Part 6
“Damn it, Cordelia. I told you to stay in the jeep,” Angel scolded as he checked the cut on her leg dangling out of the passenger door.
“That thing was going to chop you in two!” she pulled her leg inside the jeep and slammed the door, appalled that he seemed ungrateful, mad even at her attempt to help him out.
Angel stormed to the driver’s side and opened the door, “ That ‘thing’ would have been dead two minutes earlier if you hadn’t distracted me by getting yourself hurt!” he pointed out, punctuating his argument by slamming his own door.
“So, I’m just supposed to sit on the sidelines now that you’re here,” she complained.
“Well… yeah,” he started the engine.
His matter-of-fact manner made her blood boil. “Well, I’m sooo sorry,” she turned slightly in the passenger seat, facing him as he pulled away from the curb, “but, not gonna happen.”
“Cordelia, I appreciate the fact that you want to be involved in the fight. Really, its….”
“Involved in the fight?! I’ve got news for you, Angel. I’ve been ‘involved’ in the fight a lot longer than you have. Or at least a big chunk of time that you haven’t. And if you think that you can just come along and start barking out orders, telling me what to do and what not to do, you’ve got another thing coming, buster.”
“Now why in the world would I think you‘d follow orders,” he bit off sarcastically as the jeep sped up to match his rising temper. “I mean, you never have before. Remember the Krylock demon? Last year?”
“That scaly faced, hygienically challenged freak? Pfft.”
“Pfft! He nearly took your head off, Cordy!”
“Well, you, Wes and Gunn wouldn’t have known about his second heart or that it took piercing both with pure silver to kill it if I hadn’t shown up.”
“Every time I think about how close that was…. That’s why you should do what I say, Cordy. We were lucky that time. But it only takes once. One time for me not to be fast enough, strong enough. I’m not trying to take over your life. I just don’t want to lose you.”
“Ugh…” Cordelia flopped back onto the seat and stared at the windshield. “This is so like you ya know. You brood about the past so much that you let it effect the now. That was a whole year ago, Angel. I don’t think that….”
Cordelia fell silent as Angel slammed on the brakes. They both looked at each other, hope in his eyes, shock in hers.
“You remember,” he whispered the statement.
“I… I..not everything. Just that moment. When you started talking about it, and with the fight back there, it just all seemed so familiar. It kinda brought it back.”
“But you remember that night? In the alley?”
“Yeah,” she answered, astonishing herself at the knowledge. “And you? You must remember it too.”
“Just pieces. Flashes really. But yeah, its there.”
They both stared at each other in silence. Cordelia’s rapid breathing and pounding heart the only sounds echoing in both of their ears.
“Is there anything?” he broke the silence, hopeful that her memory was coming back as well, or even stronger than his own. “Anything else about that night, or any other time that you remember.”
“No,” she lied and swallowed hard, trying to wet her suddenly dry throat. There was more. She remembered the way he had hovered over her for two days after that night. Staying with her at her apartment, insisting she rest and arguing with Dennis over which one would bring her breakfast in bed and threatening to exorcise the poor ghost if he ever caught him drawing her bathwater again. “Nothing,” she shook her head in affirmation.
“Yeah,” Angel blew out a calming breath. “Me either. I guess it was just so familiar that it triggered something….” he thought of the hotel. Of how pieces of his past, of his and Cordelia’s past, had raced at him when he entered the building.
“Angel, what is it?” she questioned as he put the jeep in gear and made a u-turn. “Angel? I thought we were going home?”
He glanced at her and then back to the road, trusting that the old hotel would do the same for her. “I think we are.”
***
“Love what you’ve done with the place,” Cordelia turned in a slow circle as she took in the massive, dilapidated lobby.
“Anything?”
