Faithfully Dangerous

Author: enigmaticblue

Rating: PG-15

Disclaimer: These aren’t my characters, as you all know. If they were, they’d all be living happily ever after by now.

Summary: Set during my story Latter Days. Faith is sent to L.A. to get information out of Angel and recruit Wesley—if she can. What she discovers is a scheme by persons unknown to take advantage of the imbalance, and an unlikely friendship.

A/N: Although this takes place during Latter Days, there isn’t a direct 1-1 relationship between the chapters. So, you could say that time is moving at a slightly different pace, although they will intersect.

Chapter 12

Faith wasn’t how she felt about Wesley not meeting her at the airport. It wasn’t as though she didn’t understand that he had responsibilities to the girls, but there was a small part of her that wished he’d dropped everything.

Although, there was another part of her that was happy he hadn’t, because it would have felt too serious.

When she walked into the hotel, silence greeted her. The girls would be out with Wes, and Ellen and Dana would be in their room, which meant that she essentially had the place to herself. After giving a moment’s consideration to calling Wesley and finding out where they were at, Faith thought of something better to do.

Fifteen minutes later, she was up to her neck in hot water, letting tight muscles relax for the first time in a week. Faith hadn’t realized how tense she’d been being around Kennedy and Rachel, dealing with all of those old emotions. She’d come to terms with the deputy mayor’s death years ago—or so she’d thought.

Seeing Kennedy struggle with many of the same emotions reminded her that there were some burdens that it was impossible to put down, even after years had passed.

There had been very little privacy in the old house, not with six other girls sharing one and a half bathrooms. The old hotel didn’t have that problem, and Faith could luxuriate in hot water to her heart’s content.

A hot bath was another thing that being in prison had taught her to value. There certainly hadn’t been a chance to enjoy that sort of thing behind bars.

When the water started to cool, Faith simply ran more hot water, opening the drain a for a moment to prevent the tub from overflowing, then leaned back against the ledge.

It could have been moments later or hours later, but it was Wesley’s voice that intruded. “You know, if you stay in there long enough, you’ll turn into a prune.”

“As long as it’s not a prude, I don’t care.” She cracked open one eye. “When did you get back in?”

“Just a bit ago. When Ellen said that she hadn’t seen you, I thought I’d check to be sure you hadn’t drowned.”

Faith realized belatedly that she must have dozed off, because the water was now completely cold, and most of the bubbles had dissolved. “I’ve got to wash my hair,” she said, watching in amusement as Wesley turned to go, apparently out of consideration for her modesty.

“I’ll just—”

“Join me?” she suggested archly, having noticed that whatever trouble he and the girls had found, it had left him more than a bit grimy. “I’ll let you scrub my back.”

He turned, the heat in his eyes causing her skin to flush. “Oh, you will?”

“Everyone needs help with those hard-to-reach places.”

“Then I assume you’ll do the same for me?”

“Only if you tell me where you’ve been.”

Wesley closed the door behind him and began undressing slowly. “We had a spot of trouble with one of the demonic problems that Gunn told me about.”

“Nothing you couldn’t handle, though.”

“No, everyone came through without any problems.”

Faith’s eyes widened when she saw the long scratch down the length of his left arm, already red and swollen. “That’s what you call ‘without any problems?’”

“It’s just a scratch.” He sighed. “Although I imagine I’ll be experiencing some rather interesting side effects tomorrow, as it was a Goresh demon.”

Faith felt her stomach clench. “What kind of side effects?”

“A fever, nausea, the usual with poison.” He shrugged. “It’s not fatal.”

“It had better not be,” Faith replied, striving for levity. “I’d hate to have to break in a new Watcher.”

“I’m sure.” His tone was dry as the last of his clothing hit the floor. “I would hate to inconvenience you.”

“There’s also the fact that you’re kinda handy to have around,” Faith replied, standing up and gasping as his hands gripped her around the waist to steady her, then moved to her breasts. “No pun intended.”

His lips were already busy, teeth and hands working on her flesh, and the heat in her belly spread. She grasped his bare shoulders, hanging on tightly to avoid slipping. When he stepped inside the tub as well, she just managed to close the shower curtain and turn on the water.

Faith couldn’t quite believe how much it felt like coming home, to have his naked form pressing her against the tile, to feel the hot water as it beat against them both.

“I missed you.”

