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E-mail Hilary

By Beth Muramoto

Rating: NC-17

Summery: Buffy and Spike's last night together. Takes place during Chosen

Spike watched as the amulet twirled in his hand. He watched the glimmer of the light in the basement bounce off of its many facets. If it weren't some kind of weapon against the first evil, the sparking rainbows it threw off would almost make it beautiful, if a little gaudy for his tastes. Spike pondered how long it had been since he had viewed a rainbow. Funny, he hadn't even missed not seeing them until he met Buffy. Meeting her had brought so much back to him that he never realized he had lost or missed. Though he would never see the sun shine again, her beauty was all the sunlight he'd ever need, ever desire.

As the amulet spun slowly, his thoughts strayed to its meaning. What it held for him, oddly, for the first time in his undead life, he was truly afraid. All that he went through the past year, the growing bond that he and Buffy had finally begun to forge was an exciting prospect and a wonder to behold. He regretted that he hadn't realized sooner the potential of doing good without gain or reward, financial or for her affections. They might have reached this point sooner, but maybe he needed to fight for his soul to achieve it. She had given him the amulet and called him a champion, maybe her champion. He never thought he could be a hero in anyone's eyes, but that Buffy would even believe in him enough to think of him that way was overwhelming. He told Buffy the night they faced Glory that he thought he'd go down fighting.

Suddenly he heard the footfalls on the stairs and recognized the feet, then the legs, the beautiful hips, torso, and lastly her lovely face. He could stare at her for days, drinking in her beauty until he was drowning, drunk from her. He had so much as told her that back when he had no right to feel it. He was happy that she had come to him, that she had wanted to be with him, the last night before..maybe the last night forever.

"Hey," she uttered softly in that little girl voice that always melted his heart, "Can't sleep, either?"

"Normally don't luv. Night, you know." He said with a slight snarkiness that was truly Spike. He stood up to greet her.

"Yeh, I get that," she smiled, getting the joke. She always counted on him to make her laugh when she needed it.

"What's bothering you, pet?" Spike asked.

"Can I stay here with you?"

"You never have to ask."Spike urged.

Buffy walked over and hugged him softly. He felt her tremble against him. She was so small yet she fit into his embrace so perfectly. He had always believed they were a perfect fit, both as lovers and as warriors. She was strong, but she was also the most vulnerable person he knew. So easily bruised emotionally. He rubbed her back lovingly to warm her and give her whatever security and comfort he could for her. He felt her relax and heave a sigh.

"Mmmm…that feels so wonderful…don't stop," She said.

"For as long as you need."

They reluctantly broke their embrace and sat on his cot.

"Spike, I have to tell you something…" Buffy started haltingly.

"Tell me what, sweetheart?" Spike asked, cocking his head at her. It made her giggle and feel so moved that he was giving her his undivided attention.

"When I kissed Angel, it didn't mean I was choosing him."

Spike took an unneeded breath. A part of him didn't want to talk about Angel. His name would always bring him pain.

"Buffy, I'm sorry I got jealous," Spike said, "I'll always be possessive of you. I can't help it, but you don't have to lie to make me feel better, especially now. I don't need it. I'm so grateful for what we have now. You have no idea how much. You made me see the beauty of having a soul and saved me from the insanity of it. I meant it when I said my love for you had nothing to do with me. Your kindness and forgiveness, your belief in me were my salvation. It's enough for me, more than enough."

Buffy's eyes gleamed with tears and she smiled brightly back at him. She remembered that same night with Glory as he did. It was a defining moment and one that she thought, in looking back, was probably when she started admitting to feeling something more for Spike. He had told her he knew that she would never love him, but that she treated him like a man. Though he never finished the sentence, she knew now he probably wanted to say that it was enough for him then. Still, she knew it wasn't enough, not then and especially not now. It only made her realize that she really did need to tell him the truth.

"No, Spike, it isn't enough and I'm not lying to you. I can't blame you for thinking that. I've hurt you so much, but I'm telling you the truth now. I kissed him on impulse. I needed to convince myself of something. The kiss was empty. The only feeling left was a long dead crush of a 16 year old girl."

