Mm, Mm, McDonald's

The shadows are long by the time Spike actually gets up - the sun is already well on its way past the horizon, casting the clouds in brilliant colors. Spike walks close to the sides of the buildings, his hands in the pockets of his duster. It's taken quite awhile for the two of them to get this far with his stopping every so often to just look at things, but now that the golden arches are in sight, he's doing a lot less sight-seeing and a lot more walking fast. He pulls a hand out of his pocket to wipe irritably at his forehead, then growls a curse under his breath and shrugs out of his duster. "It's too bloody hot for this thing." It's said with a note of sadness, actually. He starts walking again, then stops absolutely dead, dividing a look between McDonald's and his jacket. "I don't have any money," he finally says quietly. "'Sides what I stole. I ... I shouldn't spend that." His stomach chooses that moment to growl audibly, which is followed by a despairing look shot in Faith's direction.

Sunlight is nothing knew to Faith, but as each stop is made, she looks to where he does with an honest interest before moving on. It's endearing, in a way; childish wonder often is. "Yeah, that's ... what happens, in the sun," she responds to his lament, gesturing to her own distinct lack of a jacket. "Only gets cold in the dark." When he stops, she urges him forward, sliding her arm through his to pull him gently. "I do," she assures him briefly, at first leaving it at that. Despite the need for reassurances, an eyebrow quirks upward at the growling stomach, and she fights back a smirk. "I didn't steal it. Angel gave me some for working with him, and seeing as I don't eat much, I still got it." She reaches for the handle of the door, tugging it open and holding it that way so that he might go in first. "Pretty much all I can afford on short notice, and you don't wanna eat my cooking anyway, so."

"Ugh. I'm eating on Angel's dollar? That's almost worse than using stolen funds." At least Spike's retained some things - his dislike for Angel must be a tough thing to shake. He lets Faith urge him forward, studying the posters in the window of the restaurant as they pass it. "I've never cooked," he answers, sounding distracted as he slows to study the meal deals. "We had cooks, and then I didn't need anyone to cook." He walks through the door and wrinkles his nose as that grease smell reaches his nose. "This is just bloody charming." He walks forward and lays his jacket over the back of one of the two person tables before he steps up to the counter. "Two number ones, a number five, and a couple of those little apple pie things." He pauses, then adds as a rather awkward afterthought, "Please." He turns and waves Faith up to him. "You ought to eat something, too."

"Uh-huh. Pipe down, Sparky, I'm doing you a favour here." Allowing the door to swing closed behind her as she follows Spike inside, Faith fixes him with a steady gaze, broken only when he complanis about the appetizing smell of grease. Her eyes roll emphatically, and she nudges him forward again, this time with a simple poke to the back. "Yeah, it's gotta be a real step down from..." Her words trail off abruptly when she realizes what she nearly said: a step down from the smell of blood. One, public. It's just generally a bad idea to talk about blood in a public venue. Two, crazy man. Remind him of his murders. No, do it. See how much fun it is. "...the crypt. Dusty, stale." Well, it's an attempt at saving, anyway. When her smirk begs at her mouth a second time, she allows it, watching him order with an approving look. She moves forward at his request, but shakes her head just a little bit. "This is your deal today, Spike. Don't worry about me."

Spike wheels around as soon as Faith starts to mention just what this is a step down from, his eyes wide. There's a moment in which he looks dangerously close to slipping back into babbling incoherently again. His gaze slides past Faith, fixing on an empty area just behind her. He starts to fold in on himself, throwing a hand back to use the counter to support himself before he falls. But then she corrects and moves toward him, and with a bit of obvious effort, he wards it all off. He gives his head a quick shake and briefly closes his eyes, bringing a hand up to scrub roughly over his face before he turns toward the counter again to accept the tray piled with food. "If you're sure. I suppose I could share." It looks like there soon won't be anything left /to/ share - before he's even turned to go to the table, he's unwrapped one of the hamburgers and eaten half of it in one bite. "Mmph. Ris inn oo'!" He steps aside to let Faith pay, drifting slowly back toward their table. He's got the first hamburger finished before he even gets halfway there.

Faith wards off her own relapse, of a sort, forcing herself to resist a frown. In the end, all she can do is avert her eyes, without saying anything; if she tries to apologize, they'll cause a scene. Everything will cause a scene. In fact, look! Causing a scene already! To another customer who has come up beside her to make his own order and is staring - gawking, even - at Spike now, she whispers, "Tourist. Long flight. No meal." It's awkward for her to try and save face, but she makes a valiant effort, before turning back to the cashier to hand over some money. The cashier, too, is doing no small amount of staring, and Faith casts her an apologetic look. The change, what little there is, is tucked into her pocket before she moves toward their table. "You're gettin' on my nerves, fly boy," she warns him half-heartedly, gesturing to the table all the while. "Sit down and eat. This is fast. If I'd taken you somewhere better, it woulda' taken longer, and I'm thinking I woulda' killed you for your whining before you ever got anything." It's all said in jest, at least; dismissive, thrown out without a shred of sincerity. She takes her own seat across the table from him, tossing her hair back over her shoulders, and rolls her shoulders in both a shrug and a stretch.

It might be said in jest, and somewhere deep down, Spike might be aware of it like he normally would be. But today, he blinks and actually pauses in his meal to look a little hurt before he settles himself down at the table and unwraps his second hamburger. "I'm sorry." It's been his most common phrase lately, even topping out 'bloody hell' at the forefront of the list. "You don't have to stay." He glances around the establishment - no one's openly staring any more, but the cashier is still shooting the two of them some strange looks every now and again. He shifts uncomfortably in his seat and ducks his head, concentrating entirely on his food for the time being. "We should order in Chinese tonight," he muses, more to himself than to Faith. "Maybe I'll get on your nerves less if I'm not around so many bloody people." Well, the second part is more to Faith, but it sounds no different than before.

Now, when the frown tugs her brow into a deep furrow, Faith lets it. With a shake of her head and a wave of one hand, she says, "I was kidding. Don't apologize." There's a beat, and she adds: "And don't apologize for apologizing, either." She smiles, just slightly, and then sneaks forward a hand to snatch one of the fries from the tray munches on it absently. "You're right, Blondie. I don't have to stay." But she makes no move to get up, and instead, she squares him with a level look. "I want to, alright? Just eat." A single, eyes-narrowed glower of warning is shot to the cashier, and the employee turns to attend to some mindless task behind the counter. She won't look again. "We can do Chinese. I figure once you get some food in you, we can pick and choose what you wanna eat." She brightens then, as much as she ever does, and she straightens some before asking, "When was the last time you had something like ice cream? Or chocolate? Man, we gotta hit up the ice cream place after this." She hesitates, then, and looks to the window, where the sun is still dropping steadly. "If it's open."

