Xander grinned as he flipped though his new collection of semi-naked vampire postcards -- though why he was getting turned on by something he saw every day, both at home and at work, he wasn't sure; maybe it was the Victorian underwear.

"Oi, look at this one!"

He turned his attention to the items on the shelf that Spike was now pointing at. "What are... where are we?" He looked around, realizing that in his contemplation of Victorian underwear, which had led him back to thinking about Spike in that corset, he'd missed noticing which section of the store they'd headed for after they'd left the stationary area. "Spike? Tell me these are not sex toys."

"Why not? Bet we could use 'em to enhance our sex life."

Xander laughed. "Like we *need* any enhancing." And wasn't this the perfect way to avoid having sex in public, or even semi-public? Talk about it until they couldn't help themselves?

Spike was grinning at him, though, and Xander had to stop worrying about public indecency and how much the batter beater he was holding up might hurt, in order to enjoy the look of sheer blissful perversion on Spike's face. Xander could feel himself slipping into the brain-dead zone, but he couldn't help himself. Spike just looked so...happy. It made Xander want to kiss him--

"Stop it!" Xander scowled at him. "Why can't you be annoying, or something?" There was a time when Xander would have shot himself for even thinking those words, much less uttering them. He missed the good ole days, when Spike was somebody he could threaten, then forget about. For a few minutes. Right? The good ole days when he didn't have to constantly slap Spike's hand before it crept inside Xander's pants, in the middle of a department store filled with vampires.

Of course, Spike had *always* done what he did next -- which was pout when he got told he wasn't being annoying or evil or scary enough to make a little old librarian lady nervous. Granted, Xander didn't used to *know* it was a pout-- he'd once thought it might be a sign that somebody had finally gotten wise and spiked Spike's bloodbags with garlic.

"Can be, if I want." Spike cranked the egg-batter-beater in Xander's face, and as he watched the two metal paddle things whirl around, Xander decided it was one enhancement their sex life could do without.

"Put that down," he ordered.

Spike stuck out his tongue, and clasped the kitchen utensil to his chest. "No. I want it. S'my wedding present."

Xander reached for it, then thought better of that idea. Touching Spike would only make things worse. "First off, Cordelia gave us the food processor from hell, just so you'd stop going down to the kitchen and bugging her when she's trying to make brownies--"

"Won't work," Spike interrupted.

"I know that. Second, I *gave* you your wedding present already. It involved you, me, and the babysitter. Remember?" Yes. Also a bright idea. Remind Spike and himself of *that* little adventure, as a way to take their minds off sex. Why didn't he just drag Spike off someplace, like a fitting room, and *have* sex? Other than the complete mortification that would follow?

Xander shook his head, and felt the guy with the crayon go flying around, losing his grip so that he and the crayon both careened off the walls of Xander's head, and for a moment none of them could remember the question, or the objection thereto. Spike was holding a see-through apron.

Luckily, Spike then ruined the moment by saying, "We should get one of these for Princess."

Xander blinked. "What? Why? I mean, why her? I thought you--" He stopped as Spike gave him a grin that was both knowing, and preening. "Yes, big surprise, I like thinking of you, naked. Why would we give Cordelia a see-through apron? Do we *want* her to cook?"

"What about Angel?"

Xander had to dig around for the hand-crank to his brain. When he got it re-started, he scowled at Spike. "I am not thinking about Angel, naked, while I'm on my honeymoon. Not unless we're playing 'Angel and Wesley' in the privacy of our own hotel suite."

"Eww. That's disgusting," Spike protested loudly, just like he hadn't invented the game.

Xander looked around, but no one in the immediate vicinity seemed to care that his insane glurble was implying that *he* was the perverted one, so he simply shrugged, and picked up another item from the discounted merchandise shelf. "You think Cordelia would like one of *these* ?"

Spike looked at it, widened his eyes, tried not remotely to suppress a grin, then leaned over to whisper into Xander's ear.

"Oh, it is *not*!" Xander studied the item in his hand, and succeeded in not turning the color of a tomato. Mostly. "It's in the kitchen section."

Spike just lifted an eyebrow and said, "Like you can't do that in the kitchen?"

