Part 6
The gossamer time between sleep and waking was a bittersweet moment for Charles Gunn, for a few moments all was well in the world, vampires didn’t exist, Alonna was safe and well and his Mom was making breakfast in their small kitchen. Life was what he thought it would be before adulthood stripped away his hopes and dreams, no longer simple and bright with the promise of a new day.
When reality crept its way in through the blinds and cast its shadows around the room, chasing away the small gossamer moment and leaving him with nothing but yet another day spread before him, Gunn didn’t have the energy to ignore the thoughts that had been whispering in the corner of his brain for the last few weeks.
They scared him, those thoughts, and he wasn’t use to feeling scared. He was a fighter with a heart that had slowly hardened with time and loss. Stay alive to fight another day. Nothing else matters but the fight. Never let your guard down.
For so long there had been no one but himself and Alonna, the two of them struggling against a world that wanted them to have nothing no matter how hard they tried to hold on to what little they had with their hungry fingers, in the end they always lost. Dirty with the fight and tired from a war they would never truly win, they had been each others entire worlds. But then she was gone and the fight was all he’d had left. Maybe that would have been enough. Maybe he would have been happy.
Maybe he would have been dead within three months.
Maybe he wouldn’t have cared.
But now he did care, probably too much. He had everything he’d been fighting for.
A mission. A family. Friends.
Love.
That’s what scared him the most. One simple word that when said aloud had the power to bring a person to their knees weeping tears of acceptance or betrayal. Left unsaid it would stand in the corner of the room like a white elephant, you could pretend it wasn’t there, deny its existence, but in the end it would always trumpet its presence and leave the occupants with an unreadable silence. Then what? What’s to be done if one loves but the other doesn’t?
Gunn didn’t know how much longer he could keep the words inside himself. He wasn’t the kind of man that spoke lyrical prose and promised his lover the world, his recent need to whisper those words made his throat tight with a fear he was unaccustomed to.
The black man let his eyes drift open, squinting slightly at the mottled light that bled through the window. The vista outside no longer confused Gunn, he’d woken up here enough times now to recognise the green grass and sleepy sidewalks. It was nothing like his own place, rough streets and triple locked doors that he knew like the back of his hand. He’d felt out of place here the first time, a lumbering creature with battle wounds encroaching on a world of neatly shelved books and tea. Not anymore.
Gunn didn’t know how they’d fallen into this, the line between friendship and more had been crossed one night in a blur of accusations and anger, fists meeting flesh in a bout of testosterone filled fury until hands were grasping and lips were meeting in a flurry of passion that knocked them off their feet and into bed. The morning after had heralded a silence unlike either of them had suffered before, both worried that the other would cast the first blow and sully what they had shared. Wesley had been the one to make the first move, to take the initiative, to swallow his fears and set them on the path they were now entangled in.
He’d kissed Charles Gunn that first morning in bed and nothing had been the same since.
It was an affair conducted in secret, hushed conversations and furtive glances, the brush of fingers over a thigh as they ate with their friends, kisses stolen in quiet corridors.
It had been good, really good, for a while.
He turned his head away from the stark morning light and pressed a kiss to the crown of hair that slumbered on his chest, a warm arm slung possessively across his chest as though the owner feared Gunn might flee in the middle of the night. A part of him had wanted to. To crawl from Wesley’s bed before dawn and run from the feelings that threatened to bring light back into his shadows.
Gunn knew he should have kept to his original decision not to spend the night, he should have let Wesley get out of the truck, driven home and tried to gain some perspective. But he hadn’t, he’d followed Wesley, pressed him up against the apartment door, his lover’s hard body fitting to his, fingers tangled and hearts beating loudly they’d made love without speaking, they didn’t need to, not anymore. It was familiar, comforting and much too good.
“Hey.” Wesley murmured, his sleep rough timbre muffled as he dropped a kiss onto Gunn’s chest.
“Hey.”
“What’s the time?” The Englishman asked groggily.
“Early, go back to sleep.” Gunn kissed his forehead and Wesley settled back down into the cradle of his arms, his even breathing a signal that he had already drifted back into slumber.
Gunn knew he should leave. His brain told him it was the smart thing to do, but his heart…his heart never wanted to leave this room
***
Cordelia stared up at her bedroom ceiling, her teeth worrying the flesh of her bottom lip. She should really be up and in the shower by now, it was creeping towards eight thirty, she was meant to be in the office by nine.
