Chapter 1: Moose

Logan stirred, opened his eyes. The TV was still blaring away in front of him; Lethal Weapon 4, from the looks of it. He and Jubilee had discovered that they both liked action movies, and had settled in to watch the Lethal Weapon movie marathon on TV. He'd apparently fallen asleep, and she'd probably gotten bored and wandered off. He switched off the TV and got out of bed, yawning.

He and Jubes had changed rooms a week ago, moving into a large room beside Scott and Jean's. It was much more comfortable now, and it kept the other residents of the mansion from getting an eyeful of Jubilee in a robe rushing to his room to find something she'd left there. All their stuff was now in one room. It was good for her, but a constant source of exasperation to him. Before Jubilee, his room had been plain, simple, almost Spartan in its simplicity. Now there were books, papers, physics texts, loose pens and pencils and notebooks piled haphazardly all over the desk she'd insisted she needed, and perfumes, makeup, and other girl's toiletries cluttering the top of the dresser. He shook his head now as he pulled on a pair of jeans and fastened the button. Her lab space was almost obsessively neat; her living space—and his—was something else entirely. At least she was neat about her clothes; there were no more clothing items scattered about the room as there had when she was a teenager.

He wandered out into the hall and down the stairs; and then even further down, to the lab. It was dark; Hank, he'd heard earlier, was playing pool with Bobby and Remy in the rec room. On a hunch, he retraced his steps to the rec room, and sure enough, there was Jubilee, bent over the pool table, frowning, intent on making her shot. She was still wearing the clothes she'd been wearing earlier; a short skirt and a low-cut black cropped top. It showed him a generous amount of cleavage when he looked down the front of her top. And when she got up, strolled around the table and bent again to poke the white cue ball at the six ball, the back of her skirt lifted just the tiniest bit and he saw a peek of black lace briefs.

"Six in the corner pocket," she said confidently, and sure enough, the six clacked into the corner pocket by Remy's beer a second later. She grinned as Bobby groaned.

Logan stepped up to the pool table. Since they never played for money, there had at first been a steady trade in personal possessions. Then one night Scott had rashly bet Jean's emerald pendant and lost it. Jean had had a few choice words to say to him about that (even after Remy had returned it to her, having never seriously meant to keep it). Directly after that Jean and Betsy had gone out and got a lot of different-colored poker chips.

He studied the shrinking pile of chips in front of Remy, Bobby, and Hank, and the huge pile in front of Jubilee, and grinned at the other two men. "Looks like she's takin' ya ta the cleaners," he smirked. Bobby groaned at his grin and waved a hand despairingly at his tiny pile.

"Logan, do something about her! I'm losing everything here!"

Jubilee edged a hip up atop the edge of the pool table, took a sip of her beer, and grinned. "Maybe you'll think twice about insulting one of my papers next time, then," she said with a poisonously sweet smile.

"Now, now," Hank said genially from where he sat on a substantially-built stool in the corner, sipping another bottle, "Exaggeration does not become you, Bobby; you haven't lost everything just yet. Though," he said after getting off his stool and looking at Bobby's pile of chips and Jubilee's mountain, "you may not be so far off the mark there. Jubilee, where did you learn to play so well?"

Jubilee grinned as she tossed her empty bottle in the trashcan. "Cleaning out the frat houses back at college," she said, "And from losing a few games over at Rex's, over on Eighth Street. I was just lucky I move faster than Moose, there. Or I'd have had a really big problem."

Logan's jaw dropped at that revelation, and he tapped her shoulder. She spun around, and from the look on her face, she hadn't meant to inform him of that particular incident.

"You went to Rex's?" Logan growled. "When?"

She bit her lip. "Uh…"

Logan growled. The other three men took a nervous look at Logan, at Jubilee's pink cheeks, and decided there was somewhere else they absolutely had to be at just that moment. Neither Logan nor Jubilee saw them leave.

Jubilee bit her lip and studied her toes. "The first time was when I came home for a visit before flying out to the summit in Geneva," she said. "You weren't home that time. I was looking for a little excitement and I found Rex's." She looked at him with her best pitiful-puppy look in her eyes, and he groaned inwardly. He could never resist her when she made those eyes.

"So when'd you meet Moose?" he asked her. Max 'Moose' Montgomery was a huge brute of a man, almost seven feet tall, probably a good three hundred pounds. And not a fat three hundred pounds, either. It was all muscle. Logan had tangled with him several times, and he was no joke. He winced to think of Jubilee going up against the behemoth.

