Title: Pied Piper
Author: Helen
Posted: 11-05-2004
Email: helen_taft@msn.com
Rating: R
Category:
Content: C/A
Summary: An AU sequel to Three Blind Mice, that takes the beige Angel arc and twists it to being all about C/A. Darla is about and so is Dru and Wolfram & Hart. With the single exception of the Shroud of Rahmon the rest of the episodes are not followed.
Spoilers:
Disclaimer: The characters in the Angelverse were created by Joss Whedon & David Greenwalt. No infringement is intended, no profit is made.
Distribution: GoTeam, Angel’s Archive, Just Fic
Notes: Some dialogue taken from the script as I don’t have the episode on DVD anymore.
Feedback: Yup, feeding is good. Also, feel free to include criticism too if you feel the urge so long as its constructive, always appreciated
Thanks/Dedication: To Cali for being the best beta eva! Also, for putting up with me and last but not least, the ficpic.
Part 1
Danger does things to you, both good and bad, and when survival hangs by a thread you focus on what’s around and find comfort where you can. When the world slipped back to the dark ages I found it with humans, which is kind of ironic considering I’m a vampire.
Living with a soul and a demon inside you, trust me, you get used to opposing urges and being conflicted is a given, but I’d believed I’d found a balance between the two. Maybe I had, only my feelings of friendship and belonging were already upsetting that dangerous balance.
I knew safety lay in me keeping my distance and maintaining the detachment needed to keep my demon side caged. It was a good plan, except for the part where without me noticing, my detachment slipped, hit the floor and cracked right down the middle. Worse still by the time I figured that out it was too late to fix and my cold, dead heart was left vulnerable to a sharp, lippy girl with a smile that could melt an ice cap.
Cordelia started off as my barely tolerated secretary and then before I knew it, ended up being my closest friend and worst temptation, and it wasn’t as if I hadn’t been down that doomed road before. You’d think I would have learned my lesson back in Sunnydale.
With the curse gone and the world back the way it’s supposed to be, it shouldn’t have been such a big deal, but Cordelia wasn’t the problem- I was. The best I can explain it is that deep inside where evil lies waiting, a part of me was feeling ignored. Not helped by the constant guilt and insecurity from thinking I didn’t deserve her, or any of it.
Darla coming back couldn’t have happened at a better or, worse time. I wasn’t ready for her endless obsession with mind games, or Dru’s reappearance, or even Cordelia for that matter. Let’s face it, I wasn’t prepared for any of it.
As for the idiots pulling the strings, well let’s just say they didn’t all live to regret it and occasionally I feel guilt about that. Why did I let them push me so hard? That’s the question that gets me. It’s not like I didn’t have friends, resources and two centuries worth of experience behind me to fall back on.
The only answer I can think of is that Wolfram & Hart didn’t play me, I played myself. My life was a house of cards and it all started to topple over when we took on a case involving a museum heist and a supernatural shroud.
~
EARLIER THAT DAY
In the semi gloom of the basement the cranky old dryer was churning his clothes in a swirl of charcoal, black and navy and shuddering noisily with the effort. Standing idly watch with both hands tucked into his pant pockets, Angel heard the door up top open and turned his head to see Cordelia slowly descend the stairs, her body language screaming faux casual and wearing a too-bland expression on her beautiful face.
It was about time she made her move. He’d been about to go up there and bodily haul her down here. Satisfied he’d been right about that part of it at least; Angel used polite attention as an excuse to drink in the sight of softly hugging jeans, an impossibly delicate sleeveless blouse and what they did for a stunningly made woman.
Guessing what she wanted hours ago, he’d left her to stew before taking pity on her. Now, seeing the left over glint of frustration Angel was forced to suppress a smile. Finally after a whole afternoon of Cordelia casting him determined glances, opening her mouth to speak then stopping with a frustrated puff of air, he’d decided to cut her a break and come down here; knowing she’d follow.
Weirdly, he liked it when she tried discreetly interrogating him. It was refreshing if totally un-Cordy-like, but kind of endearing that she’d gave it a try. His expression must have hinted at his thoughts because stepping off the last step she gave him a suspicious look, causing him to straighten his face.
The sparse basement was unmistakeably Angel’s domain with the leather punching bag hanging heavy and still from a chain in the ceiling. Add to that, the target boards embedded with sleek throwing knives, make-shift wooden training horses that had her wincing at the mere idea of kicking her shins into them and at least three different types of sword propped against the wall. Overall, not her idea of home comforts.
