Chapter II

Spike burst out of the main doors of the building taking long, heated strides towards his car.  He thrust his hand in his jeans’ pocket digging for his keys.  They slipped through his shaking fingers as he yanked them out only to have them fall to the ground.  Angered even more by his lack of control, he reached down, yelling, ”Fuck it!”  Snatching the keys from the pavement, he swung around in one movement to kick an innocent litter can standing nearby, knocking it halfway off the sidewalk.  He wrenched the car door open, then threw himself into the driver’s seat.  He jabbed the keys into the ignition, the car roaring to life.  He needed a drink … badly!

He pulled his car over to the first bar he saw.  Not the kind of dive he usually frequented, but as long as it had booze it would do.  Leering at the ‘Please Do Not Smoke’ sign, he ordered a bottle of whiskey.  He grabbed it along with the shot glass, heading for the furthest, darkest corner of the smoking section he could find.  He wasn’t in the mood to be bothered with having his ass thrown out for not being politically correct.  He just wanted to get drunk.

He twisted the cap off the bottle and took a long pull of the burning liquid, not bothering with the glass.  Feeling it sear his insides straight to his belly, he slid back against the wall of the booth and swung his legs, knees up, in front of him.  With the edge off, he took his time to fill the shot glass and knocked the welcome taste to the back of his throat once more.  Waiting for the liquor to work its cheap magic, he shrugged back and closed his eyes.

He had been brutal with his father.  Spike was beginning to regret it when he angrily caught himself.  ‘Not any more than he deserved,’ he fumed.  He tamped down that small part of him that was still troubled by the words he’d said and focused instead on the folder he found.

Angelus!  It always came back to that fucker.  Nothing had changed while Spike was gone.  He hadn’t really thought it would, but he hated it just the same.  Spike endured a lifetime lost in that broken fuck’s shadow.  He shouldn’t have been surprised to find his father was keeping track of everything the asshole did.  He expected it really … but seeing it in black and white made him see red.  He sneered at his own lame joke.  He wanted Angelus to see red, blood red.  He poured more whiskey into the shot glass.  Fingering the smooth surface of it, he stared at its contents.

He never thought much about his sister Harmony, she had her own world.  Harmony loved her friends and her clothes and herself and not much else if she wasn’t the center of it.  But Dru – she had enchanted him from the day she was born.  Blonde and blue-eyed, just as he and Harmony, yet Dru was so very different from either of them.  He tapped a cigarette out of the pack and lit it.  Drawing deeply on it, he exhaled a harsh stream of smoke, then emptied the shot glass.  She captured his heart from the first as he did hers.

He spent many a drunken, sleepless night wondering if she had known what was going to happen that day.  It still cut to the bottom of his heart knowing that she cried for him and he wasn’t there.  If only he hadn’t stopped to talk to one of his gang everything would have been different.  He was just in time to see what was happening, but too late to prevent it.  Spike’s heart pounded even now at the thought of how he had run as fast as he could even though he had seemed to be moving so slowly.  They disappeared around the corner and were gone.  He pleaded with his father to let him help.  Later he begged his father to take him along, but Holtz had yelled at him to stay home where he was.  Tears filled his eyes and he blindly reached for the bottle, letting the fire course down his throat, almost choking on it.

Why hadn’t he been there to save her?  He would have given his life for her.  But Angelus hadn’t.  No, he was found in one piece, hardly a scratch on him, a few bandages on his wrists.  Spike’s neglected cigarette burned his fingers.  In a masochistic moment, he let it smolder against his flesh for several long moments before finally flicking it away.  He welcomed the pain, wishing he could give that and more to the fuck who hadn’t done everything he could have – should have – for his sister.  Everything Spike would have done.

He took every opportunity to ensure Angelus knew exactly what he thought of him.  Spike told the wimp that he would have taken care of Dru, if he had been with her.  How dare Angelus return home alive while Dru’s tiny, helpless body rotted in some dank casket.  How dare he live when Dru could not.  Spike jogged another cigarette out and stuck it between his lips.  He flipped the top of his lighter open, rubbing the small wheel to ignite the flame, lifting it to the tip until it caught.  He poured another finger of the amber fluid and swallowed, then chased it with a drag of smoke into his lungs.

