Title: Frustration
Author: Rari

(notes and disclaimer with part one)

Frustration: Part 4

Giles bent down to nuzzle her neck. All of a sudden he had the strongest sense of Buffy. It was as if he could smell her. As if the smell of her was all over him. He felt his cock grow hard. And he felt the net she had cast around him grow even tighter, threatening to choke his breath away. He muttered. "Not tonight."

The brunette pulled away. "What?"

Giles shook his head. "Amanda, I need you to rescue me again. Dance with me? Make all these thoughts in my head disappear?"

She reached up and brushed her lips against his, just teasing his lips with her tongue. Without a word she took his hand and they weaved their way through the crowd to the dance floor.

Buffy had Ethan drop her off at Riley's. She sat outside on a bench trying to collect herself. She felt as if she might jump out of her skin. Nothing had gone right. She'd humiliated herself in front of Ethan, she'd lost a bet with him, Giles was probably kissing some skanky brunette right now, and despite Buffy's best efforts, he didn't want her. Giles didn't want her. That seemed inconceivable to her.

She stood and started to pace. She couldn't get that kiss out of her mind, or out of her body. Everything had shifted inside of her. Buffy thought about her sex life. Once with Angel, and once with Parker and a bunch of times with Riley. Pretty much the same kind of thing with all three. She'd been with Riley a while now but she was beginning to think that he was the sort of guy who did the Sunday school stuff with the little missus at home and then paid a prostitute to get all that other stuff.

She'd never really given a whole lot of thought to that other stuff before now. Sex had been good enough. But now her body was going crazy thinking about it. And Buffy couldn't stop thinking about it. She let out a whine. And she wasn't thinking about doing any of it with Riley. Buffy couldn't seem to get past a certain set of green eyes, or a certain pair of lips and how hard his chest had felt and how hard… Buffy fanned herself. And then she kicked a stone so hard it hit the building on the end of the block. It didn't matter. He didn't want her. She wasn't his type.

Fine. She could do that stuff with Riley. She ran all the way up to his room and pounded on the door. It took Riley a minute but he finally opened it. It was clear he had been in bed. Buffy threw herself on him and began to kiss him. Buffy kissed him harder than she'd ever kissed anybody. She murmured against his lips. "Kiss me harder."

Riley tried. He pulled her hard against him and tried to keep up. She pulled back and let out a frustrated cry. She began to pace the room. Kissing Riley now was like kissing flat ginger ale. No fizz. Not anymore. Giles had kissed her once and ruined her for anybody else. Riley approached her. "Buffy, are you all right?" He grew alarmed. "You are Buffy, aren't you?" The only time Buffy had ever acted like this was when she'd been Faith.

Buffy rolled her eyes. "Yes, I'm Buffy. Sort of." She put her hand up to keep him from coming any closer. She looked at him. She tried to imagine doing any of the things that Ethan had listed off to her to Riley, or letting him to any of those things to her. She shook her head. She actually couldn't imagine touching him at all anymore. There was only one guy she felt like touching.

Riley looked even more concerned. "What do you mean, sort of?"

Buffy looked at him, a sad look on her face. "I'm sorry Riley. I can't."

"You can't what?"

"I can't be with you anymore." Buffy suddenly gasped. She had to get back to the club. She had to stop Giles from leaving with that woman. "I've got to go."

"Buffy, wait, I don't understand."

"I don't either but I have to go. Now."

"Will you be back?"

"No. I'm sorry."

With that she ran for the door and he could hear her feet running as she left his building. Riley watched her from his window as she raced to wherever she was going. He let out a small sigh. He'd been expecting Buffy to break up with him for weeks now. At least it was over. The waiting was finally over. He crawled back into bed and tried to go back to sleep.

Buffy ran as if her life depended on it. Part of her felt like it did. Part of her knew that if she missed Giles and if he slept with someone besides her that it would kill her. She got there just as Giles was walking out the door, the brunette on his arm. She called his name. "Giles." She was breathless.

Giles looked up and saw Buffy, bent over trying to catch her breath. "Oh, God, Buffy." He excused himself from Amanda and ran over to her. "What's happened? Are you all right?"

"I need you. I need you, now." She glanced up at the brunette.

Giles sighed. "Now?"

Buffy nodded. "Now."

Giles let out a long breath. He walked over to Amanda. "I'm sorry. There's a bit of an emergency I have to deal with. May I call you?" He saw a flash of anger cross her face. He didn't blame her for being angry. She had played a magnificent game all evening and now it was all for naught.

She shook her head. "No, I don't think so." She gestured towards the other woman. "Go tend to your emergency." She hadn't missed the look on the blonde's face. As soon as she had seen this man's face when the blonde girl had walked into the club she should have trusted her instincts and walked away. That girl had him like a fish on a hook whether he knew it or not. She almost felt sorry for him. It made her smile at him and press a soft kiss to his cheek. "It was fun while it lasted." She squeezed his hand and walked away.

