifts his head, his eye wide and wet and… bloody hell… nearly happy! Or almost as close to as happy as I’ve seen him since Sunnyhell. Not quite, because what he had to do is likely to haunt him for the rest of his life, but…

“Xan,” the word leaves me on a tiny breath and he shakes his head, smiling some and I never saw anything so bleeding beautiful in my life, mucus and salty tracks and red blotches and all. “Xan…” I say again and that smile gets just a little bit bigger, and…

“Quiet,” he tells me, shifting higher on my chest, and then…

Bloody hell, he’s kissing me. He’s kissing me and his lips are just as hot and firm and plump and tasty as I thought they’d be, and… and I’m kissing him, too, wanting to crawl into him from the mouth down, wrap around his heart, keep it and him safe, and…

After everything we’ve done to and with each other, how fucking strange is it that this moment—lips against his, tongue just barely touching his warmer one—in this moment, I don’t think I’ve ever felt so close to him.

Of course, we’ve also never kissed before, so maybe that explains it.

* * * * *

Love kissing the bloke, I do. Who the hell knew he was so bloody good at it?

Maybe the demon-chit, back in the day. Maybe that fucking bastard who was his first. Doesn’t matter, though, because they’re dead and now I’m the only one who knows that he can sit on the couch and snog for hours without it going anywhere. Just be there, holding on, lips, tongue, teeth sliding, touching, moving slow and sweet, then fast and rough… He’s a bloody marvel, my boy is.

Don’t know what makes tonight different from any of the other twelve since ‘that night’, but I don’t have to know. All I need to know right now is that… he’s not afraid anymore. Not afraid of ‘infecting’ me with his ‘evil’ or whatever it was that had him all constant bottom-boy.

Started out on the couch, watching some bloody stupid reality show… was right in the middle of my usual rant about how staged the shit was, and… he laughed.

Stopped my words, that; mostly because I’m still not used to him laughing like he means it, and my boy—my wonderful, beautiful boy—took that as a sign, I’m guessing.

Pulled me into his lap, his lips soft and hard on mine, and… bloody hell, wanted him so bloody bad, didn’t I?

Rocked against him, nipped his chin, gnawed on his neck…

And now, here I am on my back in our bed, his fingers up my bum, and…

“Fuck, luv… don’t be teasin’…”

Can hear the whimper in my own voice and I’m thinking he can too because he’s chuckling and giving me that slightly wicked little smile that always makes me… breathe.

“I… can I have you, Spike?” he whispers, and how can he even ask that when I’ve been waiting for this for… fuck! Months, now!

He’s still wearing that smile, even though his eye is desperate, and… “I… God, Spike. Please, I… I need…”

So I shift a bit, sitting up and forcing his digits deeper while I kiss him hard. “Almost gave up hope that you’d want ta, luv,” I admit sheepishly. “Not that I’m complainin’ ‘bout havin’ your ass all th’ time, pet. ‘s a bloody amazin’ ass, after all, but… want ta feel ya, Xan. If you’re sure ya want ta…”

Only takes a minute for him to decide it’s past time, and when he presses me back against the mattress, his fingers leaving me empty, he does it. He finally does it.

He lifts my leg over his arm and leans over me, his eye hot and wondering and intent on mine while my other leg wraps ‘round his waist, and when he presses forward, presses in, his thick, hot head forcing its way inside me, I don’t know which of us shouts louder—me because he’s so hot and perfect and I can feel his heart beating in me as he slides deeper, shoring up against my ass—or him because of the “So tight, God, so fucking tight, Spike… J-jesus fuck… love you, Spike, love you, always wanted this, a-always will…”

And he’s moving, sliding in, out, rubbing so perfectly inside me that I almost can’t stand it. “Xander,” I hear myself groaning, “Luv… bloody hell, luv…”

Don’t know which of us decided that biting was a good idea, but I think it was probably me. My boy. Inside me. Being so full of him. His voice, moaning my name. Yeah, probably me.