“Sorry,” she apologized weakly, but it was true. The big, empty hotel was just that to her. A big, empty hotel. No memories. No warm fuzzies or traumatic flashes. Just, nothing. In a way she was relieved. The memory of how Angel had reacted to her a year ago had implied too much, stirred up too much inside of her. She wasn’t sure if she was ready for anymore revelations just yet.
“Maybe if you walk around?” Angel stepped closer to her and took her arm, both tried to hide the way their bodies shuddered at the contact. Cordelia placed her free arm across her stomach, willing away the butterflies that tickled and tingled her insides as he walked her to the stairs, his body brushing hers with each step up.
The second floor hallway was long and very dark, so much so that she could hardly make out the doors that led inside to each room. Even so, exactly twelve steps down the corridor, she stopped and turned to face a shadowed doorway. Butterflies turned into acrobats flipping her insides around at the memory of the room, and at the nearness of the quiet man standing so close to her.
“What is it?”
“This room,” was her only answer, as she stared at the blackness where she knew the entryway stood.
Angel pushed the ajar door completely open and led her into the suite. It was almost as dark as the hallway, but the soft glow from the doors to the balcony filtered in enough of the city lights that she could make out a few shapes and shadows. Moving away from his touch, she walked through the room, skimming her fingers along what she knew was the dresser. “I don’t know. I think it might have been yours,” she furrowed her brow in confusion, “or mine? I’m just not sure.” She continued her blind tour of the room.
“Maybe it was both,” he hoped aloud before he could stop himself.
“Crap!” Cordelia half yelped when her injured shin bumped into the bedrail.
Angel reached her in an instant and taking her by the shoulders, gently sat her on the edge of the bed. Kneeling in front of her, he lifted her bare leg. It was dark in the room, but with his night creature vision, he could see the sun kissed stem clearly. God, she was so beautiful. He wandered at what they had been. She had referred to the others as ‘friends‘, ‘family‘. Those seemed to be such inadequate words for what he felt for her even now, without the memories, the experiences of their past. “We need to put something on this. It’s not bleeding again, but I don’t want you to get an infection.” He stroked the area around the small cut, his hands cool and soothing yet scorching her skin with every caress.
Cordelia studied the dark shadow that was the top of Angel’s head, she looked down at where she knew her leg was, unable to see the short skirt or her bare skin in the dark. “So, you not only have superhuman strength,” her voice sounded husky and she tried to mentally shake herself, to regain some semblance of control over what his touch was doing to her, “but you can see in the dark too,” she reasoned aloud.
He didn’t answer her, but simply stared at her tempting skin, at the reddened mark, evidence of how close she had come to being seriously hurt. How many nights had it been like this for her, or worse? How many nights had she been forced into the fight because he had been gone? He closed his eyes, his small soothing caress now turning into more of an erotic stroke as his hand ran the length of her leg to the hem of her skirt above her knee. His touch feather soft.
The dark room and his caress began to work a kind of magic on her, weaving a spell that she knew she couldn’t fight. She didn’t know if it was déjà vu or some remnant of a dream, but she knew she had felt this before. Had lived some moment like this with him in the past. Maybe he hadn’t simply been a part of their team. Maybe he had been more, at least more to her. Whatever it was, this feeling, this pull that seemed to draw her to him, make her want him, felt right. In fact, it seemed like the first ‘right’ feeling she’d had in a long time.
Cloaked in blackness, her fingers seemed to find their way to his thick mass of dark hair, playing in the coarse strands. The stroke of her hand, automatically and unconsciously matching that of his own.
Just being near her was temptation itself. The feel of her skin had tested the limits of his restraint. But it was her touch that undid him. His hand stilled and he leaned forward, resting his forehead against her knee. “Cordelia, there’s something you should know about me,” he said it so softly, she almost couldn’t hear the words.
Her hand stilled, “What is it, Angel?” she whispered back.
“I’m not…. I’m not what you think I am.”
“Oh?”
Her tone was too nonchalant for him. This was important, she had to understand, know what he was, so that her rejection could come quick if not painless. “Cordelia, I’m not….” the word wouldn’t come out. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t finish.
