Gunn was about to bitchslap somebody. Surprisingly, it wasn't Spike. More surprisingly, it wasn't even Angel, who had dozed through most of the flight, and fallen back into his not-quite-broody-enough-to-get-his-nails-painted silence, as they made their way underground from Heathrow to Kings Cross Station, and boarded the train for Nottingham.

No, he was about to spin *Xander's* head around if he didn't shut up.

"Look! Sheep!" Xander was sitting in the seat ahead of them, pointing out the carefully-draped train window at a passing meadow. Or field. Or whatever the fuck it was besides fuzzy and green and just like the last 30 of them that they'd passed. The first time Xander had pointed out the sheep, it was cool. The second time, it was funny. The 29th time...

"Xander, you just got *back* from England. And you've been here how many times on business?" Gunn finally asked, in order to stop himself from intruding on Spike's territory and whapping Xander on the back of the head. If he could even focus on it, since Xander was still bouncing in his seat. "What's the big deal about some sheep?"

Xander turned his head to look at Gunn. "Spike and Angel ate a sheep farmer once, and decided to try raising his flock for a couple of months. Somewhere between London and Nottingham, there's a flock of sheep that are kind of my step-grandchildren."

Gunn looked at him. He looked back. Xander seemed perfectly serious, and from the seat next to him, where Spike was slumped to avoid the sunlight that was trying to sneak past the curtain, he heard "Not this one, luv. Our sheep had black ears."

Was it even worth *trying* to respond? Those nutjobs raised piranha and called them their kids, so why couldn't sheep be their grandkids? "Hell, knowing Spike," he muttered, "They really *are* his grandkids."

"Oh, right," he heard from Spike's seat. "Cos Angelus would *never* get drunk an' have unlawful carnal knowledge of a fluffy animal."

Gunn started to comment, when he stopped and looked back at Angel. Angel, who was studiously trying to pretend he had the hearing of a 90 year old human and hadn't heard a word from the seat two feet from his. "Angel?" Gunn demanded, because he *knew* Spike was pulling his leg. It wasn't totally unheard of for Angel to play a joke or two, but to go along with one of Spike's?

Angel looked at him with an expression of innocence. "Yes?"

"Don't make me ask if it's true," Gunn told him. He was trying hard not to think about the fact that Angelus had probably done lots of things that didn't involve killing and torturing, which Gunn still wouldn't want to know about.

"It was Spike!" Angel protested.

"Was not," Spike argued. "You *told* me. You rodgered that fluffy one with the bell round its neck."

"Yes," Angel responded in a patient voice, and Gunn had to force himself not to clap his hands over his ears. "That was *you*."

Gunn grinned as Xander, then Spike, realized what Angel was saying. Xander began laughing hysterically, while Spike looked outraged.

Angel looked very nearly smug. "He was dressed up as a sheep. Even had the little bell around his neck on a blue ribbon, and did a fair 'bah'."

"I am *not* fluffy!" Spike protested. "And I can't remember any such thing. Must've been passed out, or some such. Took advantage of me in my weakened state, he did," he assured Xander, who was still laughing hysterically. "Pervert."

"You'd had two bottles of Scrumpy Jack, I'd had six," Angel said, still smug.

"You're bigger'n me!"

"It was your idea."

That set Spike's husband laughing even harder. Gunn blinked. Husband. Sheesh. *There* was a word. Even after living through six months of Cordy's wedding preparations, and surviving the wedding itself, it was just...weird, to think of those two as married.

He flicked a glance over at Angel, who was actually smiling, just a bit, at Spike, or maybe at Xander. Shit. Right, 'cause *Gunn* hadn't just said yes to the same thing, two weeks ago.

"S'okay, Spike," Xander was whispering now. "*I'll* never get you drunk and make you pretend to be a sheep."

"What, never?" Spike sounded disappointed.

