Is This Love...?

Part 9

Return to Bloodmoon

Mature content: sex, baby in health distress, depression

The weeks of January rolled on and soon February had arrived; the snow had left Bayville and instead, bitter chills of wind and near constant rain. Life became so hectic that for periods of time, there was little time to have personal feelings. Missions kept cropping up, training had to get harder; and when there was downtime, Rogue saw very little of Remy LeBeau. He'd gone back to making himself scarce at nights. She'd often find ticket stubs to shows in the cities, or torn wristbands from clubs and concerts in his clothing when it was her turn to do laundries.

The relationship with Remy she'd had managed to remain...congenial for the team's sake, but they didn't socialise outside of it at all. He rarely showed up for any team social gatherings and didn't bother to spend much time in the rec room any more, which...made things easier. It felt like a working relationship more than anything else. He was there when he needed to be but...he was absent when she needed him to be – and that helped more than anything in slowly starting to get over what had happened in December.

She'd tried to focus on her leadership instead of wallowing in self-pity and she felt she was doing a somewhat decent job of it – no one was complaining at least.

When February came, Jean and Scott were getting ready to move out of Scott's room to the now almost renovated boathouse. Rogue found herself packing up her room to get ready for the switch.

Due to the move, she'd decided to clear her closet out and throw out a lot of things she didn't wear any more rather than just shift it from one closet to another to never be worn or looked at again. She was searching through shoes she hadn't even worn in years when there was a knock at her door. She swept her hair back from her face.

"Yeah?" she called, throwing a pair of old Converse into the box for the trash; the things had holes in them and the soles were cracked.

She turned to see Remy at the door, standing there, his face a little grim. He looked exhausted – he'd seemed that way for days but she'd held her tongue in asking why. It wasn't remotely her business what was going on in his personal life. As long as he was committing to the team and not making himself ill, she wasn't going to complain.

He'd not come to her room once since his return to the mansion on Christmas eve. His standing there right then told her that something was wrong, he wouldn't have remotely come near her otherwise.

"Need t' talk," he said, he leaned on the door frame, his eyes dropped to the floor, his lips pursed.

"What is it?" she asked, she slowly rose from the floor where she'd been kneeling and she dusted off her black leggings. She examined the serious look on his face.

"Need personal time off," he said, he hovered at the door, not entering. He'd always invited himself in before, and to her it spoke of just how distant they'd become.

Again? You're barely back six weeks.

She tried to force her personal feelings for him aside and tried to hold back from reminding him that he'd taken a lot of time away already. She examined the look on his face, he looked...unhappy. Worried. She'd only seen that look once...in Bloodmoon. "is...somethin' wrong?"

"Lil' Kennedy is in hospital again – she need some kin' o' major surgery. Somethin' t' do wit' the heart..." he tapped the left side of his chest lightly.

"Oh god," Rogue gasped, "is she going to be...?" she trailed off, not really wanting to finish the sentence.

"Hard t' say. She's high risk...an'...ain' doin' good. Back in intensive care again..." he frowned, "My brother is..." he sighed, "not copin'."

"When you say not copin'...?" she asked.

"No one been able t' fin' him f' since Sunday when she wen' in t' intensive care. He didn' show f' a huge heis' las' nigh' an' there's only one more window o' opportunity t' pull it off on Friday nigh'. If I can' fin' him, I'm gon' I need t' go do what I can t' pull it off myself – we can't break this contract, it's wort' a fortune...it'd pay f' the surgery an' all the bills so far. If we can't...we even more in the red."

Rogue folded her arms, standing looking at him, "of course...you should go...it's...your family and...you should be there," she agreed. "You don't even need to ask."

Remy gave a nod, he sighed as if he almost seemed relieved she approved of the time away.

"How long do you think you need?" she asked of him.

"I don' know how long...maybe a week...maybe two..." he ran a hand through his hair, he sighed deeply. "I try t' not be gone as long this time as las'."

"Is there anythin' you need?" Rogue asked, gazing at him. "Money for flights or anythin'? Ah can speak to the Professor to ask him to advance some money for you..." she offered.

Remy studied her, his eyes meeting hers in a way that he hadn't looked at her since Christmas. He faltered, was on the verge of asking something, then seemed to stop himself.

"Remy?" she asked.

"Coul' y' come?"

She blinked, "huh?"

"Jus' f' a bit. Few days, that's all...Y' don' got t' stay the entire stretch but...jus' be there...f' a few."

She stood silent for a moment, trying to process why he would want her there. He'd barely said two words to her for the past two months and now he wanted her to go back to Louisiana with him? "You...want me..." she trailed off, not able to finish the sentence. She cleared her throat. "To go with you..." she finished in disbelief. She could hardly believe her ears.

"Yeah."

"Why?" she asked. After all that'd happened, the way he'd been cold to her, distanced himself, why would he remotely want her there with him now?

"'They still think me an' you is a thing," he responded. "I...ain' corrected anything."

"Remy, Ah-"

"Jean-Luc is expectin' y' t' be wit' me. I didn' wan' tell him. If I go now wit' out y', I'm gon' need t' answer quests I don' wan' answer. I tol' him things here were was fine...I don' wan' them askin' questions 'bout us an' I don' wan' him worryin' any more than he is already."

"Ah...don't know, Remy..." she chewed the inside of her cheek.

She studied the look in his eyes, and she saw it right then. She'd never seen Remy LeBeau truly worried like this and she understood exactly why he didn't want to go alone. He's afraid if the worst happens, he won't know how to be around his own family, she realised.

He swallowed, she saw his Adam's apple bob.

"Ah...Ah'll need to speak with the Professor...see if it's okay. Things have been hectic but...Ah don't see why he wouldn't let me take a few days..."

He gave a meek nod, "I'm gon' go pack."

As she watched him go, she felt her heart sinking in her chest. It was going to be a very stressful week.

Rogue had not wanted to go back to Louisiana with Remy LeBeau to keep up the ridiculous charade that they were a couple. She didn't want to go back there at all for any reason but seeing that look on his face, the worry in his eyes that something bad was going to happen...she'd not been able to say no to him. He'd never really asked anything of her before. Other than asking her to help him get recruited into the X-Men he'd never asked a proper favour of her in all the time they'd been team-mates.

If you don't count the makin' me pose as his girlfriend, Ah suppose, she thought dully.

They were quiet on the flight to Louisiana; Remy dozed off on the plane ride, and then in the rental car on the way to the LeBeau house in Bloodmoon parish, Rogue dozed off herself. When she awakened, Remy was pulling the rental up in front of the house.

It was night time when they arrived, the lights were off in the house and Rogue felt an odd sense of eeriness about the place. In the headlights, she could see the driveway hadn't been swept in a while, leaves and garden debris had blown onto the porch, the garden shrubs were outgrown a little, and a tree had fallen near the driveway and had yet to be moved. Everything cut into darkness as Remy cut the engine of the car and got out.

"House is dark," she said, noting the porch light wasn't even on. Rogue noted that the cars usually in the parking area were also all gone.

"They're at the hospital," Remy said, "they spen' mos' the time there, righ' now," he replied as he went to the back of the rental car to retrieve their bags. Rogue made the way up the porch, the sound of an owl hooting somewhere caught her attention and she gazed towards the trees, trying to find its location.

Remy passed her her tote bag then went into his pocket to fish out the house key he still clearly had. He unlocked the door and it creaked open. Rogue felt an eerie chill run up her back; the door had never creaked like that before. He moved in and switched the light on.

Immediately what caught Rogue's attention was that things were not as they had been the last time she'd been in the house. The table by the stairs had a spray of fresh flowers on it the last time she'd seen it, now dead roses and gypsophila dangled from the vase, petals decaying on the lace doily. It was easy to see the thin film of dust on the mahogany of that table, that the normally shining wooden floor looked dingy and dirty. A old fashioned baby's stroller was parked near one wall, blankets dangling from it. A pair of dirty boots had been discarded in the corner near the coatrack, crumbling clumps of dirt near them.

They dropped their bags off in the hall and Remy went to the kitchen, "I'll put coffee on," he decided.

Rogue put her bag down and followed him; as the kitchen light came on, she saw the mess; breakfast plates still lying out, and as they passed by the kitchen table, a cluster of disturbed flies took to the air, buzzing by her face. The kitchen was...a mess. No dishes had been done in days, the sink piled up with them, the half-eaten food not even removed from most of them; the smell of rotting food was in the air and she wrinkled her nose.

Remy looked at the coffee pot, there was still coffee in it, he lifted the lid to the thing and saw the grounds inside were mouldering. Rogue peered past him into the laundry room off the kitchen; it was filled with laundry, piles of it.

"This ain't good..." Rogue mumbled worriedly. "Belle is...a neat freak...the house was immaculate when Ah was here last..."

"It got like this when the baby was in intensive care last time," Remy sighed. "I had t' keep up wit' mos' o' the mess...while workin' my ass off. They was at hospital mos' o' the time...I did what I coul' t' help keep things runnin' here."

Rogue looked at him, "why didn't you say?"

"Didn' think y' wanted t' hear me complain, t' be hones'," was all he remarked as he began emptying the dishes from the sink so he could wash out the coffee pot. "It was fine when I lef', we had it all cleaned up. Things slipped again. Guess everyone got more t' worry about than a tidy house.

Rogue felt the guilt about October biting her again as she moved away to a table by the wall, a stack of papers was sitting beneath a decorative bowl and she lifted the bowl to look at them. Hospital bills for care for the baby; the numbers she was seeing were astronomical. "seventy-three thousand dollars for...NICU?" she turned to look at him. "What's NICU?"

"Neonatal intensive care unit," he told her. "An' yeah...at that hospital...it's like..." he paused, "I don' know...seven or so thousan' a day..." he squirted dish soap into the sink.

She flicked the through other pages, "twelve grand for sepsis care...seven grand for respiratory care...holy fuck, sixty grand...?" she heard her voice get higher.

He was standing so still at the sink. "Specialis' had t' fly in from Portugal...he one o' the bes' when it come t' this. He don' come cheap, though."

"How is anyone supposed to afford all this?" she kept going through the bills; it disgusted her the way they were nickel and diming everything, from massive inflated prices for a saline drip to even the medication. A charge for a specialist unit to move the baby from one side of the hospital to the other. Rogue couldn't believe how they could do something like that.

"They ain'. That's why doctors are rich an' mos' people is poor," Remy put the dirty coffee pot into the sink and started scrubbing it out.

And Ah was mad at him for stayin'...for gettin' dragged into his family financial problems. How could he not? How could he just leave to let them deal with this?

"We had everythin' under control but...things mounted again when I leave...pretty fast. Baby ain' well..." he sighed.

"Ah'm sorry..." she admitted, putting the bills down. "Remy...Ah'm...so...so sorry..."

He glanced over his shoulder at her, "for?"

"Ah...didn't really...realise how bad it was..."

"How could y'..." he shook his head and turned back to the task at hand, "I didn' at firs' either," he stopped for a moment, "I hadn' planned t' be out here up 'til Christmas. I got...caugh' up in it...was always tryin' t' get them back in the black."

"What about insurance plans?"

"Those are the costs wit' the insurance."

"Jesus..." Rogue sighed.

"Jesus got nothin' t' do wit' this."

It took hours to get the kitchen cleaned. After having coffee – the task having to clean the coffee maker itself being a bit of a pain – they slowly got through trying to get the stacks of dishes clean. It was difficult when the water pressure in the kitchen sink was so damn poor. Apparently replacing the entire water system was still on the list of things that needed done in the LeBeau house...but the medical bills had been getting in the way.

They'd almost gotten the kitchen into a reasonable condition when they heard the front door opening and shutting, and the sound of heavy boots coming down the hall. Jean-Luc had looked much better when she'd been here in October, but now he seemed thinner, paler...more weary.

"Y' made it," Jean-Luc said.

"Yeah," Remy was finishing drying off the last of the dishes, Rogue was standing on a kitchen chair putting things away on a higher shelf. She began to get down and Jean-Luc reached his hand out to help her.

"Good t' see y', chere," Jean-Luc he said as he helped her down from the chair.

She didn't really have an adequate response to give him. She couldn't say she was glad to be there – she simply wasn't. And the grim circumstances made the atmosphere heavy. What exactly was she supposed to say to him? He suddenly hugged her and it surprised her; he was careful about skin to skin, but the way he hugged her caught her so off guard. She held his waist weakly, glancing towards Remy who just watched, his expression a little sad.

"How's the baby?" Remy asked, he put the last plate down on the stack on the counter.

Jean-Luc let go of Rogue. "They los' her heartbeat a lil' bit ago...managed t' get her back. Stabilize her."

"What's wrong with her exactly?" Rogue asked, hugging herself insecurely, feeling out of place and intrusive on such a delicate family matter.

"Somethin' t' do wit' the way the blood flow through the heart...lef' side o' the heart didn' form right 'cause she come early...I can' even pronounce the words they tol' me they call it."

"She's goin' to go through surgery?" Rogue asked.

"Yeah...they wanted t' hol' off 'til she was aroun' four or five mont's...stronger, y' know? But...things ain' goin' well..." Jean-Luc's face was grim, his eyes dull. "Baby can't breat' on her own...all hooked up t' all kin's o' tubes...we ain' been able t' hol' her f' days..." his eyes seemed misty for a moment, "what they gon' do supposed t' make it better...but...it's a real low mortality rate wit' this op so..."

Rogue winced.

Jean-Luc took a deep breath through his nose, "Remy...can I get a word?"

"Yeah...sure..." Remy nodded, "y' remember where the room is?" he looked at Rogue pointedly, which told her that he needed time alone to speak to his father.

She gave a soft nod.

Remy left the kitchen with his father and headed to Jean-Luc's private office and Rogue went about putting the last of the dishes away then she headed upstairs; the upstairs was in slightly better condition, although there was a laundry basket piled high in the hall and some clothes – she couldn't tell if they were dirty or not – had been hung over the rail at the top. She turned to Remy's room but noted the door to Belle and Henri's room hung open.

Not being able to help herself, she moved to the door and pushed it open a little more, reaching into turn the light on.

The once immaculate bedroom was cluttered with baby items, a crib set up in the corner, blankets dangling from the corner. Discarded clothes on the floor, both baby and adult items strewn everywhere. Rogue spotted a breast pump near the bed, packets of breast pads and diapers and wipes scattered around; an empty box from a multi-pack of diapers was on the floor, partially crushed.

She moved to the dresser where a bunch of printed out photos had been left scattered. All of the baby; some of her still in the incubator not long after her birth. She was so tiny...this red little thing that didn't look like she should have survived. Rogue felt her stomach churning at the thought of what Belle was going through...what Henri was going through.

Ah'll never have to go through this, Rogue realised of herself, and she hated that she was selfishly glad of it. The first time she'd ever been glad of her powers, because her powers would never let her be in this position. Never leave her in a place that would cause so much damn tragedy and heartache.

She felt her eyes watering at the photos of Belle and Henri holding the baby in the hospital, the incubator still in view. Belle looked haggard in the photos, her blonde hair dull and lifeless, her skin seemed sallow.

Rogue suddenly understood why Remy had not wanted to come here alone. She could feel the tragedy echoing in every room here in this house; a heaviness bounced off every wall. The feeling of impending misery.

"Rogue?"

She turned her eyes to the door to see Remy standing there looking in at her, his expression was full of worry. She felt a tear tickling her cheek on it's way down and she wiped it with the back of her glove quickly, "yeah?" she asked, she could hear her voice was shaky.

"I need t' go out f' a while...talk t' some people, see if anyone seen or spoke t' Henri. Then I got t' do some plannin' f' Friday. I probably won' be back 'fore dawn."

"Okay," she sniffed.

"Y' be okay here alone?" He asked, his cheek twitched a little. She understood he was recalling the first time he'd wanted to leave her alone here, and how it'd been the breakdown of what might have been the start of a real relationship.

"Yeah, Ah'll be fine," she nodded, she exhaled shakily.

He shifted uncomfortably at the door, "Y' okay?"

"Yeah, Ah'm fine," she lied, she forced a weak smile. "Ah'll...maybe clean up a little in here...while you're gone," she wiped her face again and she looked down at an empty cardboard box from breast pads on the floor, half trampled.

"Y' don' got t'."

"Ah need somethin' to keep me busy..." she explained, "and it'd maybe be nice for them when they get home to...not have to worry about this...mess..." she pushed the box with her foot.

"Do what...feels righ'," was all he managed to say.

She gave a weak nod, "Ah'll see you in the mornin'."

"Yeah."

It took all night to get the room in order; she stripped the bed and after searching through some closets in the hallway, found where they kept the clean bedding, she changed it. She swept, vacuumed and dusted every surface, she sorted through empty packets and boxes and forced them into the pitifully inadequate recycling bin at the side of the house, when she'd stop for a brief coffee break, she did some of the laundry that had been in piles everywhere – most of it Belle's (much of it stained with breast milk).

Rogue had found another stack of bills in the bedroom, they'd fallen on the floor and a lot of them were in the red. Car payments, parking fines, an electricity bill was due – quite a high one and there was an estimate to have the water system in the plantation replaced – which was an astronomical hundred thousand dollars. They'd recently had the water heater fixed and that itself, had cost them nearly three grand.

Everythin' is mounting up, Rogue realised as she put the bills in a neat pile on the dresser. She hoped Belle and Henri wouldn't be offended that she'd seen them, and she prayed they wouldn't think she'd actually looked.

The bathroom attached to Belle's and Henri's room was the only room that they seemed to have made vague effort to clean. The toilet cistern was definitely thick with dust, but the inside was at least clean, which Rogue was thankful for. The bathtub was grimy looking though, and the sink dull. She gave them a quick wipe, not having the energy for anything more thorough. Exhaustion started to weigh on her and she gave up, noting it was almost five am by the time she had.

Remy's room was the only room in the house she'd seen so far that had remained relatively the same as she'd left it; it required very little cleaning except a quick dusting and a bedding change. By the time she'd wiped the few pieces of furniture down and finished changing the sheets, she could hear the sound of a car outside, breaking the night's intense silence.

She went to Remy's private bathroom to change into her nightclothes, and when she returned to the room, he was standing there, he looked thoroughly exhausted, his hair wet from recent rainfall.

She couldn't find anything to say to him, so she sat on the edge of his bed and waited to see if he himself had anything to report. Nothing. She stared down at the dusty floor – the only thing she'd not had time to really deal with yet. She heard him at her back undressing, she moved her eyes to the window, watching as the rainfall was becoming heavier, hearing it starting to pat at the glass.

It was the first time they'd been properly and privately alone in a room together since Christmas eve. The night they'd had sex. She wished that given the grim circumstances of what was going on here in the LeBeau house, that she could avoid thinking of her own problems and yet, they still surfaced nonetheless. She felt the bed shifting a little as he sat at the other side of it to take his boots off, could feel him practically mirroring her afterwards as she heard the boots getting kicked away.

What do Ah say? She wondered, she felt her heart nervously thrumming in her chest.