Spike remembered watching Angelus on the rare days when Cordelia would drag him outside.  He stayed close by her, his eyes never resting, hunting every corner of the yard.  It made Spike’s blood boil to see him.  Angel could watch over his own sister, but not Dru.  Spike hadn’t been able to stop himself from screaming at Angelus, telling him he couldn’t take care of Cordy any better.  Cordy always yelled back, standing up for her brother.  Angelus never defended himself, watching mutely as Cordelia raged.  It made Spike hate him even more, looking at the coward, not even willing to defend himself.

His father had told him that Angel wasn’t to blame, that it was his job as an agent that had placed Dru and Angel in jeopardy.  Spike couldn’t believe his father not only blamed himself but refused to admit whose fault it really was.  His father – that was a joke.  Holtz never cared about Spike.  It was all about Angel – even when he fucked up for all the world to see, his father worried about him.  Here he’d been gone for almost three years and Spike came back only to find Angelus was more important to his father than ever.  If he wasn’t then why did Holtz have a file on him thicker than his wrist?  Because Angelus had another breakdown?  Why was it that even when the asshole melted into yet another pile of jello he was still so important to Daniel Holtz?

One thing was clear though, Angelus was no longer an agent.  He was no longer the all-powerful, all-knowing perfection Spike’s father thought him to be.  The only bad guys Angelus hunted down now, according to his father’s file, were in books or on computer screens, not in the real world.  Angelus had sunk so low, Holtz had him working right there in the same building.  That was probably to keep an eye on him in case he went off again.  And that thought alone gave Spike more satisfaction than he’d felt in a very long time.  But it wasn’t enough.

Spike had another drink and another cigarette.  He kept thinking about Liam Angelus and still wanted to exact his own revenge, to make things ‘even’.  Spike was going to find a way.  He checked his pack of cigarettes and settled back in, deep in thought, searching for a way to solve his problem.

The lone waitress made her way to Spike’s booth.  She had kept track of the duster-clad figure since he strode through the door.  She would have been blind not to notice the piercing blue eyes and chiseled cheekbones below the sleek blonde hair.  And the duster had unfurled enough to reveal a muscular chest and flat abs under his thin t-shirt. He certainly didn’t look in the mood for company, but she knew the bottle had to get low sometime.  He definitely was worth the trouble to get to know.  She tried to time it when she figured the whiskey was almost gone.

After he ordered another bottle when she asked, she smiled seductively at him.  “You sure there isn’t something else you need?”

Spike looked up, not even realizing she hadn’t left with the empty bottle.  “No,” he said caustically, “not a thing.”

Not one to give in easily, she tried once more.  “Too bad. You look more interesting than the bunch from the complex who usually hang out here.”

Spike looked more closely at her, suddenly interested in her subject.  She was a little over five and a half feet tall, with dark eyes and dark honey blonde hair, falling long and straight down her back.  “There’s not much a crowd now.  I imagine it gets packed on the weekend,” he said, softening his reply.

“Fridays are the busiest,” the girl answered quickly.  She thought the speculative gleam in his eye was meant for her.  She was confident of her looks and knew they appealed to men.

“I take it the people you mentioned give you even more work to do … ah …” leaving his sentence for her to fill in the blank.

“Amy,” she supplied, not missing how his eyes lingered longer and lower than they needed to as his gaze dropped below her face in search of a nametag.  “And I can’t complain.  The tips are better.”

“Amy,” he said smoothly, “always liked that name.  I’m Spike.”

“Well, Spike, let me take this back and get you another one,” Amy breathed coyly, making the invitation clear.

“No,” he told her, eyeing the bottle, “I think I’ve changed my mind.  I’m not thirsty anymore … at least not for that,” he added provocatively.  Giving her his most winning smile he added, “You wouldn’t get in trouble if you joined me, would you?”

She turned and gave the large area a practiced sweep, focusing a little more attention on her boss behind the bar.  He was sitting on his stool, raptly engrossed in the newspaper, not bothering to even look around.  Amy knew he was probably checking his betting results.  She and Spike were the only other occupants.  “It’s not like there’s much going on at the moment,” she finally told him and slid into the booth across from him, accepting his gestured offer.

“So are those the ones who leave you the extra tips?” he asked nonchalantly.  “They must be pretty dry after a week of nose to the grind stone.  But I bet you can keep up with who’s who when the place fills up.  You seem very … capable.”

