"What are you guys doing here? What's up?" Buffy leapt up from her bench when she saw them. "Please tell me there isn't some new bad breaking out—the wedding is the day after tomorrow!" She wielded her bouquet of shopping bags to ward off trouble.

"No bad. We came to help Spike with some stuff."

"Stuff, Xander? What stuff?"

Willow couldn't remember the last time she'd seen Buffy so twinkly. In the midst of the dreary lighting in Paddington, the litter, low-flying pigeons, blaring advertisments, she shone like a movie star, and barely had eyes for either of them, so fixed was she on Spike.

"Business, pet. I'll tell you about it. Thought we'd all get a drink."

He tucked her under one arm; Xander and Willow grabbed the bags, and followed them out of the concourse and around the corner. They passed the pubs overflowing with inebriated business types, and turned in at a quiet doorway that gave onto a flight of stairs up to a quiet wine bar on the second floor. Willow could only conclude that Spike had found it by following his nose, but he made it seem like he knew every bit of London as if he'd never left it.

When they were settled into a cozy back booth with the shopping bags stashed under the table, and glasses in front of them, Buffy tugged at Spike's sleeve. "What's this 'business' that you're all plotting behind my back?"

"Family stuff."

"Family? Whose family?"

"Mine. Ours, to be."

She stared at him, bemused, a little apprehensive, completely focused. Willow held back her urge to blurt out the whole story of their evening herself, to reassure Buffy that everything was okay.

Spike reached into the case he'd brought away from the solicitor's. "Have a few things to show you. Startin' with this."

She took the flat wooden box he held out, but didn't look away from his face. "What is this?"

"I was lucky, I knew your dear mum, an' can think maybe she'd have welcomed me as her son if she'd lived to see us now. You can never meet mine, only ...."

Buffy's eyes went wide. She opened the box—it was, Willow saw then, a hinged picture case, about four by five, containing two shadowy collodian prints. Willow released a little ball of light from her finger's ends, to hover over Buffy's head, so they could see better. One picture showed a woman seated, a young man standing beside her, both swathed up to their chins in the composed elaborate costumes worn by prosperous people in the 1870s. In the other picture, the man posed alone, seated in the same chair, legs stiffly crossed.

Buffy said, "This is your mother? Wow ...."

The only inkling they'd ever had that Spike had a mother, a human past, was when they'd been trying to de-activate The First's trigger, and then all they'd heard about it was that there was a little song she'd sung to him. It seemed unlikely that Spike had told Buffy more than that, and Willow knew it was even more unlikely that she'd asked.

"And who is ... oh my God. Spike, is this you?" For a second Willow was afraid that she was going to laugh—it was possible to find the images funny, so earnest were they, completely devoid of irony, completely removed from the relaxed informal present. Laughter would be a disaster. But Buffy didn't; she shifted closer to Spike, pressing in against his side, holding the pictures up to the light, comparing them to his face hovering beside her. "This is you. I see it now, but I don't think I'd have recognized ... and your mother was lovely." She gave the pictures her minute attention. "So this is the real William Pratt. I guess I'm not so surprised now, having met him recently." She smiled at Spike. "You sure kept him under wraps. I'd never have guessed before, that this could be you." She glanced up at Xander. "Would you have guessed?"

"I would not." Xander played along good-naturedly. Buffy tore her gaze from the images. "Where did this come from?"

"I've kept a cache of old things, at my solicitor's."

She reacted the same way Willow had to the word solicitor, laughing as if it must naturally be a joke. But Spike told her about it, describing the business he'd transacted that evening, the financial arrangements he'd made for her. Buffy listened, open-mouthed, casting looks at Willow and Xander for confirmation.

"Don't want to hear any nonsense about refusin' it, either. It's right that the money should pass from vampires to the slayer. Most of the money was Angel's, since Darla died. An' he'd have wanted you to have it."

To Willow's surprise, Buffy nodded. "He offered to help me, when ... when I met with him, after they brought me back. I wouldn't take anything, and he told me I was being a fool. I never thought about where Angel's money came from. This is kind of amazing. It never occurred to me that you had anything ... I thought you just stole."

"Well yeah, I mostly did. Was too proud to spend such easy money—my Aurelian birthright. But all that's from before I got my soul. You really thought I'd ask you to be my wife, an' bring nothin' to you?"

"Nothing? What nothing? I'm going to have you." Buffy looked to be on the verge of tears, but she smiled, and prodded him. "Anyway, you're a pretty cheap date. Most of the time I don't even need to get you liquored up to get a good time out of you."

"Whoa," Xander murmured, "Verging on TMI."

"Spike knows what I mean."

"We all know what you mean."

"Wasn't goin' to marry you an' not provide for you. Hard an' dangerous your life is, but I'm here to make sure you're never in want, an' never lonely."

At that Buffy did begin to cry, and she was still crying when Spike took the little ruby ring from his pocket, and slipped it onto her hand.

"What—what is this? Oh my God. Spike?" She held it up in the light, turning it this way and that so the stone glimmered. "Is this my engagement ring?"

"If you like it. Was my mum's. They went in for colored stones in her day."