Giles watched her for a second and then he ran back over to Buffy. "What is it? Where's the trouble?"

Buffy grabbed his hand and pulled him to the alley on the side of the building. "This way."

Giles patted his jacket. "I don't have any weapons. We should go to the car first."

"You won't need any weapons." When they had gone in far enough to be fully in the shadows she stopped.

"Buffy, I don't understand."

Buffy pulled his head down and kissed him. She kissed him hard, as hard as she could. She put all of herself into that kiss. It took him a moment but he began kissing her back. This time Buffy was more prepared. This time she kept up, and as his tongue swept in her mouth she met his advances with a fire of her own. Their lips fused together as passion flared between them. Giles' hands were fisted in her hair while hers were hanging on to his jacket lapels for dear life.

Giles finally disengaged. He looked down at her, dazed and disoriented. He put his hand back on the wall to keep from falling. He sort of slid down the wall until he was sitting, his knees almost to his chest. Buffy sank down with him, glad not to have to support herself on her shaking knees.

Giles looked at her. "Good Lord, what was that for?"

She only had one question to ask. "Do you want me?"

"Of course I want you Buffy. What man wouldn't want you?"

"But do you want me enough?"

Giles shook his head. "Enough for what?"

"Enough to make love to me? Enough to want me more than that woman you were leaving with?"

Giles' jaw dropped. "What?" His eyes narrowed. "Did Ethan do something to you?"

Buffy started laughing. And then she thought maybe she was crying. "Yes, no, sort of."

Giles started to get up. "Where the hell is he?"

Buffy pulled him back down. "It's all right, Giles. It's all right. He didn't do anything wrong. He just made me see some things about myself."

Giles scowled. "He excels at that." He looked at her again. "Why did you kiss me like that?"

Buffy inched closer to him. She got on her knees and separating his knees she moved as close to him as she could get. She ran her hand up his chest. "Did you like it?"

Buffy's body was millimeters away from discovering just how much he liked it. Giles tried to back up into the wall some more. It didn't budge. "What did he make you see?" None of this made sense to Giles. He couldn't imagine that Ethan would have made Buffy see something that would make her touch him the way he'd been wanting her to touch him for months. Ever since she'd asked him to be her Watcher again Giles had wanted her. He'd wanted her that day, he'd wanted to pull her down on the couch next to him and make love to her. But he knew that Ethan never would have intended this to happen. Giles was waiting for the other shoe to drop. He asked again. "What did he make you see?"

"That I want you."

Giles lost his breath for a second. When she pressed her lips against his he groaned and straightening his legs he held her on his lap as he kissed her back. Giles lost all track of everything. All he knew was that he wanted her and for some miraculous reason she wanted him too. His lips caressed hers, sometimes gently, sometimes almost painfully and her little moans were making him crazy as she kissed him in return.

Only the fact that they were in an alley kept Giles from going any further. Sanity reared its ugly head and Giles gently pushed Buffy from his lap. "Buffy, we have to stop." He moved to stand but one look at her face and he crouched back down in front of her. She looked devastated. "Buffy, what is it?"

"Am I still not your type?" Buffy started to cry. His words telling her they had to stop combined with him pushing her off his lap had brought back all her painful feelings of rejection.

"I don't understand. Buffy, why are you crying?" He dug in his pocket for his handkerchief and then remembered he had already given it to that blonde woman in the bar.

"You told me I wasn't your type. In there." She gestured towards the club with a nod of her head.

Giles sat down, hard. "That was you?" The memories all shifted in his mind. "Oh, God, that was you." He dropped his head into his hands and groaned. He could hear the other shoe falling, as if from a great distance, gathering momentum. As he groaned again he began to realize that Buffy was sobbing her heart out. He stood again and reached down for her. "Buffy, come on. We clearly need to talk but I'd rather find a more comfortable, not to mention safer place for it than this alley."

Buffy just buried herself against his chest and kept crying. Giles cursed Ethan under his breath and wrapping his arm around Buffy he maneuvered her to his car. When Giles got behind the wheel he watched as Buffy curled up against the car door. He couldn't remember seeing her this unhappy. He started to mentally review his conversations with her when he hadn't known it was Buffy. Giles laid a consoling hand on her arm.

Buffy was inconsolable. He still didn't want her. She had kissed him the best she could and he had still pushed her off his lap. She didn't know how to kiss any better than that. She didn't know how she could convince him that she was his type and that he was hers. All he was doing now was patting her, trying to get her to calm down, but he wasn't trying to touch her or kiss her. He was acting like her Watcher. Buffy started to cry harder as a deep sense of loss started to consume her.

Giles was startled at the vehemence of her tears, and he started to feel quite concerned. He felt an urgent need to get her home. Turning the key in the ignition he began to drive. He approached his apartment cautiously looking around for Ethan's car. Giles was quite relieved when he didn't see it anywhere. After parking he walked around the car to retrieve Buffy. When she just continued to cry he finally picked her up and carried her inside.

