Choose your own adventure

"I have to go LA, Giles," Buffy said, shaking her head, "I can't stand this. It's...it hurts...inside, you know?" she said, her eyes wide with unspilled tears as if she tipped her head they would fall down her cheeks.

"I just wanted to tell you," she said, "that I have to go. Maybe you can take care of Dawn for me?"

"Course," he clipped, showing his disapproval but not bothering to argue. There really wasn't a point in arguing at this junture. He could tell by the look in his Slayer's eyes that she fully intended to go to see Angel. Giles stood and went to the kitchen for more tea, if only to keep her from seeing the concern in his eyes.

"I know you don't approve, Giles," Buffy said as she moved towards the door, "I know how you feel about Angel, but this is not just some whim. Something is really wrong." Giles kept his back turned in the kitchen and pretended to be distracted by the tea preparation.

"Okay," Buffy said quietly, "I'll...I'll call you, okay?"

"Do be careful, Buffy," Giles said, finally turning around. "I'll see what I can come up with from here." She nodded and met his eyes for a moment before she walked out the door and headed toward her house to pack.

***

Cordy watched Angel standing in the corner of the hotel. He had been lurking and barely speaking for days. Hell, he barely moved and when he did his movements were jittery and nervous. When someone spoke to him, he turned toward the sound quickly and paused before he answered as if he wanted to make sure the person was actually there before he spoke. It was more than just a little creepy. She, along with Fred, Wesley, Gunn, Lorne and even Connor had tried to talk to him and get him to snap out of it, but he would hardly speak or even look up in acknowledgment of their voices.

"We have to do something," Cordy whispered to the group in the office in an emergency meeting called with no words, just anxious waving of hands. Fearing that the souled vampire would overhear, should he even care what they were saying, she kept her voice as low as possible.

"What do you propose we do?" Wesley asked irritably.

"Yeah, I thought we tried everything already," Gunn agreed.

"I'm calling Buffy," Cordy announced picked up the phone. Three sets of eyes followed her movements, unable to come up with an argument of why she shouldn't call but just as she starting pounding in the numbers into the phone, Wesley stilled her hand.

***

Standing in the corner unnoticed by anyone, Angel had a perfect vantage point of the dance floor of The Bronze - or what looked like The Bronze if it had been stuffed into the lobby of the Hotel Hyperion. The vision of her tonight was so liquid and fresh, he could smell her perfume as it wafted in the door before her. He smelled the blood pumping wildly in her veins and it was irresistible, but he kept his place in the corner just a little longer to watch her. Some where in the back of his mind he realized that this was yet another vision of her. The difference, though, was that this one wasn't a memory. It was completely new.

His eyes drank her in, famished. Reality tried to press into the vision, but he kept his eyes trained on her, unwilling to release the pleasure of seeing her. Her black leather pants hugged her narrow hips and muscular thighs, barely touching the top of her silky red halter top. He watched her sway with the music, moving her lithe body in time with the beat. Clad in his traditional black pants and shirt, unfazed by the pounding beat of the house music blaring in his sensitive ears, he stared at her, burning holes into the vision. Buffy looked up and met his eyes, holding them, drawing him in from across the room.

"Is someone going to say something?" Cordelia asked, her voice breaking into the vision.

"What?" Angel asked, glancing over at Cordelia after struggling to turn his head from the intoxicating sight of his mate.

"Um...are one of you going to say something?" Cordelia asked, gesturing to where Angel had been staring. Slowly and reluctantly, he turned his head to see The Bronze had disappeared just as he thought it would, but Buffy still stood there. It barely registered that her clothes had changed to jeans and a t-shirt and an overnight bag was resting at her feet - the visions were fickle things anyway. She played with the edge of her shirt nervously and unknowingly gave him glimpses of her belly button.

I don't..." he started, shaking his head to clear it and then looking up again. There she stood...still. "Cordy," Angel said patiently, "Do you see Buffy standing there?"

"Buffy, what the hell did you do to Angel?" Cordy huffed. The long days that had passed were wearing on her nerves. She should have figured that it was Buffy in the first damn place. "Whenever he goes crazy, it's always your damn fault!"

"So, I'm not the only one. You're having the visions too?" Buffy asked, moving down the stairs quickly. Angel propelled himself forward as well until he reached her, sliding his fingers over hers. A simultaneous sigh erupted from both of them as their flesh touched.

"I almost forgot," Angel said in low, pained voice, "what it felt like to be with you...or is it without you?"

"Me too," she whispered, "But I think someone is trying to remind us."

***

Buffy always remembered Angel's eyes as being smoldering and intense, but over the time they were apart, she convinced herself that she had exaggerated details about him in her memories - like the size of his hands. She was wrong. She didn't exaggerate a damn thing. If anything, his eyes were a hundred times more intense than she remembered and his hands, especially when he took hers in his, were huge.

She also remembered the feeling of him, the sensation of his presence as being something intoxicating and tangible, she had always thought it filled her up and made her feel stronger somehow and more in touch with everything around her. This was also not an exaggeration. There was something about it, aside from the regular sense she felt with all vampires, that made her body glow with warmth. It was delicious and unnerving at once.

