destructo-girl.com

"The Only"

Author: Gail Christison
Email: chriscln@ozemail.com.au

Buffy pressed the bloodstain into her bleeding wrist until the pain was palpable and repeated each phrase as Tara chanted. Every word felt like a heartbeat, faster and faster until her wrist was throbbing, the connection blossoming into an overwhelming, searing presence.

"Giles..." she whimpered softly when the last words were uttered and Willow gave the command.

Reality faltered, and the room became a blinding blue entity, without form, without substance...only amorphous surges of energy grasping and enveloping her. For a moment she struggled and then, between breaths, she wasn't.

Buffy blinked and shook her head, turned in panic, then exhaled heavily. Behind her, the portal had contracted to a small blue pulse of light, but it was still there.

Relieved, she reached out experimentally and grazed the light with her fingertips, watching, fascinated, as blue tendrils flared and embraced her whole hand. She pulled back quickly, and turned, cradling her throbbing wrist, her heart dropping as she realised that Giles was still missing.

He should have been there. A part of her had harboured the hope that the portal would open and he would be there, look up and see her...and smile. And they would go home together.

Instead the place looked like something out of a Tarzan movie and there was no sign of Giles, or of anything other than jungle and creepy crawlies and...more creepy crawlies. After a few steps her wrist began to burn and the throb turned to pounding. She rubbed it and looked around.

Several yards away she found what looked like the remnants of a campsite. There wasn't anything to say definitively that Giles had been there...except...just maybe the torn pants-leg tied at the bottom, hanging on the side of the lean-to. She went straight to it. Pity he no longer wore tweed. Would have made it much easier to identify in these days of so many demons spending so much time on Earth, living like Humans, wearing Human clothes...

Her arm throbbed and that connection flared. Her eyes widened at the strength of it.

She looked around, unable to shake the thought that he wasn't in them, and trying desperately to block any thought of losing him...of never being able to tell him.

There was only one other path out of the small clearing and it looked well used. Buffy followed it to a pretty stream and didn't try to hide her disappointment when he wasn't there either. Still blinking away moisture, she hiked some distance upstream without finding anything, then the same distance in the other direction before returning to the campsite dejectedly.

The big cat stared at her through the undergrowth, two large emerald eyes flashing in the filtered sunlight.

It shrugged its way out of the bushes and padded into the open without taking its eyes off her.

It growled low in its throat, as though agreeing with her, and continued to stalk toward her.

Only a few yards away, Giles stirred at last, groaning as his head throbbed, then freezing when he heard the low growl. He was on his feet and staggering towards his camp on adrenaline-autopilot, before he realized what he was doing. Another growl pinpointed the beast's location. He stopped at the edge of his campsite, stunned.

The cat turned towards him and sprang. Buffy moved almost instantly, intercepting it in mid-air, much to the horror of the barely functional Watcher.

But she was too busy, arms and legs wrapped around the huge, muscled body until they both hit the ground, then her hands were clutching its head desperately, trying to prevent it from wrapping its great jaws around her throat.

Buffy used all her strength, and one foot as a lever, to roll them both so that she was on top. As it thrashed she squeezed her knees together with all her Slayer strength.

Frantic, Giles scrambled across the camp to find his stone knife and ran unsteadily back to where Buffy and the cat still struggled, the Slayer's back slashed through her shirt now from the feline's frantic back legs trying to dislodge her and her arms locked straight, trying to keep it from tearing her jugular out.

Then he heard the crunch. The cat let out a horrifying howl of agony and its back legs went limp.

Buffy sobbed and twisted the helpless animal's neck swiftly, so that it didn't suffer any more than necessary.

Only a couple of feet away, Giles dropped to his knees then collapsed in slow motion.

She made a desperate sound. She had missed him so very much, even before he'd gone missing. Nothing had been the same without him. She slid to her knees beside him, unheeding of her own wounds.

Buffy frowned as she looked him over, unconsciously shaking her arm to relieve the agonizing pounding in her wrist, the searing of the skin. And then it registered. She raised it very slowly to stare at it, the first flicker of real recognition flaring in the grey-green eyes before they widened in stunned shock. How could she have been so incredibly blind all this time? And why the hell did Spike, even when he was being a total creep, always see things so much more clearly than everyone else?

His body was warm to her touch and his breath tickled the spit-dampened fingers she held under his nostrils for a moment.