"I...appreciate y' comin' down here," Remy broke the silence, his voice was thick with exhaustion. "Don' think I coul' face havin' t' explain t' my family righ' now about us. They're worried so much 'bout the baby, I don' wan' put extra strain...I know it's stupid but..." he shook his head.

"It's...fine," she replied. She stood up and pushed the covers aside and slipped between the sheets, her cheek pressing against the cool crisp clean pillow case. She lay with her back facing him, her eyes on the window. She felt Remy get up from the bed, heard him moving around as he finished undressing, as he got his nightclothes on.

What do you say to someone in this situation? She pondered. Is anythin' really appropriate?

She felt him get into the bed, heard the click of the lamp and the room fell into darkness; she felt the mattress shifting as he moved around, trying to get himself comfortable.

"Remy?"

"Hmm?"

"It's...gonna be okay, you know. The baby? She's...gonna pull through."

She felt him turning and she twisted to herself to look at him, his red eyes glowing faintly in the dark.

"Can't help thinkin' maybe if I'd not lef' so soon, maybe this woul'n' have-" he started.

She leaned up, interrupting him quickly, "No...you can't think that. This isn't on you. Nothin' you could have done would have made anythin' different..."

"Henri taken so much time off t' be wit' the baby...he's tried but he can't keep up. Jean-Luc strugglin' wit' the runnin' o' the guil' an' goin' on heists...trainin' the recruits...he ain' strong enough no more f' this..." he frowned, "If I'd been here...I coul' have worked more...costs woul'n' have spiralled again..."

"They're not your costs, Remy."

"I know that," he grunted, "doesn' mean I don' feel guilty about leavin' them t' pay for all this. None o' this is their fault. How were they t' know the baby was gon' be born wit' a broken heart..." He sat up with a sigh.

Rogue was starting to feel like little Kennedy was not the only one with the broken heart.

"Maybe this is my faul'."

"How could it possibly be yours?" she sat up too, pulling her knees to her chest.

"If I'd stayed here...if I'd married Belle...done what I was suppose t' instead o' runnin' off...things be differen'..."

"You think this couldn't have happened if you'd been here instead?"

He didn't respond, he sat there in the darkness, quiet.

"It could have as easily been you."

He didn't seem to agree but didn't argue.

She stared off into space, thinking. "You know..." she took a deep breath and sighed, "for...the first time today...Ah was...glad...Ah had my powers."

Remy turned, she felt his intense gaze.

"Ah'll...never have to deal with this...no...high risk pregnancies...no...constant worry of a baby Ah'd never know how to look after...no...loss if...it goes wrong..." she admitted, she let her chin rest on her knees. "Ah know it sounds selfish..."

"It doesn'..." he breathed. "I had the same thought when...they was goin' through all this back in October..." he admitted quietly, "kep' thinkin' thank god it ain' me...thank god it not my baby. Hated myself f' thinkin' that. Feel's so selfish but...it was all I coul' think o'. All I coul' think...thank god this ain' me..."

Remy got out of the bed, picking up his cigarette packet from the cabinet by him, he moved over to the window and raised it, and he settled at the window seat, as he lit the thing, the flame from his zippo lit up his face in the dark. She heard the sound of him draw on the cigarette.

Rogue decided to not remind him that Belle wouldn't want him smoking in the house. She wasn't here...and by the time she got here, the smell would probably be long gone anyway. She switched the small lamp on by her bedside, the room was cast dim light, shadows creeping across the floor and walls.

"Hate myself f' sayin' it but...maybe this be punishmen'..." he exhaled his smoke, he propped a foot up on the wall, wedging himself in the three feet of space, his other leg dangling from the edge, his expression distant, his mouth slack.

"Punishment?" Rogue asked, raising her eyebrows; she stared across at him, hugging her knees.

"F' the things Belle done in the pas'. The murders she's committed. Even if those was bad people...it ain' right t' kill."

Rogue had always kept forgetting that about Bella Donna. She was a killer...from the guild of Assassins.

"Maybe karma catch up to her..." his expression soured. "Maybe we all bein' punished. Maybe the baby bein' punished f' all the shitty things we did."

"This...this isn't karma, sugar. It's just...nature. It happens."

"I ain' so sure."

"If this was karma...it'd be Belle or...or Henri, or Jean-Luc that'd be in a hospital bed...not the baby. She's innocent. Karma doesn't come after the innocent, sugar..." she said softly.

"God, I fuckin' hate this place," he admitted, "I didn' wan' come back. Every time I'm here...life feels so...futile."

"Must have been good times..." Rogue supposed. She'd seen the relationship between Remy and his brother...between Remy and Jean-Luc. It didn't seem to her as bad as he'd made out. Other than what they did for a living, things seemed almost...normal.

"A few good times don' coun' f' a hundred bad..." he grunted, "I have tried so...so fucking hard t' be better than this...but every time I get away from it, I got t' come back...got t' go righ' back t' the life...dealin' wit' the sleazy people an' the underbelly..." he let his wrist rest on his knee, the cigarette ash was growing longer on the cigarette, the trail of smoke dancing up into the air. "Jean-Luc up t' some shady shit, Rogue...saw a lot o' stuff I didn' like. Make my skin crawl."

"What shady shit?" she asked, she slid her legs off of the bed, turning properly towards him.

"I snoop in some o' his tex's, he's been talkin' t' one o' his ol' contacts about goin' int' traffickin'..."

"Human traffickin'?" she blinked.

Remy gave a vague nod, "there's a lucrative business f' it righ' now. An' he desperate."

Rogue winced at the thought of it. It was difficult enough to be all right with what the LeBeau's did for a living, but trafficking sat very uneasy with her.

"I shoul'n' have even tol' y' that..." He mumbled, standing up. Instead of going back to bed, he paced a little, it was clear to Rogue he was anxious and frustrated.

"You okay?" she asked, watching him.

"My stomach in knots...I can't...settle..." he sighed, "Maybe I go back out, drive aroun' try t' get my head clear, see if I can think o' where Henri migh' be. We looked all night but-"

"You can't do more right now, you're exhausted, Remy. Look at you...when was the last time you even slept?"

"The plane," he shrugged, his expression dull.

"Ah mean a proper night's sleep..."

He looked away from her, his jaw clenched a little.

"When?" she reiterated.

"Monday...when I firs' got tol' baby in hospital..."

Monday? He knew since then? Why didn't he say then? She thought in despair.

"But it's...it's Thursday..." Rogue stood, "You're tellin' me you haven't slept in days? No wonder you look so pale..."

"I'm fine. I can go wit' out days o' sleep."

"You'll end up havin' an accident on the road if you go out drivin'..." Rogue moved to him, she took him by the arms, "come on...come back to bed. At least try to sleep a little..."

"How can I sleep when all this is goin' on aroun' me? My brother's missin', my father out lookin'...sister-in-law ain' lef' the hospital or eaten in days...my niece may die!" he snapped, he choked a little after he'd said it, as if he hadn't been letting himself even think it for days.

Rogue swallowed hard, she felt emotion welling up in her to see him like this..

"Fuck..." he pulled away from her, he sunk to the edge of his bed, he rubbed his head, "sorry...didn' mean t' snap...jus'...really stressed."

What am Ah supposed to do? Ah don't know what to say to make this remotely better, Ah don't know how to calm him down or to make him settle.

She stood for a moment, observing him as he sat, quiet, brooding, rubbing his temples.

There's one thing Ah could do, she supposed, she chewed her lip. Distract him.

Butterflies fluttering in her stomach, she moved towards him slowly, and reached out to his shoulders, she squeezed them. He raised his head to look up at her.

"I'm sorry," he said again, his voice weak and slightly broken. "This isn' your probl-" he stopped as she put her knee on the mattress to support herself as she began to climb upon his lap. "Rogue?"

She touched his lips with her gloved fingers to hush him, and tried to give him a look that told him to not speak. She was sure if he spoke, she'd lose any modicum of confidence she barely had as it was.

This isn't me, Ah'm no good at this shit, she thought nervously. But tonight Ah need to be. Even if it's just this once...just for him. Just so he doesn't lose his mind.

She tried to think of being drunk on the night of the wedding, of the confidence she'd felt that night, of the way she had the confidence to do things she'd never do sober. She tried to recall the confidence she'd had on Christmas eve.

Pretend you're drunk...just for tonight pretend you've had too much and...nothin' else exists.

Rogue lowered herself, trying to bridge the gap between their groins. He locked eyes with hers, and his expression changed and she saw the bewilderment.

It'll hurt, she remembered. You know it's gonna hurt so bad..it hurt the first time.

Holding onto his shoulders to support herself, she pressed herself to him, aware there wasn't any arousal at all – not that she had expected there to be.

The pain went away the first time...it will again, she squeezed his shoulders again, trying to give him a meaningful look, trying to be inviting, trying to convey what she wanted – or rather what she wanted him to want. She awkwardly began grinding on him, tried to maintain a sultry expression and knew she had to be failing. It didn't feel like it had on Christmas eve, the passion wasn't there, she didn't know the first thing about initiating a passionate encounter, about seducing someone and she felt clumsy and inept.

She felt his hands lightly touch her waist, tentative at first, his fingers gliding down her hips, drawing her close to him, his face pressing against her chest; she heard him breathe in her scent deep and she buried her hand in his damp hair, already feeling the water seeping through her gloves onto her fingers beneath.

Rogue closed her eyes and tried not to think about the consequences, tried to not predict how awkward things would be later, she tried to think of the things she'd seen on television and movies, the way women on TV shows and in movies seduced men.

God, Ah'm so bad at this, she fretted. Ah'm not doin' it right...

But despite knowing she was lousy at finding any kind of natural rhythm to the friction, she heard his breathing starting to slightly change, felt the difference between their bodies as he started to become excited.

Ah feel him, she realised, leaning back from him to keep any accidents from occurring with their skin. She felt hot from embarrassment – the heat in the bedroom wasn't helping either; she felt clammy and nervous and her body burned at the thought of what she was doing.

Stop thinkin' about how you feel...think about how he feels, she told herself sternly. She swept his damp hair from his face, her gloved hand cupped his jaw as she kept slowly riding the growing protrusion. Rogue hadn't started this encounter with any arousal whatsoever, there'd been no sexual tension at all between them – at least in her mind. But pushing against him in just the right way definitely had started to awaken feelings she had only had a glimmer of at Christmas.

Stop thinkin' of Christmas, she told herself, shuddering against him. But she couldn't stop thinking of it...couldn't stop thinking of the way his hands had touched her, the way for the first time she'd felt him sliding across her. She felt the tingles of pleasure of the memory but the ebbs and flows of anxiety that came with it. She wanted him to be like that again, but she wasn't confident enough to ask him.

Remy finally twisted her towards the mattress, flipping her and pushing her down into the sheets, her head landed against the pillows; he climbed over her, pinned her wrists to the mattress and he pushed his groin between her open legs hard, his control of his hips was far better than she remembered...or maybe it was just that neither of them were drunk this time around.

She grunted at the weight of him, at the weight of his hands on her wrists as he held her down; she turned her head away as his head came dangerously close to hers. She wanted to cry out 'careful' but was afraid of breaking any kind of mood. His teeth found her shoulder and ground down against the fabric of her shirt. Finally he released her wrists, his right hand moved to explore her left breast. Tentatively, she wrapped her arms around him, gripping the fabric of his shirt, trying to control the urges to make any kind of sound as his thumb brushed against her sensitive nipple and pleasure signals began dancing along her body.

She let out a little gasp as Remy pushed his body into her a little more enthusiastically, biting down on her shoulder a little harder, soft grunts and moans muffled against cotton as his protrusion pushed against her just right; she bit her lip hard to stop from moaning, she was too afraid of killing the mood or being overheard – she didn't even know if Jean-Luc was home. She heard the drawer opening at her left, but she couldn't concentrate on what he was getting from the drawer because everything he was doing distracted her; she was barely able to concentrate on trying to keep him safe from touching her skin. His mouth moved down upon her left breast, she felt his teeth bite down, felt them roll on her nipple which was protruding against her top and she gasped and arched her back, her fingers tightening on him.

She felt a sense of fear and dread because she knew what was coming. What if it hurt more this time? He wasn't drunk this time, the chances were he'd not lose it. What if she locked up again and she couldn't? What else could she do for him? Could she compensate by touch alone?

Ah don't know how to touch him...Ah don't know what he likes, she thought helplessly, moving her head to awkwardly try to avoid his chin hitting her cheek.

He twisted her onto her stomach and she felt herself hauled from the bed right to the edge, her legs hanging over and the boldness surprised her but she realised why he'd done it; the proximity of their faces was too much of a risk of her powers being triggered – they couldn't bump faces if their faces were pointed away from each other. She felt him yanking down the loose fitting pyjama pants she'd worn to bed and she twisted her self to look behind her a little to see a black latex glove on his left hand as he put a small bottle of sexual lubricant down on the cabinet by the bed, white translucent liquid trickling down the edge of the cap and pooling on the top of worn wood.

She felt almost relieved to see it, she felt foolishly like crying that at least this time, she didn't have to worry about that. She bit down on her lip as his lubricated fingers touched her, and she flinched at how cold and wet it felt. Remy's expert fingers glided and moved across her, spreading the cold slippery stuff around, his delicate digits hitting spots he hadn't touched since Christmas eve.

She tried to pretend it was the first time but it was impossible to not compare the experience because it was so different this time. Everything was different from the way she'd experienced it at Christmas. His touch was deliberate, rougher, slightly more focused and purposeful...and because of the lubricant, it wasn't nearly as uncomfortable as she might have expected it to be. She couldn't fight how good it felt, how he knew every move right on the dot that made her shiver and ache for more.

After a while of his rubbing, his fingers penetrated her and she let out a tiny breath, she pulled the pillow from his side of the bed towards her, grasping it hard until her knuckles hurt as he started pumping his fingers into her with slow and deep deliberation, stopping for a moment to apply more of the lubricant before starting again.

It occurred to her when he started adding more lube that he was preparing her, and she tried to not let the anxiety catch her. Desperately, she tried to fight off the worry of how it'd hurt or how tomorrow would be after they'd been together. It was too hard to think properly...hard to concentrate, hard to even think and focus on breathing when he was doing things to her; all she could focus on was the feeling of his hand. He'd vary what he did, slapping her groin softly, fingers gently sliding and pulling then rubbing the hot swollen flesh furiously, adding more lube again.

Her thighs and hips started to hurt, the muscles tensing and straining as his touch hastened and fingers thrust; she could hardly bear it, she could taste the salt of blood on her mouth from where she'd bitten her lip. He stopped much to her relief and she tried to catch her breath, tried to recompose and collect herself; she had no experience of getting this far and she'd been sure she'd been close.

And that was when he thrust himself enthusiastically into her. It hurt...far more than what he'd done with his fingers and far more than when they'd first been together at Christmas. She tasted the blood on her lip again, salty, metallic and bitter and she fought the urge to cry out. Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew she couldn't complain now – this had been her idea. She wasn't sure she wanted to complain...she just wanted to adjust...things were moving much faster this time than she had been prepared for.

She felt so foolish that this had all been her idea and yet, she didn't feel prepared for any of it.

Remy seemed to be pushing himself as deep as he could feasibly get himself without – she assumed - going past the condom threshold. He took a hold of her by the shoulder with one hand and held her hip with the other, pulling her towards him, moaning low as he started to ride her. She tried to follow the guidance of his hands, tried to match the rhythms he set, trying to ignore the discomfort and the anxiety, tried to ignore the fear.

She tried to focus on relaxing, so afraid a repeat of Christmas Eve would happen again, tried to ignore the fear of what could happen if he went too far, if their skin should even for just a split second graze against each other.

Remy pulled her harder and he rode with more enthusiasm; he slid his hand beneath her, between her legs and started rubbing her frantically; she felt her eyes rolling into the back of her head as his fingers hit the spot and the build up began quickly. Her body was in sensory overload and she lost all thought and reason as her muscles cramped and pulled right then. She struggled to not moan as her centre pulsed and the pleasure soared through her, she knew right then she'd passed the threshold, she'd finally had her first true orgasm. Remy rode her furiously to the end of his climax, and eventually, much to her relief, slowed to a stop.

He finally released her body, withdrawing with a soft moan escaping his lips. He sat at the edge of the bed, back hunched, breathing heavily. Rogue lay there half across the mattress in disbelief and shock. She was somewhere between pain, aching from the muscle strain of orgasm and euphoria, she hurt from the penetration but she didn't care.

She couldn't manage to say more than mumble a weak, "fuuuck..." halfway against the pillow beneath her face as she lay there half naked with her heart hammering wildly in her chest. Her body was burning hot, sweat was making her pyjama top cling to her body, her groin was still tingling and throbbing for minutes after. She could hear Remy still breathing heavy at her side.

Finally, she moved from where she was, shakily pushing herself up, she was still trembling, she felt dizzied and weak, as if he'd fucked every ounce of energy she'd had left from her. She glanced at him, his chest was rising and falling fast, his eyes were closed as if he were trying to focus on bringing himself down.

She looked for where the pyjama pants had been discarded but in the low light, she couldn't see them. In defeat, She slid her bare bottom half beneath the covers and she settled down on the side she slept on in his bed.

Her entire body felt like it was still so much in sensory overload as her hip slid across the silky high thread count of his sheets, as she felt the silky sheet above her slide across her bare recently shaved legs; as she shifted she was aware of how almost painfully hard her nipples were as the fabric brushed on them. Her centre pulsed pleasantly despite the pain she felt deep in her belly; she throbbed in a way she had never expected she would and right then she suddenly knew why so many people let sex rule their lives.

She turned her back to him and faced the window, curling up and gripping the covers to her chest, pressing her legs together tightly, trying to hold onto the feeling as long as possible, trying to savour it and burn it into her memory forever.

Might be the only time you ever feel this, she thought dully as she switched the lamp off and the room fell into blackness.

In the dark, she heard him shifting around. She could hear the sound of him pulling tissues from the box, the rustling of him cleaning himself off and the sound of the tissues and condom hitting the metal waste paper basket near his bedside cabinet. There was a moment of him sitting still again, she was so aware of him just trying to come down and catch his breath for several moments, and then the covers shifted and he got beneath them. She lay watching the window and the drapes shifting in the breeze, lit by slithers of moonlight.

Exhaustion began to settle over her; she felt weirdly calm, peaceful, sedated and relaxed right then more than she'd ever been in her life, the strain of her muscles beginning to loosen, her body letting go of all the tension she'd felt for months.

She felt the mattress behind her buckling as Remy turned and she sensed a moment of hesitation before she felt him sliding closer, his latex-clad hand touching her bare hip gently beneath the covers...almost tentatively. His touch was suddenly so shy and unsure, so unlike the bold and brazen sex god who'd been touching her with expertise and confidence only ten minutes previous. She shakily put her hand on his and drew it around her, placing it on her stomach, so his touch could rest against the area of her lower belly where somehow she could still deeply feel him.