"Buffy, what are you trying to say?" Spike asked, his voice trembling.

"You left the cemetery without hearing the rest of our conversation. I told Angel you were in my heart and you are, but it's even more than that. You have seen me through so much. Stayed by side through all of the battles, all of the ugliness, the cruelty…" Buffy winced at the memory of how she hurt him over the years.

"And you, me, luv." Spike assured her.

Buffy took a deep breath, afraid to ask the next question.

"Okay, this is insecure Buffy talking, but I have to ask because…though I couldn't blame you for losing your feelings for me…If that's happened, I guess I need to hear it from you…" Buffy paused to take in another breath, "Spike, do you still love me?"

Spike stared at her in shock, his mouth agape that she would ask that question, but he softened when he saw how forlorn she looked, how scared, so easily bruised, he thought again. Despite her physical strength and power, when it came to love and trust, she was fragile, delicate, and breakable. Could Angel, alone, have done this to her, made her so fearful or was there a history that even he couldn't be entrusted to know?

"Buffy, what would make you think that my feelings for you had changed? Is it because of something I've done or said?"

"No, no, not really…remember, this is scared and insecure Buffy talking…it's just that when I told you that I was going out with Robin Wood, you were so noble, then you said that you were okay with it. It's not your fault, please don't misunderstand, Spike…I guess, I never expected you to let me go that way. To be honest, I was afraid you had finally stopped loving me, given up on me…It hurt so much…more than losing Riley, more than losing Angel…I didn't want you to give up on me…didn't want you to stop loving me even though, out of everyone, you should've stopped loving me long ago, like I said, selfish, I know, but -" Buffy started to babble.

"God, luv, I had no idea. I…I didn't think I'd ever have your love, but your happiness means more to me than my life, my unlife. If I couldn't give it to you, I wanted to make sure you had a chance for it…but Buffy, I have NEVER stopped loving you, if anything, I love you more every day.

"It killed me to maybe lose you to another man, possessive, you know, but you deserve to be happy. Your slayer lot in life took so much happiness from you, so much so you wanted to die. Out of all the slayers I've known, I never thought you'd have a death wish, even if I did tell you all slayers eventually do. You were so alive, full of life when I first saw you dancing at the Bronze, you were so happy, but even you were touched by the slayer death wish. I didn't want that for you. You've gone through so much. I'd do anything to give you that happiness. Hell, I'd give you to Angel if it would mean you'd be happy. I'd spit nails doing it, don't get me wrong, but you deserve better than me. You deserve to be with someone who loves you and who you love. Someone who can make you smile everyday because you are SO beautiful when you smile. You don't smile enough. You need someone who can never hurt you." Spike winced at thinking how much he had hurt her, then paused to stare into her eyes deeply. "But no matter what happens, Buffy, I will love you forever, until I am dust. Never doubt that. That will never change." He finally insisted gently.

Buffy looked into his eyes. They gleamed with love for her, a love that had never diminished after all these years. She took his hands into hers.

"Spike, you give me all those things. You make me happy, ease my pain, you have never let me feel alone. You were the only one I talked to about heaven. You make me laugh, you tell me the truth, even when I don't want to hear it, but have to hear it. You've kept all of your promises. You protected Dawn and my mother. There were so many things that you've done for me that I've taken for granted. It took me a long time to realize that I have always loved you. All you've done without a soul and with one, all you suffered when Glory tortured you to reveal Dawn and you didn't. I think I started to love you then. That kiss I gave you was more than gratitude, but I denied it…Best thing I do next to fighting is denial. When you suffered the demon trials to get your soul for me, I couldn't deny it any longer." Buffy swallowed hard, " I really do love you. It's not pity, it's not obligation, it's not because we're facing the First. It's real and true. I don't know if you can ever trust me or believe me, but even if you don't, I'll make it my mission from now on to prove it to you. You deserve that and so much more."

Spike nodded in understanding, eyes filling with tears, his face lined with joy. He never thought their relationship would ever come to this.

"You won't need to prove it, luv. I feel it and see it in your eyes. Something I thought I'd never see or only thought I saw glimpses of."