And yet she was still in bed.
Troubled hands smoothed over her rumpled bed sheet as her alarm clock blinked accusingly at her. She could always take the day off, she was due a few days rest and relaxation.
Maybe go shopping.
Get a massage.
Anything to stop thinking about that damn dream she kept having.
It wasn’t just any dream, it was that dream. The dream that made her ache between her thighs and squeeze her eyes shut to block out the images that refused to leave her. It wasn’t uncommon for Cordelia to relive the horrors of her visions in her subconscious, she had grown accustomed to the nightmares to a degree. She’d thought she would spend the night thrashing around in her bed haunted by the face of a terrified little girl, but she hadn’t, it was the face of Angel that had made her call out loudly in her sleep last night.
It wouldn’t leave her, his confident hands travelling her body, the way he made her back arch from his bed, his lips stealing kisses….
In her dreams Angel kissed her.
That was what kept Cordelia entombed in the safety of her bed, she and Angel didn’t kiss, had agreed it would be too personal. So why did he kiss her in her dreams? Was he meant to kiss her? Was that part of the vision sex deal? But he hadn’t kissed her in her original vision. Or maybe she’d just forgotten that part?
“Ugh!” Cordelia rubbed the palms of her hands into her eyes and told her brain to just shut the hell up for once.
The problem was that when she closed her eyes the images returned. Obsidian orbs that demanded everything she had, flashes of pale skin mottled in moonlight, bruising fingers and teasing lips. Bodies slippery with sweat, her wrists grasped in his powerful hands, harder and faster, begging for more, now, please, more, oh god oh god, don’t stop…The way he looked at her…hungry and wild, Angel didn’t look at Cordelia like that. Like he wanted to posses her body and own it for all time.
Angel just didn’t look at her in that way.
Except…once he had. For a moment last night Cordelia had seen a promise of passion fogging his gaze, it had made her heart beat a little faster, caused her breathe to catch in her throat and terrified her unlike any of the monsters they had faced ever had. It was gone in a flash and he was Angel again, her vampire best friend that was having sex with her so she wouldn’t die.
But for those few silent seconds it had been there and she’d thought the vision had come to life. The vision she was seeing replayed over and over again behind her eyelids, singeing her nerves and spreading goose bumps up and down her arms.
In her vision Angel kissed her and Cordelia wanted him to. In her dream Angel travelled her body like a knowing lover and Cordelia begged him never to stop.
It’s just a dream, she told herself for the millionth time that morning. Just a dream, just a vision, just Angel’s lips on the inside of her thigh, just her nails grazing red scratches down his back, just her name falling from his mouth like poetry, just his arms she fell asleep in.
Just a dream.
“This is so gonna drive me insane.” Cordelia whimpered and buried her head into a pillow.
***
Wesley Wyndam Pryce finally woke up to find himself alone in bed. He squinted at the clock on the wall and groaned, he was going to be late for work.
“Charles?” He called out even though he knew he wouldn’t get an answer. The pillow beside him was cold, the heavy boots that had so many times sat next to his bed were gone, Gunn had left before Wesley had woken, there was no scribbled note on the bedside table, no hastily written words to greet him.
It was almost as though he’d never been there at all.
With tired limbs Wesley pulled himself out of bed, rubbing a hand over his stubble rough jaw he tried to wipe away the last fuzzy vestiges of sleep as he made his way to the small kitchen. He filled the kettle and flicked the switch, actions performed on automatic pilot because his brain hadn’t completely woken up yet. Wesley crossed his arms over his chest and leant against the doorway as he waited for the water to boil, his mouth stretched widely with a yawn.
He swept his gaze around the kitchen, it was messy with last night’s destruction, an over turned chair, broken plates on the floor, the refrigerator stood at an odd angle. A small knowing smile slipped across Wesley’s face. Gunn’s passion was a hurricane, it threw debris around them in a storm and all Wesley could do was hold on and hope to see daylight.
It was always the same after a mission, rough and demanding, Gunn pushed Wesley up against the refrigerator and staked his claim, Wesley pressed Gunn down onto the kitchen table, glass breaking and legs shaking he tried to show Gunn with his body what he couldn’t in words.
He knew that was why Gunn hadn’t stayed the night.
The kettle whistled its shrill call, Wesley dropped a tea bag into a mug and poured hot water on it, another jaw breaking yawn taking over his face. He reached his hands above his head and stretched his back, wincing at the pull of overused muscles. He added milk to his tea padded silently back to his bedroom, not sparing a glance at the mountain of books and papers that littered his living room table.