Spike pauses in struggling to get the little aluminum covering off of a package of honey mustard, looking up for a second at Faith before he shrugs and continues with picking at the top. "I've never had ice cream," he answers without any sort of concern. "Kind of stopped bothering to eat when I realized just how bloody rotten everything tastes when you're dead." Victory over the honey mustard! He pops the aluminum wrapper into his mouth and sucks off the sauce that's found its way there, then raises an eyebrow and reaches up to pluck the wrapper from between his lips. he gives the labeling a quick study, then shrugs and opens his container of nuggets. "We can always go tomorrow if it's not open. You'll have to ... " He hasn't really bothered to lower his voice before now, but he does take a moment to do so before he continues. "Patrol. If you're going to. Right? I could help. With the demon part of it all. I don't know how it'd go over for me to be staking vampires and whatall. I'm supposed to be bad and all." He dips his hand into the box of nuggets again and finds himself surprised that they're all gone already.

For one good, long moment, Faith watches his battle with the honey mustard, her face screwed up into a disbelieving stare. If she were the type to gape open-mouthed, she just might. "Never... had ice cream?" She shifts in her seat a little, taking another few fries from his tray and using them as a distraction while she thinks. "God, there's so much you have to have," she mutters, almost to herself, with something akin to wonder in her tone. Something shifts, changes, and she frowns again. "Yeah. Trying to stick to places I know Buffy won't be. Not gonna make you come with me if you wanna sleep or whatever." The last one of the fries she stole from him is eaten, her stare distant for a moment, and she shakes her head slightly. "Gonna go to the park first, see if that girl's around still. You can come, or stay back at the motel. Might be safer." And she wants to know just what is going on, and she isn't sure she'll be gentle; the last thing he needs is to see her tearing someone down for information. "Got some things to do later, kinda need to do 'em on my own, so if you've got something you wanna do, do it then." Because I'm not leaving you alone for long. That's what she implies, and nearly says, but censors at the last moment.

"Safer?" It's evidently been lost on Spike that with the loss of the whole vampiric thing comes the loss of ... well, just about everything that goes with it. Despite Faith so easily pushing him around last night, it hasn't quite dawned on him that he's nowhere near as strong and agile as he's used to being. "Well, I'll be fine on my own. I'd like to go to the park and see if she's been ... if she's all right." 'Been eaten' isn't really something he can stomach at the moment. He's silent for a few moments, finishing off all the fries that're left before he starts in on the apple pies. As he slides one out of the box, he opens his mouth - likely to comment about how unlike apple pie it really is - but instead just shakes his head and digs in. "Might even have dinner on the tab - er, nightstand - when you get back." He smirks and dusts his hands off, taking a moment to study the tray laden with wrappers and boxes. "Bloody hell. Still feel like I could eat another five of those." He pushes the tray to the side and fixes Faith with a long, considering look. "What now? I suppose I could just take a walk. Or go get coffee. Or go out to The Point before the sun really goes down. Or ... well, I'll just find something to do, is what I mean."

If she's still there, and you're worried, bring her back with you." It's spoken with her eyes downcast, almost distantly. It isn't something she'd like to offer, but it's for him. "At least that way she isn't out there," Faith explains, gesturing with her head to the windows, where the night is setting in a little more. "Just, uh - don't bring the whole town with you." It's like bringing a cat home, right? This is just a demon. And if the demon goes evil, Faith will kill it. She'll just... be sure to take it outside first. "Just, um... promise me one thing, Spike." The look she gives him is unwavering, fixed on his without so much as a blink. "Be careful. You get a vibe, you get back to the motel. Lock yourself in." There's something more than sincerity in her tone, something more than warning; it's almost like the same pleading tone from last night. "And when I get back, I'm bringing ice cream with me. You get hungry, there's some money... around. Might have to look for it, I keep it a couple places, since I don't do the bank thing. Can't."

"I can give her my crypt for a few days, at least." Spike nods slowly, almost to himself, then gives Faith a rather startled look. "Unless you'd rather /I/ go there, instead. You can say you don't want me hanging about your room. I'll manage in the crypt. I suppose I just assumed ... " He trails off and frowns once again at his tray, then gets to his feet and walks it to the trash can. After shoving all of the paper into the bin, he sets the tray on top and turns to walk back to Faith. He stands in front of her and offers both hands to help her up, the frown still lingering a bit. "What've I got to run away from? I'll be fine, love. Really." Which isn't at all the same as promising. "But I'll get back early if I can, get us something to eat, and you can bring dessert." He takes a step back and drops his focus to the tiles on the floor. "I suppose I could try to sleep. If I get back before you. I'd just ... rather not, as it were." He bites his bottom lip for a second, then seems to turn his mood completely around - his next words are almost cheerful. "You know what I haven't really done yet?"

Taking the offered hands to 'help' her up from her seat, Faith closes her hands around his a little tightly just for a second, then releases them again. "I want you to stay," she tells him, her tone determined, with an expression of 'no-nonsense' fixed on his. "Sleep if you want to, don't if you don't." The inflection to her words is as noncommittal as the shrug she follows them with, and she throws one arm out to either side to stretch absently. She, for one, hasn't slept. It doesn't show, but she feels it, nonetheless. "What's that?" Her interest is genuine, though distracted, as things set in. What she needs to do, and how difficult it's going to be. Still, she pushes all of that aside as best she can, and ducks her head to look him in the eye. One eyebrow sneaks upward again, a strange sort of curiosity in her eyes; this could be good or bad. She's really not sure which it's leaning towards.

"Well, a lot of things, but there's one that I can knock off the list right here before you go." Spike takes a second to glance around again, then ducks his head and glances out the window before he looks at Faith again. "Probably ought to do it outside, but I don't bloody care right now." Middle of McDonald's it is! He reaches for her hands again, pressing his palms to hers before he curls his fingers to intertwine them with hers. He studies their hands for a moment before moving in another small step, stooping just slightly to bring his lips to hers. Aside from being a little lingering, it's really a pretty chaste kiss as far as kisses between the two of them go. Once he straightens, he almost immediately turns to pick up his duster. "Last night, I know. I remember kissing you last night. Different now, with the heat turned down on the crazy, though." He drapes his jacket over his arm, then tips his chin toward the door. "Probably ought to go. Things to do."

