|
|
How to Treat Your
Lover
by Tami
Chapter 39
Chapter 39-A: Step 3 – Estrangement (Part
6)
Los Angeles, Hyperion Hotel
Angel was in his basement training area teaching Cordelia some defensive maneuvers with a sword. He stood behind her, leaning close.
“Don’t stiffen up,” Angel instructed.
Cordelia nodded and raised the sword in her hands as they began to move through the exercise with Angel guiding her movements.
“All right, a good defense is about moving the line of attack. When the other guy comes at you, you want to step off the line,” he explained. Angel used his hands to direct her into another position. “Like this.” He jumped back to avoid the point of her sword. “Creating a new one. Every time you do, your opponent will be forced to adjust. Always make the other guy work.”
Cordelia nodded. “Okay. Move the line. Then what?”
Angel picked up another sword. “Then – just keep moving the line. You’ll be able to keep an attacker busy until . . . you know.”
“What?” Cordelia looked at him skeptically. “Until he dies of old age or until you and Spike swoop in to save me?”
She had been doing that a lot lately. Every time she mentioned Spike, Angel’s eyes lit up as if expecting to see the blonde vampire and then would cloud over. She would pointedly say Spike’s name in her own subtle way. Not because she wanted Angel to . . . okay, yeah. She wanted him to feel guilty and shamed. There was no excuse for what he had done to Spike.
When Angel’s features became a dark mask of anguish, Cordelia sighed. “Angel, I didn’t ask you to train me so I could stave. I already know how to stave. Now, I need to learn to fight!”
Angel frowned and gripped the gripped the hilt of his sword. “You don’t think that I would?”
Cordelia glanced over. “Would what?”
“Save you.”
“The men-folk not always around to protect the women-folk, you know?” she said patronizingly, pointing her sword at him. “Besides, what if it turned out you was the guy I had to fight. It could happen.”
Angel knew she was right. He also knew a jab when it was aimed his way. Cordelia and Fred both reminded him nearly every hour that he had fucked things up with Spike. He tried to fix it by contacting Spike through the link they shared, but Spike ignored him. Fred noticed his mood change to Spike’s not being there whereas Cordelia noticed the effect that a lack of sex on a regular basis had on his temperament.
“Okay.” Angel raised his sword and shifted into fighting stance beside Cordelia and she copied his movements. “When you put an adversary down, you want to make sure that he doesn’t get up again. So, like I showed you . . .” They moved through an exercise parallel to each other. “Force the other guy to counter and he’ll open himself up to something like this. We’ll go half-speed until . . .”
“No need, I got it. Three years of Varsity Cheer Squad, I only had to be shown a move once.”
Angel smirked. “You know, Cordelia, handling a lethal weapon is a little different from shaking a pom-pom.”
Cordelia ignored him. “Ready. O-kay!” She came at Angel with the sword full-speed, forcing him to backtrack across the basement to avoid the sword. The maneuver ended with him up against the wall and her sword inches away from his throat.
“Easy,” Angel laughed nervously. “Go team.”
Cordelia looked at him. “Are you going to talk to Spike and apologize to him?”
“Cordy,” he whined as he inched away from the sword. He didn’t want to talk about Spike. That’s why he was training her, to distract himself from thoughts of Spike.
She dropped the weapon to her side and watched him. “How hard can it be to call him up and say: ‘I’m sorry I messed up, come home’?”
“I can’t, Buffy needs him,” Angel mumbled.
“Buffy needs him?” Cordelia repeated in disbelief. “What about you? What about us? What if we need him?”
“You think I like feeling this way? That I don’t feel it every second he and I are apart? Do you know the gut-wrenching pain I feel from having my mate two hours away?” Angel sat down on the stairs, holding his sword upright between his legs. “Besides, he hates me right now. I’ve tried to use the link to talk to him and he ignores me. So, I don’t think picking up the phone will help matters.”
Cordelia sat beside him. “How do you know if you don’t try? I know you still care about Buffy. You probably always will. But, I’ve known you for a while now and Fred isn’t the only one that’s noticed it. I’ve seen how you and Spike are around each other. If you’re in the same room, you stalk each other with your eyes when the other isn’t looking. When you’re apart, you’re always looking around for signs of his presence.”
Angel rested his forehead against the handle of the sword. The more Cordelia talked, the more he missed Spike. The hotel seemed empty without his energy to liven it up. The place had become a giant, empty tomb with echoes of Spike. His king size bed – chosen to replace the one he had when he first moved in because he shared it with Spike – was cold and lonely. The Jacuzzi shower was strictly used as a shower now. He didn’t bother with the jets. Comfort was a luxury he felt he could no longer afford. Instead, he stayed up at night, looking out the window and sleeping in his wing-back chair during the day.
“Buffy is going to be the Slayer no matter what happens to her. Five years from now, ten years, it won’t matter. Are you just going to force Spike to remain with her until she dies of old age? You can’t protect her from everything and you can’t compel Spike to. He wants a life, and up to recently, he wanted his life to be with you and people he’s come to care about,” Cordelia said.
Angel straightened his spine and looked at her. She and Fred meant well. It wasn’t that Buffy would live forever. Personally, he couldn’t be without Spike that long. But, maybe, for a little while, Spike’s presence could help her cope with the world around her.
“Spike and I have eternity. We have decades – maybe centuries – to be together. One slayer’s life is but a blip in the timeline for us,” Angel reasoned.
