DISCLAIMER: Not mine; borrowed from their creators.
FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO'VE HUNG IN HERE: thanks for your interest, support & comments. This chapter is mostly self-indulgence; I just wanted a little more fluff before Max & Logan have to go back to pre-Prodigy status. Also, any feedback or thoughts would be great–especially since I'm self-beta-ing, this has been one heck of a learning experience. One of the primary things learned: boy, do I love the feedback!!
Chapter 14: Fogle Towers
They sat at the table, plates and bowls cooling, now emptied of their warm, impressive contents. The wine bottle was three quarters gone, and the candles had burned down a few inches from where they had started dinner. Max and Logan sat at his dining table, full and relaxed.
Max sighed, and looked over to the cook. "That really was a culinary miracle." She lay down her fork and smiled sweetly in feline contentment, her voice threatening a purr. "What did you call it?"
"Chicken Cacciatore" Logan took the last swallow of wine left in his glass, allowing a satisfied grin for both the dinner and Max's response. "When all the ingredients are available, it isn't too bad."
Nor was the company. Dinner had been pleasant, but safe–no heavy topics, no angst, no heartfelt admissions... but also no missteps or recriminations. It too, like the food, had been warm and comforting. And after all the highs and lows of the previous night, that effect seemed both completely improbable...and perfectly right...
...earlier...
After the ingredients had been set to simmer Max had decided to delve into Logan's unlimited hot water supply by using the hour of cooking time to shower and change clothes...but when she suggested it, Logan looked at her in some remaining concern. "Are you steady enough for the shower?" he asked. He had learned over the past months how an innocent bathroom could be a dangerous place for one not so sure-footed...
"Hard to manage bubble baths in the shower stall" Max shrugged. "It'll be fine." But at the look in his eyes, she ventured to ask, "What?" at the expression she saw there.
He wavered, the awkwardness clear in his eyes before he brushed it away–anything for Max, he reasoned. "Grab your things and come on back to my bathroom" he released his brakes and started down the hall. "Maybe not a bubble bath like you had in mind...but maybe I can find you something close..."
Curious, she went to the guest room to get a change of clothing from those Bling had brought earlier, and came back toward the master bedroom. Crossing through to the attached bath, she'd heard the sounds of deep water splashing and came in to see Logan also returning, a couple big, fluffy towels in his lap. Across the spacious bathroom at the opposite wall, a generous jacuzzi tub was filling with softly steaming bath water...
"Logan...." Incredulous, she looked back to him–and the look in his eyes filled in the rest, immediately, despite his efforts to play it off. What had clearly been a luxurious but "normal" bathroom now spoke of its owner's impaired mobility– the jacuzzi had been sullied by grab rails, the nearby shower stall defiled with transfer chair, bench, handheld shower head and lowered controls; there were other medical looking items and equipment that she knew immediately pained him to display.
But he waited, the green eyes finally lifting to hers, almost afraid for what he'd see in her own. And among her reactions, she knew she couldn't let him see the tug of sadness and compassion that she felt, that he thought he needed to hide these things from her. She had absolutely no problem, however, letting him know her first thoughts, turning to him, fists on hips. "Logan Cale, I can't believe you've been holding out on me!" she sputtered.
And what Logan saw, as he dared to look for Max's reaction, were her eyes growing wide in recognition as she crossed straight over to the swirling water, seemingly oblivious to the hospital-like contraptions dotting the room. He breathed out in a tentative sigh, wondering if she could really overlook...
"Your bathtub is like a swimming pool!"
Watching her carefully, the hesitant smile starting to light his face, he leaned over to the switch. "Not 'swimming pool'" he offered, anticipating the effect this time. "Whirlpool..."
Forty five minutes later Max had emerged, feeling liquid and warm and more relaxed than she ever could after hauling boiling pots of water to fill a tin-lined tub. A whirlpool...she'd completely forgotten any grab bars or rails or resulting angst to her host as she hatched her water-logged plans to make Logan pay for not 'fessing up sooner...