Frantically, she stroked his face, his brow, pushed his hair out of his eyes so that she could see them, all the while talking to him softly, calling to him. He didn't rouse.

"Giles!" she called more loudly and lifted him by his shoulders. His hidden, stubble-covered cheek was scratched, and there were more scratches and grazes on his chest as she turned him. He was still damp, including his hair. That was why he was naked. He must have been bathing when the portal opened. She called his name again as she tried to prise his boxer shorts from his hand and tried not to think about the other.

Beneath their lids, his eyes began to move and the fingers tightened on the shorts.

"Giles...Rupert!" Buffy called again, willing him to wake up, hoping the shock of hearing his name on her lips might jolt him somehow. It had certainly jolted her...

Giles blinked. He had a headache that would fell an elephant, and the light hurt. He squinted.

His breath caught, adrenaline shooting through him. He was still hallucinating. He had to be. It wasn't possible. He wasn't even in the right country...er...whatever. Perhaps he was concussed again...

He focused. "Buffy...?" he breathed, his fingers reaching out unconsciously to touch her cheek for a moment. "My God...how...?"

For a long, long time Giles simply stared. A part of him wanted to reach out and drag her to him, to cry out with joy, but it couldn't be. He had to be hallucinating or concussed or worse.

He started to smile. Then colour flooded into his lean, pale face and the smile faded. He lifted her hand to look at it, carefully tracing the scarring on her knuckles with a trembling finger before letting go.

He searched her face, the hurt in her eyes, the confusion. How could he ever tell her the real reason he left...?

He looked away again, then frowned and looked down at himself. His eyes widened and the colour drained from his face once more.

"Good lord!" he exclaimed, mortified, and rolled onto his stomach again, groaning loudly when the movement made his head hurt more.

When he closed his eyes she stared for a long moment, then found herself stroking his hair again. "It doesn't matter. Let it go," she said softly.

She smiled self-consciously at him, remembering her reply to Spike, a part of her wanting to snatch her fingers away. "I can't believe I found you. It seemed so impossible."

"Nor can I," he agreed, warmth returning to his eyes in spite of himself. She was so much more alive than he remembered. "I just wish I'd been better dressed for the occasion."

"I don't know," she teased, finally pulling herself together. "Looking pretty good there, well, except maybe for the beard and the...um...soapless-ness. Are you feeling well enough to put those shorts on so I can help you out of here?"

He nodded sheepishly. He would have said yes even if he'd been about to pass out.

After considerable rustling and some muffled swearing she turned back. He had the damp shorts on but he was on one knee, breathing heavily and looking decidedly green.

Without thinking, she went straight to him, knelt, and felt right through his hair from his temples to the back of his neck, looking for a bump.

Giles, whose eyes had closed again, not from pain this time, shook his head very gingerly. "I'll be fine. I was just knocked out earlier. Nothing lasting, just another bloody headache."

She withdrew her fingers, trying not to think about the intimacy of the contact or their nearness to each other.

He, too, grew awkward, looking down at the ground, clearing his throat and looking up again, endearingly reluctantly.

Buffy smiled again, unaware both of the radiance lighting her face, or the warmth in her eyes. She had missed him so very, very, much...and her heart was beating so very, very fast...

He was barely aware that he'd spoken aloud, but she heard the wistfulness, the need in those two words, even as she felt the pounding of her wound redouble, her skin burning like fire as warmth spread right through her. Blood trickled down her arm.

Impulsively, perhaps instinctively, she reached out and laid the bleeding wrist against a deep scratch at the base of his throat.

Giles gasped as the fire spread to his skin, the pounding like drums against his chest.

"Dear God!" he managed before the sudden, extraordinary connection finally subsided to a vibrant, yet infinitely comforting presence.

Buffy shook her head then hesitated, as though a little frightened of her own actions.

"Dear Giles," she corrected softly and whispered, "I knew it was going to hurt when you left. I just didn't know how much," before laying her cheek against his rough one.

There were no words. If he were dreaming, then let his life be a dream. Nothing on Earth could make him let her go again. He slid his arms around her and crushed her to him as her embrace became fiercer.

"Last time I was so glad to see you I'd have gladly curled up in your arms and stayed there, forever. I didn't get it then, but I do now, finally. Giles, I don't want to live without you any more."