At first, lost in the confusion of not having the first clue what he's suggesting, Faith stands there. Maybe a little bit afraid, given his state; maybe a little apprehensive. Her hands, before he takes them, play at her sides, tapping against her legs anxiously. When he mentions outside, she follows his glance to the window, then looks back to him with a frown. "The hell are you..." And then he takes her hands, and when he studies them, so does she. Whatever words were to follow are forgotten, and she respects him well enough when he sets the tone for the kiss. She won't take advantage. Right now. He turns, and she looks after him, fighting down that smile again. She doesn't smile. Not the type. "And good thing, too. Woulda' had to gag you if you hadn't stopped raving," she teases again, this time reaching for his arm to squeeze it lightly. Reassuringly, in a way. It's a tease, not a dig. And rather than letting him go, she slips her arm through his again, tugging him just a bit towards the door. "Yup," she agrees aloud, nodding once. "Then ice cream. It's gonna blow your mind, Blondie. That, I promise."

Don't Ask Why - March 4th, 2004

The sun set long ago, and yet, hours after darkness fell, Faith is only just returning to the crypt. The door is pushed open tentatively, far from her usual rambunctious entrance. Where she might have been is anyone's guess, as she left no hint as to why she was out and about, and the expression on her face is void of any discernible emotion. She's a mystery, tonight, like so many others. She neither looks for nor calls to Spike, though she knows he'll be awake and about; instead, she averts her eyes to the floor beneath her feet and moves towards the fridge to retrieve a bottle of water. Silent, for once. Something is most definitely on her mind.

There's a scramble of claws followed by a snort of laughter that comes from downstairs, but once the sounds of Faith entering the crypt reach Spike's ears, all falls silent - for a few seconds, at least. "You stay here," the vampire murmurs to what can only be Byron, then climbs up the ladder with a rather unreadable look of his own on his face. Once he reaches the top of the ladder, he swings to the side and up to his feet, dusting his hands off on his jeans as he turns to face Faith. "Thought you weren't going to show up tonight," he ventures, actually managing to sound casual about the situation. "Everything all right?" His eyebrows arch as he tilts his head slightly, fixing her with a look that's now just a bit curious.

"Question." The word is said as the sort of statement that almost has no purpose, aside from announcing some oncoming point. A bottle of water is replaced to the shelf in the fridge, the door closed, and Faith turns to face the vampire as he emerges from below. "Do I have anywhere else to go? I'm always gonna show up, 'til I figure out how the hell I'm gonna get a place being, well, a wanted criminal and all." Her shoulders lift -- not in a shrug, but a more defensive sort of gesture -- as she crosses the room, making a point to keep from meeting his eyes. "Five by five," she mumbles, though audibly, at his curiosity. "Just..." Another wrench of her shoulders, and she slides up onto the sarcophagus, dust thrown into the air. "Restless." Only she's never been all that good at hiding when she's bothered by something, and she's failing at it now, too.

While Spike doesn't immediately speak, there's a change about him - what's usually easy confidence is tonight a guarded sort of wariness brought on by Faith's attempts at hiding whatever it is she's thinking. "How am I supposed to know where you are when you're not here? You might've found somewhere. You're industrious, you could find a place." Wary /and/ defensive tonight, it would seem. He breathes a sigh and frowns down at the floor for a moment, then looks up at Faith once he's gathered himself once again. "Mmhmm. Restless. But tonight isn't one of those take me downstairs until I'm worn out kinds of restless, is it? It's more a leave me the hell alone restless." He takes hold of the back of the chair and pulls it toward him, spinning it so he can sit facing Faith. "So what's going on?"

Faith pulls herself back over the sarcophagus until she can draw her legs up and cross them, her elbows set upon her knees. "Yeah, well, if I hadn't gone all I don't *know* what last week and showed my face around town a thousand times, I mighta' been able to play up the whole no-one-got-a-good-look-at-me thing from the Bronze," she mutters, the gripe not so much directed at anyone as it is a venting of frustration. A look of disbelief finds its way to Spike, a brow raised. "I'm *just restless*, Spike." Her hands move to her knees now as she leans back, turning her head away. "Think I need to go back to LA." The words are almost jumbled together, as if she doesn't want them to sink in before she finishes. "Kinda feels like I didn't finish what I needed to."

"What?" Oh, Spike heard, he just doesn't believe he heard /right/. He shakes his head and gives her a disbelieving look, leaning back into the chair as he slumps slightly, stretching his legs out in front of him. "Just restless turns into wanting to leave the bloody town. Well, that's fine. You didn't get Angel last time, and now you're wanting to finish it. But last time you told me this, you at least looked at me." And somehow, it doesn't really sound accusing ... a little hurt, maybe, and definitely a touch confused. "Look, love, maybe this time, I'll go with you, hmm? We've managed well in the past, maybe with both of us, we can cause some damage?" He straightens a bit, curling his fingers around the ends of the arms of the chair.

Slowly she brings herself to meet his stare, her weight shifting uneasily as she does. Oh, yes; Faith is hiding something. Body language screams such things, with her. "So I'm looking at you," she says, quite seriously, with that same blank expression. "And I'm going to LA." She nudges herself forward, allowing her legs to fall back to the front of the sarcophagus and strike the side with a quiet sound. "Nothing to do with you, dollface," she offers, as if it might make things better, with another aversion of her gaze. Maybe it has *everything* to do with him. "Or Angel, for that matter." She stares off, distant, until he suggests coming with her - and suddenly she's looking straight at his face, all games dropped. No shifting, no darting her eyes away, nothing but that stare. "No." The tone isn't meant to hurt, but she accepts that it likely won't be understood that way. "I need to go this one alone, Spike, and I'm not gonna sit here and justify it to you."

"So wh - " Spike cuts off abruptly in the middle of his question, his chin jerking back abruptly. He really looks as if he's been hit - the look on his face, the way he shoves back the chair an inch or two as he recoils. "So let me get this /straight/, love." He tries to make himself sound angry, but it's a miserable effort that ends up just making him sound rather awkwardly hurt. "It's not about me that you're leaving, it's not about Angel that you're going, but you're not going to give me the why of it? I don't deserve to know? I'd like to forget about most of what I did last week as much as you would, b-but there are some things that I'm bloody well glad we said. You're just ... you're going to ignore it all, aren't you?" He gets to his feet and wanders rather aimlessly around the crypt, though he does reach for his jacket and shrug into it as he moves. It's small comfort, anyhow.

All of his ill-fated attempts to feign anger elicit a pained wince from Faith, her head drawn back as if taking a blow of her own. "It isn't like that," she argues, returning her eyes to him with a wave of one hand in a gesture meant to facilitate understanding. "This isn't about you, Spike. It never has been." Again, it occurs to her much too late that this, too, could be interpreted in an entirely wrong way. The risks she has to take, sometimes. "I'm not *ignoring* anything, damn it!" Her anger isn't at all artificial as she hops to the floor, taking no care to brush the dust from her pants. "Maybe I --" No, you can't say that. That would be bad. "-- jesus. The hell do you want me to say? 'Oh, please come with me, Spike! I need you there!' Just isn't me." She closes part of the distance between them before pausing again, a deep sigh replacing any words she might have.

