When he came to the mansion it was all about Jean. He took one look at her, decided he wanted her and whatever The Wolverine wanted, The Wolverine found a way to get it, so he chased her, flirted with her, showered her with attention and while she made a token resistance as a tribute to her relationship with One Eye, it took just over a month before she told Scot it was over and she moved all her belongings into Logan’s suit and like a truly good sport, Scott pulled Logan aside to tell him no hard feelings.

These things happen, Scott said with a shrug.

People move on and change.

He had no issue with Logan, he just wanted that clear.

Logan nodded, a bit dumbfounded, unable to believe The Fearless Leader was content to be the odd man out. He didn’t seem at all upset, or hurt, he didn’t seem to miss Jean at all, if how quickly he moved on with Ro was any indication.

Later, Logan would look back and realize that should have told him something.

It should have been a clue.

But like all men, when caught up in the tangled web of hot sex with a hot woman, he was a little slow on the uptake.

It took about a month before he saw the cold, the hard, and the somewhat ugly truth staring him in the face.

Dr. Jean Grey was a first class, impossible to please, overly demanding, self centered, self involved bitch from hell.

In Jean’s world, there lived one person…Jean.

Jean had one and only one favorite topic…Jean.

In Jean’s opinion no one was as smart, as pretty, as sexy, as well educated as blessed Jean herself and three short months after The Wolverine got the very woman he was so certain he wanted, he was ready to find a way to bypass his healing factor so he could kill himself to get the hell away from her.

She was horrible, impossible, angry when things didn’t go her way and even the sex that had been so hot in the beginning began to occur so rarely that Logan shamefully found himself reduced to late night ventures into the bathroom with Playboy magazines he confiscated from the horny little fuckers in his self defense class.

He thought about leaving, picking up and heading back to Canada, but he found he liked it at the school; he liked the team, the digs, liked the chance to legally kick some bad guy ass.

And though he would never admit it, even under the most extreme torture, he actually had a soft spot for the brats Chuck took in; he liked having a chance to teach them, to help them learn how to defend themselves and in an odd way, he liked how he was part of giving those kids a sense of family, because too many of them had been kicked out by their so call families when their mutations manifested.

Of course, he knew that just dropping Jean was an option.

But he couldn’t bring himself to do it.

Sheer pride kept him with her…pride kept him from admitting that what he had was not the best, that he had fought for something that it turned out he really did not want, now that he had her and looking at Scooter and Ro snuggly wrapped up in one another sitting in the rec room one afternoon, it downed on Logan just why Scott hadn’t been in the least bit upset when Jean dumped him.

The sneaky mother fucker had been relieved.

Logan had come along and saved Scott from the Jeannie Nightmare, freeing him to find real happiness with Ro while Logan was left living day in and day out with a foul tempered, redheaded demon.

For half a second, he wanted to be the living shit out of Scott.

Then he bitterly reminded himself he had no one but himself to blame.

He had, after all, gotten what he wanted.

Hindsight, he reflected, was indeed twenty fucking twenty.

It was another three months into his relationship with Jean that he finally went to Scott and told him he got it…he gave a glare meant to be menacing, but Scott laughed and finally shook his head.

“When you came along, I was getting ready to end it with Jean, cause I couldn’t take it anymore and I was already in love with Ro.”

“And I saved you an ugly breakup.”

“Good timing for me.”

“And shitty luck for me.”

He expected Scott to laugh at that, but the younger man gave him a serious look and told him not to make the same mistake he had, not to drag it out with Jean for so long he might miss out on meeting someone better suited for him.

He had damn near done that with Ro.

He told Logan not to cut it as close as he had, but Logan shrugged and said he didn’t have his eye on anyone, not for a relationship.

He wanted almost desperately to get laid, though.

But he didn’t tell Scott that.

There were some things The Wolverine wasn’t inclined to share.

There were times The Wolverine was caught off guard.

Like he had been with Jean’s true nature.

Like he found himself caught very much off guard when Charles contacted him and Scott and explained that he needed them to go to a place in Canada called Laughlin City to retrieve a mutant.

A girl named Rogue.

Nineteen years old, Charles explained, The Rogue was a mutant with toxic skin that first manifested itself when she was sixteen years old.

The first boy she ever kissed was in a coma for three weeks, and as happened with too many mutants, Rogue’s family threw her out, declaring her dead to them.

She had been on her own since then.

For a year and a half she had managed to survive by sheer luck.

Then her luck ran dry.

She was caught by a government lab.