Typically, he spent every moment he could down here.
“Hi, are you busy?” she asked carelessly, as if wandering down here had been purely by chance. It didn’t look like she was interrupting much, but with Angel it could be hard to tell.
Illogically, she felt like a trespasser, which was dumb considering that until Darla, they’d all spent time down here talking or kidding around, something else that stopped when Angel started to draw away from them. That line of thought reminded her exactly why she’d followed him down here.
As far as she was concerned it was past time to reel him back in and on that, Cordelia was filled with resolve.
“I was drying some clothes, did you want something?” he offered as an opener, injecting it with just the right amount of friendly innocence.
It worked. Her answer was a wide smile, as warm as a summer breeze and tinged with relief, “That’s great, Angel, very domestic and homey and…” running out of adjectives Cordelia spread her hands and dived right in, “Can I talk to you about something?”
A few months ago Cordelia had managed to bargain a second-hand furniture store owner down to almost zilch and got them a bench for the basement, announcing he needed somewhere to sit and not catch his breath between bouts of training.
Walking over to it now, Angel sat down and waved her on, “Sure, what about?”
Your head and where it’s at about Darla, Cordy thought clasping her hands and hedging, “oh this and that, ya know certain um…things.”
She was struggling not to just blurt it out. Angel’s lips threatened to smile again. Knowing this could take a while, he got comfortable, stretching out long legs and linking his hands over his stomach. Then simply because he knew it would knock her off stride told her, “Wesley made me a cup of tea yesterday.”
Stumped, Cordy stopped looking flustered and stared, “he did?”
“Yeah, said he wanted to talk to me,” Angel shrugged not taking his eyes off her face, “I still don’t know what he actually wanted to talk about, all he kept mumbling about was us being men and how our natural feelings of protectiveness can make us go too far.”
Seeing her blank response, Angel admitted, “I tuned him out in the end.”
Unknowingly mesmerised by the amused gleam in his eyes, Cordy slowly shook her head from side-to-side, “I don’t blame you.”
Then snapping too, she narrowed her eyes realising Angel had never looked more relaxed or approachable. It made her suspicious. Giving up on discreet she shrugged fatalistically and started to pace back and forth in front of him, “Okay, so we’re both crap at subtle- big surprise. I want to talk about Darla.”
Bingo! This time the wry smile did break out, Angel jerked a thumb towards the seat next to him, “Okay, but sit down before you make me dizzy.”
Expecting to meet a brick wall of bad tempered stubbornness, her jaw dropped, “Really?!”
Quick to recover, Cordy plonked herself down before he could change his mind. “That’s great- sorta like old times when we used to actually talk to one another.” Despite the jokey tone the remark was loaded. Darla had been a no-go, super touchy topic ever since the revitalised once un-dead bitch had slunk back from hell, courtesy of Wolfram and Barf.
He might have known she couldn’t resist a dig, Angel rubbed a hand over his face to wipe away a telling wince before answering, “Yeah, sorry about that. I guess I’ve been acting a bit-“
“Obsessed, borderline schitzo, neurotic, paranoid and did I mention obsessed?”
Slashing brows dropped in annoyance, “For instance.”
Now fervently wishing he’d just left her to stew and a little hurt, Angel sat forward with his elbows on his knees. A move that failed miserably when Cordelia mirrored him so he couldn’t avoid her, “I don’t like being shut out, Angel, I thought we’d got passed the tired ‘boss and employee’ schlick back in the old millennium?”
Another score, Angel tensed with shoulders hunched, “We did; you know that.”
Dismayed, he stared at the floor ahead of him rather than meet that too direct gaze. He hated it when she picked his behaviour apart, mainly because by then it was too late to go back and change it to the way she wanted him to be, adding yet another kernel of despair that she could never return his feelings.
Beside him Cordy was having none of it and poked his side, unerringly catching him sharply between the ribs, “Uh huh, you could’ve fooled me over the last couple of weeks.”
Scowling, he shot her a disgruntled look, “I said I’m sorry and Ow! That hurt.”
Ugh, he was holding a protective hand over the spot like he’d been mortally wounded or something, seeing it Cordy rolled her eyes, “Gimme a break, you get stabbed every other day, big baby.”
She paused to make him look at her again, “She ran off, Angel.”
Dark eyes were caught and held, “I know that.”