"If I like it! Oh Spike!" She took him in her arms; they sank back against the banquette, absorbed in wordless but not silent communion.

Willow caught Xander's eye, and they grinned at each other. "This time I had nothing to do with it," Willow mouthed.

"At least she's not talking about 'The Wind Beneath my Wings'."

That brought Buffy's attention back. "I hate that song! No, really! This wedding isn't going to be cheesy. Is it? No cheese!"

"You like cheese," Willow said.

"Well, cheese to eat. There could be a cheese platter. But no ... no cringe-worthy moments. We're going to keep it simple, right?" She glanced anxiously at Spike. "You prefer simple? What are you going to wear? I bought all my things today."

"Guessed as much. Lots of bags there."

"You can't see any of it. Not until I have it on."

"Wasn't gonna try."

"Please tell me you're not going to wear these clothes at the wedding. Not that there's anything wrong with ... I like you however you are."

"Thought we'd stand up before all assembled an' say our vows naked. Like Adam an' Eve, yeah?"

Buffy went still and glassy. It was all Willow could do to repress her guffaw; Buffy clearly didn't spot the joke in Spike's tone, in his tender glance.

"I think ... do you really? ... it might embarrass some people. Not me! The guests ... But if that's what you really want ...."

"You really would," Spike chuckled, bringing her hand to his lips. "You good girl. You really would, if I asked you to."

"I—Oh. You're not serious."

"To deprive you of your bridal finery? Not a bit of it. Anyway, would spoil my pleasure in takin' it off you later on."

"And we're back in TMI-land," Xander said.

"I love this ring. I love it." She held it up to admire some more. "This is just ... I'm kind of overwhelmed. I didn't expect any of this. When were these photos taken? What was your mother's name?"

"Eighteen seventy-seven. Anne Frances Witkins Pratt. She'd have been taken with you, Buffy."

"You think? She looks kind of ... she's awfully proper. She probably would've thought I was fast. A hussy. Maybe even a bad influence."

"She was a lady. But not a stick. She'd have been delighted with you."

"I'm more interested in whether she was delighted with you. Did you get along? Were you close?"

"Close, yeah. Close as could be, 'til we died."

"You—wait. You and your mother died at the same time?"

Spike shifted uneasily. "Wasn't sure if you knew the story, if Robin Wood told you."

"Robin?" Buffy's eyes narrowed. "After he and Giles tricked us both and tried to kill you, we stopped chatting. What might he have told me?"

"That I turned her."

Xander looked a little sick. Spike twisted his glass in his hand. His admission had such an air of inevitability about it, Willow wondered that this had never occurred to her before. Wasn't that what vampires were always supposed to do? They went after their families first.

"Guess I've spoiled the mood here."

Buffy was grave, but she put a hand on Spike's, drew his fingers away from fiddling with his glass, and held them. "I'll say when the mood's spoiled."

"Yeah, well. Was time you knew. Don't want to keep secrets from you, if we're to be together."

"Okay. I'm listening."

"She was a sweet creature, the best of mothers, we were devoted to each other. Wanted to share all my new power with her. She was ill, an' I thought if I made her to be like me, she'd be strong an' well and we'd be together forever. Only it didn't work out like I'd imagined ... the demon wasn't her at all. The demon was the opposite of all she was in life. Dishonored an' defiled her, letting that loose in her body." He paused. "She was the only vampire I ever made. Never wanted to repeat the experience."

"So what happened?" Intrigued, Willow leaned forward.

He twisted his hand from Buffy's. "Staked her same night as she rose."

Buffy leaned back, sighed. "Now you've told me this, am I supposed to shriek and toss the ring back in your face? Is this is the one thing too far that's supposed to make me reject you? Oh my God, I'm engaged to a vampire!"

Spike looked flummoxed.

"I mean—I get that you want me—us—to know the truth. But I'm not keeping score on your undead past, Spike. You have your soul, you died to save the world, you atone every day, yadda yadda yadda. I'm much more interested in what you and your mother were like in life. And I think that's what you're more interested in too. Which is why you've shared these pictures, and given me her beautiful ruby. You wanted me to know something of her, and how she died is the least important thing."

Willow could forget, often, that Buffy was more than fighting chops and quips and occasional "blonde" remarks. She could also be incredibly sensitive, astute, and breathtakingly loving. It was plain, from how Spike's expression broke, that she'd surprised him too.

"That's right, pet. Thanks." He gathered up her hand, pressed the palm reverently to his mouth. Buffy's own mouth wobbled; her gaze was fixed intensely on her hand in Spike's, on the winking jewel.

Xander slapped his thighs. "This has been both fascinating and fun, but I've got a training session with eight girls that starts in precisely eight hours. Time to beam me up."

Willow glanced at her watch. "You guys missed your train. I could drop you—"

"No!" Buffy waved her hands. "I mean—thanks, but really, it's fine, we can get a room here in town. Right, Spike? Maybe you could take my packages back to the castle, though."

To Spike's look, Xander said, "Teleporting makes her barf."

"Ah. Well, let's not do it, then. Actually, there's a last train to Bath goes at 12:15. Slow one, but we're in no rush, are we, love?"

"No rush at all. All we've got to do for the rest of tonight is snuggle."