Part 10
“This small talk is all very entertaining, but I think it’s about time we got down to business, don’t you?”
Immediately noticing the subtle shift in Angel’s demeanour, Lilah Morgan gathered her frayed wits about her and forcibly pushed down the hot arousal stirred up by his close proximity.
“We’ve been instructed to offer you a deal,” she told him, shooting a quick glance at Lindsey. “The Senior Partners are willing to hand over details of the slayer’s whereabouts in exchange for your discretion on certain matters.”
“Discretion?”
“They want you to look the other way where a number of future projects are concerned,” Lindsey spelled out the terms in black and white for the vampire.
“Thought as much – and if I don’t agree?”
“Then you’ll pay the price that the Orb has set instead.”
“Which is what?” Buffy moved forward a step, her hands automatically going to her waist in a stance that, despite her slight stature, was full of power and intimidation. Unimpressed, Lindsey simply smiled congenially back at the petite slayer.
“Don’t bother, Buffy,” Angel cut in when he saw her start to shift into aggressive mode, infuriated by the lawyer’s blasé response to her deliberately threatening body language. “They’re not going to tell us – this is Hell’s Law Firm, remember? They don’t know what the word ‘honour’ means.”
Buffy reluctantly backed down. “The clock is ticking, Angel. We’re rapidly running out of time to rescue Wesley; maybe you should think about…”
“No!”
“What?” the slayer swung around to look at an appalled Cordelia.
“No Angel, you can’t,” the young seer implored, moving to stand in front of her boyfriend. Reaching out and taking his forearms in her hands, she looked up at him, her hazel eyes beseeching.
“This is your mission; you can’t turn a blind eye to their evil activities simply to save a bit of time. Wes and Faith, they wouldn’t want that – you know they wouldn’t. You said it yourself – the Orb is testing us, so play its game and play it to win. Don’t try to fix the contest – it’ll only come back to bite you on the ass later on.”
“Relax baby, okay?” Angel murmured quietly, palming Cordelia’s earnest face in his hands and dropping a soft kiss on her upturned lips. “I don’t have any intention of dancing to their tune. The Orb may be evil, but it’s playing by the old rules and I have a certain amount of respect for that.”
He brushed the backs of his fingers gently over the soft skin of his girlfriend’s unblemished cheek, then straightened and turned to face their enemies, “Forget it. No deal.”
Lindsey shrugged, “Fair enough,” he agreed nonchalantly. “I never believed you’d go for it anyway. You’re so noble it makes my teeth ache.”
Ignoring the pointed little dig from his nemesis, Angel chose to remain focused on their objective, rather than getting sidetracked by Wolfram and Hart’s petty mind games. “Let’s get on with this – what does the Orb want?”
“It wants you and the slayer to ‘Run the Gauntlet’ and obtain the information for yourselves.”
“How very trite,” the vampire shook his head in sardonic amusement.
“Well, what did you expect? The stone has been trapped in the Hellmouth for centuries, it hasn’t exactly moved with the times. We did suggest a few adjustments to spice things up however, which the Orb agreed to.”
Angel’s brow furrowed at that, his chocolate eyes narrowing with mistrust. “What does that mean?”
“If you and the slayer want your friends to leave with you, then they’ll have to ‘Run the Gauntlet’ too. Otherwise they stay here at Wolfram and Hart,” Lilah gleefully informed the coldly furious vampire. “I’m not sure what use we have for Ken over there, but the eyes of a seer we can definitely exploit to our advantage. Such a shame you’re so overprotective – you really should have left your little playmate at home, you know.”
Angel immediately erupted into game face at Lilah’s taunting, and grabbed her by the throat, slamming her up against the wall. Incensed, he thrust his ridged face into her line of sight, tightening his fingers around the lily-white skin of her neck.
“Like to play games, do you Lilah?” he growled threateningly from between clenched teeth, his golden eyes burning with rage.
Smelling the fear – and arousal – coming off the woman that he held in his iron grip, Angel bent to speak in her ear, his voice so low that no one in the else in the room could hear his murmured words.
“You know that thing about me that has you creaming your panties in my presence, Lilah? It ain’t *never* gonna happen, sweetheart; I’m really not that desperate.”
