All Ages Summary: Amid the events of Divided We Stand and the X-Men's move to San Francisco, Kurt and Logan navigate a whirlwind of desire, love, and trust as they struggle to define the new terms of their relationship. Slash. (With some mild Kurt/Betsy.)
This story is rated "M" for mature sexual content, all of it consensual and loving, but still—sex. Don't say I didn't warn you! :)
Preamble... This is kind of a sequel to my other Kurt/Logan story, The End of the Beginning. You don't necessarily have to read that one first, though a few of the things in this story refer back to it. You also don't have to be a comics nerd to read this, though if you are a comics nerd (like me), the relevant X-Men events/comics are Messiah Complex (some flashbacks), Divided We Stand (Chapters Two and Three), and Wolverine: Origins (specially, Wolverine: Origins #46, which is the context of Chapter 5). One other thing: I know the Cliff House in San Fran hasn't been a hotel since it burned down for the first time at the turn of the century (thanks, Wikipedia!), but I'm pleading artistic licence :)
Disclaimer #1: Whether because of condoms or mutant healing factors, my heroes always practice safe sex.
Disclaimer #2: I don't own the X-Men, so I definitely don't make any money from writing about them.
Thanks to Sundowhn, as well as the always inspirational folks over at Logurt on LiveJournal!
And now, finally... Enjoy!
GIVE AND TAKE
Chapter One
Logan untied Kurt's feet first. As he freed each one, he massaged their unique shape under his fingers, kneading his thumbs into the arches. Then he moved on to Kurt's hands. He started with his right one, tied to the brass bars at the top of the bed, before tackling his injured arm, tied at the side because Kurt's range of motion was still limited. As he pulled loose the quick-release knot in the fabric tie, he heard Kurt groan. Logan felt the delicate pattern of scar tissue under Kurt's silky indigo fur as Kurt flexed his arm, drawing it stiffly towards his body.
"Does it hurt?" asked Logan, pressing gently into the muscles around Kurt's shoulder blade.
"It was worth it," Kurt insisted, his warmth only slightly forced.
Logan released Kurt enough to let him roll over onto his back. Then he lowered his chest over his and kissed him, tugging lingeringly on his blue lips. As Logan pulled away, Kurt was smiling softly below his glittering amber eyes, awash in a sea of contentment. Logan allowed his gaze to linger on that beauteous sight for just a moment before collapsing back against the mattress. He folded his hands behind his head, savouring his own post-coital bliss.
After what might have been minutes or hours, the stillness was broken by Kurt shifting back onto his stomach, his good arm gripping the pillow above his head. Logan moved toward him, resting his cheek against Kurt's shoulder, smelling him, listening to the steady rhythm of his blood. Even after three weeks of sharing a bed nearly every night, Logan was still in thrall to the privilege of such easy, casual access to Kurt's naked body, a privilege he never truly believed he could have. A privilege he still wasn't sure he deserved.
He laid his hand on Kurt's back and moved it slowly downwards, watching the subtle play of the low light in Kurt's fur as it shifted under his touch. Touching Kurt wasn't like touching an animal—at least any animal that existed on Earth. Kurt's fur was too short, too soft, to serve any practical function of warmth or physical protection. To look at or touch, Kurt's fur was more like a version of silk velvet but lustrous, with a colour-changing quality. Logan never tired of its mystery, just as he never stopped being entranced by Kurt's unclothed beauty. Seeing—but especially touching—Kurt's naked body still seemed magical, otherworldly.
Like a man in a dream, Logan continued to stroke him, from his neck past his shoulder blades to the hollow of his lower back, where he'd let go and start over, meticulously following the delicate, light-refracting grains as they broke over Kurt's bones and muscles. Logan took the time to savour the sensation, knowing that if he were any less blissful, Kurt might not allow such attentions. Which was stupid; Logan knew Kurt loved being petted, as surely as he knew he'd never admit it. Except in and around sex, of course, when everything became fair game. Logan was sure that in some ways, Kurt was most himself during sex. Desire made Kurt honest, something Logan hoped was also true about himself, as least where Kurt was concerned. Because he was sure he'd never made anyone as happy as he was capable of making Kurt when he made love to him. And if he could use his physical gifts to do that—if he could make Kurt forget all his insecurities, even for a moment, and help him to simply be—then he was sure it was the best use he'd ever made of those gifts since the first, awful day bone claws tore their way out of his knuckles.