“You tried,” she said softly and laid a hand on his arm, a gesture of comfort.
“I know that too,” he replied just as softly.
Inexplicably the air around them quivered with tension and Cordy held her breath, “So, does that mean we can get back to normal, please?”, adding in case it wasn’t crystal, “Less of the, racing out at a moments’ notice and leaving your friends to sort out the icky mess afterwards, kind of normal that is.”
Underneath her palm the muscle in his arm jumped. “Have I been doing that?” Angel asked, a perplexed vee forming between his brows. Damn, had he really been that bad?
“Um…yeah!”
“Oh…sorry.”
“S’kay, but it has to stop.”
Had he moved closer or had she? Distracted, Angel couldn’t tell. Her bare shoulder brushed his shirt and somehow her hand had ended up on his forearm. Inside him a small fire kindled and as much as he knew he should, Angel couldn’t shake her off or move away.
Dropping back his head Angel closed his eyes, trying to get it straight so when he spoke it might actually sense. She hadn’t asked, but he needed to explain at least a small part of what had been driving him, “I kept thinking that saving her would be a good thing. I was being selfish. I wanted to save the creature that damned me, as if it might impress someone up there into thinking I deserved…”
He couldn’t finish; dared not, knowing it would give away too much. Like how he wanted to deserve her so much it was eating at him that, given his past, he probably never could. A fact almost as revealing as the other reason why he dived headlong into his ‘Save Darla’ campaign, he’d desperately needed a distraction from his real obsession- Cordelia.
It terrified him how easy it was just to stand in a corner unnoticed and watch her, soaking up every graceful move and expressive gesture like a parched man at a well. Thirsting, hunger, yearning, craving and desire; all of them and any others meaning intense neediness applied to him about Cordelia.
Angel had felt that compulsion before, namely for Buffy, but this time was different although he couldn’t pin down why, another fact that scared him. There was simply no denying it anymore. Seeing her struggle and then nearly die from the incessant visions had awoken something in him and nothing was working to make it go away.
He was in love with Cordelia.
She had no idea how he felt about her. Thank God, or she’d likely have run screaming away from him by now. Rightly or wrongly, Angel hid those feelings because having something was better than having nothing, no matter how much of a torment it was at times. He could handle it- he had no choice.
Oblivious, Cordelia called him back from his thoughts.
“Deserved, what?” she whispered, as if afraid that talking too loud might make him clam back up, just when she was being sucked back into loving him simply because he was finally opening up to her.
Gazes still locked, several heartbeats passed unnoticed.
The flame became a roar and abruptly Angel stood, dislodging her hand and sucked in a breath to give his body something else to concentrate on other than the impulse to lean in those last few inches and kiss her. Thankfully, an answer came easily, “You know, the redemption thing.”
Uncomfortably aware he’d disappointed her, Angel went to move away only for her to reach out, accidentally brushing the pads of her fingers over his palm trying to catch his hand. Angel stilled instantly, absorbing the guilty pleasure from the forbidden skin-to-skin contact before it showed.
“If she tries to contact you, promise me you’ll tell me before you do anything?”
She’d been really worried about him. The fine hairs all over his body stood electrified. God, he wanted to pull her up, draw her in and do nothing more than stroke his lips over hers, maybe gently steal a taste of warm moist air as it escaped in a gasp. Instead he rasped, “I promise.”
The interruption, when it came, pleased neither of them. Wesley poked his head through the door from the ground floor, “Angel, Gunn is on the phone. He says he has a case for you, something about a cousin of his being in trouble. He wants to know if you’ll meet him?”
Dragging his gaze off Cordy, Angel headed for the stairs calling back, “Get the details and tell him I’ll be there.” Good, just what he needed, an honest to goodness case to get his mind back on track and off his libido.
Little did he know.
~
12 HOURS LATER
The hospital was busy with rushing feet and hushed voices that clamoured in his head as Angel stood watch, cloaked by shadows in the furthest corner of her unlit room. A silent sentinel of suffering and remorse who dared not venture closer, imagining her waking up and ripping his heart out with nothing more than the simple phrase, “get out.”
Opposite him, the metal frame of the raised bed remained unhidden by the sparse, crisp sheets tucked up to gown-covered shoulders. An unnecessary reminder of where they were. As if the gauze taped to Cordelia's neck and her pale, expressionless face wasn’t enough. She would live though and that was all that mattered. He’d think about what to do if she hated him once she was back on her feet.
