TITLE: Anchor (Part 7/16)
AUTHOR: Kerry Blackwell
PAIRING: Genfic - B/S and X/A as on the show
RATING: R
SPOILERS: Through "Wrecked" on Buffy and "Dad" on Angel
TIMELINE: Imagine it's about six weeks after those episodes and the ones we saw didn't happen.
DISCLAIMER: All things Buffy and Angel belong to Joss Whedon, the WB, UPN, FOX and Mutant Enemy and 20th Century Fox Film Corporation. I own only my genius (yeah, right!)
DISTRIBUTION: My site - White Hats - http://www.whitehats.co.nz (as soon as I'm well enough to code it and upload it) Any one else please ask first
FEEDBACK: Yes please!
THANKS: To Sarah for her editing assistance, and to Sarah and Ang for being ready to brainstorm with me when I begged appropriately.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I started this after seeing "Wrecked" and "Dad". My take on what could have happened next. It got totally Jossed immediately of course and since it takes me a long time to write anything, it got more and more AU as time went by. I had hoped to post it in the break, before anything _more_ happened, but I didn't manage it. Anyway, here it is. Just forget what happened after those two episodes and read my version. Please...

CHAPTER NOTE: This is the chapter that made me decide to give this an R rating. Nothing graphic, but a frank talk about sex.

_The king was in his counting house, counting out his money._

Frank Lombardi smiled whimsically and stacked more bills on the table. He had a good feeling about this. True, he'd barely even heard of Sunnydale before being approached about this business, but he'd done his research since. He was, after all, a thorough man.

For a small town, Sunnydale had an unexpectedly high quantity – and quality – of amenities. The housing market was volatile with a steady turnover, meaning a regular influx of new blood. The town also boasted a disproportionately high number of churches, and to Lombardi, that seemed like a message from on high. He'd run some of his best operations out of God's houses.

A town like Sunnydale needed a protector. He was surprised it didn't have one already, but from now on it would.

Frank Lombardi was in town.

"We're actually going to _pay_ for the Child?"

"If necessary," the Cult Master agreed.

"Vampires don't _pay_." It was a low, dissatisfied mutter.

"For the Sake of the Child," the Master intoned reproachfully. "Any sacrifice may be made…"

"…for the Sake of the Child," the vampire finished with grudging respect. "Yes, Master. We will pay for the Child."

Gavin Park closed and locked the metal case. "It's all there," he confirmed, looking up at Lilah.

"Of course it's all there," she snapped back. "Do you think I'm so stupid as to touch it? Linwood had accounts go over it; not only did they count it, they spelled it as well. They can trace _exactly_ where it goes. I don't want them – or the Senior Partners – paying any negative attention to me, thank you." She glared at the Asian man. "Just having you around is getting me into enough trouble as it is. I never thought I'd say this, but give me Lindsey any day."

"If that's how you feel…" Gavin began tightly.

"That's how I feel," Lilah agreed coldly. "Get that locked in the safe and go out somewhere. There must be _something_ you can do in this God-forsaken little town to keep you out of my way."

Determined to stand his ground, Gavin shook her head. "I am as much a part of this team as you are. Why don't _you_ go out."

Lilah picked up her coat and slung it over her shoulders. "We are _not_ a team," she reminded him. "And I think I will." She headed for the door, stopping with her hand on the knob. "Two suites. We should have had two suites."

Gavin shrugged, and had no chance to answer before she was gone, the hotel room door slamming shut behind her. He picked up the case and went to arrange to have it stored in the hotel safe.

"That is a _lot_ of money," Robert said in awe.

Justine clicked the lock on the case and shrugged. "It's a means to an end. A way to take down the vampire. That's what it's all about."

Robert nodded obediently, but his gaze was still on the now closed briefcase. "A lot of money," he repeated softly.

Justine finally looked at him, her eyes boring into his. "Don't get any ideas," she warned in a low, dangerous voice.

"I wasn't," he protested hastily. "Really, I wasn't." Remembering what it was rumoured she'd been like when Holtz found her, the stories that went with the scar on the back of her hand, he backed off, both literally and figuratively.

"Good," she said firmly, stowing the case under the sorry excuse for a coffee table provided by the seedy motel.

Despite his best intentions, Robert's mind was still on the money. "Where did Holtz get that much money anyway? It's not like he's been building a stock portfolio."

