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Oct. 19th, 2005 07:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elgrey Cheerleader Philosophy, Part Two
As always with David Nabbit, the party was a triumph. The food was melt in the mouth delicious. The guests all the kind of people Cordelia had used to dream about meeting. David himself was, as usual, sitting in a corner wearing a rumpled shirt, slacks and sneakers, nodding cheerfully to anyone who deigned to notice him. Cordelia noticed that a few people were polite enough to at least say ‘hello’ to him when they arrived, but most of them didn’t bother. When she thought about what a good guy David was, how unassuming and modest, how utterly sweet, how little he expected from life, she could briefly flirt with the idea of becoming his other half; buying him better clothes, tidying him up, banning him from playing Dungeons & Dragons for the foreseeable future; but then, once she was in conversation with him, the total lack of sparkage became too marked to ignore. All the same, that didn’t mean she couldn’t be kind to him, and she made a point of going over to talk to him, smiling brightly as if he’d just cracked some great joke, and nodding as if he were saying something truly fascinating. No one knew better than she did how a guy’s profile could be raised by being the object of interest from a beautiful woman, and, all false modesty aside, she was a beautiful woman. Of course, there was also the downside of the uncool guy dragging even a beautiful woman down to Loserville, as she’d found to her cost with Xander Harris, but when you really loved someone you did it anyway. Only to find him playing tonsil tennis with the red-headed geek-girl from Loserville’s less fashionable suburbs and ending up with a rebar through your torso.... And what was the point she’d been trying to make again? Oh yes, that it was an act of kindness on her part to talk to David Nabbit.
Looking across at the party she saw Wesley watching her and shaking his head, and knew that her motives for being kind to the nerd element were being completely misconstrued. Well, when that was the kind of response you got for being nice it was no wonder that she didn’t bother with it that often. She would have stuck out her tongue at Wesley, but, before she got the chance, a well-dressed man moved in smoothly and engaged him in conversation. The man seemed to be erudite and interesting, as Wesley looked relieved at having someone intelligent to talk to and even slowed his consumption of crab puffs a little.
“Are you going to tell me what exactly we’re doing here now?” Gunn demanded.
She started, snapped, “Creep up on people, much?” and then took him by the elbow and firmly steered him out of earshot of any other partygoers, giving David a beaming smile of farewell over her shoulder as she did so. Perhaps the lack-of-sparkage problem could never entirely be overcome but just in case she woke up one day and decided it wasn’t such an issue after all, she liked to stay on good terms with him. It wasn’t as if she knew that many eligible billionaires after all.
“I told you,” she hissed at him. “We’re networking.”
He adjusted his collar uncomfortably. “I feel like a waiter in this damned suit.”
“Well, you look kind of....” She took a step back and had to admit the truth. “Hot.”
He blinked at her in surprise. “What?”
She walked around him slowly and there was no escaping the truth. Charles Gunn looked very good in a tuxedo. It suited his height and broad shoulders and slim muscular build, and the combination of boyish good looks and toned body was pretty much a knock out punch to the hormones. “You look…hot. Like…doably hot. Not that I would want to.” She held up her hands at the thought. “But to someone who hasn’t held your coat for you while you vomit into the gutter after being vampire-sucker-punched in the...or helped wipe demon pus out of your ears I think you’d look like quite the catch.”
Gunn stopped glowering with attitude and did something remarkably close to preening, trying to catch sight of himself in the picture glass as he did so. Then he got an ‘ewww’ look on his face and put down the crab puff he’d been about to eat. “You had to mention demon pus now?”
“Yes, but not as loudly as you.” She glared at him as a wealthy woman who’d been giving him the once over turned away.
“How are we networking if we’re not allowed to mention what we do for a living?” he demanded.
“We’re...displaying our wares. Think of it like a marketplace. We’re letting people know what’s on offer, but we’re doing it in congenial surroundings and in pleasant company and with food that we’re not having to pay for.” The latter was no small consideration, as, if the human elements of Angel Investigations had a common belief that bound them together, it was that blood for vampires took a more than fair bite out of the household budget and left the rest of them with nothing like enough cash to spend on donuts. Thinking of that injustice, she snagged another crab puff for herself from a passing waiter.
Gunn was frowning at her in confusion. She would have told him to stop wrinkling his forehead in that unattractive manner if she would have thought it would have any impact on him but actually it made him look more cute than not, so she left him to it. “How exactly are we displaying our wares if we’re not telling people what our wares…are?”
Angel said quietly, “Our ability to kill demons doesn’t appear to be the ware that Cordelia is trying to sell.”
Cordelia would have jumped out of her skin, except two years of working with a brooding vampire had gotten her more used to the sneaky creature of the night creeping up on her schtick. She hit him on the arm anyway, just because. “Don’t lurk!”
“I walked across the room in full view of everyone,” Angel protested. “There was no lurking involved.”
“You can’t clear your throat before you butt into a conversation that doesn’t concern you?”
“But it does concern me,” he insisted. “Why are we here, Cordelia?”
“Networking,” she said again.
Angel was calmly implacable. “Why do guys keep hitting on Wesley?”
Her heart skipped a beat. “Has he noticed yet?”
“No.” Angel conceded the point with a shrug. “He just thinks everyone here is very friendly and surprisingly well read for a Hollywood party, but I’d be interested to know what you’re up to. Do we get auctioned off to the highest bidder at the end of the evening or do you already have a bill of sale for Wesley in your purse that you’re not telling us about yet?”
She hadn’t thought about auctioning. Her experience of being a lot at one particularly grisly ‘caller sale’ hadn’t exactly left her with a case of the warm fuzzies where auctions were concerned. But, come to think of it, those charity auctions where people offered their services were always high profile, and the bidding for her guys, if she could get them back into their tuxedos, would probably be pretty fast and furious. Of course, Angel could only be available for night work and nothing that involved him getting naked, but....