"No." Spike stops pacing to lean back against the wall, falling against it with enough momentum that he bounces just slightly before his shoulders press back into the stone. "I don't want you to lie and say you need me there, because if you did, you'd have asked me to go with you in the first place. I just want you to tell me why. If it's not about me - if it never has been - then I want to know why." He lifts a hand to rub at his temples, bowing his head as he does so. "You can't just go without a bloody reason, Faith. You might as well cut my heart out with your bloody knife if you do." Well, maybe he shouldn't have said it, but he does. And he fixes a very solid, unwavering look on her while he says it, too. No more dancing around the issue.

Faith was afraid of this - of 'talking', of working things out, of explaining herself. She's never been good at this, least of all when she isn't even sure why she's doing something. "Then no, I don't *need* you there," she says, the absolute queen of unnecessary remarks, without realizing that stating it again only serves to make herself sound even colder than she already did. "And -- maybe I *can't tell you why*." Helplessness tugs at the words some, though she never gives into it entirely. "Maybe I don't know why I think I have to do this one on my own." She meets the look only for the briefest second, withdrawing a few steps and half-turning away. "Spike, don't..." This time, the helplessness is there, no attempts made to conceal it.

Spike meets her words with silence for a good minute or so, his head tipped back to rest against the wall, eyes closed. "Don't what?," he finally asks without moving or opening his eyes, his voice quiet. "Don't make it hard for you to leave? Because it's such a bloody picnic for /me/, Faith. How dare I make this hard for you?" In the next second, he's crossing the crypt to stand in front of her, one hand moving to close around her shoulder in a firm but not unbreakable grasp, the other rising to her cheek to try to direct her gaze up toward him. "I don't want you to go. And I wish you'd tell me why. But ... just tell me you'll come back, and I won't say another word to stop you, or ask you why. Please." And if that last word seems to be spoken quietly to hide some of the desperation contained within it, that's because it most certainly is.

Taken by surprise at his sudden move, Faith finds her attention pulled back towards him before she can so much as think, let alone react. "I..." She heaves a plaintive sigh, briefly thinking to look away again before she thinks better of it. "I don't even know why, Spike." It very well might be the first honest - truly honest, anyway - thing she's said all evening. His request throws her again, her brow furrowing into a frown she isn't accustomed to wearing. She hesitates, not because she means to stay away, but because everything is so uncertain. It's there, if he looks for it - somewhere in the way she looks at him. Both her hands move to touch his face, her fingers falling lightly over his cheeks, as she fixes him with a stare. Meaningful, yes, though the message isn't clear. "I'll come back, Spike," she promises, her voice almost alien to her in its determination. "I'm not leaving *you*."

Spike's gaze drops briefly away from Faith's face when she touches his cheeks. He lifts the hand from her shoulder to hold one of her hands to his cheek, then turns his head to glance a kiss against her palm before he lets it go again. "All right." He forces a faint smile as he brings his gaze back up to hers, then leans in toward her to give her a kiss before he steps away and squares his shoulders. "Maybe you ought to go before I try to stop you," he murmurs, turning a quarter turn to glance at the door, then back at Faith. "You know me," he adds with a quiet chuckle as he moves a few steps toward the door, "Only good for promises for a few minutes, if that long." He reaches out and swings the door open, looking outside for a few seconds before he steps back to give Faith room to go through.

For one fleeting moment, Faith considers that door as her way out; no complications, just *out*. She takes a step backward as he moves away, looking injured in her own turn as her hands tug at the sleeves of her jacket idly. She's fidgeting, her own nervous habit. Much of the distance is removed as she wills herself to oblige and leave the way he asked, her eyes on the floor just ahead of her as she moves, a quiet sigh of resignation expelled in one breath. As she draws up beside the open door and, consequently, Spike, she simply stops, partially turned away from him, her chin tilted down. "Can I stay?" If it can be imagined, her voice is nearly inaudible, brought down to just above a whisper. Not once does she look towards him. "For tonight? I'll go, if you want me to, it's just..." She doesn't want to leave, but something bars her from saying so. Instead, her head shakes ever-so-slightly in a dismissive gesture, another step taken towards the open door.

Spike could say no. He could shove her through the doorway and close it behind her. He could leave himself and just hope she's gone when he gets back. And while all of these options cross his mind, he still lets his grasp on the door falter, watching it swing closed - and likely brush awfully close to Faith's arm. "You can stay." He steps back and eases his jacket off of his shoulders, then folds it over one arm and turns to walk back toward the chair. The duster is draped over the back, but Spike doesn't sit down, he simply stands in front of the chair, looking down at it. "Suppose it makes it easier. For me to not follow you." Not, as the clarification implies, easier to let her leave. "If the sun's shining and all." He finally turns to look at her, but falls silent once he does so.

As the door is released, Faith steps to the side of it, leaving only a short space between its edge and her shoulder as it passes. She turns, watching him as he moves away, with a sad light taking her features briefly. She nearly says something, then opts out in favour of moves up behind him, one hand on his arm and the other resting lightly on his back. "Spike..." She can't help but feel there's something ominous, looming, when she cranes her neck to look around his shoulder up to his face. "Don't." Again with that simple command, only this time it isn't a plea of any kind to make her own leaving easier. It's for him. "Not tonight." She can't seem to think of anything to say to make light of the situation, which, for one reason or another, brings her to frown again. Where's her flippant attitude now, when she needs it? Another sigh, and she pulls away a step, her hands withdrawn.

"You're right." Spike turns only once Faith has taken that step back, taking his time in letting his gaze slide to her face - for awhile, it lingers somewhere behind her and off to one side. He reaches out for her hands with both of his, then draws her back a slow step, glancing over his shoulder toward the ladder. "You'll want to say goodbye to Byron, right?" His tone of voice is at least a shade lighter, which isn't saying much - it's still rather quiet and cautious. He stops moving backwards once he's within a step or two of the ladder, but keeps pulling her toward him at the same slow pace until she's close enough to kiss. He combs the fingers of one hand through her hair and kisses her forehead first, and then her lips in a brief, fleeting kiss before he turns and gestures toward the ladder. "He's probably sleeping on the bloody bed by now - he's been doing that lately, when you're gone - but he'll get up."

Faith allows the faintest smile to touch her face at the name of the dog, her hands taken in his, her feet following where he leads. When they've reached the ladder, the kiss placed on her forehead, she closes her eyes with a hushed sigh. The second finds her looking almost sadly beyond Spike to where he gestures, a quiet huff given at his words, until she brushes past him to get to the ladder. "He can stay there," she says, her shoulders shrugging only slightly, as she pulls herself onto the ladder. It occurs to her, when she looks back to him, that she doesn't even know if he intends to join her. Ever. "Spike?" What descent she'd begun is halted momentarily so she might tilt her head, watching him closely. "... thank you."