"That's _Mr_ Holtz to you." Justine's voice was sharp, but she didn't really seem to be particularly interested in continuing the conversation. "If you must know, Sahjhan got the money."

"Oh." Sahjhan freaked Robert out more than Holtz did.

Justine, reading the thoughts crossing his face, suppressed a laugh. Robert thought he understood a lot of things, but he didn't get it at all. And unless he did – and soon – he was nothing more than vampire fodder. She'd tried to teach him, but she knew he wasn't going to make the grade.

He didn't matter. There were others out there that understood the mission like she did. Once this was done, once the child was theirs and Angelus broken, she and Daniel would find them.

Buffy leaned back in shock, staring at Giles, and was lucky the railing was there to save her from an ungainly tumble onto the grass.

"How did you know?" she gasped.

"I'm old, not stupid," Giles reminded her mildly. "And I can still do simple arithmetic."

She continued to gape at him, but as he watched, the shock seemed to slowly turn to something else. Embarrassment?

"Things Dawn wrote in her letters, things you've said and not said. Even something Xander said as we drove over. I know something's going on with Spike. Are you going to tell me what it is?"

"He can hit me without getting a headache," she said slowly, her voice small and quiet. Before he could react she spoke again, her voice even smaller and even quieter. "And we're having sex. Lots of sex."

Giles leaned back abruptly, setting the swing moving again. "All right," he conceded when he got his breath back. "I _wasn't_ expecting _that_."

Buffy sort of collapsed, sliding down the porch railing to sit on the floor, looking up at him. "You hate me now, don't you?"

Giles sighed. "Didn't we just have this conversation? I don't hate you. I do wonder about your taste in boyfriends, I admit, but I don't hate you."

Buffy managed a choked chuckle in that. "I think _I_ hate me," she said slowly. "I mean, _sex_. With _Spike_."

Giles looked at her, his expression carefully shuttered. "Which bothers you more?" he asked her. "The sex? Or Spike?"

She stared, not understanding. "It's terrible," she said, refusing to meet his gaze completely. "Disgusting and degrading and totally perverse, and I cannot believe I am having this discussion with you."

"Well, we're going to have it," Giles said firmly. "As much, as I can't believe it either, we are definitely going to have it." He got off the swing and went to sit beside her so that they could each look the other in the eyes, heads at the same height. Equal. "Because I think you need it."

"To talk to you about having sex with Spike."

Giles shook his head. "To talk with me about having _sex_. We'll leave Spike out of it for now and come back to him later."

"That's an interesting image," Buffy commented before she could help herself, and Giles laughed.

"Oh, thank you," he chuckled. "That is a visual I really did not need."

Serious again, he caught her chin in his hand and turned her head so that she had to look at him. "Buffy, sex isn't bad. Under the right circumstances, it can be magic. It can be communication and understanding and touching another person on the deepest level. It can be about touching life and banishing fear, even death." He smiled. "And even leaving that aside, it generally feels bloody good."

"Bloody good," Buffy echoed softly.

"I know your first time turned out to be…" Giles hesitated, more uncomfortable with the concept of Buffy with Angel than he was thinking about her and Spike.

"The end of the world?" she suggested.

"I was going to say traumatic," he corrected. "Tell me if I'm prying, but do you really even remember the _sex_ with Angel, or just the aftermath?"

Buffy blinked, surprised. "Afterwards," she admitted after thinking for a moment. "How big a mistake I made and how bad I must have been."

"Bad?" It was Giles turn to blink. He pushed his adult sensibilities aside and tried to recapture some portion of the youth he had been, the one who could have – and had had – this kind of conversation without hesitation. "You mean a bad lover?"

Buffy nodded miserably.

"What were the stipulations of the curse?" he asked her seriously.

"If we have sex, Angel loses his soul," Buffy answered, not understanding where Giles was going with the question.

"No." Giles shook his head. "It was that if Angel experienced a moment of true happiness, he would lose his soul. Since he did, what does that tell you?"

"I was good?" Buffy asked slowly.

"You must have been perfect," Giles said simply.

"Oh." Buffy was silent, digesting that concept. "Oh."

Giles waited, wondering what was going on in that brain of hers. Buffy had an extraordinary gift for making the simple outrageously complex, and the complex, simple.