Xander turned the item over, and read the label off -- "Pineapple ring stand, for use as a decorative centerpiece. And you say *I* have a dirty mind?"

The look Spike gave him was reminiscent of the second ever look Spike had given him. It said 'you're a looney.'

"You *have* a dirty mind. S'why I love you, git." Xander whapped him lightly on the back of the head. Spike didn't even blink. Xander put the decorative pineapple ring stand back on the shelf, and picked up another item which he *knew* wasn't a sex toy, even if he had no idea what it really was. "You're going to tell me you don't know that's a nuts-squeezer," Spike said.

This time, Xander whapped Spike with the garlic squeezer, as he'd discovered it was labeled. "Is there *anything* in this store you can't claim is used for sex?"

Spike gave him another 'you're insane, why am I with you?' look, before saying, "Xan, what sort of store do you think we're at?"

"Um, just guessing here, but - department store?"

"That caters to vampires."

"So...you're saying they sell stuff for eating blood, looking mysterious and sexy, and...oh. Oh!" Xander looked around, as he suddenly realized. "We're at Morrie's!" Or, Morrie's if Morrie contracted his clientele to vamps, and expanded his product line to...well...everything. Including tea cosies.

With that in mind, Xander looked around again, and... Spike was right. Yes. Well. *That* was going to be helpful in the whole not-having-sex project. Considering that Morrie's was one of the select list of places in L.A. for which he'd lifted the not-in-public rule, precisely because it was impossible to be around Spike and that many sex toys and not drag him into one of the tryout rooms. This place was like one of *Morrie's* sex fantasies.

Xander blinked. Then he decided that, while normally, imagining the sex fantasies of a human-sized duck was *not* on his to-do list, it was just perfect for the spot he was in right now. Cooled that 'must shag Spike now' fire down to a low smolder. "Neat. Hey, do you think we should bring some stuff back for him?"

Spike looked at him like he was loony, again. Or possibly still. "For Morrie? I'm not buying sex toys for Morrie. That'd be like..."

"Offering him a marketing deal? For a cut of the profit if it catches on in the local vamp community?" Oops. Spike's eyes were doing that contracting-pupils-spinning-in-circles thing. "Stop that!" he commanded. 'You're not helping here,' Xander saw scribbled on the back wall of his skull. Apparently somebody had found his crayon. "Spike, I mean it!"

"But you're being all ruthless. How the hell can I help it if that makes me want to be shagged?"

"Spike, there is no way I am going to have sex with you in this building. Or near it, or anyplace else that isn't our hotel suite. And we are not leaving this building until we have our collars." Because that would do so much for ensuring they made it all the way *to* the hotel without sex, right? Xander sighed. "I mean it, Spike." He knew he wasn't playing fair -- using that tone. The 'I'm not fooling around anymore, this isn't a game' tone.

Right. Glurble. What was the question? Spike was already taking his hand again, and pulling him close for a soft, almost non-sexual kiss. Right when he was about to say something nice and touching, and growly protective, Xander grinned triumphantly. Spike's expression froze, then he glowered. "That's not fair."

"Oh, and you going all growly on me is fair? Think not, bubba. Hands *off*. Where I can see 'em."

Spike slowly raised his hands -- and Xander realized too late that Spike was holding something. It was probably originally meant to be a cooking utensil. But all Xander could think was 'yeah, now *that* would fit'. He thumped himself on the forehead.

"That's not fair either," Spike whined. "No foreplay for me means no foreplay for you."

Xander looked up. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"You don't get to whap yourself on the head, if you won't do it to me."

The temptation was strong, but Xander resisted. Instead, he asked, "You think it's been an hour yet?" Spike made a great show of pulling his pocket watch out of his trousers, and popping open the cover to check the time. Xander knew quite well that he just did it so the little music-box mechanism would start playing 'Black Velvet' and Xander would have to reach over and-- "Spike?"

"Fifteen minutes."

Arrrrgh. "Maybe we should shop in opposite corners of the store."