“You and Spike – reluctantly, I’m guessing – are fighting for good. There are many ways to kill vampires. Do you really have that much time?” Cordelia asked as Angel stared at his hands clasped around the sword. “When Buffy died you brought Spike here. At first, I was skeptical, I admit. But, he turned out to be a lot of help. Then, Willow brought Buffy back. What happens if she dies again? Will Willow allow that? She shouldn’t be here now.”
“I could say the same for myself and Spike,” Angel said in a faraway voice. “We’ve both died and come back. I was in a hell dimension and came back. What’s to say Buffy hasn’t been in one too?”
Cordelia slapped her hands against her lap, angry at Angel’s denials. She stood up and glared down at him. “Why do you keep doing that?”
“Doing what?” Angel asked petulantly.
“Keep talking yourself out of any sort of happiness? You’ve been with Spike for two years! Whatever small amount perfect happiness you felt with Buffy that made you lose your soul, Spike gave you just as much of himself. It may not have been perfect bliss, but it was something. You have to stop worrying about everyone else and focus on what’s in front of you. If you don’t care about Spike enough to do that, then cut him loose and let him live his life without you interfering.”
With that, Cordelia stomped up the stairs and slammed the basement door. Angel grabbed the sword she left behind as well as his and put them away.
**************************
Los Angeles, Wolfram & Hart
“How long has he been here?” Liliah asked as she walked through the hall with her secretary on her heels.
“Security brought him in about twenty minutes ago,” her secretary stammered.
Liliah had a hand on the doorknob to her office when she turned on her secretary, causing the jittery woman to shrink back. “You should have pulled me out of that meeting the minute you heard anything. What about the family?”
“On their way,” her secretary confirmed.
Lilah nodded then entered her office only to see Gavin chatting with the Billy, the same man Angel had rescued from the box of fire in the demon dimension to save Cordelia.
“Lilah,” Gavin greeted dryly. “I was just keeping young Billy here company.”
Lilah gave him a false smile. “Gee, thanks Gavin. I’ll take it from here.” She turned to the young man and gave him a concerned look. “Billy, your family has been worried sick. Where have you been?”
“Went for a walk,” Billy replied casually.
Lilah raised a tweezed brow in disbelief. “A walk, for three days?”
“The boy was feeling cooped up,” Gavin commented.
Lilah gave him a withering look. “Why don’t you go close an escrow or something?” Then, she focused all her attention on the young man. “You’re not supposed to be out on your own. You remember what happened last time, don’t you? You don’t want to end up in that awful place again, do you?”
“Well, of course he doesn’t,” Congressman Blim said from the doorway, startling Lilah. “No one wants that.”
Lilah nodded to the new arrival in greeting. “Congressman.”
“I trust you managed to stay out of trouble this time, Billy?” Congressman Blim admonished.
“There was no trouble,” Billy assured him.
“Let’s go home,” Congressman Blim suggested. He looked at Lilah. “Well, this is the second time you’ve returned our nephew safely to us.” He glanced at Gavin. “Thank you.”
“Our pleasure,” Gavin said, accepting all of the praise as the Congressman and Billy turned to leave.
Lilah followed after the Congressman. “Our pleasure in the sense that,” the door closed and she glared at Gavin. “He had nothing to do with it.”
“Nice boy,” Gavin commented.
“Yeah, Billy?” Lilah smirked. “He’s great. He had his own private room in hell. Family connections . . . and oh, by the way, get out!”
“But, I wasn’t finished,” Gavin protested.
“No,” Lilah said sarcastically. “You really were. To make myself clear: if you go sniffing around one of my clients again, I think we’re going to have a problem.”
“You think?” Gavin raised a brow. “Who told you that you could think? You know, why don’t you try listening once in a while instead of constantly flapping that fat mouth of yours?”
Lilah laughed bitterly. “You were exactly captain of the debate team, were you, Gavin? At least Lindsey knew how to . . .”
Her comeback was cut short when Gavin grabbed her by the hair and smashed her into the glass shelves against the far wall. Then, he jumped on top of her, wrapped his hands around her neck and choked her.”
Hearing the commotion through the closed door, Billy turned and walked down the hall, a smug smile spread slowly across his face.
**************************
Sunnydale, Crawford Street Mansion
It was long past sundown when Spike crawled out of bed still hung over from another drinking binge. Alcohol kept his mind dull and made it easier to ignore Angel’s prodding to acknowledge him. He used the mattress to pull himself to his feet and staggered to the bathroom.
Making it there by sheer willpower, he immediately turned the shower on steaming hot. He set
a dry towel within reach. Then, undressed and threw the dirty clothes he’d worn and slept in the past twenty-four hours, in the laundry basket and stepped blurry-eyed into the shower.
Spike leaned forward with his hands on the wall, letting the water pour over his head, shoulders and down his back. The steam woke him up enough to crack his eyes open. When he could make out the blurry image of a bath scrunchy and the soap, he started washing himself. Then, he turned his attention to his hair.
Spike?
He had a good lather of shampoo in his hair when the sound of his name echoed dimly inside his head.
Spike!
The louder tone startled him out of his daze and the soap ran into his eyes. “Fuck!”
What? What’s wrong?
“Your loud mouth caused me to get soap in my eyes, you great lummox,” Spike replied as if Angel was standing in the shower with him.
