*****
"whenever i'm alone with you you make me feel
like i am free again whenever i'm alone with
you you make me feel like i am clean again
however far away i will always love you however
long i stay i will always love you whatever
words i say i will always love you i will always
love you"
— Snake River Conspiracy, covering "lovesong" by The Cure
*****
"Ready to go?" Logan's room being almost as familiar territory to her as Remy's or her own, Rogue opened the door and walked in after only a token knock. Remy being out picking up a new student, with Cyke of all people, Marie was free to spend the evening shooting pool with Logan at their favorite local dive.
"Just about," Logan said, putting his wallet into his back pocket.
While he turned to the closet to get his jacket, she took another couple of steps into the room, bringing her around the end of the bed — and stopped. The comforter on the bed hung most of the way to the floor at the corner — but a bit of contrasting fabric could be seen underneath one edge. Contrasting fabric in a familiar pattern.
Bending to lift the edge of the comforter, Rogue reached underneath and pulled out a pair of boxers in an eye-glaringly obnoxious turquoise-and-purple paisley. They looked absolutely identical to one of a set she had bought Remy the previous summer as a joke. The major difference between these and the more familiar pair were the triple slices down the front of these underpants, reaching from the waistband completely down to the legholes...
Turning to face Logan, she asked disbelievingly, "Are these — these aren't...?" His sudden shocked pallor and guilty look were all the reply she needed. "Oh my God," she whispered numbly, letting the boxers fall to her side forgotten. "What...?"
"Marie, wait..."
"How — how long have these been here? How *long* have you been...?"
"Marie — "
"Don't you ‘Marie' me!" she snapped, shock giving way to anger. "What the hell have you been *doing* — as if I couldn't guess?"
"But you — you said you didn't care, when I asked. That you weren't going to let it bother — "
"How *dare* you?! Just where the fuck do you get off? HOW COULD YOU TELL ME TO DUMP REMY FOR CHEATING ON ME WHEN **YOU** WERE THE ONE FUCKING HIM?!"
Logan winced. When she made a move for the door, he managed to get there first. Leaning against it to keep her from leaving, he begged, "Marie, wait, listen to me..."
"Logan, if you don't get away from that fucking door I swear to God I'll send you to the Medlab for a solid fucking *month*..."
"Fine, then touch me if that's what it takes. Or hear me out..." She froze in shock, and he took advantage of the respite. "Marie, I couldn't stand it, I couldn't think what else to do, I knew you wouldn't want me to kill him and I couldn't deal with him any other way."
"What...?"
"...Marie, I hate his guts. Utterly. I wanted him dead. But I didn't want to hurt you — and you wanted him. And whenever he'd come around me smelling like you, I just couldn't think straight, but I knew you wouldn't want me to kill him, and it was the only other thing I could do..."
"What...?"
"...I just had to grab him and try to get every last bit of your scent off him. And he didn't fight much, and he liked most of it, and it made him *so* much easier to deal with being around — well, once he figured out not to flirt with me in public, and when you said you knew and you didn't care I thought it was going to be all right — sort of..."
"...Logan, are you saying...? Why...?"
"...Marie, I love you. I have since I met you, and you were too young — I'm probably old enough to be your *grandfather*, for Chrissakes — and I went away to let you grow up before I tried to do something illegal with a teenaged girl, and when I came back you had *him*, and I wanted to kill him so *bad*..."
"...What...?"
"...I love you, and I can't stand seeing you with him, or being around him, but I wasn't ready to just pack up and leave and not see you anymore, and it was tearing me up inside, and this was the only thing that was keeping me from doing something *really* bad to him..."
"...You love me...?"
"Yes... Touch me and see for yourself." He held a hand out to her pleadingly.
It was that more than anything else that convinced her. Hadn't Remy made her promise never to use her power on him to look at his thoughts, ever? Yet here was Logan volunteering to show her anything and everything she wanted to know from him.
She crossed the few steps separating her from him in a dream, taking his hand and moving even closer, pressing him against the door.
She didn't use her power until her lips met his, and his arms wonderingly rose around her. He had never felt her gift after she had gained control, so he hadn't expected it to be so painless. Merely taking thought and memory was so much easier than taking the power or life energy from a person, being the things that leaked through first if she got a bit careless.
After a moment, she stopped and pulled her lips away. Thoughtfully resting her forehead against his cheek, she stopped to let the newly-absorbed memories swirl and settle. Little flickers of recall danced up for review and were replaced by others.