The look Spike gave him for that was akin to the one he'd received when he'd tried to suggest they go look at the squirrels in the zoo -- the ones that were safe behind glass so they couldn't get him -- in order to desensitize him to that little phobia of his. "Alone?"

"It would be difficult to shop in opposite corners of a store this size and stay together." Spike's mouth quivered, ever so slightly, and slowly Xander saw something he hadn't seen in a very, very long time. It was a new pout. He suspected it was a 'you just married me, and now you want to go more than two yards away from me?' pout. "Otherwise I'm not gonna survive the next forty-five minutes," he tried to explain.

Spike's pout slipped into a more familiar one. "You don't wanna shag me," he complained.

Xander resisted the urge to hit him. "D'uh! What have I been saying? I don't want to shag you. Or be shagged by you. Or grope, or be groped by you. *In* *public*."

"Can we--"

"No."

"What about--"

"No."

"You're no fun."

Xander rolled his eyes. "Get used to it, pal. Maybe once I get turned I'll lose my mind and my morality enough to not care if people see me getting it on. But right now, I do, I have, and I'm *not*."

Spike didn't say anything for a moment, looking vaguely disquieted. But all he said, was, "Don't you love me, Xander?"

Xander laughed. "You'll have to try harder than that-- no! I didn't mean it. Shit, shit, shit. I'm going to look at shoes."

All Spike had done was waggle his eyebrow. But it was the *way* he waggled his eyebrow. Like eyebrows were independent creatures who only lived on people's faces because it was convenient, and *Spike's* eyebrow was in the mood to get together with Xander's eyebrow and make lots of little eyebrows, so it was doing the Forbidden Dance of the Sacred Eyebrow Mating Ceremony. And it had to be the one with the scar. Asshole.

"Please? I'll be good." Which statement should have had Xander rolling on the floor laughing his ass off, if it weren't delivered in a soft, subdued voice that, while it didn't *really* sound hurt, did almost sound as if Spike meant it.

"Spike, you can't be good. You might not exactly be evil anymore, but good isn't even a remote possibility."

"I can if I want to." Now he sounded more like a grade-schooler than he usually did. Like Xander had just told him he couldn't eat a spoonful of ketchup, grape jelly, sauerkraut and baked beans without throwing up.

"And why would you want to?" Xander retorted, not sure why he was encouraging Spike to misbehave. Masochism? Or was he just *really* that horny? Okay, that second was a distinct possibility. But no matter how horny he was, and no matter how adorable and fuckable and sexy and cute and edible Spike looked, he wasn't...going to.... "Spiiiiiiike."

"What? I wasn't doing anything! Both my hands are right here." He held them up, showing how they weren't touching anything of Xander's.

"Stop lookin' at me."

"Or what? You'll kiss me? Give me the shagging of my unlife?" Spike grinned, apparently thinking he was about to be triumphant in the 'Let's Get Xander' game.

"Or I'll buy this," Xander grabbed the first thing off the shelf that he could reach. "And I'll tell Angel you bought it to use on Gunn."

Spike blinked. He looked at the item in Xander's hand, and blinked again. It was clear he was weighing the pros and cons - getting killed by his Sire, or not getting to have sex with Xander in the middle of Ambercrombie's. "Er...Xander?"

Xander looked down at the item in his hand. Which was an egg-timer. A flat, squat, can't possibly think of anything sexual you could possibly do with this, egg-timer. Spike looked a bit smug, until Xander said, "He'll think you're saying Gunn would only last three minutes."

"Gunn? Naw, I'd clock him at a good hour, at least. We could give that to him and tell him it's to time the Sire, though. *That's* believable."

Xander began to believe he might just *never* get it through Spike's thick skull that public sex anywhere that hadn't been pre-approved wasn't an option. The Hyperion was okay -- it was home. The office was okay; it was his private place. The car was okay, depending on where they were parked, and he truly didn't have a choice about Morrie's. Everywhere else... he had to think about. Spike had known this about Xander since the days when he was dating Anya and pretending he didn't like playing pool with Spike -- but it never stopped him from trying.

Not that Spike was *directly* begging to be shagged right now, but silly, pointless arguments were just as much foreplay as eyebrow-waggling, or butt-pinching, or standing there giving him that perfectly innocent look that Xander kept telling Spike he was incapable of, because if he *knew* he could do it... gah.