"I just need to know…was it really all worth it, Spike?" Buffy asked.

"Every moment." Spike said without hesitation.

"Was I really worth it?"

"You're worth everything and more."

"Even all the pain? All the things I did to you?" Buffy asked, tears running down her face in rivulets.

"Especially all the pain."

"How can you say that? That's what I don't understand…"

"Without pain, there is no joy. Pain strengthens you, builds either resolve or resignation. It gave me both."

"If it gave you resignation, why did you stay? Everyone else left. I was expecting you to leave too. That's why I was so cruel for long. I couldn't stand loving you and having you leave too."

"Don't you know me, by now, luv? I'm not Angel or the soldier boy. I couldn't leave. When I left to get my soul, I ached without you. I was torn in half. The pain of being without you is much worse."

"Why did you let me hurt you?"

"Buffy, I caused you so much more pain from my desperate need for you to love me, it wasn't all kindness, luv. I gave as much pain as I took and you know it. There was nothing heroic in some of the things I did to get you to love me. I tried to break you into believing you were less than who you were, that you were like me. I didn't help you then. Saw your weakness and seized it like a real monster would. All of the hurtful words, the selfish acts, I gave you plenty of reasons not to return my love…especially after I tried to…I tried to…" Spike couldn't even bring himself to say the words and he stood up so he couldn't face her. He still felt that nothing good he could do from now on could ever make up for what he did to her that night. He would never forgive himself for that.

"After I attacked you, that broke me completely. It drove me to the brink of my monstrosity. I knew then that it wasn't enough to just love you. I had to be someone you deserved. I'm not convinced that getting my soul makes me any closer to deserving you. I don't think anything can do that. I'm still who I am, but I've always cared for you, Buffy. I just had to find a way to make sure that I cared how I treated you."

Buffy stood up to face him. She lifted his chin up to look into his tear filled eyes.

"Spike, later that night I realized that it wasn't all your fault. I drove you to that desperation. Anyone else would have broken sooner after going through what I did to you for so many years. In that way, I was evil. You were right about me. I am a part of the dark. I denied it. See? That denial thing again. I was too arrogant to believe that I had any darkness in me…any evil."

"Buffy, no, there is nothing evil about you. You have only goodness in you. I won't have you take the blame for that night. I could have, should have left you, but I was too selfish. I should have taken your resistance as 'no' and stopped hurting you. Only a monster, a killer would keep on hurting you the way that I did."

"I'm just as much of a killer as any demon, Spike. Does killing demons make me less that?"

"Yes!" Spike spit angrily at himself for even suggesting otherwise to her, "I won't let you convince yourself that you were wrong. You never were. I hate myself for saying those things to you, to make you doubt who you are. I said them out of stupid selfishness as I always do, to hurt you for not loving me. There is no truth in it. I'm evil, Buffy. Not you. I will always be evil, soul or not, just as you will never be evil."

"No, no," Buffy insisted and cupped his face.

Buffy stared deeply into Spike's cobalt blue eyes and drew closer to them, her lips pressed lovingly against his as she inhaled, breathing in the purity of his love for her. She deepened the kiss more and more, tasting him with her tongue. She moaned at the feel of his lips returning her passion. He cupped her face too and began to devour her lips. A deep, throaty mix of a groan and a growl vibrated from his mouth and it only made Buffy dizzy with desire for him. He pressed himself against her, his hardness growing until he realized that she was slowly rubbing her hips against him, making him so hard it was causing a delicious pain.

"Buffy…my god, how you make me feel in ways that I have never felt before…" He gasped as he gently and lovingly moved his hands underneath her sheer top and cupped both of her swollen breasts. He had always loved how perfectly they fit into his palms, how smooth they felt, silken beneath his hands. She moaned at his touch.

"It's all behind us, Spike." Buffy said breathlessly. " There's no reason to relive it other than to learn from it and never repeat it. We've gone past the hurting. All that's left is the loving and I do love you, Spike, I believe in you. We're facing something so unknown and I'm scared to death, but I don't have a death wish anymore and never will again. You've given me a life wish. All I want is this, to make love to you now and forever if the fates allow it. I've wanted it for such a long time, wanted you."

