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My gosh, this is getting darker, not smuttier. That's not right at all...
Previous parts here
Watching, Waiting, Anticipating Part Three
He ducks, which is fucking smart of him, and the vibrator kisses the wall behind him in a Fatal Attraction, end in tears, kinda way, falling with a thump to the floor, casing cracked, batteries spilling out.
She stalks over to him feeling a faint quiver in her clenched fists, the kind she gets when she's so angry her body can't stay still without it making her feel as if she'll splinter into razor-edged shards in two more gulped-in breaths.
He's straightened up and his eyes go from the vibe to her face and his mouth's parting when she slams him back, strong Slayer hands on his body, getting right in his face.
"No, Wes," she says, talking really quietly and marvelling at how calm she is. "I don't fucking think so." She reaches for his hand, yanking it up between them. He's got – and she's always thought this, even in Sunnydale, even when he was all starch and priss – the most beautiful hands. Elegant and strong with long fingers that look just right on the handle of a knife or wearing the trigger guard of a gun like a ring.
"You're going to get messy doing this. Going to use your fingers... " She reaches up and taps against those tightly-compressed lips."And your mouth." She gives him a sneer she picked up from Spike and practiced in the mirror, tip of her tongue tapping the back of her teeth. "Talk dirty, or fuck me with it. Hey; maybe both; you're kinda good at multi-tasking, right?"
He's giving her an intense, scary glare but she's close enough to feel how hard he is – has been since she walked in. And he can pretend all he likes about what he's doing, but this is foreplay, and that's fine, she can deal, she can wait until he stops teasing, stops playing.
He's daring her, right?
She brings his hand to her mouth and slick-slides her tongue across them, getting them wet. Then she drops it and turns to the closed door that, as this is a mirror of her own apartment, has to be his bedroom.
"And we're doing this in comfort –"
His terse "Faith, I'd rather -" comes way too late.
It's like walking into his mind and she knows how a vampire must feel because she can't cross the threshold, feels the skin over the air that's holding her out.
And that's not a metaphor. Her hand prods cautiously at the barrier even as her eyes are scanning, absorbing, flinching away.
"Got a nice little hidey-hole here, Wes," she says finally, keeping her voice neutral.
He mutters a word she can't catch and his hand hits her back, propelling her forward, the mystical barrier popping like a pea-pod.
She goes with it, moving fast so she can spin to face him. "You're starting to freak me, Wes."
"Only starting?" he asks, standing squarely between her and the door.
"I've stopped now," she says with a shrug. "All done freaking, but, gotta tell you, it was an intense three seconds." She walks over to the wall that's got her bed on the other side of it and taps it. "We sleep head to head, huh? Got to like the symbolism."
The bed's big enough for two, which is something, made neatly with clean sheets. There's a night table beside it with a lamp, a book and, hmm, a box of tissues. Her fingers are itching to prowl through the two deep drawers.
And that's it. The sliding doors to the built-in closet are firmly closed and she knows what he wears anyway.
"What's in here worth protecting with a spell?" she asks. "Looks like a big load of nothing to me."
"I sleep in here," he says. "I don't want company."
"But you let me in?"
"It's apparently necessary," he says with a bite to his voice. "I hadn't realised you were quite this fussy, Faith." He nods at the bed. "But since you insist, I suppose this will be more comfortable for both of us."
And she doesn't want to do this anymore. Doesn't want to get closer to him. Doesn't want to feel his hands on her, in her, because it'd be like fucking a corpse.
"I've changed my mind," she says, daring to look at him.
There's a flicker of resignation and then his eyes are as blank as the walls. "I rather thought you might," he drawls. "Then perhaps you could patrol? Or have you given that up in favor of indulging your whims?"
She pushes past him and doesn't look back to see if he's following her, doesn't wait for him when the elevator door slides open, doesn't glance around as she heads out into the night.
Doesn't need to.
A memory of him's hovering on the edge of her vision all night, eyes dark with an emotion she can't put a name to, mouth tight. His voice is in her head as she slams each stake home, lecturing her calmly, advising her, correcting her stance. A ghost of Wes – but where the fuck is he? She's almost sure she sees him in the distance once, moving quickly, head ducked down, but the city's full of broken stick figures of men and isn't he taller than that?
She's bone-chill cold as she slays and so fucking lonely.