Amy never even picked up on his careful questioning, already thinking of what it would be like to be pressed closely against the body that sat opposite her.  She knew he’d meant ‘capable’ in quite a different way.  But she wanted to impress him with how well she knew her job and how she knew how to get what she wanted.  She told him about the different people who gathered on Fridays, which ones drank and who lingered the longest, whom to look out for, tip-wise.  It was as good a conversation as any, as long as he stayed there.

*****

A week later, Buffy took a seat next to Willow.  “He always sits there?” she asked.

Willow looked up across the lawn.  It was a beautiful spring day and they were eating at a picnic table in the middle of a sea of green grass.  Liam Angelus was eating by himself at a bench inside a small, dilapidated gazebo, a good distance away, near the edge of a wooded area.

“Yeah,” Willow said her voice oddly sad, “that’s his spot.  A few of us have tried inviting him over, but he just acts like you’re not there.  Dr. Walsh and the other bigwigs are the only ones he ever acknowledges and sometimes he won’t even speak to them.”

“Sounds like a good way to get fired,” Buffy said.

Willow laughed.  “No way,” she said.  “He could show up at work naked and no one would say anything about it.”

Buffy arched a speculative eyebrow at her co-worker and then stared across the lawn.  Angel naked, now there was a strange idea.  Given that their desks were situated on opposite sides of the room, both facing the wall, Buffy hadn’t really gotten a very good look at her officemate, but what she saw wasn’t hideous.  He had brown eyes and hair and he was tall.  He always dressed in faded, nondescript clothes.  He usually lurked in the shadows or stayed on the fringe, rather than out in the open.  He wasn’t unattractive, from what she could see of him.

She sighed heavily.  This was going to be more difficult than she had originally thought.

*****

“Good morning, Angel,” Buffy said as she sat the insulated mug of steaming hot coffee on her officemate’s desk the next day.  It was fresh and fragrant.  Buffy wasn’t a great coffee connoisseur, but when she indulged, she indulged in nothing but the best.  Giles had made a special gift of the outrageously expensive coffeemaker.  He was proud and a little bit in awe of Buffy’s speed in matriculating so quickly and her excellent grades.  It had been a long-standing joke between them of Giles preferring a good cup of English tea to Buffy’s American need for coffee.  The beans were fresh and at fifty-seven dollars a pound, the handpicked Blue Mountain Jamaican beans were as good as you could get.  She ground them at home and used bottled water in her three-hundred-dollar coffeemaker from Williams and Sonoma.

It was a damn fine cup of coffee.  Damn.  Fine.  As far as a first attempt at making peace, she thought it went above and beyond the normal call of duty.

He didn’t touch it.  Twenty minutes later, it was sitting in exactly the same position on his desk, obviously untouched.

In irritation, Buffy pushed herself up out of her chair and headed for the break room.  If he didn’t touch it, then he didn’t touch it – but no one could say she hadn’t tried.  She was muttering to herself as she turned the corner into the cramped break room.  Riley was standing at the sink, rinsing out his coffee mug when Buffy entered.  They smiled and exchanged pleasantries.  Riley was cute, but Buffy had a hard and fast rule about getting involved with her co-workers.  It just wasn’t a good idea.  But as Riley bent over to get something out of the refrigerator, Buffy wondered if it was such a good thing to live by the rules.  Riley might be a bit of a Gomer, but she couldn’t deny that he had a very nice body.

She was saved from such a weighty decision by Anya’s appearance.  The young woman was blunt and tactless, but very amusing.  Apparently she and Xander were a couple.  Odd as it was, they seemed to go together well.

*****

Angel stared down at the coffee.  He was stunned.  Buffy had brought him coffee.  And from the aroma, not the kind you bought in a convenience store.  Why?  No one had ever given him something without a reason attached to it.  What did she expect him to do?  Besides drink it, that is.  She must have made it for him.  He couldn’t remember anyone ever doing something like that – not just for him.  She didn’t seem the type to have ulterior motives.  She was too sunny and open for subterfuge.  Prattling on at times, she would act as though they were having a conversation.  Until those few times she left the office, he wasn’t aware how much he liked hearing the sound of her voice.  Her absence made the office feel oddly vacant.  He liked what she had done, even if he didn’t know why.  It made him feel … well … he liked it.  He wasn’t willing to examine it any more closely than that.  He knew he should say something, but he still couldn’t bring himself to talk to her.

