TITLE: Interstitial Angel Ficlets AUTHOR: Katriena Knights RATING: NC17--Sexual Content. SUMMARY: Bits to go in and around, after, before or during episodes. NOTES: This is a WIP. I don't normally post WIPs, but I didn't really see any other way to do this one, since it'll be going on for a while. SPOILERS: Mild for "Halloween." MORE FIC AND ART AT: http://www.bewellweb.com/dknights/fanfic.html ARCHIVE: Ask it nicely and it'll follow you anywhere. DISCLAIMER: Not mine, just playing. He nestled into her as she sat next to him on the bed, feeling her mouth on his, letting her lead the way. She tasted chocolatey from the Halloween candy she'd eaten on the way home. The sweet flavor barely registered on his taste buds. She kissed him and kissed him, as if it were the only thing really worth doing. He could tell she enjoyed it, but he couldn't help wondering if she wanted more. He was afraid to ask. After a time, she drew back and looked up into his eyes, smiling. Looking into her soft, open expression, he felt a sudden, sharp pang of dread. "I was . . ." He swallowed, and she frowned. "I was afraid for you." "You kept me safe." She stroked a small hand down his cheek. "It was too close." Her small fingers traced the line of his cheekbone, and she said nothing, just smiled up into his face. Then, slowly but without hesitation, she lifted his hand and set it against her breast. So soft, so warm, and he could feel her heartbeat through the handful of flesh. Her nipple rose and prodded against his palm. Leaving his hand there, she bent forward to kiss him again. To his surprise, she walked her fingers down his stomach, until the tips sat just under the waist band of his trousers. Her little fingertips were hot through his shirt, and he felt his body respond. They might as well be two teenagers, making out, exploring each other, daring, looking for that newness and forbidden intimacy. Except he was over 240 years old and knew exactly what he was doing. Or did he? As many times as he had slid his thumb flat over a hard, pebbled nipple, as he did now, as many times as he had tasted the depths of a woman's mouth, or her body, he had never done it out of love. Sex augmented with emotion was a new experience for him, one he wanted to savor. She made him feel things he'd never felt before, things that made him feel almost human. He curled his hand around her breast and it was like grace, her mouth on his like mercy, absolution. He wondered if she could ever truly understand the profundity of what she was to him. "Angel." She whispered his name against his mouth. "Angel." And before he quite knew what he was doing, certainly before she had given him any kind of signal, he cupped his hand between her legs. She jumped, obviously surprised, but didn't pull back. "Buffy?" he murmured. She held very still for a long moment, her breath barely fluttering his hair. Then her hand moved, lowered to the drawstring of her sweatpants, and untied it. He sat unmoving as she lowered the front of the sweats under his fingers. Her soft musk rose to his nostrils, that intoxicating mix of arousal and Slayer. She touched his hand, guiding him past the loose top of her pants. "Touch me," she whispered. "I want you to." Her panties were damp, and she gasped as he softly tickled the pads of his fingers over the cotton. He could feel the heat, the springy cushion of hair, and forced himself to keep his movements small, slow. It was like gentling a horse, he thought, carefully acclimating a spirited animal to your touch. But she tipped her hips forward, then, and the movement brought his fingers right into her heat. She shifted, rubbing against him, rotating. Something occurred to him. "You've done this before," he said, unable to control the shock in his voice. She opened her eyes, and he was ashamed to see that he had embarrassed her. "Well..." she said, hesitant. "Not with a person. I mean, just with me." "Oh." Now he was embarrassed, but he wasn't sure why. He moved his finger in a careful circle and watched her eyes glaze over. In his day, she would have been a woman, not a girl. In his day, she likely would have been married, with at least one child. But she wouldn't have known her body this way, wouldn't know to pulse herself into his hand, increasing the speed and the friction. He stroked and teased her, following her signals, ignoring the insistent need of his own body. He just held her as she rode his hand, until suddenly her eyes widened and she breathed, "Oh, God," and shivered, and shook, and came on his fingers. "God," she whispered again. He kissed her face, lost in the thick odors of arousal and release, exulting in her warmth, the heat of her body that was almost enough to burn. Coming down from her climax, she braced herself against his shoulders, leaning into his kiss. "What about you?" she murmured. God, what he would give to feel those small