The whole day had been spent relating the visions to each other, doing research and checking with the Scooy Gang on their progress. Buffy and Angel finally decided to go for a quick patrol when the sun set. The intensity of fighting vampires by his side again, watching his body move and just reeling in being near to him was too much. Buffy was certain she was going to tackle him before the patrol was through, but she managed to make it all the way back to the hotel without even touching him. When they got back it was late and Cordy had gone out somewhere, Connor was patrolling by himself, Gunn was nowhere to be seen, Wesley was sitting at the desk behind the counter scouring over some text and Fred was sitting at the counter reading as well.

Angel headed up the stairs, saying that he wanted to take a quick shower before he started helping with the research and from the sound of the growl in his tone, Buffy understood that he was feeling just as she was - or she hoped. The mental image of her ex-demon lover in the shower only topped off her arousal and suddenly her bright idea of coming to LA seemed much dimmer. At least she hadn't had any visions since she arrived, but she was still jumpy, fearing she would see him standing somewhere, stuck in a memory whenever she wasn't looking right at the real Angel.

She wandered around the lobby, knowing that she wouldn't be able to focus on a book and finally took to the stairs. It was strange that the huge structure only housed a few people. She had gathered that Connor, Cordy, Fred, Gunn and Lorne all lived there with Angel, but there were hundreds of rooms left empty. She wondered how many of them hadn't had a visitor in years.

***

Angel would have run to his room if his erection hadn't impeded that movement. He wasn't sure if the visions were worse than the real thing. Her smell...damn, had she always smelled that great? It was like the moon tipped over and spilled her out, leaving the fragrance of vitality and womanhood all over her.

There were a couple of times during their patrol that he was sure she was going to touch him or that he knew he was going to have to touch her. It was all he could do not to run his fingers through her hair or to lick the mate's scar on her delicate throat. The sweat coming from her pores was made him want her, the scuff on her boot made her seem more irresistible. Hell, the scrape on her elbow made him want to worship her. It was too much and he was quickly being reminded of why he left in the first place.

After a quick and very cold shower, he headed downstairs to emmerse himself in her...er...research, but before he got to the stairs, he turned and headed the opposite direction instead. The familiar scent of his mate's arousal led him and even as he went, he knew he should turn around, but he couldn't. He followed the fragrance of her until he stopped outside of a closed door in a room he didn't remember ever going in, which wasn't a surprise because there were a lot of rooms he had never bothered to go inside.

He opened the door slowly and looked around the dark room. Drawn by her, it didn't even occur to him to knock or even make a sound to announce his presence. The only light in the room came through the window, but his eyes easily adjusted. Buffy was lying across the bed diagonally, her legs dangling off the sides. Her jeans were pushed low on her hips and her hand was working furiously between her firm thighs. Her mouth was hanging open, her eyes tightly shut and her chest was rising and falling with her quickened breaths.

Without thinking, Angel moved across the room. He half expected her to pull away or open her eyes or something, anything, but she didn't. She either didn't hear him or didn't care, lost in pleasuring herself. He knelt on the floor, slid her jeans down and removed her hands from between her thighs so quickly she barely registered what was happening. He leaned forward without looking up at her to see what her expression was, not wanting to know if she was going to push him away.

He growled as he pressed his face between her thighs and snaked his tongue out to taste her. Sensing her urgency as she threaded her fingers through his hair, he started started licking and sucking her hot, wet pussy, reveling in the familiar taste of her. She's already dripping with honey and Angel wasted no time capturing every drop of her perfection.

***

"You were supposed to be following them," Cordy panted as she and Gunn stumbled tiredly inside of the hotel's front doors.

"Uh...you were with me," Gunn panted back, "I'm not the only one who lost them, besides, they both move too damn fast to follow. And talk about sexual tension! I could feel it from a block away. It's a good damn thing they can kill things to work it off."

"Well, if Angel starts killing us, I'm going to blame you," she snarked.

"They came back about a half hour ago," Fred said, glancing at her watch and yawning, "Angel went to take a shower and Buffy...she's here somewhere."

"Probably in the shower with Angel!" Cordy exclaimed, "Am I the only one around here that realizes the importance of him not losing his soul? I mean, hello? Psycho killer! Gunn, you should go look for them!"

Gunn grumbled and bitched his way up the steps to find Buffy, hopefully sans the Angel. He didn't want to run into Angelus but he still felt stupid carrying a stake with him. He started with Angel's room, entering slowly and looking around. Thankfully, he didn't run into a naked Angel or a naked Buffy. Well, maybe a naked Buffy wouldn't be that bad.

Relieved they weren't in Angel's room, he continued his journey. As he made his way to the end of the hallway, he heard quiet female moans and groaned to himself. He opened the door, peaked inside and sucked in a breath. There he saw Angel, fully clothed, kneeling on the floor beside the bed and eating Buffy like she was his last supper. Her jeans were dangling on one leg and one of her shoes had landed on the floor behind Angel. Her free leg was over Angel's shoulder and something about the way his large hand looked on her bare thigh was just as arousing as the oral sex he was performing.

***

What happens next?

Does Gunn interrupt them?

Or does he walk away?

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