“Cordelia!” Angel used his sharp tone and she snapped back out of her reverie.
“No,” she said defensively. “No one is selling any of you. Not unless they cut off the telephone again and even then I would try to talk to the utilities people first.”
Gunn rolled his eyes. “You’re all heart.”
She took their elbows and pulled them into a corner where there was less chance of being overheard, before fixing Angel with her best ‘don’t mess with me’ face. “Look, Broody Boy, when you were off on your ‘let’s obsess about Darla like a big fat loser’ kick, we were in serious financial difficulties.”
“I’m not fat,” Angel protested.
She ignored him with the skill of long practice. “The only reason we weren’t having to panhandle for nickels on a street corner was because of Wesley knowing Virginia, who got us lots of paid work through her wealthy friends. All I’m saying is that even if you’re literally a dead loss in the dating stakes there’s no reason why Gunn and Wesley couldn’t be doing their bit for Angel Investigations by....”
“Shaking our booty at some society party in the hope that wealthy women will want to use us as their boy toys?” Gunn demanded.
“Do you remember Wesley screaming ‘save me from the beautiful wealthy woman’ when Virginia was sticking her tongue in his ear?”
Angel and Gunn both pulled ‘ewww’ faces. “That was a visual I didn’t need,” Angel admitted.
“Wesley’s – sex life not something I want to think about. Ever,” Gunn assured her.
She rolled her eyes. “Look, the two of you need to pull your weight more and you need to be proactive about getting us more clientele. At the moment you’re just – unrealised assets.”
Gunn stared at her in disbelief. “We go out every damned day and risk our necks fighting demons in sewers and Miss Stay At Home & Wait For The Visions To Come Along says we’re not pulling our weight because we don’t happen to be dating society hostesses every spare minute?”
Cordelia thought about his words and then nodded. “Yep, that’s pretty much it.”
Angel sighed heavily. “Cordelia, much as I love you, I don’t think you can really justify....”
“All I’m trying to do is get Gunn and Wesley dates!” she protested. “How is that a bad thing? Do you want them to remain pathetic saddoes forever? They spend every evening when they’re not getting up close and personal with the demon poop playing Risk. And they’re not even very good at that.”
“Are you nuts?” Gunn glared at her indignantly. “I rock at Risk.”
“Your lives suck,” she informed him helpfully. “I’m just trying to make them less sucky. Or sucky in the right kind of way if you get my – ”
Gunn and Angel were both warding her off again as if she was the vampire and they wished they had crucifixes. “Enough with the sex talk!” Gunn pleaded.
“If I’m a dead loss in the dating stakes, why am I here?” Angel added. “You know I hate these kind of things. Is this still payback?”
“No. You’re here because you look good in a tuxedo and...” She mumbled the last bit through a crab puff to make it less distinct, “…you may need to play the jealous boyfriend if Wesley has too much to drink and the wrong potential client invites him home to look at his sacred scrolls....”
Angel folded his arms. “Would you like to run that past me again, Cordelia? Without the crab puff filter?”
She rolled her eyes. “Is it my fault that Wesley has across the board appeal? Who hasn’t assumed he’s gay on a first meeting?”
“Well, you, as I recall,” Angel returned grimly. “You were too busy panting over his accent to think about anything except how he’d look out of that Watcher suit.”
Gunn’s jaw actually dropped. She wasn’t sure that it didn’t bruise his shoes. She glowered at him. “Hey, I was young.”
“It was only two years ago,” Angel pointed out. “According to Buffy, the first time you saw Wesley you practically....”
“Oh, Buffy – Miss Worst Taste in Boyfriends Ever – what does she know?” Cordelia countered quickly. “I’m not denying that I may have been temporarily dazzled by Wesley’s surface glamour....”
Angel was relentless. “She said you tried to sit on his lap while he was standing up. And I heard and resent that Worst Taste in Boyfriends remark by the way.”
Gunn was gazing at Wesley with renewed respect. “Wes has surface glamour?” He put his head on one side as if that would somehow make this invisible element come into focus. “Was there a memo about that because I definitely missed it?”
“Hey, I’d just come off dating Xander. I wasn’t feeling any too choosy back then.” Realizing she was coming dangerously close to snarling, Cordelia took a deep breath. “We’ve wandered off the point, which is....”
“Which is that we’re demon killers not gigolos,” Angel reminded her. “And, I don’t care how many donuts you offer him to do it, I don’t see Wesley selling himself to the highest bidder just to keep you in shoes. And, whatever signals he may unconsciously give off, at no other party we’ve attended have the single white males been all over him like they are tonight, so...?”
“They haven’t all been white,” she pointed out brightly. “And I think some of them are actually still in relationships.”
Gunn fixed her with his best tough guy stare. “What have you been telling people about us?”
“I’m just trying to ensure that we reach every demographic!” she protested. “Can you two stop being so uptight and judgemental for five minutes? I told David you three needed to get out more and I’d really appreciate it if he could ensure there was a good cross-section of society here to meet you, that’s all.”
“And...?” Angel pressed relentlessly.
“Well, a lot of society people already know about Wesley breaking up with Virginia.”
“And...?” Gunn demanded.
“And it may be that I gave the impression that they broke up for reasons other than her freaking about him being shot by a zombie policeman. But, when you think about it, how likely is it that someone is going to get shot by a zombie policeman anyway? I was really just giving people a reality that is easier for them to grasp.”
“This particular reality being...?” Angel prompted.
“I made it clear that it was a rebound thing for him. I think I used the words ‘confused’ and ‘experimenting’....”
