Summary:  Set in Season Six, As You Were.  An old flame returns to Sunnydale and Buffy is forced to make the hard decisions. Will she have the strength to listen to her heart instead of the voices that have taken over her life?  Can a person be taught how to love by the very demon that supposedly couldn't? And is the risk of love worth the risk of hurt?

Rating: R

Disclaimer: The characters of BtVS and Angel belong to Joss Whedon.  Thanks to his generosity, I play with them as much as I can.

Beta: Many thanks to the most wonderful Holly in the world.

Chapter Two

"No more sex."

Spike stared at her like she'd suddenly declared that Glory was never defeated and they'd have to go back out and do it all again. Then he leered in that way that always cracked her resolve and resulted in the two of them rolling around the floor like two desperate dogs that couldn't let go of each other.

She refused to let it work this time.

"I mean it, Spike."  She didn't dare pout; her current foundation was still so shaky that the whole crypt could end up crumbling around her ears if she  made even one tiny little step wrong.  Trying to find the strength to resist any more of his usually successful seduction techniques, Buffy finally looked up to find a very sheepish Spike, his hands in his jeans pockets and barely able to look her in the eye.

"'S where we went wrong, yeah?"

Yeah, that's where they went wrong.  Buffy could remember it all so clearly, the powerful urge to share her waking moments with Spike, talking, joking, getting drunk.   Even the silence had been important and she'd cherished it, though she'd struggled to keep him in that part of her life that didn't quite mesh with her friends.  On the outskirts where she could easily ignore the fact she'd shared secrets with him and invited him into her life in preference of pretending t she was the same girl she'd always been for her friends.

And kicking Spike to the curb was an easy habit to fall into.  No amount of awestruck, amazed looks as she descended staircases alive could stop her from the knee-jerk reaction when things started to get too complicated.  When he started getting too close.

Still, this decision to go forward rather than cutting off what they'd had at the knees felt exhilarating, despite the incineration and debris of his lower level where they now stood.  It should have been symbolic for the relationship, but instead, Buffy felt the unfamiliar phoenix rise up from the ashes, fluff up its newly formed feathers, and give her hope.

"'S okay, we were more than just sex," Spike agreed warily, even though his voice was husky in that way that made her weak at the knees.  Already Buffy regretted setting down that condition, not having the first clue what they should actually do to embark properly on this mission.

"Yeah.  We really were."  It brought the blossom of a smile to her lips and Buffy felt freer by realising the fact.  They'd had fun with each other before she'd been stupid and kissed him.  Before Spike found out he could hurt her.  That the chip didn't recognise her as the girl he'd known before she'd died. 

She couldn't blame him for going crazy with that news.  If she'd been around her natural enemy for two years with her hands effectively tied behind her back, her first action might well have been to lash out.  He'd been frustrated with her—and really, who wasn't these days?  He was frustrated, but he'd had more invested in her than anyone else did.  Everyone else pretty much ignored her in case she was in one of those moods and would bring down anyone who dared to engage her.  Spike had saved her life, had been the keeper of her secrets, had been there every single time her friends had let her down—and she didn't underestimate the cost of that revelation.  She'd kissed him and then run away like a frightened rabbit.  He loved her and as a creature accustomed to using evil to gain what it desired, he'd done what he needed to get a reaction from her.

Fighting had always stirred her up.

Spike sighed into her hair and a delicious tingle speared down her spine. He hadn't let her go and it felt good to be in his arms.  She loved the sensation of his leather coat against her cheek; it felt like home to her now, and as such, Buffy rested her face against his chest.  She may have vetoed the sex for now—and she was seriously contemplating kicking herself all the way home over that really ill-thought out plan—but there was no way on this green earth that she was giving up these arms.  Bands of steel, so sexy with the muscles and the flesh and the...muscles, and Buffy almost moaned at how good it felt to still have access to this. 

"Right then," started Spike, eager to get the motivational talk underway.  "We can do this, yeah?  Start the ball rolling all over again, but without the fun stuff at the end." He frowned, wondering how long he could keep his hands off, especially when she was making love to his coat while he was still in it and just as receptive as always to her shape and smell.

"Maybe...maybe some fun stuff is required," she suggested in an almost panicked, squeaky voice.  "You've always got to have the fun.  Fun is...of the frolic and fun making?"  Okay, so that didn't quite work, but were they looking for miracles?  Buffy snuggled deeper into her vampire's embrace and closed her eyes.  This was so much easier than it had looked.  All those months she'd watched his arms and lamented how empty they always appeared.  It was totally her fault, she knew.  But knowing it and doing something about it when you were too terrified to breathe were two completely different things.

"Right.  So we slot some fun into the schedule," Spike suggested hesitantly; Buffy could feel his frown as it settled into her hair.  "But not too much fun, right?  Can't risk getting carried away again and blowing this all to hell."