Remy gave a quiet sigh, but it was different from before; it was contented almost...as if he were relieved. After a while, his breathing behind her changed, she recognised the way his breathing sounded when he was asleep. It'd worked...she'd brought him down...she'd gotten him to finally come down and relax. She smiled faintly for a time as she lay there, despite the pain and discomfort from the sex, she felt the oddest sense of peace washing over her.

Ah'm really not a virgin any more, she realised as she stared at his window, watching the drapes shifting in the breeze. She supposed her virginity had technically gone on Christmas Eve but it'd never really truly felt that way. It felt like it'd never really counted because it'd gone so horribly wrong. This time...this time everything had gone right, he had known exactly what to do and despite he'd been more...enthusiastic than she'd been prepared for, she didn't even care.

It hadn't been the romantic candle lit moonlight love making she'd always hoped for, and yet, there was absolutely no disappointment. She didn't regret it...it made Christmas Eve almost seem as if it'd never happened at all.

Enjoy it now...'cause come mornin', it won't be like this, she reminded herself as her fingers twined with his open hand upon her belly.

Finally, she closed her eyes and let the sound of his breathing lull her into her own, dreamless sleep.

It was midday when she awakened; the other side of the bed was empty. She leaned up, her body sore and slightly stiff. She wiped her hair from her face and looked around, a paper note sitting on the cabinet next to Remy's side of the bed, a Thermos mug sitting on the corner of it. She pulled the piece of paper free from the cup and unfolded it.

Remy's handwriting was atrocious, a mix of mostly capital letters mixed with lower case. She supposed something about him had to be imperfect.

She read the words out to herself.

"GoNE to looK FoR HENRi. MiGHt be GoNE FoR MosT oF DAY. LEFT MoNEY in KiTcHEN FoR FooD. x REMY."

She crumpled up the note, rolling her eyes. After last night and that's all I get? Some money on the nightstand and an impersonal note? She rolled her eyes. She opened the Thermos mug, there was coffee in it, still reasonably hot. She poured some into the plastic mug and sipped it; the coffee was good quality and had exactly how much cream and sugar in it that she liked, which told her he definitely did pay attention to her likes.

At least he had the decency to provide me a hot drink after the booty call, she supposed. She lay in the bed a while, drinking the coffee, staring at the ceiling, remembering the details of what'd happened, replaying it over and over in her head, trying to let that be all she thought of and not what Belle might be feeling at the hospital right that moment.

Every detail she replayed, and revelled in upon the memory although some details she felt quite foolish about. She'd felt foolish about how clumsily she'd tried to grind against him, how she'd not known how to reciprocate with her hands or if she was even holding onto him right. She'd wished she'd touched him intimately, tried to engage more but she'd been far too afraid to, too afraid to distract him or do something terribly wrong.

That was probably my last chance to do that. There's not likely going to be a next time, she thought dully.

After a while, she forced herself to get up, and winced at the pain she felt from last nights rather vigorous sex. Her stomach hurt terribly; she wasn't sure if it was her imagination or not that she could feel exactly where he'd been and she wondered if that was even normal. When she went to the bathroom, she found that she'd bled a little and she supposed it shouldn't have surprised her. She'd bled the first time too. After a weak shower, she dressed, brushed her hair and went downstairs, finding the money Remy had spoken of; he'd left two hundred dollars on the kitchen table in ten dollar bills, and what looked like a spare house key and the rental car keys. She supposed that meant she was supposed to go and get some groceries since last night they'd established there was barely any food in the house.

She left the house and drove to Bloodmoon Parish proper. The area itself was a beautiful charming little place, not too many homes, mostly small houses, a couple of low apartment buildings and a small main street with a few stores and a pharmacy. She located a small local store that was limited in stock but had the main staples, and chose what supplies she thought the house needed.

As she was checking out at the counter for her items, a woman in her thirties with long black hair looked at her with the clearest blue eyes she'd ever seen, tilting her head a little curious. She was staring.

She knows Ah'm a mutant. She's probably figured it 'cause Ah'm so pale...or 'cause of my hair...or...'cause Ah'm not from here.

Rogue tried to play it off, watching the woman busily checking each item out. The girl was still staring at her.

Rogue sighed, "Is...somethin' wrong?"

"I know you," the woman announced almost quite matter-of-factly.

Rogue blinked, "don't think so. Ah'm not from here..."

The woman tapped numbers into her cash register, "you're Remy LeBeau's girl."

Rogue gave a vague laugh, "what?"

"You are, right?"

She fought to answer, "uh-"

"He told us about you..." the woman stated, still speedily tapping numbers in as she picked items out of the basket, "showed us your photos on his phone last time he was here. Recognise you because of the hair..." she gestured to Rogue's head with a slight smile. "We honestly thought he was making it all up when he said he had this girlfriend in New York..."

"He...talked about me?" Rogue tried to not show that she was taken aback.

"Yeah, a few times. My little sister has had a thing for him since they were in high school together. He was in here every now and then late last year," the cashier explained. "She was broken when she asked him out and he told her he was in a serious relationship."

"He told you that?" Rogue tried not to blink.

"At first we thought he maybe made it up – just so he could be nice. My sister isn't...his type," she put nicely. "Then he showed us photos of you two at some wedding or something..." she shrugged.

"Yeah...my...friend's wedding," Rogue drew a breath, "Remy was my date," she supposed. Although there'd never been any official agreement about it, she supposed in a way Remy had been her date. He'd been the only man she'd danced with.

"He said you were in New York...that he'd stayed back for the family...'cause of Belle and Henri's baby bein' in the hospital. That you went home to work," the cashier explained. "I was so convinced he was makin' it up..." she chuckled.

"Why?" she asked.

"He's never been the settlin' down type. Even with Belle it was off more than on," the cashier finished bagging the items. "Fifty two eighty-nine."

"Ah see," Rogue handed the cash over for the items.

"You any idea how the baby is doin'? Rumours is she's back in hospital."

"Yeah...she's not doin' good," was all Rogue could really say as she waited for the woman to count out her change.

"Tell the family we're askin' for them. And that we'll pray."

"Ah will..." Rogue forced a smile.

She sat in the car a while after the discussion with the woman, trying to absorb what she'd just been told. She hadn't even been here and Remy had been talking about her. Showing her photos around to people...why? There'd never been any real agreement of anything. The story he'd made up about their relationship shouldn't have needed to spill into town gossip.

Back at LeBeau house, she put the items she'd bought away, and she went to the living room and dining room to clear up any mess that'd been left. The living room was a nightmare; takeout food containers everywhere, empty beer bottles and soda cans on the floor, the hardwood floor was sticky with beer spillages. Rogue found a half-eaten pizza mouldering in a box under the couch.

The clean up seemed to fly by for Rogue; as she listened to music on the Bluetooth speaker next to the television, her mind kept drifting back to five o'clock that morning, when Remy had thrown her down to the mattress, rolled her over, pulled her over the edge of the mattress and done things to her she'd never expected anyone would ever do to her. Her body got hot with the idea of it, ached at the thought of his hands, she felt chills at the memory of how he'd held tightly onto her as he'd thrust wildly and desperately against her. She ached hard at the thought that that had been true fucking.

Logically she knew she should feel violated, that she should feel like a line had been crossed. She was absolutely certain she'd just let him use and abuse her body in ways that she never should have. She'd let him get rougher than he should have...she was still too new to this to be letting him get that rough.

And she didn't mind a bit.

Why do Ah not mind? She wondered. Ah should mind...some woman would...not be okay with what he did. It hurt...Ah can't pretend it didn't. Everythin' about it was so damn...wrong.

Why did it feel so right though?

It did feel right, she thought, her body tingling at the thought of his touch, the way her body had shook, the way her muscles had cramped when she'd gotten so close. It was intense but...it never felt wrong. Ah didn't lock up...

She gazed around the living room which was now spotless, smelling of wax furniture polish and Febreeze. The place felt lonely and empty around her.

The dining room had been mostly untouched, although she had to dust the unused mahogany table and fireplace, and sweep the dusty floor. She cleaned a downstairs bathroom and tried to get through a little more of the laundry. She wondered if somehow Remy might have brought her here so she could do the cleaning up while he was off looking for his brother and trying to make some money. Wondered if he'd maybe just brought her to treat her like Cinderella, somehow manipulated her into thinking this was all her idea to clean.

Ah don't care. They need help. Ah've got time and Ah need to take my mind off of this mornin' she thought dully as she ate a sandwich alone in the kitchen, waiting for a load of laundry to finish.

By nine pm, he still hadn't come home and neither had Jean-Luc. She sent him a text just asking if he'd found Henri, and for two hours there was no answer. She was changing for bed when she heard her phone ping and she went to it to see a text from Remy say; Not found bro.

Sighing, she settled on the bed and text back; Where are you?

A moment later, her phone pinged.

Remy's response read simply; WORK.

Frustrated, she got into bed and watched a movie on Netflix on her phone until she dozed off some time after midnight. When she awoke, it was to the feeling of the bed moving at her back, and she felt Remy's body creeping up behind her.

"You're late," she mumbled tiredly, her eyes closed.

"Yeah," He grunted.

"Did you find him?" she yawned.

"Non," he replied quietly, she felt his lips press against the back of her shoulder and this surprised her.

"Time is it?" she asked.

"Four," he replied in murmur, he sounded exhausted, and as his arms wrapped around her in the bed, he felt heavy to her and his heaviness was reassuring and familiar somehow.

Nothing else was said; she heard his breathing change as he dozed off at her back, his face close to her hair, and she let herself go back to sleep, holding onto his arms, feeling comforted by his presence.

When she awoke later that morning, she'd expected he'd have left her like he had the day before, but he was still there in the bed, gripping onto her although their position had changed, she'd rolled onto her stomach through the night and she could feel the weight of his head against her back, his left arm was beneath her, she was aware of the feeling of it under her stomach, his right arm slung over her hip, her hand gripping it. She lay there for a time, watching the numbers on the digital clock changing from minute to minute. From nine am until nine-twenty-nine, she lay there under him, feeling his body shifting when he breathed, her fingers twined with his. She dared not even shift, too afraid to move and disturb him.

Ah don't want this to end, she thought unhappily. If Ah move, it has to end.

At nine-thirty am exactly, she felt him stirring, groaning a little as he moved from a position that clearly hadn't felt that comfortable. He shifted, moving up a little on the mattress, and the arm he'd had locked under her body all night pulled her so she rolled onto her side and she felt him push himself up against her ass so she could feel the evidence of his morning arousal, she felt him kiss the back of her shoulder and she sighed, closing her eyes.

Through her pyjama top, she felt him toy with her left nipple, his touch was gentle, teasing and she loved it. Every time he touched her, it felt so right, so necessary, so blissful. She felt his right hand pushing between her legs, rubbing her as he rolled his hips against her backside and she was so aware of the length of cock sliding between her cheeks, pressing against the flimsy discoloured leggings she'd worn to bed.

She twisted a little to look at him, his eyes were sleepy and soft, and she immediately succumbed at the slight way the corner of his mouth curled momentarily into a smile.

Everything almost seemed to move in an almost dreamlike way to her after that. The way he touched her intimately through her clothes, fingers exploring and moving against her with slow deliberation, his lips against her shoulder and back. He put on a pair of new black latex gloves from pack he had in the drawer by his bed (apparently these were a staple in this 'thieves kit'), and undressed her completely and he worshipped and admired every inch of her pale skin. There wasn't a part of her he didn't look at or caress, everything from her face and her neck, right down to her feet and after the slow build of worship as his hands slid and caressed over her skin. He sheathed himself and mounted her, and after that first initial penetration, it was so different to the first two times they'd been together.

The anxiety of the first two times was gone, the desperation had melted and every move felt purposeful, careful and tender. It felt different...he felt different.

Her heart was not hammering quite as hard, her breathing was not as laboured, and without the sense of urgency to everything they did, she was so very in tune with the sensations of everything; to the feeling of the way his outgrown hair brushed her forehead, to the way the slightly rough fabric of the long-sleeved tee he'd been wearing yesterday felt as it brushed against her erect and highly sensitive nipples. She felt so extremely receptive to everything as he attentively bedded her in the warm beam of a mid-morning sun. He kept her eyes locked to hers the entire time; yesterday's early morning sex had been from behind, she hadn't been able to look at him. Now she could see him, lock eyes with him and connect with him in a way that she hadn't ever imagined she might.

The orgasm was nothing like yesterday mornings explosive earth shattering heart-slamming one, it was smaller, a slower build to a less intense and definitely less uncomfortable time, as her leg muscles didn't spasm quite so painfully this time around; as she came, he thrust himself against her more enthusiastically only for ten or twenty seconds towards the end, moaning low as he reached his release. Although it hadn't been as intense of an orgasm, it felt oddly more meaningful...almost spiritual in a way she was too shy to even admit to herself.

After they were done, they lay together in the sunbeam cutting through the window, and Rogue felt the warmth of it spreading across her bare back as she lay across Remy's chest, her ear against his heart listening to the slow and measured beat through his shirt.

She stared across his bedroom, not really seeing anything, aware that every time he breathed, she felt herself rise and sink with the movement of his body. Being able to feel every breath...every beat of his heart...the warmth of him through his shirt...it felt like it was much more than she'd ever hoped for in her life.

It felt...perfect. More perfect than anything she'd ever thought she'd feel.

After a long silence – the most comfortable one she was sure she'd ever had in her life – she said the first thing that came into her head.

"Ah've missed you," she murmured, feeling peaceful and content, almost drunk as if she'd had too much good wine.

She felt his gloved fingers lightly skimming at the dip in her spine, felt him sigh beneath her. She lifted her head to look at him, to drink him in as if it might be the last time. He seemed pensive, his gaze was soft and almost hurt. He opened his mouth to speak, but he was interrupted.

"Remy, are you up ye—oh."

Rogue sat up in surprise, grasping the thin blankets to her bare breasts at the sight of Jean-Luc walking in on them. She felt her body burn with furious humiliation. Couldn't he have knocked?

Remy didn't even flinch, he turned slowly to the door, his entire demeanor comfortable and relaxed "Been up f' a while," was all he said, his drawl lazy. Rogue looked down at him judgementally; she was sure it was an innuendo.

"So I...see..." Jean-Luc said, seemingly slightly uncomfortable, he straightened, "sorry t' interrup' y' mornin', but I got a tex' from Belle. Baby goin' t' be prepped f' surgery in a few hours - they wan' move ahead a lil' faster 'cause time runnin' out. We shoul' be there wit' her."

Remy finally sat up, throwing his legs over the side of the bed, "okay."

Rogue held the blankets to her bare breasts, watching Jean-Luc hover. If there was ever any question that we weren't havin' sex, Ah guess there's no question about it any more, Rogue thought irritably.

"I'm leavin' now. I'll see y' two there," Jean-Luc left the room and the door shut behind him.

"Fuck..." Remy sighed, he rubbed the back of his neck.

Rogue sat silent for a moment.

"Where the fuck is my fuckin' brother?" he sighed, he picked up his phone and looked at it, checking for messages that just weren't there. Checking his texts had gone through. "He needs t' be there."

After trying once to see if Henri might answer his phone, Remy gave up, sent a text, then got up, zipping up and buttoning his pants (which had remained undone until this point) and he went to retrieve where he'd kicked off his boots.

"Do you ever lock doors?" she asked of him, glancing towards the door before she decided to get up from the bed. She was wary of Jean-Luc maybe walking in again – somehow she'd forgotten the possibility he might be home.

"Forgot, I guess," Remy sighed, "Not exactly the mos' pressin' thing right now, is it?"

"You're seriously not going to change?" Rogue asked, eyeing him as he brought his boots to the edge of the bed and started to put them on. She wondered if he smelled of sex...if anyone else would smell it. Would he even care?

"We don't got time t' fuck aroun'. Got t' be at the hospital."

"But-"

"Chere..." he said, and it was the first time he'd called her it in over a month and it immediately caught her off guard and silenced her. "Y'...un'erstan' why this is importan' why I don' was'e time, righ'?" he asked as he started lacing up his left boot hastily.

Rogue was silent. She didn't want to admit it but she understood. This could be the last time he might see his niece alive. Her stomach churned at the thought of it, of having to go there, to see the tiny premature infant in some box, tubed up and still. She'd seen the photos and they'd been jarring enough. She didn't want to see it in person. It made it far too real.

"Do Ah have to come?" she asked weakly.

"Wha'?" he turned to look at her; it seemed to her that he hadn't even considered her feelings on the matter. He'd expected her there – no intention to ask if she would be. This caught her a little. The look in his eyes was almost angry and hurt.

"What Ah mean is..." she tried to back-pedal a little, "Ah might...you know, not be welcome, Remy."

"Course y' welcome," he said, sounding irritable. "Get dressed. I'm gon' go smoke a cig while y' get changed, I'll meet y' at the car."

Rogue felt butterflies in her stomach during the drive to the hospital. Remy was quiet, every now and then switching radio stations clearly trying to find something that would distract him from his thoughts. Every now and then, she'd see the look of anger on his face, and he'd get briefly tense, then somehow calm himself down. His phone was on the dash and every now and then, when he was at a stoplight, he quickly dialled Henri's number and let it ring. Forty minutes had passed and an answer hadn't been given yet.

To try and kill some time, Rogue checked her emails and deleted the spam, and she looked through the Facebook feed to see what friends were posting. Back in Bayville, Lance and Kitty were having coffee at a cosy cafe, Kurt had posted about seeing a movie, and Jean and Scott were posting pictures of the now beautifully renovated boathouse. Life back in Bayville was normal, and seemingly happy.

Here, everything felt...tragic and heavy. Even the brief blissful moment of their time together in bed that morning had been ruined by the the announcement of Little Kennedy going into surgery.

Another stop light. Remy dialled Henri's number again, the phone sat on the dash on speaker, ringing and ringing.

"Come on, f' fucks sake, mon frere..." Remy gripped the wheel, his knuckles getting white. "Where the fuck are you?"

Rogue sucked in a breath, staring ahead at the road; traffic was heavy. "You've left him a message, Remy. You can't do anythin' more."

"I have looked everywhere I can think o' since I got here. I've called every frien' we got, knocked on every door o' every one I know...no one has seen the asshole. Where the fuck is he...?"

"Calm down..." she touched his arm gently.

"This coul' be the las' time he-" Remy started, his tone sharp.

"Don't say it," Rogue warned him, "If you don't say it, it can't be true..." she decided, she held her breath. "We just have to stay positive..."

Remy took a deep breath through his nose and exhaled. "Sorry."

"Don't apologise."

"Change the subjec'," he suggested to her, "or I'm gon' drive myself nuts..." he shifted as the lights changed and the car began moving again.

Rogue took a moment to try and think of a subject, anything that might take his mind away from this. "Yesterday afternoon Ah went into Bloodmoon proper," she propped her elbow on the side of the door and let her cheek rest in her hand, she looked at him, watched him for reaction.

"Oh?" he asked, not turning to her.

"Went to that little market...Sugar Shop or somethin'?"