Not that it matters because his teeth are just as deep in my neck as mine are in his and I can feel him throbbing, swelling just a bit more, and my balls are so hard, so tight and high that I know it’s only a matter of moments, if that, and…

Never had a human cum deep in me before. Never knew the heat of it, the over-bloody-whelming heat! And my fangs are in his skin, my cock spewing between us, covering him in my scent just as he’s filling me with his, and he’s drinking me in with every sign of pleasure, and…

“My boy,” I tell him after a few minutes spent catching my breath, and yeah, I don’t need to breathe, but talking works better with air to make the words, and fuck me if I could manage it before now.

His head rises slowly from the still-oozing bite one my neck and he smiles a bit uncertainly.

“My vamp…?” he says softly, and I can’t help but nod.

“Yours, luv,” I agree, because I know he needs to hear it out loud, and “Not lettin’ ya go, yah?”

Nothing quite like watching another piece of that self-loathing die in his eyes. Nothing at all like seeing a tiny mote of joy replace it.

Yeah… think I can handle this for as long as he’ll let me. Not a bloody problem.

Don’t move or make a sound when he drifts off, still on me, still in me. I just hold him closer, his head on my shoulder.

Wait ‘til I know he’s deeply, peacefully asleep for once, then I brush my lips against his temple and smile.

“Goin’ ta keep ya safe, pet,” I whisper carefully, smiling more when he mumbles something that sounds contented. “No nightmares this time, yah?”

And he doesn’t have any. Guess he feels protected here in my arms... and he is.

* * * * *

He’s not better, exactly. Not all recovered and going on like nothing ever happened.

Hell, he’s never going to be ‘all better’. Never going to be the same bloke he was in Sunnydale, or even the young man he was in Africa before Shayna and Wave… before his ‘friends’ decided that putting those poor kids out of their misery was something wicked and evil rather than compassionate and caring.

They were supposed to be the ones who knew him! The ones who would always assume the best of him, not the worst! And maybe that’s a big part of what broke him to begin with, but even so…

No, my Xan will never be the same.

Know that, don’t I?

Don’t expect him to be that bloke ever again.

‘s fine, though.

Love the man he’s becoming, love watching him figure out who he is now.

Love that he’s not as ashamed of himself as he was in New York.

L.A. seems to agree with him, even if he’s not quite willing to take orders from the Mighty Poof. Not most of the time, anyway, but even Angel admits that my boy’s a valuable addition to the team. Finds all sorts of things we would have missed without him and I can’t help wondering if that Caleb bloke wasn’t right on the bloody money when he called my boy ‘the one who sees everything’. Seems to know when something’s going to become a problem later, anyway, and manages to nip things in the bud, so to speak.

Still has a mad-on for anyone or anything abusing kids, but so do I these days. Fuck it, if something’s important to my bloke, it’s important to me, yeah?

And we’ve been talking about forever, me and my Xan. Still trying to figure out how having a demon inside with his soul might affect him. Would it make him less anguished than he still is? Or would it make him harder, colder in his heart?

Don’t know, but I’ve got a team looking into it. Don’t want to lose him, after all, and it seems likely that I will one day, what with humans being so bloody fragile.

No, I don’t want to lose him, but for the moment… it’s enough just knowing that he’s considering eternity. That and the shagging, biting, making each other mad with want… driving Broody the Wonder-Git crazy with smelling us when he walks into some random room we’ve been shagging in… and meanwhile, underneath it all is the love we found entirely by accident, and all because I walked down a particular alley in New York and noticed a dying bloke.

Yeah… want him forever, but I’ll take what I can get.

As long as it’s my Xan, I’ll take what I can get… and even eternity wouldn’t be enough.

And some day, if he does let me turn him… well, maybe I’ll ask him again about killing his little ‘friends’. Gift to the Sire and all that.

Yeah, I’ll have to remember that one. Just in case.

~End.
~End series.
* * * * *

(A/N: Many thanks to each and every person who has reviewed this series along the way, and also many thanks to delmi, E, nulinka & windssong for the reviews on the last part. Hope this final chapter didn't disappoint!)