So she did it for him.
“Human? Already past that page, Angel. Try and keep up.”
Angel sat back on his heels, puzzling at her revelation. “How? When?” he stared at her, aware that she was unable to see his shocked expression.
“Oh, I don’t know. You killing two vamps on the beach with your bare hands. Getting past Dennis almost unscathed when you rushed in my room last night. Your miraculous recovery. Your inhuman strength. Take your pick. I’m not an idiot ya know. It really wasn’t that hard to figure out.”
“You knew? All this time you knew that I was a…. not human?” He left the word demon untouched for the moment.
“Hey, you make it sound like it’s a bad thing. I’ll have you know that some of my best friends have been ‘nonhumans‘. And that includes a ghost, a demon, and one very sweet, alcoholic, Irish half-breed who gave his life up for the mission.”
“Is that what I am?”
“What? A half-breed?”
“No. A friend,” he leaned back up on his knees. “I mean. Is that all I am?”
“A friend is a very important thing, Angel,” she said quietly, her voice trying to slip back into that embarrassingly husky, sexy sound that she seemed unable to control. “To be. To have. Couldn’t you accept that, if that’s what we were? Are. Friends.”
“Could I accept it? Yes. I could accept anything that kept me close to you. Would it be all that I wanted, define all that I’m feeling even right now? No.”
Cordelia tried to reach the rational side of her brain, hidden through the fog of emotion and lust that seemed to be swirling around in her mind. She had almost grasped it when she felt his hand on her leg again, the light brush of his cool fingertips on her skin.
He knew he wasn’t playing fair, knew what his touch was doing to her, but he couldn’t stop himself. He couldn’t let her walk away from the moment without letting her know just how much he needed her, loved her, wanted her.
“Angel,” it was a whispered sigh, a plea to stop or not to. Neither really knew or cared. They were hidden away in some black cocoon, shielded from the past, the future, and what mysterious, tragic event that lay between.
“You said you knew me even before you saw the negative. You said you looked in my eyes and knew that you cared for me. Through whatever was done to us and after being apart for who knows how long, you felt something inside of you. Just like I did. Something inside of you that trusted me, that cared for me. They couldn’t touch that, Cordy. Why? Why do you think they couldn’t erase that?”
She closed her useless eyes against the darkness. Wanting to answer, to help him work out the problem aloud. But her lips were trembling now and her body burned as his hand crept higher again, stopping again at the bottom of her skirt, gently brushing, gliding back and forth against the hem. “Cordy,” his voice sent chill bumps racing across her skin. “Were we in love?”
She opened her eyes then, trying to focus them on the face hidden in the silhouette. In one last desperate attempt to reach the intellectual side of her brain, she tried to answer his question, without answering his question. “Angel, it’s obvious we were close,” she breathed, unable to hide what his touch was doing to her, but unwilling to stop him. “I mean, the negative alone is proof of that.”
“I’m not asking you for proof. I’m asking you what you feel. What your instincts tell you. I want to know if they’re telling you what mine are telling me.”
“Oh? And what are you instincts telling you, Angel?” she closed her eyes again and let her head drop back slightly as his second hand followed the lead of his other, tracing a path up her other, unblemished leg.
“Right now they’re roaring so loud, Cordy, I can’t think straight. Everything in me is telling me that you’re the only reason I came back, made it through. Were we in love? I know I had to have been. Because no other answer makes any sense to me.”
She knew that this was the moment, the moment that some silent alarm should go off in her head. She waited for it to sound, to save them both from the flood of sexual attraction, of deep instinctual emotion that was about to sweep them away. But it never came. Instead of feeling wrong, dangerous, forbidden, his touch and the way her body responded to it felt natural, essential. It was as if she had been thirsting for this moment, his presence, for so long that her body was absorbing every delicious stroke.