When she gets back, a sneaked, gulped vodka on ice from a bar doing a damn fine job of warming her, which makes no sense at all at her teeth still ache from crunching the cubes and pretending she's got his cock between them – which, OK, makes even her cringe as she chews, so she doesn't think she'll be sharing that little fantasy any time soon – his door's closed and there's no light under it.
Somehow, finding him in her armchair, pencil tapping impatiently against the fucking clipboard he's adopted and named George isn't a surprise at all.
"Too early to make more than a preliminary finding, but tonight's performance was enlightening," he drawls. "A marked improvement. I rather think frustration and anger are beneficial emotions."
She tosses her stake aside. "Yeah. Sure. I feel like crap and I'm gonna burst into tears when you fuck off and get back to your cell, but hey, bagged nine vamps and that's all that matters, right?"
The tears are starting to gather and press but she'd sooner pee in front of him than cry.
"All that matters is that you do what you were chosen to do," he says. "And I counted eight, not nine."
"I don't matter?" she says. "I don't matter at all?"
"I can't let you matter," he says, standing up and going to brush past her, back to that bed with the tucked in sheets, where he'll lie and stare into darkness for hours.
"Gonna kiss me goodnight, Wes?"
It's a taunt, it's a dare, and in some ways he's as predictable as every man she's known.
He pauses and gives her a long, slow look, head to toe. "Would you like me to read you a story and check you washed behind your ears too?" he bites out.
"Love it," she says evenly. "But a kiss is fine for now."
He curves his hand around the back of her neck without any pressure at all and starts to walk forward, taking her with him until they're at the wall. Then he slides to his knees, unbuttoning her pants and peeling them back without pulling them down.
His hair's dark and soft from this angle and she wants to touch it but she can't because his lips are on her belly, scant, bare inches away from where she wants them and she knows he's not gonna be dipping lower, sending his tongue between her legs to lap up the mess she's in because he's a cold bastard with shaking hands and fever-hot lips...
The door slams behind him and she pushes away from the wall and turns to ram her fist against it, through it, but what's the point?
She showers and crawls into bed naked and waits until she hears him do the same. Thin walls, that's all they are, but they're enough to keep her from seeing him, reaching out to him...
She twists around and puts her hands against the wall. She's a Slayer. She could punch through it if she wanted to; kick it down, grab him and – what? If Wes gave in to threats and violence he'd have fewer scars and softer eyes.
And, yeah, he'd probably be dead, so maybe it's a good thing he's stubborn.
She doesn't know Morse code, though she bets a Boy Scout like Wes does, so she can't tap out a message, and fuck knows what she'd say anyway. He knows what she wants, and if it's boiling down to a sick ache of need right this minute it doesn't mean that's all there is in the mix. She could see them being as close to friends as two people like them can get.
Which isn't very, but – oh fuck this!
She wriggles onto her back, thrusts three fingers up inside her and swirls the middle finger of her other hand around her clit in a slow, hard, tight circle, again and again. Then adds a sound track she wouldn't normally bother with until right at the end when she can't help it, though even then she can keep it quiet if she really has to.
She's subtle about it too. No howls and 'Oh Gods', just stuttered breaths and bitten-off whimpers, voiceless, wordless exhalations that end, not with a shriek but a name.
The next morning, when she reports to him for training, he hits her; gets past her guard for the first time ever, and buries his teeth in her neck before she can do more than gasp.
"Don't do that again," he whispers against her throat. "Or I'll cuff your hands to the bed while you sleep."
"Yeah? Would it have made a difference if it'd been your name at the end, there?" she says, shrugging out of his tight grasp. Her skin's stinging and from the look in his eyes and the way he's running his tongue over his teeth, she's bleeding.
"Don't flatter yourself that I want to be part of your fantasies," he says coldly.
"Just my nightmares?"
"I don't want you to think of me as anything but your Watcher," he snaps and this is too fucking much denial to swallow dry.
"Then stop getting hard when you're around me," she says. "Gives a girl the wrong ideas, Wes." She heads for the door. "And you got any more fantasies about me besides the one where you tie me down and watch me squirm? Because, you know, gotta keep those Watcher/Slayer communication lines wide open..."
"Rest. Eat. I want you patrolling around the factory area off Duke tonight." He's all business now as he nods towards a newspaper spread out on the table. "I think the signs point to a nest. I'll come with you, and we'll observe until close to sunrise, time our attack for then."
"Don't need your help, slaying."
"Even so, I will accompany you tonight."
"Whatever."
Her hand's on the door when he says her name, but when she turns he's staring out of the window and he doesn't speak again.