Sorry, what are you doing?
“I’m taking a bloody shower. What do you want?” Spike asked gruffly.
Why have you been ignoring me?
“Let me count the reasons: Darla, Buffy, Buffy, your foot-in-mouth disease, and oh yeah, Buffy. Give me a good reason why I should talk to you,” he said in a bland voice.
Spike . . .
“Get out of my head, Angel.”
Spike felt the ghost of fingers trailing down his spine. The sensation made him close his eyes. Then, it was gone only to be replaced with the feeling of a hand sliding over his stomach and down to his short hairs. He groaned at the imaginary touch of fingers around his semi-erect shaft.
“Angel, what do you think you’re doing?” Spike breathed raggedly.
Something we were always good at.
Spike squeezed his eyes shut when he suddenly felt Angel fill him completely. It wasn’t forced. His Sire had slipped inside as if he were sliding behind the wheel of his Plymouth, as cool and easy as he pleased. For a moment, Spike ground his teeth in annoyance that Angel was as bold as to try something like this, knowing that he was still upset with him.
“You’re a bloody bastard, you know that?” Spike growled.
But you like me this way. You get off on it when I take what I want.
Spike sucked in a breath at the sensation of his left nipple was pinched and twisted hard. He felt Angel swell inside him, his own erection now painfully hard.
It makes you so hard when I possess every part of you. I can feel you, baby boy, so goddamn hard. Even now, I can feel the arousal rising inside you.
His Sire’s words were a whisper inside his mind and he could imagine feeling Angel’s cool breath against his ear. Spike’s balls tightened up as he felt his mate’s intense passion wash through him.
“I soddin’ well hate you, Angelus,” Spike hissed through clenched teeth.
Hate me all you want, William. That doesn’t change what I can do to you. I can make you beg.
“Not likely,” Spike scoffed as he tried to stem his arousal from Angel’s insistent touch inside him.
It made it hard for Spike to resist. Angel filled every pore. The younger vampire tried to ignore his reaction. His Sire was evil personified. When he realized Spike wouldn’t talk to him, even through the link, he apparently tried the underhanded tactic of sex. Once Spike was clearheaded, Angel snuck in and blanketed him with overwhelming stimulation so that he wouldn’t or couldn’t object. It was a devious trick and Spike hated him for it.
Plead.
“No.” The denial came out on a moan.
I’ll keep you on the verge of orgasm until you’re crying real tears for release. Beg me to possess you again. You know you want to.
“In your dreams,” Spike growled as he tried to steel himself against responding to his mate’s seductive tones.
He let out a guttural noise as arousal overtook his actions and Angel forced him to his knees on the shower floor. His head fell back and a sobbing cry of release escaped his lips as his cock shot creamy ropes of cum onto the shower floor where the spray of water washed it down the drain. He felt Angel wrench the orgasm out of him. He heard his Sire’s growl of triumph as he was left panting from the exertion.
Spike felt warmth inside him. He sat back against the wall, basking quietly in the afterglow. Angel was still there. He could feel him. Spike kept his eyes closed, wishing for a cigarette to calm his jumbled thoughts. If he was quiet maybe Angel would remain . . . silent?
There was always something between him and Angel. It consumed his senses when he was near the elder vampire. Something always drew them to each other, even before the mating claim. Angel wasn’t wrong about that. It left him feeling warm and content, at peace, like he knew that was where he belonged. Now, with Angel inside him, portraying a silent, foreboding beast, he felt . . . satisfied.
Spike tried to ignore Angel’s prodding up to now. He was too pissed to deal with Angel’s reasoning. He’d had enough of Angel’s reasoning for why he sent him to Sunnydale. He was sick of hearing that Buffy was more important than whatever their relationship was turning out to be before it got sidelined for a human and a Slayer on top of that.
Why the bloody hell did he tell Angel that he felt like he belonged in L.A. with him and the team? Angel obviously didn’t want him there. The minute he opened his heart to his mate, he was shipped back to Sunnydale. Love’s bitch, that’s me.
What was that?
“Nothing. Did you get what you needed out of that?” Spike asked.
You needed it too, Spike. To remember how it is between us.
“I know how it is between us, Angel. I tell you how happy I am in L.A. and you send me to Sunnydale for your ‘true love’!” Spike got to his feet and twisted the knobs to shut the water off. Yanking the glass door open, he grabbed a towel. Drying off with angry swipes, he growled, “Don’t ever do anything like that again. That was not only rape, it was rape of my mind, you soulless bastard.” He stepped out of the shower and slammed the door, rattling the glass.
How can you say that, I was just trying to show you how much I care, Angel said irritably.
“With cheap imitation, long distance sex,” Spike scoffed. “No Angel, if you wanted to show you cared you would never have let me go.”
Spike . . . I just wanted . . . Angel trailed off. And since you won’t answer the phone, thinking it’s me. This is the only way I could talk to you.
“I won’t talk to you on the phone, so you invade my mind instead! You are a total bastard. Get out of my head, Angel. I want nothing to do with you. I’m here as you asked to help Buffy, much as I hate it, you cannot ask any more of me,” Spike said as he got dressed and headed for the kitchen.
But, you helped Fred, Angel reminded him.
“Fred was different. She came to me and asked for help. She wasn’t something that was forced on me,” Spike hissed as he grabbed a couple of blood bags from the freezer and threw them in the microwave, punching in the time and START with a little more force than necessary.