It was too bloody early to be dealing with life.
***
Angel had learnt long ago that if he stood under the hot spray of the shower for long enough his body temperature matched that of a human’s. His skin was no longer cool to the touch, the borrowed blood inside his veins felt warm and if he closed his eyes he could imagine the sun shining through the curtains. For a few seconds in the day the vampire wasn’t cold and it would be easy to forget what he was.
The last time Angel had done that he’d almost brought the world to its knees.
The vampire walked a thin line that sometimes he wanted to throw himself across, give into the whispers, lose the soul and let Angelus sate the hunger that would never end. He almost had with Darla, for a hundred years they’d lived an life of desire and destruction, the demon had howled for release with it’s eternal mate but the soul had held on tightly and Angel thanked whatever deity it was that hadn’t abandoned him completely.
He let the hot water pelt his face and flatten his hair, his hands braced his weight against the tiled wall. It had been that moment with Darla that Angel really understood that sex didn’t equal happiness. Sex with Buffy had made him forget himself, forget everything but the soft body in his hands, the blonde hair that he wrapped his fingers in. He’d found happiness in the Slayer’s arms and Sunnydale had suffered because of it. It was the forgetting that signalled the emergence of the Scourge of Europe, sex was just one of the many catalysts.
The gypsies really knew how to curse a guy. Boils and blinding torment had nothing on the fear of letting go for even a moment, every second of every day walking that deadly line. His sleeping hours were haunted by the faces of the innocents he’d slain, his waking hours by the guilt and isolation that sat heavily on his back and made his shoulders slump with the weight. But like Gunn, it was that moment in between that tortured Angel the most.
For a year Angel had drifted from slumber believing that the woman he loved would be laying next to him, he could smell her shampoo, feel her warm skin pressed against his chest…but Buffy was never there. It was a waking dream that he’d suffered with silently until the memories started to fade and his heart didn’t ache with her absence quite so much.
He hadn’t had a dream like that in a long time. Not until this morning when Angel had woken with the familiar but foreign scent of perfume on his pillow. In his sleep the vampire had wrapped his arms around it, cradling it in his arms and burying his nose into the soft material, breathing the light scent into his lungs. There was something else lingering in the air of his bedroom, thick and musky, the aroma of a woman’s desire, of sex.
Cordelia.
She was on his skin, on his sheets, taking over every one of his sensitive senses until the night before replayed itself in all its awkward technicolour glory in his far too photographic memory. He’d woken up hard, his hips grinding against the sheet beneath him as he clutched at the pillow that smelt of his best friend.
Angel turned the water to cold, desperately trying to soak the images from his brain and the tension from his body.
He looked down and frowned.
“Why couldn’t you have been this eager last night?” Angel muttered, refusing to give into the desire to touch himself. If he did it wouldn’t a melancholy girl with the weight of the world dragging on her coat tails he’d be thinking about. It would a beautiful brunette with a caustic tongue and full breasts that he had held in the palms of his hands.
It’s only natural, the vampire reasoned, they’d had sex twice now, it would be odd if he wasn’t thinking about her firm ripe thighs. Right? Right?
Oh he really couldn’t start thinking about his best friend in that way. He just…couldn’t. He couldn’t let his mind wander into the memory of her tentative hands, of the shy smile that fired his demon with want, he couldn’t think about the seductive beat of her blood, couldn’t imagine what it would feel like as it coated his lips and slipped thickly over his tongue.
Well, he could think about it, but he shouldn’t. Because Cordelia was his best friend.
And that would be wrong.
Right?
“Please go away.” He begged his erection. It was at times like this the vampire wished he really was a eunuch
***
“Do you ever get the feeling there’s something going and your the only person that doesn’t know what?” Fred asked Lorne as he studied the cards in his hands.
“Like?” The prescient demon flicked his red eyes momentarily in her direction.
“I dunno, it’s just that it’s almost noon and so far we’re the only people here and I coulda sworn I heard Cordelia leaving the hotel in the middle of the night last night.” She took a bite of her apple as she pondered for a moment. “’Cos her heels make that loud click clack noise that makes Angel wince and I heard that.”
“Maybe she was too tired to drive home?” Lorne shrugged casually. “Got any twos?”
