I do not own Buffy nor any of the show's affiliates.

Discretion is Advised

Chapter 8

Buffy sifted through all of the possible responses in her mind, but seeing Dawn struck her speechless; the air was dense enough to turn the scene rigid as a photograph. Spike's own body refused to turn around, so he stood defiantly as possible with weak knees and wide eyes.

"I-I can explain." He ventured, asking himself 'how' inside of his head.

More silence followed, too thick to penetrate. Bethany felt a creeping feeling that she had done something horribly wrong, and thus retreated into herself with a step in the opposite direction of Buffy's vacant stare.

Dawn had done a better job, approaching at a creeping but steady gait towards her sister, a look of pure disdain pointed sharply ahead. Motionless, Buffy followed her indecipherably.

"Let me just-" Dawn began.

"You were supposed to be back at the house hours ago." Buffy coldly interrupted. "You were supposed to be back at the house and you weren't, leaving me worried sick. And now I find you here. With him of all people."

Dawn's composure faltered for a brief moment.

"And what," She scanned her sister's clothing, "are you wearing." There was no disappointment in Buffy's voice, only thinly veiled anger. Dawn moved a hand to her partially bare chest, turning her head in shame.

"Now wait a second." Spike tried to reign the situation in, promptly giving up upon seeing Buffy's wordless scowl. He quickly regained his courage. "Leave the bit alone - only came by to check up, jus' like you."

"I wasn't doing anything, I swear." Dawn added fruitlessly.

"Not done talking." Buffy growled. Bethany, having never met the blonde, assumed that she was either about to murder everyone in the room or not-so-quietly judge them all to death - a painful one. "I found your shirt and skirt, under your bed earlier today. What's wrong with you?" Buffy's sincerity stung Dawn enough to stir up tears.

"How was I supposed to know where to find you? If you were in trouble I wouldn't be able to help. But it seems that trouble doesn't need to find you, Dawn, you find it." She spoke. "Him."

The younger Summers pulled her top up and bottom down in an attempt to conceal, her bottom lip beginning to quiver. Spike, noticing this, intervened by cutting in front of Dawn. Bethany could almost see their metaphorical horns being locked.

"Get out of the way." She warned. In response, Spike brushed Dawn further back with an outstretched arm as if his opponent were some sort of wild animal. "You're beginning to piss me off, get out of the way." Heat welled beneath Buffy's skin, her senses sharpening with each passing second in preparation for a fight.

"No." He said, arms crossed in a show of immense bravery.

"What did you say?" She encouraged, leaning in. The second 'no' had barely been uttered before Buffy swept forward, placed her hands stiffly upon Spike's shoulders, and hauled him sideways into one of the crypt's hard stone walls with a loud crash, knocking over an array of extinguished candles.

He collapsed to the floor with a broken rib, clutching at this chest in agony but making no sound. "Buffy!" Came Dawn's gasp of shock.

"Don't 'Buffy' me, we're not done here." She said, immediately assuming that Spike would no longer interfere with the definite verbal whooping she was about to dish out. Ignoring the growing pain in his side, he grasped at a support, finding one in a rocky outcropping. Gathering himself, the vampire pulled upwards.

Though Buffy noticed this, she gave no sign of caring. "Home." She ordered to Dawn, reaching out to clutch at her sister. Spike reentered the fray by pushing once more between the two women. With the same steely indifference as before, she elbowed him aside, striking the place where his rib had departed.

Hissing in pain, Spike showed no signs of giving up, matching Buffy's fiery eyes with his own cold ones. "Leave 'er alone."

"No, you leave her alone. You're lucky that I'm not the sort of person to jump to any conclusions, otherwise you'd be blowing in the wind; if you so much as look at my sister again, let alone," Buffy shuddered, "touch her, you'll wish I'd killed you."

Unimpressed by her tirade, the vampire gave no ground. Clearly she didn't know the extent of his relationship with Dawn, otherwise he doubted that she would be so merciful as to give him only one broken bone.

"Alright, alright. I'm coming." The younger Summers gave in, entirely too exhausted to do anything but press by Spike and into the strongly guarding arms of Buffy.

He knew there was no longer any sense in shielding Dawn, not if she was too weak or tired to back him - at least for the night, anyway. In less than a second the Summers sisters had vanished, leaving Bethany and Spike in each others company.

"Er...?" The redhead shrugged, coughing to fill the vacuum.

"You can go." Spike replied, heading back down into the bottom level of his crypt via ladder. She shifted her weight for a second, looking for an exit among the uniform walls, then left having found it.

The confrontation between Buffy and Spike had been much different in the vampire's head. In five out of ten instances she killed him right off the bat: stake, burning, decapitation, lots of holy water, or a very large cross. Two hypothetical situations had him revealing his and Dawn's affair, and the other three were the success probability of different escape routes.

Lounging on his bed, Spike shuffled through these thoughts without having ever considered her (albeit, less than nonviolent) walking out. Still, he was thankful for not being reduced to itsy bitsy molecules.

It had been a long, tiring day - the busiest he'd had in ages. Spike threaded his fingers through his platinum blonde hair before sighing. A lonely hand snaked its way towards his new necklace, clutching tightly enough to hurt.

Far, far away, an enamored young man with a lisp wondered the reason for his love spells failure. Was it so wrong to want his psych teacher to fawn over him?

THE END

Author's Note: I know that it's a lazy way to end the story, but all motivation for continuing was eaten by angry plot bunnies. It's cliffhanger-y but alas, finally done. Spike is lovelorn, Dawn is separated from her beloved, and Buffy is acting the overprotective bitch (which even I thought was just a bit out of character in its extremeness.) Anyway, hope you enjoyed. :)