When Gunn and Wes and Angel got married, would they automatically have to become as crazy-ass as those two? Well, no -- Spike and Xander had been pretty crazy before they'd gotten married. Now they were just sickening about it. Gunn glanced over at Angel again, and watched him watching Spike wriggle out of admitting he'd done anything perverted unless Xander wanted him to.

Angel was still smiling, but then his gaze flicked back to Gunn. For a moment they just looked at each other, the silent communication thing going, without Wes around to get into a snit about it. That thought reminded Gunn where they were -- why they were halfway across the globe. Drag Wes back home where they could all three get married.

Gunn felt something inside, give a slight lurch. As he felt it, he saw Angel's expression change. The smile vanished, and the echoes of a serious brood settled into Angel's eyes. Gunn reached over and took Angel's hand. "We're gonna drag his pansy English ass *home* and lock him in the bathroom, if that's what it takes."

"If he wants to come," Angel said quietly. Gunn gave him a sharp look.

"It's gonna take a lot of convincing, to make me think he shouldn't come home with us," Gunn declared. He wasn't totally certain he wouldn't sling Wes over his shoulder, anyhow. He didn't *want* to marry Angel, if Wes wasn't gonna be there.

What was the point? Wes was the one who needed something like a ring and a piece of paper, no matter how not-legal it was, to show that the two of them wanted him for more than just running the show in the office (or pretending to run it when Cordelia's back was turned), and playing the bottom in bed so Gunn and Angel didn't have to flip coins for it.

Gunn knew how Angel felt about him, and though nobody knew exactly what Wes felt about anything, Gunn knew how much he needed the guy who'd once told him that if he fucked up on the job again, he was out, 'bag and baggage.' He'd been pissed at the time, but later, he understood. In the middle of a firefight, two *years* later, when Wes had given him one look, and Gunn had run to knock Cordy out of the way, instead of saving Wes. Right then, Gunn had figured out exactly what it had taken for Wes to make a speech like that -- and had loved him all the more for it.

How could Angel even have questions about whether to grab him and carry him home? If Wesley *did* somehow manage to convince him that he needed to stay...England was going to have two more permanent residents. Gunn felt Angel's fingers press lightly against his -- Gunn knew Angel had felt him relax, again, and was saying that if they weren't on a public train, he'd probably gotten more than just the slight touch. Gunn gave him a half-smile.

Spike and Xander didn't seem to be paying any attention to the whispers and stares, even if they hadn't gone as far as to play their usual every-three-hours tonsil-hockey. The two girls giggling, a few rows back, seemed to be the only ones who didn't really mind the gropes, quick kisses, and things Gunn didn't want to know about that were making Xander say "No, Spike! Not on the train!" and Cordy say, "Damn straight, not on the train. Not anywhere where I can see you -- the airline food was bad enough the first time, thank you."

Gunn returned the pressure on Angel's fingers, and thought about getting Angel and Wesley back to the hotel. Wes wouldn't refuse to see them, would he? Even if he'd started being a prick about returning their calls? Gunn stared towards the shaded window, and tried not to think about why Wesley *was* trying to avoid them.

Maybe... Maybe things really were a mess with his family, and they could help straighten things out, before throwing Wes over one shoulder or another? If it was money, well... Gunn was perfectly willing to go into debt to Xander until he was eighty. Not to help Wesley's parents, who, as far as he was concerned, could suck eggs, but to make Wes feel easy about leaving them alone.

When they hit the Nottingham station and were making their way to the back of the car to grab the luggage, he quietly shared that thought with Xander, after a deep breath. Xander just looked at him, pretty much like he'd suggested one of those sheep in the last field they'd passed had Spike's eyes.

"I ain't hitting you up, Xander. If they need it, I'm saying, we'd do it the legal way. Through a bank, and--"

"Don't be a dork. If Wes needs money, I'm not gonna loan it to *you*. I'm gonna give it to him." Xander rolled his eyes.