This line of reasoning was only going to lead him into trouble -- having sex with Spike, in public. Normally the trick was to get as un-public as he could manage, before dropping his pants. But Xander felt like he should stand firm about getting back to the hotel first. He *didn't* want to have sex at Ambercrombie's, and anyplace outside, like the alleyway, was likely to be inhabited by vampires.

He tried to think of a way to distract Spike again...assuming he'd actually managed to distract him, before now. The problem was, just about anything counted as a prelude to sex. Arguing about who fed the fish last was a prelude to sex. *Feeding* the fish was a prelude to sex. There was just no way Xander was going to be able to say 'no', in a store full of sex toys and egg timers. He glanced up in time to see Spike's grin broaden, like the silly vampire knew Xander had lost the internal war.

Xander sighed. The guy with the crayon in his head was writing 'and why is this a bad thing?' over and over, in purple. Xander blinked. In fact, the kid kinda *did* look like Harold. He shook his head, fast, and thought about ways to use pepper shakers as a marital aid.

That kept him happily confused, and not entirely turned on, long enough for Spike's triumphant grin to turn doubtful. "Xan? You wanna buy the egg timer?" He nodded at the item still in Xander's hand.

"What? No. Um, yes. Give it to Gunn and tell him it's for Angel. Then we run. Or we can mail it to him... *Can* we mail stuff from here?"

Spike shook his head. "Don't think so. Think I remember seeing something about it in the brochures. Y'know, before we did unspeakable things on top of 'em." Hopeful grin again.

"If they're unspeakable, why are you speaking about them?" Xander asked, hoping to forestall the apparently inevitable. "And I suppose we can just get Wes to give it to them. He's always looking for an excuse to get in trouble."

While Spike got that hazy undetermined look on his face, wherein he tried to decide whether he was going to try to top Xander's sane human logic with his own insane Spike logic, or pout because Xander hadn't picked up on his oh-so-subtle hint, or just pout because pouting stood a good chance of getting him shagged, Xander was suddenly struck with a thought. He suspected for a second that it might just be crayon-boy throwing his purple crayon at the walls of Xander's skull and giving up in disgust, but no, it was actually a thought. And it didn't even involve nekkidness on the part of himself or Spike. Might even distract Spike, for at least thirty seconds.

"Hey, who do you think won the poll?" he asked Spike, whose expression was still fighting with itself in a disturbing manner. Disturbingly cute, of course.

"Which poll?"

"The 'how long does it take Angel to get off his ass, realize how unbearably cute we are, and ask the zoo crew to marry him so he can try to be as cute as us' poll."

"Dru." Spike didn't even seem to have to think about it.

Xander blinked. "They let her play?"

Spike just shrugged. "You think anyone would say 'no' to her? You've seen her pout, Xan. Even Angelus and Darla went weak in the head when Dru pouted."

"Huh. True. But how do you know she won?"

Spike stared at him, and this time it was the 'you *are* an idiot' look, and not the 'you're insane' look. "You remember Drusilla, don't you? Loony psychic vampire chick? About yea tall? Talks to stars?"

"Spike! Are you saying she cheated-- what am I saying? Of course she cheated. Spike, whap me on the head, will you? Ow. Thanks."

"Does this mean I can shag you now?"

Xander groaned. Harold was scribbling 'told ya so' on his mental walls. "Spike? If I *say* no, what will you do?" Xander knew it was pointless, asking. He knew what Spike would do-- keep trying. But the longer they stood here and talked about having-not-having sex, the closer they got to getting to go try on their collars and go back to the hotel for actual sex. He made a note to himself -- *not* sex in the cab.

"Is this a trick question?" Spike was frowning, now, as though Xander had just over-taxed his reptilian brain.

"Probably. Are you going to answer it?" Was this a conversation? Was Spike actually holding a Victorian butt-plug in his hand, or was Xander just too far gone to be able to figure out what on earth that thing could possibly be used for that *didn't* have a sexual connotation?

