The long ride home tempered things.

They barely spoke, each lost in thoughts of the future. The chair in the back only seemed to ramp up the uneasy feeling that had been growing for weeks. Marie's naked fingers beat an impatient tattoo against her knee. Logan recognized it for what it was. Leaving her gloves off had been an act of defiance. She did that when she was pissed. It was a warning. Like the bright colors some animals flaunted to advertise their poisonous nature to all predators who dared come near.

Touch me if you dare.

On an empty stretch of country backroad, they passed an unidentifiable crush of blood and fur that was gory enough for Marie to close her eyes and look away. She was surprised when the truck drifted to the side of the road and Logan turned it back around toward the sad, twisted lump.

"Sugar?"

"S'still alive," he said tightly. The slow twitching under the skin was all too obvious to a man with his acute senses. It didn't help that he knew what that kind of death felt like. The difference was he'd gotten up and walked away after a handful of hours so horrific he only recalled them in his darkest dreams. That wasn't going to happen today for the poor creature crushed by some uncaring motorist, but he could at least make the passing quick and painless rather than a lingering hell of razor sharp pain, the way it had been for him.

It was less an act of kindness than one of desperation. He hoped that someone would do that for him one day— that just once it could be blissfully quick rather than a sideshow of horrors.

He pulled the truck up behind what Marie guessed had once been a shaggy wild dog of some sort. It stunk of death and pain, fur matted with blood and the sharp pulpy bits of splintered bone.

Logan put his hand on the door without looking at her. "Stay in the truck."

Like hell.

She got out anyway, kneeling with him at the animal's side. It was so far gone it didn't even try to snap at them. It merely turned its one good eye toward them and begged soundlessly for release from the suffering.

Logan shook his head and raised his fist, rubbing one hand over his knuckles before the claws sprang free with a metallic hiss. This wouldn't be the first creature he'd put out of its misery, but it disturbed him in a way that killing a man didn't. Snuffing out a life like this felt too much like putting his claws into that wild part of himself. Ending the existence of something that deserved to live free, unmolested and without pain.

Beside him, he felt Marie shudder and draw in a shaky breath.

"Shh…." Marie's soothing, gentle voice calmed both wild things. She put her fingers on his knuckles between his claws and he allowed her to slowly lower his hand to his knees. "Shh…. sugar. Shhh. You won't need those now. It's okay."

It was very definitely not okay.

Her voice was so soft and something in it eased the ache in him. She'd always had a strange way of making him feel better. He put the claws in. "He's gone now. Look." She pet the shaggy head with her other hand, stroking the bloody fur reverently as it heaved a last shuddering sigh and went still under her gentle caress, slack and relaxed without the pain knotting it in agony. "It's alright now. It's alright," she crooned, and he looked at her out of the corner of his eye. Her face was in profile and he could see in the shine of her eyes that she was barely holding it together.

Marie'd always had a soft spot for wild things, from feathers to fur. He included himself in that group, too. The real truth was that the Wolverine was a bigger part of him than anyone of them knew, save her. He was largely an animal walking around in a man's skin, only conforming to the laws of men when it suited him, and even then, not very well.

He left her kneeling by the dog while he removed the blanket wrapped around the chair. The leather was distressed anyway. What was another scuff or two? She didn't speak as he moved the animal's broken body to the blanket and wrapped it gently before lifting it to the back of the truck and securing it carefully for the ride home. Marie followed slowly, leaning heavily on the side of the truck.

"Sugar?"

"Gonna bury him back at the house." He wasn't paying attention to her as he dug under the seat for a bottle of tepid water to wash off the worst of the gore. The stench was overwhelming. He couldn't look at her feeling so raw and exposed. He passed the bottle over to her without a word, eyes still fixed anywhere but on her. Blood on her hands, too. He didn't want to see that, either.

She was slow getting in and Logan didn't put two and two together, lost as he was in his own thoughts, until they hit a pothole and she gasped quietly.

He knew instantly what she'd done and his anger was tempered only by his concern for her. "Dammit. You okay?" He'd mistaken the tears of pain for tears of grief. Or maybe there was some of both. It was hard to tell with the stench of the dog stuck in his nose.

Marie nodded through the big, wet tears on her face. "Yeah. I'll be fine." Her words were clipped.

"You sure? I could touch you." Heal whatever damage she'd suffered by pulling the life of that pitiful dying creature inside her.

"Wouldn't help. It's not that kind of pain."

That was somehow worse. A wound he couldn't heal. Logan's lips thinned into a line and his fingers tightened on the wheel until his knuckles were white.

"Why'd you do that?"