“But Angelus…”
“Angelus is effectively me, or hadn’t you worked that one out yet? Tsk, tsk – I thought you lawyers were supposed to be smart. Don’t kid yourself into thinking that you could ever replace Cordelia. Why would we bother with a cold bitch like you, when we can have that warm, sexy and – let’s face it, honey – much younger siren in our bed every night?”
Feeling his captive stiffen in anger at the callous and insulting rejection, Angel laughed mirthlessly. “Oh dear – have I hurt poor old Lilah’s feelings?”
Running the forefinger of his free hand over the rapidly thrumming pulse-point on her neck, he continued to talk to his hostage in a cold menacing tone.
“You seem like an ambitious woman, so I’ve no doubt that you and I will cross paths again. One word of advice though – don’t try to come at me through Cordelia. It would be a *very* bad move career-wise, because I will bring you – and the rest of Wolfram and Hart – down, if you even think of trying that again.”
Finally releasing the stunned female from his hold, Angel turned towards Lindsey, who was still leaning casually against the desk, not having made – nor intending to make – any move to help his colleague.
“Point us in the right direction,” the vampire demanded tersely, impatient to get things moving.
“Go to the end of the hall and take the elevator to Level Zero.” Lindsey replied. “Have a nice day, won’t you?”
“Come on,” the vampire said to his friends, inclining his head towards the still open door. He frowned when Cordelia strode boldly across the room to confront Lilah instead.
“I think we should get one thing straight, lady,” the seer declared hotly, her hazel eyes blazing with anger and her hands spanning her curvy hips. “He’s mine, so keep your evil skanky ho hands to yourself, got it?”
“And what are you going to do about it if I don’t?” Lilah asked contemptuously, looking down her nose at the furious brunette. “I don’t really think you’ve got what it takes to hold onto an experienced vampire like Angelus, little girl.”
Cordelia’s clenched fist whipped out to connect with the corner of the smug lawyer’s jaw, and Lilah reeled back, lifting her fingers to her split lip in open-mouthed shock.
“You’ve got yourself one hell of a fire-cat there, Angel,” Lindsey commented jovially as the vampire wrapped an arm firmly around his seething girlfriend’s waist and dragged her out of the room.
“Tell me about it.” Angel replied, rolling his eyes comically before he firmly shut the door behind them.
Once they were alone, the vampire span Cordelia around to face him, taking her shoulders in his hands. “What happened to the count to ten rule?” he demanded.
This sort of thing had happened before, when several damsels in distress had shown him a little too much gratitude for Cordelia’s liking. Her over-the-top reaction had cost them several pay cheques until, after one particular case in point, Doyle had slyly pointed this out to the excessively possessive brunette.
Cordelia hated to lose money of any kind so had imposed the ‘count to ten’ rule on herself. Now, if she felt that any woman overstepped the mark with Angel, she got up and left the room, slowly counting to ten. That was the vampire’s cue to get rid of their client as quickly as possible, before his irate girlfriend took the situation into her own hands and ejected them herself.
Angel was at a loss to explain this somewhat annoying, yet endearing, facet to Cordelia’s character – he knew her behaviour wasn’t because she didn’t trust him to remain faithful to her. The first time her temper got the better of her, he had gotten extremely angry at her apparent lack of trust in him, and his umbrage had thrown a bucket of ice water over her fit of pique.
As he waited for a response from his fuming girlfriend, he absently brought to mind a conversation they’d had after a previous display of similarly possessive behaviour…
***
“I’m sorry Angel – it’s not that I don’t trust you. It’s just when I see women eyeing you up like you’re a bowl of chocolate fudge brownie ice-cream, it makes me go all *grr*” Cordelia screwed up her nose and crooked her fingers in the gesture that she usually used to illustrate his game-face.
“It’s hardly appropriate behaviour in front of clients though, Cordelia,” he reproved, trying not to smile at her shame-faced embarrassment.
“I know, I know – I just can’t help myself; something inside me goes pop and I react without thinking. Besides bucko,” she continued defensively, “It’s not like you’re Mr Whiter-than-White where that kind of thing is concerned. Last week when that guy kept talking to my chest, instead of my face, you were all growly vamp – this is just the same.”
“Maybe so – but I’m a demon; one with a soul, of course, but a demon all the same.”
“And that makes a difference how?”
“Well … umm… vampires are possessive by nature, so… err…” Angel stopped when the atmosphere turned distinctly frosty.