Spike tucks his hands into the pockets of his jeans and shrugs, his shoulders remaining tensed as he takes a small step back. "I don't know what you're thanking me for. I would've stopped you before you got two steps out the sodding door." So much for promises. He smiles faintly, then gestures for her to go downstairs. "I'll be along in a minute." He doesn't give a reason for why he's staying upstairs, but he turns toward the fridge, which is likely explanation enough. When he reaches the fridge, he opens the door and bends to look in as usual, but rests his forehead against the top edge and closes his eyes briefly before he reaches in to grab the first glass he comes into contact with.

Singing Him to Shipwreck

Having just returned from his little walk and subsequent meeting with Drusilla, Spike makes a beeline for the fridge once he's inside the crypt. There's a moment of panic that registers on his face when he doesn't immediately see a can of beer, but after a little rummaging, he unearths one under the cups of blood and bottles of water and anything Faith might've thrown inside. As he closes the fridge, he cradles the can to his chest as if it's the most precious thing in the world, then turns to collapse in the chair and flip the television on. After he opens the beer and takes a long swallow, he frowns at the television and mutes it, content for the moment to sit in relative silence.

Only silence isn't exactly meant for Spike this evening, and a certain Slayer rather notorious for not being the quietest in her affairs (of all kinds, thank you very much) pulls herself up carefully from the bedroom below. For a moment, Faith considers the blonde vampire from behind, watching as he sits in the chair. For what might be the eighteen thousandth time, she thinks, 'This would be so easy.' And it would. He isn't even expecting her or, as far as she can tell, caring about where she might be. She could sneak right up behind him... and she does, slinking across the room as quick as she can, lacking for the mischievous smile that would be so welcome any other day. There she stands behind the chair, the fingers of one hand moving as if hovering over a trigger, the hand just at the gap where the buttons of her jacket would close. One... she flinches, canting her head to stare at the vampire in front of her. Two... her hand jumps, snapping inside the jacket and out again to withdraw a worn stake. Three... she barks. No, not her - Byron, stuck downstairs and suddenly alone and lonely. Well, at least it wasn't Faith who broke the silence. She is, however, still standing there with a weapon in her hands - so, in a panic of sorts, she drops it to the ground and shoves it off to one side with her foot.

Spike is rather used to Byron's barking at random times - to dogs, shadows are scary and interesting, right? So it's not so much the barking that alerts him, but the sound of Faith dropping the stake to the floor. He sets the beer down on the ground beside his chair and gets to his feet rather quickly, turning to face Faith to see her kicking ... something. It slides off into the shadows before he gets a good look at it, and he evidently thinks little of it, as he doesn't bother with investigating. "What was that? Didn't expect you to be back so soon, thought you'd be out for awhile yet." He rolls his shoulders, not in a shrug, but looking as if he needs to release a little tension. "Not that I mind, of course." He flashes her a brief smile, then slides his jacket down off of his shoulders and drapes it over the back of the chair before he takes a step toward her.

Jerking her head up to fix Spike with a stare, only *slightly* wide-eyed and surprised, Faith pulls backward a step out of reflex, if nothing else. "Rat," she lies straight-faced, lowering her shoulders and sliding her jacket down over her arms. He didn't seem that concerned, so she doesn't seem that concerned with elaborating much further with her little story. "Didn't figure Byron would want it. Never knows what to do with 'em, anyway." The jacket is discarded, tossed to the floor without care, and she forces herself into a characteristic grin. "Didn't have all that much to do," she explains, meeting his advance with a step of her own, "so I got back in quick. Figured you were out, figured I'd wait, and I was *about* to surprise the hell out of you and have a hoot until just now." Yeah. *Yeah*. Ruin her fun, why don't you! Still, she's being the queen of mixed messages tonight. As per usual. "You run into trouble?"

It's those mixed messages that cause Spike to give Faith a curious look before he withdraws, moving back that single step that he'd taken forward. After a moment or two or studying the Slayer in front of him, he turns and bends down to pick up his beer, taking a long swallow before he finally answers. "Trouble, Dru ... same thing, really." He moves to the wall and presses his shoulders back against the stone, hooking the thumb of his free hand into one of his belt loops. "Seems someone's throwing her a big sodding party sometime soon." That's right, Spike, focus on the extremely trivial part of the conversation - that's sure to distract from the bigger picture. Especially when he looks as uneasy as he does ... though that could just be because he just had a run-in with the former eternal love. "She's awfully excited about it, anyway. Dru always did like parties, I suppose." He follows this statement with another long swallow of beer, then gives the empty can a sour look before he crumples it and tosses it into a corner - likely to join the stake.

Faith shifts her weight somewhat uneasily as the vampire turns away, taking her eyes off him only fleetingly to search the shadows for any hint of where her weapon might have gone. Failing, she turns back to him at the recount of his evening, raising a curious brow. "Dru." Not a question, but an acknowledgement of the name, as if to show that she understands. Suffice to say, she's both surprised and interested, or as near to either as she can be. Drusilla. Sire. Seer. "The hell would be throwing her a party, and why? Some other vamp? New flame, minion, whatever you wanna call it?" Uh-huh. Press the brooding ex-lover for information. He'll love that! Closing some of the distance between them, she flashes him a devious little smile, raising her shoulders slightly. "Think we oughta go?" ... and talk about left field! Her trains of thought don't seem all that logical tonight, and with due cause: she isn't voicing every thought that's getting her from one place to the other.

"She didn't - I - " Think first, then speak. Once Spike's gotten that sequence down, he sighs and starts again, frowning down at the floor. "She didn't say, so I don't know. Who's throwing the party, I mean." He lifts a hand to touch his fingertips to the back of his neck, absently kneading at the muscles for a second before he looks up at Faith abruptly. "Go? To ... the party?" Faith's absence of logic doesn't seem to bother Spike much tonight, as he's very definitely not operating on all cylinders, from the look of him. "I, ah, don't see why not. Yeah." There's a moment in which you can just tell he's talked himself into it, the uncertainty disappearing as if it was never there. "Yeah, we should go. It'll be fun. And I can prove to her that her bloody visions are all a crock." He pushes himself away from the wall and holds a hand out to Faith. "If you're serious, of course." He raises an eyebrow and tips his head to the side - there's nothing quite like convincing yourself of something, then being told that they were actually joking. "Are you serious?"