“Cordelia?” both of his hands stopped on the sides of her thighs. His voice was ragged and uncertain and although she couldn’t see his face, she could feel the heat of his stare, waiting for her answer.
“I think we were,” she whispered, sitting up straighter and looking at him with sincerity, knowing that he could read the emotions, the raw truth in her eyes.
She was trembling all over then, the sheer magnitude of their confession to each other filling her with anticipation for his touch, and fear of the unknown – or the unremembered.
She was tearing him up inside. Just a moment before he had been ready to press her to the bed, make passionate, earth shattering love to her. But now, as she sat there in front of him in the dark, her eyes full of naked honesty, her body trembling in what he could only interpret as terror at their situation, his only thought was to hold her. He stood and sat down beside her, pulling her slowly into his arms, “We won’t rush this,” he crooned into her ear. “We’ll find out all we can before we….” he trailed off and held her tighter.
They stayed that way for what seemed like an eternity before they both pulled back slightly. Her body had stilled, felt soft and pliant now against his, but her lips still trembled slightly. Unable to resist, he bent his head to hers, kissing the corner of her quivering lips and sparking the electrically charged air between them.
He bent his head to her again and this time she met his lips willingly, eagerly with hers, reveling in the charge that shook her body and sent a bolt of lightening racing beneath her skin. His mouth became more possessive, more needy, hungry, and when one of his hands moved to the nape of her neck, pressing her closer to his body, she could have sworn the room began to spin. Passion built in her, an erotic heat that swirled and spread to every cell. Her arms crept up and circled his neck. She shifted slightly, pressing herself as much as possible against his hard frame.
He laid her back slowly, his mouth never leaving hers as his hands began an exploration or her hips, her small waist, and the soft mounds of her breasts. His mouth teased, coaxed hers into a rhythmic dance. And when she finally broke free, allowing herself to breath, she heard him murmur something incoherent in a husky voice, a sound of aching hunger that made her burn even more for his touch.
She ran her fingers along the sides of his face, cradling his head in her hands as he took one hard beaded nipple into his mouth, suckling it right through her silk blouse and lacy bra. Impatiently he raised up, lifting her slightly with him, his hands pushed at fabric and worked at buttons until her blouse and champagne colored undergarment were discarded. He stared at her as if experiencing some miracle and circled one arm around her, bending her slightly back so her breast jutted forward, offering themselves up to him. He lowered his head again, his mouth was a cool mist, pulling strongly at her tight, bronze flesh. His tongue dancing around her nipple, his blunt teeth scraping until she cried out in uncontainable pleasure.
When he paused his sensual assault, he lowered her back to the bed again, leaving her panting and flushed.
“I need to see you,” he caressed her cheek with his hand, his hot gaze taking in the dazed and sexy eyes that he knew couldn’t focus clearly on him in the dark. “I need to just look at you, all of you,” he whispered and trailed a finger over her hot, swollen lips.
Cordelia felt consumed with need, possessed with passion, bold and seductive. And in a move that shocked herself, she drew his finger into her mouth, suckling it, tickling the tip of it with her tongue.
He had meant to take it slow, enjoy gazing and exploring her body at his own pace, but the moment her hot mouth closed around his finger, all thought left his brain. And in a flurry of zips, buttons, and a few fabric tears, she was pinned down on the bed, his naked body covering hers.
Cordelia let out a little shriek and then graced him with a small smile. Reaching up, she trailed her fingertips down his shoulders, the sides of his muscular chest, and then up again. She felt his powerful body clench and then shake slightly at her tender touch. In that moment she knew, knew that no matter how strong he was, no matter how much strength his body held, that he was just as vulnerable as she was when it came to this. To them.
He loved her, and she knew.