“I’m digging myself into a hole here, aren’t I? Yep – think so,” he quipped, asking and answering his own question with a self-depreciating grimace.
“Wow – you’re such a smart boy,” Cordelia commented mockingly, patting her chagrined boyfriend on the upper arm.
“Okay – I’m willing to accept that I’m no saint in that regard either,” he continued, “But you’ve got to learn to keep a lid on your temper, Cor. I may have been all ‘growly’ as you say, but I didn’t remove the perverted jerk’s eye-balls with my fingers like I wanted to, now did I?”
“Eew – that’s so gross!” Cordelia exclaimed, wrinkling her nose in distaste.
“Admittedly, it is kind of appropriate where some men are concerned, but that guy was just your average testosterone-fuelled male. You should watch whom you brand a pervert as well. Can I say pot and kettle? You stare at my breasts all the time.”
Not attempting to refute her teasing accusation, Angel stepped closer and deliberately began to un-button her flimsy blouse, a mischievous smile tugging at the corner of his lips.
“Difference is – they’re mine to look at,” he said finally, dipping his hand into the shadowy cleft of her cleavage and twisting open the front clasp of her bra.
He pushed her blouse and lacy underwear off her shoulders and down her arms, and bared her firmly rounded femininity to his avid scrutiny. As Angel’s gleaming eyes roamed hungrily over her creamy pink-tipped cleavage, Cordelia’s face split into a cat-got-the-cream smile when she saw his expression darken with undisguised lust.
“You’re trying to change the subject,” the vampire accused in a low and gravely voice, as he traced his cool fingertips up and down her sides in an intentionally stimulating gesture.
“Yeah and it’s working.” Cordelia concurred unrepentantly, raising one eyebrow as he slid his hands around to cup and knead the heavy weight of her breasts in his palms.
In retaliation, the intent vampire purposely circled her hardening nipples with his callused thumbs, and she arched up into his touch with a breathless moan, unable to prevent herself from vocalising the pleasure he was affording her. “Oh God!”
“You’re a very naughty girl, Miss Chase,” Angel drawled seductively, bending low to whisper in her ear. His honeyed words sent shivers down the length of her spine and prompted a rush of moisture to gather at the apex of her thighs.
“I thought big badass vamps like you, got off on naughty girls like me,” Cordelia murmured silkily in response, turning her face into the hollow of his throat so that her warm, moist breath kissed the sensitive skin there…
***
“Angel!”
“Huh?” the vampire snapped out of his hazy reverie, and refocused his attention on the beautiful seer in front of him. That lovemaking session had been particularly hot and heavy, he recalled with an inward smile. Hopefully, there would be time for reminiscing – and possibly even a little reliving – later.
“I bet I know what you’re thinking about,” Cordelia said coyly. Her jealous anger had dissipated the moment she’d seen that familiar look of glazed arousal crossing her boyfriend’s handsome features.
“I was thinking how you always manage to change the subject when we discuss the count to ten rule actually.” Angel replied smoothly, leaning down and invading her personal space so that the two of them stood almost nose-to-nose.
His deep brown eyes danced with amused delight when Cordelia’s cheeks flushed pink as it dawned on her what his deceptively innocuous words were in reference to.
“Angel!” she protested, slapping lightly at his chest.
The vampire chuckled at his seer’s discomfiture, and fondly wrapped his arm around her slender shoulders as they turned to follow their two companions down the carpeted corridor.
“So, is ‘Running the Gauntlet’ what it sounds like?” Buffy asked her ex-boyfriend, her voice haughty in tone.
The slayer did not like the air of effortless affection that plainly existed between Angel and Cordelia, and the fact that their light-hearted banter was clearly some thinly veiled in-joke about their sex life, only served to aggravate her even further.
Angel nodded, “It’s a variation on that theme. To discover that which you seek – in our case Faith’s location – you have to fight your way from one end of the Gauntlet corridor to the other.”
“Doesn’t sound too bad – Riley can come through with me, and you can protect Cordelia.”
“Unfortunately it’s not as simple as that – the Gauntlet is supposed to be a test of a warrior’s prowess. It has to be run individually – the level of difficulty adjusts to suit the relative skill of the competitor.”
“Sounds like we’re gonna get dropped into the middle of an Indiana Jones movie,” Cordelia commented wryly.