Giles stiffened a little and lifted her away, missing the feel of her against him almost immediately.

Her eyes met his and held them, open, clear, and at last, honest...and, for the first time in a very long time, truly vulnerable.

"Oh..." he whispered, staring back at them almost in wonderment, his fingers extending to caress her cheek once again, as though to confirm the reality of her.

"Very big," he agreed, still finding his equilibrium while lost in the sea of soft grey-green.

Buffy drew herself up so that she was only inches from his face, terrified of what she was about to do, but wanting it more than she'd ever wanted anything. Nothing had ever felt more right...

His eyes flashed and his face changed from amazed bemusement to resolve and purpose. Buffy couldn't know, but his heart was almost smashing itself out of his chest, which was being crushed by bands of sheer terror. Nothing could have prepared him, no amount of dreaming or yearning prepared one for the reality...the point at which you reach out and touch your dreams...and risk shattering them into a million pieces.

Giles lowered his head very slowly as her face lifted to his, hesitated millimetres from the tender mouth, in one last, painful moment of apprehension, before the point of no return was passed and he kissed her for the first time.

As they merged into one, the connection between them flared again and embraced them so overwhelmingly that not even the hovering arachnid, nor the slithering creature sliding past them, inches from their knees, penetrated it.

When they eventually, reluctantly, separated, they each searched the other's face, as though afraid it wasn't real.

"It was real," Buffy told him, as though she could read his thoughts and not just his emotions. "I have the whisker burns to prove it," she added whimsically then grew serious again. "Are you scared?"

Giles shook his head, unable to keep the glow from his eyes. "When did you get so old?"

"Sometime between you asking me if I hated you and coming back from...coming back to find you gone and finding out you were leaving, again."

Buffy understood immediately what he meant. "They couldn't know...any more than I could ever hate you."

He smiled then in a way that melted her heart. "I am selfish enough to be glad you're back, regardless," he admitted, emotion flooding his face. "So very, very glad."

She traced his jaw. "So am I," she whispered. "Until now I never thought I would ever say that. But..." she brushed his lips with hers. "So am I." She smiled again. "We should go home."

Giles' grin widened almost beatifically. "Home," he repeated reverently then looked down at himself. "After we find my pants," he added ruefully.

Buffy giggled and got to her feet, lent her Slayer strength to help him to his, and steadied him while he found his balance.

They walked to his lean-to together and he slipped on his cut down shorts while Buffy inspected his digs properly.

Giles halted alongside her and looked down at the broken fish-trap she was standing over.

She frowned. "About six days in normal time," she guessed and looked him up and down. "You?"

"At least time in this dimension passes only a little faster than ours. God knows how long I really lost in that fun demon dimension I managed to spend part of my last summer in high school in."

"Old history," Giles told her. "I think it's time to go home and plan some new history of our own."

When they stepped through the portal, the first face they saw was Dawn's, but to Buffy's surprise, she didn't come forward. She could see how excited and relieved she was, could see the tears in her eyes, but the girl stood back quietly while the others greeted Giles, all except Willow embracing him and joking about his general un-Giles-like state of dishevelment, malodorousness and undress.

Buffy watched with interest as Phillip and Giles shook hands. It was obvious that they had a history, and that they were good friends. They spoke for several minutes while the others quizzed her about the rescue.

And then they were all gone, just as swiftly. Xander and Anya took Willow and Tara home when Willow made it clear that she wanted to go, and Phillip returned to his hotel with a promise from Giles to meet him there the following day for lunch.

Buffy turned, grinning, to Giles, sitting wearily in an armchair and now wearing the oversized Hockey T-Shirt Buffy sometimes used as a night shirt, over his grubby shorts.

He smiled back, about to answer, when Dawn reappeared carrying a mug, and handed it to him. He breathed in the aroma blissfully. "Tea," he sighed. "You are a wonder, young Dawn," he told her with great affection, holding her gaze with warm eyes before succumbing and savouring the long-dreamed-about beverage.

When he was done he put the cup down, rose, and smiled at the younger girl again. "Thank you," he said softly, his eyebrows rising as her eyes filled with tears.

He laughed and held her close as she wept. "What's this?" he asked gently. "The Summers tough-guy wetting my shirt front?"

Dawn giggled into the shirt soggily and looked up. "I missed you. I didn't think Buffy would find you. Don't go away again."