She couldn't help it.  There were moments when Spike was so clueless and cute that there was no other option but to giggle.  Oh yeah, this could actually be lots of fun—without the physical, sweaty fun they needed to avoid at all costs.

The carefree sound was so foreign in the crypt that the shocked silence that followed it very soon became uncomfortable, and awkwardly, Buffy untangled herself and pulled away.  She felt like crying at the panicked look on Spike's face, but distance seemed necessary while they tried to put some kind of limits on this arrangement.

Still, they needed an arrangement to begin with and Buffy felt a long forgotten tingle of anticipation warm her insides.  It felt a little like the time she'd spent waiting for that first date with Riley to kick in and the giggly nervousness of then was threatening to engulf her now.  How had she gone from dread and determination to break up with Spike and banish him from her life— once and for all—to working up to an actual date with him?

The way he was looking at her proved it didn't matter.  Despite her behaviour toward him, this time she hadn't wanted to hurt him.  Now that they'd settled on a new altered course, she was insanely pleased there was no heartbreak in sight.

"Why don't we start this out easy—with something we both know and can relate to?" Spike suggested hopefully.

Buffy blinked and the image of the two of them, sitting on a blanket in the middle of the local cemetery sipping on wine and blood while flirting with each other, seemed totally ridiculous.

"Huh?"  She waited through Spike's mini-explosive temper episode and then smiled as he turned to her, his eyes imploring her to agree and not leave him standing and looking the fool.

"A date, princess.  I think we should stick to the familiar."  And then the doubt that was going to take some solid work to banish clouded his features and he asked her uncertainly, "Unless you'd prefer something different?  Flowers, movie, dancing?"

Buffy felt her throat close up and her heart threaten to thump its way out of her chest at that one, simple word.  Date.  That's what it all boils down to, people! she thought to herself almost hysterically.  Taking this to a new level—giving it a fresh beginning and room to grow meant so many things, but the one she hadn't really considered was that it meant actually trying to date.  It meant going public with what they were doing, with all their hopes and plans and possibly all the 'I-told-you-so' failures her friends would be especially quick to point out when it all blew up in her face.

Buffy paused, thinking heavy thoughts as she looked at the evidence of the last thing that had blown up in her face.  There was the potential for so much badness here and it scared her to death.  But then the doleful expression on Spike's face registered and she felt like kicking herself.  How could she make the offer of a handful of Buffy crumbs only to brush them out of his hand the next second?

Taking a breath so deep it hurt her diaphragm, Buffy slowly looked back up and met his eyes, stark terror making her appear skittish and deer-like.

"A-a familiar date is good.  Absolutely.  No need for flowers.  Um, patrol?"

Spike hit her with an obscenely knowing smirk and Buffy felt her blood pressure drop into her shoes.  "Patrol, sweetness? If that's the case, we've been datin' for years.  At the very least, wear a pretty dress for me?"

She gulped.  She could do that.  She wanted to do that, and if that wasn't a sign that the world was ending, nothing was.  She could easily remember times when she'd patrolled in cute skirts, just hoping that Angel would happen by and admire her taut legs and maybe be enticed to come a little closer.  But to want to do that for Spike implied so many things she'd been denying like crazy to herself, the first being that she wanted to be attractive to him.  Where had the days gone when she'd not cared a bit about what he thought of her?

It didn't take much to think of the day when things between them had truly changed.  She was almost ashamed to admit that it had come before the obvious admiration-inspiring event when he'd showed the depths of his loyalty to her and her family by facing certain death in saving Dawn's identity from a bitter hellgod. It hadn't been on finding out he'd continued to protect her sister and friends even though she'd surpassed any level of awareness of the deed.  It wasn't even as romantic as the day they'd spent betrothed, in love, and gushy with their happiness.  The shame came from the flutter that had started in her belly and quickly spread throughout her body the night they'd hid deep in the bowels of the hellmouth after the attack on Tara; it was avidly ignored as she'd raced across town to save Willow from a likely slaughtering.  The moment he'd admitted he'd do something foolhardy—dangerous even—in the name of love.  While Spike and foolhardy walked identical paths, it did her heart good to know that someone—even if it was a someone she'd not had the courage to even consider with a piece of her heart—thought that highly of her that they would sacrifice their life to revenge her.

Not that the sexy wounds that had covered him from head to toe hadn't left her a little breathless and off kilter.  There was just no way she'd have admitted to herself in the middle of a fight for all their lives that he did something to her blood that no soulless vampire ever should—that no other man, normal or otherwise, ever had.  Furthering this honesty trick she had going with herself, it was the violence of his conviction that had truly moved her, and Buffy realised now that she'd been seeing that on a fairly continual basis since she'd allowed him responsibility within their little demon-fighting army.

So, yeah, she'd wear a dress, even though it made the butterflies in her belly do the snoopy dance and her vaginal muscles clench with promise.  Buffy licked her lips, suddenly eager for this monumentally tradition-breaking date to commence.  There was really only one question remaining.

"What colour?"