Unbidden, tears stung while guilt formed a burning hollow under his ribs and angrily he dashed the wetness away, furious with himself for weeping when he was the one to blame. He’d done this to her, leeched the life right out while she screamed his name in anguished denial. She’d been there to save him and instead nearly died by his hand. While his body thrummed with her stolen blood, Cordy lay lifeless and pierced by the needles necessary to allow the flow of its replacement.
A tremor shook Angel and he clenched his fists to ward it off. In the dark his vision turned inward, making wounds out of his eyes when despite trying to suppress them, horrifically detailed replays of the night continued to haunt him and bitterly he wondered how he could ever make this right again, or even if he should try.
“I’ve tried to protect you, both of you; thought I was doing okay with it, too.” He stopped realising he hadn’t meant to speak his thoughts out-loud, but having started he felt compelled to finish, even when the words choked him, “I just didn’t count on me being the biggest danger.”
Outside, standing behind the Plexiglas window, plastic cup of water and painkillers in hand having returned unnoticed from the water fountain, a battered Wesley stood utterly still and silently observed the tormented vampire, helplessly recalling the same nightmare.
Wesley turned the corner and came to a skittering halt. “Angel? Thank God I found you…” Angel turned to look at him, eyes glowing with yellow lights in the brown, “…in time.”
Oh God, was he vamping out? “Is it in time?” Despite the confusion in his own mind Wesley was lucid enough that his heart sank.
“Wesley?”
Oh thank heavens, he remembers me. Wesley nodded hard enough for his head to fall off, “Yes! I had a message for you. And the message was…” he hit his hand with his fist trying to recall the urgency, “…the shroud! The shroud… very dangerous. It makes people— bad! Although it’s amazing how good I feel!” He started to laugh and his grin was a caricature under wild, unhinged eyes.
Grabbing him up with a fistful of shirt, Angel pushed him down the museum corridor and away from the silent demons, standing watchful and menacing at the corners of the casket containing the ancient shroud.
“Wesley, get out!” he gritted.
Wesley seemed not to hear the urgency, or feel the force of that shove, “Is that Gunn? What’s he doing here? I never thought of him as the museum type.” Gunn was slumped on the floor, head held in both hands rocking back and forth and muttering insanely.
Angel looked transfixed for a moment as the whispers of madness cranked up the volume, stroking harder along his fevered mind and nudging his demon. Coming too, he shook his head with feigned disappointment, “Wesley—Wesley…”
Then Cordelia skidded around the corner before he could say whatever he’d been about to. Wide-eyed, she took in the scene with a face bleached of colour, realising instantly that the shroud had already done its dirty work.
“Angel?” she called out, uncertainty lacing her tone.
In a moment of stunning clarity that wiped away the shrouds thrall, Wesley twisted his head to look back, stunned with sudden horror of the potentially incendiary effect she might have. Still holding his friend as if he were a rag doll, Angel’s head whipped up to focus unerringly on the new arrival.
Hunger repressed over too long mixed with frustrated longing and resentment finished what the Shroud of Rahmon had started. His eyes stopped shimmering and turned to full, gleaming gold. Conflict over.
Dropping Wesley he advanced as mocking and feral eyes locked with wary hazel. “Wow! —Look at you—rushing in here all by yourself! What is that? It’s gotta be either bravery or stupidity, I can’t decide,” he asked.
Retreating only a tiny bit, Cordelia lowered her chin and gave him her trademark defensive stare and he could literally see the desperate churn of her thoughts, searching for a way to reach him, “Get away from the shroud, Angel, it’s making you crazy…”
Annoyance had her tacking on with the toss of a hand, “…Well, crazier anyway.”
Insults. Did she really believe that was going to stop this and turn him back to a good little vamp? Insanely, Angel wanted to laugh and laugh and laugh…and then eat her tongue- as an entree.
“Too many humans,” Spiny the demon muttered from behind them, pulling out something from inside his filthy jacket.
Maddened, Angel skewered it with a single short glare, “Excuse me, that is *my* girl.”
The demon subsided with a sneer. Satisfied and turning back to Cordelia, Angel smirked seeing the dreadful suspicion dawning in her eyes. The pervasive odour of rich and unspeakable fear wreathed though the air and his nostrils flared in appreciation. God, he loved humans.