Previous parts here
Watching, Waiting, Anticipating Part Three
He ducks, which is fucking smart of him, and the vibrator kisses the wall behind him in a Fatal Attraction, end in tears, kinda way, falling with a thump to the floor, casing cracked, batteries spilling out.
She stalks over to him feeling a faint quiver in her clenched fists, the kind she gets when she's so angry her body can't stay still without it making her feel as if she'll splinter into razor-edged shards in two more gulped-in breaths.
He's straightened up and his eyes go from the vibe to her face and his mouth's parting when she slams him back, strong Slayer hands on his body, getting right in his face.
"No, Wes," she says, talking really quietly and marvelling at how calm she is. "I don't fucking think so." She reaches for his hand, yanking it up between them. He's got – and she's always thought this, even in Sunnydale, even when he was all starch and priss – the most beautiful hands. Elegant and strong with long fingers that look just right on the handle of a knife or wearing the trigger guard of a gun like a ring.
"You're going to get messy doing this. Going to use your fingers... " She reaches up and taps against those tightly-compressed lips."And your mouth." She gives him a sneer she picked up from Spike and practiced in the mirror, tip of her tongue tapping the back of her teeth. "Talk dirty, or fuck me with it. Hey; maybe both; you're kinda good at multi-tasking, right?"
He's giving her an intense, scary glare but she's close enough to feel how hard he is – has been since she walked in. And he can pretend all he likes about what he's doing, but this is foreplay, and that's fine, she can deal, she can wait until he stops teasing, stops playing.
He's daring her, right?
She brings his hand to her mouth and slick-slides her tongue across them, getting them wet. Then she drops it and turns to the closed door that, as this is a mirror of her own apartment, has to be his bedroom.
"And we're doing this in comfort –"
His terse "Faith, I'd rather -" comes way too late.
It's like walking into his mind and she knows how a vampire must feel because she can't cross the threshold, feels the skin over the air that's holding her out.
And that's not a metaphor. Her hand prods cautiously at the barrier even as her eyes are scanning, absorbing, flinching away.
"Got a nice little hidey-hole here, Wes," she says finally, keeping her voice neutral.
He mutters a word she can't catch and his hand hits her back, propelling her forward, the mystical barrier popping like a pea-pod.
She goes with it, moving fast so she can spin to face him. "You're starting to freak me, Wes."
"Only starting?" he asks, standing squarely between her and the door.
"I've stopped now," she says with a shrug. "All done freaking, but, gotta tell you, it was an intense three seconds." She walks over to the wall that's got her bed on the other side of it and taps it. "We sleep head to head, huh? Got to like the symbolism."
The bed's big enough for two, which is something, made neatly with clean sheets. There's a night table beside it with a lamp, a book and, hmm, a box of tissues. Her fingers are itching to prowl through the two deep drawers.
And that's it. The sliding doors to the built-in closet are firmly closed and she knows what he wears anyway.
"What's in here worth protecting with a spell?" she asks. "Looks like a big load of nothing to me."
"I sleep in here," he says. "I don't want company."
"But you let me in?"
"It's apparently necessary," he says with a bite to his voice. "I hadn't realised you were quite this fussy, Faith." He nods at the bed. "But since you insist, I suppose this will be more comfortable for both of us."
And she doesn't want to do this anymore. Doesn't want to get closer to him. Doesn't want to feel his hands on her, in her, because it'd be like fucking a corpse.
"I've changed my mind," she says, daring to look at him.
There's a flicker of resignation and then his eyes are as blank as the walls. "I rather thought you might," he drawls. "Then perhaps you could patrol? Or have you given that up in favor of indulging your whims?"
She pushes past him and doesn't look back to see if he's following her, doesn't wait for him when the elevator door slides open, doesn't glance around as she heads out into the night.
Doesn't need to.
A memory of him's hovering on the edge of her vision all night, eyes dark with an emotion she can't put a name to, mouth tight. His voice is in her head as she slams each stake home, lecturing her calmly, advising her, correcting her stance. A ghost of Wes – but where the fuck is he? She's almost sure she sees him in the distance once, moving quickly, head ducked down, but the city's full of broken stick figures of men and isn't he taller than that?
She's bone-chill cold as she slays and so fucking lonely.
