"It's so easy to forget
The bitter taste the morning left
Swore I wouldn't go back there again
'Cause you and Tequila make me crazy
Run like poison in my blood
One more night could kill me, baby
One is one too many, one more is never enough
When it comes to you
Oh, the damage I could do
It's always your favorite sins
That do you in."
(You and Tequila- Kenny Chesney)
"Logan, it isn't wise to keep her isolated." Charles warned.
Logan glared at the other man, "Chuck, she's still violent when she wakes up, and the girl's a damned narcoleptic. Sleeps half the day and is up half the night."
"She's adjusting." Charles said evenly, "Miss Kinney might adjust faster if she's around others. Think about it, Logan, shouldn't she be given the chance to interact with her peers?"
Logan bared his teeth, "There it is, there's you judging me about her age. You think she should be around teenagers instead of an old man like me? Is that it?"
Charles response was a long suffering sigh, but anything further was cut off by the shower in the other room turning off.
"She's a mess, Charles." Logan groaned after a minute, rubbing his face with both hands.
Charles nodded, "Hank sent her blood work off to a colleague of his, and, had you bothered to come to the main house in the last two weeks, you would know the results." Logan raised his eyebrows to prompt him to keep talking, "Mr. Rice had her body flooded with synthetic chemicals and large amounts of sedatives. It's withdrawal, Logan. She'll need time for her body to regulate itself, her mind in particular."
Maia emerged from the bathroom, red hair wet still but her clothes all on the right way. Logan counted that as progress. "Professor?" She asked, scanning the room fruitlessly with her hazy blue eyes.
Charles smiled as if she could see him, "Yes, Miss Kinney. How are you feeling?"
"Better. I've had a good nurse." Maia said, a smile coming to her face, and damned if that wasn't a kick in the gut to Logan. The pretty girl from his scattered memories was returning more and more each day. Skin still flushed from the shower, Maia almost looked healthy. Her hair had already started regaining it's shine, which made it even harder to keep his hands out of it.
Her stomach growled. Fabulous distraction, "Hey, Kid, get a jacket on and we'll go up to the mansion for lunch. Charles wants to make sure I'm not cooping you up out here."
Maia moved around the room with measured confidence to where the jacket he'd bought her several days earlier was draped on her bed. "Professor, I hardly feel cooped up. Spending my time outside with Logan has been amazing." She shrugged the garment on obediently, thought she'd fought him about wearing it before. That had been a more difficult argument than he'd expected, but she'd been keen to point out that he often wore nothing more warm than a plaid button down. She'd won at first, but had been shivering within the hour. "Anything about our daughter?"
Charles sighed regretfully, giving an answer Logan had already known, "No, unfortunately. With Rice and Stryker both dead things have been difficult."
She nodded understandingly, but Logan could tell by the way her heart beat that she was disappointed. He was too. It had been a solid two and a half weeks since they'd found her, two since she'd stabbed Hank with her own bloodied needle, but there had been no leads on their girl. "What can I do to help?"
"Regretfully, I'm utilizing Cerebro as often as possible, and Hank is searching all the files he can in order to find her." Charles said as reassuringly as he could.
Maia looked pensive for a moment, plucking nervously at her jacket. "I…I don't know much about your Cerebro, but…would it help you if you knew her name?"
Logan and Charles fixed her with identical stares. "Her name?" Charles asked, Logan was too stunned.
She nodded, shifting awkwardly, looking even more like a teenager than she usually did, "Yeah, I mean, you don't carry a baby for nine months without giving it a name. I was waiting until she was born to really talk about it, just to make sure our instincts weren't wrong and I saddled a boy with a girl's name."
Logan was standing in front of her before he knew what he was thinking. Her heartbeat quickened at his closeness. He put one hand on the side of her face, "What, Maia? What were you going to name her?"
She closed her eyes, and leaned ever so slightly into his hand, "I was going to talk to you about it, but… Laura. I wanted to name her Laura. I've called her Laura in my head since the moment she was born."
"Laura." Logan echoed, linking the name to the scent from the box. Laura was so much better than X-23.
Maia smiled, putting one of her hands over his, "I didn't know your name then, but I thought you'd appreciate it. L. Laura. Logan." She looked up towards his face, still smiling, "My Wild Man."