This is not how I planned on going about this. For one thing, I thought you’d be calmer now, Angel brooded.
“Sounds like your plans are as crap as some of mine,” Spike said as he searched for burba weed in his spice racks. “I want you out of my head. I’m going to get some burba weed. Looks like I’m fresh out. Just get lost, Angel. Go back to your oh-so-perfect life in L.A.!”
Spike shook his head to make sure he didn’t feel Angel there. Then, he walked out the door, leaving the microwave to do its thing.
**************************
Sunnydale, Magic Box
The shop was filled with customers, including many laughing children. There was a large banner hanging from the rafters that read: HALLOWEEN BONE-ANZA with the letters spelled out in paper bones. The O in BONE was a paper skull.
Anya moved through the store on roller skates, wearing very short candy-stripped shorts, a red blouse and Farrah Fawcett hair. Addressing a costumer as she rolled by, she said, “Um, everything on this table’s half off, including the table.” She skated past another customer with, “Buy one eyeball, you get the second one free!”
On the other side of the store, Giles ran the cash register while wearing a wizard’s robe. Xander, dressed as a pirate, was talking to some children as he held a jar.
“Arr! Careful, me matey! These be fireflies spat from a volcano off the coast of Katmandu. Arr!” he said in a phony pirate accent.
“You’re not a real pirate!” accused a little boy dressed as a fireman. “Real pirates live on boats and don’t look stupid!”
Xander gave a fake pirate laugh. “Oh, a salty swabbie! Maybe you be fishin’ for the taste,” he held up his hook, “of me hook!” He shook the hook-hand in the boy’s face and was met with a bored look.
“Uh, hello, Ahab,” Giles called out. “Little help, please?”
“Arr, and help ye shall have, arr!” Xander replied in his pirate voice. He gave the fireman-boy a menacing look and walked away, scratching his neck with the hook.
Anya skated over to Buffy who was carrying a large cardboard box.
“We’re running low on mandrake root. Check the basement,” Anya said as she skated by.
“Don’t blame me if we have this conversation over and over . . .” Buffy mumbled to herself as she headed down the basement steps with the box. “. . . And over . . . and over, and over.”
She reached the bottom and turned to go around them, just as Spike emerged from underneath them.
“Oh!” she cried in surprise, nearly dropping the box, even as he jumped a little. She glared at him over the top of the box. “Bell. Neck. Look into it.”
“Come with a nice leather collar, does it?” Spike asked sardonically. “’Cause I’m sure Angel would love that. On top of ordering me around, he can also physically do it, and hey, if you throw in a leash that can stretch between here and the Hyperion, it’ll give him something to yank on when he wants me to go somewhere!”
“Are you done?” Buffy asked with a raised brow.
“Oh, not even close, Slayer,” Spike sneered. “I have more where that came from.”
Buffy let out a put upon sigh. “Why are you lurking down here?”
Spike let out a sigh of his own. “Came through the tunnels.” He held up a handful of vines. “I’m running low on burba weed. If you stir it in the blood, it makes it all hot and spicy.”
Buffy cringed at the thought of what he did with the burba weed and blood. She turned away and set the box aside.
“What? I was going to pay for it,” Spike said petulantly. She gave him a skeptical look as she stepped in front of him with her hands on her hips. Then, he changed his tune, “I mean, no. I was going to nick it, ’cause that’s what I do.”
Spike sighed. First, he had to answer to that ponce of Sire of his, who took extreme liberties with him in the shower. It gave new meaning to a mind fuck. His Sire was one thing, but he wasn’t going to answer to a soddin’ Slayer. “I go where I please and I take what I want. What’s your excuse anyway?” He nodded towards the stairs. “I thought you’d had it to the brim with costumer disservice.”
Buffy raised a brow. “One-time deal to help out and I mean straight time. No loop-de-loop mummy hand repeat-o-vision.” Spike nodded in understanding. Buffy looked around, embarrassed. “Where’s the mandrake root?”
Spike looked around and moved towards a shelf covered with jars. “Um . . . here.” He took down a jar and handed it to her. “There’s only three to a jar. They tend to . . . go a bit wonky if you cram them too close.”
“Thanks,” she took the jar and headed for the stairs.
“Feel like a bit of the rough and tumble?” Spike called after her.
She turned around with a shocked expression. “What?”
“Me . . . you . . .” He gestured between them. When she only stared at him in shock, he growled, “Patrolling? Hello?”
“Oh. Uh . . . I . . . should stay.” She shrugged. “Maybe tomorrow.”
Spike shrugged and walked away. “It’s not like I don’t already have plans. If I work around Angel’s schedule of non-stop yammering in my head and get a little peace, I can probably watch The Great Pumpkin.”
Buffy shook her head as he walked away ranting to himself about Angel. She headed up the stairs, mumbling to herself, “So much easier to talk to when he wanted to kill me.”
**************************
Los Angeles, Wesley’s Apartment
Gunn and Angel sat on the couch playing a video game as Fred sat on the arm of the couch next to Gunn, watching. In the small kitchen, Wesley poured Cordelia a cup of tea.
“It’s inspiring to see you like this. The initiative you’ve shown in training with Angel, taking responsibility. I’m proud of you,” Wesley praised.