"But Parker didn't want me."

Giles, once again, had to push down the urge to go out and strangle Parker Abrams. He'd seriously considered it two years ago and the idea had its merits even now, especially since he doubted the boy would even remember who Buffy was.

"Buffy, Parker Abrams was an immature ass, who was so busy trying to sleep his way through the entire female population of Sunnydale University that he couldn't see a good thing when it came up and hit him over the head." He remembered Buffy, barely coherent and drunk on 'cave beer', thumping the boy with a large branch. "Literally," he added with a grin.

Buffy managed a small smile at that. "He deserved it," she said firmly, before her voice faltered again. "It's just, they always leave me."

Again, that urge to bang some young male heads together.

"Riley left too, and I thought he'd stay. He loved me."

Ouch. Another sore point. Another bad relationship.

"Buffy, a relationship is a two way street. Even without a long-term emotional commitment, if two people have an understanding and both want to sleep together, there's a place for that. It's when it becomes uneven that the troubles start. If one wants love and commitment and forever, and the other doesn't, something has to break." He gave her a serious look. "Did you really love Riley, Buffy? The way he wanted you to."

"I loved Riley," she insisted defensively. "I did." A moment later she sighed and shook her head. "I couldn't love him the same as he loved me. He'd have swallowed me up whole."

"So, in the long run, would it have been better if he'd stayed?"

"I guess not," Buffy conceded sadly. "But Giles, it hurts. It hurts every single time."

"That's because you're a caring and sensitive person, even if you feel you've lost touch with that. If you didn't care at all, you couldn't be hurt."

"Not being hurt is okay."

Giles shook his head. "Not being loved, not being able to love, that's worse, Buffy."

"I guess." She was silent, staring out into the night, thinking. He saw something cross her face, an expression he couldn't read, and waited to see what was going to come next. Buffy dropped her head, and spoke while staring down at her hands. "Giles, with Riley… I mean, it was nice, you know?" She looked up shyly. "But it wasn't bloody good."

"And it is with Spike?" he asked, understanding where she was saying. He wasn't sure if he liked the implications of that or not, but he was trying to help Buffy work through past issues here, not tell her what he thought she should or shouldn't do next. He'd promised he wouldn't judge her, and he wouldn't.

"Bloody, bloody good," Buffy admitted in a whisper. "He makes me feel so _good_. So _alive_. It's _never_ been like that with anyone else." Her face flushed scarlet. "But Giles, the things we do – I think they've got to be bad. I mean…"

"Would you like to tell me?" Giles asked ironically. "I doubt you can shock me. I'm sure I'll have heard it all before. And I've probably done most of it."

Buffy's eyes went as round as saucers at the thought. A moment later, she relaxed a little. "You mean when you were being Ripper, right?"

"Actually, yes," Giles conceded. "But I might have been last week. Why should it be any different?"

"You've been having orgies in England?" Buffy squeaked.

"You've been having orgies in Sunnydale," he pointed out.

"That's different," she said automatically.

"Why?"

"Well, because…"

"Because I'm old and it's very gross?" Giles suggested ironically.

"No," she answered quickly. "It's just…" She was silent as she thought about it. "It isn't different, is it?" she said slowly.

"Not really," he agreed.

More silence.

"Buffy, in and of itself, sex is not a bad thing. You've had bad experiences that have made you think that, but it's not. It's a good thing, with lots of shadings and nuances and levels. But it can be used as a weapon, and I think that's when it is its most dangerous. _That's_ when sex is bad – when it is used to hurt and abuse another, either physically or emotionally. And I don't see you as the type of person to stand for that kind of relationship."

Although, with Spike and in the state she had been when he left… He felt a sudden, sick dread settling in the bottom of his stomach. "Spike…" he started slowly.

Buffy understood immediately what he was asking, which did nothing to ease his fears.

"Not really," she said after a moment. "I mean, he's Spike, so yes. But less than me."

She flicked a glance at Giles, and was relieved to see his face remained just Giles' face, the one that could be mad and proud and frustrated and annoying and impossible to live without all at the same time. Not judging, not speculating, just watching. Watching _her_, like always.

She sighed. "He gave as good as he got," she explained. "Or I gave as good as I got. Or something. He pushed me around because I pushed him around." She looked up again. "And Giles… it was _good_. 'Cause I didn't have to pretend and I didn't have to hold back and I didn't have to act happy. I can just be _me_, warts and all, and Spike doesn't care. And yeah," she finished shyly, "it feels bloody good."