"Sugar Shack Supermart?" he replied. "What 'bout it?

"There was this...woman maybe...Ah don't know, bout Ororo's age...with really long black hair, looks a little like Cher?"

"Merrel – her uncle own' Sugar Shack," he said. "She's worked there since she was fourteen."

"She...said you mentioned me. That...she recognised me 'cause you showed her photos of me..."

Remy's was silent, eyes locked to the road, he shifted gears.

"She...said you told her Ah was...your girl..."

She wasn't sure what else to talk about but she was sure it was going to distract for a moment. However, she wondered if the subject might be...insensitive during such a time like this.

"I tol' her that, yeah," he finally said, his tone straight forward, his cheek twitched a little.

Why? She wished she could ask. Why?

"Look, there was a facade t' keep up," he reminded her.

"That's...what Ah thought."

He gave a sigh, shifting in the car seat "'Sides..." he continued, "was nice t' have people thinkin' better o' me...that...I wasn' some asshole screw up still man-whoring my way up an' down through town. Was nice...t' have them think I...grew up...was a better man than I am."

"You don't think you are?" Rogue asked softly.

"I'm...tryin' t' be," he supposed. "I...know I'm still screwin' things up. But I'm tryin'."

"Ah know that..." she touched his arm tenderly. He turned to look at her briefly as the car slowed at a stop light. "You're much better than you think."

"I've made so many mistakes, chere."

"Everyone does," she reminded. "It's the most human thing we do is make mistakes."

"As of late, I've made too many," he grunted.

"Ah've made some too, sugar," she reminded. "Maybe that's...just how things have to be...we have to keep makin' mistakes until we figure out how to stop makin' them."

"Maybe."

Rogue felt sick as they walked down the hospital corridors together. The place was maze like, winding around and making her feel like she was going around in circle. Finally, they came to an area that stated NICU above the door. Rogue's stomach churned as she and Remy were forced to – by sweet but slightly bossy older nurse – made to put surgical masks on, sterile gowns on and gloves. Rogue was made to change her gloves. Even though she had no intentions of touching the baby, everything had to be sterile going in. Kennedy was high risk, there could be no bacteria going in.

Through double doors, they went and the lighting changed; inside the NICU everything was a soft cool blue, subdued, quiet. Rogue couldn't even focus on anything but the incubator off to the back of the room, she spotted Belle there at once, her face half concealed by a mask, leaning near the incubator, her hand through one of the ports.

The baby was incredibly tiny. As Rogue walked next to Remy, she felt her breath catching in her throat a little, felt her anxiety rising as she looked into the incubator. Kennedy LeBeau was so small, barely twenty centimetres, impossibly small for a baby. Had she grown at all? It'd been six weeks since Remy had returned to Bayville, when Rogue had seen the photo of Kennedy in his arms.

There were so many tubes hooked up to the infant that Rogue could barely see much of at her at all, a tiny pink still body, a squished face with tubing in her nose, the only clothing item was a hat which looked far too big for her tiny head.

It all felt far too real, far too frightening to be there. She wanted to turn...run and leave. She couldn't be here. Why did he want her here when this was happening? She was no good for this.

"Rogue..." Belle raised her eyes to her as Rogue and Remy approached.

"Hi, Belle," Rogue tried to force a smile, then realised it was pointless as the mask hid everything from the mid-nose up. Remy moved to the incubator to peer in, his eyes seemed cloudy, Rogue could see his jaw moving a little beneath the mask.

Belle's tired turquoise eyes were so swollen and puffy, she looked exhausted, and if she'd been crying. She stood from her chair and approached, "I'm so glad to see you."

You are? Rogue wondered.

"Where's Jean-Luc?" Remy asked, turning to her.

"He went to get me some coffee," Belle sniffed, "I've not slept."

Rogue could definitely believe the blonde had barely slept.

"So what's happenin' now?" Remy asked, his head inclined to the baby.

Belle began speaking but Rogue couldn't absorb the words. Her eyes were glued to the tiny infant; she watched as she baby moved slightly, she seemed so incredibly weak and Rogue felt her heartstrings being tugged so hard she might cry. She heard a lot of complicated medical words, something about the left side of the heart, and mortality rates and oxygen levels. And the words no choice.

As far as Rogue could figure out...there had been a choice...but it was to let the child die or to risk a very complicated surgical procedure which she may not survive. Rogue understood why Belle would pick the latter. Even though she herself was not a mother, given the choice Rogue would have picked the risk every time.

Rogue examined Belle as she stood talking to Remy, the pained look in her eyes, the body language. She remembered how Remy had suggested to her that Belle was manipulative...cold...but she was certain he had to be wrong. This woman was suffering...

"She gon' pull through, Belle," Remy said, his voice was thick and Rogue sensed he didn't believe his own words. Rogue watched him as he slid his hand through one of the ports in the incubator, his index finger stroked the bottom of the baby's tiny little foot, his expression seemed so pained.

He knows this could have been him...could have been his baby, she realised as she watched him.

Rogue turned to look through the windows that stared out into the corridor where the nurses were located, they she saw them rushing towards a door that was out of sight. It seemed like something was going on...was there an emergency in another side ward?

"Do you want to touch her?" Belle asked looking at Rogue.

"Not a good idea," Rogue swallowed a lump in her throat. Even with surgical gloves Rogue felt there was still too much risk. "Ah've broken two supposedly 'unbreakable' phones since last year. Ah don't want to break your baby."

Belle's eyes crinkled at bit as if she was smiling, but the look in her eyes was sad, empty. Remy turned to look out the window, his eyes squinted a little now, she recognised his worry from the furrow of his brows.

"I'll...be righ' back..." he said.

Rogue went to ask him what it was but he'd left the NICU ward before she'd even had a chance to get the words out.

Standing alone with Belle in the room, a nurse at the back dealing with another baby, felt incredibly awkward. She stood by the incubator, glancing in at Kennedy, her heart sinking.

Please don't die, she begged silently. She lifted her eyes to the ceiling. If there's a God up there, don't let this baby die...

"I'm glad you came," Belle said, her voice stammering a little.

"You are?" Rogue asked as she stared down as Belle slid her hand into one of the ports, touching the baby's stomach lightly with a gloved finger. It struck Rogue right then how it must have been painful for Belle to not even be able to hold her daughter, how she could only touch her with surgically sterile gloves in controlled settings. It felt impersonal and clinical...it wasn't fair.

"Course," Belle tilted her head, her finger stroking Kennedy's side thoughtfully. The baby shifted a little, a tiny sound came from her.

"This...this is private, you know?" Rogue watched the baby. "Ah feel like an intruder, like Ah'm not supposed to be here..."

"You don't think there's a reason he brought you here?" Belle raised her eyes to look at Rogue. "You don't think there's a reason he made you part of this?"

Rogue tilted her head, examining the blonde's eyes.

"If you're here...he wanted you here. He's...never brought a girl near his family before, 'cept me. To bring you here...to this..." Belle lowered her eyes again, "that means this is...serious. Means you're family now..."

The thought had never even crossed Rogue's mind that this could be remotely serious. She was still trying to process the fact she'd had sex with Remy LeBeau, still trying to process that they hadn't properly talked about what everything meant yet.

Rogue bit into her lip, there was a hard scab on it from when she'd bit into it and made it bleed during the sex yesterday morning. She chewed on the scab, gazing down at Kennedy's impossibly tiny little hands.

"I know it's hard to tell wit' him," Belle supposed. "He's hard to read. And he never says what he feels. Not proper. He never says it. He never has said it. Not to anyone his whole damn life," Belle remarked, "He'll show you how he feel but he'll never say a damn word properly about it. When y' say things, it makes it real."

Rogue turned, she could hear yelling in the corridor now. Belle stepped away from the incubator and leaned awkwardly to look out of the glass windows into the corridor. The nurse who had been in the NICU ward with them left what she was doing and rushed out into the corridor.

"What's goin' on?" Rogue asked, sensing something bad was about to happen. Then as she gazed through the window, she saw that Henri was walking down the corridor, there was yelling, muffled through the glass. Rogue saw Remy chasing after him, saw Remy grab him by the upper arm hard; in a flash she saw Henri spin and punch at Remy; Remy's face swung right.

"Henri..." Bell muttered, she darted for the door and as she pushed the doors, the voices got louder.

"That my daughter in there!" Henri was yelling; Rogue saw him stagger, he steadied himself, his eyes unfocused.

Remy recomposed himself fast, grabbing Henri by the arm, "mon frere, jus' stop."

"You got no righ' t' walk in there after what you pulled!" Jean-Luc's voice came, Rogue saw the older man chase after Henri; they almost made it to the door just as Belle was getting out, yanking her mask down. Jean-Luc grabbed Henri by the collar and swung up away from the door, Remy trying to help keep him from the doors of the ward. Rogue watched through the window as if it were a movie playing out in front of her.

"That's a sterile space, y' can't go in there!" Jean-Luc snapped.

"Sir, you can't go in there..." the nurse who'd left the NICU approached, her expression worried.

Henri fought off Remy again, Remy was slammed into the window and Remy heard it thud loudly as his back banged into it. The nurse tried to get in front of Henri but he swung her out of the way as if she weighed absolutely nothing and she fell to the floor.

"My baby is in there!" Henri hollered

"You're drunk, for gods sake, calm down," Jean-Luc got in front of him and pushed him backwards, "just take a moment! Stop an' think!"

"That my baby in there!" Henri pushed Jean-Luc aside awkwardly, staggering as he finally got past, "I'm goin' in."

Rogue let out a gasp as Belle leapt into action; she'd have never given the tired blonde credit for being so...wild. It started with one punch, right to the face and it was hard enough that Rogue saw blood stream from Henri's nose almost immediately. A second, a third, his jaw swung. Belle was like a wild cat; slapping him across the head, slamming her fists against him, her eyes seemed wild as the two spun around in a frenzied dance as Henri fought to try and keep her away from him and she kept hitting and hitting.

"Belle, stop!" Remy grabbed her and pulled her back, his arm wrapping around her upper chest in a bear grip whilst a nurse and Jean-Luc managed to haul Henri back from her. "this a hospital, control y'self!"

"Control myself?!" she shrieked, trying to kick at Henri, her petite frame flailing, her small slim legs kicking violently out towards her husband, a few feet short of reach. "Sunday! I haven't seen your ass since Sunday! You abandoned me! Left me and our daughter alone...you left me alone to deal with this!" Belle's breathing was so angry and fast that Rogue could see the mask moving in and out.

Henri wiped his bleeding nose on his sleeve after yanking his arms out of the reach of his father and the nurse, there was more blood seeping down his nose, spilling down the front of his dirty looking brown t-shirt. "I wan' see my daughter," he said, sounding pained, he wiped his nose again, smearing the blood over the right side of his unshaven face.

"You can see her after surgery," Remy decided, still trying to hold Belle back, his teeth clenched in the effort. The girl probably weighed half of him but her wildcat strength definitely compensated for what her height and mass didn't have.

"They gon' kill her! That surgery gon' kill her!" Henri hollered furiously, "I won' let y' kill her!"

"It gon' save her life," Jean-Luc tried to pin Henri to the wall with the help of a nurse, Rogue saw a panicked looking nurse behind a reception desk with a phone raised to her ear, it was clear she was calling for security.

It all happened so fast, Rogue saw Henri swing Jean-Luc aside, and the nurse was thrown into the reception desk, it winding her as her stomach hit the edge; Rogue watched in shock as the nurse crumpled to the floor that her face was red and she was gripping her ribs, trying to catch her breath, eyes bugging and glassy. Her eyes caught sight of Henri as he staggered through the door.

She had no choice. If Remy wasn't going to take down his brother, she was going to have to do it herself.

She yanked off her right latex glove and before Henri could reach the incubator and she grabbed for his face and yanked him backwards; holding onto his jaw hard. She felt the drain of her powers on him, his strength, his thoughts, his drunken anxiety, his memories rushing into her. She saw pieces of his life play in her head like a movie; the fear, the grief and anguish spilling from him into her like a waterfall pouring into a cenote.

She's gon' die. Gon' die. Gon' die. Ten percen' mortality rate, it gon' kill her. They gon' butcher my baby. Gon' cut her up...

Henri sank to the floor, his body swung sideways and he landed with a thud to the tiles onto his shoulder, then rolled onto his back, Rogue stepped backwards, slamming into the wall of windows, holding her head as the thoughts overwhelmed her. Visions of tiny coffins and gravesites, and the way he imagined looking at his dead child as she lay on an operating table, the way he imagined her blood trickling down the side of it. Horrifying images of a dead infant, colourless, doll-like and still.

She felt drunk, heavy and unsteady and she staggered.

Everything became a blur; all she saw was flashes of his memories. She was Henri...fighting with Belle over what to do...over letting their child die in a dignified way or on an operating table.

'I'd rather let her die on an operatin' table wit' a small chance to live than let her die slowly in an incubator until she's brain dead bein' kept alive by machines!' Belle had sobbed at her husband.

Rogue felt herself losing a fight with everything in her head; losing herself. In her head she heard Henri's voice. Don' wan' say goodbye...don' wan' say goodbye.

Wan' my baby.

When she opened her eyes, she wasn't in the blue-lit NICU ward any more, she was in a corridor, and she was lying down, gazing up at an unfamiliar ceiling. Weakly, she leaned up with confusion, she realised she was on a gurney. She put a hand to her head, "What...?" she asked.

"Chere...jus' relax, it's okay..." Remy's voice as soft, she felt him holding her right arm, as she started to sit he supported her.

"What happened..." she asked groggily.

"Y' passed out. Y' absorbed Henri...he wen' down like a ton o' bricks...then so did you..."

"Ah didn't have a choice..." she admitted weakly.

"I know...it's okay, chere..." Remy said, his voice tight. "We don' blame y'. Y' had t' stop him, we know that..."

Rogue raised her eyes to Remy's worried face. "He's scared..." she remembered.

"I know," he gently stroked her cheek, he was still wearing the latex gloves the hospital had provided him with, "Jus'...lay a bit, try t' get y' head t'gether."

Rogue brushed his hand away and sat up fully, looking around the wide hallway, "What happened to him?" she rubbed her head.

"They took him down t' psych. Nurses think maybe the strain o' the baby bein' ill caus' him t' have a breakdown..." he leaned against the wall near the gurney.

Great, more hospital bills, Rogue thought and she wasn't sure if that was her own thought or an echo from Henri's personality shining through her. "How long have Ah been out?"

"About twenty minutes..."

"Is Belle okay?" Rogue asked.

"Jean-Luc still tryin' t' calm her down. They took the baby away t' surgery. She's freakin' out..." he looked down to the floor, his eyes slightly misty. "Everythin' jus'...fell apart so fast..."

Rogue swung her legs over the side of the gurney, "he's so scared..." she admitted. "God, his...his thoughts..." she swept her hair away from her face and rubbed her throbbing head. "All the things he's been imaginin'..."

A silence fell between them, she felt Remy stroking her back tenderly as she worked her way up to getting herself centred, tried to push away Henri's thoughts. After a moment, she turned to look at Remy, noting the guilty look on his face. "What...?" she asked, knowing there seemed to be something on his mind.

"There somethin' I need t' ask o' y'..."

"What is it?" she wiped her face, glad that she hadn't had time for makeup at all today.

"I got no choice, I got t' work t'night in Henri's place..me an' Jean-Luc bot' need t' go," he squeezed her shoulders, "I know we shoul' be here f' Henri an' Belle but..."

"You can't back out of it," Rogue remembered him telling her before they'd even left for Louisiana, she wiped her left eye, the emotions still echoing from Henri made her want to cry, but she couldn't afford that right now. She had to be strong now, she couldn't show herself breaking down and add to this tragedy. "Ah know."

"I need y' t' stay here wit' Belle..." he leaned closer to her, his voice soft.

Rogue searched his eyes, "But she hardly knows me, Remy..."

"That ain' gon' matter t' her, chere..."

"What about her family?" Rogue sighed.

"Her Daddy is comin' from France, he's been tryin' t' get a fligh' out but some bad weather is causin' delays..." Remy explained, "Meantime, I need someone here wit' her."

"What about her brother...you said she had a brother..." Rogue tried. She didn't want to be alone here with Belle, she didn't want that responsibility. She wasn't sure how to begin to properly comfort this woman.

"He in France too, they wen' on vacation a week ago – she never tol' them Kennedy wen' in t' hospital again. They though' everythin' was fine...Jean-Luc jus' call her daddy an' he say he had no idea about any o' it. She jus'...didn' tell anyone..."

"Why would she do that?" Rogue asked. It didn't make sense to her that the girl would keep that from the child's grandfather. Wasn't it his right to know?

"Why anyone do anythin'?" Remy asked with a shake of his head. "Poin' is, 'til her daddy an' brother can get down here, someone need t' be here. Me an' Jean-Luc got a lot o' plannin'. Got a fligh' t' catch t' Miami at four..." he touched her shoulder gently.

"But...Ah barely know her..." Rogue shook her head, feeling distressed at the idea.

"Please..." Remy pleaded, he took both of her hands and clasped them in his together, "I need y' now...more than ever. This importan'..." he lowered his voice. "I know y' owe me nothin'..." he looked her in the eyes, "after all I've done las' mont's...I know I don' deserve this. But it mean a lot t' me...I can't leave her alone, chere...she's not in a good space..."

Rogue chewed her bottom lip, searching the look in Remy's eyes. He'd just watched his immediate family falling apart in a matter of minutes a short while ago...he was genuinely more stressed than he had ever been in his young life.

"If y' can't do this f' me, I un'erstan'..." he said, his voice a little firmer, "but please..." he kissed the top of each of her gloved hands, "do it f' Belle. She need you..."

"When will you be back?" she asked, deciding to accept defeat. His not even being in the state worried her. How long would it take him to get back if something should happen? The thought of being alone if the worst should occur frightened her so much.

"T'morrow afternoon at the absolute lates'...I don' wan' go, chere, but if I don' go...it's gon' complicate things f' them."

"Then...you need to do what you need to do," she sighed.

"I leave the car wit' y'. Take care o' her, okay?" he murmured, "I know it's weir', what I'm askin' y' t' do, 'cause o' who she was t' me..."

"No...Ah get it," Rogue admitted, she moved backwards from him, "she was your first love...you're always gonna want to protect her..."

Remy didn't argue this, he looked away, his expression sheepish, "Chere...I..."

"Don't try to explain, it doesn't matter," Rogue said, "do what you have to and get back here..."

"Y' got no idea how amazin' y' are, chere..." he said softly, and he started to leave; he gave her one last glance before he went.

Now Rogue felt more lost than ever.

It was a very long night at the hospital. The hospital had a small waiting room for the NICU, it was nicer than other waiting rooms Rogue had ever been to, leather couches, coffee tables, a coffee machine, nice lighting and plants. A television was mounted to the wall, and the air felt cooler in this room.

It was somewhere nicer to wait than a stark white room with chairs. But the nicer surroundings didn't make the situation feel any less intense or frightening.