He leaned down and kissed her, letting her feel his stark, raw need. He touched her face with one hand, before trailing it to her breast, stopping for one teasing moment and then sliding down her stomach to rest where her heat and arousal called to him. He trailed the palm of his other hand down the length of her body and both hands found the curve of her hips where he held her still as his cool lips descended to ignite a trail of fire across her stomach. Still he moved lower, and when he finally tasted her, her fingers slipped down, tangling themselves in his hair. Her body ached and arched and moved restlessly beneath him, her flavor and scent bombarding his acute senses until he thought he might explode.
He could have stayed there forever, bathing in her hot, wild scent. Until she let a soft moan escape her lips. That small sound sent him into another reality, a place where only the two of them existed. No thought or care for the past, the future, or any other being in the world. He grew so tight and hard that his desire for her became almost painful. Leaving her heated folds, hot, slick, and ready for his invasion, he lifted himself over her, pressing himself against her fiery entrance.
He was so thick and full with need, yet he was so gentle with her, easing his velvet tip in so slowly, so tenderly, as if not to hurt her. Her hands grasped his shoulders, her fingers digging into his skin. Looking down into her eyes, he expected fear, apprehension, but was met with trust, acceptance, and love. Something animalistic, demonic, deep down inside of him roared, tried to break free, whispered horrible secrets in his brain in a desperate attempt to stop what was about to happen. It beat at him, clawed at his soul and then suddenly it was gone, the only thing left in its place…..peace.
Cordelia reached up, caressed the lines of strain on his face. “Angel? What’s wrong?”
He looked at her, and something within told him that he was free. Free from some horrible fate because she loved him, allowed him to love her. Lowering his head, he kissed her, softly, reverently before whispering, “It’s nothing….it’s everything. I love you, Cordelia.” He pushed slowly, deeply into her until he was completely surrounded by her tight, welcoming walls. The act eliciting a gasp from both of them. He stared at her in the darkness, watching the myriad of emotions play across her face as he began to move, slowly at first, with long, sure stokes.
He filled her so completely, it was the most intimate thing she had ever felt. She reveled in the way her body tingled, the way her channel ached and stretched to accommodate his large size. She moved with him, reached for him.
He began to surge into her harder, deeper. His hands grabbing and cradling her round, smooth, buttocks, moving her, urging her closer to their mutual goal. Her body rippled, vibrated. His hands tightened, his fingers biting into her delicate skin. She could feel him, swelling, harder, deeper, faster. Lights flashed before her eyes in the blackness. A display of colors and shapes, a promise of perfect ecstasy. She grabbed at it, felt a pressure building deep inside until the lights burst into flames and she screamed, her body shattering into a million pieces.
His mouth took hers, matching his hungry, frantic rhythm and devouring her last whimpering cry. He drove her so hard, so deep, the friction of it so excruciatingly delightful that her body wound tight, the ripple, the lights, exploding again into another earth shaking orgasm.
She gripped him so tightly, milking him until he swelled and then pulsed into her. Waves of bliss washing over him as he peppered kisses all over her face, whispering her name over and over as he shuddered and then calmed. His wild thrusts gradually slowed until he was simply rocking against her, with her, bathing himself in their mutual satisfaction.
When his body finally stilled, he rolled to his side, taking her with him. His arms circling her in an unbreakable band, locking her to him.
He was relaxed now, but she could still feel him, hard and strong inside of her, his body still sending pulsing aftershocks into hers. She wrapped her arms around him, snuggling close to his chest. “Do you think it’s always like this with us? Every time?” she whispered.
He tightened his arms around her in answer, filling his lungs with their combined scent. “I think it will always be like this with you, Cordy.”
She sighed and snuggled deeper into the shelter of his body and hid her face against his chest when her stomach began to rumble and growl. “I’m sorry,” she apologized with an embarrassed giggle. “I’m starving.”
“Oh yeah?” ‘me too,’ he thought.
“You think we could leave our rundown, dusty love nest for a while and grab a bite to eat?” she crinkled her nose and looked up towards him. “DO you eat?”
Well at least she hadn’t asked “WHAT do you eat?”