Giles touched her face. "You don't need me, love," he told her, and looked up at Buffy, "but I'm not going anywhere."

At that Dawn seemed to relax. "Make sure you don't," she admonished, straightening and wiping her face with the back of her sleeve. "God, you smell bad. I have to go and see Melinda."

"I know," Giles said softly. "I didn't want to leave her, but I...I simply couldn't stay here any longer, and I knew Willow and Tara would care for her. And of course the last time, you were..."

"Yeah, well, I really don't think it was that simple. Still, I think I'll let you be guilt guy about that one."

She found him the most luxurious bath sheet in the house. "Only the best. You need to be spoiled a little," she told him, pressing it into his hands outside the bathroom door.

"Oh, I've needed to be spoiled for a very long time," he told her humorously, but his green eyes were burning with something that sent a shiver down her spine.

Buffy's breath caught. Not only because she was stunned to find herself wanting to kiss him again, but from the realisation that there truly hadn't been anybody to spoil Giles in a very, very long time.

Even though she knew he was teasing, a rock formed in the pit of her stomach, mostly from the knowledge that it had never even occurred to her in the past. He had been in Sunnydale for what seemed like forever, and yet, except for Jenny, whom she'd managed to get killed, he'd had no-one, least of all her, to 'spoil' him. Olivia she refused to count, since a waving a few days out of a whole year at him, then announcing that his life was too much for her, seemed more like torment than spoilage.

"Knock yourself out," she said hoarsely. "T-take a bath if you want. I'll...I'll make you some f-food."

Giles watched her go wondering what could have caused the distressed look on her face and whether or not he should ask. Eventually he looked at the towel in his hands and sighed. Then he turned to the shower. After a beat the perplexed look on his was softened by the hint of a grin.

The mains pressure hot water blasted blissfully onto his back and the soap cut through every millimetre of grime. Even Buffy's shampoo felt like a decadent pleasure. Shaving with a lady's shaver, even with a new blade to replace the extremely suspect looking object that was already in it, was an experience. Between the roughness of his beard and the unfamiliar action of the razor it took far longer than usual, but he was more than pleased with the result.

When he emerged, much, much later, with the bottle green bath sheet tucked around his waist, Buffy was waiting with an armful of clothes and there were delicious smells in the air. So much so his stomach was threatening to make a dash for the kitchen without him.

"Xander came back," she explained. "He figured you'd be needing some clothes, so they picked some up from the mall."

There were jeans and a shirt, a sweater, and both socks and underwear still in their packages.

When the package was opened she started to giggle. It was quite obviously something Anya would like for Xander. Giles held up the black lycra g-string and sighed when the giggling increased. He had gotten quite used to going commando. One more day wouldn't hurt...

Buffy smiled approvingly when he re-emerged from the bathroom. It was obvious that Willow and Tara must have helped with the clothes, because he looked beyond good in open-necked black silk shirt and black jeans. Both were a little loose on his slimmer frame.

She looked down at his bare feet, a size and a half bigger than Xander's, and frowned. "I guess the guys didn't have your size. We'll have to buy you some shoes tomorrow."

"Most certainly," he agreed. "And I'll have to come up with a plausible reason why I'm in the country illegally, and without a passport."

"Or we could call Angel Investigations and they could find you some papers and a passage of some kind back to, well, England...if you want..." she trailed off.

Giles could almost hear her withdrawing again and sighed inwardly. It was too much to hope that the rush of blood back in the forest might mean anything more than just that.

He reached out and touched her cheek. "That would be one option," he agreed and watched her begin to smile again. Then he turned red when the tender moment was interrupted by an almighty rumble from his stomach.

Buffy giggled again, a sound he hadn't heard in far, far too long. "Come on Jungle-dude, your body is mutinying from lack of food. I made some stuff."

By the time Giles had worked his way through eggs, bacon, toast, an entire pot of tea and a stack of pancakes, it was obvious that he was getting sleepy.

She cleared away as he sipped at some previously untouched orange juice, feeling more content than she had since before her mother's death. Normally Buffy and cooking were truly un-mixy things. It surprised her how much she wanted to do that for him, and how much she had enjoyed it, not to mention the look on his face when he saw the food.

"Lord, I've been a glutton," he said good-humouredly a while later, stretched and rubbed his midriff.