/Remy, reeking of Marie (herself) and of desire, blissfully tangling his fingers in her (Logan's) hair as she (he) desperately chased down each lingering trace of maddening scent/
/Marie (herself) sitting next to her (Logan) on the couch in the rec room, unbearably burning untouchable attraction within an arm's reach that couldn't be bridged/
/Jean, wide eyes and scent loudly proclaiming shock and disbelief, "He, ah, seemed to think that you were upset because you found him attractive"/
/Opening her (his) bedroom door at the sound of a passing footstep, catching the familiar swirl of mingled scents and yanking Remy inside because she (he) needed to do something desperate and violent *right now*/
Logan held her close while she examined the new perspective gained, and as she assimilated the newly-borrowed knowledge she gradually became aware of the pounding heartbeat she was pressed closely enough to feel, and his roughened breathing. She opened her eyes and lifted her head, noticing his closed eyes and furrowed brow. Her new awareness suggested to her that being so close to her was probably serving as a form of erotic torment, and when she shifted position slightly she could feel the beginnings of an erection pressed against her.
"So," she murmured softly. He opened his eyes slowly and turned his head to meet her gaze. The new insight helped her to identify the roil of emotions lurking in the hazel eyes — pain, guilt. Lust, anger, lingering panic. Love. "So. You love me..."
Faint spark of humor, flicker of hope. "Yes."
"And you think I could do better than Remy."
Strengthening hope, beginnings of a smile quirking one corner of his mouth. "Yes."
Lifting a hand, tracing one finger along one lower lip before brushing lightly over one sideburn. "Care to show me *how* much better?"
She had only a fraction of a second to catch the blaze that kindled to life in his eyes before he ducked his head forward and kissed her. She closed her eyes and leaned into it, pressing herself into the solid-muscled body against hers. When he ran his tongue along her lower lip, she willingly parted her lips and let him turn the kiss into something hot and exploratory.
Running her hands up under his shirt, she examined the contrast between the furry muscularity under her fingers and the slimmer hairlessness her hands were used to. He growled low in his throat, wrapping his arms around her even more tightly if that was possible. Shifting his attentions from her lips, he began working his way down her jawline to one ear, hot breath tickling as he nuzzled earnestly at her earlobe. She whimpered as he ran his tongue along the corner of her jaw, and tugged upward at his shirt, suddenly needing bare flesh.
He complied willingly enough and started unbuttoning her blouse as soon as his shirt was removed. Peeling it off of her, he kissed her throat, upper chest, and between her breasts before reaching behind her to unclasp her bra. She shrugged out of it eagerly, pressing herself against him for the new sensation of hair tickling at her sensitive breasts.
He groaned softly, reaching one hand up to cup around a smooth breast while holding her close with the other arm. Stroking the nipple with his thumb, he bent forward for another kiss. She happily reached into his mouth with her tongue, stroking it along his lower lip before setting up a suggestive back-and-forth rhythm against his own tongue.
He whimpered desperately and ducked his head to her breasts. While he began licking — delicately at first but then more urgently — all around the nipple of the breast he wasn't already holding, she combed her fingers through his dark hair. Clinging to him for balance, she kicked off her shoes and managed to remove her socks with her toes before pulling back and leading him in the direction of the bed.
Willingly taking the hint, he pulled the bedclothes back and swept her off her feet, depositing her on the mattress. He paused long enough to deal with his own shoes, and when he turned back to the bed she was stripping off her pleather trousers. When she made a move to do the same with her panties, he stopped her. "Let me get those," he growled seductively in her ear, sitting on the bed beside her. She gave him an impish grin, and he leaned down for another kiss before standing back up long enough to peel off his own jeans. He left his own boxers on and lay down beside her.
She wrapped her arms around him and pulled him down for another kiss, hooking one leg around his. He began kissing his way down her throat, back to her breasts, and then down her belly. At her navel he paused, met her eyes, and with a wicked look hooked two fingers into the waistband of her panties. Slowly, reveling in every little bit uncovered, he slipped them down her legs, then tossed them aside and ran his hands over her thighs.
Parting them gently, he shifted position and after a good, hard, dizzying sniff he began kissing and licking the areas in between. Marie gasped and tangled her hands in his hair. He growled happily at the scent, the taste, the way her legs were tensing to either side of him, the unselfconscious noises she was making. "Oh, Logan... Oh, God... My God... LOGAN!" He gave her one good hard back-to-front lick and began working on her clitoris, alternating sucking with hard tongue rubs. When she cried out and arched her back, he grinned to himself and kept nuzzling.