"So you wouldn't have to," she said simply.

She looked at him then, a real look. Right in the eyes. Nothing tempered. Nothing hidden. Love and pain and openness so deep it unsettled him to the marrow of his metal bones.

Her nose was red and running and her face was blotchy, and in that moment the truth and beauty of what she was to him and how she truly felt about him crashed into him with the force of a sledgehammer. He was woefully unprepared to receive such pure emotion from her without the boundaries and barriers they'd become accustomed to over the years.

What she'd done hadn't been the petulant act of a willful girl, but the selfless act of a woman deeply in love. Logan was so stunned, so moved that he couldn't even bring himself to chastise her. He watched, with gratitude and a touch of awe, as she seemed to gather herself and smile at him through her tears.

"Don't worry. I'll be okay soon. It's starting to fade already."

"Marie—" he stopped himself then, unable to articulate how he felt. He hated that she hurt, but he damn sure wasn't going to wish away such a profound gift. That she wanted to spare the man who always healed from everything the pain of one more wound was hard for him to wrap his mind around.

"Shh…" She put her bare hand on his for a brief moment and squeezed. "I didn't want you to hafta carry that, sugar. It'll fade from me in a way it never would have for you." There was a truth there, too.

She took her hand from his and turned her watery gaze back out the window. Things were still strained, but she didn't protest when he wrapped his arm around her and pulled her close. She simply nestled into him and put her head on his shoulder.

"Soon." It came out on a sigh.

The Wolverine just nodded and held her closer.

~ooOoo~

Marie didn't help him bury the dog. Logan wouldn't allow it and she seemed to understand that he wanted to do it alone. Maybe some lingering part of him in her head told her so, or maybe she didn't feel the need to lay the body to rest now that a part of its spirit resided within her.

Hell, maybe she just wanted a hot shower. He couldn't really tell. She was a hard read these days, prickly one moment and alarmingly selfless the next. A bold vixen making his blood burn and a shy virgin a heartbeat later, flushing and stammering and leaving him feeling like a slavering beast, licking his chops and eyeing her like a prize treat. He kept hoping the next flash of the woman he so desperately needed her to be would be the one that stuck.

Marie was nowhere to be found after he returned from the forest with a shovel and the blood-stained blanket. The dog didn't need human trappings. Logan had returned him to the earth, to nature. To freedom.

He took a long, hot shower, wishing he could wash away the uneasy feeling crawling under his skin as easily as the dirt and blood. It swirled down the drain, leaving nothing but fresh clear water behind. That seemed wrong too, somehow. No trace left behind. Is that how his passing would be?

Putting a hand on the cold tile, Logan let the water beat down on his wide shoulders. It felt like he was carrying the weight of the world on them today and he wished, again, for the sweet release he knew he'd find in the arms of the woman he loved— if she could just be brave enough to reach out and take him for her own.

Scrubbing a hand over his dripping face, he shut off the water and got out, throwing the towel he'd used to dry himself back in the general direction of the bathroom as he padded naked to the small pile of clothes in a box by the low sleeping pallet that had been serving as his bed for the last year.

Christ. Had it really been so long?

He counted backwards and was surprised to realize it had been even longer than that. It was a weakness of his, not noticing the passage of time the way the others did, until something disturbing forced him to face it in some inescapable way.

When he reached for his clothes, he found one of Marie's scarves draped over the edge of the box. He held it to his face, swallowing a huff of frustration as her lingering scent made him start to grow hard. He set it aside and sat heavily as his mind wandered. Dressing slowly gave him time to think; the banal motions automatic after all these decades. He was almost glad he didn't remember them all now. They seemed to stretch into one unending sameness and the realization of how close to the edge he'd become was inescapable.

Marie was going to need to make a choice soon, and if that choice was to be a girl for a while longer, he was going to need to leave. Logan could see that clearly now. They couldn't continue on the way they had been. Not anymore.

A sound drew his attention upward and he realized with a start that Marie was in the loft. The house smelled so much like her now he hadn't even noticed she was there. Goddamn, he really was slipping.

He climbed the stairs slowly, wondering who he'd find up there this time. Rogue? Marie? Some unstable blend of them both? That seemed to be the norm these days. He didn't have the patience to deal with it today. Not after what had happened, but concern for her well-being kept him moving. Slow, silent steps that brought him to her side regardless of the personal cost. Isn't that what she'd done for him today? How could he give any less?

Up next: Every Rose Has Its Thorn. The last of the boundaries have been ripped away and a brutal exchange reveals how close they are to the breaking point. One can only push the Wolverine so far before he snaps...