“Well, it never hurts to be prepared,” Cordelia replied.
“Hm, I agree,” Wesley said. “We should all be battle ready. Every one of us.”
“Dead!” Gunn yelled in the living room. “Dead! So dead! So very, very dead. Just how dead are you, huh?”
“I’m tired of being the dead one,” Angel grumbled.
“So, Angel, have you talked to Spike yet?” Fred asked shyly.
“We’ve communicated. I wouldn’t exactly call it talking,” Angel replied sadly.
“Arguing then?” Fred asked, looking at him as if he were the problem.
“More or less,” Angel shrugged.
He didn’t want to talk about it. Whatever was going on between him and Spike should remain private. Fred and Cordelia had been on him to call Spike and try to talk to him. He’d done that, so to speak. He finally broke through Spike’s drunken haze and then he discovered that Spike was in the shower. After that, all he saw in his mind was water cascading over his boy’s naked flesh and had to have him, even if it was only in thought. Then, Spike warned him to never try anything similar a mind fuck like that again and promptly kicked him out of his mind.
He’d started out with good intentions. What was he doing wrong? He remembered a time when Spike would crawl on his hands and knees for what he did to him. Okay, so Angelus was in residence at the time. But, he remembered hot nights and sticky, blood-soaked sheets. Most of the blood was Spike’s, but points for intent!
“He still hasn’t forgiven you?” Fred asked sadly.
“No,” Angel replied looking down at the game controller and watched his fingers go through the motions of the game.
Wesley looked at the three of them through the open kitchen door. “I was thinking, perhaps I’d enter into a similar training arrangement with our Fred,” he said, addressing Cordelia behind him.
She watched Wesley look at Fred and perkily replied, “Oh, hey, if you think she can help you fight, why not?” Wesley balked at her. “I’m kidding. Wesley, if you want to get to know Fred better, maybe the next time you have her over for an intimate dinner for two, you won’t ask the rest of us to come along.”
“Ah, I don’t . . . I mean . . .” Wesley stammered. Cordelia looked at him expectantly. “Was I that obvious?”
“Yes! Ha, ha!” Gunn gloated from the living room as he watched the TV screen.
“I don’t think anybody else noticed,” Cordelia whispered knowingly.
Wesley looked longingly at Fred. “She is a rather extraordinary young woman. I thought Spike had his sights set on her?”
“Oh, please,” Cordelia said with a wave of her hand. “He and Angel are so wrapped up in each other they can’t see two feet in front of them. He only cares for Fred like family.”
“Ahem,” Wesley cleared his throat at hearing that. He’d read the Watcher’s Journals and numerous accounts of Spike and Drusilla together.
Cordelia rolled her eyes at him. “Not that close.”
“Still,” Wesley sighed. “The last thing any of us should be doing is – coupling with each other. I mean, office romances, even under the most normal circumstances . . .”
“We don’t live in normal circumstances. I mean, what are the odds of any of us actually finding someone out there who can deal with the kind of stuff we have to deal with? I don’t know. Maybe Angel and Spike are the lucky ones . . . if they’d both get their heads out of their asses and make up. Maybe we are meant . . .”
“For each other?” Wesley asked hopefully.
“Actually I was going to say ‘to be alone.’ But what the heck, Wesley, if you like her, tell her. Just go right up to her and,” she started to frown and sway a little from the nausea that suddenly came on her. “Hug her into little pieces.”
Suddenly, Cordelia was hit by a vision and collapsed on the floor. Gunn and Angel heard the crash, jumped off the couch and ran into the kitchen.
“Easy,” Angel soothed as he helped her up into a chair.
“Convenience store, a man attacking a woman,” Cordelia reported. “His wife – it’s his wife.”
Angel looked at Gunn and Wesley. “How many convenience stores we got on the Westside?”
Fred immediately did the calculations in her head. “Well, even if you just include Santa Monica, Beverly Hills and Malibu only, the combined populations are something like a hundred and thirty thousand people spread over more than thirty square miles, and given that . . .”
“A lot,” Gunn cut in.
“I was getting there,” Fred pouted.
“All right,” Wesley said in a tone that emphasized his still-new role as boss. “We go in two teams. Gunn, you and I . . .”
“No. It’s too late. You can’t save her,” Cordelia said glumly. “This murder happened a week ago.” She looked at Angel. “Why would they show this to me now?”
**************************
Los Angeles, Hyperion Hotel
Cordelia was at her desk when Wesley dropped a thick file onto the counter. She went over to look at it with the rest of the team.
“What’s this?” she asked as she flipped through it.
“Everything,” Wesley replied as he sifted through some of the papers. “Everything about the crime I believe you saw in your vision. The police reports, the husband’s written confessions, captures from the convenience store’s video surveillance cameras . . .”
Fred came down the stairs as Gunn and Angel trickled in from other parts of the hotel to join Cordelia and Wesley in looking through the file.
“. . . and I have to caution all of you, the medical examiner’s crime scene photos are . . . Cordelia . . .” Wesley said apprehensively as Cordelia picked up the very thing he was warning her about.
Angel reached out and gently took the crime scene photos away from her. “Maybe you shouldn’t be looking at that.”
“Tell that to the Powers,” Cordelia shot back. “They already ran the THX version in my head, remember?” She looked at Wesley, “How did you get this stuff?”
“I did it the old-fashioned way,” Wesley replied and then avoided her eyes when he said, “I bought it.”
