Chapter 4

Jean slammed the phone down in exasperation. "If one more newspaper calls here to find out where Sara Ryan is I'm going to disconnect the phone. Can't they leave her alone?" she sighed.

It had been a week since the fiasco at the Governor's Ball. Xavier had brought Sara to the mansion, where she had recovered thanks to Hank's careful attention. She had thanked them all profusely, and accepted their offer of sanctuary (actually Xavier didn't give her a choice; there was no way she could leave anyway, the press were practically camped outside the mansion's gates.) They had had a field day with Richard Ryan. The photographs of Sara taken at the ball had illustrated the lurid stories they'd written about Ryan's treatment of his wife. He was now in prison awaiting trial, and lawyers who had been reluctant to help her before were now calling incessantly to see if they could help her out with a suit, or divorce. Xavier spoke to all of them, telling them thank you, but no, she already had a lawyer. He had asked one of his personal attorneys to file the paperwork, and given the public nature of the case, it had gone through the red tape with unusual speed. The papers were ready to sign whenever Sara was ready.

Of Sara herself they had seen entirely too little. Xavier had told them she wanted to sort out what had happened, and she needed quiet time, so they had left her alone, aside from friendly hellos when they had seen her. She had returned them, but spent much of her time by herself, or in Wolverine's company. Jean had seen the two of them heading off into the woods earlier.

Sara and Logan strolled down the trails, each wrapped in their own thoughts. She was thinking about the legal mess she was going to have to get into; he was thinking how pretty her hair was, dappled with flecks of sunlight that filtered through the trees. She spoke first. "I shouldn't spend so much time moping," she sighed. "They're going to get tired of answering the phone calls."

"Chuck said ta take all the time ya need," Wolverine said. "An' a lot happened. Ya need time ta sort it all out."

"I know," she said. "But I still feel like I shouldn't stretch everyone's patience too far." They walked on for a time in silence.

Wolverine asked tentatively, "Sara…what happened?"

She was silent for a long time. "He was furious," she said finally. "And he was so pleased with having 'won' as he put it. He said he would teach me a lesson. I didn't eat, drink or sleep for days. I gave in. I promised him I would never leave him again. He said he would test me at the Ball, that if I was completely obedient he would allow me to resume work at the hospital." She looked at him with eyes so full of pain he ached for her. "I don't think I need to go into details. You know what he was like." She was silent for a while, and he looked over at her as they came out of the woods and sat on the grass by the lake. She was crying silently, tears falling down her cheeks. He wrapped his arms around her in a hug, and she hugged him back as she sobbed on his shoulder. He let her cry herself out, sitting with his back against the tree, snuggled her between his knees with her back too him, and held her as the sun slowly worked its way down to the western horizon.

Sara got up, went down to the lake, and splashed some of the cool water on her arms. A mischievous smile crossed her lips and she turned suddenly, sprinkling water in his direction as she laughed. He yelped in surprise and scrambled away from her, then ran after her as she skittered away from him and tackled her. She screamed with laughter as he carried her up onto the lake's dock and dumped her off, but at the last minute she grabbed his ankle and dragged him in after her. They came up, spluttering and gasping, and laughing. It was good to see her laugh again, he thought.

She dragged herself to the shore and sat in the grass, wringing the water out of her long hair. She grabbed handfuls of her shirt and tried to wring it out as Logan stripped his own T-shirt off and squeezed most of the water out. She licked her lips at the sight of his muscled torso as he pretended not to notice her appraising glance. He dropped the pretense as she removed her own shirt, borrowed from Jean, and started to wring it out. She wore a plain white cotton bra that was nearly transparent now because of the water, and the cool breeze brought certain parts of her anatomy into prominence. She had a nice body, he thought, as he looked her up and down approvingly. A little thin, but she was a lovely woman. And the sight of her in tight jeans and a wet bra was doing things to his anatomy as well.

Sara grinned at the subtle shift in his hips as he shifted his weight. His jeans looked suddenly too tight for him. She sneaked up behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist, pressing her bare chest against his back, teasing him. He dropped his shirt, spun, and grabbed her as she giggled in his ear.

The sun set the rest of the way without them.

The X-Men were all surprised when she joined them at the breakfast table the next morning, yawning. They kept their conversation on other topics, choosing to avoid, for the moment, the topic of her divorce. Directly after breakfast she disappeared into Xavier's study with him, and they remained there until nearly lunch. She emerged, looking grim but satisfied, and Xavier addressed them all at lunch. "Sara's signed the papers," he said, "and I faxed them into my attorney's office. Now, Sara has said there are some things she wishes to get from Senator Ryan's house. Logan, Warren, Scott, Jean, I would like you to go with her and help her get whatever she needs to get. The police have informed me that the senator did post bail and is home, so I want you all to be careful, and do whatever you have to do to ensure her safety." Sara looked about ready to protest at his show of caution, but he raised a hand. "Sara, don't argue." She subsided.