That was the kick in the teeth: He was sitting in front of Maia, her soft presence behind him as she received the alphabet, "A…B…C…D…E…F…G…H…" He remembered his head ticking to the side at 'H' sounding familiar, but he told her to keep going. She took a breath, "Okay…I…J…" That had drawn more interest from him, but he wasn't ready to stop, "K…L…" He'd spun around, locking eyes with her. She smiled broadly at him, her face more beautiful than he'd remembered up to that point, "That's it? L?"
He'd nodded, smiling at her, and she'd stretched out to kiss his cheek. The second she touched him, he pulled her into a bone crushing hug. His hands moved over the bare skin of her arms as she settled herself onto his lap. She drew her lips from his cheek and rubbed her face against his beard, the sensation primally satisfying. Then she whispered, "L. L, my Wild Man."
He'd instantly liked that, liked her calling him hers. The possessive growl he let out had her shaking, and he stood with her in his arms, pinning her to the wall of their enclosure. She wrapped her legs around him, the heat between her legs pressed against him. Her lips had moved over his, and he'd let instinct lead his movements. He became a heat seeking missile intent on marking her fair skin everywhere he possible could. Then he'd heard a commotion in the hallway, and had pushed her off. She'd squawked in indignation, her face pink from kissing, but he'd been completely focused on protecting her.
And now he was standing in front of her with a hard-on and Charles in the room. He really needed someone to shoot him in the head. He took a few breaths and urged his body to quite being a pedophile.
Maia laughed, "Sorry. I overstepped. Know I'm 'Kid' now, but…I called you my Wild Man for a long time."
"I… remember." Logan muttered.
Maia's eyes widened, "Really?"
Charles chuckled, the shit-head, "Being in your presence helps Logan remember some of your past."
She was a demon. Had to be. The female reached her free hand out, skimming it up his arm and neck to rest on his cheek, and used her new anchor point to press a soft kiss to his lips. She pulled back smiling at him, "Relax, I'm better now. So are you. Let's go."
Charles hummed at something she must have thought, "Yes, it might help locate her if you assist."
Logan shook his head, "Woah, no, she's still…"
"Right here, and, as I've said, feeling much better." Maia snapped, glaring at him. She huffed haughtily, "I didn't even draw blood this morning." She glanced Charles' direction as if to remind Logan they had an audience before she returned to staring him down, "I've spent the last week thinking about what I can do. Can we start with food and move from there? The last…ten years… of my life have gotten me nowhere. I'm ready to move forward."
The girl may stumble and fall all the time, tripping over her own feet as she moved around the boathouse, usually bumping things 'he' had moved, but she had an uncanny ability to find his face with her big blue eyes. Logan sighed, "Come on, there's some people you should meet anyway."
He held her elbow loosely with one hand, keeping her on the worn path, and kept the other hesitantly behind Charles' wheelchair, ready to help if needed. The piece of machinery wasn't exactly meant for off-roading, part of why it had taken two weeks for Charles to get concerned enough to wheel his own ass out to the boathouse to check on him.
Maia hesitated when she heard the front door open, turning beseechingly towards Logan, "This is terrible. I've suddenly…Uh…What if they don't like me? I mean…I've hurt some of them!"
She looked every bit the teenager she appeared, and Logan scoffed, "Kid, they've all gone a little crazy at some point or another. We're all fucked up." He urged her forward, "Welcome to Charles Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters." Maia visibly startled at the cacophony of noises that came with the place being packed with children and teenagers. She grabbed hold of his hand, and refused to let go until he put her in a chair in the kitchen. He tipped his head towards the female who was already occupying a seat at the table, "Rogue, this is Maia. Maia, Rogue is to your right. Play nice."
Both girls groused about being told to play nice, but were able to start up a conversation without being too awkward. That was a plus for sure. He returned with a helping of some meatloaf he'd found in the fridge, and despite the fact that he had no idea who had made it or how old it was, it had smelled fine. He put the plate in front of Maia and put a fork in her hand.
Rogue blinked several times at Maia, "Ya need mah help?"
Maia shook her head, "I've got it, really. He just doesn't have the patience to watch me fumble around the table to find the appropriate cutlery." She smiled, "That's why he's been feeding me mostly finger food for the last two weeks."
