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Xander's basement is as damp and musty as ever. The day's events have left her drained and exhausted, and all she really wants is to go home. But she can't risk going back to her dorm, and the last thing she wants is to accidentally lead the Initiative back home to her mother. Xander's basement seems like a safe option, for all of them. Even though they'd let her go without any issues, she still didn't trust the Initiative as far as she could throw them.
Besides, she doesn't dare risk leaving Riley, and he's too weak to travel. He lays in Xander's pull out sofa bed, shivering slightly (though if it's from the drugs he's detoxing from, or the danksome atmosphere in the basement, Buffy can't be sure), hair matted and plastered to his forehead, bare chest rising and falling rhythmically. A dry sterile dressing covers the vulnus on his abdomen, the deep puncture wound from where Adam stabbed him clearly causing him pain.
He'd looked half dead when he'd staggered in, dropping to his knees and begging Buffy to hide him. She'd said yes, of course, because she didn't really want to send him back to the Initiative, not when he'd clearly worked so hard to escape from their custody.
That, and she's in love with him.
Now is probably the wrong time to tell him, so for the moment, she keeps her mouth shut, and focuses on tending him and his wounds. The puncture wound looks alright for now, and Riley had sworn the Initiative had patched him up just fine for now, so she leaves it alone, instead choosing to dab at his forehead with a damp cloth.
Only when he falls asleep, eyes shut and face languid, does she lean down, whispering, "I love you."