“Come on,” he withdrew from her and raised her up to sit next to him. “There’s an all night diner down the block.”
She sat there and watched his shadowed body leave the bed and begin to dress. Completely drained and exhausted, she fell back down to the bed and burrowed herself against the mattress. “I think I need a little nap before we go,” she yawned.
Bending down as he buttoned up his shirt, he kissed the top of her sleepy head, “What you need is food. I’ve been in your apartment, remember? Go to sleep, I’ll be back in a minute.” He needed to lift a pint of blood from the closest butcher shop anyway.
“Hurry back,” she mumbled as he left the room.
***
Charles Gunn drove the dark streets of L.A., peeking over at Wesley now and again. When Fred had whispered to him at the hospital about the eviction notice and bolted lock on the door of their office, he had intended on taking care of the matter himself. Had even called up a few favors owed to him by his old crew, soliciting their expertise in breaking and entering in order to retrieve whatever of their belongings that would fit in the bed of his truck. He really didn’t want Wes to know until he had gained some of his strength back, knowing what it would do to him to have to leave some of his research behind. He had been through a lot in the past twenty-four hours, he didn’t need the added stress of knowing that their business, their mission, was crumbling beneath their feet.
But Fred, being Fred, had let it slip out while she sat with Wes after Cordelia had left that evening and as a result, Wesley had insisted that he help. But Gunn knew that he was going along more to make sure that the right material, the most important of their holdings, was saved.
Gunn glanced at his friend who was immersed in an old dusty book, a journal from the Watchers Council that logged every known vampire. From those that had been dusted for centuries and the ones who still walked among humans. He looked back to the road, his eyes shifting now and again from side to side, scanning. He didn’t need a book to tell him that the world was still infested with disgusting, bloodsucking demons. He’d seen too many of them to not know how to spot them immediately. The filthy mother-fuckers. He hated them. He didn’t just want to exterminate them. He wasn’t like the rest of his family, happy to just see another one ‘bite the dust’. He wanted them to suffer, all of them, for what they had tried to do to Wesley. For what they had done to his sister.
He closed his eyes, willing her image, human and demon, from his mind. Concentrating on the road again, he saw the tall building that always fascinated him, approaching on their right. The old hotel was abandoned, had been for as long as he could remember. Even junkies were too spooked by its legend of ghosts and death to set up shop in the place. But he had always seemed to be drawn to the place, appreciated its failing beauty and dark mystery.
“Aw, hell no,” he suddenly swerved to the curb on the opposite side of the street, watching a healed and healthier looking version of the creature that attacked his friend the night before leaving the aged dwelling.
“What is it?” Wes finally roused from his study.
“Looks like our vamp found a place to nest,” Gunn nodded toward the vampire rounding the corner and disappearing from sight.
“Gunn,” Wes’ face seemed worried and tired. He glanced to the book in his hands and back at his friend. “We’ve faced him before unsuccessfully. I’m not sure it will turn out any better for us this time. I especially know that I am incapable of battling a demon in my condition.”
“Who said you’d have to do any of the battling? You‘re gonna stay right here until I come back.”
“Gunn, you can’t face him alone. You saw how powerful he was before.”
“Before the dude had you to bargain with. That’s what gave him power. This time it’ll just be the three of us,” Gunn stated as he exited the truck and began to rummage through the mound of objects in the back.
“Three?” Wes questioned.
“Me, him, and the kickass crossbow Fred made that’s gonna dust his ass,” he explained, producing the weapon and heading across the street.
“Where are you going?” Wesley whispered loudly out of his window.
Gunn turned in the middle of the street and looked at his friend, remembering the gut wrenching feeling when the vampire had him in his grasp. “Already broke in one building I don’t own tonight. Not much difference in this place than that. Except that the only thing I’ll be takin outa here is a little satisfaction,” he answered and turned back to the hotel, intending to surprise the vamp when he returned. To show him just how high the price was for snacking on one of his people.