"But if he won't take it -- if he gets all proud and stupid and shit--"

"Then Wes' folks will suddenly win the Georgia Lottery, and they'll have all they need," Xander interrupted. He sounded eerie, like an international, inter-species business magnate who hadn't just been laughing at his vampiric husband and making 'baaah' sounds.

"Why don't I ever win the lottery?" Cordelia complained, and Gunn watched the entertainment as Xander tried to explain why he hadn't ever just given Cordy a couple hundred thousand dollars to play with.

Gunn started grabbing bags, and tossing them towards stronger-than-thou vampires. Xander was reaching the 'because you never asked!' lame end of the excuse pool, as Gunn moved past him with his own bag slung over his shoulder. A thought occurred to Gunn -- one he didn't like. "We gonna wait til tonight, to go see Wes?"

"Why? Can't we just stash the sunlight-challenged among us, while we go pay a visit?" Cordelia was smiling. Gunn wondered just how much pocket money she had now.

Angel looked suddenly nonplused. Gunn wanted to grin. So he *wasn't* quite as laid back as he'd been pretending. Looked like Gunn wouldn't need to look around for any help in carrying Wes home. "I don't think a family of Watchers would be very happy to see a vampire on their doorstep, even if we did wait for night," Angel said after a second.

"And we care about their feelings because?" Spike piped up as they headed down a narrow passageway to the rental car pick-up, on the shaded east side of the station.

"Because Wes apparently does, and I don't think we should embarrass him by pissing off his folks," Angel said sharply. Maybe a bit sharper than he'd intended, Gunn thought, because Spike -- *Spike* -- was silent as he walked to the second car and stood in the shadows while Xander dealt with the car rental people, making sure they'd gotten the vamp-safe cars he'd ordered, before they began loading suitcases into the trunks.

When he was alone with Angel in their own car, Gunn was suddenly at a loss for words. They were here. A mile or so away from where Wes lived. Angel was still plainly not happy about the whole thing, no matter how many times he looked like he might give in and be the one to lead the charge. Finally, for lack of anything else to say, Gunn began, "Spike was just--"

"I know he was just. When Spike decides somebody's family, nobody else is allowed to pick on them. Not even their own." Angel looked out the darkened windshield. "Especially not their own."

Gunn wasn't entirely sure he wanted to ask what Angel meant by that. He had some suspicions -- he'd heard a few things, but hadn't ever asked. A survival instinct, that the cops couldn't make you confess to something when you didn't know. Not that Spike had a problem with getting arrested, but Gunn liked being able to swear, in all honesty, that he had no clue exactly what Spike did when he was out of Gunn's sight.

"He's OK," Gunn said quietly, not quite changing the subject. Angel glanced at him sharply, almost looking surprised.

Gunn didn't blame him -- he didn't really believe it, himself. He knew Wes was a grown man, able to take care of himself. But the thought of anyone even hurting Wes' feelings -- the way Wesley's folks always seemed to do -- made Gunn's blood burn. He knew he was over-reacting, but the closer he got, the more he wanted to knock somebody silly at the first sign his father had even looked cross-eyed at Wesley.

It was weird, though, to realize that *Spike* felt the same way. Disturbing, in a way he really didn't want to think about. Made Gunn wonder just how much he didn't know about *Wes*, too, despite all the time they'd spent together when Angel had been off in Darlaville. He didn't *like* to think that he didn't know his lover, but he was beginning to wonder. He didn't like wondering, either.

Gunn felt a poke on his arm. "Huh?"

"I said, do you want me to paint your toenails? I think Spike said he had the blue sparkly stuff." Angel looked deadly serious.

"Try it and you're a dead dead guy," Gunn answered. Then he leaned his head back against the upholstery, which just happened to have Angel's left arm stretched across it.