“The police sold you information on an open case?” Fred asked surprised.
“Not exactly,” Wesley coughed. “A source, someone with access to this stuff. Usually they sell to the tabloids, when the victims are more high profile.”
“Charlene Baird,” Gunn read off the paper in his hand.
Wesley nodded. “The victim. She and the perpetrator were married for thirty years, no history of domestic violence.”
“Why’d he do it then?” Fred asked.
Wesley read through the man’s confession. “He says: She wouldn’t listen to him. He was trying to get her to stop talking.”
“Well, it worked,” Fred said blandly.
“I don’t get it,” Gunn commented as he waved a paper under Wesley’s nose. “If this guy confessed, then crime solved. Why are the Powers airing reruns in Cordy’s head?”
“I don’t know,” Wesley replied.
Angel looked at one of the pictures from the surveillance cameras and saw someone familiar. “I do.” He put the photo on the counter between them and pointed the person out. “Eleven twenty-four, twenty minutes before the crime occurred look who’s there.”
Wesley grabbed a magnifying glass and aimed it at the guy Angel pointed out in the background. “It’s Billy.” He handed the picture to Gunn.
“Oh, boy,” Gunn groaned, seeing it for himself.
“What? What?” Cordelia asked confused. She grabbed a photo and looked at the person in question. “Okay, kind of cute. So, who is he?”
No one answered her right away.
**************************
An hour later, Wesley and Fred sat on the round settee in the lobby. Gunn stood beside it. They looked over at Angel and Cordelia, waiting for her reaction. Angel perched on the edge of Cordelia’s desk and watched as she paced back and forth, holding the photo in her hands.
“Are you sure this is him?” Cordelia asked, holding up the picture. “This is the guy?”
Angel nodded for the tenth time. “When you pull someone from a hell dimension, you tend to remember their face. That’s him.”
Cordelia slowly sank down into her chair. “Well then, now we know why the Powers made me experience that woman’s death. She died because of me.”
“No,” Angel said flatly.
“Yes! Angel, if he’s somehow responsible, then so am I,” she contended.
“You’re not the one who broke him out and put him back on the streets. I did that,” Angel stated, taking the blame on himself.
“For me ,” Cordelia stressed. “You did it to save me.”
“And I’d do it again,” Angel said stubbornly.
“Angel . . .” Cordelia said sadly.
He crouched down in front of her. “Hey. Hey, whatever’s happening now, you’re not responsible for this and neither am I. But, I know who is.” He looked at her watery eyes. “Do you want to go up to Sunnydale and stay with Spike? He may let you use that whirlpool tub of his if you make him feel sorry enough for you.” That got a small smile out of her. “You’ve been after that tub since he bought it on my credit card. Besides, I think Sunnydale needs a dose of you. You can hit Xander for making eyes at my boy.” Angel sounded hopeful. “Fred already punched him.”
A tearful laugh bubbled up out of Cordelia. “Fred socked Xander Harris good when she was up there?” Angel nodded with a smirk. “He deserved worse than that.”
“Surprised me and Spike both. She’s become a tough little cookie since she met Spike,” he replied.
She gave him a little smile. “I won’t be a coward, Angel. I’m not going to run up there and hide from this under Spike’s bed.”
“Hey now, I never said anything about his bed, just his tub,” Angel admonished teasingly.
**************************
Sunnydale, Summers’ Residence
Anya was showing off the ring Xander had gotten her as the Scoobies oohed and ahhed over it.
“And he said he couldn’t imagine the rest of his life without me, and he gave me this,” she said, wiggling her fingers. Xander stood beside her as Dawn grabbed her hand to look at the ring.
“Which I’ll be paying for the rest of my life,” Xander said and then smiled at Anya when she looked his way.
“Can I try it on?” Dawn asked hopefully.
“Oh, absolutely not,” Anya smiled.
Giles and Buffy came into the room, bearing drinks for everyone.
“Sorry, we couldn’t do the big fancy,” Buffy said apologetically. “You kind of caught us with our parties down.”
“Oh, that’s okay. This is just the first premarital celebration. There’ll be lots more . . . with gifts,” Anya sounded sure of herself.
Buffy hugged Anya and then Xander, a little too tightly.
“You’re getting married! You!” Buffy said happily.
“Me. Choking,” Xander said hoarsely.
“Oh sorry!” She said, releasing him. “I just – I can’t believe it. It seems like only yesterday you had to pay a girl to date you.
Xander scoffed at that. “Like I’d ever pay . . .” He snickered nervously. “Define ‘date’.”
“I was only out of commission for three months,” Buffy pouted and asked as Willow returned from the kitchen with snacks, “How many other things have changed since I’ve been away?”
“Ooh, I got a tattoo!” Dawn smiled.
“What?!” Buffy said shocked.
“Which is why we told her no,” Willow stressed.
“Just a little one?” Dawn whined.
“Over my dead body,” Buffy glared at Dawn. “The kind that doesn’t come back.”
“Fine,” Dawn pouted. She saw Anya come back and hugged her. “Congratulations. You’re lucky to find a guy like him.”
“Not as lucky as me,” Xander said, kissing Anya on the cheek as Buffy looked on with a smile.