He was the one to speak the words, and although she shared the sentiment, she couldn’t quite bring herself to respond in kind. Instead, she gripped him more tightly yet, letting her body profess what her lips could not.

~~~~~

“Please tell me that you can’t hear that.”

Uta’s voice broke into Leslie’s thoughts. She’d been reading a book on demonology that Wesley had recommended, and had been considering some of the information in light of the evening’s events.

Whatever the others thought of the Watcher, as suspicious as Caridad was of his attentions to Faith, she liked him. He was tough and smart, and he didn’t act as though it was at all odd for a Slayer to like to read. Sometimes she’d thought that Robin Wood had spent too long as a principal, because he seemed to have an innate suspicion of all teenagers, and generally thought that they were all stupid and uneducated.

Leslie had been an honor student before she was Chosen, so she’d resented his assumptions.

“Hear what?” she asked.

“Oh, good.” Uta came into the room and plopped onto the bed next to her. “You know, if I’d known there’d be action going on next door that didn’t involve me, I’d have picked a different room.”

Leslie’s eyebrows went up. “Things are going bump in the night, I take it?”

“Yep. Not saying I blame them, since Faith’s been gone for the last week, but I’d like to be able to sleep sometime tonight.”

She leaned over and fished around in the drawer of her bedside table. “Here.”

“Earplugs?” Uta asked. “Where did you get these?”

“For Faith and Robin. I had the room right next door to them, although they weren’t going at it all that much there at the end.”

The other Slayer crossed her legs, apparently settling in for a good, long gossip session. “You cool with being here?”

Leslie shrugged. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“I don’t know. You’ve been kind of quiet lately.”

“I heard from my parents the other day.”

They hadn’t understood her being a Slayer; her parents had wanted her to go to college, and then on to get some kind of professional degree. They’d had high hopes for her, and saving the world wasn’t included in those expectations.

“Parents are weird about this shit,” Uta agreed. “I mean, mine were cool with it, because they already knew it was a possibility, but they had a long time to come to terms with it.”

“Mine haven’t.” Leslie shook her head. “I don’t really want to talk about it.”

“You wouldn’t have to be here, you know,” Uta pointed out. “I’m not saying that I want you to leave, or think you should, but it’s a possibility.”

“No, it’s not.” That much she was sure about. “My parents always told me that it would be a shame to waste my gifts, and that hasn’t changed. I just have different gifts than they thought.”

Uta frowned. “What if you went to college here? You could, right? I’ll bet Wes would be on board for that. He seems to like books.”

It was something she’d considered, but Leslie felt that right now she had to concentrate on her training. With demons coming after them at every turn, and death a real possibility, her sole responsibility needed to be getting the most training she could. “Maybe someday.” Wanting to change the subject, she asked, “You hungry?”

“God, yes,” Uta replied fervently. “Come on. I’ll get the others, and we can stage a raid on the kitchen.” She grinned. “Maybe Wes and Faith will cool it by the time we’ve finished eating.”

Leslie just shook her head, knowing that it was probably wishful thinking on her friend’s part.

~~~~~

Fred frowned at her computer screen. She’d decided to do a little research on memory spells, and had run across a reference to the Senior Partners on one of the supernatural forums. The thread was full of references to Wolfram & Hart, mostly offering suggestions for how to avoid drawing the law firm’s attention.

What she really wanted to know was nowhere to be found, however, which was how to hurt them. Fred wanted to know how to get to them, how to stop them, if it came to a fight.

As far as she could tell, it was only a matter of time.

Among the references to the Senior Partners were mentions of a group called the BT, which Fred assumed was short for something. “The BT?” she murmured, beginning yet another search, this time focusing on that term.

It took some time, but she saw a quick post on another forum about “the Black Thorn,” but no more than that. She still had no idea who they were, what they did, or what sort of power they held. Then again, it was fairly clear that no one wanted to talk about them because of how dangerous they ostensibly were.

The knock at her door surprised her, and Fred hesitated before rising. Her confrontation with Knox had shaken her badly, more than she’d wanted to admit to Gunn. Looking through the peephole, Fred saw Charles standing there, hands in the pockets of his blue jeans. She hadn’t seem him wearing clothing this casual since they’d started working at the law firm.

“Hi,” she said, opening the door.

“Hey. I wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“I’m fine.” She stood aside to allow him entrance. “How are you?”

“Good.” Gunn stepped inside and looked around. “Cozy place you’ve got here.”

“I don’t need much,” she replied, knowing that he was referring to the fact that it was an apartment in an old Victorian house that had been subdivided. She could have gone for something much nicer, she supposed, what with what she’d been earning, but now she was glad that she’d opted for cozy.

In truth, she’d fallen in love with the dormer windows and low ceiling of the bedroom because it had reminded her of home, of Texas.

“Yeah.”

Somehow Fred knew that Charles would have chosen something posh and modern because he’d never had much. She understood that, too.

“What are you doing here, Charles?” she asked.

He wandered over to the window that overlooked a postage-stamp sized yard. “I don’t know. I didn’t really want to stay at the office late again.”

“Do you want to help me?” she asked. “I’m trying to find information on the Senior Partners and some group called the Black Thorn. I can’t find much, though.”

“Lorne got some information out of Angel today,” Gunn said abruptly.

Fred blinked. His statement had seemed to come out of the blue. “Okay.”