Being alone with Belle for what felt like the first time for real was awkward. Rogue had been alone in the LeBeau house with her before back in October, but this felt incredibly different. There'd been no feeling of obligation then, but now, Rogue felt that sense of not being able to leave Bella Donna's side. Belle had dozed for a while on one of the couches, hours into the wait. They pretended like they were watching the television, but she was very aware neither of them could concentrate on the lifetime movie that was playing.

Briefly, a doctor came to talk with them; at first, Belle had almost lost control of herself thinking he'd come to tell her that her child had passed away, but the doctor was from the psychiatric department below, and he'd come to talk to her about Henri, to get her to fill in some forms and to explain that Henri was having a very severe mental breakdown from the strain of what was happening with their daughter.

Severe is an understatement, Rogue had thought dully, remembering all the horrible thoughts that had come from Henri.

To pass the time and awkward silences, they talked, Belle recanting stories of her childhood, the first time she'd met Henri and Remy LeBeau. The misadventures they'd get into as teens. But every story sounded empty; Rogue was aware that the blonde was just talking and talking and talking just to stop herself from thinking about her daughter.

The silences were the worst. Every now and then, the conversation would die down, and it'd get eerily quiet and Rogue would see Belle staring off into space, her hands tightly gripping at a small pink crocheted baby blanket she'd been holding onto; Rogue had seen it in the baby's incubator earlier that morning. That was what broke Rogue's heart, seeing Belle sitting there with the blanket in her left hand, her knuckles white, the bare fingers of her right hand stroking against it. Belle's knuckles were red and swollen from when she'd punched her husband in the nose, but she'd not given a single complaint about it although Rogue could see it definitely hurt.

Rogue barely had anything to do with these people, barely knew them really, they were strangers to her still. But now, having had Henri's thoughts in her head, she felt connected, felt strong echoes of who they were. Right now, lingering traces of Henri still in her head, she knew Henri better than she knew Remy, and she knew Belle in ways she hadn't before. She saw Belle through Henri's eyes, understood his feelings for her.

Started as a casual thing after Remy left, Rogue had deciphered. It evolved into more...it got...serious. She still had flickers of memories, things Henri had remembered about the past few years with Belle; the good times they'd had together, the way she made him feel, the way they were together when they were alone. This isn't just a convenience thing...never was, she thought as she gazed at Belle who was half asleep, curled up on one end of the couch, her feet bare, her toenails in bad need of repainting.

Belle sighed, looking at her smart watch. The baby had been taken away around eleven thirty am. It was now going on the twelfth hour.

How many hours can a baby be under surgery? Kennedy is so tiny...how can someone so small need so many hours to fix? Rogue's stomach rumbled with anxiety and hunger as she sat at the other end of the couch, one leg crossed over the other, her eyes pointed at the television which was playing some late show.

Rogue's eyes raised to the door into the waiting room as it opened, and an older man entered – Rogue estimated at least of sixty-five. His hair was long, curling a little, his face deeply tanned, his eyes were the same clear ocean blue of Belle's. Lingering memories from Henri told her this was Marius Boudreaux, Bella Donna's father.

The man said something in French and Belle sprang to her feet and into his arms at once. From the moment she was in his arms, she was sobbing hysterically and it was the first real time Rogue had heard Belle crying. The sound of it cut deep through her soul, and Rogue wasn't sure if it was due to the echoes of Henri's feelings for Belle still lingering in her from her absorption of him twelve hours before, or if it were due to her own growing fondness for Belle despite who the girl had once been to Remy.

Feeling like she was intruding, Rogue quietly got up from the couch, "Belle, Ah'm just gonna go get some soda and some air...give you some time with your daddy," she announced. She didn't need soda but it was the only excuse she could think of. She wasn't sure Bella Donna even heard her speak over her sobbing.

Going out into the hall, Rogue felt like a strange weight being lifted from her shoulders just to not be in the presence of so much immediate grief. The tension had been so palpable in the waiting room, for hours it'd been that way.

Rogue leaned against the wall outside, she stood listening to the sounds of the hospital still running busily even at midnight. Nurses rushing past, distant sound of footsteps and wheels on floors, from the nearby window she heard traffic, and the sound of distant ambulance sirens. It felt so much better than the intense silence and calm of the waiting room. She stood there rubbing the knots out of her sore neck, feeling like she could somehow breathe again if even for just a moment.

She fished her phone out of her phone, and she checked for messages from Remy; there were none.

At this hour, he's gonna be workin', Rogue decided. To get away for a while, knowing that Belle was in very safe hands with her father, she left the hospital entirely and got into the rental car that Remy had left her with. She drove to a small twenty-four hour coffee place and she took a table at the back of the almost empty place and sat drinking a latte at the ridiculous hour of midnight, scrolling through her phone, trying to take her mind off of the baby, off of Belle, off of Henri.

All she wanted to do was talk to Remy, tell him things she was feeling, worries she was having, just wanted him to hold her, tell her things were going to be okay. She just wanted to hear his voice.

She went through Facebook posts, seeing what her friends were up to, seeing that Jean and Scott had moved some of their items in to the boathouse already. Jean had posted a photo of a framed photo from the wedding on a brand new glossy white cabinet in their living area. Something caught Rogue quite unexpectedly right then...she felt...happy for them.

She'd never ever felt happy for them before. That was the moment she realised that finally, after almost seven months from the wedding date that she was finally over Scott Summers. The feelings weren't there any more. When she looked at photos of him and Jean together, she didn't get that same feeling, the attraction wasn't there, she couldn't find it, found it almost odd she could have felt that way at all.

When did that change? She wondered. Despite it was something she'd never done before, she held down her finger on the like button and dragged it along to the 'love' reaction, and she left a small comment of 'the place looks great'.

She'd never liked a single one of Jean's post since the day she'd arrived at Xavier's and accepted the friend request from her. She wondered if Jean would realise the meaning of that, that the resentment had finally burned itself out. In the back of the cafe, she could hear a radio was starting to play 'Is This Love' by Whitesnake, the beat caught her attention because it took her back to her first date with Remy; it'd been one of the songs that'd played on the radio on their drive home that night.

She felt the immediate sense of how she'd felt at that moment, as the date had been ending, being alone with him in the car, every beat somehow took her back to every beat of her nervous heartbeat that night. Reminded her of how an idiot had tried to mug them, the way Remy had gotten so upset over it.

Sighing, she went to Tabitha's facebook profile again to reach the photos, to look at the photos from the wedding again, to look at the photos Tabitha had posted of Rogue and Remy together. Remy was handsome and dapper in them, smiling, his grin roguish, his eyes twinkling like rubies on a bed of onyx.

He'd barely been gone half a day but she missed him, she felt his absence. She felt his absence now more than she had when she'd left Louisiana and him behind. With every beat of the music on the radio, she felt beats of her heart, in her mind she saw Remy, remembered how he'd felt that morning, remembered how it'd felt to lie against him and feel his heartbeat beneath her ear.

All she wanted right at that moment was to tell him...tell him exactly the things she was starting to feel, was really starting to understand....

She saved some of the photos from the wedding into her phone's photo album, it being the first time she'd ever done that, and she left the cafe. She drove to a nearby drive-thru burger place and ordered various items, deciding that after days at the hospital, it might be nice to take Belle something that hadn't come from a vending machine or a hospital cafeteria.

Rogue hated that she dreaded returning to the hospital; she was so afraid that in the time she'd have left, something might have changed. When she returned to the waiting room, Belle was sleeping, curled up against her father's side.

Rogue stared down at Marius, she felt her cheeks flush a little at the sense of intrusion she felt. She didn't belong there...she never had.

"Ah, uhm..." Rogue held up large bag of food and cardboard carrier with two colas and two milkshakes, "Ah brought food."

Marius looked her up and down, "Y' Remy's woman," he said quietly, his clear eyes seemed to burrow right into her.

Rogue put the bag of burgers and fries down on the table, and the drinks beside it and she sank down into an armchair opposite the couch.

"Didn' catch y' name," Marius said.

"Rogue..." she forced a smile, although she immediately felt judged. She knew from Henri's memories Marius had a judgemental streak. Even without knowing ahead of time, she felt herself being weighed by sight.

Marius's hand was stroking his daughter's tangled hair; Belle hadn't groomed in days, she'd never left the hospital once and it showed.

"He leave Belle for you?" Marius asked.

Rogue shook her head, "Ah've...known him for years but...we only started seein' each other...Ah don't know...end of July?" she tried to think of the date of the wedding but couldn't. "Ah never even knew he'd been engaged to anyone until October, when we came for a visit. He never...told me."

Marius snorted, "A lot goes unsaid wit' that one."

Rogue nervously shifted in her seat. Marius made her feel uncomfortable. Perhaps it was the sense of what she knew about him. He was a stone cold Assassin, she was aware he'd killed a lot of people, Henri's memories had told her so.

Rogue tried to change the subject, "is there...any news? About the baby?"

He shook his head, "I asked, surgeons still at it. They said when they done, they let us know."

"Oh."

"Where is Remy, anyway?" Marius asked.

"He and Jean-Luc went down to Miami...somethin' about work...he has to fill in for Henri," Rogue said softly. "He's doin' what Henri couldn't do right now..."

"If he's doin' what Henri' coul'n' do, why isn' Henri here?" his voice was a little cold. "His daughter in surgery, he shoul' be here wit' his wife."

"Didn't Belle say?" Rogue asked, staring across at him.

Marius shook his head, his lips pulled into a snarl a little.

Guess she wasn't in any condition to explain to her daddy what happened this mornin', Rogue supposed.

"Henri had a breakdown...couldn't take the grief."

"Right. Sure he did," he said disbelievingly.

"No...he...did," Rogue raised her eyes to Marius's incredibly blue eyes, "he...got into a fight outside NICU with Jean-Luc and Remy. He's down in a psych ward now under sedation."

"And you believe that?"

"Ah saw it for myself," Rogue frowned a little, "Ah...felt it."

"How?"

"My powers," she decided to be up front. She was sure that Belle probably had told her father about her. Or that Marius would have heard rumours about her somewhere by now. Especially since five years ago she'd come down here and helped Remy fight several initiates of the Assassins guild.

"I heard about those," Marius said after a moment, "About how you can't touch people without almos' killin' them."

His words stung her violently, she wasn't entirely sure it hadn't been unintentional.

"Ah absorb their powers...their skills...memories...for a short time," Rogue explained. "Ah...had to touch Henri to get him under control..." she lowered her eyes, "he's...strugglin'. The things he thinks...the things he's scared of..." she closed her eyes and tried to get a grip of herself. "He's...so hurt. As badly as Belle."

Marius was silent, his expression dark. Rogue sensed how much Marius had never really liked Henri...or Remy for that matter.

"He loves them both so much," Rogue spoke up, recalling the memories.

Marius kissed his daughter's golden hair, but said nothing about her revelation. He stared off into space. "Got any other powers?"

"No..." she shook her head.

"Can't see int' the future...nothin' o' the like?"

"Ah wish Ah could," she admitted, "Ah wish Ah had powers that...would know how to make this better."

There was a long silence, and Marius gave a grunt, "Maybe this my punishmen' f' the things I did."

Rogue moved her eyes to him, his face was like stone, seemed so...unfeeling. But as he spoke, she sensed he felt the weight of every word.

"Maybe this how God repay me f' every single misdeed, f' the mistakes I make...the...sins...fate need me t' pay f'...all the lives I took..." his voice trembled.

"The baby is innocent. She's payin' for no one's sins," Rogue spoke up. "You can't think like that. This is...nature...it's nothin' to do with God or...fate."

Rogue's eyes shifted to the door, a handsome blonde haired blue eyed man of about twenty six was standing by the door, the same clear blue ocean eyes as Belle. Rogue recognised he was Belle's brother. Henri's memories of him told her he wasn't to be messed with, that he was dangerous...unpredictable.

Marius sighed, "You should go, Rogue," he decided.

"Ah told Remy Ah'd stay with her..." Rogue spoke up.

"She need her family...and her family here."

Rogue stood slowly, "course..." she felt caught somewhere between being glad to have a proper escape from this, and of being dismissed and now being considered an outsider again. "Ah'll be at the LeBeau house if...anyone needs me."

The LeBeau house felt so eerily silent when she returned at two in the morning. She could hear an owl again, and she realised it must be nesting somewhere close by. As she left the rental car and walked up the porch alone, she heard one of the metal trashcans at the side of the house rattling; some animal scavenger was clearly looking in the trash and she wasn't in the mood to go see if it was rats, mice, cats or something else. She unlocked the door and went in, locked the door firmly behind her and she went to the living room.

She didn't feel like going to Remy's bedroom tonight, she didn't want to be in there alone in the bed; in the living room, she turned the television on and settled on the velvet couch, curled up under a crocheted blanket with velvet trim and she watched movies all night to try and keep her mind off of the baby, off of Belle, off of Henri. Her stomach flipped every time she thought of Remy and whatever he might be doing right at those moments. From what she'd seen in Henri's head, the heists of late had been risky...dangerous, going into highly secure places where people had firearms, where there were vicious guard dogs and electric fences.

He's never been seriously hurt before, Rogue kept reminding herself over and over through movie to movie, from Rob Zombie's 'Halloween' remake, to 'Insidious', to 'The Craft', to 'Skeleton Key', to 'Girl on the Third Floor'. Hours and hours of movies, trying to keep herself distracted.

She wasn't sure when she dozed off. When she awakened, the sunlight was pouring through the French doors to the back of the living room, filtering through the white muslin drapes. The television had lone gone onto standby, and the living room was comfortably silent; she could hear birds outside, and the sound of a windchime gently moving on the back porch. Rogue leaned up, feeling stuff and sore; her eyes moved to the clock on the fireplace mantel to see it was almost two pm.

Ah slept nearly the entire day, she realised with horror. She rubbed her tired eyes and stood, stretching her back.

It's been more than twenty-four hours since Kennedy went into surgery...they must know somethin' by now, she thought dully as she looked at the clock again. She moved to the fireplace and stood by it to look at the various photos of the family. The photo of the day they'd brought Kennedy home from the hospital was in a chic glass frame. Belle looked tired but beautiful and happy. A stark contrast to how she'd looked yesterday at the hospital.

Please be okay, Rogue thought anxiously as she touched the image of the baby in the photo with her gloved finger. Please be okay. Please be okay. Please be okay.

She heard a clicking sound; she recognised the sound of the loud old fashioned lock on front door. Her heart leapt in her chest a little, nerves shooting through every vein as she left the living room and headed to the hall.

Remy was there at the door, different clothes from yesterday, a light grey t-shirt, a burgundy hooded sweatshirt and a pair of dark blue jeans.

They stood looking at each other, and Rogue didn't dare to ask but the question was on the tip of her tongue and in her eyes as she gazed at him.

Please don't say it. Please don't say it, she begged silently of him.

Remy gave a small nod, "she made it through the surgery."

Rogue felt her legs weaken, and she moved to the stairs and sank down shakily to sit there, her head in her hands, "thank god..." she sighed, a sense of relief weighing on her.

Remy shut the door behind himself and approached, he dumped his backpack on the floor by the stairs, he leaned on the newel post. "Recovery be real hard. She ain' out o' the woods yet," he explained. "But she made it."

"Where's your daddy?" she asked, noting there was no sign of Jean-Luc following him in.

"He drop me off here, he gon' go t' the hospital. Gon' check on Belle an' the baby..." he explained.

"And Henri?"

"Far as I know they gon' keep him in f' a few days. Observation. He ain' in a good way righ' now."

Rogue examined Remy's handsome face, he looked tired...drained, his eyes a little dull. She could tell he had had very little sleep since she'd seen him last. "You look exhausted, sugar," she said softly as she stood up and moved from the stairway.

"Yeah," he grunted, "I'm...jus' so drained righ' now. It's...been a long night an' mornin'."

"You should go lie down...rest up. You've more than earned it," she gestured up the stairs.

He gave a small nod, picked up his backpack and started for the stairs; he was halfway up the stairs before he stopped, lingering there for a moment before he turned and looked down at her. "I..." he paused.

"Yeah?" she asked.

"I...wan' talk firs'," he put the bag on the step above him and sighed. "I think we shoul' talk."

"About?" she queried, hovering at the bottom of the stairs.

He sank slowly to sit on the stairs, facing her, his arms between his knees. He locked his eyes with her. "About how things have been."

"Oh..." she responded, she chewed the inside of her cheek.

Rogue felt her stomach churn. She didn't want to have this discussion right now. It'd be easier if they just pretended like nothing had happened and didn't speak of it at all. There'd been too much tension in the past few days, she didn't want to feel more of it.

"Obviously..." he took a breath, "things have been...tense...I've been..." he paused, trying to consider the words, "frustrated...an' dealin' wit' stuff..." he looked at her, "An'...if this weren' goin' on...I know y' woul'n' even be here righ' now."

She agreed with this assessment. If he hadn't been under so much stress, she wouldn't have felt so compelled to go to him. If it hadn't been for this situation, she'd have never come back here again.

"But...y' are here," he said. She felt him keeping his eyes on hers, although she had hers firmly to the floor. "An'...the fact y' are here...the fact y' stayed..." he seemed to swallow, "Well...it...has...me thinkin'."

"Oh?" she asked nervously.

"I didn' expect y' woul' be half as kin' t' me as y' have been. 'Specially not after the way I acted...'specially not after the jackass I've been..." he shrugged and looked down sheepishly. "'Specially not after what I've been doin' since New Year..." he wrung his hands anxiously.

Rogue licked her lips, she couldn't find a way to comment. She wasn't sure she had the right to comment after the way she'd rejected him at Christmas.

"I...need t' ask somthin'..."

"Okay..." she agreed, her stomach fluttering.

"When you..." he drew a breath, "when y' came t' me on Thursday mornin'...an' we was t'gether like we was..." he raised his eyes to her again, "Was that jus'...pity?"

She looked away from him, hugging herself, feeling a slight chill creep up her spine despite the definite warmth in the house. There's no point in lyin', she told herself. He's too perceptive. He recognised what that was.

"Was it?" he asked of her, his voice soft, he sounded almost slightly hurt.

"It...was...comfort," she confessed sheepishly.

"That's what I thought," he said quietly, a small nod, his eyes locked to the floor.

"But yesterday mornin' wasn't..." she continued, shifting nervously from foot to foot. She almost felt like crying and she wasn't sure why. "Yesterday mornin'...it...was..." she trailed off, not knowing really how to define it.

"Real," he finished for her.

She felt her cheeks flush hot at the memory of yesterday morning, of the way he'd touched every part of her body, the slow build to gentle release, the way it'd felt to hold his face in her gloved hands as he'd moved against her with slow and deliberate rhythm. She wanted that again. She wanted it every morning.

His eyes were on the floor, but he seemed a million miles away. "So...that's why it was differen'..." he said in a voice so quiet it was almost a whisper.

She felt her body flush with anxiety and emotion. The tension made her feel sick, made her feel quivery and hot, left her body all on edge.