“Go fish. You know something, don’t you?” Fred narrowed her eyes at him.
“Moi?” The prescient demon pressed a hand against his chest in mock outrage.
“Lorne….”
“I’m sorry sugar-muffin, I promised I wouldn’t tell.” Lorne smiled apologetically.
“Secrets are bad.” Fred frowned. “Got any nines?”
“Go fish my little bundle of Texan cuteness.” Maybe Lorne would finally win a round.
“Secrets turn people inside out and upside down. When I was in sixth grade Tommy Peterson-”
“Honey, is this story gonna make me want another sea-breeze?” Lorne stopped her before she had the chance to start rambling about little Tommy’s adventures in sixth grade. Fred stuck her tongue out playfully then took another bite of her apple. The Hotel was eerily quiet, the pair would be worried if it weren’t for the fact that the morning after a mission team Angel were notoriously slow to trudge into work. That and the fact that their merry team of do-gooders where all currently embroiled in two of the most complicated relationships the prescient demon had ever had the displeasure to read probably had something to do with the all round tardiness.
“I’m worried about the boys too.” Fred leant her elbows on the lobby counter. “Wesley looks like he hasn’t slept in a week and Charles…Charles just hasn’t been Charles of late.” The brunette fiddled with the cards in her hand, worry etched clearly around her eyes. “When we got back from Pylea and Angel went away because that girl with the funny name died, Wes and Charles were like two peas in a pod, all that back slapping and knuckle bumping…now they barely talk. Why don’t they talk anymore?”
“Who doesn’t talk anymore?” Angel asked as he walked by in search of coffee.
“Angelcakes, nice of you to finally join us.” Lorne laid his cards down on the counter. “You’ll be glad to know that while you were doing whatever it is you do in that room of yours Angel Investigations got the grand total of one call, the details are on the pad on Cordy’s desk as is the bill for my services. I am not your secretary. Even if I do have a fabulous phone manner.”
“Who doesn’t talk any more?” The vampire asked Fred once more, it was still too early for Lorne.
“Wesley and Charles. Do you know what’s wrong with them?” The Texan tilted her head with concern.
“Me? No. Why would I know? I don’t know. “ The vampire poured the thick black sludge that masqueraded as coffee into a mug, he use to be better at lying than that. Lorne raised an eyebrow at him, his eyes quickly narrowing when the vampire’s aura began to shout at him.
“Stop it Lorne, I warned you about that.” Angel growled, mentally trying to rid any lingering thoughts of sun kissed skin from his aura.
“Hey, it’s not my fault. If you people didn’t project every thought that went through your brains I would be a lot happier and taking a lot less cold showers.” The green demon muttered testily. “Nobody ever spares a thought for the prescient demon that doesn’t have a honey.”
“There there.” Fred patted his hand sympathetically before she quickly turned her attention back to the vampire. “Why was Cordelia sneaking out of the hotel last night?”
“Cordy wasn’t sneaking out of the hotel last night.” Which wasn’t a complete lie.
“But she was here, right?”
“She fell asleep and I didn’t want to wake her, you know how tired she is after a vision.” Also not a complete lie.
“OK.” Fred narrowed her eyes at him.
There was definitely something going on that she wasn’t being told about. Fred watched as Angel sipped at his coffee, his eyes focusing on anything but the two people that were looking at him.
“Angel, can I ask you a question?”
“Sure.”
“Are you and Cordelia having sex?”
Fred’s blunt, rather Cordelia-like question made Angel choke on the black liquid, spilling a spray of coffee across the office and down his sweater.
“What? Why would you say that? Cordelia and I are friends, we’re not having sex.” He snatched a Kleenex from Cordelia’s desk and attempted to soak up some of the mess.
“Try that once more with feeling.” Lorne bit the inside of his cheek to stop himself from laughing.
“We’re not having sex.” Angel growled and shot Lorne a look that clearly said shut the hell up or I’ll snap off your horns and shove them somewhere very unpleasant.
“Who isn’t having sex?” Gunn asked as he strolled casually across the lobby, the door swinging shut behind him
“Angel and Cordelia.” Fred grinned at the black man.
“Ya damn well better not be, you touch one hair on that woman’s head and I’ll be handing you your ass on a plate, fang boy.” He crossed his arms over his chest and glared at the visibly uncomfortable vampire.
“Cordelia and I are not having sex.” Angel ground out through his tense jaw.
