AUTHOR: Cerebral Seductress (Fallon D)
DESCRIPTION: Two years later, Logan figures out what he wants- and who. Sequel to 'All But Gone.'
RATING: PG-13 for language.
THEME: 'Hemorrhage (In My Hands)' by Fuel.
A/N: Fluff. Joy!
……………………..
Rogue dropped the key on the desk, wondering why her landlord wasn't here to meet her like he'd said he would be. She wasn't going to wait around for him- a chill was dancing through the air even now, almost an hour before sundown.
Pulling her gloves on, Rogue stepped outside, shivering as the breeze crept through her warm clothes to tickle at her skin. January in Toronto got progressively colder each year. It was probably a good thing she was leaving.
But her ride was late, she noted, frowning as she glanced at her watch. She moved to step off the walkway into the snow, wondering what could have held…them…up…
Rogue stopped, staring stupidly at the man in front of her.
The Professor had said he'd be sending someone to escort her back, but of course Rogue had thought- Scott- Bobby- Ororo…
Never Logan.
Not in a thousand years would she have expected Logan.
Seeing any of the X-Men would have been a shock to Rogue at that point, even though she'd read the Professor's letters, had dialed his number with shaking fingers to confirm her return. It hadn't taken long for her to break down after Xavier had offered her the position. Scattered hopes aside, there wasn't anything left for her in Toronto. There had never been anything there for her in the first place, actually- just a pipe dream, the impossible possibility that Logan might someday follow her there, find her. As she'd always hoped he would.
She'd arrived, and waited, confident that after what they'd shared he would come to his senses and sweep her off her feet.
A year later Rogue celebrated her twenty-first birthday with another man who had- Logan's eyes- money to burn on a pretty girl, in the kind of low-class bar that her mother had always warned her against, with the cheap sort of whiskey that still burned in your mouth long after you'd swallowed it.
And then, just a day before she turned twenty-two, the letter from Xavier had arrived.
Even after she had answered the letter, Rogue had harbored the hope that maybe, just maybe Logan would still come for her.
But he hadn't, until now. Until the Professor had sent him to round her up like a lost sheep.
The cold nipped at Rogue's cheeks as she adjusted the strap of her duffel bag over her shoulder, fighting the urge to meet his eyes. She kept her gaze directed at his chest, noting with irritation that his worn jacket and flannel shirt seemed just as ageless as he did. Two years in Canada had matured her, filled her out, forced her to buy new clothes when her old rags had nearly fallen apart from the wear. But Logan remained as he always had, in jeans, boots and that damned leather jacket that he'd worn for as long as she'd known him.
"Hey, kid."
Even his voice was the same.
She finally met his gaze, knowing as she did so that there was no way to hide her bloodshot eyes, her tearstained cheeks. This wasn't the way she had imagined it. When Logan saw her again, she'd planned on being prepared, her appearance flawless, her demeanor cool and reserved. She'd made herself vulnerable to him far too many times in the past. This was supposed to be his effort, his pride on the chopping block, his turn to understand the pain that came with the possibility of rejection.
But the Wolverine was as stoic as ever, his emotional armor a tangible thing in Rogue's presence. Some things never changed. Two years later, she was a jaded woman, while he remained the invincible warrior. Judging from the solid clench of his jaw, though, his careful mask of blankness, she wondered if maybe he was disguising his true feelings, just as she was.
"The Professor sent you," she said, stating the obvious. The words were thick on her tongue but came out easier than she'd expected.
He didn't answer, studying her silently.
The thought occurred to her that this could only be a trick. It could be Mystique, looking like Logan, acting like Logan. But even as the idea surfaced Rogue couldn't bear to give it any kind of consideration. She knew Logan, better than anyone- better than he knew himself. Mystique wouldn't be able to fool her for a minute.
There were things about them- about Logan and Marie- so similar that Rogue could hardly stand it. At night she lay in her bed, completely alone save for her thoughts of him, and at times the fine line between their two existences was so blurred that facets of Marie began to shade into aspects of Logan, their separate lives intertwined closely enough for her to forget that there were hundreds of miles and decades of difference between them.
How strange that now, with the miles removed, they became two people again, both in her mind and reality. They were each alone: his seclusion by choice, hers by necessity.
The feeling that was building inside her threatened to spill over in tears. Rogue knew she wasn't going to let that happen, ever again. Not in front of him, not because of him.
"I hate you," she said, her voice clear and unwavering.
He hadn't expected that. She thought she saw something flash across his features, some unidentifiable emotion, but then he glanced past her, at the door to her landlord's office, breaking eye contact.
When he looked back at her, his face was blank again.
He didn't deny it, didn't deny her. That made Rogue angrier, and beyond that, frustrated, as if Logan were catering to the whims of a spoiled child.
