It wasn't that he held grudges so much as kept them carefully tucked away and coddled until such a time as they either became full-fledged resentment or collapsed under their own weight. He hadn't even realized there were still some left over from Sunnydale until her face flushed with an embarrassment that filled him with vicious satisfaction. He held her gaze until she started to squirm.

"Sorry." Her apologetic grin was almost enough to erase whatever grievances he was clinging to, and her next words enough to obliterate them entirely, though it may have had something to do with the fact that she sounded entirely in earnest, and more than a touch crestfallen. "I leaped without looking again, didn't I? Guess I was kind of spoiling for a fight."

Buffy shifted uncomfortably as he continued to look at her. "You're hardly dressed for one," he observed.

"This?" She looked down at the filmy shirt and tight denim skirt. "Okay, not exactly the number one seller in the Slay-and-Play department, but hey--" she moved one leg to the side to demonstrate-- "slits, so no mobility impairment, and yeah, the heels on the boots are a little high and narrow, but on the plus side, wood."

"Slaying with stilettos?" He had to admit, there was something entertaining about her attempts to justify an outfit Cordelia wouldn't have been caught dead in.

"Hey, don't knock it. You never know when a pair of knee-high boots is going to be the difference between life and death, and stop looking at me like that."

"Like what?"

"Like you'd laugh at me if you didn't think it was rude to laugh at someone who's already made a complete fool of herself in front of you."

"Well, it isn't the most plausible of explanations for your attire, Buffy."

He didn't quite expect her to blow up, but she did. "Fine. You want to know why I'm dressed like this, why I'm in L.A.? I trying, strange as it may seem, to not be an adult for once, to find something to do where I don't have to play bad cop or voice of reason or pay bills, but apparently, I'm failing utterly and behaving like an idiot in front of--"

He interrupted her rant. "In front of the laughingstock of the Council?"

Confusion reigned supreme among the expressions that crossed her face. "No, that's not what I was going to say."

"Wasn't it?" Yes Wesley, do go on and see if you can re-open old wounds. His ability to pull insult from apology astounded him at times.

"Actually, all that got cut off was a pronoun. There weren't any value judgments. Why do people keep assuming that anything I say or do is somehow me being judgey and inhuman? My discomfort wasn't even about you personally."

Having managed to find her high horse, she seemed disinclined to climb down from it. Moreover, her dismissal of his person stung more than the assumed assumption had. Negative would have been better than negated. He turned to head back to the car, not bothering to grab the useless piece of metal that had started the night as an axe.

"Wait." He stopped and waited for her to continue. "I've made a huge mess of this."

"I see you're more given to understatement than you used to be."

"Look, I know this got off on the wrong foot--probably because it was firmly wedged in my mouth, as usual--but I really was just trying to help."

"Don't you ever find that it's more trouble than it's worth?"

"All the time, but it's still my job."

Even, it seemed, on her days off. Kind of put a crimp in the whole get-away-from-it-all plan. Too bad, because she'd really been looking forward to de-rusting her social skills for a change. During the less stressful portions of the drive down (all five or so minutes of them), she'd even entertained thoughts about boys of the still-breathing uncomplicated kind.

The thought occurred to her--before she could stop it--that Wes fit at least the first of those qualifications. And there was the advantage of not needing an introduction.

"Can I buy you a drink?" Might as well at least try and salvage some of her weekend. If nothing else, she could talk openly about what exactly it was she did around him.

For a second, it looked like he was going to refuse. Then he smiled. She wasn't willing to call it a nice smile--it was a little too calculated to call nice--but it was the kind of smile she hadn't gotten from anyone over the age of eighteen and under a hundred and fifty in way too long.

"I can't say that it's something I'd ever pictured myself doing, but then again, that's sort of par for the course these days. I'll join you for a drink."

She smiled back at him, a little sheepishly. "Of course, you'll have to suggest a location. I'm kind of not as up on L.A. as I thought I was. "

"I know just the place, but it's a bit of a drive." The voice held a little of the same calculation as the smile, and a bit of a challenge as well.

"Are you offering to chauffer? Because I could always call a cab, but I'm thinking carpooling makes more sense."

"I'm parked right around the corner. Shall we?"

A little voice that sounded an awful lot like her mom's sounded in her head, reminding her about taking rides from strangers. Or maybe it was candy--the voice wasn't too clear on the matter. She paused for a moment, wondering if this was really the best idea in the world, then shrugged a little. Wes wasn't exactly as stranger, even if he was kind of strange, and considering she'd even thought about going and seeing Angel, this wasn't even her worst idea of the night.

"Sure."

The car wasn't quite what she'd pictured--she'd thought something a little more Giles-y, a little less large and imposing.

"It's easier to carry armaments in a large vehicle, Buffy," he said off her look.