Spike looked into her eyes and smiled. Buffy ran her hand down to his hardness and stroked it through his jeans, "Oh, god…" was all Spike could say before she one-handedly undid the button and zipper of his jeans then moved her hand beneath to feel his deliciously cool skin, no briefs to get in the way. She knew this about him. It was just skin upon skin when she reached it and she stroked it even longer, feeling it strain against her hand and the jeans. "Mmmm…" Spike murmured.

His passion flared from her ministrations and he moved his hands to her pants and undid them as well as push her panties down with them, letting them both drop. She stepped out of them and her hand took his cue and pushed his jeans off as well. He, too, stepped out of them. She then leaped into his arms, wrapping her legs around his waist. He felt her wetness against his stomach and it urged him on. He carried her to the cot and laid her there gently. Her legs loosened their hold just enough for him to lift himself above her, his longing burning inside of him. He didn't think that he would ever love her like this again, make love to her like this. He hadn't realized how much he had missed her body. How touching her this way, feeling her this way made him feel complete, safe, and loved. She felt his hardness toy at her entry and she gyrated against the tip to increase the sensitivity.

"Oh, Buffy, you're driving me wild with that… oh my god…." Spike said as his eyes closed and he felt his orgasm rising to a wonderful crest.

Finally, he moved inside of her, slowly in a dizzying way. Buffy caught her breath as he entered her and she arched up to envelope him and the coolness of his member delighted her even more. Soon their rhythm became one, in and out, up and down.

"S…s…Spike," Buffy hissed, "You know me so well…oh, yes, there…mmm…more." Buffy cried as she felt him reach places she never knew existed, moving around in her in wondrous ways and finding secret places that only he knew how to reach. Of her lovers, he was both passion and gentility. Even during those dark days when all she was doing was using him, he tried to make love to her, but she wouldn't let him. She would force him into desperate, pain-filled, ravaging sex to make her feel anything. She didn't want the love, the gentility then, but she did now and in ways that she knew only he could give her.

Spike smirked at his ability to drive her wild, but also to make her feel his want of her, every part of her. She never had to question his desire for her. It would burn until the end of time.

When they both could take no more, their timing quickened, their breaths panting, their throats moaning each other's name over and over again until they finally screamed them. Spike's last thrust arched him so high he though he would fall and hurt her, but he held on and then, spent, laid against her gently. Buffy's crest had her hands gripping the chains that used to hold Spike prisoner, until she was white-knuckled then she, too, lay still beneath him.

Both tired, but also relieved, Spike shifted off of her and just laid next to her, wrapping his arms around her, his left hand still stroking, lovingly, her bare stomach and breasts. She had called him insatiable on more than one occasion. They fell into a dreamless sleep for the first time in months, years. There was no desperation, pain, hurt, or need this time.

They both awoke a few hours later. It was still night. Still time before they had to face the Hellmouth. Buffy turned to be on her back and stared at the ceiling. Spike sensed her nervousness.

"Buffy, are you all right?"

"Oh, yeh, I was just thinking…"

"Of what, pet?"

"Of what's coming."

Spike understood. Their wondrous lovemaking helped them forget for a moment what they were facing, but in the end, it was still there, looming.

"Spike, I want to live so much. You've made me want to live so much."

"You will live, luv. I'll make sure of it this time. I won't fail you again." Spike said with conviction.

"You never failed me. We've both been through so much to get here. I don't want to lose it."

"I know, I don't want to lose it either, evil, after all." Spike said as he kissed her passionately, wanting to convince her that they would survive, even though he still wasn't sure he would live.When they parted, Buffy looked at him and saw something in his eyes that worried her.

"Spike, what's wrong?"

"Nothing, pet."

"Don't lie to me, not now, not ever again." She said emphatically.

Spike squirmed a bit, then just starting drawing circles on her belly. "Just random thoughts, is all…the amulet…I want it to work even though I don't know how it will work. A part of me doesn’t trust it…doesn't trust Angel."

"Are you worried it's 'a trap' of some sort?"

"I don't know. Angel meant to wear it and wouldn't risk you with it, one thing we agree on, but even he wasn't sure of its power, what it will do."