He didn’t know about women and how they thought.  It wasn’t that he was celibate, far from it.  But women had always made the initial contact with him.  He had never needed to seek them out.  Being a healthy, virile male, he had needs and felt no remorse appeasing them.  He had never taken advantage of a woman, had always tried to make any encounter mutually satisfying.  But, that’s where it ended.  There had never been any long talks or even much idle chatter.  He’d never had feelings for any of them, or even contemplated a relationship.  And though a few wanted more, his cold, unemotional demeanor kept them from trying after one or two futile attempts.

After she left the room, he finally took a sip of the coffee.  It was delicious, the taste even better than the smell.  He sighed inwardly.  He would have to thank her, it would be rude if he didn’t.  It didn’t seem to occur to him that he’d been rude to her all along.  Or that he thought about her, unlike any of her predecessors.

*****

Buffy was still at her desk working when Angel neatly gathered his things and put them in his ever-organized briefcase.  She wasn’t good at spreading her work out evenly over her day.  She was more prone to goof off all morning and then stay until seven finishing up a project.  Angel never seemed to have that problem.

Squinting over her laptop, Buffy jumped when Angel set the mug down on her desk, neatly washed.  “Thank you,” he said.

Buffy was so stunned that by the time she gathered her wits enough to turn around, he was already rounding the corner.  Buffy smiled and leaned back in her chair.  “Maybe we are making some progress,” she said to the empty room.

*****

“Good morning, Angel,” she said out of habit the next morning as she set another mug of coffee on his desk.

“Good morning, Buffy,” he replied.

She stopped in the middle of opening her satchel and removing her laptop.  Slowly she turned.  He was facing away from her as usual, nothing out of the ordinary.  But he had spoken.  She knew he had.

Or maybe she was just going nuts.

Cautiously, she sat down at her desk, waiting to see if he would say something else.  He didn’t, but he did pick up the coffee mug and take a drink.  Slowly, Buffy turned her chair around and flipped on her laptop.

Curiouser and curiouser.

*****

It wasn’t the strong, pungent aroma of the coffee that he smelled.  It was the soft, sweet fragrance of vanilla.  He drank the coffee, savoring it, as he pictured a pair of small, deft hands carefully preparing the ambrosial liquid.  Just for him.  His palette registered at some level – and he knew his coffee – this was the best he had ever tasted.  Damn. Fine.  Not connecting that the flavor was deliciously enhanced by his current musings of the maker.  The vanilla made it all that much sweeter.

He still didn’t understand why she was doing this, but he had to thank her.  After all, she’d gone to all that trouble.  Besides, it couldn’t have hurt to tell her ‘good morning’ … it was only polite.  They did have to share an office.

*****

Willow made a visit to Buffy and Angel’s office to ask Buffy to go to the local pub where everyone met on Friday nights.  Her friend insisted that since Buffy was settled in her apartment she should join the crowd for their once a week get-together.

Angel had moved from his desk to a file cabinet in the furthest corner of the room the minute Willow entered the door.  Willow saw Angelus was keeping his gaze firmly fixed on the contents of the file that he pulled out of a drawer.  But she noticed that for all his concentration, he turned his head to catch Buffy’s reply to the redhead’s invitation.  Willow cautiously covered the few steps to where he stood.  She saw his eyes flit around the room as if preparing an escape.  Asking softly if he’d if he’d like to join them, she jumped back slightly as Angel gave her an emphatic, implacable, “No,” brusquely pushing past her.  He strode across the room, through the door, and vanished down the hall, leaving both women looking after him.

*****

Angel watched as Buffy left the office Friday, sighing as he saw her figure disappear from sight.  He knew she was keeping her date with Willow to meet the others at the pub.  He had no interest in seeing his non-Buffy co-workers after hours.  But he felt a strange twinge of jealousy that Buffy would be there laughing and talking with them.  It was one of the few times in his life he could remember wanting to spend time with someone.  He didn’t know what he’d say even if they did happen to end up together somehow.