"You lost weight," Buffy said quietly, eyeing his stretched out form. "I thought you had when I first saw you, but now, here, it's more real, y'know?"

He nodded. "It's nothing. I shall very likely end up fat, now that my body thinks its in survival mode."

"What did you eat?" she asked, soothed by the sound of his voice and still trying desperately to understand what was happening to her...to them.

He chuckled. "At first some raw mussels that tasted rather like rubbery squid. Then, gradually, I discovered a few fruits, some nuts, seeds. Just before you came I even managed to find some eggs and to catch my first fish."

She smiled back, trying to ignore the desire to just go to him. "Wow. Not only majorly smart and good with the weapons and the Slayer teaching-ness, but a major survival guy too. Maybe you should go on one of those TV shows?"

Giles snorted. "Not likely. I've never seen such voyeuristic rubbish. I don't know what society is coming—"

Buffy had raised her hand in smiling self-defence. "And we don't care," she pointed out, in over-enunciated syllables.

Her smile grew wider as he ducked his head a little again. He was so very much the Giles she remembered, the one from before all the relentless badness that had paraded through their lives since high school, that she was tempted to just throw herself back into his arms.

"Were you...were you alone before you came to Sunnydale?" she asked unexpectedly.

Giles regarded her with those perceptive green eyes of his. "You are wondering whether I gave anything up for you. Yes I did. I gave up that life for this one. Do I regret it? Never. Did I miss it? Like hell, sometimes. One does, when one's entire social life is a school library, jelly donuts and copious demon research...oh..." he smiled, "and let's not forget the periodic bangs on the head."

"But...you had us," she said quietly, remembering so many times when they were all together, researching, fighting, training...

Buffy shivered. It should have been hokey and melodramatic, but the way he said it, so calmly and with such a dark undertone, made it a truth, a curse and an indictment rolled into one. She wanted to drop her eyes, to look away, but she couldn't.

Not for one more moment could she deny what was in the green fire holding her in thrall, any more than she could deny the need to feel the mouth she'd never realised was so sensuous before, against hers once again.

"About wh-what happened, back in the jungle..." she began nervously, at a loss as to how to recapture that moment now.

Giles' eyes widened, and Buffy suddenly saw withdrawal and even hurt in them. "Yes?" he said quietly.

Her heart dropped. He thought she was pulling away...probably even expecting a patented Buffy 'eiww' for good measure...

She rose and went to him then, slid her arms around his shoulders and lowered her head before he could open his mouth to protest.

The kiss began tentatively, but within seconds the residue of the link between them throbbed to life and with it the flames both had been holding in check since that moment in the jungle.

She sat back and bit her lip, a part of her wanting to curl up and die. "Was I wrong?" she asked quietly.

She held up her wrist then silently traced the wound at his throat without taking her eyes from his.

"No..." he whispered, and closed his eyes for a moment. "But you...we...you never..."

Buffy struggled against the instinctive urge to withdraw as the hurt of his continued doubts washed over her. A part of her knew it was her own fault, that she had made him this way but...

She knew now what she wanted...whom she wanted and was determined not to be the one who did the hurting this time.

"No, I never...not even after you left, not right away. Even then I couldn't admit it, even to myself. All that pain...I just let it...be about people leaving me...but this time wasn't about that, not really...it was about you, about...us."

"There's this, too," she said, holding up her wrist. "It's a spell to locate a lost lover. Kind of hard to ignore that when your arm is burning up and pounding like a rock band just because you're close to this guy you've been crying yourself to sleep over periodically ever since he walked out of your life..."

Giles half-smiled, almost sadly. "I think we both know I had to go...but it's nice to know one wasn't entirely alone."

Buffy felt her eyes prick at the very idea of Giles being as miserable as she had been, and was unable to stop the moisture that sprang into them.

"Not entirely," she agreed, remembering the nights she'd cast herself into bed after patrol, after pretending everything was okay, that she could cope with the house, the Slaying, Dawn...and cried herself to sleep knowing he wasn't there, that he wasn't going to be there to train her, joke with her, that he might never again be there to speak softly, as only he could, to her, when her heart most needed it...

Why had it taken her so long to understand why they were able to hurt each other so much...?

Eventually Buffy couldn't bear it any longer. "S-so what does a girl have to do to get the guy she loves to say something?" she said awkwardly.