Naturally, that piece of information caught Logan’s full attention, as the professor had known it would and he listened intent as Charles went on to explain she had been in the lab for close to a year.

A friend of his, that had been involved in the raid on the lab that had resulted in the girl called Rogue being able to escape had found her file and delivered it to Charles, but he hadn’t had an easy time finding her.

Her mutation was a bit complex, according to the file, when she touched someone, she took in their energy, their life, their memories and in the case of mutants, she absorbed their powers as well.

A piece of everyone she touched stayed lodged in her mind.

The longer she touched them, the more she got, and if she held to someone, if she held to a mutant, until they were dead, she took their powers permanently.

In the lab, she had been forced to absorb several mutants until they died.

The government had once again been attempting to create the ultimate weapon; the girl with toxic skin now had telekinetic abilities, some telepathic skill, she could fly, she had super human strength and healing.

In the wrong hands, The Rogue could indeed be a deadly force.

Charles knew The Brotherhood had their sights on her, but he intended to get to her first, to offer her a haven at the mansion…he wanted to maybe get her to agree to be on the team, but at the moment, the primary objective was giving the girl someplace to feel safe.

He wanted Scott and Logan to go and talk to her, at a small bar in Laughlin City where Charles had finally found her.

He wanted Logan to go, because he felt The Wolverine stood a chance at convincing The Rough that she could trust him, trust The X-Men and Charles to help her, give her a home, maybe even help her clear up the mess Charles was certain she had in her head with so many voices residing there.

Logan agreed without hesitation.

Without even knowing the girl, without having a clue what she looked like, he felt as if he had a connection to her.

He felt as if he knew her.

He had, after all, endured a hell similar to the one she had endured…he knew what it was to be frightened and to be alone…he knew what it was to trust no one and he told Chuck and Scott he was ready when they were.

He was ready to bring in The Rogue.

---

Retrieving The Rogue went easier than either Logan and Scott had anticipated, mainly because she had already heard a lot about the professor as well as The Brotherhood so it took little effort to convince her to return with them to the mansion for a while. As she admitted to Logan on the flight back, she had grown rather tired of running, she really wanted a chance to settle down for a while, but she didn’t need help with the voices in her head, she already had them all under firm control and she also confessed to Logan that after escaping the lab, she had found the switch that allowed her to turn her skin on and off at will.

As the professor had expected, it was Logan that she warmed up to, Logan she felt the most at ease with and she even told him her real name was Marie, as they set in the back of the jet, removed from Scott.

She and Logan almost forgot he was even there, flying the jet.

Scott didn’t mind.

Hell, he told himself, he had expected it, after seeing first hand the connection that had formed between Rogue and Logan the instant their eyes touched.

Even before words passed between them, something was there…some spark, some sort of recognition…Scott couldn’t put a name to it, he didn’t even mentally try, he just told himself that he would be a friend to Logan and Rogue, cause they would need it just as soon as Logan fully realized that he had found someone he truly wanted.

Someone that wasn’t Jean.

Scott had an odd suspicion that the Wolverine had just found his mate.

Yep, shit would be hitting the fan really soon.

Course, Logan didn’t seem worried about that, his attention was focused on Marie…he couldn’t think of her as Rogue once he knew her real name…she was Marie to him and he listened to her talk about her experience at the lab and her time on the road, and he shared some of his own history as he held her small hand in his.

He felt an overwhelming need to comfort her, to assure her she was safe.

He wanted to promise that he would always keep her safe.

He wanted to tell her she had faced all the bad she would ever face in life.

He wanted her. Period. He knew the moment he saw her that she was it, she was the one…he knew talking to her that she was everything he had wanted Jean to be and so very much more; she was bright and beautiful and warm and despite all the hell she had endured, she seemed completely open and honest and not at all bitter or angry.

Jean was always angry.

And she had never endured anything close to the hell Marie had known.

It didn’t take much compare and contrast to make him realize that he had to soon free himself from Jean.

So he could be with Marie.

If she would have him.

And something in the way she looked at him with those big brown eyes told him she would.

---

As soon as they returned to the mansion, Charles directed Logan and Scott to bring Rogue to his office and despite Charles request to speak to Rouge privately, she gently asked Logan to please stay with her.

If the professor was surprised by that, he didn’t show it.

Bastard, Logan thought, the damn man probably knows my ass is as good as cooked when it comes to this girl.

But he didn’t care.

As soon as possible, he wanted anyone and everyone to know he had staked a claim on this girl.

He was going to mark her as his mate.