"We played a couple games of pool," Jubilee said, trying to suppress a giggle and failing. "I pulled the shots on my first couple of games, till he thought I was just another wannabe. Then I took him to the cleaners completely on our next game with a couple of professional trick shots. He took offense at that, and took a swing at me. I ducked, and his fist bashed in the face of a guy who was standing behind me. In the fuss that followed, I slipped out the side door. The next time I went there he played against me again, and I cleaned him out again--"

Logan's jaw dropped. "There was a next game? Moose must be gettin' soft!"

Jubilee threw her head back and laughed so hard she fell off the ledge onto the pool table's felt, dislodging the eight ball and sending it into the side pocket. "After I got done with him, there was this other guy, a lot rougher-looking, who challenged me. So I played him, and cleaned him out too. The second guy tried to nail me with a fist, but Moose knocked him out. We were both on the same side of the bar fight that time." She grinned at him unrepentantly. "We're great friends now. He's really a softie, Logan. When I told him why I was cleaning everyone out, he and I paired up for a week straight, hitting all the local pool halls and challenging everyone we could find. I wanted to split the take, but he insisted I take it all. Didn't you wonder how I got the money to get your saddlebags?"

Logan growled and grabbed her arms, pushing her backward down onto the pool table and burying his face in her neck. She giggled and wriggled her hips against his, and all thought fled his head, to be replaced with one driving desire.

Some time later, Jubilee sat up. "Hey, Logan," she poked him in the ribs.

He opened one eye.

She giggled, and kissed the tip of his nose. "It's only ten, and I'm sure Lethal Weapon Four is over. Wanna go to Rex's with me? Moose has been dying to meet you."

"He's met me," Logan groaned, lying back and closing his eyes again. "Oh, he's met me, a'right. Or at leas' his fist has. Met my ribs, met my arm, met my shoulderbone, met my back…Jubes, he's met me, a' right."

She giggled. "Let me rephrase that. He wants to meet, and I'm quoting him here, 'the poor sumbitch who's got the steel balls to take on someone like you'. He doesn't know you by name. I don't think you ever bothered to tell him that." She kissed him again, nibbled on his earlobe. He loved that; it sent these little shivers up and down his spine. "Please," she whispered, breathing gently into his ear. "Afterward we can--" she whispered quietly in his ear.

His eyes flew open. "Hol' that thought, darlin'," he said, sitting up and sliding off the table. "Lemme go get dressed. Remy's got the pickup for the night already; off with that dancer girlfriend o' his again, so we have to take my bike. Ya game f'r that?"

She grinned too. "Okay. Let me get dressed too."

He got the barest glimpse of something black and then something sparkly disappearing into their bathroom with her, but he didn't ask. As he was buckling his belt, he heard a low, feminine giggle coming from the room beside theirs; Jean's giggle. Then a masculine groan. Logan rolled his eyes. There was little doubt what Jean and Scott were doing; he wished they would be a bit more discreet. He'd brought the subject up to Jubilee one morning after Jean had gone down to cook breakfast, and she'd said, "Hmm. Let me see what I can think of." She hadn't said anything after that. Logan was going nuts. Jubilee wasn't really noisy in bed. She panted, she'd moan, but she wasn't really vocal. Neither was he. Jean and Scott, though…

All thought abruptly fled his mind when Jubilee came out of the bathroom. She was wearing a pair of boot cut leather pants that fit like a glove over her thighs and calves, and an eye-catching spaghetti-strap gold-sequined top that showed off her upper story quite nicely. She dug a pair of calf-high heeled black leather boots out of the closet, bent and laced them up, straightened her pants, and looked at him expectantly. "Are we going?"

"Yeah." He said. "Yeah, we're going." She led the way out to the garage, and he lagged behind, mostly to catch eyefuls of her backside encased in that tight black leather. He was glad they'd had the rec room to themselves earlier, or he wouldn't be able to control himself now.

* * *

Rex's was noisy, unusually so for a Thursday night. Logan pulled off his helmet and coat, watched Jubilee do the same, and then she scanned the room for anyone she knew.

"Hey! It's da little Lady!" came a booming voice from off to their left, and there was Moose, stomping up to them. He wasn't really stomping…it just seemed that way when you had a man who was six feet eight and three hundred pounds walking over stained wooden floorboards toward you. He grabbed Jubilee in a big bear hug, nearly engulfing her petite figure in his huge arms, and boomed, "How ya been, little Lady!"