hands on his cock. Or her mouth. Or to sink deep into her--but he knew she wasn't ready for that. "Don't worry about me," he said. "Angel--" she started to protest, but he could see in her eyes that she was a little relieved. He didn't blame her. The intensity was almost too much even for him. "Next time," he told her. She swallowed, some of the uncertainty fading from her eyes. "I want..." "Want what?" "I want to touch you. Can I?" He nodded, pretty sure he should have said no. But it was too late now, so he closed his eyes and forced himself to utter stillness as her fingers softly traced the length of his erection through his pants. She curled her hand around his shaft and he swallowed hard. "Do you want--?" "No." Perhaps a bit too blunt, but he needed to stop her. She wasn't ready. He wasn't ready. Not for this. He wasn't sure how much control he could maintain if she started moving on him. He caught her wrist gently and lifted her hand away. Her face crumpled, but he smiled and she softened again. He just looked at her, lost in the green of her eyes. He could stay that way forever, just drowning in her eyes, wishing she could love him. "I should go," he said finally. She nodded. "Yeah. I wish you could stay." Stay and do what, he wondered. Eat Halloween candy with her? Sit and giggle like teenagers? Or was she obliquely offering to share her bed? It didn't matter. Even if she had offered, blatantly and with obvious intent, he would have declined. He just couldn't, not now. Because he loved her too much. He kissed her one last time, then slipped quietly out her window. He wasn't sure why it had surprised him so much to see Drusilla. He'd known Spike was here, after all, and where Spike was, Dru was bound to be. She barely even had her own smell anymore, she had become so covered with Spike's. Angel jammed his hands into his coat pockets, hunching against the cool night and the cold wash of memory. He remembered everything he had ever done with vivid, wrenching clarity, and what he had done to Drusilla had been cruel and vicious and . . . he wanted to shy away from it, not to have to relive the steady process by which he had emotionally, then physically, brutalized and violated her. He had made her, shaped her, molded her, Turned and damned her. And that tiny corner of his mind, the one he didn't want to acknowledge, the one he was often certain held the truth of him, as much as he didn't want to admit it--that little corner still took ride in the accomplishment. He stopped walking and, looking up, realized he was in front of Buffy's house. He should warn her about Dru. Dru could be every bit as dangerous as Spike. As Angel himself had been. And much less predictable. There was something dreadfully wrong with her, though, he had sensed that much. She was weak, drained. Only a few things could do that to a vampire, all of them mystical. What had she and Spike stumbled into? He would probably never know. He tried to tell himself he didn't care. The first time he had seen her, she had looked at him with night-dark eyes and he had seen the fear there. Later, he had wondered. If she had the Sight--and she had proven more than once that she did--why had she allowed him to do what he had done? Why had she not escaped, if she had known what was coming? Did she believe the future to be immutable? Was that why she had never fought him? Or, and this was perhaps even more horrible to contemplate, had she allowed it? When it had been happening, when he had been stalking her, killing her family, it had pleased him to think that. That she wanted it, because she wanted him. That he had ensnared her thoroughly, entranced her, beguiled her to the point where the knowledge that her family and friends would die brutally at his hands no longer mattered. She would know what he would do to her, as well, that he would break her and take her and own her and finally make her into a demon beyond the reach of any God she might swear herself to. He didn't believe that now. He wasn't certain what he did believe, but he didn't believe Drusilla had wanted anything he had forced upon her. He had stalked and brutalized women before he'd met Dru, but how much worse it must have been for her, knowing what was coming, knowing--or at least believing--that she couldn't stop it, or that using her powers to prevent it would be succumbing to Satan . . . He forced the thoughts back. He was still standing, still as shadow, in front of Buffy's house. *Warn her,* he thought. But to warn her, he would have to explain. And if she knew what Drusilla was, what he had made her... He could only imagine. Would she ever look at him again with that softness in her eyes? Ever let him touch her? He drew a long, shuddery, unnecessary breath. Only if he had to, would he tell her this truth. It was too big, too difficult, too...evil. He turned away from her house and headed home.