Raising a hand as if to ward him off, Cordy licked dry lips and tried to stop her voice shaking, “Stay back, Angel, don’t do anything you might regret, okay? This isn’t you, it’s the shroud.” There was a plea in there somewhere. Perverse excitement unfurled in his belly.
“Whoo! Okay,” Laughing, Angel tossed up his hands in surrender and danced that little bit loser. Then sobering abruptly, he pinned her with a look of unadulterated menace, “Right, I forgot. You’ve got me by my whiny balls and my life of fun lovin’ debauchery and torture is over.”
Still she retreated and he followed.
Raising a clenched fist, Angel pressed it over his chest, right where a heart should be beating. “No being a bad Angel or, you’ll talk me to death about how good I am- and how saving the sheep is giving me purpose. Hey, maybe you’ll even bend down and flash those tits and I’ll nod and pretend I haven’t noticed. I always do by the way.”
Fear forgotten, hazel eyes snapped with fury as she went to slap him, only to miss as Wesley lunged from behind and tried to tackle the vampire. Spinning, Angel backhanded Wesley, knocking him into the wall with a sickening crunch and then turned back to face Cordelia.
She was frozen, temper flown and shocked by his casual and brutal violence. Angel knew it, too, asking softly, “Oh, Cordy, what are you so afraid of? Is it this?” he morphed into vamp face and closed the remaining distance between him and her. “Or, is it the part where I’m gonna kill you? Because I got to tell you I love that in a woman!”
Unfreezing, she tried to duck past him and over to Wesley, but he snagged her long hair and wrapping it round his fist, yanked back Cordy’s head to expose her throat. That done, he sank his fangs into her neck, crushing her close with an arm around a painfully bowed back while her scream echoed around the museum corridor. Music to his ears.
A single, fat tear rolled down starkly hewn cheeks, “I was never going to let anything happen to you.”
The rough whisper carried across the room and Cordelia twitched, the hand lying peacefully atop the sheet clenching as she started to rise between the layers obscuring consciousness. Instantly he was gone, his escape made with a rush of air just as she opened bruised eyes and blinked up at the ceiling.
It made no difference. Unfocused, head splitting with a crushing headache and insides feeling like they’d been coated with plaster or not, some sixth sense still warned her he’d been there. Hesitantly, she croaked his name, “Angel.”
There was no answer and she had no idea if it was relief, or disappointment that had her slumping back to the pillow. She couldn’t think about that, or anything, right now.
A shape appeared at the door just as she closed her eyes, using the gathering moisture behind the red-rimmed lids to try and cleanse the ton of grit that must be scoring them to cause such fiery pain. Re-opening them instantly, Cordy blinked away the blur.
A few feet away Wesley, looking like he’d been pushed through a car wrecker, stood with one foot in and one out of the room. “He’s gone isn’t he?” she asked, too weak to truly care how forlorn she sounded. Needlessly he nodded, his solemn face answer enough.
Lost, he tried to offer some comfort, “Just. It’s probably for the best.”
Cordelia didn’t bother trying to reply, but ran a trembling hand over her cold face, keeping the shaking fingers well away from the, thankfully, covered wound on her neck and thinking Wesley was very wrong. What was for the best was this night never having happened at all.
Covering her eyes, she twisted her lips to stave off a sob. Oh, God! Now what was she supposed to do, forgive him? She’d been convinced she was as good as dead for Christ’s sake! Confused, Cordelia dropped her hand to stare fixedly at Wesley who’d gingerly taken the seat on her right, “What happened, Wesley, how come I’m not dead?”
Sighing, Wesley slowly placed the plastic cup of water on the small square table, his cautious movements more that of a tired old man than a man in his prime, “I’m not sure, Cordelia. He just…stopped. Then with the police arriving straight after, the whole horrible mess became even more fraught.”
“The Shroud?”
“He took care of it. It’s gone.”
~
A week later, Cordelia stood looking up at the hotel. She’d been there for over a quarter hour already and still hadn’t moved an inch closer. After a whole morning of fretting in her apartment she’d been glad to get out, only now she was here she didn’t want to go in.
It was noon, an hour or two before he’d rise and more than enough time for her to pull on her casual, I know you bit and drank me, but I’m over it, face. Still she didn’t move, just stood there with the wrought iron gate between her and him, feeling as if the blank façade of the Hyperion was mocking her cowardice.
