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7 Clues
 
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Chapter 7 - Clues

Buffy pressed her hand against the wood of the doorframe.

“Spike?”

She knocked on the door.

“Spike?”

She opened the door a crack. The curtains were drawn and the room was dark.

“Spike?” she whispered.

“What?” he finally said.

“Were you asleep?”

“No.” He obviously had been.

“It’s like four in the afternoon. I know we got in late last night, but wow. Mom was starting to get worried. Um, you’re not hung over are you?”

“From two sodding beers?”

“Okay, okay. Anyway, that girl just came by.” She held up the brown paper bag before stepping in and setting it on the dresser.

“I’ll be down in a minute, yeah?”

Spike sighed to himself as she shut the door behind her.

It was naturally hard for him to sleep for more than a few hours at night, and he was with Buffy most of the day. Besides catching naps in the afternoons, he hadn’t been sleeping much. Since it was the weekend now, and since Buffy hadn’t gone out, he hadn’t gotten up.

-----

When Buffy got out of her bath, she went downstairs and found Spike and Joyce in the kitchen. He’d already eaten his food, and was now chatting good-naturedly with her mother over what looked like hot chocolate.

Correction. Joyce had hot chocolate; Spike had coffee. Which sort of supported the theory that he was hung over. Who actually had problems getting out of bed before four?

But whatever.

Buffy glanced at her mother’s cup. “Isn’t it a little early for holiday cheer?” she asked. “It isn’t even November.”

“Buffy, did you know that Spike’s been all over Europe? I had no idea. I went to England myself in college.”

“Well, he’s from there,” Buffy said, pouring herself out a handful of marshmallows.

Joyce rolled her eyes at Buffy. “But to have seen so much of Eastern Europe, too—Czechoslovakia, Romania. What was it like then?”

“Couldn’t say. Really, it was a long time ago.”

“You never tell anything about yourself,” Buffy said. “How’d Mom get it out of you?”

“Your mum, she’s a talker.” Spike took another sip from his mug.

“Speaking of almost being November, Buffy,” Joyce said, “are you still going to the Halloween party?”

Buffy glanced uncertainly at Spike. “I don’t know.”

“But everyone your father or I know will be there.” She looked at Spike. “It’s invitation only. Surely that would be all right?”

Spike shrugged. “I s’pose. Bunch of rich corporate and college types. I’m not dressin’ up, though.”

“Just wear your normal clothes,” Buffy said. “And the coat.”

He turned to her. “Somethin’ wrong with the way I dress?”

She popped the rest of the marshmallows in her mouth and smiled.

“Spike?” Hank stood in the doorway. “Could I see you for a moment?” He was dressed in a suit, briefcase in hand. “Joyce, I’ve got a dinner with a client, but I won’t be late.”

Buffy looked at her mother, who was frowning but didn’t say anything.

Spike followed him to the door, where he paused. “I’m not sure going to the Halloween party is such a good idea,” Hank said.

“No worse than goin’ out last night, I expect.” Spike peered carefully at Hank, who looked like he wanted to say something, but wasn’t quite sure what.

“Well, you’re the professional,” he finally said. Then, “Has anything else happened?”

“No.”

Hank looked down and started to open his mouth, before shrugging apologetically and quickly making his way out the door.

Spike went back into the kitchen, only to find Joyce fiddling with her keys and saying a quick farewell to Buffy.

“I don’t think she wants to be here when he gets back,” Buffy said in answer to his stare. Then her gaze hardened, and she crossed her arms.

“What?”

“I’m not a child.”

“Come again, pet?”

“I said, I’m not a child. I don’t know what sort of secret talk you and Dad just had, but if there’s something going on concerning me, I think I should know about it.”

Spike shrugged, leaning against the cabinets. “He asked how things were goin’ and if anything else had happened. He wasn’t sure about goin’ to the Halloween party. Didn’t give a reason, though.”

“That’s all?”

“That’s all. What’d you expect?”

“I don’t know, I just...have this feeling,” she finished lamely.

He studied her for a moment. “What feelin’?”

She sighed. “When things first started happening, it was like he was going overboard trying to blow it off as nothing. And then after the kidnapping attempt, he seemed more bothered about dealing with it than worried. Though now I’m starting to think that he was really worried. He gets me ‘the best,’” she said, pointing at Spike, “but he never even said anything about calling the police. Why wouldn’t he call the police?”

There was a hitch in her voice, like she was desperately hoping he would make sense of it for her. But her face said that she was already making sense of it.

“He must have someone else doing it,” she said, sounding unconvincing.

Spike sighed. “The bloke that hired me,” he said slowly, “wasn’t paid to find out anything, love. I bet no one else was, either.”

“But why wouldn’t Dad want to find out? It doesn’t make sense, unless…unless he already knew who it was.” Her voice fell as she finished the sentence, her last word barely a whisper as she looked at the floor.

Then her head snapped up. “You think he knows who it is? Why would he know who it is?”

“Don’t know. I think he knows somethin’ he hasn’t said, though.”

“That’s it. I’m searching his office,” Buffy said, tearing off down the hall.

She’d gone from crushed to pissed off in five seconds flat.

Buffy flung open the door and flipped on the lights, walking to stand in front of the massive wooden desk. “You keep watch,” she instructed.

“He’s gone. He’s not gonna pop back just like that. By the way, you’re doin’ that all wrong.”

She stopped rifling through the papers. “What?”

Spike came in. “Don’t just throw ’em all around. You gotta put every piece back where it was, even if it’s just layin’ there random.” He demonstrated.

“Again, you seem to know a lot about this. So are you just going to stand there, or help me look?”

He shrugged, and together they began a methodical search of the office, Buffy sorting through the desk, Spike working his way around the bookshelves.

After several minutes of silence, Spike heard a small noise from Buffy. He turned to look and found her kneeling beside a drawer, several dropped sheets spread on the floor. She held the rest in her hand. Wordlessly, she stood and handed them over.

Photos. All outdoors, and she was obviously not aware in any of them.

“These recent?”

Buffy didn’t say anything; she was just staring blankly at the pictures.

“Pet?”

“Yeah,” she said in a small voice. She looked at the photos as he flipped through them. “Out shopping, around school, just before class—oh God, this was right outside the house. Dad had these all along, for who knows how long. And he just kept acting like I was crazy. I bet he knows who’s behind it!”

“Maybe, maybe not. There aren’t demands. Could be this is all he knows—got sent the pictures in the mail or something.”

“Still! He knew something! He knew and he didn’t say!” Her voice cracked. “He knew, and he didn’t say.” She turned suddenly and went out of the room.

Spike shuffled through the pictures once more before carefully placing them back under the papers in the drawer.

Then he sighed. He supposed he had to go talk to Buffy.
 
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