Tilting her head to one side and raising a brow at Spike's antics, Faith presses forward a few steps, fighting back the smirk she so very much wants to make. "Good," she accedes to the decision to go to the party, though her expression falters at the mention of visions. "Visions? What'd she say?" She doesn't quite return to scepticism, but it is there, in her mind - the idea that someone might be telling Spike anything 'vision'-like irks her. Not that she'll ever say it. Oh, internal melodrama. Taking the hand in her own, she tugs (not at all gently, as is her way) for him to come closer, adopting a grin in response to his question. "'Course I'm serious," she says, as if it were unusual for her to be otherwise. "Haven't been to a good party in ages, figure we could both use a night out on the town, and - hey! Buffy and the superfriends don't know I'm back, so bully for us. Perfect timing." That's right. Get back into the swing of things. Be evil. "When's it going down?"

Spike is easily enough tugged in Faith's direction, giving her a more assured smirk in response to her grin. "This weekend, if the fliers for a party and the party Dru was talking about are one in the same. Masquerade, too." He settles his hands at her hips and ducks his head to kiss her forehead, then draws back just slightly to look down at her. "If you're interested in that sort of thing, I suppose. Short notice to get costumes, but we could manage if we wanted." He shrugs a shoulder, then becomes serious again, as he's faced with recounting the vision Dru had. He comes close to pulling away from Faith, but summons the will to stay where he is and actually look at her while he speaks. "It was, ah ... it was more nonsense about you, and me being in torment and chaos and whatnot," he murmurs, looking over Faith's shoulder for a moment before he forces himself to look back at her. "You know," he adds with an almost nervous-sounding chuckle, "Typical Dru babble. ...Doesn't mean a thing."

Masquerade. This weekend. For Drusilla. Isn't that ... *convenient*! Though the faintest moment of tension creeps through her at the kiss, she dismisses it just as quickly as it appeared. "Let's do it," Faith agrees, twisting her fingers lightly in his shirt with a grin. "Costumes, huh? Can't think of the last time I wore one for... well, anything. You're gonna have to come up with something, that really ain't my best, uh... field." Sliding her arms over his shoulders, no discernible reaction made to his explanation of Drusilla's visions, she links her hands behind his neck, watching him with a steady stare. "Listen to me, Blondie. Whatever she's talking about? Not gonna happen. You think, if I had any intention of doing you in, I'd be around here? The hell would I be doing like this, or sleeping here, or - well, any of this? Not that stupid, Spike. And neither are you." One hand flattens over his cheek, and she offers what's meant to be a reassuring smile. From Faith? Who knows if it succeeds. "If I wanted you dead, Spike, you would be. Seeing as you're still standing here and, well, not so much breathing as ... you know what I mean." She smirks, shifting her shoulders some, before adding: "Probably just wants you for herself, trying to scare you away from me."

"I know, love." Spike has some differing views on whether or not he'd be dead if she tried to kill him, but for the moment, he lets every single one of her statements ride. He smiles faintly and pulls her close, pressing his lips to the top of her head before he lets his cheek rest against hers. His smile fades and his eyes close briefly as he idly trails his fingertips up and down her back. "It's just ... well, it's bloody strange, two people who have absolutely nothing to do with one another saying nearly the same thing, isn't it? But you're - well, you're probably right. She did talk about being lonely before she left, so maybe it's all a sodding ploy." He's back to sounding not entirely convinced of his own words, though he does make a valiant effort to seem as if he's certain. "All right." This part, he does sound more sure of, because it's simple planning. "If costumes are what you want, it's costumes you'll get, love. I'll try to come up with something that you won't completely hate wearing." He pulls back and gives her another smile, this one more genuine than before. "I'm thinking ... cheerleader?" The smile becomes a definite smirk, and he readies himself to try to duck away should she try to hit him for the suggestion.

Throughout his brief interlude wherein he points out the strange coincidence involved in both the Host and Drusilla claiming her to be a danger of some sort, Faith casts her gaze over his shoulder, careful to keep out of his own view. As he speaks, she rolls her eyes emphatically, suddenly wishing she had a certain redheaded witch's capabilities for levitating wooden objects. Come heeeere, stake! Still, once he's finished speaking, she takes his face in both hands. "All you gotta do is trust me, Spike," she says, her stare never once wavering. "Not them - not some green drag queen demon or vamp who's been off her rocker for centuries, or anyone else. Just me." Famous last words, maybe, but that's what she's going for, after all. "You gonna grant me that, or do I have to make you?" And then he makes her, anyways, because it's now that she hears his suggestion. Hit him she does, or at least tries to, with a half-hearted jab meant for his shoulder. "Uh-huh, cheerleader. Can't so much see myself going out in a pleated skirt and crop top, but hey, whatever strikes your fancy, doll," she replies, both hands held up in mock defenselessness. Then, on a 'more serious note' without ever actually getting more serious, she ducks her chin and looks to him with artificial resolve. "You put me in that costume and you'll be dust before you can even enjoy it."

Spike turns as Faith's punch connects, snickering as he moves toward the ladder that leads down to the crypt's second level. "Fine, fine. If it keeps me from a Dust Buster-y end, I'll stay away from the bloody cheerleader bit. Besides, if I went that route, I'd have to be some meatheaded football jock, and I couldn't stoop so low." He smirks, easing himself down a couple of rungs before he stops to look up at her, the smirk fading by small degrees until it's gone. Only then does he finish what he's got to say, the humor from a minute before now completely replaced by solemnity. "I trust you, love. You haven't let me down so far, so I don't have any reason not to." He pauses a moment, then emits a short, dry chuckle and shakes his head. "I'll be downstairs. Need to change, at the very least." With that, he descends into the lower level of the crypt.

Following his move with her eyes, a similarly half-hearted swing of her leg urging him to get to the ladder quicker, Faith flashes him a grin that would fool anyone into thinking she were sincere with her humour. Before he descends, she tilts her chin back, kissing the air in his direction to show both her acknowledgement of his words and an agreement, of sorts. "Change all you like, Sparky," she calls to him, crossing the room to the shadows to retrieve the stake she cast aside earlier, "I can't guarantee they're gonna stay on you long." She lifts her jacket from the ground, sliding the weapon back inside, before draping it over the sarcophagus. At least now it looks less suspicious. "Or, hey! Don't change at all," she shouts, having changed her mind, as she saunters straight towards the ladder. For a moment, standing at the top of the ladder, she hesitates, drawing in a deep breath. As she exhales, she shakes her head, as if she had to will herself into going into the bedroom - and then she fixes a smirk onto her face and descends the ladder. Game face, indeed.