Angel looked at her in disbelief. “You didn’t?”
“It doesn’t mean he’s not still heartbroken and in need of comforting. In fact twice as much in need of comforting when you come to think about it.”
Gunn gazed at her as if she had done a Very Bad Thing, which she so hadn’t. “Which one of us exactly did he rebound onto? Or...under? Or...let’s not even go there.”
“Well, not you, obviously. You actually can date rich society women without any danger of you turning evil and trying to kill them. Like I was going to throw you away on Wesley.”
Angel was now also looking at her as if she’d done a Very Bad Thing. “So, not only did I apparently take advantage of Wesley’s ‘confusion’ to cause a break up with Virginia I then - what...? I presume he has to be broken hearted but unattached for your evil scheme to work?”
“You have commitment issues.” She held up her hands in supplication. “Which, let’s face it, you do.”
Gunn gazed at Angel in mock-reproach. “Man, that was low. Toying with Wes’s affections like that? And after he broke up with Virginia over you, too.”
“Don’t you start,” Angel warned him. “Cordelia, this isn’t funny. You can’t just make up things like this.”
“Where’s the harm?” she countered. “It’s a teeny weeny fib to make your company more congenial to a broader spectrum of potential clients. It’s not like I’m offering you for sale on eBay. And how do we know that one of those nice wealthy guys currently talking to Wesley about boring old books isn’t The One for him?”
“Because he isn’t gay?” Gunn suggested.
“You are so closed-minded. Maybe Wes just thinks he’s straight because it’s never occurred to him to date anyone except women. Maybe unbeknown to anyone he’s actually been waiting for Mr Right. I could be helping him to a whole new chapter of self-discovery.”
They all looked across at Wesley, who was now in earnest conversation with the good-looking forty-something guy from the restaurant. He looked very unstressed and was still eating crab puffs, although at a slightly slower rate than his starving wolverine act of the first ten minutes of the party.
“That’s Mr Right?” Angel queried.
Gunn put his head on one side. “I thought he’d be taller.”
Cordelia held out her hands. “The point is – Wesley’s having a nice time. And he’s actually networking. Which is what you two should be doing if you weren’t too busy annoying me with your petty little gripes.” She flapped her hands at them. “Go! Circulate. Gunn – look available to rich society women who only want you for your body. Angel – don’t brood.”
“How is this helping the helpless?” Angel demanded.
She jerked her head contemptuously at Gunn and Wesley. “Do you know any two people less likely to get a date this century without help from me? They are the helpless.” As they continued to stare at her with that indignant look on their faces, she gave them both a not so gentle shove. “Go! Smile! Mingle!”
They went, still grumbling, but she noticed that Gunn didn’t exactly look broken-hearted when a beautiful brunette moved in on him, while Angel did wander over to where Wesley was still deep in conversation with the good-looking forty-something guy, presumably to play the part of chaperone.
“...Yes, of course, we could take a look at it. I’d be happy to check the provenance of any demon scrolls that may have come into your possession. The Faulkner Auction, you say? I would have loved to attend but unfortunately most of the lots were somewhat out of my budget....”
Angel was relieved to find Wesley talking so intently about something that certainly did sound work-related. The man he was talking to was beautifully dressed and everything from his exfoliated skin to manicured hands suggested that money was not a problem. He was handsome, with dark hair greying only slightly at the temples, and spoke quietly, his gaze intent as he looked at Wesley.
“So you’ll help me?”
Wesley nodded. “Certainly.”
“Perhaps we could make an appointment now for you to come over and look at my scroll?”
Thinking of Cordelia’s words, Angel felt that was probably his cue, and cleared his throat, trying to catch Wesley’s eye so the Englishman would notice he was there.
But Wesley nodded at once. “Of course. Would Monday suit you? I’m free all afternoon.”
Angel cleared his throat more loudly and Wesley looked at him in surprise. “Oh, Angel, I didn’t see you there.” He turned back to the well-dressed man. “Felix Raymer, this is Angel, one of my associates.”
Raymer immediately held out a hand and Angel shook it while trying to assess the man. He didn’t believe for a minute that his demonic scroll would have been so urgently in need of a translation if he hadn’t been told by David Nabbit that Wesley would be the guy translating it, but he certainly didn’t seem to be any kind of threat.
“I’m very grateful that your agency is willing to take on the job,” he told Angel. His glance transferred to Wesley and there was humour and liking and just a hint of regret. “Perhaps some of the information I was given about you wasn’t strictly accurate but I’m pleased to see that the important things are.”
Wesley smiled back. “We’ll do our best to help, I promise.”
“Here’s my card with my private address. I’ll clear all my other appointments for Monday afternoon and see you then. Goodnight, Wesley.”
“Goodnight, Felix.”
As he went off, Angel raised an enquiring eyebrow at Wesley. “So, is he…?”
Cordelia was there in double quick time, demanding breathlessly. “Is he a client?”
Wesley regarded her levelly. “Yes, he recognized me in the restaurant as someone whose picture he’d seen in the society pages with Virginia and remembered that the agency I was involved with dealt with matters of the paranormal and unusual.”
“Oh.” Her face fell as she evidently realized that her scheming had played no part in securing this business for them.
“I think I’ll head home and make a start on finding the necessary reference books. It’s probably not a particularly urgent matter but better to be safe than sorry. Will you and Gunn be all right...networking here?”
Still a little downcast, she nodded. “Yes, of course, and hey, a client is a client, right? However he heard of us. See if you can get him to put you on retainer or at least pay an advance.”
As she went off to tell Gunn, Angel raised his eyebrow at Wesley. “So, there wasn’t any other reason he came here tonight then? Didn’t want you for anything except your...paranormal experience?”