**************************
Los Angeles, Lilah’s Apartment
Lilah was pouring herself a drink. She jumped and nearly spilled the amber liquid on her plush carpet as the door to her dimly lit apartment was suddenly kicked opened. Angel stood on the other side in the brightly lit hallway.
“That’s a very dramatic entrance,” Lilah commented blandly, “except for the part where you can’t enter.”
“You’re a little jumpy there, Lilah,” Angel said ominously.
“It’s been a long day at the office,” Lilah replied tiredly as she sipped her drink.
“Then you know that your boy is on the loose. You know what he’s been doing,” Angel surmised.
Lilah sighed and turned around. “It’s been brought to my attention.”
As she walked closer to the door, the light from the hall shadowed her face, but it was enough for Angel to see the black and blue bruises from the beating Gavin gave her earlier.
“God, Lilah. Are you . . .?” Angel almost felt sorry for her. Almost.
“I’m fine,” Lilah said bitterly. “You should see the other guy.”
“I plan to.”
“Billy never touched me, friend,” Lilah sneered.
“I know. He has some power. He makes people . . .”
“No. You don’t know. Billy never touched me, and you can’t touch him. Nobody can. Billy, as in Blim? As in Congressman Nathan Blim’s nephew? That family is the closest thing this country has to royalty. They’d own half the eastern seaboard even if they weren’t clients of ours. The law won’t go near him.”
“I’m not the law,” Angel stated the obvious in case her beating knocked common sense out of her.
“This isn’t some three-horned Gurnar Beast you can just chop into meatloaf!” Lilah argued.
“Why are you protecting him after what he did?” Angel asked brow furrowed.
“I’m sorry, but this deep chivalric concern coming from the only man I know who definitely wants to kill me, is a bit much on a day like this.”
Angel noticed the glass rattling and the stutter in her voice. Lilah was always sure of herself. He’d never seen her frightened of anything before. “Your hands are shaking.”
“Stay away from my client,” Lilah said angrily and shut the door in his face.
**************************
Sunnydale, Crawford Street Mansion
Spike lounged on the couch with his legs crossed and bare feet propped up on the coffee table, a glass of blood balanced on his knee with one hand and a remote in the other. He flipped through the channels, trying to find something to watch and fell on a rerun episode of Married . . . with Children. The episode featured an actor who kind of resembled his Sire. Bloody hell, he couldn’t even get away from Angel while watching TV.
He hadn’t heard anything from the brooding ponce since the incident in the shower. Not that he cared if he ever did again. That was an underhanded trick. He hoped Angel was in L.A. doubled over with guilt. Not just for the shower, but also sending him back to Sunnydale and forcing him to leave . . .
Okay, so he really didn’t like L.A. Nor did he particularly care for Wesley’s upper-class, holier-than-thou demeanor, and Gunn’s looking down his nose at him, or Cordelia’s brash comments about his hair and clothes or Fred’s sugary sweet behavior. Was there such a thing as too nice? And, he especially didn’t like Angel’s heavy-handed ‘I’m the Sire, you should be lucky I give you the time of day’ attitude.
God, he missed L.A. He wished Cordelia was here to argue over mundane stuff. He wished he was out patrolling the five blocks that surrounded the hotel with Gunn, or bickering with Wesley over some type of research. It was cute to see Fred’s face turn red with a blush that went to her hairline when he teased her. Bloody hell, he was bored here. He wondered what sort of beastie Cordelia had in a vision tonight and if Angel was enjoying hunting it down and killing it without him.
**************************
Los Angeles, Blim Estate
Angel’s convertible pulled to a stop outside the gates. Angel shut the ignition off and jumped out over the door. Gunn and Wesley followed suit and they walked up to the entrance gates of the big estate. Angel started looking for a way in.
“This is it. The Blim estate,” Wesley confirmed.
“Not very welcoming, is it?” Gunn asked as he eyed the gates.
“I don’t suppose it’ll do much good to ring the bell either,” Wesley surmised.
“How about we sneak in dressed up like security guards or something?” Gunn suggested.
“Well, that’s a possibility,” Wesley nodded. “Or we could . . .”
Suddenly, Angel leapt straight up fifteen feet to the top of the gate. He climbed over the spikes, dropped down on the other side and disappeared into the bushes.
Gunn and Wesley watched Angel and then looked up at the gate, judging the distance. “So . . . wanna go next?” Gunn asked.
Wesley sighed at the gate. “I guess we wait here.”
Inside the property line, Angel ran towards the house. He spotted Billy through a set of glass doors, talking on the phone. Angel crept closer to the glass doors. Billy lowered the phone and looked out, directly at him.
Angel ran out from behind a bush, jumped over a low wall, picked up a metal patio chair and tossed it through the glass doors, shattering them. Billy stood unmoved. He tossed the phone aside as Angel stepped in through the doors.
“Why doesn’t it surprise me that I can just walk right in here without an invitation?” Angel asked.
“Well, as far as I’m concerned you have a standing invitation,” Billy replied.
“You’re not a right guy, Billy. You’re not quite human either, are you?” Angel asked as he took a menacing step forward.
“Not quite, more than you,” Billy replied, watching him advance. He didn’t look too worried.
Angel moved cautiously around the boy, always keeping him in sight. “You like to hurt women, do you, Billy? That make you feel like a man?”
“I have never hurt a woman in my life,” Billy sneered. “I just like to watch.”
“Not anymore,” Angel growled softly.
“Oh?”