"If you feel it's dangerous, then don't wear it. I trust your feelings more than I trust it. We don't need its power."

"We'll need all the power we can get, luv. I'm just worrying for nothing…I want to live so much too. I've always wanted to survive, but never to truly live. Didn't have anything to live for. Now, I do." Spike said as he gazed deeply into her eyes.

"I love you so much Spike."

"I love you too, Buffy. More than unlife itself."They kissed passionately and let each other know that there were no doubts or regrets with their bodies. It was the most beautiful night.

*****

"Go on then."

"No, no, you've done enough, you could still -"

"No, you beat them back, it's for me to do the clean up."Buffy heard Faith yelling for her to come, but her feet were riveted to the crumbling floor of the Hellmouth. She didn't, couldn't leave Spike here.

"Gotta move lamb, I think it's fair to say that school's out for bloody summer."

"Spike!"

"I mean it, I gotta do this…" Spike said as he put his hands up as if trying to fend off something.

He felt the fire burning inside of him, devouring him, consuming him. He tried to keep his focus, he had to get Buffy out of here before he burned. The pain was excruciating. So this is what it feels like to really die, Spike thought to himself. He never tried to imagine what real death, his own death would feel like. Even when Dru turned him, it just felt like sleeping and then when he rose, he was a vampire. No pomp, no fuss, but what he was feeling now was how others must have felt, how others died at his hands as he looked on uncaring of their suffering and pain. He suddenly felt that this feeling was only right, that he should feel this pain, feel it sear into him, not deserving of the quick and probably relatively painless death being staked would have afforded him. This, after all, is the pain of redemption and he wanted that, both for her and for himself.

Suddenly, his concentration was broken by a touch, a hand clasping his and then fingers curling his to meet them. He turned to see Buffy's face, torn, in pain herself. She didn't want to leave him. She was holding his hand tightly as if to never let go. She couldn't die with him. He wouldn't let that happen. He gazed into her eyes, tried to engrave her face, her love into his memory so that not even the flame that the amulet was causing to rise within him could erase it. He felt her love through her touch, it filled his open soul and he could feel it almost overpowering the pain of the fire.

"Buffy, you have to leave."

"No, not without you."

"Yes, without me, but not without my love. You'll always have that. It's your world up there, Buffy. You created it, you gave birth to it. It's waiting for you. It needs you."

"But I need you, Spike. I can't do it without you. You promised me that you would never leave me, are you breaking it now?"

Those words hurt him so much, but he knew she didn't mean them as hurtful, she was just trying to convince him to leave with her.

"No, I'm not. You know I can't be with you, but I didn't leave you. You understand? I will never leave you! Believe that!" Spike insisted.

Buffy nodded as she sobbed uncontrollably. Suddenly there was a terrible rumble that nearly knocked her off her feet and it broke their hold.

The pain was getting stronger and he felt himself weakening. He had to make her go.

"I love you," Buffy cried.

"I love you so much. I'll never stop. Now, please go! All this will be for nothing if I lose you again. I can't lose you again."

Buffy nodded again and another quake finally forced her to leave. She ran up the crumbling stairs just in time. All Spike could do was hope it wasn't too late and that she'd make it out. No, he knew she'd make it out. He'd feel it.

Suddenly he let go of the fire from within. God, the pain was merciless, but all he could do was laugh. If anyone had seen him, they would have thought him mad, but it was laughter born from joy that he had the love of someone good and pure, who believed he could make a difference, make a better world, become a better man. It was also a laughter of defiance at whatever lay ahead of him. It was as if to say, "Come and get me, you bastards. I'm ready for whatever you dish out at me." He didn't believe he had done enough good to earn heaven and was ready for the hell that probably awaited him, but knowing that Buffy believed him worthy was enough. It was all enough. Suddenly Buffy's words to him after she was resurrected came flooding back. He remembered them clearly and they now applied to him. Everyone he cared about, especially Buffy, was going to be all right. He was finished. Complete.

He then felt himself disintegrate into ashes and it was over. The pain was over, but the love wasn't and never would be.

The End