Wesley waited until Cordelia was definitely out of earshot before saying conversationally: “Do you want Cordelia to think that her current strategy is one likely to successfully garner us new clients? Or would you like us to be able to cling onto the last ragged remnants of our self respect?”
Angel nodded. “Good point.” Curious now though, he added: “So he did come onto you?”
Wesley shrugged. “He politely enquired. I politely declined. It’s really not an issue.”
“It didn’t bother you?” Angel was surprised although he wasn’t sure why. He supposed he thought he knew everything there was to know about Wesley but the guy was still capable of surprising him.
“Really, Angel. I went to an all male boarding school followed by an all male Watchers’ Academy. I have had a little experience in telling people that I’m sorry but I’m not interested.” There was a pause before Wesley added honestly: “Actually, that’s pretty much all the experience of being at an all male boarding school and an all male Watchers’ Academy gets you, romantically speaking, which is why people from my background tend to be a little slow out of the starting blocks when it comes to knowing how to court women.”
“Oh.” Angel felt slightly nonplussed. “You can...do that then? At those boarding schools? Just say ‘thanks but no thanks’?”
Wesley looked at him as if he were mentally challenged. “It was a respectable academic institution, not Borstal. Where do you people get your ideas about our education system anyway?”
“I just thought....” He shrugged awkwardly. “I mean I read ‘Tom Brown’s Schooldays’, I just assumed there would be a lot of bullying and buggery going on....”
“I don’t even know why they keep reprinting that book. Haven’t you heard of ‘Harry Potter’? In my experience it’s a much more accurate depiction of English boarding school life. Except for the unisex aspect and the Quidditch, obviously. We preferred cricket – and magical assistance in field sports was frowned upon. Although there was a mild scandal involving the captain of the first eleven using the occult to add a little extra zip to his googly as I recall.”
“I know I don’t want to know what you’re talking about right now,” Gunn observed. “Her Snippiness says you’re heading off to work on a case. Do you need any extra muscle because I really don’t want to be stuck here with her?”
“Why, what’s wrong with her?” Angel looked across at Cordelia in concern.
Gunn shrugged. “She’s sulking because her best laid plans didn’t work out the way she hoped and because all the good looking guys at the party have been talking to Wes instead of her. And she forgot to tell David Nabbit to invite any straight men and apparently none of us complimented her on her dress or her hair. Like we’re supposed to know we’re meant to keep telling her stuff like that.”
Wesley winced. “She tells us often enough, we really ought to know by now, and she does have to bear the not inconsiderable burden of the visions by herself.”
Angel admitted a little shame-facedly, “Actually, I got a case too. Some guy wants me to exorcise his garage. He thinks he may have a case of Spelaeum Imp infestation. I don’t think he minds them manifesting trans-dimensionally and opening wormholes into hell-pockets so much as the way they’re peeing on his Morgan.”
Wesley blinked. “The anguished wailing of the damned filtering in through the wormholes isn’t troubling him?”
“No, he just thought that was something he was picking up through his fillings. Apparently he gets KXTA all the time.”
Gunn waved to a curvaceous brunette who was waving at him, his face briefly assuming the idiotic expression of men everywhere in the first throes of attraction. He turned back to them looking more like himself. “I got a date. I mean – she said her aunt’s house has a poltergeist but she seemed more interested in knowing if I’m single and what I like to eat for dinner than telling me about the poltergeist. What about you?”
Wesley sighed. “Demonic scroll translation.”
“Gay guy?”
“Yes.”
“Came onto you?”
“Yes, but it’s not a problem.”
“If it’s Felix Raymer he’s rolling in it, so you may want to reconsider the not dating him part.”
“Don’t you start,” Wesley warned him.
“I’m just saying, the guy’s supposed to have this reference library like no one else and he’s so rich he makes Donald Trump look like he’s on welfare.”
Wesley had a far away look in his eyes as he clearly sorted through his encyclopaedic memory. “Reference library? The Raymer Reference Library? Good Lord, that’s the only private library in the world that has a complete set of the Grimorium Grimoires. The Watchers’ Council have been trying to get old man Raymer to sell it to them for decades. What I wouldn’t give to take a look at....”
Angel raised an eyebrow at him. “Well, what would you give?”
Wesley returned his gaze without a flicker of shame. “None of your business. But I think I’ll go and make a start on those reference books right now. You’ll chaperone Cordelia, Gunn?”
Gunn’s gave the curvaceous brunette another little wave. “I was hoping to go home with Susan.”
“Far be it from to tell you how to conduct your personal life but I wouldn’t give her any free…advice on poltergeists until she’s paid you for your services in the matter of her aunt’s haunting.” Wesley held his gaze.
Angel nodded. “Don’t give it up until she’s signed the check.”
Gunn grimaced. “Now, I’m feeling like a gigolo again. You two are really spoiling the magic.”
Angel picked a long blonde hair from Wesley’s sleeve and dropped it on the carpet. “Are we going to tell Cordelia that her strategy…?”
“Got us more clients in an hour than we usually manage in a week?” Wesley countered. “No, I don’t think so. Do you? I do however think that we owe her one. She may have got us here under false pretences and she may have been pimping us to complete strangers for the entire evening but it will also be down to her creative advertising if we all eat this month.” Decisively, he said: “Gunn, you go and dance with Cordelia and remember to tell her how wonderful she is. Then escort her home and make a big fuss of her. Angel, you go and distract Gunn’s client and get her to tell you more about this poltergeist. Tomorrow you can take Cordelia out to dinner and thank her for being her.”
“And your part in the Let’s Be Nice to Cordelia Plan would be…?” Gunn prompted.
Wesley adjusted his collar and headed purposefully for his reference books. “My not informing her of what I think of her for telling everyone that Angel dumped me for a bus boy from Reseda....”