There was something nice about resting your head on somebody's leather coat sleeve. Especially when somebody didn't say anything about it, just left his arm there, and rested his hand casually on your shoulder, as he drove. Still, by the time they reached the hotel, Gunn was almost ready to admit that maybe they should just paint each *other's* toenails. Maybe they'd let Wes do it. Bribe him to come home, and they'd let him paint them whatever colours he liked.

Or else they'd threaten to paint *his* toenails.

*****

Cordelia was beginning to reconsider her original decision. True, the first two times she'd ever kissed Wesley, there had been nothing by way of passion. There was also the whole 'gay now' thing, not to mention having two boyfriends, even if they were pissed off at him right now. But, seeing the Wyndham-Pryce estate, Cordelia reconsidered.

The family might or might not have a lot of money -- but they had a lot of land, a huge house, servants, and English accents. What else could she possibly ask for?

"Don't even," Gunn's voice jolted her out of her accounting of how many servants a mansion that size would require.

"Huh?"

"I see that look in your eyes, Cordelia. You ain't gettin' him." He sounded stern, but he was smiling, ever so slightly. Xander just shook his head, and moved forward up the porch to ring the bell. It actually took him a few moments of searching the doorway, before he just pressed the area where doorbells usually were.

Cordelia gave Gunn an offended look. "I wasn't thinking anything like that! I was just...you know. Nice house. Nice garden. Could do with a beautiful young woman gracing the rooms with her presence."

"Yeah, well, if you wanna stay here when we take Wes home, be my guest. Maybe they need a new maid."

"Uh! I'll give you 'new maid,' Mr. I Can't Clean The Cheeto Bags Out of My Desk Until The Health Department Comes By To Shut Us All Down. See if I ever--"

The door began to open, and Cordelia broke off mid-threat, to present a smiling, cheery face to whoever was on the other side. Wesley's dad needed an executive assistant, right?

The woman on the other side of the door wore a simple gray dress. Housekeeper? Or Wesley's mother, in something so expensive it didn't *have* to be complicated? Cordelia blinked. There was a time when she would have known instantly, and it irked her that she even had to wonder. "May I help you?"

That wasn't the voice she'd heard over the phone. Housekeeper, then. Cordelia never let her smile falter. "We're here to see Wesley. Is he home?"

"No, I'm sorry. He's not due back until this evening." The woman remained in the doorway for a moment, obviously just waiting for a message to be left, when they heard another woman's voice call out.

"Who is it, Cecile?" That voice, Cordelia recognized. Wesley's mother. "We're friends of Wesley's," she explained to the maid, who relayed the information to an older, *very* tastefully attired woman who walked up behind her. There wasn't any comparison. Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce gave them all a short, but thoroughly measuring look. "My son is not here at the moment," she said to them, not quite disdainfully. Cordelia had the feeling that if it were the proper British thing to do, she'd dismiss them all at once and slam the door.

"Can we wait for him?" Cordelia asked, boldly. She gave Wesley's mother her most charming smile before the older lady could voice her refusal. "This is a gorgeous home, Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce. Nothing at all like the glitz in LA." Cordelia gave the woman an un-subtle 'Please let us look around and show off your house while we pretend to care, so we can wait for Wesley,' expression.

Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce almost smiled. "Thank you. It has been in my husband's family for generations." She still made no move to invite them in -- or, given the non sheep-farming part of the family business, to stand aside and let them invite *themselves* in.

"I guess the upkeep on it must cost quite a bit," Xander said, as his gaze traveled over the whole scene around them.

The carefully-clipped hedges along the drive, the little unmanned stone gatehouse halfway down it. The garden gnomes peeking out of the grass, which Cordelia hoped were *real* garden gnomes, the stone kind. You never knew, and after the incident where Spike had invited the pixies to hide in her bathroom, disguised as troll dolls, she'd been overly suspicious of such things.