The sun-baked sidewalk seeped heat up through strappy sandals, as she stood undecided and chewed her lip. The sweltering temperature had sweat beading on her forehead and gathering under the heavy fall of dark hair she hadn’t put up because of the huge band-aid that shrieked at her every time she saw it in the mirror. She was getting as bad as Angel for avoiding them.
Melting in the heat, brutal honesty forced her to admit it wasn’t the bite that was the problem. Not anymore anyway. Wesley had listened to her plea to be left alone and must have passed on the message because she’d remained undisturbed, giving her time and space to think it through.
After a couple of days of being convinced she never wanted to see him again and pounding out her semi-hysteria doing housework she hadn’t touched in months, Cordelia had reached a decision. She was going to forgive Angel and then they’d move on.
Once she’d calmed down it didn’t take a genius to balance out all the times he’d saved her against that one slip from grace. Anyway, what other choice did she have? She was vision-girl, so leaving was out and holding a grudge would just make everybody miserable, especially her.
Nope, the problem was that damned dream again. Having it at all was bad enough, but how sick and wrong was it to have had it last night, so soon after Angel had almost drained her dry? The memory alone had her shuddering.
Early this morning she’d woken up, hot as Hades, her lower body still buzzing with a twisted thrill and her neck in agony because she’d wrenched it tossing around the bed like a stranded fish.
Worse and the thing that was really giving her the heebie jeebies was that she now recognised the room and the bed they’d been writhing on as being Angel’s right here in the Hotel. Even now goose bumps chased over every inch of skin at the thought that maybe it hadn’t been a dream, but a premonition.
That raised a few scary questions such as: how had she known back then that the old offices would get blown up and they’ve move into the hotel, but most of all why had her dream self been so afraid of Angel before he’d tossed her on that bed?
Cordelia had no answers and sucking in a fortifying breath then stiffening her spine, she reached for the latch on the gate, “This is so unfair, Angel. Creepy and conflicted is supposed to be your thing, not mine.”
~
Standing behind the counter with his blue shirt militarily crisp and hair perfectly styled back from his forehead, Wesley looked up over his spectacles as she entered through the old glass doors, adopting a politely enquiring mask to hide his unease as he watched her stride across the tiled lobby.
The flower splashed wraparound skirt kicked up from the knees to reveal lithe calves, highlighted by killer heels with a dainty strap hugging slim ankles. His eyes narrowed recognising the signs. It was a known fact that the more Cordelia was upset, the higher the heel on her shoes became. A clue supported by the fact that she didn’t look at him as she rounded the reception counter to dump her purse on her desk.
Turning and crossing his arm he decided to save his ears by not asking how she was feeling and instead stated softly, “You shouldn’t have come in yet. We wouldn’t have minded you taking a few more days.” He’d already said that on the phone, but seeing her like this, strung up and nervy, compelled him to repeat it.
Apparently needing something from her purse, Cordelia started to rummage instead of answering immediately, “Yeah, well I’m here now, so let’s just forget it,” the headache brewing behind her brows worsened as the tension in her shoulders rose another notch. Casually she flicked him a look while picking up and pretending to flick though the small pile of mail, “Where’s, Angel, is he up yet?”
The million-dollar question. Wesley nodded and then did some evading of his own by turning back to the book spread open on the counter. “He’s gone out with Gunn.”
Cordelia froze since that was the last thing she’d expected to hear; thinking more along the lines of him skulking in his room mid-brood. God, he wasn’t even here. Unexpectedly that hurt, a lot.
Her smile was wan, “Great, no guilt’n’pity party to put up with.” Lifting her brows, she swallowed back resentment and dropped the mail with a disinterested flick of one hand. “Fine, I can live with that, means I don’t have to pretend to be all empathy and forgiveness, gal.”
Wesley wasn’t fooled, “I’m sure he’ll apologise when-“
Fury came out of nowhere and blindsided her, “When it suits him,” Cordelia interrupted then softened the harsh tone, “I don’t want any tossed out apologies, Wesley, so he can just keep them to himself and leave me alone.”
In fact the further away he was the better, she fumed. The last few weeks since Darla had pushed herself back into Angel’s life had been hellish and today was just the latest in a series of unwelcome reminders that she simply didn’t get him anymore. At least the Darla thing was over and done with.
“So, what was so frickin’ urgent, he had to go out in the middle of the day?”
There was a pause. Wesley had been dreading that question, but couldn’t lie, “Gunn found out where Darla was hiding.”
Stunned, Cordy dropped the last few inches into her seat, “Darla? Tell me you’re kidding…?”