The bar, on the other hand, was a little closer to what she'd expected. It was loud, dingy, and rough. The sort of place the Bronze sometimes looked like it wanted to be, depending on which band was playing and how many vamps were in the place.

They settled into a booth in the back corner, which was darker and dingier than the front, but far enough from the bar and the jukebox to allow for conversation, provided they sat next to each other and talked in fairly loud voices.

"Beer?" he asked.

She drew a twenty out of her roll and handed it to him. "A pitcher, something domestic and mediocre, please." Her experience with microbrews had left her a little wary of anything that didn't have catchy ads with scantily clad women or large animals.

***

As unappealing as your standard American pilsner was, it had the advantage of being cheap, plentiful, and virtually indistinguishable from water unless you consumed a fair amount of it. Wesley went up to the bar, ordered a pitcher of the least offensive of the selection, and carefully made his way back to the booth with it.

Gingerly, he set it down before placing the two glasses next to it. Buffy was watching him with an expression that seemed to mix equal parts caution and curiosity.

"Can I ask you something?" Her brow was furrowed in concentration, an expression that should have looked ridiculous, but was closer to charming.

"Go right ahead."

"What happened to your glasses?"

"Nothing, really. I still keep a pair at home. I simply got a prescription for contacts; peripheral vision is somewhat important when you're fighting on a regular basis."

"Oh." She frowned again. "They suit you."

"What? The contacts?"

"Mmm-hmm. You have nice eyes." The look on her face showed quite plainly that she hadn't intended to say that. He was tempted to go about discomforting her just to see the various changes on her countenance.

He poured the drinks and changed the subject. "Will you be seeing Angel while you're in town?"

Buffy took a hasty gulp of her beer before answering. "Nope. We kind of agreed that we wouldn't get in each other's way unless the world was ending. Which it probably is, but if I did decide to pull the apocalypse card, I'd probably end up spilling everything that's happened in the last year, and that would be bad."

He raised an eyebrow and waited for her to continue.

After a long pause, and several more swallows of beer, she did just that. "I made some bad relationship decisions. And some bad life decisions. Actually, pretty much ever decision I made between coming back from the dead and a couple of months ago? Bad. With a capital B."

"I've made a few of those myself," he admitted.

"You won't tell Angel, will you?"

"It's unlikely--we're no longer working together. Besides, you haven't actually told me any of the specifics. I somehow doubt things were as bad as you claim." Her eyes widened and she turned an interesting shade of bright rose and drained the glass. "Oh dear, they really were that bad, weren't they?"

"Probably worse. Definitely worse. Sleeping with the enemy worse." She flushed again as she said it, looking like she wanted the booth to swallow her where she sat.

He let his arm brush against hers as he refilled the glass. "Well, was it worth it?"

"Some parts. On the whole? No, it wasn't, and it didn't have the prettiest of endings." She sipped her beer, more slowly this time. "But I'd be lying if I said that I didn't get anything out of it."

"For example?"

An unexpected and possibly alcohol-influenced grin split her face and she held his eyes for a second before answering, "Laid on a regular basis?" She groaned and covered her face with her hand. "I really didn't mean to say that," she muttered from between her fingers.

He hadn't quite imagined the conversation taking this sort of provocative turn, but then, he'd never imagined they'd be having a conversation of any nature in there first place. It was strange to realize they had more in common than just a nominal alignment and a somewhat convoluted history with Angel. They had a nominal alignment, a somewhat convoluted history with Angel, and, it appeared, a taste for disastrous entanglements.

Which, when he thought about it, was actually somewhat more than he and Lilah had in common outside of the bedroom, as recent events had proven. He was poking at wounds again, but at least this time it was a fresh one, and one he'd had no one to blame for but himself. And, if he felt like seizing the opportunity, one he'd be able to pay back in a way that might actually cause Lilah to have second thoughts about playing him again.

Of course, it could also cause her to make good on her Mrs. Robinson threat. Wesley wondered which would upset Angel the more: him sleeping with Buffy, or Lilah seducing Connor as a result. He supposed there was only one way to find out.

He gently pried her fingers from her face, letting his thumb brush her cheek as he did so. "I didn't mind. Honestly."

"Is this flirting?"

"I haven't ruled out the possibility."

Her eyes darted everywhere but his face as she took in the words. Throwing her off balance was both easier and more enjoyable than he'd ever envisioned.