Finally, unable to resist, Logan moved his hand down to Kurt's tail, draped lifelessly against his indigo leg. It twitched limply as Logan drew it toward him, running his hand over the soft, warm length of it, skipping the sensitive, forked tip before starting again at the base. In his semi-consciousness, Kurt tolerated Logan's hand for at least ten seconds before his body stiffened, and he flicked his tail decisively away.
"Come on—quit it."
"That really bugs you, huh?"
"You know it does."
"Not always. Fer instance, five minutes ago."
"That's different."
"You afraid you might start purring or something?"
Kurt made an amused sound. "Yes, that's clearly what I'm 'afraid' of."
"It's just part of you. How's it any different than your arm or leg?"
Kurt's was silent for a long moment.
"It's just different," he said at last.
"Uh huh."
Kurt pushed himself wearily onto his side to face him, frowning. "Why are you doing this?"
"Doing what?"
Kurt regarded him through narrowed eyes for another long moment before rolling once more onto his back, dropping his head heavily against the pillow.
"Why can't we ever have a normal conversation."
It wasn't really a question, but Logan answered him anyway.
"'Cause we're not normal."
Kurt glanced at him, only managing to hold his frown in check for another few seconds before his lips twitched into a smile, and then a laugh. He was still laughing as Logan covered his face with his hand, feeling Kurt's mirth under his fingers as he swept them over the familiar, beloved contours of his face. Kurt's expression had calmed into a close-lipped smile by the time Logan's hand reached his neck, stirring the impossibly soft fur at the pressure point under his jaw line with the edge of his fingernail. Kurt's eyelids flickered as he released a small sound that wasn't quite a purr, but meant something similar.
Quitting while he was ahead, Logan settled his face into the crook of Kurt's neck, letting his hand slip down to Kurt's midsection. Kurt covered Logan's hand with his own.
"You know," Kurt began thoughtfully after a moment. "I used to think about getting rid of my fangs."
"Really? Why?"
"It would be easy to have them filed down. And, short of making me look like I'm cashing in on the vampire craze, they don't serve any purpose."
"Beg to differ."
"Hm."
"Well, how come you didn't go through with it then?"
"It didn't seem… right. After all, I don't really need my tail, either."
"But that's different, isn't it?"
"Ja. It is."
Logan hesitated only a moment before speaking his next words; over the past weeks, such things were becoming easier, if not painless, to say.
He brushed his lips against Kurt's neck as he said, "You're perfect the way you are."
Kurt's body twitched as he uttered an ironic snort. "Ja, I know."
Logan's heart sank a little, even if he'd never let Kurt know it. Yet in the silence that followed, Logan felt and heard Kurt swallow.
"When is Piotr supposed to be here, again?" Kurt asked, deliberately changing tracks.
"Said he'd be here at midnight. Flight leaves at 2:30."
"And we'll be in Irkutsk by… almost two days later, with the time change."
"Yep."
"How…" Kurt swallowed again. "How is he?"
"He's okay," Logan replied. "'Bout as well as any of us."
Kurt remembered it vividly, the morning twelve days ago when Logan had returned to Newark from outer space and told him Kitty was gone. Dead, maybe. Or maybe just lost. Maybe worse than dead. Kurt was certain it had been one of the worst moments of his entire life, made worse, somehow, but its unreality, by its happening, literally, worlds away, like a fact devoid of context. Yet as bad as that moment had been, Kurt also counted his blessings that Logan had been by his side, immediately offering up his arms and the firm, flat surface of his chest for the tears that followed. Over the course of the next hours and days, Kurt had also dried Logan's tears with his clothes, hands, and lips.
"Logan?" Kurt wasn't sure whether his voice sounded quiet, or distant, only that he was suddenly having trouble controlling it. "It's… Despite everything, I… "
Logan pressed his hand against Kurt's body, saving him the trouble of continuing. They stayed that way for several more minutes before Logan disengaged himself, getting out of bed and heading over to the dresser.