"And it's probably a family trust, so you wouldn't be able to mortgage it." Xander spoke very casually, much more so than Cordelia had. Well, he could afford to -- he wasn't standing on a hard granite porch in heels that were just slightly too high for walking comfortably in the English countryside. She recognized his 'I'm being subtle' face, though, the one he used when he was trying to convince Spike that *later* would be a good time to try the thing with the raspberry jelly, and not while Match Game 79 was re-running on the Game Show Network.

Wesley's mother looked slightly uncomfortable, but nodded. "It does get rather expensive to keep the place up to Historical Society standards, yes."

Xander nodded. "And that's the only way to keep the property in a tax bracket that isn't three times the income of the estate itself." He flashed the Xander innocent-boy grin, and Cordelia would have rolled her eyes, if it didn't seem to be working so well. "You know, I bet there's a way to play it from both ends -- get the tax credit for being a Stately Home, and still not have to funnel your own money into it. Have you looked into applying for a National Treasures grant?"

The uncomfortable look on Wesley's mother's face was being replaced by a combination of flattered and... well, 'money-grubbing' didn't sound right for somebody dressed so well. But Cordelia had seen a similar expression n her own mom's face, in times long past. "No -- I think Wesley might be..." Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce frowned.

"I'm sorry -- we're being rude. This is Cordelia, and Gunn, and I'm Xander, who can't keep his mouth shut about financial things that are none of his business."

"No, that's perfectly all right." She smiled, now, very politely. "I'm not certain when Wesley will be back, but perhaps you'd like to wait for him inside?"

Just like Cordelia hadn't asked that, two minutes ago. She glared at the woman behind her back, as they were led into a large entrance foyer. Then she whispered into Xander's ear. "Okay, I know you own a big company, but since when do you know about real estate and English tax law?"

"I don't. I was just making it up as I went along, trying to sound as much like David as possible. Without mentioning hit points or dexterity rolls."

"Whatever works," Cordelia whispered, heartened that Xander hadn't been hiding this business acumen persona from her -- his ability to bullshit, she knew about. They used to call it babbling, but once he'd started increasing his vocabulary and hanging around Spike, it became full-fledged bullshitting.

They entered the house, losing the maid somewhere behind them as they walked into the large foyer. Gunn stood behind and between her and Xander -- looming back there like he was Angel, or their bodyguard or something. She wanted to tell him to relax -- but Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce was smiling at them, now, and gesturing towards one of the side doors.

"Would you children care to see the house?"

Cordelia smiled, biting back the 'children?' response, choosing to believe it was just that she still looked 21 and not because the woman was being condescending. Xander, of course, *did* still look 21, which always irked her.

Wesley's mother led them out of the entryway, and through a much larger room. "The formal parlor -- I'm afraid we don't use it much anymore; it's rather expensive to heat in the winter, so it's usually blocked off year round, but we're having some of the art pieces appraised, and needed to air it out."

"It's very...airy," Cordelia managed. Airy, as in, could fit half a football stadium in it. Her own house in Sunnydale, B.D.T.D. (Before Daddy's Tax Disaster), had been large -- but nothing like this scale. Only the knowledge that everything wasn't hunky-dory on the money front here, either, kept her from drooling unabashedly.

"I wouldn't think about selling them off to pay for the house, if I were you," Xander said, as he walked closer to a large painting of three children in velvety clothes, playing with a dog that was taller than any of them. "You'd have a better chance at a historical grant with the ancestral art collection intact."

"That's what Wesley said. Though of course, we wouldn't part with them anyway. They're just being reappraised for insurance purposes."

Xander smiled disarmingly. "Wes and I have the same tax advisor."

It was on the tip of Cordelia's tongue to say 'Yeah, he's a Burgelin demon', but she controlled herself. No doubt Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce wouldn't find it amusing, and since when did she have this urge to annoy Wesley's mother? She hadn't spent *that* much time talking with Spike on the flight over.