Unable to meet her blazing gaze, Wesley dropped his eyes and nodded. Inside Cordelia the resentment surged again and this time burst its banks.
Pale faced all Cordelia could think was that at least now she knew who really mattered to him the most, and it wasn’t her.
~
Holland had that gentle welcoming smile on his face that Lindsey hated. Beside him, as they entered the opulent games room, Darla didn’t notice with her whole attention being locked on the statuesque vampire standing beside the aged lawyer. “Dru,” she breathed in shocked recognition.
Regally Drucilla nodded her head, “Hello, Grandmummy,” as Darla stood blinking and recalling how she hated that stupid title, the smooth pale forehead turned ridged, “I’ve come to save you,” Dru finished.
“Anyone care for a drink?”
Lilah didn’t get a chance to serve the cocktails perched atop the silver tray she held aloft. Perfectly plucked brows raised she pursed her lips, watching with detached interest as the vampire she’d finally located swept across the room and hurled the human Darla to the wall, fangs already sunk deep into her one-time mentor’s fragile throat.
Against the backdrop of savage feeding and Darla’s mewls of human pain the tray was slid onto a nearby surface, “I guess she was thirsty after all, just not for vodka, huh?”
While Lindsey swallowed back an uprush of bile, Holland Manners tried to look stoic about the possibility of bloodstains on the carpet and the repercussions of that from his wife. “How long before she rises do you think?”
Cocking a shapely and suited hip against the walnut sideboard, Lilah turned thoughtful, “Nightfall, even new vampires can sense when the sun goes down which makes it…oh, about eight four hours from now. What do you think, Lindsey, does that sound about right to you?” She smirked seeing the bluish cast to his mouth. Priceless. If he puked she was going to crow for months.
Sighing his resignation, Holland took an unusually fortifying gulp of bourbon, “Any news on the whereabouts of our testy white knight?”
Lilah’s upper lip curled again, only with even more venom this time, “Chasing his tail as per usual probably.”
“Excellent, so that means the hotel is empty except for the Englishman and the girl?”
Recovering with the deed done and tearing his sick gaze off Dru as the vampire fastidiously wiped her mouth with a square of white cloth, Lindsey butted in, “Dru swears the girl, Cordelia Chase, means the most to him. In my opinion, she’s the obvious choice to accelerate the process.”
~
The fury didn’t dissipate one iota over the next twelve hours and when the clock in Angel’s office struck twelve, Wesley was more than ready to leave the suffocating atmosphere behind him. Cordelia, a simmering mass of seething temper, bared her teeth in a fake smile to bid him goodbye and then with a glint in her eye turned in a slow circle, sweeping the empty lobby with storm-filled eyes.
She’d had enough. He hadn’t bothered to turn up or call in, meaning he’d probably gone loopy again with this stupid fixation. Wes and Gunn obviously weren’t willing to haul him back in and so that meant it was up to her.
This Darla addiction was dangerous and she was going to tell him that and this time *make* him listen to her. The dumbass owed her that much at least. Decision made, she headed for the stairs to the upper level, reasoning that Angel’s bedroom was a better place to wait for a confrontation, just in case he wasn’t alone.
Once there, she paced with both hands planted on her hips and heels thudding on the carpet, trying to ignore the squiggly feeling in her belly just from being in there.
Agitated and sick of waiting after spending pretty much the last two days doing nothing else, Cordelia searched the familiar landscape of his rooms, looking for any distraction. A box tucked under his stiff-back armchair caught her eye and with nothing else being even remotely interesting, she stalked over to pull it out and sit in the chair, not giving a rat’s ass that it was snooping.
Lifting the top Cordelia stared blindly at the contents, consumed by her own thoughts. As little as six months ago she’d never have believed that she could fall for someone who didn’t love her back, or that that person would be Angel her then no-bone, emotionally retarded, pathetically pining boss.
Or, that he’d bite her. “Oh, no. Let’s not forget that. It’s not everyday a girl can claim she survived a bout with Angelus, slayers excluded.”
Dropping the lid she tucked her hair behind her ears, full lips drooping sadly as she sighed, “Uh huh, guess who’s pathetic now, Cordy.” As far as she was concerned love was like a fungus, you could make it go away, but not disappear completely, it stayed lurking and just waiting to pop out again.
Giving into the urge to mope, it took a full second for the image on the white paper to sink in, then her eyes widened and she snatched it up. “Oh, my God!”