Giles' eyes grew wide, his heart pounding again, but he watched her warily. "I think you already know that," he told her softly.

"Me? Know? Giles...Rupert..." She paused, and smiled a little at how that sounded. "I'm the most clueless person on the face of the planet. Spike even tried to tell me...and way before that Xander told me there was someone waiting for me...but I could never see...well, except maybe that time you came back from England and I almost busted three of your ribs. Sorry about that, by the way," she added sheepishly, and added, summarizing: "You should know by now that I don't know diddly," but held his gaze, afraid to lose him again.

It was obvious she was searching for words. Then she frowned, frustrated. "What's wrong with us?" she demanded. "In the jungle...we ...we both felt it, so why is this so hard?"

Giles seemed to turn inwards for a moment. "Perhaps it's the fact that in your life I've always been more than a little invisible, perhaps even a little too old...or there's the wacky notion that you've always appeared to prefer pretty much any young man, even vampire, who payed the slightest attention to you, to spending even the briefest time with me."

Too much of what he said hit home. She tried to shut out the memories of Parker, the extreme mental gymnastics she went through to convince herself to go out with Riley, the unhealthy experiment with Spike...but she couldn't. Then...Angel's face supplanted the rest. She considered it for the longest time, the initial pleasure of it gradually overwhelmed by the realisation that she had, finally, outgrown even the memory of him. It was kind of scary to realise that the once great passion of her life was now little more than the memory of a schoolgirl's first love. And the rest...the rest...

"You didn't know?" he prompted, when she continued to stare at him, lips parted, eyes stunned.

"You," she said simply. "It...it didn't just happen. I didn't know that none of the others were ever going to work...because you were always..."

"Angel," he whispered, hating even the sound of it on his lips, but unable to let it go.

Buffy nodded. "I'm not gonna lie to you. He was the first..." She went to him, swallowed as she gathered all her courage to look up at him again. "But you...God, Giles, you're the only..."

For a moment Buffy was devastated. Then she saw the hunch of his shoulders, the tenseness of his body just as she was hit by a surge of roiling emotion through the link that had been forgotten in all the excitement. She could feel his joy, the stunning power of his love for her, his desire, and most of all his fear: fear that after all this time, and all that life—and she—had done to him, that if he were to reach out for happiness with both hands, he would be slapped down, yet again.

With all her strength, and with her heart wide open, she concentrated on showing him through the link, what, in the context of her history of stupidity where he was concerned, she could never convince him of with words alone.

Buffy heard his quiet gasp, saw his fists clench, and wondered if she had made things worse.

Then he turned slowly and it was her turn to gasp low in her throat. No one had ever looked at her like that before...not even Angel.

Giles couldn't quite believe that the look in her eyes, the expression on her face, matched the love...the passion he'd felt through that magic-induced link. He reached out with an unsteady hand to touch it, letting his forefinger brush the moisture in her lashes, trace the outline of her eye socket, the curve of her rose-flushed cheek, the softness of her slightly parted lips.

Buffy trembled and something in them finally broke. Both moved, bodies fusing together with liquid grace as she pushed herself off the ground, her arms locking around his neck, and Giles held her against him, their mouths finding, discovering each other again.

He revelled in the soft mouth melting into his, the sweet, demanding body and fought to stop himself from carrying her upstairs then and there.

She couldn't get close enough to him...she wanted to be inside his skin, inside his head, his heart. Instead she returned his plundering of her mouth three-fold, feeling his body respond to her exploration of his, her willing offering of hers. For a long time they were lost in the sensuality of such new intimacy, barely aware of the world around them, or the passage of time, neither wanting it to ever end.

It was the sound of Buffy groaning that finally parted them, Giles lifting his head almost reflexively, letting her slide down, as though slammed back to reality.

She was a vision. No secrets, no pain, no heartache or regret. She glowed with the intensity and the conviction of her feelings and it was achingly clear that the blazing desire in her eyes, the throbbing of the link, was all for him.

He smiled back at her and they came together again, the kiss this time one of triumph and reward. They lingered for a long time before Giles swept her up as he'd been longing to do, and her arms wound around his neck as he moved silently up the stairs.

He hesitated in the doorway of her room, a part of him sorrowing that he was not taking her to his own bed, and another somehow awkward about her childhood refuge.

