Ahestele
FEEDBACK: Love some.
SUMMARY: You meet the damndest people at the airport.
SPOILERS: Through Season 6. Set fifteen years after Season 6 finale.
CONTENT/WARNINGS: Some four letter words
RATING: NC-17
DISCLAIMER: Not mine, Never were. All rights to Joss, Mutant Enemy and assorted capitalist entities.
NOTES: Unbeta-ed. All mistakes are mine alone.
Spike rested his bag on the floor and stood in the middle of the living room while Xander walked around turning on lights and checking his messages.
He lived in a town house he'd found for a good price after seeing the description in the paper under 'Repos~ Property.' Not fancy, but all right. He'd have liked a yard, and a dog, but otherwise it suited him pretty well, and the neighborhood was middle class and quiet. He'd decorated the place all by his lonesome and felt pretty good about it. Over the years he'd accumulated better furniture and a decent stereo system, and actually purchased some framed comic art that he'd had his eye on since his high school days. Maybe other people developed mature interests into adulthood, and he had a few, but give him a good comic book any day. The living room set had a warm plaid pattern, the rug was simple burgundy and dark wood made up the tables. A collection of photos spread over the fireplace mantle and a large print of the Superfreinds cartoon series from the late seventies took up the space above.
It was to the pictures Spike walked, studying them in silence, and he joined him, taking in the eclectic array of frames. Here was his favorite picture from high school with Willow, Buffy and him laughing their ass off at something. A small pewter square held Giles in all his stuffy splendor and another had an older, shorter haired Slayer with her arms around a teen-age Dawn, both of them beaming at the camera. Almost hidden was a very small picture of Jesse he'd had to cut out of the yearbook because exchanging pictures was all girly and 'eww' during freshmen year, and then Jesse had been gone. The only Scooby not on the mantle was Oz, but Xander had framed an old Dingoes poster and it had it's own place of honor in the hall.
The pictures were his good memories, the ones he chose to have. The ones without snake demons and mind sucking goddesses. The ones he wished he dreamt about but didn't.
"Where are they all?" Spike asked, alabaster hand waving at the collection of photos and Xander shrugged.
"Around. The group fractured after Tara died. Willow went to England with Giles and didn't come back. I haven't heard from Oz in years, but I guess he's all right. Anya still owns the shop and does the vengeance thing. Buffy and Dawn are still in Sunnydale, fighting the good fight. Can you believe it?"
"And you came here." Spike surmised quietly. Xander nodded, turning away.
"And I came here."
"Was it hard to leave?" Spike asked in a normal tone and Xander got another hot flush of anger, illogical and fierce.
"Was it hard for you?" He rounded on the vampire and his anger fell in pieces to the ground at the bald pain in those eyes. Never mind that they had all treated Spike like a rabid dog. Never mind that he had wished for the bleached vampire to get gone with a manic fervency. Spike had wormed his way into Buffy's heart, and Spike hadn't had to watch her always looking up the road for a flash of leather and a whiff of cigarettes. He hadn't had to watch her hang on to hope with white knuckled faith, only to pry the fingers loose one excruciating year at a time. Xander had. It had taken him years to accept Buffy would never turn to him for anything more than platonic solace, and realizing he'd been hanging around waiting for just that had been hard and sobering.
"I never meant to stay gone." Spike whispered. "Went to get the chip removed then come back, but...."
"But?" Xander said, and yeah, he was pushing. The vampire had stirred up silt at the bottom of his carefully calm pond and he could just quid pro quo, and now.
"Wasn't listening too well, was I?" Spike laughed and it sounded like broken glass. "Bloody demon put me through the wringer promising me what I came for so I could give Buffy what she deserved. Teach me to overlook semantics. Before I could stop it he'd given me my bloody soul back. Then after...after it.... was bad." The voice finished almost inaudibly.
"Did you go to Angel? Him being all souled up and all." Xander pointed out and Spike gave that awful grating laugh again.
"No. I think he might have known something happened, felt it, but Dru found me first."
"Oh...shit." Xander said, then amended. "Or...shit? I thought she was the love of your life."
"So did I." Spike said in an empty voice. "She went insane with rage, tried to get me to remember, see what it had been like to do...what we did and I... couldn't...." The trembling had begun again and Xander lay a hand on one slim shoulder but Spike moved away, hugging himself in a brush of leather.
"I couldn't come back to Buffy after that. I couldn't. The things...."
"Where is she now? Drusilla?" Xander asked and Spike swallowed with obvious effort.
"She finally left. I was no fun, and she got tired of my asking her to stake me since I was too cowardly to stake myself. Made herself another pet."
"Spike..."
"I'm so tired." The vampire whispered, his shoulders actually slumping as if the narrative had exhausted him.