Angel laughed, “I guess that’s one way to describe it. You need to be prepared for anything though,” he said, his voice turning serious. “It’s designed as a psychological test as well as a physical one, which means you may have to do something that you might normally consider abhorrent.”
“Like what?”
“I had to kill a kid last time,” the vampire told them matter-of-factly.
“You didn’t actually do it?” Buffy stared at Angel, her blue eyes wide with horror.
“Yes and no,” was the cryptic reply.
“Well, which one was it? You either murdered a child, or you didn’t; there’s no middle ground.” Riley demanded, his voice throbbing with barely suppressed revulsion.
“There is in this case. Anything you face in the Gauntlet has corporeal mass, but it doesn’t actually exist in this reality, or any other for that matter. So yes, I ran my sword through what appeared to be a twelve/thirteen year old boy, but I didn’t kill one – he disappeared from the arena as soon as I’d defeated him.”
“It’s like an advanced Virtual Reality game then,” Cordelia ascertained, catching on to what her boyfriend was driving at. “You’re in this world and these things can hurt you, but none of it is actually real, it only seems like it is.”
“Exactly – the Gauntlet is effectively a simulation; just one that’s created and sustained by ancient magic rather than microchips.” Angel replied.
As the four of them reached the end of the hallway, the doors of the last elevator slid open of their own accord. Peering inside, they saw that this lift was different to all the rest. Instead of a lushly carpeted and mirrored interior, the elevator was lit by a dim bluish-white light, and the floor, ceiling and walls were constructed of what appeared to be burnished aluminium.
The doors glided shut the moment they entered, leaving them trapped in the confined space with no visible control panel to control the elevator’s descent.
“Which Level do you require?” a throaty female voice asked out of nowhere, making them all start in surprise.
“Level Zero,” Angel replied, his voice strong and steady.
“And what do you seek to discover from the Gauntlet?”
“The location of the Orb of Ravaclesh.”
“As you wish. You may each select two weapons from the armoury to aid your passage, but you must Run the Gauntlet one at a time. These are the rules – do not break them, understand?”
“Yes.”
“Prepare to meet your Fates then. Goodbye and Good Luck.”
The metallic structure of elevator immediately started to disintegrate around them and Cordelia gasped, grabbing at Angel’s arm in panic.
“Geez!” she exclaimed, relieved to find her feet on solid ground a few seconds later; she’d expected to be free-falling into black empty nothingness.
Her heart slowly returning to its normal beat, the curious seer looked around and discovered that they were standing in the middle of a semi-circular courtyard. Flickering orange torches lighted the stone enclave and a wide variety of weaponry was fixed to the walls with blackened iron brackets.
Whirling around in a 360° circle, Cordelia’s heart rate started to pick up again when she realised that solid stone surrounded them on all sides. “There’s no way out!”
“Yes, there is; don’t worry,” Angel said soothingly, touching a gentling hand to the small of her back. “The Gauntlet will open up once we’ve chosen our weapons,” he explained.
Enclosing her trembling hand within his, the vampire crossed to the far wall and reached up to pull down a short sword. He tested the weight and feel of it in his hands, and then passed it over to Cordelia.
“Here – I think you should use this; it’s similar to the one you’ve been training with.”
Cordelia reluctantly took the steel weapon from him, her stomach churning with nausea and her palms sweaty and clammy with dread. Although she wasn’t one to back down from a fight, far from it, she privately admitted to herself that she was scared witless.
When she’d insisted that Angel train her, she hadn’t envisioned that she would have to fight alone with no one there to back her up. Watching as the dark-haired vampire continued to survey the armoury for a second suitable weapon for her, her terror began to increase at an exponential rate, in spite of her endeavours to stifle it.
Angel tried to ignore his own worries and remain calm for Cordelia’s sake. It wouldn’t do to show his unease over what she was about to face, she had to believe that he was completely confident in her ability to make it through. If the seer sensed any doubt from him, then it would only add fuel to the fire of her uncertainty – which could have potentially disastrous consequences.
Cordelia certainly wasn’t without skill; her proficiency with a sword, after only a few months training, was nothing short of outstanding, and her hand-to-hand combat work ranked above average too. Years of cheerleading and regular workouts at the Gym had made her curvy body lithe and strong and, because she was able to think quickly on her feet, she adapted her technique extremely well to whatever he threw at her during their training sessions.