Buffy touched his arm and shifted, so that he put her down. "It's no good," she said, tracing his slightly brooding mouth. "I can't. Not here...not after..."

The confusion in Giles' eyes lasted only a moment, before he remembered. "Oh," he said sombrely. "Does it matter?"

Buffy stared for a long moment before shaking her head. Then she tilted it. "Does it?" she returned.

He closed his eyes for a moment remembering the moment he found out about Buffy's new boyfriend, the commando. "It did," he said, and caressed her cheek, "but not any more."

The bleak look on her face faded and was replaced by a slow smile. "I'm glad...but I wish...I wish we had our own place. I wish...I wish you still had your apartment."

Giles finally smiled back. "Actually the flat hasn't been rented yet. Sunnydale is rather a depressed market when it comes to real estate."

His expression grew rueful. "It's not furnished. The only thing I left was the...bed."

Buffy's smile grew wider. "I can live with that. And mom's car is still behind the house..."

When the door of the flat swung open less than half an hour later, both of them entered in subdued silence.

After several beats Buffy turned to Giles. "Empty. Like me. It's not the same without you, either. We both need you, so much..."

Buffy touched the divot between them. "Not like that." She looked around the room. "This old place and I...we need you to make us complete, to make us whole."

There was nothing he could say to that. Instead he bent and kissed her tenderly, then picked her up again and carried her to his bed.

She was almost too lovely, that hair spilling everywhere, her eyes bright with desire, breast heaving rather like the heroine in a tacky romance novel. He was entranced and a little afraid. She was glorious, and he was...

Slowly, he removed her shoes, grinning when she held one sneaker and then the other aloft with ballerina-like grace for him to undo them, and her jeans, before slowly taking off her blouse, stunned to find that she wasn't wearing anything under it.

And then she was sitting up, taking his breath in her hi-cut, fuchsia lace panties, tiny silver crucifix, and nothing else. "My turn," she told him in a husky voice, and began to unbutton the shirt. She was pushing it off his shoulders when she saw the apprehension he couldn't hide, in his face.

She smiled gently. "Hey, been there, seen that," she reminded him as the shirt fell to the bed. "And I still want to go back." Her fingers trailed down his throat and into the soft golden brown hair sprinkled across his chest. She looked up. "Wow," she grinned. " I didn't know chest hair could be sexy. I like it...even the grey ones."

"Now that's below the belt," she retorted, unbuckling his and effectively silencing him.

She watched his face and his smouldering eyes as she undid it and unbuttoned his pants before sliding the zipper down.

"And so is that," he managed to whisper hoarsely as her fingers slid inside and made him shudder. Then he shifted to lift her back and lay her against the pillows, before moving over her and kissing her senseless.

At least that was how Buffy described it to herself as she lost herself in their passion, arching as his hands raked her body, expertly divesting her of her pretty underwear and finding every sensitive curve and fold until she was almost ready to explode. He was making her crazy and he wasn't even undressed yet. Taking things into her own hands, she used her slayer strength to reverse their positions.

He grinned mischievously. "I drove over here in bare feet for you. You want them off, you take them off."

Buffy made a noise in her throat, shifted and used her slayer strength to pull his jeans off, tossing them on the floor.

When she looked around again, she swallowed. Once, when she and Willow were having a truly insane discussion about male assets, they had speculated about Giles, just for a moment, ranking him, between eiews, in order among their male friends, boyfriends and favoured entertainment idols of the time. It hadn't occurred to either of them that he might be other than...regulation.

"You know, in romance novels it's really cliché for the hero to be majorly...uh ... endowed," she teased, eyeing his assets as he propped himself on one elbow and glared at her.

"If you are complaining, we can always settle for a good night's sleep," he drawled, a twinkle returning to his eye.

"Good," he growled, moved swiftly, pinned her to the bed and kissed her hard before trailing his mouth down her arched throat to linger at the soft, creamy flesh below it. When she made a small noise in her throat he continued, exploring every soft curve of her lovely breasts, teasing their peaks and smiling to himself when her groans and whimpers became demanding. He let his left hand slide down her hip, trail across her groin and brush her soft core, exhilarated when she in turn arched to him, then dragged his head up to hers and kissed him fiercely.

"Am I?" he grinned, allowing his left index finger to slip on its side, down between the soft folds, to move gently back and forth across the swollen evidence of her desire.