"Fine," Jubilee said, grinning, her voice muffled in his heavily-tattooed arms, "As soon's you stop that!" He was ruffling her long hair into a messy mop. He put her down, not looking the least bit repentant, and squinted into the shadows by the door where Logan was lurking.

"Who you brung with ya this time?" he said to her. "Not the annoying Frenchy again, didja?"

Jubilee paused in the middle of smoothing her hair. "Moose! I toldja 'bout that! He's a friend of mine! Show some respect, willya?" she swatted the big arm none too gently.

To Logan's surprise, the big man backed down. If it had been anyone else, they'd probably have gotten thrown halfway across the room, but Jubilee didn't seem to see anything wrong with smacking a guy who would have made three of her. Probably more, Logan thought, as he stepped into the light.

The entire bar got really quiet. So did Moose. In one quick move, he had Logan's throat in one big hand and had Logan pinned against the wall. "This creep botherin' ya, Lady?" he said, his voice dangerously quiet. Everyone tensed.

Jubilee balled her fist and smacked it into his bicep. "Put him down, Moose!" she cried indignantly. "Thoughtcha said any friend of mine would be welcome here!"

"He's a friend of yours?" Moose didn't let Logan go, although his grip loosened a bit.

"Who do you think I was tryin' to get those saddlebags for, huh? You didn't think I'd fall for one of those soft little milquetoast boys at college, didja?" She smacked him again. "Now put him down and come look at what I bought with all that money we won."

Moose lowered Logan to the floor, and gave a half-hearted tug at Logan's now hopelessly wrinkled shirt. "Sorry, dude," he said. "The little Lady over there's a friend o' mine. Wanna make sure she gets someone worthy o' her, since I don't seem to be her type." He said it almost wistfully, and Logan was sure his jaw was going to end up in the basement. Moose was acting like Jubilee's big brother.

He and Moose went way back, for quite a few years, in fact. They'd tangled with each other many times in a lot of bars over the years; gotten themselves kicked out of many of them. It was odd, looking at him square now and not swinging at him; Jubilee had to be magic if she could get the big man to forget the long-standing feud between them.

Jubilee led Moose and half the bar outside to Logan's bike, where they all examined the fine leather saddlebags Jubilee had bought for Logan in Italy. His heart had nearly stopped when he saw them; fine grain, perfect black leather, butter soft but durable. Jubilee smiled at the plainly impressed Moose, and threw an arm around his waist, which was pretty much all she could reach of him. "Got him and me both the jackets to match, and look at the helmets!" she produced the two black motorcycle helmets with three silver slashes on either side, and he duly admired them before she put them back in the bags.

Moose patted her shoulder. "Still think ya could do better, Lady, but I'll be honest, I'd rather seeya with this 'un here--" he jerked a head at Logan, "than with that Frenchy. Or that big black dude who hit on ya the last time you was here; what was his name? Well, whoever he was, he wasn't right for you either. Hope I never see him again." He stopped, his attention caught by a man passing the crowd going into the bar. "Hey, Mickey!" he hailed him. "Here's the little Lady I was talkin' about who can beat the pants offa ya in pool!"

Mickey, a swarthy short guy with more tattoos than bare skin, sauntered up and looked Jubilee appraisingly. "Ya sure, Moose?" he said, frowning doubtfully. "She don't look like she knows what end of the pool stick is up." Logan growled, surprised when Moose did the same. "Try her and see," Moose said. "Jubes! Ya up to a game o' pool? Mickey here says ya don't hardly know what end of the sticks's the business end!"

Jubilee put her hands on her hips and looked at Mickey. "From where I'm standing, he don't look like he knows that either," she challenged him. "Ya game?"

"Yeah, I'm game." They all went back into the bar and Logan sat at the bar, ordering a beer as Jubilee headed for the pool tables in the corner with the new guy. Moose installed them at a table with a crowd of watchers, then sat down on the stool next to Logan. Both men regarded each other for a moment.

"So you're the dude who stole her heart," Moose said finally. Logan nodded. Moose grinned, suddenly, unexpectedly, and Logan grinned back. "I tell ya somethin, dude, ya got yerself a handful there. I hope ya got da balls to handle her, cause she's got some sass in her." He took a swig of his beer and said, "What's your name, anyway? Y'know, all these years we been beatin' the crap outta each other, an' I never knew yer name."