"You've got enough time to sleep for a couple hours before Pete gets here," he said. "Better make the most of it—it's gonna be a long flight."
Kurt pushed himself upright in the bed. "Are you going somewhere?"
"Got to make a quick call," said Logan, rummaging through the top drawer. "But I'll be back."
Kurt didn't bother to ask why Logan didn't simply use the phone in the apartment. He already knew: the call was private, too private for his ears. Kurt felt a tightness in his chest, less because of the fact of his exclusion than because he knew he was starting to grow used to such things. Already, he'd all but stopped questioning Logan verbally about his secrets. How long would it be before he stopped questioning him altogether? And who would he be when that happened?
He raised his eyes then, absorbing a full view of Logan's naked body as he pulled a t-shirt and some underwear out of the drawer, and began to get dressed. Watching him, Kurt released a silent, involuntary sigh. Kurt had never really acknowledged the beauty of Logan's body—or, for that matter, any man's body—until he'd experienced what such a body could do to him. He'd never really appreciated Logan's hands and arms until he'd felt them passionately gripping and manipulating his own naked flesh, until he'd experienced the transfusion of all that body's raw strength into an equally violent love, intoxicating in its ferocity.
Kurt was learning to crave surrendering to Logan's strength. Until Logan, he'd never really known the empowerment of that kind of surrender, which was actually a kind of trust. He'd never trusted another person enough to let them—or to truly want them—inside his own body. Until that afternoon many years ago in the locker room shower, when he'd thought nothing could get better than the feeling of Logan's hand on his cock as his rough, hard chest ground against his wet back. Until he'd felt Logan's soap and water slick fingers circle and slip inside his opening, retreating quickly at Kurt's sharp intake of breath. Until Kurt had leaned back heavily against Logan's shorter, thicker body, his tail contracting around his muscular thigh, feeling an overwhelming surge of relief as he heard himself whisper, "It's okay."
With Logan, Kurt found a different kind of release than he'd ever known with a woman. Despite her adventurousness in so many other areas, Amanda in particular had never enjoyed bondage. Knowing his past as intimately as she did, Kurt was sure she worried his desire to have his hands or feet tied during sex was a symptom of subconscious self-hatred. She didn't understand, as Logan did, that it was really about getting past that. Kurt needed to know that even restrained, and without using his powers, he could still feel safe and powerful—that he could still feel like himself.
Yet as good as being with Logan could be—and as good as it had been for the past week, especially—Kurt still felt himself pining after the different but wonderful pleasures of women. He still thought about Ororo, still had the occasional inappropriate but unavoidable dream about possessing her under his hands and body. But lately the dream had become complicated and slightly torturous. He'd be moving over Ororo, warm and tight between her thighs as he kissed her expression of ecstasy, tangling his fingers in her hair, gathering her breasts into his hands. But then he'd feel a sharp but not unwelcome downward tug on his tail, and Logan would be behind him, entering him, thrusting in concert with his movement inside Ororo. Inevitably, the dream would end with his being overtaken by a series of animal moans, virtually frothing at the mouth before waking to cold-damp fur, a tail that felt twisted into knots, and, of course a throbbing ache between his legs. Luckily, when Logan was around he was always more than happy to ease such a predicament. Yet, sated as he'd be afterwards, Kurt always found the dream returning in haunting fragments, nagging him with implications he couldn't quite grasp.
"You'll be okay here? I shouldn't be long."
Logan's voice snapped Kurt back to the present.
"Of course," he said tonelessly. "I'll be fine."
Logan threw on a black motorcycle jacket and was gone, leaving Kurt naked and alone with too many unwanted thoughts. Kurt crawled out of bed and didn't quite limp toward the shower in what felt like the vain hope of washing Logan's scent off and out of his body before Peter arrived. Kurt wasn't sure which friends knew about the new dimension of his relationship with Logan. Not that he particularly cared—not anymore. Except he knew he didn't want anyone else to find out the way Kitty had, marching into the bedroom to find them twined in each other's arms, just hours after he'd lied and told her there was nothing going on. When—and if—the rest of their friends and teammates found out, Kurt wanted it to be on his terms. Yet he still chided himself for insisting that it mattered, knowing that if there was anyone he should talk to, it was Scott. Because he was far less worried about the implications of the things he and Logan were doing to each other's bodies than he was worried about the implications of the things Logan was doing when he wasn't around to see.