"I hate you," she repeated. This time her voice cracked on the inflection, but she didn't let it stop her. "I waited for you. Every day, every minute. Thinking you'd come after me once you'd sorted it out. Thinking that I wasn't alone in what I felt." She drew in a breath, letting the cold burn her throat, freezing her lungs as surely as her heart. "Now I know better."
After a silence she continued, "You don't love me. You never did."
His nostrils flared at her words, one fist clenched at his side, the other still clutching his smoking cigar like some bizarre lifeline. The stillness of the air was incredible, the total lack of wind somehow emphasizing the space between them. It was only a few feet across the snow-strewn walkway, and yet less likely to be breached than a thousand miles in an infinitely barren desert.
She waited for him to respond, the cold seeping through her jeans. Even anger would be better than silence, in her mind, but the seconds ticked by and he said nothing, his eyes boring into hers with an emotionless intensity that wasn't quite like anything she'd seen before.
"Say something," she ordered at last. Even as the words came out of her mouth she regretted them. Talking to Logan- hell, just standing within twenty feet of Logan was like navigating a gauntlet. Each step, each movement could take you closer to your goal, and just as easily leave you vulnerable and open for attack. Pleading with him to speak wasn't exactly the height of power, and Rogue cursed herself silently for giving him that advantage.
Seconds stretched into minutes as they stared at each other, and the hope trickled from Rogue's heart just as surely as the snow melted against her skin. Perhaps she had made a mistake, responding to the Professor's offer. Better to have stayed here, far away from the reality of Logan's non-affection, and given him no excuse to tear her to pieces for the thousandth time.
She took one step forward, her boot crunching in the snow, and then another, and another. Her movements were jerky and robotic, the emotional weight on her shoulders making it difficult to move. As she brushed past Logan, his hand gripped her shoulder- so quickly she didn't see it move, only felt the pressure of his palm against her collarbone, his fingers against her neck.
"Don't."
The single utterance was soft enough that she had to strain to hear it, and paused to reconsider her senses for a moment. But it was unmistakable; she knew he had spoken, his voice low and pleading and nearly enough to make her icy heart crack in two.
She stopped, staring at the ground before her, and waited.
Logan exhaled, his breath stirring her hair. His hand remained on her shoulder, unmoving.
"You're wrong," he said finally.
Her voice was lost somewhere deep in her throat, but she managed to summon enough composure to glance at him and repeat, "Wrong?"
"Sayin' I never…" His eyes were fixed on the ground, jaw clenched. Rogue had the sudden impression of him fighting to overcome the emotional barriers he'd erected over the years. It didn't seem an easy feat, even to her.
The remnants of her anger began to fall away at the sight of his face, unchanged from the man she'd met so long ago.
"…Never loved you," he finished at last.
Rogue's eyes began to sting with the promise of tears as he met her gaze. It was eerie, the way that his face held no emotion, the manner with which he removed himself from her so that she had no idea what he was thinking or feeling.
"Logan," she breathed, and moved towards him, forgetting that she was angry with him, forgetting that she was supposed to hate him for leaving her alone all these years. His one hand moved from her shoulder to her waist, dropping her duffel bag into the snow and then sliding lower to crush her hips to his as his mouth covered hers.
It was not beautiful. It was not gentle. But Rogue knew as well as anyone that Logan's actions were instinctive, primal, and she had suffered her fair share of sleepless nights craving that brutal side of him. Wanting to tread the precipice of pain and pleasure. His fingers dug into her hip, keeping her just on the cautious side of reality even as he threatened to push her over the edge.
He shifted, pulling her so close to him that her knees buckled and she had to grab onto his shoulders to keep from falling. He supported her weight completely as he deepened the kiss, his tongue warring fiercely with hers. The heat from his body was scalding, but Rogue couldn't move, couldn't think, couldn't process anything except that she was kissing Logan- or that he was kissing her, which was much, much better than anything she'd hoped for.
When she felt her control start to slip, however, overpowered by the intensity of her feelings, she braced her hands against his chest and pushed. Logan, rough and dominating and painfully unaware of the beginning pull, still had the presence of mind to acknowledge her rejection, and he broke away completely, stumbling backwards a few steps.
Rogue watched shakily as he shook his head, trying to regain his composure after the glancing blow her lethal skin had delivered. He raised a hand to his mouth, brushing his knuckles roughly across his lips as if to reassure himself that yes, it had happened; the line he had toed for the past six years was irrevocably overstepped. She noted idly that somehow he'd managed to hold onto his cigar through all that, though it dangled from his fingertips now.
She should have felt smug about it. Instead Rogue was fighting back her apprehension, not knowing how the Wolverine would react to this new development. If he looked at her and started to apologize, she thought she just might die of humiliation.
He surprised her by cursing instead.