The End
As always with David Nabbit, the party was a triumph. The food was melt in the mouth delicious. The guests all the kind of people Cordelia had used to dream about meeting. David himself was, as usual, sitting in a corner wearing a rumpled shirt, slacks and sneakers, nodding cheerfully to anyone who deigned to notice him. Cordelia noticed that a few people were polite enough to at least say ‘hello’ to him when they arrived, but most of them didn’t bother. When she thought about what a good guy David was, how unassuming and modest, how utterly sweet, how little he expected from life, she could briefly flirt with the idea of becoming his other half; buying him better clothes, tidying him up, banning him from playing Dungeons & Dragons for the foreseeable future; but then, once she was in conversation with him, the total lack of sparkage became too marked to ignore. All the same, that didn’t mean she couldn’t be kind to him, and she made a point of going over to talk to him, smiling brightly as if he’d just cracked some great joke, and nodding as if he were saying something truly fascinating. No one knew better than she did how a guy’s profile could be raised by being the object of interest from a beautiful woman, and, all false modesty aside, she was a beautiful woman. Of course, there was also the downside of the uncool guy dragging even a beautiful woman down to Loserville, as she’d found to her cost with Xander Harris, but when you really loved someone you did it anyway. Only to find him playing tonsil tennis with the red-headed geek-girl from Loserville’s less fashionable suburbs and ending up with a rebar through your torso.... And what was the point she’d been trying to make again? Oh yes, that it was an act of kindness on her part to talk to David Nabbit.
Looking across at the party she saw Wesley watching her and shaking his head, and knew that her motives for being kind to the nerd element were being completely misconstrued. Well, when that was the kind of response you got for being nice it was no wonder that she didn’t bother with it that often. She would have stuck out her tongue at Wesley, but, before she got the chance, a well-dressed man moved in smoothly and engaged him in conversation. The man seemed to be erudite and interesting, as Wesley looked relieved at having someone intelligent to talk to and even slowed his consumption of crab puffs a little.
“Are you going to tell me what exactly we’re doing here now?” Gunn demanded.
She started, snapped, “Creep up on people, much?” and then took him by the elbow and firmly steered him out of earshot of any other partygoers, giving David a beaming smile of farewell over her shoulder as she did so. Perhaps the lack-of-sparkage problem could never entirely be overcome but just in case she woke up one day and decided it wasn’t such an issue after all, she liked to stay on good terms with him. It wasn’t as if she knew that many eligible billionaires after all.
“I told you,” she hissed at him. “We’re networking.”
He adjusted his collar uncomfortably. “I feel like a waiter in this damned suit.”
“Well, you look kind of....” She took a step back and had to admit the truth. “Hot.”
He blinked at her in surprise. “What?”
She walked around him slowly and there was no escaping the truth. Charles Gunn looked very good in a tuxedo. It suited his height and broad shoulders and slim muscular build, and the combination of boyish good looks and toned body was pretty much a knock out punch to the hormones. “You look…hot. Like…doably hot. Not that I would want to.” She held up her hands at the thought. “But to someone who hasn’t held your coat for you while you vomit into the gutter after being vampire-sucker-punched in the...or helped wipe demon pus out of your ears I think you’d look like quite the catch.”
Gunn stopped glowering with attitude and did something remarkably close to preening, trying to catch sight of himself in the picture glass as he did so. Then he got an ‘ewww’ look on his face and put down the crab puff he’d been about to eat. “You had to mention demon pus now?”
“Yes, but not as loudly as you.” She glared at him as a wealthy woman who’d been giving him the once over turned away.
“How are we networking if we’re not allowed to mention what we do for a living?” he demanded.
“We’re...displaying our wares. Think of it like a marketplace. We’re letting people know what’s on offer, but we’re doing it in congenial surroundings and in pleasant company and with food that we’re not having to pay for.” The latter was no small consideration, as, if the human elements of Angel Investigations had a common belief that bound them together, it was that blood for vampires took a more than fair bite out of the household budget and left the rest of them with nothing like enough cash to spend on donuts. Thinking of that injustice, she snagged another crab puff for herself from a passing waiter.
Gunn was frowning at her in confusion. She would have told him to stop wrinkling his forehead in that unattractive manner if she would have thought it would have any impact on him but actually it made him look more cute than not, so she left him to it. “How exactly are we displaying our wares if we’re not telling people what our wares…are?”
Angel said quietly, “Our ability to kill demons doesn’t appear to be the ware that Cordelia is trying to sell.”
Cordelia would have jumped out of her skin, except two years of working with a brooding vampire had gotten her more used to the sneaky creature of the night creeping up on her schtick. She hit him on the arm anyway, just because. “Don’t lurk!”
“I walked across the room in full view of everyone,” Angel protested. “There was no lurking involved.”
“You can’t clear your throat before you butt into a conversation that doesn’t concern you?”
“But it does concern me,” he insisted. “Why are we here, Cordelia?”
“Networking,” she said again.
Angel was calmly implacable. “Why do guys keep hitting on Wesley?”
Her heart skipped a beat. “Has he noticed yet?”
“No.” Angel conceded the point with a shrug. “He just thinks everyone here is very friendly and surprisingly well read for a Hollywood party, but I’d be interested to know what you’re up to. Do we get auctioned off to the highest bidder at the end of the evening or do you already have a bill of sale for Wesley in your purse that you’re not telling us about yet?”
She hadn’t thought about auctioning. Her experience of being a lot at one particularly grisly ‘caller sale’ hadn’t exactly left her with a case of the warm fuzzies where auctions were concerned. But, come to think of it, those charity auctions where people offered their services were always high profile, and the bidding for her guys, if she could get them back into their tuxedos, would probably be pretty fast and furious. Of course, Angel could only be available for night work and nothing that involved him getting naked, but....