"He's not…" Giles fished for words. "Taking advantage?" he settled on finally.

"Nah," Buffy answered. "Well, I guess a bit. I mean, hello, vampire. But…" She frowned and swallowed. "If anybody's using anybody, I think…" Another hesitation, while Giles waited patiently, knowing they were getting to it now. "I-think-I'm-using-him-and-not-the-other-way-around," she finished all in a rush.

She was twisting a strand of hair around her finger as she talked now, the nervous motion unusual for her. "I didn't want to admit it, but he really loves me, Giles. And I've been treating him like shit, just to stop feeling so dead inside. I kept telling myself 'evil vampire', so I didn't have to think about what I was doing to him, but…" She sighed again. "But that's not right."

"While, in all honesty, I rather like the idea of Spike getting kicked around, you're right. It's not right." Giles gently took her hand, loosening her hair and closing his fingers around hers. "Because of what it'll do to you. Keep treating people like that – even Spike – and you will become hard inside like you've always been afraid you might."

Buffy stared down at their joined hands. "So, what do I do about Spike?" she asked.

"You have to decide that," Giles said seriously.

"Can I ask for an opinion?"

"Do you really want it?"

Buffy nodded. "Yeah, I do. And I'll actually listen this time."

He laughed. "You just won't necessarily do as I say."

"You're the one who said I had to make my own decisions," Buffy pointed out with a sudden grin.

"Stake him or love him, Buffy. I don't think there's any middle ground. You can't go on like you have been."

"No, I can't," she agreed slowly. "Because I came back to life this week. And I won't be that dead person any more."

"Do you love him?" Giles asked quietly.

"It's Spike," Buffy answered blankly. "Soulless vampire, you know?"

"That's not what I asked."

"I don't know," she admitted.

"Then think about it."

She did. She sat there on the front porch, her hand still resting in Giles' larger one, and thought about it for the first time, instead of just reacting.

"Some," she said finally. "Not like I loved Angel, more than I loved Riley, I think. And different. It's totally different." She was almost talking to herself now as she tried to make some sense out of it all. "It's about passion and fire that blows up in a moment. It's not about settling down and spending winter evenings by the fire and planning where to go for holidays. It's about now. And only now." She frowned. "For me, anyway."

"So, what do you do about Spike?" Giles asked, turning her own question back on her.

Buffy shrugged. "Go and talk to him. Tell him I won't be his punching bag, but I won't make him mine either. See what happens next." She smiled suddenly. "Keep living."

Giles nodded. "Keep living, Buffy."

She nodded, the smile remaining, instead of fading away in a second like it usually did.

"Giles, please pinch me and tell me I'm dreaming, because I think we just had a very long, and totally civil discussion about my sex life. Not even my love life, my _sex_ life."

"You're not dreaming," he assured her. "Did it help? Because if it did, then it was a good conversation to have. If it didn't…" He shrugged. "Well, if it didn't, it didn't."

"It did," Buffy assured him. "I haven't got everything sorted, but I've got a lot to think about." She gave him another, almost shy look. "So you think I'm good, huh?"

He wasn't going to let her get away with that. "I'd need to try before I buy," he told her wickedly.

For a second, she looked totally shocked, then, to his huge relief, she started to laugh. "I'm not for sale, mister." She hugged him, back to rib-cracking strength again, and whispered, "Thanks, Giles."

"You're welcome," he managed to gasp before his oxygen flow was too severely restricted.

"Ooops, Slayer strength strikes again." She didn't sound particularly concerned, just hugged him once more for good measure before letting him go and standing up. "But let's get one thing straight. We are _never_ going to tell anyone else about this conversation," she warned darkly.

"Because you're ashamed?" Giles asked, wondering if this entire, uncomfortable conversation had all been for nothing after all. "Because you're embarrassed?"

"A little embarrassed, now I'm thinking about it," Buffy admitted. "But that's not why. You're right. I don't have to be ashamed. But it's none of anybody else's damn business except my own."

Giles laughed, sure now that the insane trip across the Atlantic and the credit card bills he'd be paying off for the next year had been worth it. "Cross my heart and hope to die," he promised.

NEXT