"Two years didn't change a goddamn thing," he said fiercely, and took a deep drag off his still-lit cigar. "Two years without you, workin' you out from under my skin, and you're still right fucking there. So close I can feel you, even when you're not…" He trailed off, exhaled heavily through his nose, smoke spiraling around him like a dragon, eyes smoldering as he stared at her. "What's it gonna take, Marie?"
Strangely enough, his words didn't anger her. "I don't know what you're talking about," she said calmly, and that seemed to frustrate Logan even more.
"You…this," he said, jerking his cigar in her direction as he paced the walkway in front of her. "God knows I…you…you deserve better, kid."
"We could have better," she answered. "It could be better if you would just let it."
Her words weren't exactly gospel, but they did seem to strike the right key. He stopped in his tracks and stared at her. Rogue sensed that they were approaching another crossroads, another turning point, not unlike the moment years before, when he'd nearly kissed her. She knew that if she didn't say something now, if she didn't stop him from leaving, it might be more than two years before she had another opportunity.
"I don't want to tie you down," she said. "I don't want you to feel like you owe me anything. That's not…that's not why I'm coming back." She blinked, her eyes stinging unbearably.
He grunted something unintelligible. "Why are you coming back?" he said at last. Something shifted in his eyes as he looked at her, his expression shaded.
She smiled bitterly. "I've been running since I was fifteen years old." She paused to digest that bit of information herself; it didn't feel like it had been seven years and yet she couldn't seem to remember a time before she'd known she was a mutant.
"There's only so many places you can hide before reality catches up with you. I can't keep running forever, and- I can't keep hiding from the people I care about." Rogue met Logan's eyes, traces of her smile still lingering around her mouth. "Why did you come here? The Professor could have sent someone else. Scott, or Ororo- even Remy-"
"The Professor didn't send me," he cut her off, tossing his cigar to the ground.
Rogue's eyes narrowed. "What?"
Logan fixed his hands in his pockets and looked at her in his customary sideways glance, then directed his gaze back at the cigar, which was fast extinguishing, surrounded by melting snow.
"He didn't send me," he repeated, slowly. Each word was like an electric shock through Rogue's brain.
"Then why did you come?" she blurted out, not wanting to hope if there was no reason to, Oh God please Logan, don't hurt me again- He shrugged. "You asked me to."
Her voice was gone, hopelessly crawling up from somewhere in her stomach. "I did?" she squeaked, the question pitiful even to her own ears.
"Told me to get my shit shorted out." Logan cocked one shoulder in an offhand manner, a shadow of a smile crossing his hardened features. "Figure out what I wanted. Who I wanted." He took a step closer to her.
She was suddenly transported back to that autumn night, two years ago, outside the boathouse. The taste of beer lingering on his lips, an almost-kiss that haunted her dreams to this day, and he had said-
"I'll find you."
She hadn't realized she was speaking out loud until he interrupted her.
Another step closer. She could feel the heat of him through her layers of clothing.
"I did," he said.
Something welled up inside her, so strongly, so fiercely that for a moment it was all that Rogue could do to breathe. "You did," she whispered, "Logan-"
He didn't move to catch her- but he didn't have much of a choice when she practically fell into him, anchoring herself on his shoulders. They stood like that, and it should have been awkward but for some reason it wasn't, not at all, until her breathing quieted and she straightened up. Tears glittered on her cheeks.
"I don't hate you," she said, sniffling, wiping the tears away with a gloved hand.
"I know."
Another voice broke in- Scott Summers, who stood on the sidewalk leading up to the office, eyebrows raised curiously above the red sunglasses.
"Am I interrupting something?" he said, folding his arms across his chest and fixing Logan with a look that probably would have brought a lesser man to his knees.
"If I told you that you were, would it make a difference?" Rogue snapped, burying her face in the leather of Logan's jacket. Why couldn't he have shown up just a few minutes later?
Logan laughed, briefly cradling her face to his shoulder with one hand before bending to pick up her duffel bag. "She needs a lift back to the mansion," he said, motioning to Rogue.
"We need a lift back to the mansion," she told Scott firmly. Smug, she laced her gloved fingers through Logan's and ignored him when he tried to shake her off. He wasn't getting off that easy.
She clamped down hard on his hand when he continued to try to disentangle their fingers, glaring at him when he gave her a frustrated look.
Scott looked back at the Wolverine. "Logan?"
He stared at Marie, a smile finally curving one corner of his mouth. "We need a lift," he amended.
The heat in his gaze was enough to send a shiver of warmth through Rogue, starting at her spine and continuing all the way down to her toes.
Logan's head snapped back up as Scott muttered something and started walking away. "Hope there's room on the Blackbird, Scooter," he called, obviously having heard what Scott said, although Rogue hadn't caught it. "I took your bike to get here."
-FIN- (for real. scout's honor.)