Closing Walls and Ticking Clocks

For once, the strange sounds of muffled daytime television aren't whispering through the gravestones of Sunnydale Cemetery ... no, it's actually as silent as the grave, literally speaking. This is due in large part to the fact that one bleached blonde vampire has decided to take the day to sleep rather than howl at the television about how Marlena cheated on John as he usually does. In the lower level of the crypt, Spike is sprawled in his bed, the sheet kicked down and wound rather tightly around one ankle. He's got a pillow pulled underneath his head, his arms upraised to wind around it. It's ... a little strange, in all honesty, to see him sleep - without the need to breathe, he really does look dead, except for the fact that he shifts the position of a leg or his head on the pillow every once in awhile.

There isn't any fanfare to Faith's entrance, today. The door is pushed open just wide enough to allow her passage, then set back without a sound. One might question how she knew he wouldn't be awake, sitting in the chair as she glances across the room, but she'd never say. Silent steps, careful and precise, bring her to the ladder; she descends properly, for once, using each rung until she can touch the toes of one foot to the ground. A look to the bed elicits the faintest huff of a snicker, though the smirk isn't nearly so elusive, and she leans her back against the wall at the foot of the bed, fixing the sleeping vampire with a stare. This could be so easy. She could reach one hand... but she doesn't. Her arms fold over her chest, almost as if to keep them from doing anything. For now, she'll just watch him sleep.

Spike shifts his position again, turning his head enough to open one eye and look over his shoulder. It isn't that he heard Faith - no, she was quiet enough that anyone else would likely sleep right through her arrival. It's more that he suddenly becomes aware of the fact that there's someone else in the room. He is, however, still mostly asleep, so he lays his head back down for a second before he does a groggy double-take, his head coming off the pillow a bit. "I ... " He gives his head a quick shake and closes his eyes, rubbing at his forehead with his fingertips for a second. "... Hate my sodding mind." He collapses back onto the bed and closes his eyes again, fully convinced that he's definitely dreaming. Byron, on the other hand, rises from his makeshift bed in the corner of the room to trot over to Faith and sniff at her leg.

Canting her head to the side as he looks to her, a laugh somehow suppressed behind nothing but a raise of one eyebrow, Faith approaches the bed. For a moment, she considers the situation again; maybe it's all a little *too* easy. She slides onto the end, her knee bent to tuck one leg under her, and holds out her hand to entice the dog over. A hand gesture is made to tell him to sit beside her once he's nearby, then she brings one finger to her lips as if to tell him to be quiet. An exposed foot is all she needs, and she reaches forward, the other hand flattened against the mattress beside her to keep her steady. Her nails, just long enough that they can be felt, are touched to the skin on the underside of said food, brushing just along the middle. Naturally, she's careful to keep her head pulled back, with a steady stare fixed on Spike's face rather than her hand.

Byron, good dog that he is, sits when Faith tells him to, and pants happily up at her in response to the finger touched to her lips. Spike, in the meantime, has gone back to sleep and is looking rather peaceful. Peaceful until Faith tickles his foot, at least, which at first only warrants a violent kick and a muttered: "Sodding flies ... not dead /yet/ ... " But the kick sets Byron off, who evidently thinks that this is a new and fun game, so he lets loose with a high-pitched bark that jolts Spike awake again. The bed is a flurry of activity in that second - he scrambles to sit upright, jerking at the sheet in a futile attempt to unwind himself. "Bloody - " What begins as a roar ends as a rather soft-spoken question as he finally notes who exactly did the tickling. " - Hell." He tilts his head to the side and fixes Faith with a very thorough look, bunching the sheet up in his fists as he studies her. "You're back? Yes? Or is this one of those dreams that ends up as a bloody nightmare when I wake up and find out it wasn't real?" He doesn't move toward or away from Faith, but continues looking at her with a guarded, but no less hopeful, look on his face.

Through all the commotion and hullabaloo, Faith just sits right where she is, a cocksure grin set on her face. "Damn, flyboy, if I'd known your grip was that good, I woulda' made you use it," she tells him, slanting her head down to look from his hands to his face. "Had a few tell me I was their nightmare along the way, sure, but that's bound to happen when you're sending them to Hell." She pulls herself away from the bed, holding her hands out to entice Byron into a quick little game of battle-the-hands, before tucking them back into the pockets of her jacket. "Weren't kidding when you said he was a horse now," she observes, drawing around to the side of the bed now. She watches him carefully, silently, until another smirk touches her face. "I'd almost think you're not happy to see me, though, Blondie. Haven't been gone *that* long that you're *over* me, have I?" While she speaks in a facetious tone, her words obviously a joke, she's careful to leave just a hint of sincerity in her voice.

Spike is nothing if not serious in responding to Faith, however light her tone may be. "I am the opposite of being over you." He finally lets go of the sheets and tosses them aside in a wrinkled ball of fabric, then moves to the edge of the bed. "I'm just ... you know. Having a bit of trouble believing that you're back, that's all. I bloody well resigned myself to the fact that I wasn't going to see you for - well, I didn't know how long. So I assumed the worst." He offers her a faint smile, then gets to his feet as he reaches for her shoulders to draw her in toward him, unless she moves away for some reason. "So you're all right? Did what you wanted to do, and now you're back?" The note of boyish hope in his voice is something that he'd normally kick himself a thousand times over for, but he seems to be unaware of it for the moment. Again, he tips his head slightly to the side, looking down at her as he lifts a hand to brush idly at her hair.

Quite the contrary, Faith allows herself to be pulled in, trailing her hands up onto his chest with a backward tilt of her head and a grin. "Five by five, dollface. I did what I needed to do." She offers little but a raised eyebrow to the hint of hope in his voice, knowing better than to comment. "You should know me better," she tells him, averting her eyes only briefly. "Promised I'd come back to you, didn't I?" In her mind, at least, she hasn't gone back on a promise here. Not in the slightest. "Tell me you haven't just been waiting with bated breath for me to come back, Spike, and you've actually gone out, 'cause that's edging on obsession, otherwise," she teases him, withdrawing a step. "Sunnydale as quiet as usual? Didn't hear any big news in LA, so I gotta figure nothing went down without me. No apocalypse, no killer horde? Almost makes me wonder why I'm back here."

Spike doesn't answer right away, but takes the time to press a kiss to her forehead before he pulls away just enough to look down at her. "/No/, I haven't been sitting about moping." He loosens his hold on her as she moves back, a brief moment of disappointment registering on his face before he settles himself down on the edge of his bed to sit, a hand dropping to absently scratch Byron behind the ears. "But no apocalypse, no horde, not even much Buffy, at least in the circles I travel in." He clicks his tongue and shakes his head, tilting his head back to look up at Faith. "Makes for a bloody boring town with not much to do, but I've kept myself entertained. For the most part." Drunken confessions to Willow completely ignored, of course. "I imagine we could make a bit of our own fun, if you'd like. Do admit I've been laying a bit low as of late on the whole evil front." He wrinkles his nose, then gets to his feet and crosses the room to his dresser, rummaging through it for a clean shirt. "So ... do I get to know what you did, now that you're back and done with it? Or is it still some huge bloody secret?"