Spike tossed the thing up and down in his hand for a moment, plainly enjoying the way Xander's eyes followed it, before finally sighing, setting it on the shelf and saying, "Fine. I'll play fair if you'll play fair."

Xander tore his gaze away from the shelf, and tried to decide whether to laugh or look serious. Spike looked serious, but Spike looking serious almost always lead to something utterly psychotic coming out of his mouth, rather than to him actually *being* serious. Xander settled for vaguely amused but willing to play along, and hoped he didn't come off looking as psychotic as *he* felt at the moment. "Okay, I'll bite. 'Splain this to me, Lucy."

"You tell me up front it's really not gonna happen, and I'll stop tryin' to change your mind. Not so much fun, maybe, but if it's *not* gonna happen, we could always pick out pressies for the gang, instead of wasting our time."

Whoa. Xander felt his eyebrow, the one that had wanted to go off and do the mating dance with Spike's a little while ago, try to crawl up his forehead and hide in his hair, like it was frightened of the strange creature in front of it. Xander knew how it felt. "You would actually stop trying to seduce me?" Which, Okay, wasn't...completely...unheard of. Usually there was bloodshed involved, in the form of a fight to be had. When had Spike ever just taken 'no' for an answer?

Of course, how often had Xander just *given* him 'no' for an answer, rather than play around until he said yes anyway, or got them both so distracted that 'no' wasn't necessary anymore? Xander tried grinning: small, cute, and adorable. Spike sighed and rolled his eyes. "Am I a git, now, Spike?" Xander asked.

"You're *always* a git," Spike said, fondly. "But you're *my* git, and right now I say we git to the cookbook aisle and find something for Peaches."

Xander nodded, not even bothering to groan -- he still couldn't think clearly enough to respond to bad puns -- and began to follow Spike out of the dangerous cooking utensil aisle.

An evil thought occurred, which he tried to bat down. Really, sincerely, tried to bat down. Watching Spike precede him down the aisle, humming happily as he lead them off to find something that would make Angel yell at them, yet still look like a thoughtful present, Xander found it difficult to bat it down entirely. Spike's ass had a tendency to make Xander think evil thoughts. It didn't matter if it was covered by a coat; Xander knew what it looked like, underneath the linen.

Now that Spike had agreed to *take* no for an answer...how mean would it be of him, to start flirting?

Xander fought back a giggle. Very. Positively evil. Well, not *too* evil. Mostly not evil. Maybe he needed some practice in mostly-not-evil, though. Seeing as how, at some point, he was going to become a mostly-not-evil vampire. Wasn't like he could just take lessons from all the other souled vamps around. He didn't want to accidentally become a dork, after all, and the only other choice was Harmony, and Xander *already* knew how to be evil better than *she* could.

So he followed Spike to the cookbook section, and looked around for something suitable. Took a whole...oh...twenty-five seconds. "This is a good one," he told Spike. "Cooking with blood. Let's see..." He flipped through the pages at random, looking for a good recipe. "Oo. Yeah. Type A stew. Angel's a Type A if I've ever seen one. You bring the blood to a low simmer, add a pinch of season salt. Hmm." He pursed his lips. "It says you're supposed to serve it warm, on your lover's back. Spoon optional. You pour it into that little dip... Wow. The number of utensils they had back in the other section, you'd think these Victorian guys would be able to come up with a soup bowl, or something." Xander didn't show Spike the front of the book, which actually read 'Erotic Cooking With Blood.'

"We *have* soup bowls," Spike protested. When Xander looked up, raising one eyebrow at him, Spike said, "I mean we did. These blokes might not -- no, there they are. Dining sets with plates, bowls, cups, and eyeball scoops."

"Can I say 'eew' and pretend you didn't just say that?" Talk about spoiling the flirting mood. Probably not for a vampire, granted. But Xander was still human, and didn't plan on changing his mind about the erotic or edible uses of eyeballs. Raw pig, sure. But he'd let Kyle eat the eyes.

"Lemme see that." Spike tried to take the book out of Xander's hands, and Xander pulled the book away casually, while he kept reading, as if he hadn't even seen Spike grab for it.