The first tentative touch of her lips startled him; he hadn't expected her to make the first move. Her body remained rigid, ready to hit or run if the occasion demanded it, so he kept his hands at his sides as he returned the kiss. When she broke contact, her face was flushed and her breathing a touch less even than it had been. He was careful to keep from showing his amusement as her face flitted between anxiety, desire, and determination. It seemed he wasn't the only one with an agenda for the evening. Fortunate, then, that they meshed so well, absolving him of any potential feelings of guilt for using her. She leaned in to kiss him again, and this time, there was nothing tentative about it. His arms circled her waist and pulled her closer until he could feel the soft press of her breasts against his chest. When her hands slid under his shirt, he pulled away, albeit reluctantly. "It's a little public here, don't you think?" ***

Okay, that had been about thirty seconds away from being really, really embarrassing. Obviously, she still wasn't quite grasping the "sex in public places" taboo. Of course, a dark corner in a seedy bar was a little better than, say, the catwalk at the Bronze, her front yard, next to a dumpster, and G-d--when exactly had she turned into the queen of the perverts? "Maybe a little," she admitted. "We're fairly close to my place, if you're at all interested..." His voice trailed off, leaving the ball in her court. "Oh, yeah. Definitely interested." She gave him a look she hoped was innocent. "Got handcuffs?" The grin she got in return was decidedly devilish. "Padded or standard issue?"

"They make padded ones?" Too bad she hadn't known that months ago. "You sound chagrined." "Kind of. Why didn't Sp--someone tell me they made padded ones?"

He burst out laughing. Not that she blamed him, she sounded like a petulant grade schooler, except for the part where she was talking about handcuffs.

"Perhaps it didn't seem important at the time, though I notice you've adroitly avoided answering the question."

"Sorry, you kind of threw me with the whole actually taking me up on it thing. It wasn't quite what I was expecting."

He stroked the inside of her arm just lightly enough to make her whole body tingle. "What, pray tell, were you expecting?"

"Something a little more... English, maybe?"

He laughed again. Well, at least she was amusing him.

"But we English are famous for our restraint," he said lightly.

Ouch. That was painful. And shameless. "You never struck me as the pun type."

"You never knew me well enough to know one way or the other." She winced, even though the tone was matter-of-fact. "It goes both ways," he hastily reassured her. "I didn't know you well enough to know if you preferred domestic or imported beer."

"Wes, I wasn't old enough to drink last time you saw me." Nice to pass the wincing to someone else for a second.

"Well, there is that, isn't there?"

She broke the lull in the conversation about half a second before it could turn into an uncomfortable silence. "So, you said your place is pretty close?"

They left the bar and walked to his apartment. Which was, by L.A. standards, close. Heck, even by Sunnydale standards it wasn't far. It was, however, just far enough to give her time to wonder what the hell she was doing. Probably, she thought, making another bad decision. Though on a scale of bad to badder, it didn't even really register as anything more than just naughty compared to say, well, just about any of the other bad decisions that were springing to mind. And it wasn't like there was anything actually wrong with it. Just two consenting human adults doing what consenting human adults do.

"Second thoughts?"

"I think my second thoughts have had second thoughts by this point."

"If it helps, you don't have to come up." He unclipped a cell phone from his belt. "I can call you a cab, if you'd like."

She looked up at him, pushed all second, third, and fourth thoughts from her mind, and smiled before saying, "You know what I'd like that would also help? You kissing me."

***

Even wearing three and a half inch heels, she was short enough that he had to bend to comply with her request. If Lilah happened to be spying on him (which was more likely than not, considering that it was, after all, Lilah), she'd have more than a few choice words to say about his behavior, beginning with the futility of such a pedestrian play at revenge, and moving on to the blindingly obvious choice of her complete opposite as the instrument of said retaliation. But she'd still mention it, which would be proof enough that it had gotten under her skin. And in the long term, that was really all he needed.

Buffy's mouth was warm and soft and tasted faintly of beer and the last traces of lipgloss, and perhaps he was over thinking things...

She did something with the tip of her tongue and the inside of his lips that managed to stem thoughts of Lilah and one-upmanship completely, allowing for a flood of thoughts closer to "where the devil did she learn that?", "or that?", and "how quickly can we get into the building?".

There. Workshopped like in olden days, happy golden days!

It wasn't that he held grudges so much as kept them carefully tucked away and coddled until such a time as they either became full-fledged resentment or collapsed under their own weight.

How terribly lovely.

"Slaying with stilettos?"

Is it you that desperately wants to see Buffy stake a vamp with her heel?

Then he smiled. She wasn't willing to call it a nice smile--it was a little too calculated to call nice--but it was the kind of smile she hadn't gotten from anyone over the age of eighteen and under a hundred and fifty in way too long.

Oh, yeah. That's the stuff.

Sigh. Thank you, Plei. I did enjoy that.

Is it you that desperately wants to see Buffy stake a vamp with her heel?

Oddly, no, not really. But it's a funny mental image.

"I haven't ruled out the possibility."

Guh. I can hear him say it. Wibble-making.

"Wes, I wasn't old enough to drink last time you saw me." Nice to pass the wincing to someone else for a second.

Looks like Xander isn't the only one who paid attention to D'Hoffryn. Then again, Buffy has always had a talent for finding weak spots.