Logan finally saw her three fights in. The Rogue was leaning against the wall on the edge of the crowd, a beer dangling from her gloved fingers. Leather. Cleavage. He'd have looked twice even if he hadn't recognized her. She was wearing a hat pulled low over her eyes. It was the beat-up straw cowboy hat she'd liberated from his truck the summer after she had returned his tags. The summer before she'd taken the Cure.
The low brim hid her face and covered the distinctive ribbon of silver. Her hair had always reminded him of maple. That first bite of the axe into a dry round. That crack-split revealing the pale creamy center, shining against the rich brown of the bark, smooth and sweet and—
His inattention cost him a nasty punch to the jaw. He spat out a tooth and winced as he felt a new one push up through the ruined meat of his gums.
Motherfucker.
That shit hurt.
The fight slogged on, nothing had changed and yet everything felt different. Electric. Her eyes on him. Watching him. Touching him. Anointing each splatter of blood that marked his rippling flesh. Following the lines of his powerful frame as he moved. Flinching as he took a punch. Shivering when he landed one. Wetting her lips as he panted.
He'd always like fighting, but it had never been like this. The Wolverine blazed to the fore, tearing through every chain that bound him like paper and ash, and what had been rough became brutal. Vicious and savage. That first roar that tore from his chest cut through the din and even his enraged opponent took a step back in awe.
The Rogue took a step forward.
Ah, fuck.
The Wolverine growled, howling his approval as the blows fell, hot and fast and bloody. That quick release, so much like sex that he shuddered with the force of it surging under his skin. He could feel her eyes on him and his blood sang.
See what I am? See what I can do?
The man's cocky swagger was eclipsed by the Wolverine's unshakable confidence, humanity swallowed by the sheer force of the animal's indomitable will. He would be recognized. He was alpha here. Stronger, better than all the rest, and still — still— not above showing off. For her. For the one female who had touched his heart but never his flesh.
He shared a drink with the Rogue between bouts. When she finally met his eyes under that damned hat, he jerked in his seat. Smokey eyes, lined heavily in black stared back at him defiantly, daring him to say something. She'd clearly come to make war, not love. Declaring herself on the field of battle as surely as he had in the cage earlier. He'd never seen her looking like that. Though he acknowledged the change with a curt nod that she returned with a lift of her glass, his internal landscape was far from serene. Heat and desire roiled low in his belly, putting an edge on the wildness burning in his blood.
They barely spoke. She seemed oblivious to the eyes on her and annoyed with the men in general — and him in specific. He looked too. Her scent told him she liked it well enough even if there was fire in her eyes. No woman poured herself into that much leather and satin and cinched it tight unless she wanted attention. Or to make a statement, at the very least.
Tonight hers seemed to roar a definitive 'fuck you', despite her frosty silence. He smiled into his drink because he knew her well and he'd always liked her like this. Prickly. Antagonistic. Fiery as hell. Girl was spoiling for a fight. He didn't pick one because he knew it would piss her off more.
He moved closer instead. The animal would not allow her to pretend indifference now. Not when she'd responded to his primal howl so viscerally. He deliberately put his thick, hairy arm in her space, a sprawl that was half irritation and half possession. Sweat shining on his body and marking the seat at his back. She could smell him, he knew, musky and wild. Good bourbon and sweet tobacco and that coppery tang that made her twitchy as hell.
And then he shifted closer still so she could feel the heat radiating from him. Not quite a come-on, but not platonic, either. Their silent struggle was every bit as brutal a battle of wills as what had happened in the cage; a savage, wordless trading of metaphoric blows, and a give and take of power. But this, this was personal. As close to intimate as they'd been since that night in the torch when he'd shoved every bit of himself inside her and she'd gorged on him until the flame that raged so brightly in him lit up every dark corner of her, too.
Usually he would have goaded her into a fight by now. Their energy had always been volatile. Fighting helped expend it in a safe way. Or perhaps safe wasn't quite the right word. Their arguments were legendary. Cursing and shouting. Flying objects. Broken glass. Wrecked furniture. Bruises and scrapes and even blood a time or two.
Tonight it was different.
Virgin ground. A new gauntlet thrown down between them. Girl never could resist a dare, but it wasn't just that. Something else was driving it and some obstacles were so big they couldn't be tackled head on. The part of his brain that could still reason was shrieking: Danger! Madness! It demanded retreat, or regroup, or at the very least a review of what was at best a sketchy battle plan. Instinct, however, prevailed. He couldn't explain how, or why, or even exactly what it was that he'd offered her. He just knew that it would work if she'd just drop her guard enough to let him in.
The announcer in the ring called his name. As the dull roar of the crowd rose around them, he canted his head to catch her eye under the hat.
"You stayin' after?"
She looked pissed, eyes incandescent with fury. At him? Herself? The ambivalent nature of his offer? Who fucking knew? He was close enough to the edge that he didn't give a shit. She could ignore it all she liked as long as she didn't deny it outright.
The animal demanded that much.
"Depends on if I like what I see, sugar."
Screw that. The slip and slick of her under those goddamn leather pants announced a fucking sledgehammer of 'like', stirring up a river of dirty in the back of his mind. Still, he knew if she called her on it now, she'd pull off that glove and make him eat every last, painfully honest word. A full frontal assault would have her running for the hills, but Christ, that luscious scent made his cock throb and a red haze creep over his vision.
His hands clenched into fists.
The Rogue saw it and smiled.
And that just plain pissed him off.
The Wolverine uncoiled from the worn chair, looming over her; an inescapable wall of muscle and metal and attitude that made her breath catch and her nipples draw up hard and tight; her body acknowledging what her mind refused to. That had amusement skittering over his face to rest in the lines at the corners of his eyes. He wasn't the only one twisting in the wind tonight.
He grunted in acknowledgement as her grin faded — because fuck her. She could pretend all she liked. Everything had changed the moment she'd sat down next to him and told him she'd watched him come.
You didn't play chicken with the Wolverine. At least not without expecting to take a few hard shots along the way.
Especially not when playing with the Rogue, who was both sharp and ruthless— and devastatingly unpredictable on a good day.
He leaned in closer to that beautiful, deadly flesh and put his mouth to her ear.
"Ain't had no complaints."
Somewhere buried deep, there was warmth and tenderness for her. He cared more than he should. Probably more than either of them realized. But it wasn't in him to be soft tonight, or to let her back away from the edge. Fuck their usual lines in the sand. Fuck safe. Fuck sane.
"I'll bet. Because your usual conquests are so discerning." Her mouth twisted in a parody of a smile.
He ignored the nasty barb, aware the more she bristled, the closer he was to the vulnerable parts she hated for anyone to see.
He could relate, but the momentum had him now, and even that intimate knowledge didn't stop him from delivering the killing blow.
"S'okay. I get it. S'fuckin' scary. Don't mean it's wrong, though. I'm just sayin' it's yours if you want it, darlin'. Up to you."
C'mon. I'll take care of you.
He didn't say it, but he could tell she heard it well enough. Words from a lifetime ago, written on their bones, and just as apt tonight as they were on that train before Magneto tore their lives apart and forced them both into places neither of them were ready to go.
Her eyes softened, just for a moment. A flash of tenderness, of hope, before she crushed it down. It was in that split second that every moment of hesitation or indecision about tonight burned away. He was all in. Ready to double down and let it ride.
"Fuck you."
"Nah. That ain't what's on offer, kid."
He saluted her with his beer and left her sputtering in his wake as he climbed back in the cage and let the animal rage.
Up next: Fire. No way the Rogue is gonna let the Wolverine have the last word. Girl is cocked, locked and ready to rock...