He also didn’t know what it was that made her keep popping up in his thoughts.  But, there she would appear at the oddest moments.  It wasn’t like they even talked with one another, unless you counted Buffy’s running conversations with her computer or the air around her as talking.  Since she had started working in the office with him, when the weekends came they seemed interminably long.  He found himself waiting for them to be over, happy as few people were, when Monday finally arrived.

*****

Buffy smiled as she took a seat at the crowded table.  As Xander had said, the co-workers in the group were close friends.  It was apparently a payday night ritual to meet at one of the local bars and have a few rounds.  Not shockingly, Liam Angelus was nowhere to be seen.

“Buffy, you know Tara,” Willow said, nodding to Tara beside her.

“Tara, nice to see you again,” she smiled.  Buffy had met Tara when she and Willow helped Buffy move her things into her new apartment and had seen her briefly a few times since then.  She was still getting used to Will’s rather abrupt lifestyle change.

Tara looked at her shyly and stuttered self-consciously,  “Buffy, it’s g-good to s-see you too.”  Apparently it hadn’t been any easier for Tara.

In addition to Willow and Tara from Forensics, Xander, Anya and Riley were present from the Analysis department.  Several field agents were also in attendance.  Buffy smiled and nodded as she was introduced to Lindsey McDonald, Faith Knight and Kate Lockley.

Everyone was sprawled languidly over their chairs, watching the first drops of rain start to plop against the front windows.  “Oh, look!  Would you believe it? It’s raining,” Faith muttered mockingly.  The commonplace streaks of lightening and accompanying booms of thunder soon followed her words.

Xander sighed deeply, “And that would be new, how?”

The unusual storms had initially been an oddity, a freak occurrence that had been the talk of the town.  An astute weatherman on one of the national weather stations had been quick to find a pattern.  He reveled in the strange almost affectionate fixation about statistics he and others of his ilk always demonstrated.  With a triumphant smirk he had been the first to announce the phenomena of this particular weather system.

Exactly one hundred years before, in 1903 the area experienced an almost identical pattern of thunderstorms.  They started on almost the same day and month as the previous century.  The lightening and thunder from the first storms had been both mild and occasional.  But they had, over time, gained in intensity and frequency.  According to the national icon, the number, dates and even the manner of the storms matched its predecessor in an eerie parallel.

The storm cycle, officially called, ‘The Anniversary Storms’, was quickly dubbed the ‘Annies’.  Unlike their sister hurricanes, each progressive storm was referred to singularly as ‘Annie’.

But what had been a novelty of sorts had quickly become a continuing annoyance.  The intemperate weather forced people to stay indoors and contract severe cases of cabin fever. Those that wouldn’t or couldn’t stay in were overly tired of enduring the constant rain and damp. The dull pounding of thunder that followed the supercharged bolts of energy increasingly affected everyone’s mood.

Willy flicked the dial of the TV over the bar. The face of ‘Mr. Weather’, as he was fondly referred to by his associates and audience, loomed into view.  He was just starting his daily talk on that same miserable topic.  He warned that the pattern wasn’t likely to improve.  In fact he smilingly intimated that it would indeed get a lot worse with no end in sight.

Everyone at the table simultaneously groaned, then laughed as Xander took his shoe off.  He waved it at Willy, threatening to put said shoe in Mr. Weather’s mouth if Willy wasn’t quick enough to change the channel.

Riley looked at those seated, his gaze touching on Buffy speculatively and continuing to visually peruse the whole bar. “Well, guess it’s a good thing Psycho has never bothered to join us or he’d probably be hiding under the table right now,” he sneered as he lifted his shot glass and tossed the contents back in one motion.

A few of those around him snickered at his remark.  Buffy noticed that Lindsey, Willow and Tara remained silent.

Xander threw back his shot and then shook his head as the alcohol burned its way down his throat.  “Yeah,” he said, “poor Buffster got stuck with him – king of the rejects.  That guy is a freak with a capitol freak.”

Faith clapped Buffy on the back.  “My deepest sympathy, girlfriend,” she said.

Buffy smiled uneasily.  “He’s a little different,” she said, feeling an odd mix of annoyance at their remarks and loyalty to her officemate.  The euphemism ‘kicking a dog when he’s down’ came to mind.

“Different?” Riley asked incredulously.  “Angelus is as strange as they come.”

“You know it,” Xander replied with a laugh.