She walked out of the master bedroom, shaking out her towel dried hair, to see Logan lighting the candles he'd placed on the table, looking up to smile at her. "I was wondering if I'd need to come fish you out."
"Logan, I mean it, if I wasn't so relaxed I'd kick your ass for keeping that whirlpool a secret" her smile warmed him, made him believe she was back, all of her. "Thank you." she added, softer now.
"Any time." He finished lighting the candles and pivoted his chair to face her. "It's yours, when ever you need it."
She breathed in, deeply–and Logan watched her, feeling gratified with her contentment. He'd had so much in his life, she so little... Reining in his imagination, he reflected that could offer her at least these things safely, in platonic friendship as well as anything else. Whatever they were, she could take this, no strings...no heartache...no regrets...
"Dinner smells fantastic" she slid into a chair at the table beside him. "What is it, anyway?"
"Chicken Cacciatore" he said. But he wasn't smelling the rich, tomato-pepper-onion scents anymore ...he was smelling the clean, soapy-fresh scent of Max, and what her personal chemistry did to his soap and shampoo...
And was saved by the chime of his oven timer. "Showtime" he announced, and snapped his brakes to move quickly to the kitchen, relieved for the interruption. He would shake this infernal mooning once he got some sleep...
"What can I do?' She followed him,
"Pour the wine, take it in?" At her agreement, he focused on the pasta, the tender chicken. Daring a quick finger into the sauce, he tested it–perfect, just like the old days. Satisfied with dinner's outcome, he vowed to push aside the other stuff–as in, his infatuation– and get back to being as they'd been. Maybe some day they'd figure out what that was...
Over dinner, they laughed about Normal's reaction to the Guevara family 'food poisoning incident' and Cindy's play by play immediately following of Normal's 'efforts' to keep the family secret secret. He told her about Bling's tickets and the chain of contacts he'd used to get them, ultimately finding that taking shameless advantage of the Cale family connections got him exactly what he wanted, even closer to center court than he'd hoped. They spoke of non-consequential matters, avoiding the topic of Max's capture. They took coffee and more wine out to the living room where, at Max's insistence, Logan got out of the chair and stretched out on the couch, allowing gravity to attack different points of his body. Max settled into a chair facing him, and they watched the Seattle skyline darken sweetly into night...
...into night...
Logan had been drifting–on air or water, he wasn't certain–but he remembered hearing Max's voice shift from across a distance, to close at hand, little puffs of breath tickling his ear, to shift as he was cushioned into sinking again into the sweet, safe dark of sleep, exhaustion and injury demanding his submission...
He'd been dreaming...snippets, only, of holding Max close...of feeling her soft skin...of standing with her before the mirror, of brushing back her hair and turning her to draw her close, to enfold her in his arms and kiss her...
But he felt his arms not around Max's form, but flung out away from him, one overhead by his ear, across his linen-covered pillow, one stretched off to the cool underside of another. Suddenly aware that his last conscious thought had been while he was sitting on the couch, he grunted softly and started to move to investigate–and his still-sore ribs complained sharply. With another grunt, he stopped, stretching a moment before moving further.
"Good morning–or, I guess I should say, good afternoon–it's nearly that." Max shifted in the chair across from Logan's bed, sitting forward to get a better look at him, putting down the journal she held. "Feeling better with some sleep in you?" He wouldn't notice until several hours later that the journal now laid on the side table by her chair was the issue with the third of his three installments on the bio-hazard dumping–the one that had not only caught the attention of an awards committee, but of a demented pharmacist with a mother fixation. He'd find the other two issues underneath it.
"How did I end up here?" he asked, propping himself up, still a bit gingerly, on his elbows. He noticed he still had on the sweater he wore the previous night–he ventured a guess that his pants were there, too, under the comforter that had been thrown over him...
"I couldn't stand to wake you, you were sleeping so soundly–finally. I just..." she trailed.