When she gets back, a sneaked, gulped vodka on ice from a bar doing a damn fine job of warming her, which makes no sense at all at her teeth still ache from crunching the cubes and pretending she's got his cock between them – which, OK, makes even her cringe as she chews, so she doesn't think she'll be sharing that little fantasy any time soon – his door's closed and there's no light under it.
Somehow, finding him in her armchair, pencil tapping impatiently against the fucking clipboard he's adopted and named George isn't a surprise at all.
"Too early to make more than a preliminary finding, but tonight's performance was enlightening," he drawls. "A marked improvement. I rather think frustration and anger are beneficial emotions."
She tosses her stake aside. "Yeah. Sure. I feel like crap and I'm gonna burst into tears when you fuck off and get back to your cell, but hey, bagged nine vamps and that's all that matters, right?"
The tears are starting to gather and press but she'd sooner pee in front of him than cry.
"All that matters is that you do what you were chosen to do," he says. "And I counted eight, not nine."
"I don't matter?" she says. "I don't matter at all?"
"I can't let you matter," he says, standing up and going to brush past her, back to that bed with the tucked in sheets, where he'll lie and stare into darkness for hours.
"Gonna kiss me goodnight, Wes?"
It's a taunt, it's a dare, and in some ways he's as predictable as every man she's known.
He pauses and gives her a long, slow look, head to toe. "Would you like me to read you a story and check you washed behind your ears too?" he bites out.
"Love it," she says evenly. "But a kiss is fine for now."
He curves his hand around the back of her neck without any pressure at all and starts to walk forward, taking her with him until they're at the wall. Then he slides to his knees, unbuttoning her pants and peeling them back without pulling them down.
His hair's dark and soft from this angle and she wants to touch it but she can't because his lips are on her belly, scant, bare inches away from where she wants them and she knows he's not gonna be dipping lower, sending his tongue between her legs to lap up the mess she's in because he's a cold bastard with shaking hands and fever-hot lips...
The door slams behind him and she pushes away from the wall and turns to ram her fist against it, through it, but what's the point?
She showers and crawls into bed naked and waits until she hears him do the same. Thin walls, that's all they are, but they're enough to keep her from seeing him, reaching out to him...
She twists around and puts her hands against the wall. She's a Slayer. She could punch through it if she wanted to; kick it down, grab him and – what? If Wes gave in to threats and violence he'd have fewer scars and softer eyes.
And, yeah, he'd probably be dead, so maybe it's a good thing he's stubborn.
She doesn't know Morse code, though she bets a Boy Scout like Wes does, so she can't tap out a message, and fuck knows what she'd say anyway. He knows what she wants, and if it's boiling down to a sick ache of need right this minute it doesn't mean that's all there is in the mix. She could see them being as close to friends as two people like them can get.
Which isn't very, but – oh fuck this!
She wriggles onto her back, thrusts three fingers up inside her and swirls the middle finger of her other hand around her clit in a slow, hard, tight circle, again and again. Then adds a sound track she wouldn't normally bother with until right at the end when she can't help it, though even then she can keep it quiet if she really has to.
She's subtle about it too. No howls and 'Oh Gods', just stuttered breaths and bitten-off whimpers, voiceless, wordless exhalations that end, not with a shriek but a name.
The next morning, when she reports to him for training, he hits her; gets past her guard for the first time ever, and buries his teeth in her neck before she can do more than gasp.
"Don't do that again," he whispers against her throat. "Or I'll cuff your hands to the bed while you sleep."
"Yeah? Would it have made a difference if it'd been your name at the end, there?" she says, shrugging out of his tight grasp. Her skin's stinging and from the look in his eyes and the way he's running his tongue over his teeth, she's bleeding.
"Don't flatter yourself that I want to be part of your fantasies," he says coldly.
"Just my nightmares?"
"I don't want you to think of me as anything but your Watcher," he snaps and this is too fucking much denial to swallow dry.
"Then stop getting hard when you're around me," she says. "Gives a girl the wrong ideas, Wes." She heads for the door. "And you got any more fantasies about me besides the one where you tie me down and watch me squirm? Because, you know, gotta keep those Watcher/Slayer communication lines wide open..."
"Rest. Eat. I want you patrolling around the factory area off Duke tonight." He's all business now as he nods towards a newspaper spread out on the table. "I think the signs point to a nest. I'll come with you, and we'll observe until close to sunrise, time our attack for then."
"Don't need your help, slaying."
"Even so, I will accompany you tonight."
"Whatever."
Her hand's on the door when he says her name, but when she turns he's staring out of the window and he doesn't speak again.