"Yeah. I'm beat, too. I have a guest room, or the couch, your choice."
"Thanks."
Xander left to use the bathroom because he had to get away from the vulnerability on that beautiful face. Behind the door he sighed, wondered what had possessed him to ask the vampire here. When he came out Spike lay stretched out on the couch, duster and all, and looked asleep, lashes shuttered against creamy white cheeks.
Walking quietly Xander fetched a quilt from the linen closet and lay it over the unconscious vampire. Or he guessed he was unconscious. Hard to tell without the rise and fall of breath, and he had forgotten that. Tucking the quilt around the slender man he debated whether to pull off the boots then did it. Placing the Docs next to the sofa he moved to go then paused again at the sight of the sleeping form.
He guessed even vampires looked younger in repose. That weird hair he couldn't seem to wrap his mind around floated around the curved cheekbones, framing them. His fingers tingled with the urge to touch the curls and he gave in, running his hand over soft, soft silk. When the sky blue eyes didn't open Xander continued, carding the sensous strands, feeling them slip into the sensitive dip between his fingers.
Xander searched for the animosity he'd felt with such intensity as a teen, then a young man, and found that well hollow. Besides, what better karma could there be? Take away a man's nature and spit him back out in the world. If that wasn't poetic justice what was?
With a last pet to Spike's head he climbed the stairs to his bedroom.
*******
He woke with a pressure at his back, cool, still pressure. Blinking in the dark he turned, or tried to. Whoever crawled in bed had done so over sheets and comforter and he had to wiggle, loosening them enough to move.
Spike lay curled up, sans duster, and his head had been pillowed on Xander's back. Arms crossed, legs drawn up in a fetal position the vampire lay fast asleep, skin glowing in the night. A quick glance to the bed table showed it was four in the morning. As his eyes adjusted, despite the fuzziness, Xander looked over the sleeping body and tried to figure out what to make of this. He didn't really want to wake Spike up. Sleep hadn't relinquished its hold and, even now, warm waves of slumber beckoned him back. He'd almost drifted off again when Spike awakened. He just knew. A change in the air, a stiffness to the figure on the bed. Good to know his instincts hadn't dulled.
The sky blue eyes looked black in the dark and Xander stared at the vampire, putting the ball in his court.
"Sorry." Spike whispered and Xander waited. A myriad of emotions tripped across the aquiline features then, "I was cold."
He started to mention the extra blankets in the linen closet, and prudently ignore the redundancy of a vampire getting chilly, but the words died in his throat. Spike didn't mean that kind of cold. Pained embarrassment had begun to seep onto Spike's face and he began to get up, but Xander sighed and grasped a cool, soft hand.
"Go to sleep." He mumbled. "Get under the damn covers. I'm getting all tangled up this way."
"Are you hallucinating?" Spike asked after a moment.
"Don't be an ass." He closed his eyes, not so much pretending to sleep because Spike could probably hear the heart beat and sense his wakefulness, but to signal his removal from the decision. After long minutes there was a shuffle, lifting of covers and a fully clothed slender body slipped next to his. Xander could feel the tension like a scream, but it ebbed away slowly. He drifted into slumber again as Spike relaxed, and his last thought before sleep took him was how strange it felt to share a bed again after all these years. Strange, but nice.
MORNING
His body clock woke him up at six on the dot rain or shine, weekend or workday. Xander stretched, savoring the knowledge that he could go right back to sleep because he'd blown off the seminar and this was Saturday. The room lay shrouded in darkness from the heavy drapes he'd invested in. The key to sleeping late on weekends and holidays when your internal clock clamored for action was darkness. He closed his eyes and snuggled closer to the soft body in his arms, then froze, eyes popping open.
The night before came back to him, but he distinctly remembered clothes being present. Uh-huh, he'd been in boxers but Spike had climbed in jeans and all, he remembered that. Somewhere along the way the vampire had disrobed and acres of satiny, warm skin lay flush against him, tucked into his lap, legs intertwined. Xander blinked frantically trying to figure out how to disentangle from the intoxicating presence because other parts of his body were doing what they did in the morning, and his wake-up erection had enthusiastically woken up. Stirred by the scent of musk and ash his cock got that heaviness he knew so well. Xander shut his eyes willing it to go away, because this was so not acceptable......
The sleek hips wedged against his stomach pushed gently back causing him to gasp from the contact. A deep sound came from the vampire, throaty and languorous. Trembling, Xander tried to find a safe place to lay the hand not pinned under Spike but there was nowhere. Marble white impossibly soft body all over him and he finally lay his palm on Spike's shoulders, shuddering at the yielding coolness.