To hell with Jean, Logan had no doubt she would land on her feet and likely have yet another foolish man entangled in her web by months end.

Might even wish him luck, like Scott did me, Logan reflected with a smirk as he listened to Charles ask Rouge a few questions she answered vaguely and when he told her about the team, she said it was something that she was willing to consider.

Logan spoke up and said he would handle that.

He would give her a better idea what being an X-Man involved and if she decided to join, he would personally oversee her training.

The professor merely smiled and nodded.

He could clearly see what was happening.

Logan was falling hard.

So was Rogue.

As they left his office hand in hand, the professor wondered if he could find a reason to send Jean on a long sabbatical.

If he didn’t, her endless screeching would likely shatter every window in the mansion.

---

Jean Grey was not a woman that like surprises.

And Logan had indeed surprised her, by becoming the first man to **ever** dump her.

Flat out, no remorse, just a ‘sorry, Jeannie, but it ain’t working for us and I think it’s best if we just move on’.

Only she knew what he was moving on to.

She had brushed against his mind with hers, despite knowing he hated it, when she did, and what she saw there made her blood boil.

Logan had found someone else.

Worse yet, he had found what Jean considered a mere **girl**, and certainly nothing at all special when compared closely to Jean herself.

The **girl** was a runaway, an escapee from a lab where god only knew how many men she might have **serviced** and added to that she was plain.

What man could be fascinated by mousy brown hair and mousy brown eyes?

And those white streaks?

She told Logan he was insane, that he was throwing away the best thing that had ever happened to him and he was lucky she had ever looked at him twice to begin with, as he was so barbaric.

He was a fool, she said.

He was a bastard, she added.

He would realize soon that the little girl he had found would never compare to a real woman, and he would come crawling back.

Logan told her she was out of her fucking mind, that she wasn’t the hot shit she seemed to so firmly believe herself to be and the worst mistake he had ever made was thinking she was anything more than a one fuck wonder.

She threw a vase at his head and told him to get out.

She said **she** was breaking up with him.

That was the story she would tell, she declared, and she told herself everyone would be quick to believe it.

After all, why would any man in his right mind break up with her?

She was Dr. Jean Grey, after all…she was perfect…she was beautiful…she was any and everything a man could ever want.

Logan finished packing his things.

He told her he hoped she had a happy life alone, cause no one could ever love her as much as she loved herself.

She threw another vase as he ducked out the door, but he didn’t care.

She could throw every vase in the mansion and start on the glasses, cause it wasn’t his problem anymore.

He was free.

He was going to his Marie.

---

Like everyone else in the mansion with average hearing, Marie clearly heard every very angry world Jean had shouted at Logan in her rage, but the worry and guilt she felt at being the main cause behind the breakup faded the moment Logan walked into her room with a smile on his face.

He was happy.

He hadn’t loved Jean.

She was in the past.

Marie opened her arms and he stepped into them, holding her close as she sighed and asked if he was okay, had Jean actually hit him with anything she had thrown.

She laughed when Logan said she had missed, but even if she had, he wouldn’t have cared in the least.

Getting smacked upside the head with a chunk of glass would have been a small price to pay to get himself freed from Jean.

Marie admitted she was looking forward to finally meeting the good doctor face to face.

She had taken serious offense to some of the things she had heard Jean say.

It had pissed Marie off thoroughly to hear Jean call Logan a bastard, to say he was near barbaric and that he was a fool.

He was none of those things; he was kind and beautiful and good…he was Logan and he was hers and Marie was glad for it, as he kissed her for the first time, his lips warm yet somehow demanding.

His lips on hers felt like heaven and she gladly yielded to him, offering no protest, only whispered encouragement as he easily stripped off her jeans and sweater and carried her to the bed, where he gently laid her down before using a single claw to cut away her lacy bra and underwear.

Then he made love to her.

Thoroughly.

Completely.

He devoured her with his mouth and stroked her with his hands…he suckled her breast and kissed his way down her body…he touched all over her again and again and by the time he slipped inside of her, she was begging him to take her.

She was begging him to make her his.

She eagerly, franticly, lifted her hips in time with his.

She dug her nails into his back.

She screamed his name so loudly she was certain everyone in the mansion had heard her pleasured cries as clearly as they had heard Jean’s angry tirade.

Afterwards, as they held one another close, he ran his fingers through her hair and she rested her head against his chest and he told her for the first time that he loved her and always would.

She said the words back to him and meant them.

And this time, Logan knew, what he had found with Marie would look just as good in hindsight as it had at first sight and that, he decided, was all a man could ask for.

THE END