Buffy frowned at their brutal barbs but knew they were rooted in truth.  The storms had a profound effect on Liam Angelus.  His usually quiet, introverted veneer failed to hide an agitation verging on panic whenever the dark clouds gathered.  Clutching his papers, he would stalk back and forth, like a cat.  She half expected to see his tail twitch.  She glimpsed the tiny muscles in his jaw tighten as he clenched his teeth at the sound of a lightening bolt hitting its mark.  Unbeknownst to him, she could feel the waves of anguish and fear roll off him the longer a storm lasted.  He was a large, powerful man so maybe it should have scared her, but it didn’t.  Instead she felt an almost irresistible urge to wrap her arms around him, as she would the frightened creature he reminded her of being.

“You know him?” Buffy asked Faith, ignoring the laughter.

Faith didn’t seem to hear the question, but Lindsey did.  He smiled at Buffy and then leaned in closer, “Angelus used to do field work,” he said, keeping his voice low.

Buffy had the impression that Lindsey did not share the others’ opinion of Liam Angelus.  For some reason, this made her think more highly of the attractive young man.  “What happened?” she asked.

Lindsey smiled and she could almost hear the wheels turning in his head.  She had the impression that he was attempting to discern whether or not she could be trusted.  After a few moments he shrugged.  “He got messed up pretty badly some time ago and the brass stuck him in your department,” Lindsey explained.  He took a sip of his beer and his mouth curved into a wry grin that didn’t reach his eyes.  “Angelus is a class A oddball, but he’s also one of the smartest son of a bitches I’ve ever known.  He was a damn fine field agent.  It’s sad to see how far he’s fallen.”

Buffy had thought they were just talking about the storms’ effect on Angelus.  Lindsey’s remarks only piqued her curiosity even more about her strange, silent office companion.

*****

Spike looked around Willy’s bar thinking that even the worst establishments this side of the border beat what were considered the better cantinas in Mexico.  He’d had plenty of time to compare.  Too much.  Not that he had cared to go there in the first place, but there hadn’t been a lot of options at the time.  Spike had always been good at taking care of number one, his downfall was that number two, three and four didn’t have enough brains to add up to one person.  The ‘gang’ he had been the leader of was more like a band that couldn’t carry a tune.  Their last brush with the law had left his dubious companions in a cell and Spike slipping out of the country before any of them had time to ‘help’ the police find him.  Finally, after three years, he had taken the chance that it was safe enough to come back.

Lounging in his usual seat, Spike had a fine view of all who came in and out of the bar.  Since he was in the smoking section he was all but invisible to the band of workers who tripped through the door shortly after five o’clock.  They had all ordered something from the small grill, then washed it down with beer.

Spike had made it a habit in the few days since he’d met Amy to visit where she worked.  He’d made his visits to Amy’s apartment a habit as well, smirking at the thought.  Didn’t they say nothing like mixing business with pleasure?  Not that he was getting paid, with money anyway, he thought.  No, this was something far more important to him, as few things were.  He had a front row seat to the people who worked with Angelus on a daily basis.  There had to be someone or something useful to use against Angelus in the bunch.

He could tell which ones were field agents.  He was familiar with the behavior of his father and his associates the rare times he’d seen them.  He recognized it here too.  A certain way of looking about them, a wariness or vigilance, not apparent in what he presumed to be common office staff.  But that’s what Angelus was now, he snorted as he lifted his mug of beer.  A goddamn desk jockey.  He took a long draught and leaned back, still smiling at the picture it created.  Angelus always had his nose in a book, but even he must think what he did now was a far cry from what he used to do.  Spike hoped he hated having his wings clipped and being caged in one place all day.

He studied the group before him more closely, starting with those he’d singled out as agents.  A blonde and a brunette, both very easy on the eyes, and a dark-haired man who carried an air of quiet authority.  One other he wasn’t sure about, a large, tall country boy who was wasting no time helping the whiskey disappear.  Spike raised his glass once more, draining it.  That left three women and one other man.  He saw the man remove his shoe, getting a scattered laugh from those around him as he waved it at the bartender.  The redhead and the taller girl with dirty blonde hair who sat close her appeared to be a couple.  The last was also a blonde, very small and very delicious.  He smacked his lips in approval.  She looked good enough to eat.