"Look, here's a recipe for mousse. Blood mousse? Does blood *set* properly? Huh, I guess it does." The recipe only called for enough blood to provide taste, but still.... Xander shook his head. "Leave it to vampires to come up with a blood-related *dessert*."

Spike sniffed. "What, we're not allowed to have dessert, just because we're evil?"

"Yes, Spike. That's sort of the whole point of life. When mothers send their children to bed without their strawberry shortcake because they shaved the cat, it pretty much sets the pattern for everything that follows. Shave the cat, no dessert. Become an evil bloodsucking creature of the night, still no dessert." There seemed to be a lack of accounting for degree of evilness there, so Xander amended himself. "Pardon me -- shave the cat, no dessert. Evil bloodsucking, no dessert *and* you have to stand in the corner."

Spoken with utter innocence, and absolutely no overt recognition of the fact that to Spike, standing in the corner invariably preceded some sort of erotic punishment game followed by much hearty shagging. "You're saying we don't get dessert?" Spike said again, sounding like a four year old who'd shaved every cat in town.

"I'm *saying*...forget it. This book proves that some vampires, at least, get dessert. Maybe it's only for vampires who are good. Or really, really bad." Xander flipped another page, and discovered the chocolate and blood section.

"Um," Spike said, a moment after Xander had quietly read the chapter listing.

Xander read all the way through 'Chocolate, Blood, and Candied Yams' before he looked up. "Yes?"

"Are we getting that book for Angel, or for us?"

"You're saying we can't steal it from him?"

"Right. Do we need any kitchen stuff Angel hasn't got, already?" Spike leaned forward to read over Xander's shoulder. Xander flipped to the 'What You Will Need' preface.

"Spike? Tell me I'm not seeing that."

"Which one? The picture of the whipped blood and cream, or the spice rack?"

"The *eyeball* scoops!"

"Well, I'm sure you don't need 'em for *every* recipe. Anyhow, it can always double as a melon-baller." Spike tugged at the book, but there was no way Xander was letting it out of his hands. "Speaking of which, did you know you can drill a hole..."

Xander rolled his thankfully unscooped and planning to stay that way eyes. "Yes, Spike. I believe you told me that the second time we ever went shopping together. My answer now is the same as it was then -- eww, what a waste of a perfectly good melon, and why would I want to when I have you?"

"You never said that about the cucumbers."

Xander shrugged. "Everybody's got a kink." He looked up from the recipe for Grimm's Black Forest Cake, drizzled with blood and topped with black cherries, to find the expression on Spike's face was the one he'd expected to produce. Disbelief wrestling with Spike's usual reaction to thinking about cucumbers and melons and other fresh vegetables.

"*A* kink?"

"Yup. All my other weird sexual deviancies come from trying to please my own personal weird sexual deviant, a.k.a. you." So did his ability to tell utter bald-headed lies like that one with a straight face, Xander reflected with an internal grin.

Spike looked as if his head were about to explode. "You are *such* a... Right, you mean you can stand there in public with a cookbook in your hand, and honestly tell me that you didn't like having your backside smacked before you ever met me?"

Xander wasn't sure what the cookbook had to do with anything, unless he was supposed to be swearing by it, but he was delighted that Spike had given him an open target, via his phrasing. "Before I met you?" he whispered, leaning close to Spike's ear. "Spike, honey, I was a virgin when I met you."

Yup, there went the pupils, doing the contracting into little black dots thing, as Spike's crayon-guy scribbled words like "deflower" on the walls of *his* skull. Even if he hadn't been there for the actual steering-round-the-curves event, Spike was more than capable of going off into a little mental wonderland of what-if. He'd taken Xander there a few times. It was a really nice place.

Crayon-guy was scribbling really fast in Spike's head now, from the glassy sheen that had appeared in his eyes. If Xander looked deeply into them, he could almost see the little bastard. He had fuzzy blond hair, huge blue eyes, and he was soaking wet. In the hand that wasn't holding the crayon, he had a grape lollipop. Xander groaned, slightly. This was *not* the plan.

Spike's eyes were regaining a little focus. Xander swayed from side to side a few times, until, yep, Spike's eyes were following him. Wondering what the hell he was up to, of course. But tracking, again. "You were *not*," came Spike's retort.

