It’d been a long time since she was in the states. 

Nearly sixteen years since she left, to see the world – at first running across the world, then taking the time to see the many sights with her lover. Lovers? It was sometimes hard to differentiate between them, not that Buffy ever complained; who would with two exquisitely perfect lovers wanting nothing more than to please her? They sometimes did complain about the other, but neither had a choice. 

Not much had changed here. Then again, everything had. Sunnydale was still the same, minus the high school. The school board decided, finally, to build the new-new high school someplace else, and make the crater that marked the two previous high schools part of their new open spaces program. 

No one bothered to actually see the open space there, the negative energy still emanating from the closed mouth to hell repelling most sightseers. The street where her house used to sit was likewise abandon. It would simply cost too much money to restructure and repave it for it to be worthwhile. It was made into a park that was used. Neither crater was ever properly explained; though she would bet everything she owned that most in Sunnydale at least suspected the reason. 

The sunlight glinted down on her as she wandered around the town that saw so much of her life, the good and bad times, the love and the heartbreak. The town itself hadn’t changed much, still preferring to be in the dark about what went bump in the night, yet still managing to decrease their ‘dog attack’ statistics. Buffy’s only thought on that was that a slayer was assigned here – maybe more than one. 

Even with the Hellmouth closed, the general air of the town was hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil, and maybe that evil won’t eat you for dinner. Buffy wondered why she bothered to save so many of them in the past. 

‘Because you wouldn’t listen to me, lover,’ her ever present demon told her with a smug smile that indicated he was the one slipping those thoughts to her. Of course he wasn’t the only one, no Buffy had changed a lot in the past years and while she and Angel still fought demons and vampires, it was on their terms, not anyone else’s. 

‘Stop putting images in my head,’ Buffy mentally shot back. ‘It’s not fair.’ 

‘You don’t seem to mind when I do…this.’ 

The image of Buffy, back arched, hair flowing down her back as Angel/Angelus closed his lips around a peaked nipple, his large hands the only thing holding her up flashed through her mind. One large hand was tangled in her hair, forcing her head further back, her breasts to thrust out into his waiting and eager mouth, lapping up the small trickle of blood from her recently reopened mark on the side of her neck. She could feel his hardness within her, a pulsing coolness that filled her completely as he forced her to move to his rhythm, slow, achingly, and tortuously wonderful. 

‘Damn it, Angelus,’ she whispered, aroused and panting for release even in so short a time as it took the image to run its course. Her demon was good at that, so very good at pushing forth  both the mental and the sensation when he wanted to arouse her. “Don’t do that.” 

“Don’t do what?” Buffy looked up at the person who spoke that, realizing as she did so that she’d spoken the last out loud. Snarling at her demon, Buffy smiled at the stranger in front of her. 

“Oh, sorry,” she apologized to the man before her, “Just, ah…just talking to myself.” 

In the years since she took Angelus into her body, securing the demon within her, Buffy grew used to these mishaps, talking to him aloud, allowing her face to show the emotions he brought out in her. It went from being embarrassing too simply annoying when others ‘caught’ her in the act, so to speak. Why did people have to ask questions about her when it was obvious she wasn’t in the mood to share? Couldn’t they just mind their own business? 

“Oh,” he smiled, “I understand.” 

Buffy went to move around him and continue her pilgrimage through her town but he wouldn’t let her. Looking up, she belatedly realized that he was handsome, in a tall blonde kind of way. Looked familiar now, too. Well, she did spend a long time in Sunnydale, and she knew most of the people here; had saved them all, though they’d never realize that, either. 

‘And they never will, ungrateful lot,’ Angelus mumbled, his Irish accent thickening with his anger. Buffy shivered at the sound, loving when both he and Angel spoke to her with their accent coating their soft voices, or better, in Gaelic. 

“Are you new here?” The man asked, obviously trying pry, or, oh, Lord, to ask her out or something. Buffy took a step back from him, mentally and physically. Just in case. 

“No, I, ah, I used to live here. Just back for a couple of days, seeing what’s changed and all.” 

“Really?” He questioned, not getting her hint. Or maybe she wasn’t hinting enough. Or maybe he just was nosey and her hints weren’t hitting their marks. “I’ve lived here all my life, I don’t remember you.” 

Buffy laughed and turned to leave. The rest of her tour could wait until nightfall. “That doesn’t surprise me,” she whispered just loud enough for Owen Thurman to hear and wonder what she meant. She looked so familiar, but a lot of people did to him these days; he was only in his mid thirties and yet he found himself looking back more and more, thinking about the past. 

And this woman looked so familiar…he wished he could place where he knew her from. 