Rogue snorted, "Nah, Logan just can't cook."
"I believe that." Maia said as she smiled in his direction.
Logan had to get away. He turned and left the kitchen, barely mumbling that he'd be back. He needed to clear his head before she drove him crazy. Maybe keeping her cooped up with him for two weeks hadn't been the best idea, but after she'd attacked Hank, Logan couldn't bear to have her out of hearing range. He couldn't even get too far away when he wanted, sitting heavily with a beer in his hand in the sitting room right outside the kitchen. It was a damned shame he couldn't really get drunk.
"It's been a while." An accented voice said from behind him, about twenty minutes into his beer.
"Ororo." He acknowledged, tipping his beer her direction as she sat in a chair across from him.
She looked into the kitchen where Rogue and Maia could still be heard talking. "Well, she looks better than she did the other week." Logan grunted in response, and she frowned slightly, "You look better too. That, and that's the first beer I've seen in your hands in weeks. Haven't seen you smoking either."
Shit, she was sounding like Jean, but at least the telepath was on a mission. "Back off."
Ororo kept pushing, "She's a pretty girl, Logan, and she seems to bring something out in you."
Logan growled at the woman, "Drop it."
She leaned towards him, "You two share a child, Logan. That's a big deal, and…I know we never really had anything serious, but if there's something between the two of you still, it's probably for the best we never did. I don't want to cause any problems. We're still friends though, right?"
Logan resisted the urge to throw his beer as he stood, "For fucks sake, you're not causing problems. I'm not ever going to touch her like that! I was an animal then, I would have screwed anything. She's a child! Why would I want to do anything with her?"
As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he could smell Maia, could hear her heart hammering right behind him. He hadn't even noticed her and Rogue leave the kitchen. Rogue had a gloved hand on Maia's elbow, "Uh…Maia, maybe we should go…somewhe'e else."
Maia shrugged out of her grip, stepping closer to him, bumping a table but still moving until she was right in front of him. It seemed for a moment that she could see again when she locked her eyes on his face, her jaw set stubbornly. Her hand cracked across his face, "You deluded asshole."
She held her hand against her chest, silly girl had probably broken something, and his face only barely stung. "Maia, you should…"
She wasn't done though, "No. I'm not an idiot, Logan. It's been ten years, you didn't remember me, so were bound to have moved on. That's fine, really, but don't you dare for a second act like I repulse you, we both know that's a lie. Also, don't you dare use my looks to justify anything. We both know I'm almost thirty. You need to get your head out of your fucking ass and decide what the truth is. You can't coddle me one minute, dump on me the next, and expect me to be okay with it. You've done the same song and dance for the last two weeks. I'm done with it. I need to focus on Laura, and you obviously aren't."
Shit. He had no idea what to say. He'd used those excuses to control himself at the same time he'd seen to her every need. He hadn't had to say anything to send out all sorts of messages. She was right.
She crossed her arms over her chest, "Rogue offered to share her room if we moved into the mansion. Think I'll take her up on it. You've been doing so well on your own in the shower the last two weeks, but we wouldn't want you to screw up and fuck a child, would we? I'll be hanging with the teenagers."
Rogue looked over Maia's shoulder helplessly at him like she'd made the offer in an effort to be nice. Logan reached for Maia, but she heard his step and moved back. "Maia, come on. You can't."
She scoffed at him, "Yes, Logan. I appreciate your help, but I need to not be around you right now." She turned and knocked the side table over. He tried to grab her as she fell, but she pushed him off, growling, "I'm fine!" Rogue helped the other girl to her feet, mouthing an apology to Logan as she led Maia upstairs.
Logan stood in shock, wondering what the hell had just happened. He wanted to run after her and run the opposite direction all at once. Charles rolled out of his office, shaking his head, muttering, "Oh, Logan."
She was driving him crazy, and he needed a drink a whole lot stronger than a beer.
It took talking with Charles, two days, and more than a beer for him to gather the courage to face the redhead again. Her pale face and wrecked scent were his fault for sure. Emotions were more trouble than they were worth. They were both worried about their daughter, right? They had to find her…find Laura.
Poor Logan, he's just got self-loathing down, doesn't he?
Let me know what you guys think! You rock!
-Jenn