Xander laughed. "I was, so! Would I lie about a thing like that? Geez, Spike, don't you *remember* the first time you fucked me? How--" And he didn't even have to say 'tight I was' because Spike's eyes had gone all golden and unseeing. At least, Xander was pretty sure Spike was seeing something that wasn't in the middle of Ambercrombie's.

He waited, grinning, until Spike's brain finally kicked in, once more. "Er, hang on! That doesn't count -- you weren't a virgin when we started sleeping together -- and I *wasn't* the first one to ever spank you. Or fuck you, thank you very much."

"Doesn't count? Being offered up as a snack doesn't count as a meeting?"

"Er..." Spike's eyes went out of focus, again, and Xander suspected that crayon-guy was writing something like 'Angel *gave* him to me, as a present. He's mine, mine, mine! Can I eat him, huh, can I?' Xander figured that because it was pretty much what Spike said every time he got jazzed up on sugar and blood, and was trying to have sex with Xander on Angel's desk, while Angel was still in his office.

"And anyway," Xander went on, just as if he had no idea what he was doing, or saying, "Anya fucking me doesn't count. I mean, the spanking counts, I guess, but the dildo doesn't. It has to be the built-in model, before it counts."

Spike blinked. "How romantic -- I was the first person who ever fucked you with something that wasn't attached by straps?"

Xander suspected, but wasn't sure, until he saw the smile spreading across Spike's face. He was serious about the romantic part -- which was why it was both cruel and kind of Xander to look at him just as seriously and say, "Spike, you're the *only* person who's ever fucked me with something that wasn't attached by straps, or not attached at all."

Only in this insane thing that Xander called his life, could that possibly be a romantic enough statement to make Spike kiss him softly in the middle of a vampire department store, with absolutely no attempt to feel him up in the process.

"Oh that's just so *adorable*. Rupert, come over here, you have to see this. The human's got him and me both all misty eyed."

Xander opened his eyes to find Spike looking at him. They both turned their heads -- breaking the kiss only incidentally -- to find a matronly vampiress, and a stodgy vampire, standing at the end of the aisle watching them. The woman looked liked his grandmother had, at the wedding -- about to cry, wringing her hands, and looking around for cake. Of course, hearing the name 'Rupert' had made Xander reflexively start to peel Spike's jacket off just to see how far he could get before Giles yelled 'Stop it!'

Spike seemed to be trying to regain enough composure to growl threateningly, but his hands were entwined with Xander's, and he was moving his mouth back to nibble on Xander's lips as though it was controlled by a mind of its own.

"Marielle, leave those children alone, and come along," stodgy Rupert was saying. Xander felt a Spike-growl pressed against his chest, and knew that Spike wanted to say he wasn't a child -- but doing so meant cutting off the kiss that was rapidly becoming less romantic and more sexy.

Xander leaned back, breaking all contact except for their hands. He found Spike blinking, then Spike focused on Xander and smiled. "Really?"

"Yes, really, doughboy." Xander didn't quite manage to inject the proper amount of casual joking into his voice, but suspected Spike wouldn't mind not being properly teased. "Let's go spend a lot of money, then try on our collars."

"Doughboy?" Instead of responding aloud, Xander poked Spike in the stomach. "Oi! Hey, what was that for?"

"To make you go squeak, like Poppin' Fresh. And don't say it. Just, whatever it is, don't say it." Because the second the words 'Poppin' Fresh' were out of Xander's mouth, Spike had got a calculating look in his eye. Xander hoped -- truly, really hoped -- that whatever was going on in there didn't involve Spike putting on a chef's hat and Buffy's extra puffy work-out suit.

"Did I say anything?" asked suddenly-innocent Spike.

Xander sighed, and guided him vaguely in the direction of the men's counter. Maybe the collars would be finished early?

"Hey, look at this!"

Or maybe he could just let Spike buy anything he wanted, and by the time the collars were done, their arms would be too full to have to worry about feeling each other up. Xander turned to look at what Spike was holding up, wondering if he'd be able to identify it. Or want to.

*****