Everyone knew her as the protector; if not The Slayer, then as the one person who helped them when those strange things happened. Very few knew her name and that was okay with her. She’d discovered in the years since leaving Sunnydale that anonymity was the way to go. 

Making her way to the mansion on the outskirts of town, Buffy ignored Angelus’ mocking portrayal of the man Buffy had run into; she wanted to know if he recognize him, but decided that she didn’t care enough to know. Besides, he was like that all the time, a constant stream of observations about everything and anything. The only time he was quiet was when she and Angel were together. Even then he often added his own mental pictures, urging her to do things she’d never have thought of. It made for more than one interesting sexual experience. 

“Angel?” She called as she walked through the front door. 

Stepping out from the Great Room, Angel waited for her to enter the house, dropping her keys onto the entryway table and shrugging out of her lightweight jacket before crossing to him. She wrapped her arms around him, hugging him tight. 

“You’re back early,” he whispered as his lips caressed hers in welcome. 

“I missed you,” Buffy told him. At his raised eyebrow, she shrugged and sighed. Allowing him to lead her into the bedroom, she told him of her trip around town. “It’s the same, Angel. Everything’s the same. The same coffee shop, the same people, the same stores. Nothing’s changed.”

“But you have,” he observed. Sitting her on the bed, Angel carefully removed her shoes and socks, running his hands up her toned legs to the waistband of her pants. Undoing them and slipping them over her hips and down her legs, he continued, “You have changed and thought that everything else should, too.” 

“Well,” she mumbled as his hands trailed back up her bare skin. “Yeah.” 

Angelus snorted within her but Buffy ignored him. Both he and Angel had warned her that time changes little in small towns and not to be disappointed at what she did or didn’t find. Considering she’d blown up the high school twice (she was still amazed she hadn’t been arrested for either of those…mishaps), that her house was no longer there, that so much had happened in the nearly seven years she had lived in Sunnydale, Buffy hadn’t wanted anything to change. 

She just thought it would. 

Angel’s cool lips kissed her stomach as he lifted her shirt over her head, tossing the soft thin wool behind him to land in a pile with her pants and shoes. Kneeling between her legs, his hands slowly working her panties down, his lips tracing random trails over her stomach, Angel chuckled. He had warned her… 

“Buffy, love,” he murmured, “Did you want it to change or didn’t you?” 

“I didn’t.” she breathed, “But I wanted it to change, too.” That didn’t make sense to her, either. 

His fingers began doing wonderful things to her breasts and Buffy wondered if she’d ever get enough of him...it was doubtful. Allowing her head to fall back, her body to arch into his touch, she struggled to listen to what he said. It wasn’t easy. 

“Everything changes, Buffy,” Angel whispered against her skin, breathing in the glorious scent, the arousal and the unique Buffy-scent. “Even we do. Small towns change, too, just not as big as the metropolises. People do change, but since the populations are usually smaller,” Angel continued as his tongue played over her heated skin, “It’s a slower process.” 

“Sure,” Buffy gasped as his mouth closed over a straining nipple, “Use logic about this.” 

The chuckle he gave went right through her, the vibrations tingling along her skin. Her arms weakened and she fell against the bed, spreading herself open for Angel. He wasted no time in devouring the feast before him. 

“I love your laugh, mo gràdh, that deep throaty, sexy sound that sends shivers up my spine, the little catch in your throat when I hit a particularly sensitive curve on your body.” His long fingers flitted lightly over her quivering stomach and he smiled when her breath did indeed catch in the back of her throat, a gasp of his name, a plea for more. 

“What you taste like here, love, your shoulder, your neck.” It was sweeter then any ambrosia he could imagine, the raised tissue that marked her neck. His tongue slipped out to taste the skin again, to trace the mark that branded her his. The mark that wasn’t ever allowed to close, now that they were together. 

Despite her harsh breathing, her whimpers and moans, her pleas for more, Angel continued. “Or here, baby, the pounding beat of your heart,” his lips pressed to her chest, directly over her beating heart, “The blood that roars through your veins calling out to mine, to me.” His lips moved back up, lingered on the pulse beating on her throat, the mark that also called to his baser instincts, tongue flickering over it again and again, driving her wild, driving him wild. 

Moving down her body, Angel continued, his whispered words floating to her through a haze of love and lust, of feeling and need. “How your breasts, so full, so round, fit into my hand like they should always be there.” He took one into his palm to demonstrate, his thumbs flicking over the peaked nipple. “That sexy sound you made just now as you know that I’m about to do this.” He closed his mouth over the nipple straining for his touch and suckled greedily on it, blunt teeth biting lightly down on the peak. 