They allowed Wesley's mother to guide them through the various rooms on the first floor, smiling and nodding while Cordelia and Xander traded making complimentary remarks. Cordelia was flatly astounded at Xander's ability to be charming *and* sound like he knew what he was talking about. She knew he could be like this, but it wasn't often he let anyone see him acting like a grown up. She gave him a smile, once, when Wesley's mother had her back turned as she pointed out a particularly boring family artifact.

He smiled back, looking surprised for a second, before returning her look with a warm one that made her secretly wish, as she did every very so often, that it was her that Xander loved. As she turned back to Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce in time to be impressed with some drapes, or possibly the windows themselves, she wasn't sure which, she told herself she would have to be satisfied with hiding a pair of Spike's underwear in Angel, Gunn, and Wesley's bathroom.

Gunn just followed them around like... well, like a tall, black shadow. Stereotypical or not, it was what he was acting like. Hands in his pockets, almost like he was afraid they'd accuse him of stealing something. He caught her looking at him as they walked out into an open area near the stairs, and mouthed, "What?" at her.

Cordelia rolled her eyes. "What?" she mimicked quietly, while Xander chatted with Mrs. W-P about the library, and how much they'd all like to see the collection of a family that had several generations of Watchers in it. "You could talk, you know. Xander and I shouldn't have to carry this show all by ourselves."

He looked guilty for a second, but then his expression changed, as his gaze focused on something over her shoulder. Cordelia glanced that way, to see Wesley's mom showing Xander the wood paneling on the wall of the stairway, and a clever little door handle that was disguised as a fleur de lis, the only indication of the tiny closet under the stairs. Gunn's eyes grew cold. "I don't think she'd wanna hear anything I got to say."

"Okay, *somebody's* grouchy. She seems perfectly nice to me." She did, if a little snooty. But snooty didn't necessarily mean bad. Not compared to flesh-eating Triska Worms or giant bugs of all shapes and sizes. Besides, if Gunn didn't chill out and stop that vein from bulging in his neck, *he* was gonna have a heart attack. They could tuck him up in bed next to Wesley's dad, wherever he was, and they could share the nitroglycerin tabs.

She understood perfectly well why he was on edge, but if he ground his teeth any louder, Wesley's mom would think she had termites. "Wes didn't ever tell you?" he asked in a low voice.

Ahead of them, Xander was cheerfully saying something about the hardwood flooring. Cordelia wondered if maybe Xander had been possessed by...well, the only one she knew who knew anything about quality flooring was herself. If *he* was getting turned on by hardwood flooring, instead of linoleum, she didn't want to know about it.

"Tell me what?"

Gunn nodded back towards the stairs. Cordelia looked, confused, as Gunn said, "That little closet's where they used to lock him up."

"Lock him *up*?" Cordelia spun around to stare at Gunn, then back at the closet, then ahead, at Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce, who was merrily recounting all the times she'd held parties and dances in the ballroom across the way.

He had to be kidding. Wes had never told her anything like that. Her eyes narrowed, but the look on Gunn's face made her stop, and look at Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce again. Gunn looked like he was about to tear something apart.

Cordelia put her hand on his arm, and wasn't surprised to find him tense. "Come on. Let's just find out when Wes is going to be back." They caught up as she was leading them towards the library, and Cordelia asked, as politely as possible, "Maybe we should leave a message and come back, after all? If Wes isn't going to be home until *much* later, we don't want to take up your whole afternoon."

Whatever Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce was about to answer, was curtailed by a voice from within the seriously huge room whose doorway they stood in front of. "Claire, is that you? Who's that with you?"

Wesley's mom-- Cordelia couldn't quite bring herself to think of the woman by her first name, blinked, then smiled a bit nervously. "That's my husband," she explained. "He's been resting in the library, lately, rather than upstairs, so he can work on cataloguing part of the book collection for the insurance appraisers. I've told him he shouldn't tire himself, but..."

"If that's Wesley, send him in here -- I want to see those bank statements."