The vampire sighed, arched up into his touch with a faint moan and Xander hissed at the silky contact rubbing against his chest on the sparse hair, lushly molding to his body. He felt so hard every drop of blood must be between his legs, the erection jutting and pulsing into Spike's ass, cool globes through the thin cotton of his boxers, and it had been way, way too long since he'd gotten laid.
"Spike." He said hoarsely, shaking with the effort of reining in the desire to embrace the flesh in his arms and sink into the heavenly satin. He would not take advantage of a dream, or a borrowed memory, or whatever had the man in his arms sliding all over him like a feline. Spike stopped then a hand closed around his and moved it between firm, muscled thighs to curl around the hardness there. Xander's breath left his lungs in a surprised pant.
"Spike." He tried again, strained and trembly and the vampire half turned in his arms and finally spoke.
"Yes." The lone, whispered word undid the tenuous thread holding him together and with a groan Xander enveloped the body in his arms. His fevered face caressed the smooth shoulders unmindful of his morning shadow, his hand pumped Spike's cock light and quick, moving the foreskin up and down. The vampire began to quiver from the attention, moans and sighs finding Xander's hard on and making it leak. He gripped the slender hips in his hands and pulled them down, grinding himself desperately into the firm, rounded ass, a strangled cry escaping him. Spike's hand reached back and drew him ever nearer, god so strong, and Xander ran his lips over the perfect back, kissing shoulder blades and the line of spine, the long, pale neck.
"Please Xander, please, god, please..." The mantra filtered through his desire-clouded mind and he slipped his arms under Spikes to touch his chest in expansive strokes, his fingers rising and falling on the delineated muscle. One flicked at the stiff nipples while the other dipped to travel over hard, tight stomach dusted with hair and that cock weeping moisture all over his fingers.
"God, so beautiful..." He didn't even realize he'd been mumbling the same three words until his hand reached under Spike's hardness to the tight scrotum, rolling, and the vampire's growl cut off his voice flat.
Getting the message Xander fumbled his boxers off and reached behind him for the small tube of lubricant he kept in the drawer because only he and Mrs. Palmer's five daughters had been sharing his bed for, oh, ever. Flicking open the top with his thumb he coated his fingers and tossed the tube aside. Panting, because breathing was getting difficult, he slipped a steadying hand across Spike's chest while the other inched into the velvet fissure between the soft, cool curves.
"In me." Spikes' voice was ragged. The sound hardened him even more and he slipped a finger slowly into the tight ring of muscle, breaching then entering, and the sensation almost made him come right then. Jesus, so tight, the channel clung to the intrusion, slippery and deep and he pushed further, searching, reaching, until....Spike made a guttural sound as Xander brushed the tiny nodule of nerves, then another, and then the vampire drew up his knees, opening himself more, and Xander couldn't wait longer if he wanted to. Pulling out the invading digit Spike's whimper of protest choked off as Xander slid home in one quick thrust, the soft, gentled flesh welcoming him, clasping him so tight, oh god....
Spike trembled non-stop in his arms, breathing harsh and loud and why, he didn't need air, and Jesus GOD. Every nerve in him screamed he move, drive ruthlessly deep but he tried to control himself, not wanting to hurt the slender creature he held because, blood sucker, whatever, he could wrap his arms almost twice around the slim shoulders.
"Spike...." He whispered, the effort of holding back beading sweat on his brow. "Okay? You okay?"
"Fuck me." Very little humanity lived in that snarl and instead of scaring him it exploded all his senses into razor sharp awareness. Satin and musk and fine bones beneath his hands and hot pulsing erection in his hand and he rolled his hips, thrusting, using muscles almost atrophied, it had been that long. The smooth globes met every stroke until the sound of slapping flesh accompanied their moans in rhythm. Xander lost any thread of control. The rumbling low in his groin grew with each thrust until he had a handful of honey colored curls tangled in his left fist and he bent Spike down at the waist, yes, oh fuck, even deeper. His right hand manipulated a long, sleek limb so one leg lay over Xander's thigh and he was pumping into Spike ruthlessly, almost mindless with sensation. He saw Spike scramble to touch himself, felt the frantically jerking elbow and he groaned, the sight rushing him along faster, stronger.
"Yeah, come for me..." He moaned, not knowing if the words found voice or if they only sounded in the mass of lust that was his brain. "Spike, come, ah..."
The rapidly working elbow became erratic, disoriented, and Spike cried out, a strangled, visceral sound and cool seed splashed Xander's hand where it gripped a sharp hipbone, still pumping. Vibrations from the vampire's orgasm rippled within him and Xander wrapped his arms around the panting man, trapping him, and pushed hard, once, twice, again, then his blood exploded quicksilver and he screamed and it seemed he'd never stop shooting.