His hand found her other breast, rolling and pinching the nipple as he continued to suckle at this one, face changing, fangs scraping the aureole until Buffy screamed his name into the stillness of their temporary home. He hardened even more at the sound of his name on her lips and switched to the neglected nipple. 

“The sound of you screaming my name as I bring you pleasure.” 

He wasn’t done, not remotely. Angel continued, lapping her nipples once more, again bringing a breathy moan from Buffy’s lips, then continuing lower, his large cool hands spanning her petite waist, the dip right before her hips flared. “Your skin is so smooth, so soft.” His thumbs played over the skin, up and down. Up, brushing the underside of her breast, down to just above her curls. “I love how you feel, Buffy, how your skin heats under my touch, how your body reacts to mine, how you feel under my fingertips. How you’re silk over steel. Slayer and woman, woman over slayer.” 

Buffy was going crazy. He was driving her insane with his touch, his words; she could feel Angelus deep within her as he added his own caresses, never one to be outdone by his alter ego. It was a competition she enjoyed to its fullest. Her hands clawed at the sheets as Angel gripped her thighs, his mouth moving up, elongated teeth scraping against her skin, bringing uncontrollable shivers of pleasure. Angelus growled within her, sending another bolt of lust streaking through her. 

“Such strength here, my love, such power,” his teeth sank into her thigh, drawing a tiny amount of blood but bringing her closer to her orgasm. She was breathless in her pleas, ripping the sheets to shreds, moving her hands to Angel’s shoulders, nails digging deep into his skin and drawing blood. His growl of lust was nearly her undoing and they both knew it. 

“I spent hundreds of years without you, never knowing you and yet I know that these years we’ve been together haven’t been enough, will never be enough. I’m always going to remember how right here,” his hand stroked up her leg to her center, a single finger dipping into her wet heat for a scarce moment. “Right here where all your secrets are, how you scream my name as I do this.” 

And so saying, he lowered his mouth to her, smiling as he heard the hoarse cry fall from her lips, even as he drove her higher still. His tongue invaded her, once, twice, only to be replaced by his oh, so clever hands as he took her clit into his mouth, rolling it between his again blunt teeth. 

The orgasm hit her, exploded through her, forcing her mind to empty of everything but Angel. His scent, his hands, his taste. She felt him kiss his way back up her body until his mouth was next to her ear and tried to open her eyes, but found she couldn’t.

“How you fly as you come, baby, falling into my arms.” And he entered her in one swift stroke to a breathless pant of his name, smooth cool hardness encased in a hot viselike grip. 

Buffy could feel herself build towards another orgasm, could feel what his body did to hers deep, deep within her, her heart, her soul, the very fiber of her being. Angel’s name was a silent chant from her lips, her body moving with his in a timeless dance neither tired of. She wrapped her legs high on Angel’s waist, holding him closer, closer, closer still. Pulling him deeper into her as if they could become one in body as they had in every other way. His hands found her again, stroking, coaxing, and this time they flew off the edge together. 

It was a long while before Angel moved off her, rolling to the side on a groan of her name and pulling her close. He never wanted distance between them, not even an inch in their bed. Eyes still closed, his hand smoothed Buffy’s damp hair off her face and down her back. 

“I love you,” he whispered, not wanting to break the spell around them. 

“I love you, too, my Angel,” she whispered back. Then, several minutes later, half asleep, “I’m ready, I think.” 

Cracking open an eye, her lover asked, “To see them?” 

“Yeah, well,” Buffy amended, “Dawn at least. It’s been too long. I needed it at first, but then it was just easier to ignore.” 

“She’ll be happy to see you again, Buffy.” Angel hadn’t kept in touch with anyone from Sunnydale but Dawn and then only extremely infrequently. Once he found Buffy and they made up – permanently – the calls to her sister were less frequent, coming once a year, if that. The conversations were short, we’re safe, you’re safe, life isn’t so bad. But she always asked after Buffy and he always told her that Buffy was fine, happy, and safe, with him. And Dawn always accepted that, telling him to relay that she missed her sister. 

This trip to Sunnydale was the first step towards bridging the gap that existed between the sisters. Buffy wanted to start where it began and ended before moving forward. It was a necessary one at the time, but…sixteen years was a long time. A lot had changed, maybe too much. 

“She still in New York?” 

“Last I heard, yes,” Angel nodded. “But we can call her before we leave here.” 

“Thank you,” Buffy said and kissed his chest, her hands reaching down his arms and clasping his hands in hers. “Love you, baby.” 

“Anything for you, my love.”

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