Remy's cheek twitched a little, and he seemed to swallow. "How..." he began, "y' wan' go ahead, chere?" he asked softly.

Rogue shifted from foot to foot nervously, "How you mean?" she asked, trying to hide the trembling in her voice.

"Y' wan' pretend this never happened?" he asked, "go back t' how things was back in Bayville, like it was b'fore?" he sighed, "or y' wan' more?"

She was surprised at the question. She raised her eyes to him, not being able to answer.

It was not what she'd expected. If anything...she'd expected him to want to drop things entirely once they returned home, so he could go back to sleeping with whomever he wanted.

He kept his eyes on her, looking for an answer and the thought of trying to make a decision to this right now was far too much, her head was starting to hurt from the strain of everything going on.

"Can...can we not talk about this right now?" she rubbed her head, "Ah've got a real headache comin' on..." she admitted honestly.

"Whatever y' wan', chere..." he gave a defeated sigh. "I'm gon' go t' bed. I'm tired. Dog tired."

She gave a weak nod and she watched him go up the stairs with his backpack alone. She heard his bedroom door closing quietly upstairs.

Remy didn't emerge from his room until after the sun had set. Rogue had gone to the store to try and take her mind off of her troubles and bought the ingredients to make one of the easiest meals she knew how to make – Macaroni and Cheese. She bought a few bottles of cheap wine - hoping a little alcohol might take the edge off - and she'd almost consumed a full glass already by the time Remy entered the kitchen, his hair sleep-mussed and eyes puffy. She gazed up from the island counter where she was in the process of pouring the cheese sauce into the cooked macaroni.

"How'd you sleep?" she asked, trying to pretend as if earlier hadn't happened.

"Lousy," he responded.

"Ah was about to come see if you were awake...dinner is almost ready..." she eyed him briefly, noting the slight frown on his brow. "You okay?"

"Head hurts," he approached.

"There's Tylenol in that cabinet there," she said as she stirred the pasta to incorporate the sauce. He moved behind her to retrieve the pills from the cabinet where she'd found them yesterday, and she watched him bring the bottle of Tylenol to the table, along with a wine glass from the same cabinet and he poured himself a glass from the bottle of cheap Sauvignon blanc she'd opened. He popped two pills and downed nearly the entire contents of the glass to wash the things down.

"Heard any news about the baby or Henri?" she asked, trying to find a way to start any conversation that wouldn't lead to talking about their relationship, and also holding her tongue from reprimanding him for washing down painkillers with wine.

"Jean-Luc tex', he say Henri is still kin' o' all over the place, he's awake, but groggy...sort o' sedated. He asked t' see Belle, but she don' really wan' talk t' him righ' now which ain' helpin'," Remy poured himself more wine.

"She's still mad?"

"Furious...incensed," Remy said. "I can't blame her after the way he handled things. I don' even think it's the breakdown. I think it's that he took off an' she didn' see him f' five days...she's needed him..." he pursed his lips for a moment, "s' not easy...I guess...when y' need someone an' they ain' there f' y'."

Rogue glanced briefly at him, wondering if there was something more to what he'd said.

"She ain' gon' f'give him all that easy f' that," Remy mumbled, he finished the dregs from his glass, his expression pensive.

"You've still no idea where he was?"

Remy shook his head. "Was hopin' you'd know."

"Why do you think he ran?" Rogue asked.

"You tell me, you were in his head...or...rather, he was in yours," he examined her. "What did y' see in his head?"

She lowered her eyes, "deep...deep fear...the likes Ah've never known," she frowned into the pot of pasta.

"Like what?"

"Can...we not talk of this?" she asked, "It's puttin' knots in my stomach...Ah've been tryin' to get it out of my head all night and all day," she admitted; every time she considered the things Henri had thought of...had imagined...she felt sick with fear and worry.

"Sorry," he sighed. "I'm jus'...tryin' t' understand."

"There's no understandin', Remy. You couldn't unless you were in their shoes...you wouldn't be able to understand unless you saw in his head. Ah know Ah wish Ah hadn't. Lets...lets just leave it at that, huh?"

He fell quiet, and she felt him studying her for a moment as he sipped from his glass of wine. Eventually, he broke the silence. "What's this y' makin'?"

"Mac and cheese," she replied.

"Y' speciality," he responded, he refilled his small wine glass.

"If by speciality you mean the only thing Ah know how to make without burnin' the house down then...yeah. It's my speciality."

"I got no complaints," Remy responded, she felt him watching her as she stirred, incorporating the sauce into the pasta. He leaned on the counter, sipping from the wine. "I know it's not what y' gon' wan' hear righ' now. I'm gon' need t' stay a while."

She lifted her eyes from the pot and gazed at him. The first time he'd announced he was staying back, she'd been resentful. This time she understood completely. The thought of him staying back though and her going home alone killed her. She didn't want to go home alone...not after the things she'd started to let herself feel again. Not after the time they'd had in bed. Not after he'd suggested trying to be together again.

"Things still not great here. I wan' make sure things are stable 'fore I go home."

"Oh," she said, and put her attention back on stirring the pasta.

"I know...it kin' o'...put y' in a bind 'cause o' the team. I'll try t' not take too long this time, I promise..."

"Take all the time you need, Remy. Your family clearly need you more than the team does."

He closed the bottle of Tylenol and moved behind her to go put the bottle back in the cabinet it'd been in. She heard him at her back retrieving dishes, heard them clink against each other as he lifted them. Her eyes dropped to her left as he placed two large bowls on the island counter, she felt him hovering at her back, felt his breath stirring on her neck.

Her body grew tense again, just like it always did when he was near her; she wished she could control the butterflies and the anxiety. She reached over to get a large ladle from the utensil holder. She felt Remy's touch at her back, fingers sliding down her spine.

"Y' okay?" he asked. "Y' lil' quiet," he brushed her hair away from her shoulder and he kissed her, she felt his lips through the thin cotton of her top.

Her pulse raced a little and she gulped down her nerves as she felt him move his body closer, became aware of his hand sliding around her hip and to her waist.

"Ah'm fine," she lied as she tried to focus on dishing out the meal; she felt his body pressing against her, "it's...been a stressful few days."

"I know a good way t' deal wit' stress."

"Riding on your Harley?" she asked, remembering what he'd said to her the day before the wedding.

He blew lightly on her ear, "well...doesn' involve a motorcycle but...ridin' is definitely part o' it..." his hand gently caressed her belly. She tried to focus on the dinner and she started dishing the food out; his body pushed a little more urgently against hers and she felt his erection press into her backside and he shifted himself until he was pressing right between her cheeks. His fingers slid lower down her belly, between her legs, pressing against the crotch of her leggings.

A part of her understood how damn inappropriate this felt given the circumstances, but at the same time, the contact felt so necessary, and the offer of distraction felt so welcome.

"Y' smell nice, what is that?" he asked.

"Probably the wine," she responded, craning her neck away from his mouth being too close to her ear; he was grinding on her backside and it was becoming very insistent.

"Smell's delicious..." he mumbled near her ear, his fingers rubbing between her thighs.

She tried to control her thoughts, her body wanted to instinctively move against his touch. "What about dinner...?"

"We coul' leave dinner 'til later," he suggested, his left hand raised to her left breast, his thumb brushing against the bump of her nipple through her shirt and bra. She squeezed her legs together tight and tried to fight the urge, his fingers clamped between her thighs and it only made him press harder.

"It'll get cold."

"I don' min', cherie. We can microwave it."

"Aren't you hungry? You've not eaten all day..."

"Not yet..." he took the ladle from her hand and dropped it into the pot.

"When was the last time you even ate?" she asked of him concernedly, glancing over her shoulder at him concernedly.

His eyes smouldered, "ain' had much o' an appetite las' few days..." he mumbled, his hips rolling against her backside.

"You need to eat."

"Need t' work up an appetite firs'..." he pushed the bowl of pasta and pot in front of her aside to the other end of the island. "Y' migh' need t' help me wit' that..." he grunted as he bent her forward over the counter top where the hot pot had been, she felt the heat from the counter where it'd sat right, warmth seeping through her clothes right to her breasts and she knew the memory of that was going to stick out later when she recalled this.

He'd yanked her leggings and panties down to her knees before she'd even had a chance to assess when he'd put the black latex gloves on; she spied the flash of black on her thigh as he grazed her skin. Was he just carrying them in his pockets now? His fingers slid between her legs and began rubbing; there was a strange sense of urgency to it, and she melted, gasping and writhing against his hand for several minutes, feeling like now that he had her under the spell there was no fighting him. Her eyes caught the empty condom wrapper as it got tossed onto the counter by her arm just minutes later.

"Are you always this prepared?" she asked with a gasp as she felt him rubbing himself against her, using the the head of his sheathed member to stimulate her from behind.

"Since Thursday, fuck yeah," he grunted as he twisted her around and perched her on the edge of the counter, he yanked her leggings off her ankles to free her legs completely, she heard her sneakers falling off with them.

She felt the sexual tension between them, it was almost crackling, it was intense and electric, she ached for him, ached for some release from the strain she'd been feeling these last thirty hours.

She cupped his face in her gloved hands as he pulled her towards him and thrust himself, the first push always caught her by surprise, caught her with pain and she cried out unintentionally.

"Y' okay?" he asked, his eyes locked to hers.

She gave a nod, shut her eyes and leaned back from him, her fingers sliding down his neck and grasping his shoulders, she heard one of the pasta bowls clattering a little on the counter as her arm hit it and she clumsily reached behind her to try and move them out of the way. She heard the cheese grater she'd used earlier clattering to the floor as it fell as she leaned back a little more, eager to try to keep his face from hers. She heard him laughing, and she opened her eyes to see the devilish sexy glee in his expression, the strain was melting from his face like butter melting on toast.

He moved enthusiastically against her, pulling her hips towards him while she fought to not fall from the edge of the island counter. She couldn't take her eyes from him, from the deep and intense look in his eyes as he swung his hips into her, as he filled her. It was still uncomfortable, and yet at the same time, it felt so damn necessary to feel him. He was a little more rough than he had been before and as nervous at it made her, she couldn't deny it turned her on, made her feel closer to orgasm than she usually was without his digital assistance.

"You feel so good," he grunted at her, lifting her knee and propping it with his arm.

"This isn't hygienic," she realised as her bare backside squeaked a little on the marble counter, it still felt warm from the pot. She couldn't help but feel like the house proud Bella Donna would be outraged at her bare ass on the normally sparkling clean counter.

Remy chuckled, "dirtier the better..." he assured, and he tugged her closer, she gasped, hands slipping. She tried to push herself up as he lifted her bottom half into the air; his upper body strength impressed her almost as much as the control on his pelvis. She grabbed onto his shoulders to try and support herself as he pulled her away from the counter, holding her up and she let out a cry of "oh fuck," just as she felt herself starting to get closer; his upstroke was starting to feel...different, she almost lost her balance and she tried to steady herself, biting down on her lip hard, clutching the shoulders of his shirt as tightly as she could.

"Y' like that?" he grunted hotly.

She gave the smallest of nods, whimpering, trying to stay perched; she eyed the trickle of sweat dancing down his temple to his jaw. She'd always heard of men having a 'sex face' but she'd never taken the time to appreciate Remy's before. The way his cheeks and neck flushed incredibly red and eyes seemed slightly feverish, the way his brows would furrow, his lips trembling just a little – she'd never noticed these things until now. The urge to kiss him was so powerful, the want to touch his skin, to feel how slick he was with sweat and heat, taste how salty his skin was. Her body was growing more tense with the idea of it, the thought of tasting that wine on his lips made everything sensation she felt so damn heightened as he pounded himself against her more furiously while using his arm strength to bounce her into him.

"Oh god," she gasped, grasping onto him hard, stretching his shirt a little. It felt like right then all the tension and stress she'd been hanging onto all night was near forgotten, a sense of relief rumbling through her as she got close to that sense of euphoria again. She was almost there, on the pinnacle of it.

Suddenly Remy lost the grip of her sweaty thighs and she fell with a loud hard thump to the floor and it hurt. She cried out in pain and looked up at him in disbelief, he was already putting himself away hastily, not even attempting to try to pick her up. "What the fu-" she began, looking up at him in disbelief.

"You two home?" came the call of Jean-Luc from the hallway, in the hall she heard the front door closing.

Oh fuck! Jean-Luc! She panicked.

"Get dressed!" Remy whispered, sounding desperate.

Quickly grabbing her panties from the tangle of her leggings, she pulled them on and hastily pulled the leggings on as she awkwardly hid behind the counter, red faced and flustered. She tried to compose herself and steady her breathing as put her sneakers on quickly, watching as Remy adjusted himself to hide his obvious hard on down his left pants leg then pulled his sweater over himself a little.

"Yeah, we're here," Remy called out, she saw him fighting to regain his own composure as he stood behind the island counter. He grabbed the dish towel that had been hanging from a cabinet door and he wiped his sweaty face with it quickly.

"Where?"

"Kitchen," Remy replied, he tossed the dish towel aside and looked at Rogue with an almost apologetic and slightly embarrassed smirk. She looked back at him, feeling humiliated and incredibly flustered. She drew a deep breath, focusing on slowing her breath, trying to concentrate on her heart reaching a normal tempo.

Jean-Luc entered the kitchen first, followed by Belladonna; Belle looked thoroughly exhausted, and Jean-Luc definitely seemed tired too, and perhaps a little pale. They all stood looking each other and Rogue got the distinct impression that Belle and Jean-Luc both knew what had been happening. Belle gave Remy a strange look, and raised an eyebrow only slightly.

"We...didn't expect you back tonight," Remy said, and in her periphery Rogue was aware of him peeling his gloves off slyly and tossing them into the trash, trying to do so out of sight of his father and sister-in-law.

Ah can't believe Ah've almost just been caught havin' sex in the kitchen, she thought in dismay, her face felt like it was on fire from the humiliation, she was so hot she was sure she was close to passing out any moment. This is the kind of thing that happens to other people, not me!

She wiped her forehead on her sleeve as she turned, pretending to be busy checking the stove was off.

Calm down, just calm down, catch your breath.

"Hospital made us leave," Belle's eyes seemed misty. "No one can go into see the baby right now, she's in a clean room."

"The nurses all agreed you need rest," Jean-Luc touched Belle's shoulder. "You've not left in near a week. The last thing you need is breaking down like Henri."

Belle let out a deep sigh, her expression was so torn with hurt that Rogue's heart bled for her. The blonde's eyes roved the kitchen which she clearly recognised had been gutted since the last time she'd been there.

"Ah've just made dinner," Rogue turned to Remy and gave him a pointed look to get more dishes. She felt so nervous, she reached for the ladle and knocked it out of the pot accidentally, barely catching it before it fell to the floor, it splattered a few pieces of macaroni onto the counter and she winced. She spied the empty condom wrapper from the island counter and she snatched it and pocketed it hastily, hoping no one had noticed.

"I'm starvin'," Jean-Luc nodded, "ain't had a proper home cooked meal for..." he paused, seeming to remember himself. Rogue realised he'd been about to complain because it'd been Belle who'd been cooking for some time. "What's f' eatin?"

"Mac and Cheese," Rogue replied, she grabbed the damp cloth from where it had been near the sink and she quickly wiped the kitchen counter with it just in case anything had been left on the counter top from the encounter.

God, this must look so sus, she thought worriedly, she wiped the bottom of the pasta pot to try and make it seem as if she were cleaning up some spilled cheese sauce rather than anything suspect.

"Ah'm sorry but it's almost all Ah know how to make."

"Oh, don't sell y'self short, cherie," Jean-Luc replied, he sounded so worn out, "Mac and cheese is some good old comfort food, and I think that's what we all need right now..." he glanced down, noticing the cheese grater on the floor; he bent down to pick it up and put it on the counter, his expression curious as he glanced between them.

Remy passed Rogue two more bowls and she dished up two more servings. Remy carried the servings to the table as his father and sister-in-law sat down. Rogue brought hers and Remy's food over and they all sat.

"Y' look a lil' red in the face, son," Jean-Luc studied him. "A lil' flushed, there."

"I jus' got back from a run 'fore dinner," Remy lied without a beat as he pushed Rogue's chair in for her.

God, this is awkward, Rogue thought uneasily as she gazed around the table. Remy chose the seat directly to her side.

"You seem a lil' red too, cherie..." Jean-Luc noted to Rogue.

"We both ran," she lied, she pushed her fork into her pasta. "Just to...burn out some of the stress..." she stared down into her food, her cheeks were burning hot.

"Yeah...vigorous activity definitely burn's out stress," Jean-Luc responded, his tone almost knowing.

Rogue groaned inwardly, she moved her pasta around in the bowl a little, trying to be as natural as she could be. He knows...he knows what we did. Jesus, he must have heard us at it when he came into the house...Remy wasn't exactly bein' quiet. He was gettin' pretty loud...

There was an uncomfortable silence at the table for a few moments as they all begun to start eating, and Rogue couldn't stand it. Usually Remy and Jean-Luc would at least converse, but this time not a word was spoken.

Need to say somethin', instead of everyone just awkwardly not talkin', not lookin' at each other, she realised uneasily, pushing her pasta around in the bowl.

"How is the baby?" Rogue asked softly, feeling that she probably should have asked before now. It was the only topic of discussion she felt there could be at this point.

"She's as well as can be expected," Belle wiped her eyes a little, a small tear having escaped, "recovery is...tricky with this condition."

"She'll be fine," Rogue said. "She's strong. Like her momma."

Belle drew a breath, "Don't feel strong...I feel...so weak."

"You're not weak. You're exhausted. Eat up then go sleep, you need it," Remy said softly.

"I shoul' be there wit' her," Belle shook her head, pushing her food around the plate listlessly.

"You've done enough, chere. This in God's hands now," Jean-Luc said quietly. He reached out his hand and looked at Rogue, "we gon' pray."

Rogue gave Jean-Luc her gloved hand and held onto Remy's as they closed their eyes while Jean-Luc said a quiet prayer for his granddaughter, Rogue tried to listen but her anxiety levels made it difficult to comprehend everything that was said, she only knew that the words were beautiful, almost poetic and heartfelt.

She felt her heart wrenching a little at the sound of Belle sobbing quietly during the middle of Jean-Luc's prayer for little Kennedy. Remy's grip on her gloved hand squeezed, and she squeezed back; something went unsaid between them that was understood but couldn't be put into words. She opened her eyes briefly during the prayer to look at Remy, to see he was looking back at her, a weak sad smile on his face.

After prayer, they ate in silence for a few more minutes; they shared the second bottle of wine she'd bought earlier that day between them and then conversation started moving towards other subjects as Remy and Jean-Luc tried their absolute best to make dinner more tolerable. Rogue felt incredibly bad for Belle, who was trying her best to be conversational but was struggling. The girl was struggling to even really make herself eat. The stress was written all over her pretty face.