None of this alleviated Angel’s anxieties in the slightest though – he didn’t lack faith in her capabilities to pass this test of combat; it was simply that the overwhelming need to protect her overrode all semblance of rational thought. Looking over at his treasured girlfriend now, he was struck by how small and vulnerable she seemed standing there, alone, in the centre of the courtyard.
The point of her sword rested lightly on the cobbled ground as she clutched the hilt tightly between her fingers, her knuckles turning white from the effort. She reminded him of the frightened teenage girl that she had once been – the one that had turned her back on everything familiar in her life, and placed all her trust in a two hundred and forty year old vampire who she barely even knew.
Sighing deeply, Angel chose a broadsword and axe for his own use, before settling on a small scythe as a second weapon for Cordelia. After he’d helped her secure the holstered weapon to the waistband of her jeans, he crooked a finger under her chin and lifted her heart-shaped face to his.
“You can do it,” he told her with complete conviction, gazing down into the caramel whirlpools of her fearful eyes. “Just try to relax and stay focused, okay? If you keep in mind everything I’ve taught you, you’ll be just fine; I promise.”
“Aren’t you going to tell me that the force will be with me?” Cordelia joked with a nervous smile, injecting a note of light-heartedness into her speech that she didn’t really feel.
Their quiet conversation was interrupted by the rasping sound of stone grating against stone, and they turned to watch as one wall of the semicircular enclave opened up to reveal a long, passageway about three metres wide. A cylindrical podium of smooth granite stood at the far end of the corridor, with a cracked parchment scroll positioned carefully atop of it.
“I’ll go first so you’ll see how it works,” Angel told them as they gathered around the narrow entranceway to the Gauntlet. “Cordy – you follow next, and then Buffy and Riley can bring up the rear.”
He squared his shoulders and prepared to face the Gauntlet, but was distracted when Cordelia spoke his name in a soft hesitant voice. “Angel?”
“C’mere baby,” he murmured, his voice gruff with emotion.
Reaching out to draw the beautiful seer into the circle of his embrace, the vampire’s hands settled on the tops of her hips as he dipped his head to capture her mouth in a fiery kiss. As she opened her mouth under his questing lips with a responsive moan, Cordelia’s fingers skimmed up the length of his arms and encircled his neck. Angel snaked out his tongue to tangle ardently with hers, grunting low in the back of his throat, when the seer purposely pressed her soft womanly figure firmly against his toned muscular form in an attempt to mould their two bodies into one existence.
With their clinch increasing in fervent intensity, their gobsmacked companions could only stand awkwardly by while the vampire and seer surrendered to the power and passion of their shared love, oblivious to everything, and everyone, else around them.
Riley didn’t have a clue what to think or feel. On the one hand, he was relieved that Angel’s sexual urges seemed confined to Cordelia and not focused on Buffy as if he’d originally feared. On the other hand, though, the vampire’s unhealthy pursuit of human women, rather than those of his own kind, left the soldier sickened and repulsed.
Besides him, Buffy was struggling to contain the slow-burning rage that was threatening to erupt from her with all the force of a long-time dormant volcano. She simply couldn’t believe the total lack of consideration being shown towards her. When had Angel gotten so selfish?
Back when he lived in Sunnydale, he had rarely shown any overtly physical affection towards Cordelia in front of her, always mindful of her feelings. Now though, it seemed as if he couldn’t care less what witnessing this disgusting suck-face display was doing to her.
Just as the slayer’s tolerance was reaching breaking point, Angel reluctantly disentangled himself from Cordelia, and so Buffy narrowly avoided the added humiliation of losing her dignity by forcibly separating the embracing pair herself.
Gently wiping away the tears that had escaped to run down Cordelia’s cheeks whilst they’d kissed, Angel touched his forehead to hers. “Everything will be okay,” he soothed softly. “I’ll try to help you in any way I can, you know that.”
“Yeah, I know,” Cordelia whispered brokenly. “I just wanted you to know that I love you, so so much. Don’t forget that, not ever.”
Angel felt his own apprehension striving to break free at this tearful declaration – she was speaking as if she might never see him again. If Cordelia were lost to him because of this, then the Orb and all the employees at Wolfram and Hart would forfeit their lives to compensate for his bereavement; of that, he was undeniably certain. It could never be enough, but he would not stop until he had hunted each and every last one of them down, and made them pay for their transgressions a thousand times over.