She writhed and moaned, her hips chasing his teasing digit. "Giles!" she gasped when he stopped.

If there had been anyone one in the flat they would have heard her cries reverberate through all the rooms. For all her time with Riley, he had never done what Giles was doing to her now. It simply wasn't in his macho-military lexicon, though he seemed not to have any problem with the reverse... nor had Angel done this on that fateful night, and she doubted Parker or Spike even knew how.

She clutched at the sheets as the man she loved drove her to sensual heights she'd never experienced before, only stopping when she began to press, her cries loud and urgent.

Buffy searched his smiling face. "Rupert..." she sighed, the name growing on her more and more each time she said it aloud.

"Yes, my love," he whispered, settling between her soft thighs and smiling even more when her legs curled around him and her tender heat ground against his.

He took her hips in his hands and lifted them, bringing himself to her and closing his eyes momentarily as he pushed into the soft heat of her.

Buffy gasped and lifted herself even higher. "Oh God, yes...!" she moaned as he slid all the way home.

"Buffy..." he croaked in a low, hoarse voice, overwhelmed for a moment by the enormity of what he was doing, the pure eroticism of the moment, and kissed her with a ferocity that was still only a shadow of what he was really feeling.

And then they were moving together, faster and faster, deeper and deeper, Buffy calling to him, Giles straining to her, glorying in her as they raced towards the completion for which their bodies were screaming. Both of them exploded within moments of each other, holding each other as they rode the waves of their respective climaxes to their lingering end.

As they came down Giles kissed her tenderly, gathered her and rolled sideways, so that she was curled in the crook of his arm. For a long time they lay in warm silence, content to hold each other.

Buffy was playing with a stray white hair among the golden ones on Giles' chest, when he kissed her hair contentedly. She looked up at the ceiling and smiled.

"No breakage. No evil. And you're still awake," she observed whimsically and sighed, the smile fading. "Giles, I'm not much of a catch. I know Dawn wrote you about Spike when she found out. What she probably didn't say was that I was pretty slutty. Are you sure you want to be with me?"

"You would have to do rather more to even approach the depths of my youth," he pointed out quietly. "Though Spike is pushing it rather beyond the pale...forgive the pun," he added sheepishly.

They smiled at each other, chuckling a little, despite the small strain in both their eyes, at both the pun and the foolishness of Buffy's choices.

Then Giles sobered again. "I have done far worse than you, for far less reason, Buffy. Are you sure you still want to be with me?"

Despite her best attempts, Buffy's eyes grew overbright, her lashes damp. "Forever," she told him. "However long that might be."

Giles' heart constricted a little, but he refused to think about her mortality today. She had been given back to him twice already, and saved from near misses God knew how many times. Slayer, or no, she was extraordinary. He had always been hers, and now she was his...

He cupped her face as he had once before. "Forever is a modest estimate," he said softly. "You are still a miracle."

"Nah," she replied, smiling and touching his face. "You're the miracle. You're here and you're mine." Her bright eyes sought and held his and her voice dropped to a hoarse whisper. "I love you so much..."

He smiled in a way that made her breath catch in her throat, bent his head and kissed her again. When they parted he looked down at her rosily flushed face and chuckled.

"I suppose now I shall have to move back in," he observed, glancing around at the starkly empty loft.

"I suppose we will," she agreed, grinning widely. "Willow and Tara are almost out of money. I'll tell them it's okay to move back in to the house."

Once again Giles drew her into his arms and rolled so that they were curled up together, his cheek resting against her hair. "As long as you don't shirk your responsibility to your sister."

"Already with the bossiness again?" she teased, snuggling close to his chest and brushing his wound gently with her lips. "I took responsibility...eventually. 'Responsibility Girl', me. I just think we're both kind of overdue for some real happies, don't you? Unless of course you want me to live full time in the house and only see you to research and train...you know, with the sweatiness, the store and Anya and stuff..."

Buffy turned her face up and caught his mouth with hers. "Good," she said, love in her voice, her eyes; her face. "Because it would be way hard to spoil you from all the way over at Ravello drive...and I so want to spoil you..."

He chuckled softly and kissed her again, very slowly, lifting his head only long enough to look down at her with mischievous eyes.

The little apartment reverberated to two sets of happy, unselfconscious giggles before settling down to a sensual, passion filled silence, like its owners, no longer empty...or alone...