"No, dear, it's some of Wesley's friends." She moved into the room, heading towards a desk where a man sat, bent over piles of books and ledgers. He bore a striking resemblance to Wesley, from the back -- Cordelia saw the same shape of the skull, the same posture and frame, even the same hair colour in the smattering that had not turned grey.

When he turned around to greet his visitors, however, all resemblance was gone. Wesley's father had a hard face, creased with lines that Cordelia knew didn't come from laughing too much. His eyes were cold, and he made no effort to put on much more than a polite veneer for the strangers in his home. His gaze took them in, then he grunted and turned back to his work.

Wesley's mother smiled, a bit nervously, and walked further into the room, forcing them to follow. "They've come to see Wesley," Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce told her husband. "I've let them know he's gone out, and I've been showing them the house."

Mr. Wyndham-Pryce waved a hand, as if that was well and good, and she could get on with it.

The library would send Giles right past green-with-envy, if he could see it, and straight into plaid, Cordelia decided. Possibly ecru. Or maybe he *had* seen it before; as the Slayer's Watcher, he probably knew Wesley's parents, at least socially. Xander was doing his David-impersonation again, though underneath that, she could see some real awe in his eyes, at the sheer number of books. Or it might be fear, that Wes would carry half of them back to L.A. with him, and Xander might be forced to actually read one of them, at some point.

Gunn, on the other hand, stood at her elbow, utterly silent -- until she touched his arm again, and found that he was vibrating so hard that you could probably sell tickets to lonely housewives to sit on his lap. Not that you couldn't anyway, but she tended to try not to point those things out to the men in her life.

Then he spoke, slowly, and way too loudly for any room with this many books in it. "You remember what I told you about Wolfram and Hart?"

She blinked at him. "That they kiss Angel's butt a little too much since that whole hostile takeover thing that David did?"

"No. About the first time I saw the place. Mecca for evil white folks."

"Come on, Gunn. They aren't that bad," Cordelia scolded him quietly, while glaring. "He just had major heart surgery, he's entitled to be a bit gruff."

Gunn gave her a look that said he not only didn't believe her, but would appreciate her removing her hand so he could go strangle someone without tripping her.

"Some of these books are over five hundred years old," Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce said, proudly.

"Wow. Are any of them in English?" Xander asked, sounding definitely a bit intimidated by the prospect of being told, one day, to 'Grab that copy of Erstwhiler's Treatise that I brought from home, and tell me if it mentions Morgag rituals.'

Mr. Wyndham-Pryce looked up sharply. "Of course. Many of them *are* in ancient languages, though; I've had to read them all, at one point or another. Wesley would have, as well, if he'd ever learnt how to read Aramaic properly."

Gunn took a step in his direction, but Cordelia managed to step daintily on his left foot. "I think Wesley reads Aramaic pretty well, now," she said, searching her memory for what the hell language that was. "Xander, wasn't that book on the Tay-cross, that that thing that was haunting the daycare center, in Aramaic?"

Xander shrugged, looking less casual now. Whether he'd picked up Gunn's alpha-male pheromones, or just heard a nasty echo of his own dad in Mr. Wyndham-Pryce's voice, she wasn't sure. "It was in something I can't read. Which means it could've been anything besides English, first-year Spanish, or Spike's handwriting."

Wesley's dad looked up again. "Tehcrossh?" He frowned, and those wrinkles fell right into place. "Are you the people my son 'works' with?" There was enough condescension in that tone to send lesser people running for the nearest plane back to whatever obviously tiny and illiterate third world nation they'd arrived from. But Cordelia had played that game with the best of them, and always won -- and Xander and Gunn... well, they worked with *her*.

"For," she said brightly, as if no insult had been implied.

"Wesley works for you."

"No, we work for him. Technically, anyway," she explained.

"Ah, yes, Wesley explained about that. You needed a figurehead to divert attention from that...so-called souled vampire." Wesley's father turned back to his books, already dismissing them, and his son's business.