Ah can't imagine what she's goin' through, Rogue thought dully. She'd been there at the hospital but only saw through windows into that world. Belle and Henri had been going through this for months – Remy too, to some degree. Rogue's window into Henri's heartbreak and strain had been bigger than the ones she'd seen with Belle and Remy from the outside looking in...she'd gotten a broader view.

Feeling Henri's pain...it still lingered with her. She'd felt his fear so much that even to think of the baby in the hospital made something in the pit of her stomach hurt.

Rogue turned to gaze at Remy as he sat eating, he was discussing some situation with some guild members casually over their macaroni, trying to just make everything seem momentarily normal. Through Henri's eyes and memories, she'd realised this had been affecting Remy much more than he'd shown for the past months. Even if it wasn't directly happening to him, to watch his father, brother and sister-in-law trying to cope with this, with potential death of a child, he'd been struggling for some time to act natural and Henri had been very aware of it. Henri had been very aware of how Remy had been pushing everyone out, pretending things were fine, just struggling to try and get the bills paid, doing what he had to so they could all get by, even sending most of the money from his pay as an X-Man back to Bloodmoon.

He never really talks much about his feelin's about anythin', she realised. He's so deep, never utters a word, never says he's sad, or angry or...anythin'. Ah just see little glimpses of it but Ah don't really know him. He just pretends things are fine, makes jokes, stays neutral...never really talks about what he's goin' through.

Every now and then, she'd feel Remy touch her thigh lightly beneath the table, or he'd touch her arm with such tenderness. At one point, when Belle was sadly talking about how the nurses wouldn't even allow her to feed her own daughter, near crying about how it made her breasts and heart both physically ache until her soul near broke, and Rogue felt so emotionally torn her own eyes brimmed with tears. She fought it for the sake of Belle, and almost as if Remy had sensed her upset, she felt him rubbing her back lightly and she felt almost relieved...comforted by his presence.

Near the end of their meal, Rogue felt Remy's arm slide around her back, his fingers stroking her shoulder; at first she wondered if he was still trying to put a show on for his family but it hardly seemed necessary any more.

After what Jean-Luc had seen the morning before, and having almost caught them in the act in the kitchen, she doubted the family were ever going to question their relationship again. She turned to look at Remy, and found that he was gazing back at her again, his eyes soft, his expression pensive, but he seemed miles away even though he was looking right at her.

She could hear Jean-Luc talking about something, someone Remy and Belle knew, but she couldn't focus. All she could focus on was the look in Remy's eyes, the way he seemed lost in thought and she wished she could read his mind right then.

Her heart swelled and ached in ways she wasn't sure she could completely process. It all felt so new and terrifying but exhilarating at the same time. At that moment all she wanted to do was go somewhere to be alone with him, to settle against his chest like she had that morning and listen to the sound of his heart and try to come down from the stress of everything happening around them.

"Well," said Jean-Luc as he finished his last bite of the pasta, having cleared his bowl completely, "I think I'm gon' retire t' my office. Got a lil' guild business t' tie up...things t' take care of before bed," he stood, "Rogue, that was an excellen' dinner."

Rogue wasn't sure she could agree, it was adequate in her own opinion, and that was enough for her.

"Thanks," Jean-Luc passed by her to put his bowl on the counter, and as he did, she felt him pat her shoulder gently. "Remy, we'll brief later 'bout the contrac'."

Remy nodded, watching as his father put the bowl aside, then left the kitchen.

Rogue gazed at Remy once again, noting the look on his face; for as much as Remy had bad mouthed his father at times, she saw the concern and the frustration with it.

"I think I'm gon' go to bed," Belle pushed her bowl away, she'd barely even eaten a quarter of the pasta. "I'm dog tired."

"Course," Remy said.

"If someone from the hospital calls-" Belle began, standing slowly, with every movement Rogue saw the weariness in her body, as she looked in the eyes of the blonde, she saw the exhaustion, the depression.

"I'll come get y', of course," Remy nodded firmly, giving her a reassuring look, "but no one will."

Rogue stood up and picked up the two bowls that had belonged to Belle and herself, "go get some sleep, sugar," she said, forcing a smile that felt sore on her face. It was hard to smile in a situation like this.

Belle then did something that surprised Rogue, she reached out and hugged her, her grip tight, and her voice trembled a little when she said the words, "thanks f' dinner, Rogue. And for cleanin'...for...bein' there yesterday...for...jus'...everythin'..."

Rogue blinked, standing with the two bowls in her hands, aware of the shaking in the blonde's petite body. She moved her eyes to Remy who was still sitting at the table, he gazed up at her and there was an odd look on his face. She wondered if this was strange for him watching the woman he'd once been betrothed to marry hugging the woman he was now casually screwing.

Belle let Rogue go, she struggled to try and smile and failed, she gave a weak nod and then left the kitchen without another word; from where she stood, Rogue could hear the footsteps on the slightly creaky stairs as Belle ascended up to her room.

Remy stared down into his mostly eaten meal and he pushed it away from him. He gave a sigh and reached for the bottle of wine, pouring himself the final dregs of it. He said nothing, his expression pensive as he raised his glass to his lips and sipped.

Rogue took the bowls to the sink, dumping Belle's leftovers into the small plastic bin that was for food waste. She heard Remy sigh again and she started running the hot water faucet, plugging the sink and squirting dish soap into the basin, trying to fight off the urge to cry. Somehow she felt she didn't have the right to in this situation even if she was now involved. It wasn't her stress, she felt somehow like it'd be disrespectful to Belle to even let herself cry over what was going on. She was just an outsider caught up in this, someone Remy had dragged into this charade.

Remy brought his bowl over to the food waste and dumped the remains inside and stacked his bowl with the others.

"Jean-Luc likes you, y know," he said quietly, he opened a cabinet above the counter and drew out a large plastic tub and moved over to where the pot with the remainder of the pasta was and started to fill the tub with what was left.

Rogue stared into the sink, watching the bubbles rising.

"He...don' like people easy. But he like you."

She stopped the water as the water started to reach the overflow, "he's not as bad as you make out," she admitted as she took her gloves off and laid them aside.

Remy sighed, "there's...a lot o' history, good an' bad. He ain'...a bad man. None o' them are bad...jus'..."

"Misguided?" Rogue supposed. "Opportunist?"

Remy put the tub with the leftovers aside to finish cooling. "I guess no family is perfec'."

"Least you've got one," she supposed as she put the bowls into the hot water.

"I don' share a drop o' blood wit' these people. But family is more than blood an' DNA," he reminded. "The X-Men is yours," he let his backside rest against the counter.

Rogue turned on the cold faucet, adding a little cold water to the sink so she could put her hand into it without getting burned. She was aware of Remy watching her, she felt the strangeness of the moment, how...domestic it felt.

"Belle likes you too," he added. "I...thought she'd hate y'...'cause o' what me an' her had..." he confessed. "Though' she'd be jealous."

"There's nothin' to be jealous of," Rogue pointed out as she picked up the dish sponge and began to clean the first bowl.

Remy observed her, "Y' think so?"

"Ah know so," Rogue scrubbed away. "Ah don't compare to someone like her. She's charmin', funny...beautiful."

"Y' all those things, chere," Remy responded tenderly.

She turned to look at him, her cheeks flushed at the compliment despite she wasn't sure of how genuine he was. "Get that pot over," she decided to change the subject.

Remy passed the pot over and put it beside the sink and put the radio on then went to retrieve a dish towel after she'd finished with the first bowl. Nothing else was spoken between them, they simply listened to the radio which was tuned into a local nineteen-eighties station, which Rogue realised, was clearly one of Remy's most favourite genres and began to clean up the dishes and the kitchen mess.

The music of Whitesnake, Cyndi Lauper, Madonna and Michael Jackson filled the silence between them as they completed every task. Rogue inspected the kitchen, everything looked so spotless, just as Belle had kept it in October.

"Wan' take a walk?" Remy asked, speaking for the first time in quite a while.

With a small nod, Rogue finished drying her hands off and she slid her gloves back on. Remy led the way out of the back door. She watched him light a cigarette once they were outside, and he walked with a lazy pace, exhaling a cloud of smoke into the slightly chilly night air.

"Dinner t' nigh' was torturous," he admitted after a moment, his voice was full of exhaustion.

Rogue walked with her hands in the pockets of her hooded sweatshirt. "Belle is...a wreck," she spoke up, feeling it was all that could really be said.

Remy took a long drag from the cigarette, "got so awkward when talk about how they won' even let her feed the baby..." he rubbed the back of his neck with a sigh. "I...didn' realise that woul' even be an issue. They always let her before..." he frowned.

"Ah guess the baby is real fragile after surgery," Rogue supposed, she listened to the sound of the ground crunching beneath her boots. "Ah don't know how she's copin'. Ah can just see it all over her face that she wants to break down and she's really fightin' it."

"She's been so strong all these months," Remy said, "barely cried at all back when the baby firs' born. Even when she was in NICU an' they coul'n' take her home. It's takin' it's toll on her...on her an' Henri."

"They'll make it through," Rogue said.

Remy flicked the ash from his cigarette.

She turned and glanced at Remy, "is it weird, seein' Henri an' Belle together?"

"It...kind of was, at firs'. I can't lie. I think if..." he paused then stopped himself, "Nah, never mind," he shook his head and gave a little roll of his eyes.

"No...what?" she asked.

"Don' matter."

"Tell me..." she urged.

He took a long drag from his cigarette and kept walking, she kept pace at his side. Finally he spoke, "I think...if I hadn't already moved on, I probably woul' have been a lil'...hurt. She was the firs' real meanin'ful relationship I've ever had. An' I've only had two."

"Who was the second?" Rogue turned and looked at him curiously.

"Y' serious?" he stopped walking, turning to look at her as if in complete disbelief.

She stopped and gave a small shrug.

"You," was all he answered, then he started moving again, "C'mon."

Rogue moved to catch up to him, but she couldn't find words to respond. Was that honestly how he really saw it? Even after she'd rejected him at Christmas, even though they'd only had one proper date, even though they'd only ever had four casual sexual encounters, did he really see this as meaningful?

As she caught up to him, he reached out his hand to her, looking at her expectantly. She put her hand in his and he squeezed it, leading her along. They walked together, hand in hand to the boathouse down the hill from the LeBeau's plantation house. Everything felt so serene, so peaceful. It was dark out but there were lights at the boathouse that helped guide their way. The sound of the water lapped gently at the edge, she could hear the insects, feel the light breeze stir her hair.

"They accept y', y' know..." Remy said in a soft voice, his hand squeezed hers.

"Hmm?" she asked, slightly distracted by the sound of the gentle wind in the trees on the property, the sound of the ground and the dry grass crunching beneath their feet.

"Jean-Luc an' Belle. They've accepted y' int' the family. Belle especially."

Rogue didn't really know how to respond to this news. She felt a little overwhelmed with the idea of it, the idea that they really believed that she and Remy were in love, were really together.

Aren't we? She wondered. What is this if we aren't together? He asked me already earlier today...he gave every indication he wants this to be more than just sex...

Remy released her hand and bent down to the ground and fished under a few rocks until he located a key.

"No lockpicks?" she asked, she hugged herself as the night air got a little cooler.

"Why pick a lock when y' got the key?" he asked as he unlocked the large padlock and it fell from the chain holding the handles of the boathouse shut. The doors swung open and Remy reached into flick a switch which turned on the lights within.

Rogue looked at the boat within; it was a motorboat, two small front seats and a back bench; she saw the name 'Lucky Lady' in beautiful writing scrawled across the back of the boat. Remy flicked his cigarette butt into the water and he climbed down into the boat, the thing swayed a little under his weight.

Remy reached for her hand and she gave him it, climbing down awkwardly, almost falling as the boat shook under her feet. He caught her as she fell against him and he laughed a little.

"Y' need y' sea legs."

"Can Ah get sea legs in a river?" she looked up at him.

"River legs?" he teased, his eyes met with hers and they lingered looking at each other for a moment, her left hand in his right, his left hand on her waist. As she gazed into his eyes she longed for his kiss right then, and her heart hurt knowing it'd never be.

He let go of her and moved to the front of the boat, taking the seat at the wheel, "I ain' driven this thing in a while. I don' even know if she's still runnin'."

"Why are all boats female?" Rogue asked as she sank into the seat at his side.

Remy fished a key from a small compartment. "Some kin' o' tradition. Hank woul' probably know better than me," he shrugged.

"How old is this thing?"

"She's thirty," he smirked.

"She's in good shape."

"Yeah, Jean-Luc take good care of her," he pulled the boat out of the boathouse.

Rogue sat silent, watching the scenery go by her as Remy took the boat up river; they passed by small river-side homes and a river-side parish that had a church facing the water. As they passed, they could hear what sounded like an evening gospel choir practising and Remy slowed the boat to a stop so they could listen to the beautiful music.

"I know y' gon' leave an' go home t' morrow," Remy said after a stretch of silence between them which was filled with nothing but sweet harmonised voices.

Rogue stared into the water, watching the reflection of the lights near the shore distorted, rippling. She hadn't said anything about it but she'd considered it that afternoon once Remy had gone to bed. Now that Kennedy had had the surgery and was in recovery, she had to go back. She was still needed, she couldn't keep taking time away from the team, and she had training to help the students get through. She'd had messages from Tabitha three times that afternoon, Tabitha was struggling to train the new students - she didn't have the patience and wanted Rogue back so she could get rid of the responsibility that had been dropped onto her when Rogue had taken leave.

"Team needs me," Rogue said softly, she moved away to the end of the boat and sat upon the bench sideways, gazing across at the church. "Students need me."

"So do I," he said pointedly.

"Remy..." she sighed too.

"I'm bein'...selfish," he confessed, he followed her and he sat beside her on the bench. "I know that...but..."

"We agreed it'd just be for a few days," she reminded gently. "A few days, that's all. That's what you said."

"I know, chere," he put his arm around her and pulled her into him as they sat listening to the distant choir. "I know."

Rogue leaned against him, listening to the beautiful gospel music, it sang to her soul and she breathed in the scent of Remy's body spray, his musk, the smell of the cigarettes and wine on him.

"I...jus' don' wan' this t' en' yet," Remy said, his voice tender and soft, a tone she'd only ever heard him use for her, "We're differen' down here. You're differen' down here."

Rogue understood exactly what he meant. How everything between them felt so different once they were away from home. Despite the stress of the situation there was a strange ease of being together somehow when they were here...it just took time to develop and once it did...it moved faster.

He turned her to him, and swept her hair from her face lightly with his gloved fingers, "we coul' move here, y' know...t'gether. Me an' you."

"And you'd spend the rest of your life makin' money for your family..." Rogue supposed.

Remy's brows furrowed, he stared away, his expression betraying his hurt but he didn't disagree.

"And what about me, sugar? What do Ah do?"

His searched her eyes, not seeming to have an answer.

"Scrub the blood out of your clothes when you're hurt? Patch you up? Stay home bakin' apple pies and makin' gumbo?" she raised an eyebrow.

Remy chuckled weakly, "Y' can barely make mac an' cheese wit' out burnin' the bottom o' the pot..." he pointed out.

Rogue fixed the collar of his hooded shirt and zipped it up a little. "Exactly. It doesn't work, does it?"

"What if it did?" he asked softly. "What if we coul' make this work, ma cherie?" he asked. "Y' coul' join the guild...I coul' train you...we coul' work t'gether..."

"Ah'm not cut out for a life of crime..." she decided, she lay her head on his shoulder. "Ah don't think you are any more either."

"Maybe not," he supposed, "but got t' do what I got t' do. S' life, ain' it?" He kissed her hair softly, careful not to let his lips touch her skin. "Don' go home yet..." he pleaded of her.

"Ah have to."

After a little while more of cruising down the river, they returned the boat to its place in the boathouse at the LeBeau's property and walked up the small hill towards the plantation. The house was in darkness when they returned, it seemed Jean-Luc had retired for the night to his room. They quietly ascended the stairs together and headed to Remy's room; Rogue paused in the hall, hearing the sobbing coming from Belle's room.

"Maybe Ah should-" Rogue began.

Remy interrupted her, "No..." he shook his head. "Let her be. She's been fightin' a proper cry f' mont's. Let her have this in privacy."

Rogue gave a small nod and followed him into his bedroom. He switched the small lamp on at his side of the bed; Rogue noted he'd taken the time to at least make the bed when he'd had his nap earlier. His clothes from that morning were in the hamper, the jeans hanging out a little.

"Ah'm gonna go take a bath," she said as she crossed the room. She didn't feel like elaborating that she hadn't bathed or showered since the day before they'd gone to the hospital. She'd had plenty of time to shower after leaving the hospital the night before but hadn't. She'd been too afraid of missing a call, felt obligated to wait and be on standby for any news, good or bad.

"'Kay," he responded.

She went to the bathroom and started running the faucet. The bath had slightly better water pressure than the shower head did. Hardly any hot water had been used all day so the water was still scalding hot and she sat at the edge of the claw foot tub watching the steam rising from the tub. She poured in a little of her body wash just to make the water bubble a little and started to undress, she could hear in the bedroom that Remy had turned on his television and was watching something like a late night talk show.

Getting the temperature right, she sank into the hot water and settled down, staring up at the ceiling, trying to clear her head, trying to make sense of everything that Remy had said that afternoon, trying to process his asking her if she wanted to try again, trying to make sense of his pointing out how his family accepted her.

She wanted so bad to be with him. In her soul she felt it'd be right to. But her head told her that things could be complicated, and that the novelty would wear off - especially for him. It would only be a matter of time. And his responsibilities here would only get in the way, she was sure it would drive a wedge between them.

She glanced up as Remy entered the bathroom unexpectedly; she crossed her arms across her breasts and pushed her legs together as he moved towards the sink, opened the cabinet and picked out his toothbrush. She watched as he squeezed a small bead of the blue gel from a toothpaste tube onto the brush and started scrubbing at his teeth, never saying a word, never glancing sideways to look at her.

It was odd, seeing him carrying out something so...normal. Just basic hygiene, there wasn't anything special about it, and yet, she couldn't help feeling as she observed him brushing his teeth thoroughly and spitting into the sink, that she was being let in on something oddly private. She never saw him do things like this at home. Never saw him shave, or...brush his teeth or comb his hair. It had only ever been in this house that she'd seen him shower and take care of himself like every other normal person did.

Sometimes to her it felt like he never even let her in a little to his life until they were here. Back in Bayville, things felt different, there felt like there was a larger degree of separation somehow. There were too many distractions, too much chaos. Here...things felt...simpler, despite the tragedy.

That's what he meant about how things are different here, she thought, observing as he rinsed his mouth out with mouthwash and spat, then ran the faucet to rinse all the evidence of his oral hygiene routine. She watched him wash his face, the sound of his splashing sounded rhythmic and she let her eyes close, listening, feeling herself drifting comfortably, feeling relaxed for what had been the first time in days.

And for a while she dozed unintentionally until something disturbed her, a touch on the bridge of her nose that was gentle and delicate, feathery.