A few minutes after her first orgasm she was whimpering again. Ready for a change in tactics, Logan pulled away and raised himself to his knees. Opening her eyes when he stopped and raising herself to her elbows, Marie saw him reaching for the waistband of his boxers. "Here, let me," she purred as she sat up. Slowly easing them down his legs and leaving them around his knees, she reached happily for the items thus revealed. Logan growled low in his throat as she began rubbing his penis, circling the head of it with her thumb while using her other hand to gently caress his testicles. Reaching back down between her thighs with one hand, he found her still damp and quivering. Massaging her clit with two fingers, he told her, "Lie back."
She accepted the suggestion, and as he moved to his knees and elbows above her, she once again reached for his penis. Guiding him to the right spot, she moaned low in her throat as he sank deeply into her. Marie pressed her thighs against his, feet tucked around his calves, and wrapped her arms around him as though never to let him go. Logan growled softly, eyes closed and face pressed to her neck, taking a moment to enjoy the scent and feel of being unbelievably intertwined with the woman he loved, before beginning to move.
Marie took a moment to pick up his rhythm before begin to nudge her hips upward to meet his thrusts. "Oh... Logan... Oh... yes... Logan... Oh... God...," she whispered. He lifted his head and opened his eyes, wanting to watch her face mirroring the growing tension, delight, and eventual release. When she dug her nails into his back he groaned low in his throat and increased his pace, and when he felt her tensing beneath him and heard her cry his name in his ear he whimpered, but it was feeling the rhythmic spasms deep within her when she came that pushed him over the edge.
"OHGODMARIE!" he dimly heard himself cry. Her face blurred for an instant as his nervous system overloaded with orgasm, and when his vision cleared her eyes had opened and she was studying him tenderly.
Reaching one hand up to ruffle his hair and tease along one sideburn, she murmured, "That was a pretty good demonstration."
He grinned. "It ain't over yet, baby..." Beginning to move his hips against hers again, she felt him restiffening within her. Marie gave him a startled look, then smiled appreciatively.
With a shove of heel and elbow against the mattress, she was able to roll him over, winding up on top. Shifting her thighs, she settled into a comfortable position kneeling astride him. Logan raked her with an appreciative up-and-down glance before giving her a lecherous grin and sliding his hands from her waist down to her thighs.
As she began thoughtfully rubbing her pelvis against his in a back-and-forth motion, he gripped her hips encouragingly before reaching for the breasts bobbing so enticingly in front of his face. Marie sighed happily, beginning to move a bit more quickly, as he put a hand on each breast. Kneading gently, he briefly allowed himself to be lost in adolescent delight at finally getting to lay hands on the woman who had taken up such a starring role in his fantasy life in the years since his meeting her.
As he circled and teased her nipples with his thumbs, she murmured in the back of her throat, throwing her head back and pressing herself more firmly forward into his hands. Logan slid his right hand from her breast, tracing his fingers lightly down her rib cage and belly until he reached the triangular patch of hair currently being rocked so delightfully against him. Slipping a pair of fingers between the two of them, he found her clitoris again and began massaging it.
She yipped in surprise and delight when he first touched it, then increased her pace. Logan managed to keep time with her thrusts. Sliding his left hand from her other breast up to the back of her neck, he murmured, "That's it, baby, just a little more. Just a little more...," until she arched and shuddered convulsively.
The sight (of Marie, delightfully gloriously unbelievably naked and transported by ecstasy) — the scent (of passion and the release thereof) — the sound (of her mindless gasps and cries, with the breathless murmur of his name mingled in at the end) — were almost enough to send him over the edge by themselves. When added to the feel of her internal muscles quivering around him, release was inevitable. He bucked his hips upwards against hers, once, twice, before collapsing back against the mattress with a hoarsely murmured, "Oh, *Marie*..."
Opening his eyes, he found her regarding him with a tender sleepy-eyed smile. Returning the smile without consciously deciding to do so, he reached up to her and pulled her down to the bed at his side, leaving her limbs loosely draped over his. She nestled comfortably against him, settling her head on his shoulder.
Logan let out a sound midway between a snort and a chuckle. "And to think, the most excitement we had planned for tonight was shooting pool..."
*****