Turning on the shower and testing the water under his hand, Kurt mused darkly that despite the way it happened, he'd always be grateful that Kitty had known, and not just because it meant his last words to her hadn't been lies. Thinking about the breakfast they'd shared in that same apartment three short weeks ago, when just the fact of Kitty's smiling presence seated between himself and Logan had made anything seem possible, Kurt knew that as badly as he missed her, he was far more intensely thankful to have known her.
Logan returned a little more than two hours later, with Peter in tow.
"Kurt!" Peter exclaimed, beaming as he strode across the room to throw his arms around Kurt's body. "It has been too long, my friend."
"It's good to see you, too," Kurt assured him, smiling and wincing as he freed himself from Peter's too-strong grip.
"I am glad. Come—Betsy is waiting downstairs with the car."
"Betsy?" Kurt echoed, instantly mortified by the hint of nervousness he heard in his own voice.
"Da. I was going to hire a driver but she insisted. She says she has missed you." Peter glanced quickly at Logan, smiling conciliatorily. "Both of you."
Logan grunted. "I'm sure."
Peter and Logan collected the bags and Kurt followed behind, still using his cane, though no longer dependent on it. Sure enough, when they excited the building into the early morning darkness, there was Elizabeth Braddock, leaning against the side of the black Impala, parked by itself in the visitor's roundabout. She was dressed for the sake of anonymity, in Keds, tight black spandex running pants and an oversized men's dress shirt beneath a cropped bomber jacket, her violet hair tucked up underneath a New Jersey Nets baseball cap. Kurt smiled softly to himself as he observed the uselessness of her disguise; with the regal, confidant way she stood and moved, and even her face, her beautiful, unpredictable lips and ever-watching eyes, Betsy could never be either average or inconspicuous—at least in his eyes.
As Kurt approached her, she flashed him a quick smile from beneath the tilted-down brim of her baseball cap before circling the car to the driver's side. Kurt watched as Peter and Logan finished loading the bags into the trunk. Then Logan stepped close to Kurt and did something truly unexpected: he touched the side of Kurt's face and gave him a quick, close-lipped kiss on the mouth. The heat Kurt imagined he felt in Peter and Betsy's however-discretely-averted gazes did nothing to avert the flash-freeze that consumed his entire self. Logan, however, was utterly nonchalant, which Kurt found even more disconcerting; following the kiss, Logan proceeded to rest his hand casually on Kurt's shoulder while opening the front passenger's side door for him, even holding his cane while he waited for him to take his seat.
Kurt forced sensation back into his face and limbs through a severe act of will as Logan closed the door. He turned bravely, though reluctantly, to confront Betsy's continued, subtle smile.
"You look terrible," she said lightly.
Kurt remembered he was still using his image inducer, and clicked it off. "Better?"
Betsy's smile widened. "Much. Though you still look a little pale."
"Is that even possible?"
"Only to a connoisseur's eye."
In the final second before Peter and Logan entered the car, Betsy covered Kurt's hand with hers where it rested against his thigh.
"You do look good," she told him, suddenly genuine. "Really."
"Betsy… It's not that I… It's just—"
Kurt's feeble attempt to explain what Betsy already seemed to know ended abruptly when Peter opened the back door and joined them, followed by Logan. Betsy gave Kurt's hand a final, affectionate squeeze and released it.
"So," said Betsy, eyeing Peter and Logan in the rear view mirror as she started the engine. "Are you gentlemen ready for a fourteen hour economy class flight to the northern wastes of the world?"
"I don't know about these clowns," said Logan, mouth forming his signature tight-lipped grin. "But I've got a whole carry-on of Archie Double Digests and Sudoku. The flight alone's gonna be the best vacation I've had in a decade."
Betsy's violet eyes rolled across to Kurt. "Tell me he's joking."
Kurt shook his head in mock-lament. "I wish I could…"
Peter's boisterous laugh filled the car, and Kurt started to feel himself relaxing. Maybe, he thought, it would be a nice vacation, after all.