He gathered from her slight awkwardness that the vivacious little figure was new to the group.  Amy hadn’t mentioned her.  He wasn’t sure if that was because Amy hadn’t seen her or chose to ignore she existed.  Spike could see how it could be the latter.  Amy wouldn’t cotton to competition.  He noticed Captain Cornbread was more than a bit interested in the young thing and could understand why he would be.  Spike frowned while watching the slender girl from his safe little nook.  If he wasn’t using Amy and her job at the bar to scout out Angelus’ playmates and if the little blonde weren’t one of them, he’d be tempted to take a shot himself.  He was still looking at her when Amy came back with a fresh beer, barely averting his eyes before she caught him.  It wouldn’t do, he thought, to bite the hand serving his purpose and his drink, not for now anyway.

*****

“Good evening, I didn’t know if I would catch you at home or not.”

Buffy smiled, sinking down onto her couch as she tucked her legs under her body, the receiver held tightly in her hand.  “Hi, Giles,” she said gently.  Even though Giles had been married to her mother and Buffy had known him for a total of ten years, she still called him Giles.  Rupert just didn’t sound right and neither did ‘Dad’, regardless of the fact that she personally considered him her father.  With the pressure of a new job, apartment, and city, Buffy hadn’t spoken to her stepfather as much as she would have liked.  It was a great comfort to hear his voice.

Even though Buffy was already fifteen when they moved, Sunnydale had always been ‘home’.   Her mother and father had gone through a bitter divorce.  Joyce had taken the money left by her mother, who had died a year prior to that, and moved her daughters to the small town to start over.  She had invested in a small art gallery to support them.

The move had been difficult on them, but Buffy most of all.  She blamed herself for her parents’ divorce.  But she hadn’t been altogether unhappy with living somewhere else.  Her parents hadn’t been the only ones having problems and she was happy to leave some of hers behind.

“Buffy?” the voice with a strong British accent queried, pulling her back from her ruminations.

“I’m here,” she said, “just thinking.”

Giles made a sound of agreement, but didn’t pry into her internal monologue.  He knew that Buffy kept a lot of things to herself, not wanting to burden those she loved with turmoil.

“I had a message from Dawn the other day, but I haven’t been able to catch up with her.  Have you talked to her lately?” Buffy asked.

“I have,” Giles replied, letting her change the subject.  “She’s doing well.  She’s fairly certain she’ll make the Dean’s List this semester.”

“Dawn on the Dean’s List?” Buffy chuckled.  “That’s great.  Mom would have been so proud.”

“Indeed, she would have,” Giles noted with a hint of sadness.  Joyce had died suddenly of an aneurysm four years after they were married.  They had been very happy years and Giles refused to become maudlin about something he had never expected to even happen in his life.  He was content to have had what he did.  Even without Joyce, he still had a family.  He was so thankful for his girls, even if he didn’t get to see them often.

Dawn was away at college and Giles was alone in the house, except for visits from his stepdaughters.  The thought troubled Buffy.  He and her mother had seemed so happy together, she hated to see him by himself.

After their mother’s death, Giles assumed the role of single parent without comment.  He considered both girls as his own daughters.  The small gallery had been successful and the sale of it made enough to pay off the house and ensure both Buffy and Dawn would be able to finish college.  There was still enough left over to save for emergencies.

“How are things with you, Buffy?” he asked.  “I assume Willow is helping you settle in.”

“Oh yeah,” Buffy assured him, “she rolled out the welcome wagon big time.”

“And work?”

“Work is good.  It’s interesting.  Still trying to get a bead on all the different personalities there, but it proves to be not boring.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” he said quietly.

“What about you, Giles?” she asked.  “What are you up to these days?”

“Oh, you know,” he said blandly, “life in Sunnydale trudges onward.”

Buffy took a deep breath.  “Anyone ... special?” she ventured.  She hated to feel like she was disrespecting her mother’s memory, but Giles deserved to be happy, not alone, nursing a broken heart.

“I … uh,” he stammered before falling silent.

“Giles?” she prompted.

“Ms. Calendar and I are going to a monster truck rally on Friday,” he admitted.

“Monster trucks?” she gaped.

He laughed.  “And nitro burning funny cars.”

Buffy laughed and slowly sobered.  “I hope you two have a good time,” she said, not wanting to pry too deeply.

“Thank you, Buffy,” he said gratefully.

[end chapter 2]

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