“The guy that called the hit on Faith is named Vail. I tried calling Wes, but he’s not answering right now, so I thought maybe we could work on finding info on him. I didn’t think that it was a good idea to do it from the office.”

“Probably not.” Fred wrapped her arms around herself tightly. “Are you happy there?”

Gunn looked at her, his eyes haunted. “No.”

“Then why are you staying?”

“I can’t leave now,” Gunn replied. “If I do, Angel won’t have anybody left there.”

“He’ll have Lorne.”

“That’s not the same.”

“I guess not.”

“What if I leave and the knowledge goes, too?”

Fred knew that he was voicing his real fear about leaving, and she thought for a moment about what it would be like to lose what she knew about physics—to be really smart, and then not to be suddenly. She knew that it would be worse than losing a limb in a way.

“You were smart before, Gunn.”

“Not like this.”

“No, not like that, but—what else did they give you, Charles? What did that memory spell do to us to make us okay with working there?” Those were the questions that haunted her the most. She wondered if she was really her, or if losing her memories had fundamentally changed her.

Gunn swallowed audibly. “I can’t lose this, Fred.”

Knowing that arguing wasn’t going to get them anywhere, she nodded. “I know. Let’s see what we can find out about this Vail guy. Maybe he has something to do with the Senior Partners or the Black Thorn, too.”

~~~~~

Wesley woke up to find Faith straddling his middle, holding him down. “You good?” she asked, as soon as his eyes focused on her.

“What—” He shook his head, realizing that he was sweat-soaked and that every muscle in his body ached.

“You weren’t kidding about the side effects, were you?” Faith asked conversationally, climbing off of him. “Stay put.”

He did as he was told, still trying to figure out why she’d been holding him down, and finally recalling the nightmare he’d been having. He’d been fighting against three demons holding him back, watching as a fourth killed one Slayer after another right in front of him.

In his nightmares, Wesley was always a failure.

“The girls told me that you got a call from your father yesterday,” Faith said.

Wesley shook his head to clear it. “How long have I been asleep?”

“Well, it’s five—in the afternoon. I’ll let you do the math, since you’re probably better at it than I am.”

He realized that it had been well over twelve hours, although he couldn’t say for sure when he and Faith had finally gone to sleep. “Why did you let me sleep so long?”

She draped a cold cloth across his forehead. “Side effects, remember? I figured that as long as you were sleeping, you probably wouldn’t be quite as miserable.”

He had to agree with that; every moment he was awake brought home just how much he hurt.

“And you didn’t tell me that you got that scratch down your arm playing human shield,” Faith added with a raised eyebrow. “Come on, Wes. You know better than that.”

“It wouldn’t have been down her arm,” he said hoarsely. “More of the poison in the system means a longer recovery time, and I’m expendable.”

She snorted. “You’re feeling sorry for yourself, you mean. I think you’ve got it backwards, moron. We have plenty of Slayers and not very many Watchers, which makes you the least expendable of all of us.”

Faith handed him a glass of water, watching as he drank greedily. “Look, I don’t know what went down last night. Caridad told me that the demon was after her, and you deliberately got in the way. If you wanted to play hero, fine, but don’t go getting a death wish on me now.”

It was a fair rebuke, he had to admit, if only to himself. In truth, Wesley hadn’t been thinking very clearly when he’d reacted; all he’d known was that he wasn’t about to give his father a reason to think he couldn’t handle being a Watcher to five Slayers.

“Sorry.”

“Whatever.” She shrugged off his apology. “You gonna be okay here by yourself for a bit? We’re heading out to see if we can’t kick some more demon ass.”

“Be careful,” he replied. Wesley would have preferred her to stay, but he knew that she had her duties, and she wasn’t naturally inclined to wait around.

Faith smirked at him. “More careful than you,” she promised, then kissed him on the forehead.

The curiously maternal nature of the gesture touched him, and Wesley found himself speechless, unable to respond.

He lay there a few minutes longer, debating on whether or not to get up or try to go back to sleep, but he was awake now. Rising slowly, feeling every ache acutely, he went to shower, hoping that the hot water would ease the soreness in his joints.

A half an hour later, he was sipping a cup of tea in his office, feeling just a bit better, and looking at the sheet of paper that Fred had delivered. Willow had suggested using an Orlon Window to bring back their missing memories, but Wesley had deliberately put the problem out of his mind while Faith was away.

All of them needed to be present for the spell—although it wasn’t much of a spell. All a person would need to do was to smash the device in the presence of all involved, and the memories would apparently come flooding back.

Wesley couldn’t deny that they likely needed those memories, particularly if they were going to find a way to get Angel out of Wolfram & Hart without harming his son, but he still hesitated. Something told him that there were things that he didn’t want to remember.

Running his fingers along the scar on the side of his neck, he took a deep breath, then began jotting down a list of the things they would need.

Perhaps restoring their memories was a mistake, but Wesley didn’t think that they had another choice at present.