“I-”
“Shut up Lorne.” He silenced the demon before he even had the chance to say anything.
“You know Freddie, I liked it when there was just the two of us. I got shouted at less.” Lorne grumbled and considered that second sea-breeze and possibly a few painkillers, Gunn’s aura was a big old mess of confusion and heart ache and the anagogic host could feel the beginnings of a migraine setting in.
“Do you think we could maybe get on with some work?” Angel asked testily as he stalked over to Cordelia’s desk and tried to decipher the scribbled note.
“What’s up with the vamp? Cordy been spiking his blood again?” Gunn nodded in the vampire’s direction.
“She’s been spiking something all right.” Lorne chuckled to himself, not realising that three pairs of ears where very much within hearing distance until he looked up to be faced with annoyance, confusion and exasperation.
It was like a lesser known three wise monkeys.
“I mean…got any fours?” Lorne winced and held up his cards. “Oh thank god.” He sighed with relief when the lobby door swept open and Cordelia swept in.
“Hey guys, sorry I’m late. Hard at work I see.” She arched an eyebrow at them.
“As ever.” Gunn nodded, a genuine smile slipping over his face.
“Cordy, can I ask you a question?” Fred asked Cordelia before the Seer even had the chance to take her jacket off.
Cordelia noticed Angel shaking his head vehemently behind the physicist.
“Er…OK.”
“That magazine you gave me said green was the new black. What happened to black?” Fred’s mind was a wonderfully confusing thing. Angel visibly slumped with relief.
“Sweetheart, green will never be the new black. You shouldn’t believe everything you read.” Cordelia smiled affectionately at the other woman and asked Angel what the problem was with her eyes. Angel waved a nothing hand at her and sat down on her desk.
“Huh.” Fred pondered unaware of the silent conversation going on around her. “I like green.” She added as an after thought.
“And green likes you too puddin’.” Lorne grinned making the brunette blush.
“Jeez, get a room already.” Cordelia snorted as she walked passed them and to her desk. “What’s that?” She nodded at the slip of paper Angel was folding then refolding as though he were about to make a swan.
“Possible client.” The vampire handed her the note.
“Oooh, a job that we might actually paid for.” Cordelia grinned, Angel could almost see the dollar signs flashing in her hazel eyes. “Another stalker?” She said as she quickly scanned the note.”Ugh, what is it with the men in this town? What makes them go from being Joe normal to Joe retraining order?”
“Love. Betrayal. Boredom. Take your pick” Angel shrugged.
“Well that’s depressing.” Cordelia rolled her eyes at her best friend. “What was with the semaphore routine just then?” Her voice dropped to a whisper as she gestured over to where their friends were sitting a few feet away.
“Nothing.” Angel dismissed it. “How are you feeling this morning?”
“Shiny and new.” Cordelia smiled.
“Good.” The vampire nodded, their eyes met in a quiet moment that held more meaning than a few awkward words ever could. Angel reached out and squeezed her hand before he stepped away from the desk let Cordelia get on with her morning routine.
“Sorry I’m late, I overslept.” Wesley announced as he jogged into the office.
“I thought I told you to take a few days off.” Cordelia said as she booted up her computer.
“I’m sorry Cordelia, I must have missed the memo that declared you boss of me.” The Englishman said dryly as he brushed passed Gunn on he way to his office, their fingers touching for a fleeting second.
“Next time check your mail.” She said with saccharin sweetness. “And for godsake get a shave.”
“Dude are you sniffing me?” Gunn scowled at the vampire hovering behind him.
“No.”
“Yeah you were.”
“Why would I be sniffing you?”
“That’s what I wanna know.”
“Got any five’s?”
“Go fish twinkle toes.”
“Lorne, are you cheating?”
“Well…yeah…you try playing with a maths genius without cheating.”
“Who moved my books?! Cordelia!”
“Jeez Wes, don’t have a cow. Honestly, you’re worse than women. Angel does this say Miss Hayward or Miss Hayford? I can’t make out Lorne’s handwriting. “
“Umm…I think it says urgent.”
“Oh. Lorne your handwriting sucks!”
“Love you too Queen of my heart.”
“How about any eight’s?”
“Ah crap.”
And so life continued for the members of Angel investigations, even though hearts were aching, desires were blossoming and the lines grew blurrier every second, the PTB’s favourite gang of hopeless misfits pretended that all was well. They hid truths from each other and denied the obvious to even themselves.
But not for much longer.