“Cordelia!” Angel used his sharp tone and she snapped back out of her reverie.
“No,” she said defensively. “No one is selling any of you. Not unless they cut off the telephone again and even then I would try to talk to the utilities people first.”
Gunn rolled his eyes. “You’re all heart.”
She took their elbows and pulled them into a corner where there was less chance of being overheard, before fixing Angel with her best ‘don’t mess with me’ face. “Look, Broody Boy, when you were off on your ‘let’s obsess about Darla like a big fat loser’ kick, we were in serious financial difficulties.”
“I’m not fat,” Angel protested.
She ignored him with the skill of long practice. “The only reason we weren’t having to panhandle for nickels on a street corner was because of Wesley knowing Virginia, who got us lots of paid work through her wealthy friends. All I’m saying is that even if you’re literally a dead loss in the dating stakes there’s no reason why Gunn and Wesley couldn’t be doing their bit for Angel Investigations by....”
“Shaking our booty at some society party in the hope that wealthy women will want to use us as their boy toys?” Gunn demanded.
“Do you remember Wesley screaming ‘save me from the beautiful wealthy woman’ when Virginia was sticking her tongue in his ear?”
Angel and Gunn both pulled ‘ewww’ faces. “That was a visual I didn’t need,” Angel admitted.
“Wesley’s – sex life not something I want to think about. Ever,” Gunn assured her.
She rolled her eyes. “Look, the two of you need to pull your weight more and you need to be proactive about getting us more clientele. At the moment you’re just – unrealised assets.”
Gunn stared at her in disbelief. “We go out every damned day and risk our necks fighting demons in sewers and Miss Stay At Home & Wait For The Visions To Come Along says we’re not pulling our weight because we don’t happen to be dating society hostesses every spare minute?”
Cordelia thought about his words and then nodded. “Yep, that’s pretty much it.”
Angel sighed heavily. “Cordelia, much as I love you, I don’t think you can really justify....”
“All I’m trying to do is get Gunn and Wesley dates!” she protested. “How is that a bad thing? Do you want them to remain pathetic saddoes forever? They spend every evening when they’re not getting up close and personal with the demon poop playing Risk. And they’re not even very good at that.”
“Are you nuts?” Gunn glared at her indignantly. “I rock at Risk.”
“Your lives suck,” she informed him helpfully. “I’m just trying to make them less sucky. Or sucky in the right kind of way if you get my – ”
Gunn and Angel were both warding her off again as if she was the vampire and they wished they had crucifixes. “Enough with the sex talk!” Gunn pleaded.
“If I’m a dead loss in the dating stakes, why am I here?” Angel added. “You know I hate these kind of things. Is this still payback?”
“No. You’re here because you look good in a tuxedo and...” She mumbled the last bit through a crab puff to make it less distinct, “…you may need to play the jealous boyfriend if Wesley has too much to drink and the wrong potential client invites him home to look at his sacred scrolls....”
Angel folded his arms. “Would you like to run that past me again, Cordelia? Without the crab puff filter?”
She rolled her eyes. “Is it my fault that Wesley has across the board appeal? Who hasn’t assumed he’s gay on a first meeting?”
“Well, you, as I recall,” Angel returned grimly. “You were too busy panting over his accent to think about anything except how he’d look out of that Watcher suit.”
Gunn’s jaw actually dropped. She wasn’t sure that it didn’t bruise his shoes. She glowered at him. “Hey, I was young.”
“It was only two years ago,” Angel pointed out. “According to Buffy, the first time you saw Wesley you practically....”
“Oh, Buffy – Miss Worst Taste in Boyfriends Ever – what does she know?” Cordelia countered quickly. “I’m not denying that I may have been temporarily dazzled by Wesley’s surface glamour....”
Angel was relentless. “She said you tried to sit on his lap while he was standing up. And I heard and resent that Worst Taste in Boyfriends remark by the way.”
Gunn was gazing at Wesley with renewed respect. “Wes has surface glamour?” He put his head on one side as if that would somehow make this invisible element come into focus. “Was there a memo about that because I definitely missed it?”
“Hey, I’d just come off dating Xander. I wasn’t feeling any too choosy back then.” Realizing she was coming dangerously close to snarling, Cordelia took a deep breath. “We’ve wandered off the point, which is....”
“Which is that we’re demon killers not gigolos,” Angel reminded her. “And, I don’t care how many donuts you offer him to do it, I don’t see Wesley selling himself to the highest bidder just to keep you in shoes. And, whatever signals he may unconsciously give off, at no other party we’ve attended have the single white males been all over him like they are tonight, so...?”
“They haven’t all been white,” she pointed out brightly. “And I think some of them are actually still in relationships.”
Gunn fixed her with his best tough guy stare. “What have you been telling people about us?”
“I’m just trying to ensure that we reach every demographic!” she protested. “Can you two stop being so uptight and judgemental for five minutes? I told David you three needed to get out more and I’d really appreciate it if he could ensure there was a good cross-section of society here to meet you, that’s all.”
“And...?” Angel pressed relentlessly.
“Well, a lot of society people already know about Wesley breaking up with Virginia.”
“And...?” Gunn demanded.
“And it may be that I gave the impression that they broke up for reasons other than her freaking about him being shot by a zombie policeman. But, when you think about it, how likely is it that someone is going to get shot by a zombie policeman anyway? I was really just giving people a reality that is easier for them to grasp.”
“This particular reality being...?” Angel prompted.
“I made it clear that it was a rebound thing for him. I think I used the words ‘confused’ and ‘experimenting’....”
Angel looked at her in disbelief. “You didn’t?”