Angel nodded. “You’re going back.”
“Really? ’Cause I don’t think so.”
Just then, their stalking of each other was interrupted by a female officer.
“Los Angeles Police Department.”
“Hands where we can see ’em,” a male voice shouted. “Turn around, slowly!”
Angel rolled his eyes. He was used to this in his line of work. Just appear to be cooperating and then he’d have to break free later and track Billy down again. He sighed as he raised his hands and turned to face the shattered doors. Billy stepped up beside him before he could speak.
“You’re looking for me,” Billy announced.
“William Blim?” the woman queried.
Angel watched confused as Billy replied, “That’s right. I’m the one that called you. Did you find the body? Was it where I said it would be?”
“William Blim, we’re taking you into custody for questioning,” the female cop told him.
“Oh yes,” Billy smiled as he turned to look at Angel. “I should think you would.”
“Sanchez, be sure you read him his rights,” she reminded her partner.
Sanchez pulled out a pair of cuffs and walked up to Billy.
Putting one hand on Sanchez’s wrist, Billy asked, “Will those be absolutely necessary? I won’t give you any trouble, officer. I’ll come quietly.
Sanchez turned back to look at his partner. She nodded. Angel watched as Billy removed his hand and left a residual glowing handprint on Sanchez’s wrist that quickly faded. Sanchez led Billy out of the house.
The woman officer looked at Angel then. “Who are you?”
“He’s nobody,” Billy called over his shoulder.
Angel watched as the police led Billy away, reading his Miranda rights as they went.
**************************
Sunnydale, Summers’ Residence
Buffy and Xander stepped out the front door. They’d just listened to Anya planning her wedding and marriage to Xander, complete with children. It all made Xander nervous.
“Air! Sweet mother oxygen,” Xander cried in relief.
“Are you okay?” Buffy asked.
“Yeah. I just . . . it’s just, I didn’t think it would be so much,” Xander stammered.
“But this is good. I mean, this is . . . love and celebration and moving forward. Anya’s right. This is the way life’s supposed to work out,” Buffy encouraged.
“Right,” Xander nodded. “Deep pools of ooey delight. I’m wallowing, not drowning.”
“Definite wallow action,” she agreed.
“Okay. So once more into the breach?” Xander asked as he squared his shoulders.
“Oh. I think my breaches are wearing a little thin. I’m going to take Spike up on that offer to patrol. Got to be something out there cruisin’ for a smackdown,” Buffy said, heading for the porch steps.
“Uh, Buffy. He may be busy. Last I saw, he had a girl with him,” Xander said.
“Spike has a girl with him? She wasn’t brain dead was she?”
“No. She was competent enough to hit me when I tried to get her away from him,” Xander said, wincing at the memory.
“She hit you?”
“Then, Angel showed up and threatened to hurt me if I grabbed her again. Why would he think we were the bad guys?” Xander asked.
“Angel’s here?” Buffy’s heart started thumping wildly. “I’ve got to go. See you later, Xan.”
She was off the porch and disappearing into the dark before Xander could tell her that it wasn’t going to do her any good to see Deadboy. He took a deep breath to compose himself and went back inside the house.
**************************
Los Angeles, Hyperion Hotel
Angel, Wesley and Gunn got back to the hotel and promptly went into research mode. They let Cordelia and Fred in on what happened. Wesley was just now getting off the phone with the city morgue concerning the body Angel heard Billy talk about before he was arrested.
“My contact at the city morgue confirms it,” Wesley announced. “Her body was discovered earlier tonight. A young woman was reported missing three days ago. Someone phone in a tip.”
“Billy,” Angel stated.
“It doesn’t make sense. I mean, even if he did it, he didn’t do it, you know what I’m saying?” Gunn said shaking his head. “So why confess? What does he get?”
“Out. It gets him out,” Angel replied.
“Yeah, out of his palatial twelve-million-dollar compound and into a holding cell at Men’s Central,” Gunn said.
“Yes, but for how long?” Wesley inquired thoughtfully.
“Well, an impenetrable cube of hell fire in a heavily-guarded demon dimension couldn’t do much, so my guess: regular bars? Not really going to be a problem,” Cordeila said.
“She’s right,” Angel agreed as he turned to leave. “All he needs to get out this time is his lawyer.”
“Angel, what are you doing?” Wesley asked his brow furrowed in concern.
“I’m going to get there before Lilah does,” Angel replied simply.
“And then what?” Gunn asked.
“Well, I took him out of one cell, I can take him out of this one, too,” Angel said flatly.
“Wait! Angel, you can’t barge into a police precinct and go all Terminator,” Cordelia protested.
“Yeah, man, this is a time when we could have really used Spike as back up,” Gunn said.
“I’ll be okay. As much as I wish Spike were here, he isn’t,” Angel said agitated.
“Whose fault is that?” Cordelia asked pointedly staring at him. “It’s dangerous. He’s dangerous. What if he lays the whammy on you? Maybe we should call Spike and get him down here to help.”
“Enough about Spike, Cordy! I know things aren’t great between us right now. But, I can’t worry about that. As for Billy ‘laying the whammy on me’, he won’t be conscious long enough to try.”
“He’s not there!” Fred said as she rushed out of Wesley’s office. Everyone looked at her. “I just heard it on the police scanner. The patrol car carrying Billy never made it to the police station. There’s been an accident.”
|