Shaking himself out of the dark tunnel of despondency that his imagination had dragged him down, Angel bent to place another brief kiss against his girlfriend’s lips, then turned and entered the Gauntlet with a quiet, “I love you too.”
He hadn’t walked more than three or four steps down the corridor, before the air shimmered and a bellowing demon emerged in front of him, wielding a heavy chain with a spiked sphere attached to the end of it. Not even pausing to think, Angel launched an immediate counter-attack and succeeded in inflicting a debilitating wound to the creature’s left side. Its movements hampered by the haemorrhaging injury, the demon proved to be no match for the on form vampire, who smoothly disposed of his opponent in less than a minute.
The fallen creature flickered and disappeared as Angel stepped carefully over its broken and bleeding form, his eyes and ears open and alert for what was to come next. Not stupid enough to be lulled into a false sense of security by this first, too easy conquest, the vampire kept his body tensed and ready for action.
A faint grating sound warned him of the impending danger, mere moments before a handful of stakes shot out of two horizontal gaps that had opened up in each wall. Angel cleverly avoided them by launching himself high into the air and somersaulting over the top of the flying missiles.
Split seconds after his feet touched the ground, a second wave of the wooden objects were fired at him from every conceivable angle. What followed next was a breathtaking display of agility as the vampire ducked and dived, twisted and turned, successfully evading all the airborne stakes. He came away with just a few nicks and cuts, miraculously making it through the ordeal relatively unharmed.
He was about three quarters of the way along the Gauntlet now, but Angel took a firmer grip on his weapons, a gut feeling telling him that the toughest test was yet to come. Sure enough, the atmosphere shimmered for the second time and a familiar form materialized directly in front of him.
Barring his path was an incredibly realistic clone of Cordelia Chase, and the resulting jolt of surprise caused his concentration to waver for brief second – now *this* he had not expected.
Taking advantage of his momentary distraction, the Doppelganger swung her heavy sword directly at the shocked vampire’s head, forcing him to raise his broadsword to stave off the attack. There was a shower of sparks as the two weapons crashed together with incredible force, and then Angel jumped back, shifting his fighting stance from the defensive to the offensive in an instant.
The Double was much too strong to actually be the seer, of course; his Cordy wouldn’t even have the strength to lift that sword off the ground, never mind wield it with the kind of dexterity that this thing was managing. This was going to be the ultimate test of his psychological tolerance however – it was extremely difficult to ignore what his eyes were telling him. Could he really kill something that looked – and smelled – so much like the woman he loved with such passionate intensity? He knew he had to – there was no other choice. It was do or die.
Steadying his resolve, Angel shut down the more emotional parts of his psyche and stepped up the aggressiveness of his attack, constantly chopping and changing the direction and angle of his sword thrusts to keep his adversary off balance. The Clone finally miss-timed one of her counterattacks, and he brought his axe down on the blade of her sword, disarming her in one fell swoop. The weapon skittered across the floor as he charged into the Doppelganger, backing her up against the wall and setting the edge of his axe against her throat.
“Angel please don’t,” Cordelia’s twin pleaded in a breathless tone and he faltered, making the fatal mistake of looking directly into her liquid brown orbs.
That familiar pain-filled gaze tugged at the vampire’s heartstrings, even though the more logical part of his brain told him that the woman who occupied every part of his heart and soul, was not the person standing in front of him.
As he desperately tried to pull his wits into some kind of order, the Clone’s eyes suddenly rolled into the back of her head and she cried out in pain, clutching at her head in a grotesque re-enactment of one of Cordelia’s visions. The premonition went on and on, and Angel froze in horror as his worst nightmare began to play out in front of his stunned gaze.
Her screams of agony increasing in volume, the Clone began to convulse violently, thick red blood starting to leak from her nose and ears. After what seemed like forever to the shaken vampire, Cordelia’s double finally went limp and slumped to the ground, pale and still as death. Angel vaguely heard someone call his name, but he could not stop his instinctive reaction and reached out blindly towards the fallen replica of his beloved girlfriend.
As he moved closer, her eyes unexpectedly snapped open and he jerked back in shock. The suddenly revitalised Clone leapt to her feet and kicked him in the stomach, propelling him into the opposite wall with the force of the blow.
Realising his reaction was too little too late, the stunned vampire dimly registered Cordelia’s anguished screams as the Doppelganger drove a wooden stake through his ribs and into his chest.