“It doesn’t mean he’s not still heartbroken and in need of comforting. In fact twice as much in need of comforting when you come to think about it.”
Gunn gazed at her as if she had done a Very Bad Thing, which she so hadn’t. “Which one of us exactly did he rebound onto? Or...under? Or...let’s not even go there.”
“Well, not you, obviously. You actually can date rich society women without any danger of you turning evil and trying to kill them. Like I was going to throw you away on Wesley.”
Angel was now also looking at her as if she’d done a Very Bad Thing. “So, not only did I apparently take advantage of Wesley’s ‘confusion’ to cause a break up with Virginia I then - what...? I presume he has to be broken hearted but unattached for your evil scheme to work?”
“You have commitment issues.” She held up her hands in supplication. “Which, let’s face it, you do.”
Gunn gazed at Angel in mock-reproach. “Man, that was low. Toying with Wes’s affections like that? And after he broke up with Virginia over you, too.”
“Don’t you start,” Angel warned him. “Cordelia, this isn’t funny. You can’t just make up things like this.”
“Where’s the harm?” she countered. “It’s a teeny weeny fib to make your company more congenial to a broader spectrum of potential clients. It’s not like I’m offering you for sale on eBay. And how do we know that one of those nice wealthy guys currently talking to Wesley about boring old books isn’t The One for him?”
“Because he isn’t gay?” Gunn suggested.
“You are so closed-minded. Maybe Wes just thinks he’s straight because it’s never occurred to him to date anyone except women. Maybe unbeknown to anyone he’s actually been waiting for Mr Right. I could be helping him to a whole new chapter of self-discovery.”
They all looked across at Wesley, who was now in earnest conversation with the good-looking forty-something guy from the restaurant. He looked very unstressed and was still eating crab puffs, although at a slightly slower rate than his starving wolverine act of the first ten minutes of the party.
“That’s Mr Right?” Angel queried.
Gunn put his head on one side. “I thought he’d be taller.”
Cordelia held out her hands. “The point is – Wesley’s having a nice time. And he’s actually networking. Which is what you two should be doing if you weren’t too busy annoying me with your petty little gripes.” She flapped her hands at them. “Go! Circulate. Gunn – look available to rich society women who only want you for your body. Angel – don’t brood.”
“How is this helping the helpless?” Angel demanded.
She jerked her head contemptuously at Gunn and Wesley. “Do you know any two people less likely to get a date this century without help from me? They are the helpless.” As they continued to stare at her with that indignant look on their faces, she gave them both a not so gentle shove. “Go! Smile! Mingle!”
They went, still grumbling, but she noticed that Gunn didn’t exactly look broken-hearted when a beautiful brunette moved in on him, while Angel did wander over to where Wesley was still deep in conversation with the good-looking forty-something guy, presumably to play the part of chaperone.
“...Yes, of course, we could take a look at it. I’d be happy to check the provenance of any demon scrolls that may have come into your possession. The Faulkner Auction, you say? I would have loved to attend but unfortunately most of the lots were somewhat out of my budget....”
Angel was relieved to find Wesley talking so intently about something that certainly did sound work-related. The man he was talking to was beautifully dressed and everything from his exfoliated skin to manicured hands suggested that money was not a problem. He was handsome, with dark hair greying only slightly at the temples, and spoke quietly, his gaze intent as he looked at Wesley.
“So you’ll help me?”
Wesley nodded. “Certainly.”
“Perhaps we could make an appointment now for you to come over and look at my scroll?”
Thinking of Cordelia’s words, Angel felt that was probably his cue, and cleared his throat, trying to catch Wesley’s eye so the Englishman would notice he was there.
But Wesley nodded at once. “Of course. Would Monday suit you? I’m free all afternoon.”
Angel cleared his throat more loudly and Wesley looked at him in surprise. “Oh, Angel, I didn’t see you there.” He turned back to the well-dressed man. “Felix Raymer, this is Angel, one of my associates.”
Raymer immediately held out a hand and Angel shook it while trying to assess the man. He didn’t believe for a minute that his demonic scroll would have been so urgently in need of a translation if he hadn’t been told by David Nabbit that Wesley would be the guy translating it, but he certainly didn’t seem to be any kind of threat.
“I’m very grateful that your agency is willing to take on the job,” he told Angel. His glance transferred to Wesley and there was humour and liking and just a hint of regret. “Perhaps some of the information I was given about you wasn’t strictly accurate but I’m pleased to see that the important things are.”
Wesley smiled back. “We’ll do our best to help, I promise.”
“Here’s my card with my private address. I’ll clear all my other appointments for Monday afternoon and see you then. Goodnight, Wesley.”
“Goodnight, Felix.”
As he went off, Angel raised an enquiring eyebrow at Wesley. “So, is he…?”
Cordelia was there in double quick time, demanding breathlessly. “Is he a client?”
Wesley regarded her levelly. “Yes, he recognized me in the restaurant as someone whose picture he’d seen in the society pages with Virginia and remembered that the agency I was involved with dealt with matters of the paranormal and unusual.”
“Oh.” Her face fell as she evidently realized that her scheming had played no part in securing this business for them.
“I think I’ll head home and make a start on finding the necessary reference books. It’s probably not a particularly urgent matter but better to be safe than sorry. Will you and Gunn be all right...networking here?”
Still a little downcast, she nodded. “Yes, of course, and hey, a client is a client, right? However he heard of us. See if you can get him to put you on retainer or at least pay an advance.”
As she went off to tell Gunn, Angel raised his eyebrow at Wesley. “So, there wasn’t any other reason he came here tonight then? Didn’t want you for anything except your...paranormal experience?”