"No, she means 'technically' in that he lets us argue about what we do, before telling us to do it. Works a lot better for him, though, than it does for me." Xander frowned.

"I thought Carla let *you* argue, before she decided what you'd do?" Cordelia asked him. Xander gave her a look that would have been a tongue-sticking-out, if they weren't trying to impress Wesley's parents.

"I meant with Spike."

Cordelia tilted her head. "You and Spike argue all the time."

"Yeah, but he never does what I tell him to. Angel and Gunn--" He stopped, suddenly, as if realizing perhaps he shouldn't be mentioning Wesley's two lovers, in front of Wesley's parents.

"But Spike doesn't work for you," Cordelia pointed out, realizing that Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce was looking confused, but not really caring.

"Oh god! Can you imagine?" Xander groaned. "If Spike were my secretary...." Even Gunn snickered at that, once, before resuming his going-to-blow-a-gasket stance.

"Is, er, Spike, another one of your...colleagues?" Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce asked.

Cordelia couldn't help snorting. Not because he wasn't part of the team. Spike was almost as good at the research thing as Wesley was, if they really needed him -- and of course, he loved to go on a killing-slimy-things run. It was just trying to associate the word 'colleague' in her head, with the image of Spike in Wesley's office, dropping paperclips down Xander's pants and trying to retrieve them with a magnet on a string.

"Yes, on a part-time basis," she settled on saying.

"Yeah, when he's not too busy with his day job, feeding the fish and lounging on the couch watching TVland all afternoon," Xander put in with a grin. When Wesley's mom looked at him questioningly, he added, "Spike's my husband." Then he made this adorable little noise that Cordelia decided then and there would have to be repeated and recorded as soon as possible, so she could play it back to embarrass him at a later date.

Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce didn't say a word -- but her face froze, slightly. Cordelia could see the stern look of disapproval in her eyes. It was Wesley's father's reaction that made Cordelia wish they'd brought Spike along, to let them see the two newlyweds groping each other. Mr. Wyndham-Pryce had looked up quickly at Xander, and his expression was one of finding slimy, muddy, demon poo tracked in on the thousand year old Persian rug.

Xander smiled back, brightly. "He's a vampire, too. Angel's grandkid."

Mr. Wyndham-Pryce leant back in his chair. In a frosty voice, he said, "I believe you three should be on your way. My health is not at its best, and having a house full of people is very distracting. You can leave a message with Cecile, to let my son know you stopped by." He turned back to his books, then, and Cordelia knew that no matter what else they said, he would no longer acknowledge their presence.

Mrs. Wyndham-Pryce stepped forward, between them and her husband. "I'll see you to the door." She sounded more formal than before, if still more friendly than Wesley's father.

Cordelia could feel Gunn hanging back, as they walked out of the library. By this point, *she* didn't really care what he said to Wesley's parents -- the look on Wesley's father's face had been enough to convince her that he, at least, wasn't worth being nice to. But if they were trying to convince Wes to come home, pissing off his parents, even if they were jerks, might not be the best way to get him in a mood where he was willing to discuss it.

When she turned back to pull on his arm, though, she found him just staring at Mr. Wyndham-Pryce's back. Not a murderous glare, just... she really couldn't read it. "Gunn?"

"You don't wanna know, okay?" He gave a last look, then took her arm -- almost like he was trying to teach this guy who wasn't watching him what it *really* meant to be a gentleman -- and led her out of the room. As they passed the stairs, he glanced back at the little door, and she almost asked him if he'd been serious. He shook his head, and said more softly, "I said you don't wanna know, right?"

"I do know," she whispered back. Maybe not the specifics, but enough. "But he has people who love him, now. People who tell him how great he is, and how much he's worth." She gave his arm a slight squeeze. "We won't leave him here, Gunn. But we owe it to him to let *him* decide." She paused, then added, "Before we haul him off in a crate and ship him back by Federal Express."

*****