"Entertained, huh?" With a mischievous little look, Faith finds her own way to the dresser as he does, one arm snaking around his waist from behind. "Good thing I'm not the jealous type, or I might be worried, Sparky," she says in that same teasing tone, craning her neck to whisper in his ear. Her free hand moves along his back, walking her fingers from the base of his spine up to his neck slowly. "Come on," she coaxes, lulling into a seductive tone meant to distract him. "It bother you that much, not knowing?" Oh, but she knows it does, and makes no effort to hide it. For a considerable time, she says nothing, fighting in her own head for just what she can say. She could lie easily enough, but that leaves her with coming up with a story to remember next time. She could tell him nothing, but he'd never let it die. In the end, she settles for the truth, or what little of it she can actually say. Without the slightest change in tone or position, her fingers drawing idly along the nape of his neck, she simply tells him, "I went to see Angel."

Spike remains silent right up until the end, Faith's distraction working wonders in its own way. It's not that he's distracted enough to not process what she's saying, but he certainly seems to be having trouble picking a shirt with her standing behind him and whispering in his ear. During the silence, he finally does manage to pull one t-shirt out from amongst the rest and unfold it, though he doesn't move to put it on - that'd mean making /her/ move, and he's quite content with the way things are going right now; in the physical sense, though likely not in the emotional sense. His eyes close as Faith's fingers move along his neck, his chin dropping slightly toward his chest. At the mention of Angel, he tenses - not really all that visibly, but with one arm wound around his waist, Faith can probably feel it more than anything. "So he said," he finally allows, not bothering for a second to keep the bitter jealousy from his tone. "Got a visit from the man himself, warning me to stay away from you. And then some." He finally does step away, dragging the shirt over his head with his back still to Faith. "So I'm gathering it wasn't a mission to go kill him, if he prances into town telling me that you're not like me and that I'm a twisted monster for convincing you of that." He finally turns to look at her with a faintly pained expression. "I never said you were like me, did I?"

Faith drops her arms to her sides when he moves away, sighing in a newfound exasperation both at the rejection and the words; she felt the tension, alright, and she's had enough of this rivalry for... whatever it might gain one of them, in the end. "Kinda guessed that's what happened when he left for a week, yeah," she snaps right back, turning to face his back with her arms crossed. She'll content herself, for now, with glaring him down (from behind) for that oh-so-male bitter jealousy bit - until he looks at her. The glower fades all too suddenly, and she ducks her head, taking a step forward to close part of the distance. "No," she assures him, her gaze steady. "Neither did I. And yeah, you're right, wasn't a search and destroy kind of deal with him." She reaches out to try and tug at the hem of his shirt, albeit gently. "Kinda wanna leave the past couple weeks right where they are," she tells him honestly, dropping her voice into a softer tone again. As soft as she can manage, in any event, while still conveying it as an order rather than a request.

Spike and orders tend to not mix very well, so despite the fact that he understands the fact that she's subtly insisting that he doesn't press the issue, he doesn't immediately let it drop. "I didn't think you'd sent him to talk to me like he did, but the more time I had to think about it, the more I wasn't sure." He sighs and tips his head back to look at the ceiling, then drops his chin again to level his gaze on her when she tugs on his shirt. "But why ... " He trails off and shakes his head, his expression hardening into jealousy for a second before he drops his shoulders and relents, stepping back toward her to pull her in close. He grazes his lips along her temple, and then her cheek, then drops his head to press his lips to her neck before he straightens again. "I suppose it doesn't matter. You're back, and you're not trying to run me through with a piece of bloody wood, so he can't have convinced you of everything he told me." He pulls back and chances a quick smirk that's coupled with a quiet chuckle. "It's good to see your face, love."

While Faith may be an accomplished enough actress to pull grandiose schemes and play both sides, she can't quite cover up the chill that sneaks further down her spine with each kiss. The last leaves her head tilted to one side, the hand on his shirt tightening around the fabric briefly, with a sharp intake of air. Too close. She's quick to release the shirt, pulling her hand away to her side. If she weren't so thrown by the neck bit, she just might falter at his follow-up. "Angel's, uh - not so sharp with the convincing," she explains, forcing herself to regain some composure despite the fleeting fright. Shift gears. Now. "All due respect, doll," she croons, moving away a few steps, "I'm not so much wanting to talk about Angel right now." She drags a lazy, drawn-out look from his feet back to his face, then slides her jacket down over her arms to discard it to one side. "Nice to see your everything, Spike." Just in case he missed her innuendo while she was gone.

Spike opens his mouth to say one thing, but he seems to hesitate after the bit of innuendo, and decides on a completely different thing to say. As much as he'd like to press, there /are/ other things to be taken care of. And they've theoretically got all the time in the world to talk to each other after, or next week, or next year, right? Theoretically. "Chains have been lonely without you, pet," he offers, the innocence conveyed in his voice in direct opposition to the swagger in his step and the smirk on his face. The shirt that he just put on a minute ago is discarded once again, joining Faith's jacket on the floor before he winds his arms around her waist and pulls her up against him. "Or maybe not, it's been awhile, we could ... " Take it slow? Was he really about to suggest that? "Nevermind." He takes a step or two back toward the bed, pulling her with him as he ducks his head to kiss her.

Regardless of what suggestions he nearly made to her, no reaction is made - not even a hint of a smirk or a quirked eyebrow. Faith doesn't so much as flinch when they move toward the bed, her hands flattening against his bare chest for balance as she returns the kiss. "Gotta say, kinda missed the chains," she tells him softly, her voice still low, as she draws her head back. "But I don't want chains holding those hands of yours back, so how 'bout we break them back in some other night?" Nice to hear he would've been the one in them, in her mind. Still, it's said in jest. If it keeps her out of them, she'll say it; the thought alone of restraints for either of them is forcing her heart to race, though she notices nothing. She doesn't catch her own anxiety. "You miss me while I was gone, Spike?" she asks, her eyes wandering everywhere but his face and her hands following close behind.

Once the backs of his legs bump up against the mattress, Spike steps forward a small step and turns, laying Faith back onto the bed before he joins her, moving carefully so his weight isn't leaning too heavily on her. He props himself up on one elbow, the other hand occupied in alternating between brushing her hair away from her face and grazing his fingertips across her cheeks. His focus is all on her face for the time being, which perhaps unfortunately calls his attention to the fact that she /isn't/ looking at him. Rather than comment on that, however, which would only serve to facilitate more talking of the unpleasant variety, he smiles down at her and finally moves his hand away from her face, instead splaying it over her stomach where his fingertips slide under he