Opening her eyes, she gazed up at Remy who was sitting on the edge of the tub. She saw the black blur of latex on his hand, felt his fingers brush her lips.

"Y' fallin' asleep," he said softly as his index finger traced her lips entirely, his expression was soft, considerate.

"Ah'm just so comfortable," she said with a tiny yawn.

"Come t' bed," he commanded, and he stood slowly.

He left her alone in the bath and she lay there alone under the warm water, listening to the occasional drop of water coming from the faucet as it hit the bath water. She felt so oddly serene and peaceful. After a few more moments, she got out of the bath, wrung her hair out and pulled a bath towel around herself. When she entered the bedroom, the light was low, and she turned to see Remy by the window seat; the window was open as far as it could go and she could smell the smoke from the cigarette he'd clearly finished a while ago. She could hear the heavy rain outside hammering against the puddles outside, could feel the chill of damp night air creeping in.

"Belle will kill you if she catches you smokin' indoors," she stood hugging the towel to her body.

He inclined his head for her to come towards him and she moved slowly across the floor towards him, aware she was dripping water on the hardwood, feeling the water from her hair dripping down her bare shoulders. He lifted his left hand and held it out to hers, and she dropped her eyes to it; he was wearing the black gloves still.

It struck her right then that that was what a relationship with him was always going to be like. Gloves...having to always cheat ways to be together without touching. Never kissing, always feeling fabric between them, never being able to feel each other's skin...

Remy seemed to immediately read her expression, "What is it?" he asked, his voice was soft.

"This is...how it'd always have to be..." she hugged her towel to her body.

"Huh?"

"Gloves...planning...never touchin' for real..." she sniffed, "it's...how it'll always be if we're together."

"Maybe not always," he supposed, his eyes followed his gloved index finger as he reached out and skimmed it across her right forearm.

"What if it will be?" she felt her eyes blurring with tears and she was glad her face was wet. Maybe in this low light he wouldn't be able to tell she was about to start crying.

"Chere, y' so young...we bot' are. We got lots o' time t' figure out y' powers."

"What if Ah never do?" she asked pointedly. She somehow managed to pull herself together. She took a deep breath and sighed it out, glad she somehow prevented herself from crying in front of him. She didn't want to look weak.

"Then that's the way it'll be..." he pried her arm away from her body, he held her hand in his right hand and stroked the backs of his left hand fingers up and down her arm tenderly. "We'll figure it out."

Rogue closed her eyes and tried to get a grip of herself. "It 'll never be enough for you, Remy. Ah won't be enough for you."

He gave a soft sigh as he moved his leg over the edge of the window seat, straightening his posture, "You..." he said, his voice firm, "are more than I coul' ever need."

She moved away from him to pick up where she'd left her pyjamas, and she turned her back to him prepared to get dressed; she heard him move, felt him in close proximity, felt his gloved fingers between her shoulder blades. She stood there, clutching her pyjama bottoms as his fingers trailed a light path down between her shoulder blades and across her spine, stopping where the towel started; his fingers slipped beneath the edge of the towel and he pulled it free, it fell to the floor.

Swallowing hard, she let him turn her. It still felt so awkward to have him look at her that way. He'd only seen her a small handful of times now but she still hadn't gotten used to being so looked at, being so exposed, being so dangerous to him.

Slowly, Remy backed her up to the bed and led her to sit; he took her bare hand and led it to the growing bulge beneath his cargo pants, making her squeeze him.

It was the first time she'd touched him intimately and she shivered inwardly, feeling the shape of him through the fabric.

Remy breathed in through his nose and exhaled through his mouth. "Feel what y' doin' t' me?" he asked low in his throat, his eyes locked to hers, his hand guiding her touch.

Rogue gave a light nod, her cheeks felt so hot, her body tingling with anxiety and the sudden need to be with him.

He stretched across the bed to open the drawer at the other side and she heard him rifling through the items in there as he half knelt on the mattress. She kept her hand on him, rolling her fingers, feeling the shape of him through the thin soft fabric until he found what he needed. He moved to lie on his side and she turned to watch him clutching a condom packet between his perfect teeth. He reached down to unzip the cargos and he pulled himself free and she watched as he stroked his flesh, his grip moving across the turgid skin, his eyes locked to her breasts as he touched himself with slow deliberation.

It felt...absurd and inappropriate to watch him masturbating himself, his breathing growing a little more excited, his eyelids growing heavy. She couldn't touch him yet, she felt lost, unable to do anything but watch him.

"Y' make me so hard," he breathed, and under any other circumstances the words might have seemed comical, but to hear it made the area between her thighs ache. "Make me hur' so much f' you..."

Rogue swallowed back her nerves as he tore the condom packet and reached down to roll the thing on, tucking the edge of the thing beyond the opening of his pants. He reached out for her hand and nervously, she gave it to him and he led her fingers to him, guiding her touch to delicately graze the underside of his shaft, tips of her fingers led to circle the head. It was clear to her as she sat there red faced and letting him lead each light touch that he was making a point of giving her time to adjust to the idea of touching him, and after some moments of those light tentative explorative touches, finally he circled her fingers around him, drawing her touch up and down sensually in a slow and deliberate rhythm before he let go of her hand and stretched back a little.

"Go slow..." he murmured, "don' rush it...s' no race..."

"Okay..." she swallowed nervously as she turned a little more onto the mattress to get comfortable and she moved her hand in the way he'd shown her, listening to his breathing changing at her touch, moving her eyes between watching his expression and watching the part of him that felt very warm in her bare hand. The condom was thin and near transparent, and if it hadn't been for the strange texture of the lubricant on it, she might have been able to imagine it wasn't there. She tried to ignore the hurt that she couldn't feel his skin completely, that she might never touch him fully.

He leaned near to her ear, and murmured the words, "Touch y'self..." he moaned.

She blinked in surprise, leaning back to look at him, "what?" she asked nervously.

"Touch y'self," he said, this time with a little more authority about it.

"Remy..." she warned, feeling hot and embarrassed now.

"Do it..." he breathed.

Rogue sighed and took her hand away from him and reached between her thighs; she'd always hated touching herself. It'd never felt natural regardless of what others had always told her. As she slid her fingers further, they detected the definite abundance of slickness and it genuinely surprised her.

"Y' ready?" he asked eagerly, his eyes flickering with lust.

She gave a small nod, still trying to recover from the surprise that all it had taken to get her aroused enough for sex was touching him. She hadn't expected it to be that simple.

He got off the bed, pulling her to the edge of the mattress, guiding her thighs around his hips and he led himself to her, thrusting without even hesitation.

She gasped and bit down on her lip to keep herself from making a sound as he began to slowly ride into her, making her feel every stroke. He was so eerily quiet, his eyes stayed fixed on hers and she gripped onto the fabric of his shirt as she tried to rock with him, trying to find rhythm with him. He yanked her arms forward and pulled her up to him, supporting her as he stood up, gripping her powerfully. He wanted to repeat what had happened in the kitchen earlier that evening before their unfortunate interruption and she was all for it.

His face and neck flushed as he started hammering into her, his hips moving impressively, his arms straining as he kept her up. It was getting more and more difficult to suppress moans, something about this particular position hit something inside that none of the other positions did.

She fought making a sound as hard as she could, merely whimpering on each upstroke, biting her lip, eyes closed tightly, her body tensing the closer she got. As she came, she let out a sharp squeal that she couldn't prevent from escaping, gripping onto his shoulders, trying to avoid slipping and falling as she kept herself back to avoid bumping his face with her. The moment felt rampantly panicked for her, but he didn't seem to mind.

She opened her eyes to see the satisfied look in his eyes that he'd made her make that sound, and as she juddered with the orgasm, she struggled to stay upright, her thigh muscles and core strained horrendously. She couldn't take it any more, it kept lingering, the pain tightening along her hamstrings and calf, and she lost the grip of the fabric on his shoulders, almost falling backwards. He stepped towards the bed so the mattress caught them both and he landed on top of her heavily, he kept riding, his enthusiasm never waning.

He was starting to moan and desperate to try and stifle it, she pushed her right hand against his mouth hard as his body slammed into her powerfully until he was met with the release he'd needed. She was thankful when he slowed, the strain in her right thigh was becoming so bad she was sure it was going to tear, and as she tried to move her leg to release the tension, she felt the muscle pull and the pain sear through her.

Breathlessly she pushed him off and rolled onto her side, rubbing her right thigh vigorously, hissing through her teeth.

"Y' okay...?" he sat at the edge of the bed, his shoulders rising and falling quickly, his face red and sweaty.

"Pulled a muscle," she grimaced.

Remy pushed her hands away and put both his hands on her bare thigh and massaged deep into her sore flesh.

"Ah don't know how it happened..." she admitted, still breathless. "Ah barely moved..."

He massaged her flesh, his hands powerfully squeezing. "Y' start t' engage all kin's o' muscles when y' get t' close. Try t' relax, it'll pass in a momen'."

Rogue lay flat on her belly as he worked at massaging her leg, she lay her head upon her folded arms and sighed softly as her body started to come down from the exertion. As he kneaded, the pain in her thigh started to release, and she felt the deep relaxation of afterglow start to wash over her. The stress that had been plaguing her all day seemed so distant, if even for just a short while.

"Gets better an' better, don' it?" he asked softly as he slid behind her on the mattress and she heard him sigh with deep exhaustion, his breathing soft on the nape of her neck, stirring her damp hair.

She was so drained at that moment, she couldn't even manage the words to agree, so all she murmured was a soft "mmmhmm..."

"I'll take that as a yes," he chuckled he responded to her as his arm draped over her, his hand cupping her belly. They lay there like that, and she listened to his breathing changing, recognised the sound of his breathing as he'd quickly fallen asleep.

Although she herself felt tired, her brain would not switch off. She reached for where her phone was on the cabinet by the bed and she lay there scrolling through emails, messages and posts on social media as she tried to wind down.

A reminder popped up on the phone to let her know her plane was at nine twenty-nine that next morning. She sighed silently, gazing at the notification. She didn't want to leave Bloodmoon but she couldn't stay here forever waiting for Remy to be ready to leave again. She had her own life to go back to, responsibilities to the team.

Giving up on sleep, she carefully slipped out of Remy's hold and got out of the bed. She quietly dressed in the pyjamas she'd meant to wear earlier before Remy had decided he'd had other plans for bedtime, then she picked up his cigarettes and lighter from where he'd left them by the window, feeling the unusual urge to smoke. It wasn't something that took her often, but right now she felt that need.

She left the room, tiptoeing in the dark hallway and she moved towards Belle and Henri's room, to gaze in through the door which had been ajar. Belle was curled up in her bed, sleeping, the warm lamp next to the bed illuminating her face, making her seem almost angelic.

Poor girl, Rogue thought, her heart tightening in her chest as she pulled the door closed then she crept downstairs as silently as she could, avoiding the steps she'd learned had a tendency to creak. As she reached for the door lock, she found it was already undone. She twisted the old fashioned brass handle and pulled the heavy oak door open, surprised her to find Jean-Luc sitting on the porch on the wicker bench, a thin cigarillo between his long tapered fingers.

Jean-Luc looked tired, his hair was loose – the first time she'd ever seen it so, and it was thin, stringy and slightly curling at the ends. He was unshaven, his brown eyes puffy, his skin a little dry.

"Didn' think anyone was up," he said, acknowledging her.

Rogue felt a little unease being alone with him, she barely knew him and had hardly talked to him outside of the few meals they'd shared while she was here. "Just me," she kept her voice low, aware Belle and Henri's room was directly above the front door. She closed the door behind herself quietly and she moved to the rail of the porch and let her backside rest upon it, drawing a cigarette from Remy's pack and putting it to her lips.

"Didn' think you smoked," Jean-Luc said, she felt him observing her closely. She felt uncomfortably studied under his gaze.

"Now and then," she said, lighting the cigarette and taking a deep drag; her lungs immediately burned with it and she fought the urge to cough.

"Stressed?"

"It's been a rough few days," she turned to look out at the view of their driveway, of the trees swaying slightly in the wind on the perimeter of where the private parking area was.

"Remy sleepin'?"

"Yeah," she exhaled.

"Good," Jean-Luc responded. "He's exhausted. That las' heis' was tough on him."

"Ah've...never known him to be this stressed out," Rogue took another drag from the cigarette, staring out into the driveway, listening to the sounds of the Louisana night.

"He's changed a lot, over the years, y know," Jean-Luc said after moment, he stared off into space, his expression a little clouded. "Ain' the boy I remember him bein' when he lef' a few years back," he flicked the ash from his cigarillo.

Rogue observed Jean-Luc, studying him now.

"He's grown up a lot. Can't help but think that's a credit t' you."

She shook her head and exhaled the smoke, watching it disappear into the dark, "Believe me, Ah've...got nothin' to do with the way Remy is."

"S' not true though. He's differen' when he's wit' you, y' know," Jean-Luc admitted.

Rogue took another drag but said nothing.

"Firs' time y' was here...I was a lil' doubtful about this thing 'tween you two, y' hardly seem a match, y' seemed a lil'...I don' know...uncomfortable wit' him? But..." he shook his head, "this time, somethin' real differen'. I see the way he look at you...like the sun shine righ' out o' you an' he jus' got t' bask in it. An' you clearly adore him...can't keep y' eyes off o' him."

She gave a laugh of disbelief. She doubted it was that extreme.

Jean-Luc took a draw from the cigarillo. "I never seen him wit' any girl the way he is wit' you, y' know."

She felt her cheeks flush a little and she flicked the ash from the cigarette into the breeze as it stirred the dust from the porch.

"An' he been wit' many. I seen how he be wit' many, all over the damn town...but he never brough' 'em home like this..." he shook his head. "One night stands...girls stoppin' by t' get high an' railed, yeah, but...never f' dinner...t' spen' the nigh' in his bed an' stay f' breakfas'," he paused, "Y' the firs'...He used t' even keep Belle away from here. Him bringin' you...it surprised us, y' know..." Jean-Luc exhaled his smoke then he put the cigarillo out on an ashtray sitting next to him on the seat. "Y' broke up, didn' y'?" he asked. "Las' year..."

She wasn't prepared for the question, but she recovered quickly from it and shook her head, "we just...had a disagreement."

"He pretended that nothin' was wrong but I didn' see him call y'...tex' y'...he didn' seem t' have any news from you. Same time he keep lookin' at his phone every now an' then like he expected the call t' come...every time someone ring that doorbell he got the look on his face like he though' it coul' be you. He seemed a lil' lost."

Rogue winced.

"What happened?" Jean-Luc asked.

She took a deep breath and sighed, "He chose what mattered more to him...and...it wasn't me."

"So my suspicion was righ'."

Rogue turned to gaze at the older man.

"S' 'cause he stayed..." Jean-Luc looked down at the weathered floorboards on the porch floor, his expression sombre. "He didn' wan' choose, chere. I made him. We needed him, an' I did everythin' I coul' t' get him t' help."

Rogue took another drag of the cigarette, choosing not to disagree; she knew it was more than true.

"Weren' easy f' me watchin' him stuck here an' unhappy. Watchin' him wan' go back t' his life wit' you."

"Was easy to take the money though," Rogue finally said, not being able to hold her tongue any longer.

"That weren' easy either, chere," Jean-Luc got up. "We're drownin' in debt, the guild is failin', half o' the chapter is dead, some in prison, some retired, a lot o' their kids didn' wan' t' join the guil' an' high tailed it. I ain' got the time t' recruit an' barely enough time t' train the others. We are sinkin'. I did what I had t' t' survive...t' ensure there was a future f' my sons...f' my granddaughter."

Rogue wondered if she'd been in his shoes if she'd have done the same thing. As it were, she'd never know what it was like to have kids...grandkids...have to make that kind of sacrifice herself.

"Wondered where y' wen' t'..."

The sound of Remy's voice at the door caught her attention, and she turned her gaze to him. His eyes were puffy, he looked sleepy, his hair was sticking up at a weird angle.

"I woke up an' y' weren' there..." Remy spoke up.

"Hey..." she said, "Just...needed a breather..."

He moved over and took the cigarette from her and put it to his lips, taking a long draw.

"I'm gon' go t' bed," Jean-Luc stood up, he passed by Remy. "See y' in the mornin'."

The door shut behind Jean-Luc and Remy stood there, looking at Rogue as she sat poised on the rail of the porch.

"What's he been sayin'?" Remy asked after exhaling.

"Just unloadin' some stuff about debt," she said quietly.

"Huh," Remy said, seeming slightly surprised, he passed the cigarette back to her after he took another drag.

"You're surprised?"

"Yeah...he don' usually talk t' anyone about money...'cept maybe me an' Henri..."

"Oh," she said, taking one last drag from the cigarette, she passed it back to him to finish – it was almost to the butt already.

"He don' even talk much t' Belle 'bout more than the baby an' the housework..." he added, his expression thoughtful.

Rogue observed him for a moment. Could that be true? Perhaps the man just felt he had little to hide from a woman whom, if she wanted, could read his thoughts with a single touch.

Remy took the final drag and tossed the cigarette into a puddle on the lawn carelessly. "Are y' really gon' go?"

"Ah have a plane booked...it takes off just after nine."

He sighed out the smoke and looked away from her, his expression hurt.

"We agreed Ah'd only be here for a few days. You asked me to come for a little bit, few days at the most – that's it..."

"That was before," he pointed out unhappily.

"Before...?" she asked.

Remy moved between her open legs, placing his hands on the rail of the porch, looking at her, "before we got...close..."

She put her hands on his shoulders, "Remy...Ah can't stay here forever, you know that. You knew that when you asked me here..."

He sighed, "I don' wan' y' t' leave yet..."

"Ah know," she said quietly, wrapping her arms around his neck; she wished for the kiss, right then seemed like such the opportune time, her heart raced, ached for that one thing. "We both know Ah have to though."

"Stay f' a few more days," he murmured. "Jus' one or two..."

"Ah've booked the ticket."

"I'll reimburse y'..." he tried, smiling hopefully.

"Remy..."

"Why are y' so eager t' be away from me?" he asked.

"Ah'm not," she answered honestly. No...she wasn't eager to leave him, exactly. But at the same time she was overwhelmed by his attention, by the closeness, by how quickly physical it had become and not only that, she was overwhelmed by being here, by how quickly she was becoming part of his world now. She didn't want to admit how much it made her anxious. Things were moving too fast for her, she wasn't used to this, and she was afraid of where it would lead her.

"Stay."

"Why?" she sighed.

"'Cause I'm askin' y' t'."

"But why?"

"'Cause I don' wan' be wit' out you," he sighed, "ain' that enough?" Remy ran a gloved finger lightly down her throat, his expression thoughtful.

Rogue pulled away, "Remy...Ah can't stay here. You know that. Ah have commitments, same as you. The X-Men need me."

"I need you," He looked at her, his expression hurt.

"Ah promised a few days, Remy...And Ah kept that promise," she slipped away from him, "Ah'm gonna get a few hours sleep before Ah have to catch my plane," she responded, and she left him standing there alone on the porch.

End of Part 9