Placing her on the couch he scouted out the apartment to make sure Ethan wasn't hiding anywhere. Then he locked the door. Abandoning his longing to make some tea he sat on the couch next to Buffy. She was sitting with her knees drawn up tight against her chest. It sounded as if she had finally stopped crying but her body was still trembling and she looked woefully unhappy. The shoe's velocity was increasing.

"Buffy, will you please tell me what's wrong?"

Buffy's voice was so soft that Giles had to bend down to hear her. "I'm not your type."

"Is that what this is all about? Because I told you that you weren't my type?" Giles felt a little exasperated. "You've been telling me in no uncertain terms that I wasn't your type for five years and you don't see me in tears about it." When he got no response he tried again. "Why do you even care?" More memories shifted into place. "Was this all part of that bet you two had? Did you kiss me to win a bet?" Giles had visions of Ethan laughing himself sick somewhere. Giles stood up and began to pace. "Why would you be so foolish as to ever make a bet with Ethan? What were you thinking?"

Buffy glanced up at Giles and then laid her head down on her knees. Her voice was shaky. "I'm sorry."

"What are you sorry for, Buffy? I still don't understand. Did you kiss me to win a bet?"

"I tried to, in the club, but you kissed me first."

"So, did that make you lose the bet?"

Buffy's eyes filled with tears again. "No, you telling me I wasn't your type, no matter what I did, lost me the bet."

"Buffy, I thought you were a complete stranger and you were hanging around with Ethan. Of course you weren't my type."

Buffy's eyes flashed for a second. "That brunette sure seemed like your type. And she was a complete stranger."

"That was different. She was…"

Buffy's eyes flashed again. "What? Experienced? More experienced than boring old Buffy? More willing to have kinky sex with you?" She angrily brushed her tears away. "Which is not my fault. I can't help it that the guys I've been with all like boring sex. I didn't know there was all this other stuff to do and that you're supposed to like to do all that stuff. I thought only sluts did that kind of thing. How was I supposed to know that you liked all that stuff?"

Giles' jaw was hanging open. "Good Lord. What did Ethan tell you about me?"

"That you liked oral sex, and an…" Buffy was blushing a brilliant red and couldn't even finish that word. She switched to a slightly less embarrassing one, "…and vibrators. That you liked to watch dirty movies, and play games, and watch women masturbate and that you use feather dusters." Buffy covered her face with her hands.

Giles had to bite his lips to keep the hysterical laugh inside that was threatening to come out. Buffy wasn't done. She spoke from underneath her covered face. "And when you saw me, even when you didn't know me, you could just tell that I didn't know how to do any of that stuff, like I was a virgin or something and it made me not be your type." She looked up at him then. "Ethan said it would happen and it did. You totally blew me off."

Giles sat down next to her. "I'm sorry Buffy. I didn't mean to hurt you."

"Do you do all that stuff?"

Giles made a funny face. "Buffy, that list, while it may seem somewhat overwhelming to you is not what I consider kinky sex."

Buffy looked at him in horror. "You mean that stuff is all normal to you? And then you do kinky sex on top of that?" She moaned. "What's kinky sex then?" She covered her face with her hands again. "No, don't tell me, I don't want to know."

Giles started to laugh. He couldn't help it. "Buffy. You really need to calm down." He was certainly getting a crash course in her sex life tonight, or lack of sex life as the case may be.

Buffy stood up. "How can I calm down? I can't compete with that. I can't compete with women who do…bondage things or whip things. I've never even given a guy a blowjob. I mean, I tried once but…" Buffy blushed again and to cover herself she started to pace. "Maybe the guys I've been with have all thought that I was boring. Riley certainly didn't seem to care very much when I broke up with him tonight."

Giles' eyes widened. "You broke up with Riley?"

"How was I supposed to kiss Riley after that kiss you gave me? You made my knees turn to jelly. I couldn't see straight. You set my insides on fire. And then you left me and walked away." She paced to the other side of the room. "So, I go and kiss Riley. I figure I can kiss him the way you kissed me, the way I kissed you in the alley. But, nothing happened. All I wanted to do was kiss you. So I go and find you and I kiss you as hard as I can and then you go and push me off your lap." She stood right in front of him. "If I can't even kiss you right, how will I ever learn to do any of that other stuff so you'll want me? Ethan said you wouldn't want to teach me, that you like women who already know how to do this stuff. Are there books on it?" Buffy whined. "It's so not fair."

Giles was nonplussed. He stared at her for a second. Then he let out an astonished laugh and pulled Buffy down onto his lap. "So that kiss in the alley, it wasn't for a bet?"

Buffy shook her head and let out a sad sigh. "No, it was to make you want me."

Giles put his hands on the side of her face. "It did."

End of Part 4