| Title: Back Too Late Summery: Set six years after season 5 of 'Buffy'. Buffy and Riley are married (Relax, just to tell you Buffy hates it and regrets it everyday!). But guess who shows up and saves her? heehee, I love my job! lol. Rating: 14A I guess. not to bad in here. Distribution: Land Of Denial, and any other place as long as I'm told where your putting it. Disclaimer: Right, like I own this show... in my dreams. *sigh* -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Buffy opened her eyes and blinked. It was still dark out, but she could still make out the form of her sleeping husband. Husband, how could she had done this to herself? They've been married for three years, but she still wasn't feeling any love for him at all. Willow had told her that in time she'll grow to love him, but she was still a robot in his arms, feeling nothing but sorrow, but acting like she enjoyed it. Quietly, Buffy slipped out of their bed and padded downstairs. She turned on the TV and curled up with a blanket to watch the news. It was about an explosion at some hotel called the Hyperion. There was video footage that showed the hotel basked in flames. And then it panned through the wreakage and people getting whisked into ambulences. One of the people in the bed looked like Cordelia, and there was a man standing beside her. "Hey, that looks like..." she trailed off when the man looked right into the camera. "Oh my goodness." she said to herself. Angel had various cuts and bruises on his face and a burn on one side. "Angel..." she looked around the screen and didn't see a 'LIVE' symbol, this was previously taped. This already happened. When a different story came on she flipped the channels. She stopped on another news channel which had a reporter who was trying to talk to Angel. "Sir, can you please tell us why you're refusing medical attention when you ran into the burning building to save these people." the reporter held out the microphone, but Angel just brushed past her and continued down the street. "I think the hero of this story is going to be alright by the looks of it, back to you Lucille." Buffy turned off the TV and went upstairs. She quietly got dressed and went out patrolling. She needed to work off some tension. All the crappy stuff happening in her life was kinda starting to get to her. Riley wanted to start a family, Angel's home gets blown up again, seeing Angel on TV, and the whole thing of marrying the wrong guy. She didn't belong with Riley, she belonged with- "Buffy?" said a voice from behind her, a voice that was all too familiar. She turned to face it. He looked so sad, almost helpless, and really beaten up, but thankfully he was still standing. "Angel. What... what are you doing here?" she asked. As if her life wasn't screwed up enough, now the man that she was SUPPOSED to marry shows up. Riley would flip, hopefully landing on his head and breaking his neck, if he found out Angel was in town. He didn't get a chance to answer he just collapsed. "Angel!" she ran to his side. He opened his eyes. "Can you get up?" "Yeah." he slowly sat up with her help. Then he shakily got to his feet. "You have to get inside, the sun'll be up soon." she told him. He nodded sadly, and with her help they walked to the closest place she could think of, Angel's mansion. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Once they were safely in the mansion, Buffy helped him into the dark room that Angel used at a bed room. Everything was still in place, even the sheets were there. She pulled back the covers and gestured into the bed. "In." she ordered. He sat on the edge of the bed, a little out of it. She pulled off his boots and took his duster. Then she put her hand on his muscular chest and pushed him to lay down. He finally did and she covered him. "I'll come back in the morning." she told him. She turned to leave but he caught her hand, his touch shocked her to her very core. "Stay with me." he said, it was the longest sentence he had said to her since his arrival in Sunnydale. She nodded, seeing the lonliness that was so evident in his eyes. She shed her jacket and pulled off her boots. Then she climbed into the bed with Angel. His arms were instantly around her, pulling her right up against him, her back to his chest. He burried his face in her hair and breathed deeply. Buffy shivered at being pressed against him again after all this time. It had been so long since she had felt truly safe, but that moment she felt totally and completely safe in the arms of her lover. Soon she was fast asleep. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- When she woke up she forgot where she was at first. Then she felt warm lips pressing against her neck, and warm hands were caressing her body. At first she thought it was Riley, but there was something in the way that he was touching that was off, because she actually liked it. Then the memories of the previous hit her like a frieght trail. The man touching and kissing her was Angel, her Angel. She knew that Riley would be worried, but she just couldn't seem to pull away. She found herself arching her neck into his lips, craving more. After a while of just enjoying his touch, she was turned over to face him, then his warm lips was pressed against hers. Soon she found herself beneath him with him nestled between her legs, now she knew she had to stop him, it was too dangerous. "Angel..." she started, but it came out as a moan as his hands slipped beneath her loose fitting shirt to caress her bare skin, and his lips moved to her neck again. He felt so good, so warm... wait a minute... warm? She touched his neck, it was warm to the touch. "Angel, stop." she finally got out, through the haze of passion. He pulled away from her neck and slipped his hands out of her shirt and looked into her eyes. "What's going on here?" she asked, catching her breath. "What do you mean?" he asked. Buffy took his hand and held it to her cheek. He realized she noticed he had body heat now. "Oh, it's a long story?" he offered. "Tell me." she told him. He rolled away from her reluctantly, and sat up against the headboard. She held back a whine in protest when he pulled away. She followed his actions and sat up against the headboard. "What happened. Why are you here?" she asked gently. "Cordelia and Wesley were killed." he told her, his face a mask of pain and remorse. "Oh, Angel, I'm sorry. That must have been tough." she said sympathetically. that explained why he seemed sad when she saw him in the graveyard. "But that doesn't really tell me why you're here." she urged him on to tell the rest of the story. "Gunn, one of my staff, he said that his gang could keep things safe in L.A., he told me to come back here. And Lorne told me that my journey continues in Sunnydale." he said with a tone of voice that told her that there was more. "And..." she urged him on. "I'm human, Buffy." There was a long silence after that. Buffy let that fact sink in. Had Angel just told he was human? "How long?" she asked without emotion, in shock. "A little after I saved Cordelia and Wesley from the building, after they died in front of me at the hospital." he paused. "I was at Gunn's place when it happened." he replied. "Oh. Well, that's...." she said ackwardly. "Um.. I better.. go. Riley will be wondering where I am." she got out of the bed. "I heard you got married." he told her. Buffy froze in her spot on the edge of the bed. "You did, huh?" she ackknowledged what he told her. "Yeah. I'm sorry I didn't come back to you sooner." he said sadly. He wanted her, but he figured the reason that she stopped him before was because she didn't want to cheat on Riley. "So am I. I'm still looking for a way out of this silly excuse for a marriage with him. I don't know why I even accepted that engagement ring. I don't even know why I went through with it. I mean, I'm Buffy Anne Finn, I cringe at my last name now." she couldn't believe she telling him all this. Letting his know her weaknesses, she hadn't even seen his for such a long time, maybe that was the reason. Whenever something happened she would 'run to Angel', she was falling right back into habits she thought she was free of. "If you hate it, why are you still with him?" he asked, falling right back into friend mode, but he could still feel her soft, bare torso beneath his hands, and the feel of her smooth creamy neck under lips and the feeling of her tongue in his mouth. He was surprised he wasn't throwing his on the bed and attacking her body. "I don't know. I guess I haven't had a real reason to leave him." she looked down at her hands. She felt Angel move closer. He sat behind her, with her between his legs. His hands moved over her bare arms, she shivered at his tender touch. It was so much better than how Riley touched her. Of course Angel was a way better lover than Riley could ever hope to be. "Divorce him and marry me." he whispered against her neck as he started to kiss it again. She arched her neck to give him better access. "Was that a proposal?" she teased lightly. "Marry me, Buffy." he whispered into her ear. She found herself shivering again with excitement. "Dump that freak and marry me." he was serious this time. "Well, now I have a reason to divorce him, I'm cheating on him." she said it without a hint of any remorse in her voice. He just chuckled and somehow got her on the bed and back in their previous position. He took hold of the hem of her shirt and she arched her back and raised her hands above her head so he could pull it off and toss it aside. The rest of their clothes seemed to just dissolve into his bed, and they were once again skin to skin. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A few hours later, Buffy arrived back at home, knowing Riley had left for work she didn't bother acting content their house. She had been really reluctant to leave Angel's place, but she didn't want to be gone all day in case Riley phoned, and she had to think of an excuse for not being home in the morning. She took a long shower and went to bed, being really exhausted by those three rounds of love making with Angel. She loved his stamina, but she felt like she was going to collapse at any moment. She fell into a deep sleep as soon as her head hit the pillow. It was 6:00 when the phone rang. Buffy groaned, she rolled over and grabbed the phone. "Hello?" she said into the receiver. "Buffy?" it was Riley, her husband. Uh oh, she thought, sitting up in bed. "Riley." she stated. "Where were you. I was worried. I didn't want to leave for work, but I'm working on a new project, what happened?" He rambled in that hollow sounding voice she couldn't really stand anymore after hearing Angel's smooth, deep, sexy, velvety voice again. "I was at Willow's place." she lied. "I called there." he told her. "No one answered." "Yeah, we went out for coffee because neither of us could sleep. Remember I was going to hang out with her? Well, we chose last night." she lied again. Hoping he didn't catch it. "Okay, I have to run sweetheart. I'm pulling an allnighter on that project layout, so I won't be home until tomorrow morning. Will you be okay by yourself?" he asked. Buffy could barely contain her excitement. " yeah. I'll miss you." she sad, pretending she was talking to Angel. He told her he loved her and said bye and hung up. She sighed, she was goign to have to tell him, but secrets made things more exciting, and she needed all the excitement she could get after three years of boringness with her Iowa borne Husband. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- On Month Later: Buffy and Angel were curled up on his couch in the new apartment that he had purchased so they wouldn't have to stay in that cold mansion. It was a fairly nice apartment on the eleventh floor of a nice building. It had everything he needed, and it had a walk-in closet, which was great because Angel loved to buy Buffy new clothes. Buffy had filed for divorce two weeks ago and she had been living with Angel, while her soon to be ex husband stayed at their house, trying to sell it. The papers had gone through and she was finally a free woman, but Riley had put up quite a fight for an annulment because he felt so embarrassed that his wife was cheating on him. But it was times like this when she was curled right up against the love of her life, watching an old movie that was airing on The WB, where she didn't want to think about anything related to Riley. Besides, she had other things on her mind. Bigger things that were exciting and frightening. She knew she had to tell him, but she didn't know how. Her and Riley had tried, but it never worked, Buffy just thought she was unable to bare children. But it had nothing to do with baring children, it was who's children. Her body, heart, and soul was made for Angel's. She had known for a few days now, she totally skipped her period and she took one of those pregnancy test things you can buy at the drug store. All signs pointed to 'yes'. She reached for the remote and turned off the T.V. "Angel, I gotta talk to you about something." she told him. "What is it?" he asked, knowing that only the more important of things could make her miss her favorite old movie. "I need to ask you something, and you have to be perfectly honest with me." she said. He nodded in answer. "Have you ever thought about starting a family with me?" she asked, not breaking eye contact. She could see he was thrown by the question, it was always obvious to her. "Yes. Why?" he asked. He was pretty sure what she was getting at, but that would be too wonderful to be real. "Well... um... I'm... pregnant." she said hestitantly, her eyes never leaving his. After she had said it she searched his face for any kind of emotion, didn't matter at this point, she just needed to know. "You mean.... we're gonna have a baby?" he questioned, his eyes flickering over her face. She simply nods and slowly his face lit up and he captured her in a hug and stood up, spinning her around a few times before setting her feet down on the floor, but not letting go. "I love you, Buffy, so much. "I love you too, Angel." The End |