As the
knife slices across his throat, sudden and deep, unexpected, Wes can
think of
only one thing.
It feels, in a way, like Angel's teeth.
Is this the way it feels to be one of
Angelus' victims? Not someone bitten by Angel in the throes of passion,
but
someone bitten for food. Throat torn open, blood bubbling out at the
pace of a
heartbeat.
He clenches the sound with his hand. The
blood is hot and thick between his fingers.
He can't hold his own life in. The grass is cold under his
knees,
against his face, and he wonders when he fell.
He smells dirt. Blood.
Darkness.
#
When he awakens in the hospital, he's surprised he's still alive. He's
been through this before. He died when he was shot in the gut--or at least he
believed he did. He felt himself slip away, felt the life drift above him in
a tenuous cloud.
When he fell to the ground at Justine's
feet, he felt himself go. He had no reason to hold on. Nothing left to
live
for, with Connor taken. There was no point.
But he is alive.
He is also alone. For a time, and then
Fred and Gunn are there and he doesn't know if they know what he did,
doesn't
know if he should try to explain, but he can't speak, in any case, so
that
doesn't matter and he just musters a smile or a grimace in response to
their
presence, their obvious concern.
"You'll be okay, Wes," says
Fred, smiling at him. She touches his arm reassuringly.
Wes nods. It hurts like hell, even though
he can feel the morphine heavy in his system. It all feels like a
dream. Maybe
it is, and he is really dead.
He drifts, disassociated, lost in a cloud
of pain and painkillers.
And there is Angel. Big, dark, looming
through the fog. His voice is gentle but threaded with...something...
what is
he saying...Wes isn't sure--he is fading and wrapped in haze and pain
and he
can't pull loose...
He smiles a little. Angel seems okay.
Perhaps Angel will forgive him the unforgivable. Wes
thinks about Angel's hands on his body and the cool width of
his chest, what it feels like to be pinned under him and taken, driven
to a
height where he can no longer catch his breath--
Angel's
hands are big and hard and bruising on his throat where Wesley's life
has
already nearly bled out of him. The pain washes over him in a blinding
red haze
and he can't see, he can't breathe, he reaches and shoves and gropes,
trying to
work his way free.
Angel's voice flays him, Angel's hands
bruise him, and his words tear through his heart, spit into his face as
he
gasps for breath he can no longer find.
Then,
after what seems an eternity, the vampire is dragged away, pushed back,
and Wes
is left alone. Broken, torn to pieces, splintered with pain.
Alone.
#
Wes has
nothing left. He sits at his kitchen
table in his apartment and eats reheated frozen food that tastes like
shoe
leather. The ugly mark across his neck itches, aches. He still has a
hard time
speaking.
Fortunate,
then, that he has no one to speak to.
The
phone sits silent on the table. It's hard for him to believe they've
all
abandoned him. Angel, yes. He committed the greatest sin against Angel.
But the
others...
Even
Fred.
And of course she was right, he could have
come to them, told them what he'd found, and maybe together they could
have
come up with a better solution, a way to save Angel from himself, to
save
Connor from Angel. False prophesy or no, he is certain the danger was
real.
It
doesn't matter now. He lies awake at night, alone. The darkness is
limned by
starlight, and the shadows in his room could hold anything. Even,
perhaps,
Angel.
If Angel were there--but of course he isn't--if
he were there, watching, that glint of dark eyes in the darkness, the glint
that spoke almost of the demon.
If Angel were there.
Wesley's
hand moves down his chest, brushing
over his own hair, down to his belly.
He feels the heat begin, heavy in his flanks, his cock.
If
Angel were there.
He
stares into the shadows, his eyes unfocused. The dark smear of shadow
in the
corner could be Angel. His lashes lower and he can almost see the wide
shoulders,
the demonic glint of dark eyes. His hand lowers, until his fingers
touch the
hard base of his cock. His eyes drift shut and he palms himself.
He has nothing. He's been alone for a long
time, in one sense--his family abandoned him a long time ago. His friends--and
he had come to think of them as family--abandoned him, as well.
And his lover...best not to think of that.
But he
can't not, as he pumps the length of his cock, as it hardens, thickens
in his
hand, moving with the growing tumescence as if reaching for something.
But he
is alone. There is nothing to reach for. His body burns; he can feel
the hot
lance of Angel's cock inside him, as if it really were inside him, and
he
thinks about cool hands on his body and the sure, firm caresses he will
never
feel again.
He
comes hard, warm ejaculate spilling over his fingers, his belly. It
feels too
warm to him, too human. He is wrung out with the clenching of his body,
and
when he is done he is so empty he can't even weep.
#
He
doesn't understand why Lilah calls him, but he goes, anyway. He has
nothing
else to do, and the bar at least is a source of readily available
alcohol.
He's barely sober by the time Lilah points out the unlikely duo to him--the
boy, the man--Angel--and Wesley's heart lurches at the sight of him, his big,
sleek body moving, dispatching vampires with practiced ease. He is beautiful.
Wes' skin aches with need.
But the boy. How could it possibly be Connor? As Lilah explains what
happened--Justine, Holtz, Sahjahn, the Quor-toth--pain sinks deeper through
Wes, searing, carving out the pit of his stomach.
"How could I have known?" he
murmurs, forgetting for a moment that he is not alone, and that the
woman with
him sees his agony as a source of amusement.
"Yeah," she says, and the derision
in her voice pulls his back to himself. She's laughing at him. "That's
the
beauty of it, isn't it?"
#
Sleeping
with Lilah isn't a conscious choice. One minute he's at the bar
wondering why
he hasn't killed her yet; the next he's fucking her so hard he's not
sure his
bed can take it. And she's laughing at him.
She
likes it when he hurts her. Likes it rough and nasty. He hates her, he
tells
himself, but he hates himself more. Hates what he did to Angel.
So he
comes back. More than once. Fucks her until he thinks he might break
her, then
she asks him for more.
He's
drinking more and more, and the fourth time she comes to his bed he's
heavy
with liquor, his vision wavering, his mind hazy. She is, as always,
demanding,
rough, insatiable. Riding him, she leans forward and scrapes her teeth
over his
neck.
His
body responds instantly, shaking with deep, wicked need. The scrape of
her
teeth sends him over the edge; the slash of pain in the unhealed scar.
He's not
thinking as he roughly turns her over. Not thinking of comfort, or
care, of
even of her, as he shoves inside her from behind, taking her hard in
the ass.
She
whimpers under him, then laughs. She is slick and wet from her own
arousal, and
so is he, so the penetration is easier than it might have been
otherwise. Her
body undulates under him, and she pushes back, bringing him in deeper.
She is
far too hot, but the tightness, the friction, makes his head spin with
more
than the Scotch he's been drinking all day like water. His eyes are
closed, he
is holding her hard down against the bed with his hands on her
shoulders, and
she is squirming under him, and he can't tell if she's trying to get
away or
bury him deeper inside her.
His body doesn't care. He thrusts into
her, hard, harsh, and suddenly his vision goes red and his body spirals open
and he comes inside that tight heat--
"God--Angel--"
The
words are out before he can stop them, a muddled murmur, and when he
hears them
he freezes, hoping she didn't hear.
But she
laughs. She's climaxing under him and laughing, her body shaking and
shivering,
and suddenly she jerks away from him and rolls over. He slides out of
her as
she moves, flaccid, and looks away, unable to meet her eyes.
"Shit,
Wes," she says, still laughing. "You are one sick fuck."
He starts
to say something, but she's already on top of him again, her teeth
scraping his
scar. "I like that," she says, and bites him. Hard.
He
closes his eyes and lets her take him.