Logan groaned inwardly at the thought. "I didn't think you were up to lugging dead weight around yet..." His attempt at a cavalier smirk didn't quite cover the look of disgrace there, to think she felt compelled to carry him to bed, especially while she was still recuperating herself. Across the room, her face was a blur to him, and he couldn't tell what she'd made of it, dealing with his immobility. He was keenly aware that the tide had turned more fully now, back to where he was the invalid and she, the hired warrior. Hadn't taken long, he reflected, the hollow feeling creeping back into his belly.
"Not much lugging involved" she shrugged, her voice light. "Just a hop to the chair from the couch, and from the chair to the bed." She almost made it sound pedestrian, as common as rain in Seattle. "And the fact that you were sound asleep during the entire process just proves that you needed someone to take matters out of your hands and into their own." She had risen while she spoke, stretched, and came around to hand him his glasses, lifting them from where she'd put them on the night stand. Boldly, she sat beside him now, on the bed near his thigh, peering at him, looking almost herself now.
"What about you?" he wondered if his embarrassment was as plain as it was uncomfortable. "You weren't just stuck here in that chair, all night..." he asked. But he knew better...
"Well, as cosy as the bed is in your guestroom, I was getting a little tired of it...the chair felt right, as a change."
"Max..." He shook his head, uncertain what he'd intended to say...uncertain what he could say, now...
"C'mon, the least I could do was return the favor."
Glasses in place now, Logan could study the perfect face before him as it dawned on him what she was saying–Max was back and it would take all of Mother Morrison's drugs to get her to admit anything directly now. But there lingered...something...of their past hours in her words, and he knew she'd stayed with him, not wanting to leave his side, not wanting to be alone again, just yet, not wanting him to be alone...
...or was that just a dream, too, like his kiss at the mirror...?
"...Logan?"
"Sorry" he came to again, blinking back to their present. It couldn't have lasted, this fairy tale. This scene was emblematic of their relationship–no, of why there was no relationship, Logan thought, sadly. Max was alive, vibrant, cheeky– and he was the guy in the wheelchair, the guy at the computers, the guy waiting at home, the guy with medical aids and equipment spoiling a wonderfully romantic jacuzzi... the guy flat in his back, in bed... He began to wonder if every bit if it had been a dream...
But she was looking at him more closely, a half smile playing along her lips, encouragingly. "So when do I get to hear how you saved the day, so I can kick your ass for coming after me?" Her smile didn't change much when she tried to complain, "Especially pulling a hare-brained stunt like coming alone, going in before your back up arrived..."
She would badger him until he told her; this time she was trying charm. Could she know how irresistible she was, like that? What had Original Cindy said, about her having the 'po-po' wrapped around her little finger? The po-po had company...
...but it wasn't enough to break through his protective shell, newly erected, or the protective concern he still held that she didn't need to hear all of it, not the way they treated her. He minimized, "C'mon, Max, the guy was a pharmacist" he didn't meet her eyes as he spoke in self-deprecation. "It wasn't as if it was a platoon from Manticore who found you." ...but after the words were out he couldn't stop himself from looking up again, to see her reaction...
He saw her eyes soften as she considered him, and then flicker in understanding. With a slight tip of her head, she asked, "So, you'd've felt better if you could have swooped in and rescued me from a whole legion of revved-up soldiers than from one measly pharmacist?"
When she said it that way–with her tone reminding him that he had, indeed, rescued her, and with that perfect, saucy little smile, he felt himself caving as quickly as the po-po. With a reluctant grin, he admitted, "Well, yeah. Who wouldn't?"
She smiled back at her protector. "Difference is, it was the pharmacist who had me. And I couldn't do a thing." Her voice and eyes had softened...and she looked long into his remarkable eyes...
And with that, Logan relaxed into a heartfelt smile. Max was back, as he was, back in their present, which, at the moment, was not an unpleasant place to be...
.....Epilogue to come......