Ryan was indeed home. He opened the door as she rang the bell, and grabbed her arm as she walked in. "There's nothing here that's yours--" He started to hiss. He was stopped by the sight of three large men glowering at him, and looking quite ready to commit murder if he gave them a chance. He dropped her arm with a curse and backed away, looking sourly as Sara went to a desk by the large living room window and took a sheaf of papers from a drawer. She folded them, tucked them in her purse, and went up the stairs to her room, the guys following. The room was huge, ostentatiously furnished, and it was evident that very little of it was her doing. There were things in the room so at odds with her personality Jean knew Ryan had decorated the room, not Sara. There was very little in here that was Sara.

She had a couple of plastic bags in her purse, and she proceeded to open her drawers, selecting some clothing here, some there, and putting them in the bags. Most things she left in the drawers, explaining to them, "I don't want them. Half the clothes in here are things he picked out for me." She turned and went back out to the hall, and into another door. Ryan yelled. "There's nothing in there that's yours!" he howled. "Get out of my bedroom!" She ignored him, walking in, and he made a move to stop her. Wolverine stopped him, looking dangerous, and Ryan watched in impotent fury as they followed her in. She ignored everything in there, going instead to a door in the far wall, which had a heavy lock on it. She tried it, and found it locked. She turned to Richard. "Open it."

"No."

"Do as she says," Logan growled. He looked meaningfully down at his fist as his claws started to slowly protrude from his knuckles. Ryan paled, and pulled a key from his pocket, flinging it to the floor at her feet. She picked it up, turned the key in the lock, and opened the door. Jean flinched at what she saw inside.

A bed frame, with a threadbare, stained mattress on it; rope hung around the posts, and from hooks in the ceiling. Right above the bed, in the ceiling, was a hook with two keys on it. Sara climbed on the bed and tried to reach them, her face pale. Scott stepped onto the bed wordlessly and got them for her. She said flatly, "They're the keys to my Buell and my Chevelle. He taunted me with them while he had me here." She went to the wall where there was a large chest pushed against it, and opened it. Warren gasped and Wolverine flinched at the assortment of things hidden in that trunk. More rope, gags, blindfolds, a car battery, numerous leather straps, adult toys, thin bamboo sticks that Jean had seen Storm use to tie her plant trailers to, and two well-worn leather whips that smelled of old blood. Sara stared at them, with an unreadable expression, and reached for a packet shoved in the bottom. Jean knew they were pictures. She didn't need to see what they were; it was evident.

Ryan snatched them from her, angry. "Those are mine!" he hissed at her. "I took them!"

Sara grabbed at the packet, but he refused to let go. "I'm not letting you have them," she said, her voice shaking a bit. "You'll find some way to use them against me!" She grabbed for the packet, and it tore, spraying photos all over the floor. Jean scooped them up, trying not to look at them. They were humiliating photos of Sara, nude, bound, tormented, and degraded. The others gathered up the remainder, and by unspoken agreement, they handed them to Jean, who tucked them into her purse. Sara fled the little cell, and they followed her. She stuffed her two bags in the back of her Chevelle, and tossed the key to the Buell at Logan. He got on the bike and revved it up, and Warren, Scott, and Jean got into Scott's Mustang. They went back to the mansion.

Sara slammed the door of her Chevy and got her clothes out of the back, running up the stairs to her room. She came back down and took the photos from Jean, going straight out the back door. She lit a fire in the grill behind the house, waited for it to really begin burning, and then fed the photos to the flames one by one until they were all gone. She turned and stalked into the house, her face set, and no one said anything to her as she went into her room and locked the door. She didn't come out until dinner. She tried to laugh, and talk with them at dinner, but it was obvious that her heart wasn't in it. Logan followed her to her room afterward.

He lay, staring at the ceiling, listening to the soft, even breathing of the woman sleeping beside him, curled against his ribs. She had no idea how close he had been to killing her husband that day. When he had seen the room that she had lived in during the weeks she'd been gone, he'd seen red. He wanted to rip the bastard senator into pieces for what he'd done to Sara. She was a special, wonderful woman, with so much to give. How could Richard Ryan have missed seeing what he had? How could he have so callously destroyed and discarded the trust and love she had given him? For she did love him; Logan saw it in her eyes, her voice, and her pain. Even after all he'd done to her, she still loved him. She told Logan she wasn't asking for anything in the divorce papers. He could have everything, she said. She would take away from the marriage exactly what she had gone into it with, materially; her car, her beloved bike, and her clothes. Logan knew she'd be taking with her the memory of pain, humiliation, and degradation too. It was an unfair trade. He clenched his fist. She didn't want anything; he thought she deserved more, and said as much. She had given him a very small smile, and said, "I have more. I have you." They had made love again, she with a desperation he hadn't felt in her the day before. A desperation that tore at his heart because she was asking him silently to show her she could be loved. "I love you," he whispered, pulling her closer, stroking the black hair silvered by moonlight.