"Logan," Logan said, holding out a hand. "Just don't break the wrist this time, huh?"

Moose howled with laughter, causing a few heads to turn. "Naw, wouldn' do that now," he said, choking. "She'd break my wrists in return!"

Logan had never been one for small talk, but he found himself getting engrossed in conversation with this man he'd considered an enemy before. They were in the middle of a friendly but heated argument about the performance of their bikes when a woman's angry voice cut through the noise in the var. Logan spun. It was Jubilee's voice.

Jubilee made a face as the big man pressed up against her. He smelled terrible, and she shoved at him. "Out of my way."

He grabbed her arm. "Look here, we got a pussy in here tryin' to grow some balls," he said scornfully. He grabbed her cue stick and tossed it aside. "Got a better stick right here," he said, pressing his hips against hers. "Wanna use this, girlie-girl?"

Jubilee shoved at him. He refused to budge. She shoved harder. No movement. "Get out of my face," she snorted irritably. "And gimme my cue."

"Got your cue right here," he said, leaned over her, and kissed her.

Jubilee groped behind her, feeling for that three ball she had left….there! Her hand closed on it, and she brought it around, slamming it into the side of his head. He swore explosively and stumbled back, shaking his head to clear it. "That's it, girl," he said. "You gone and made me mad!" He lunged for her. She slipped aside easily. He lunged for her again. Again she ducked to the side.

He lunged for her again. This time, as she slipped off to the side, he lunged sideways and caught her, slinging her into the pool table. Jubilee faced him, spitting mad. Her eyes flicked sideways…Logan and Moose were over by the bar.

She groped backward, felt the cool length of another pool cue behind her, and wrapped her hands around it. "Come to Daddy, little girl," the man said, leaning in close. Jubilee whipped the pool cue around and jabbed it hard into his middle. "Suck my stick!" she hollered at him. She'd gotten it off some movie or other, she couldn't remember which one, but it seemed appropriate.

At the bar, she saw Logan's head whip around at the sound of her scream, and he slid off the stool and started coming over, followed closely by Moose. Then she had no more time to check up on him, because her assailant was coming at her again.

He ripped the cue stick from her hands and swung it at her. She was just the fraction of a second too slow, and the butt of the stick caught her across her temple. Her body spun away from the blow, and she caught herself on the table. She was shaking her head to clear it when his weight came crushing down on top of her, driving the breath from her lungs and pressing her hips against the edge. He tangled a hand in her hair and slammed her forehead into the table, once, twice. She was dizzy from the impact and ready to pass out when suddenly the weight was gone from on top of her. She slid limply towards the floor, then was caught by a pair of gentle hands and strong arms, and cradled there as she tried to clear her head.

Moose roared in anger as the man pinned Jubilee down to the table and slammed her head down on its surface. He stormed across the room, shoving people out of his way if they didn't move fast enough, and Logan followed. The big man grabbed Jubilee's assailant off her, and Logan caught her limp body as it slid toward the floor. She lay, shaking her head dazedly, as Logan crouched over her ready for trouble. But Moose was on a roll, and Logan, watching him, thought there wouldn't be a whole lot of trouble left for him to get into.

Moose buried his huge fists into the other man's stomach again and again, as the man grunted, gasped, and tried to get away. "No one hurts our little Lady, y'hear?" he snarled, not even out of breath as he continued to pummel the man. "Now apologize!" He grabbed a handful of the man's hair and shoved it up toward Logan and Jubilee, who by now had recovered enough to sit up.

"S-s-s-sorry," the man gasped out. Moose shook his head harder. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry I insulted you! Really!" he was almost blubbering when Moose yanked him back up, dragged him over to the door, and threw the man one-handed out into the parking lot.

"And don't come back!" Moose slammed the door hard enough to make the building shake, dusted his hands off, and came back to where Logan was helping Jubilee stand. He pushed her hair off her forehead. "Oooh, that looks nasty. Little Lady, I think you better git on home. You gonna have a whale of a friggin' headache from what that little sucka done to you."

Jubilee tried to smile, although her head was aching ferociously. "You been through worse," she said.

"Yeah, but I ain't you, little Lady," he said. "You're made of finer stuff than rough ol' me. So Logan, get her home, take care of her, and I guess I'll see you both again some time." He leaned over, gave her a quick kiss on the cheek, and showed them both to the door. Logan pulled her coat over her shoulders and helped her get up on the back of the bike. "Let's go, Jubes," he said.