Scene of the Crime

But I don't want comfort. I want god, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.
~ Adolf Huxley

It was late. The wrong side of midnight as Spike lay in Willow’s bed, propped up on pillows, stroking her hair as she slept. She lay in between his legs, curled around his body, her head resting on his shoulder so that his lips were within kissing distance of her soft cheek.

As he lay there holding her, he had been breathing in time with her, enjoying the Willowy scent, dampened with tears, which washed over his tongue and warmed his insides. There had been whimpers and the occasional sigh as she thought, and then later as she slept. But at least the crying had stopped. He didn’t like it when she cried. She was normally so strong and light-hearted, and the thought that she was being broken down by guilt and worry about her “sins” in the eyes of her friends was just too much.

There had been silence in the room for a long time, broken only by the soft sound of her dreams. He toyed with a strand of her hair as he tried to think of something he could tell her that would make everything better. He wished there was something that he could kill for her that would force everything back to being okay, and they could go back to having fun.

Preferably the something he killed would be blonde, whiny and slutty, but that probably wouldn’t put him into Willow’s good books.

Yet another note to self. Note 1. Don’t kill the Slayer’s friends. Note 2. Don’t fall in love with the Slayer’s friends, because now, best of all, you now have note 3 - You don’t even get to try to kill the Slayer anymore, ever, because that will upset said friend (refer to notes 1 and 2.) Well, hell, that just sucks.

The hand that was playing with Willow’s hair froze.

Don’t... fall in love with one of them?

I love her?

Spike sat very still for a moment and let this new piece of information sink in.

I... love her. I do? Yeah. I do. Of course I do, she’s incredible. Light and sweet, but baby knows just how to be bad. So young, and so much potential. It’s not just anyone would get their rocks off with a vampire. She invited me in right from the get-go.

I love her.

How about I travelled halfway round the world for her. Twice! How about she’s human, and instead of munching and moving on, I fell for her? How about I don’t ever want her to leave me, because I love her so much? You love her, you prat. How did you not figure this out sooner?

Letting go of the soft strand of hair, he cupped her chin and gently turned her head.

‘Red?’

Placing a feather-light kiss on her lips, he pulled back to look into her eyes. Willow murmured and blinked sleepily at him, a slight smile on her lips.

‘I love you.’

She inhaled sharply, her eyes opening wide, but she didn’t move.

‘What?’

‘I'm in love with you.’

‘You are?’ she asked, battling to wake up all the way, sure that she was still dreaming. This couldn’t really be happening. He loved her?

(...demons can love...)

Clawing her way up through the remaining cobwebs of exhausted sleep Willow tried to process this. She knew that he wanted her, that much was obvious. She knew that he valued, protected and desired her.

But love?

(... “blood screaming”...)

Was it possible?

Was it possible that he could feel the same way that she did?

‘I’m in love with you,’ he continued, watching her face intently to see her reaction. ‘I just realised it this second, but I've loved you for a very long time. You accept me, and you fight for me, and you make me so damn warm inside. That alone should make me want to kill you, or at least retch, but it doesn’t. I just want more. I want it all. Forever.’

‘Spike, I...’ Willow’s voice faltered.

‘It’s okay, luv, you don’t have to say anything. I just wanted to tell you. Say the words out loud, y’know? It won’t be all peaches and cream with me, you know that already, but I... I just...’

Willow laid a finger on his lips.

‘Spike,’ she said tenderly, ‘my William. You don’t need to explain it. It’s in here already.’

She lifted his hand and laid it over her heart, smiling for him in the darkness.

‘You love me?’ she asked.

Unable to answer, Spike nodded, capturing her questioning mouth in a kiss. Moaning in supplication, Willow turned in his embrace, crawling up his body letting her thigh slip over his hip as though it belonged there. With one hand she unbuttoned the soft brown shirt he was wearing, the other hand lost in her pillows, holding her up to kiss him.

Her mind a whirl, she had a had a surreal thought in passing about Spike going shopping for new shirts in England, but then all thoughts of department stores and Harrods and English shop clerks were wiped from her mind as Spike grew impatient and flipped them on the bed. She cried out at the loss of him as he drew up to pull her cotton T-shirt over her head, his own swiftly followed and then they were back together, flush against one another, writhing on the bed.

Willow was consumed by a burning need. It had been so long since she had felt this way, but he had come back to her. Spike had come back. He tore at the skirt she was wearing, growling as the heavy denim of it refused to yield. She whimpered beneath him, wanting... needing more. Shaking hands helped him to undo the ties and they were finally naked together on the bed.

Finally they were one.

‘I just wish it could be like this all the time,’ she gasped, ‘I wish the rest of the world would just go away.’

Unseen above her in the darkness, Spike’s eyes flashed dangerous yellow.

‘You mean it?’

‘Yes. Maybe. Oh god,’ she grabbed at his shoulders, pushing against the mattress with her heels to get closer to him. ‘If we could just be together, no consequences. That would be perfect.’

He lowered his head to kiss softly at the soft skin of her throat, feeling the steady thrumming of her pulse with the tip of his tongue.

‘I can make it all go away,’ he whispered, moving more slowly against her.

Willow stiffened in his arms as she felt hard ridges form against her jawbone.

‘Spike?’

‘Don’t worry, luv, it doesn’t hurt for long, I promise you that.’

Willow seized his head with both hands, yanking it up to stare at him.

‘Don’t.’

‘Don’t what?’ he teased.

She still thinks we’re playing here. Silly girl, doesn’t she know that this is for keeps? Doesn’t she know? So young, but I'll have all the time in the world to teach her learn not to trust people. That I'm the only one she can trust.

‘Don’t ever bite me.’

He laughed then, the little girl giving him orders, but it was a bitter laugh, he didn’t like to see her in pain. No matter. The pain would be gone soon enough.

‘Willow. My Willow.’

Shaking out of her grasp, he bent once more, bowing his head almost respectfully to her throat. As his fangs pierced the skin, he knew that he would have this moment forever.

‘Spike...’

Her hair spilling wildly over the pillows, Willow tried to struggle. She tried to remember any of a dozen fleeting spells that she could have used against him, but none came. There was nothing but her body and how she was joined to him. Hips where he brought her pleasure, and her neck where he brought her pain, and something more. Something she knew she would never be able to touch again as she was flowing into him, wave after wave of her essence, making him more than he had been before, just as he would soon return the favour for her.

As her world was ending, she cried out his name.

She stilled beneath him. Spike heard her ragged breathing become shallow, her pulse skitter and slow. Turning them on the bed to cradle her like a baby, he ran a razor edged canine across his wrist, and brought it to her mouth.

No reaction at first, so he shook her gently, the crimson droplets spilling over her chin. Then she swallowed, and some of her strength returned. She choked a little on the blood, looking up at him with fear in her eyes. She feared him, and it surprised him.

But there was more. Reverence, and anger. She was furious, he noted with fondness. Something flitted at the edge of his senses, telling him that he should be worried about that. But it all seemed so unimportant now.

He smiled through his tears. She loved him still, with her dying breath. Her love made him stronger and he couldn’t wait to see her again.

‘Don’t fight it. Don't fight it, Willow. I love you, baby, I love you so much.’

The End.