Wesley waited until Cordelia was definitely out of earshot before saying conversationally: “Do you want Cordelia to think that her current strategy is one likely to successfully garner us new clients? Or would you like us to be able to cling onto the last ragged remnants of our self respect?”
Angel nodded. “Good point.” Curious now though, he added: “So he did come onto you?”
Wesley shrugged. “He politely enquired. I politely declined. It’s really not an issue.”
“It didn’t bother you?” Angel was surprised although he wasn’t sure why. He supposed he thought he knew everything there was to know about Wesley but the guy was still capable of surprising him.
“Really, Angel. I went to an all male boarding school followed by an all male Watchers’ Academy. I have had a little experience in telling people that I’m sorry but I’m not interested.” There was a pause before Wesley added honestly: “Actually, that’s pretty much all the experience of being at an all male boarding school and an all male Watchers’ Academy gets you, romantically speaking, which is why people from my background tend to be a little slow out of the starting blocks when it comes to knowing how to court women.”
“Oh.” Angel felt slightly nonplussed. “You can...do that then? At those boarding schools? Just say ‘thanks but no thanks’?”
Wesley looked at him as if he were mentally challenged. “It was a respectable academic institution, not Borstal. Where do you people get your ideas about our education system anyway?”
“I just thought....” He shrugged awkwardly. “I mean I read ‘Tom Brown’s Schooldays’, I just assumed there would be a lot of bullying and buggery going on....”
“I don’t even know why they keep reprinting that book. Haven’t you heard of ‘Harry Potter’? In my experience it’s a much more accurate depiction of English boarding school life. Except for the unisex aspect and the Quidditch, obviously. We preferred cricket – and magical assistance in field sports was frowned upon. Although there was a mild scandal involving the captain of the first eleven using the occult to add a little extra zip to his googly as I recall.”
“I know I don’t want to know what you’re talking about right now,” Gunn observed. “Her Snippiness says you’re heading off to work on a case. Do you need any extra muscle because I really don’t want to be stuck here with her?”
“Why, what’s wrong with her?” Angel looked across at Cordelia in concern.
Gunn shrugged. “She’s sulking because her best laid plans didn’t work out the way she hoped and because all the good looking guys at the party have been talking to Wes instead of her. And she forgot to tell David Nabbit to invite any straight men and apparently none of us complimented her on her dress or her hair. Like we’re supposed to know we’re meant to keep telling her stuff like that.”
Wesley winced. “She tells us often enough, we really ought to know by now, and she does have to bear the not inconsiderable burden of the visions by herself.”
Angel admitted a little shame-facedly, “Actually, I got a case too. Some guy wants me to exorcise his garage. He thinks he may have a case of Spelaeum Imp infestation. I don’t think he minds them manifesting trans-dimensionally and opening wormholes into hell-pockets so much as the way they’re peeing on his Morgan.”
Wesley blinked. “The anguished wailing of the damned filtering in through the wormholes isn’t troubling him?”
“No, he just thought that was something he was picking up through his fillings. Apparently he gets KXTA all the time.”
Gunn waved to a curvaceous brunette who was waving at him, his face briefly assuming the idiotic expression of men everywhere in the first throes of attraction. He turned back to them looking more like himself. “I got a date. I mean – she said her aunt’s house has a poltergeist but she seemed more interested in knowing if I’m single and what I like to eat for dinner than telling me about the poltergeist. What about you?”
Wesley sighed. “Demonic scroll translation.”
“Gay guy?”
“Yes.”
“Came onto you?”
“Yes, but it’s not a problem.”
“If it’s Felix Raymer he’s rolling in it, so you may want to reconsider the not dating him part.”
“Don’t you start,” Wesley warned him.
“I’m just saying, the guy’s supposed to have this reference library like no one else and he’s so rich he makes Donald Trump look like he’s on welfare.”
Wesley had a far away look in his eyes as he clearly sorted through his encyclopaedic memory. “Reference library? The Raymer Reference Library? Good Lord, that’s the only private library in the world that has a complete set of the Grimorium Grimoires. The Watchers’ Council have been trying to get old man Raymer to sell it to them for decades. What I wouldn’t give to take a look at....”
Angel raised an eyebrow at him. “Well, what would you give?”
Wesley returned his gaze without a flicker of shame. “None of your business. But I think I’ll go and make a start on those reference books right now. You’ll chaperone Cordelia, Gunn?”
Gunn’s gave the curvaceous brunette another little wave. “I was hoping to go home with Susan.”
“Far be it from to tell you how to conduct your personal life but I wouldn’t give her any free…advice on poltergeists until she’s paid you for your services in the matter of her aunt’s haunting.” Wesley held his gaze.
Angel nodded. “Don’t give it up until she’s signed the check.”
Gunn grimaced. “Now, I’m feeling like a gigolo again. You two are really spoiling the magic.”
Angel picked a long blonde hair from Wesley’s sleeve and dropped it on the carpet. “Are we going to tell Cordelia that her strategy…?”
“Got us more clients in an hour than we usually manage in a week?” Wesley countered. “No, I don’t think so. Do you? I do however think that we owe her one. She may have got us here under false pretences and she may have been pimping us to complete strangers for the entire evening but it will also be down to her creative advertising if we all eat this month.” Decisively, he said: “Gunn, you go and dance with Cordelia and remember to tell her how wonderful she is. Then escort her home and make a big fuss of her. Angel, you go and distract Gunn’s client and get her to tell you more about this poltergeist. Tomorrow you can take Cordelia out to dinner and thank her for being her.”
“And your part in the Let’s Be Nice to Cordelia Plan would be…?” Gunn prompted.
Wesley adjusted his collar and headed purposefully for his reference books. “My not informing her of what I think of her for telling everyone that Angel dumped me for a bus boy from Reseda....”
The End