It was her, unmistakeably and no doubt about it.
What the…where would he have got this and who the hell had drawn it?
Duh, Angel had she realised, recognising the delicate pencil strokes that revealed every curl and curve of the face that reflected back at her every morning. Angel had drawn her picture, she couldn’t believe it. Hands shaking with a new and very different kind of tension, she placed it on the table and upended the box, spilling pages and pages of more drawings.
It only took a few seconds of excited rifling to tell they were all of her. Every single one and there had to be hundreds here. “Sheesh, Angel- obsess much?”
Dropping to her knees on the carpet so as not to miss a single detail, Cordelia scoured them, choking on a gasp and goggling when she found more than few where she was reclining in buck-naked splendour. Angel had never seen her naked, had he?
Whatever. There she was in plain black and white and if he was going off imagination she had to give him points for guesswork. Shaken, she sat back staring blindly at a stain on the wall. Before the museum she’d have been giddy with delight, now Cordelia wasn’t sure how she felt about it.
Thoroughly absorbed, Cordelia got no warning of impending danger until the horribly familiar voice spoke, then startled she shrieked and tumbling back on her butt, staring at the open door and the vampire framed by it.
“You didn’t know did you, precious? Precious, precious Cordelia, and even now he thinks about you- wants you, craves to possess you.”
Caught out and defenceless, Cordelia was forced to stop retreating by the chair at her back, “Drucilla, what are you doing here? I thought you were still in Sunnydale.”
“We’ve come for you.”
At last a sentence that actually made sense. Heart thudding and mind spinning looking for any avenue of escape, Cordelia hit on the anomaly, “We?” she queried.
“You don’t think I’d let darling, Dru, have an adventure without me did you.”
Whipping her head around, Cordelia’s blood drained from her head, leaving her dizzy and sick. Oh crap, two against one, meaning any chance of escape was disappearing fast. “Darla…”
Wallowing in the fear emanating from Cordelia, the blonde smiled and sauntered closer leaving the window with its billowing drapes behind her, “In the flesh, and damn but it good to be back to normal.”
With Darla morphing into vamp face, Cordelia was left in no doubt what ‘normal’ meant. Oh, shit! Angel, where the hell are you?
~
Holland was enjoying his last night of marital freedom before his wife got back from her trip when the knock at the door came. Annoyed at having to get up from his hideously expensive oxblood leather recliner, Holland tucked the newspaper under his arm and headed for the marble tiled reception hall.
Opening the glass leaded barrier he was thrown back several feet when his visitor lashed out with a kick from the other side, sending it slamming in the lawyers face. Sprawled in an ungainly heap, Holland gaped seeing a tall well-built black man striding into his home. It took a second to recognise him from the surveillance photos. Charles Gunn, a known associate of Angel.
Kneeling and flicking open the switchblade with a practised skill, Gunn pressed it to that convulsively swallowing throat, “Invite him in,” he demanded with deadly softness.
Terror pooled and Holland’s bowels gave a lurch seeing the other powerful frame filling his doorway. Angel must have followed Darla’s trail to here, either that or someone had betrayed him. Leaning against the frame, the vampire smirked coldly, “Hello, Holland. I’d do what the man says he’s even more bloodthirsty than I am.”
If he invited him in, Holland knew he was dead. The knife blade was cold and he shivered, brittle boned with icy fear. Stripped of his power simply by finding himself a victim Holland could only think that this was never supposed to happen, at work- yes he could cope with all of the resource at his disposal there, but not at home with supernatural defences useless against human accomplices.
Talking seemed a good idea. “You’re too late. Darla is a vampire again.”
There was no discernable reaction on that sculpted face, getting desperate he added, “You have no idea how much your wasting time with me. Darla’s not the one you should be worrying about.”
Angel pretended to scrutinise his nails, “Really, who should I be worried about- you?”
“Invite him in,” Gunn repeated, slicing deeper and drawing a thin line of blood.
Dead was dead, Holland shook his head and then shut his eyes.
“Bring him outside, there’s a garage around the back.”
Eyes snapping open, Holland opened his mouth to scream as he felt himself dragged over the threshold, only to choke as a cold hand wrapped around his neck and squeezed before effortlessly lifting him up.
“I’ll ask one more time and then we’re gonna have some alone time. Who should I be worried about?”
Eyes watering, Holland managed only a single wheeze, “Cordelia.”
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