She sat bolt upright in the bed, the covers falling away from her bare breasts.
Logan was transfixed by the sight, unable to move or speak, until her hand shot out and clamped around his wrist.
“What are you doing?” he ground out as he pulled away from her. Breaking her grip was so much easier than tearing his eyes away from her body, but he finally managed both. He turned his back on her and stalked across the room to the window, all the while trying to convince himself that this wasn’t the happiest moment of his life.
“Logan, why are you so angry?” she asked innocently.
And that was exactly the problem—her innocence.
For nearly two years, since the day he’d found her in that hellhole up north, she had hovered around his heart like a hummingbird—dainty, fragile, untouchable in more ways than one. And he liked it that way. She was always there, always with him, giving him a reason to hope that he could be more than the Wolverine. With her, all that strength didn’t have to be lethal; it could be protective, even comforting.
Then Liberty Island happened and she proved she was anything but fragile. Now, God help him, he’d seen that she was no kind of dainty either; she was a woman full-grown if he’d ever seen one and he’d seen plenty. But none like her. Sweet Jesus, none like her.
Now he understood for the first time that what he really wanted wasn’t just the idea of Rogue—the possibility of her—it was Rogue herself.
As long as her skin was deadly, he could fool himself into believing otherwise. As long as every inch of that luxurious alabaster body was draped in fabric, he could still think of her as just a kid with a crush. Now that she had been stripped of those barriers, quite literally, what was he supposed to do? How was he supposed to explain that what he was projecting as anger was in reality pure, unadulterated panic, sheer terror that the one protection she had left--her innocence--would never be enough to keep the Wolverine at bay?
Roughly tossing back the covers, Rogue bounded out of bed and came after him, heedless of her nudity.
Without turning around, Logan let loose, stopping her in her tracks. “For God’s sake, Rogue, put some clothes on!”
“Is that what it’s going to take for you to talk to me?”
“Yes!”
Still looking out the window, Logan saw Ororo coming up the stone pathway from the fountain toward the front door. Before it even occurred to him to duck out of sight, she looked up and saw him at the window. Her eyes widened first, in shock, and then narrowed in blazing anger.
He knew he wasn’t supposed to be in Rogue’s room, because she was supposed to be sick, but Storm wasn’t usually quite so judgmental. Then he heard Rogue’s breath catch.
Oh, shit.
Logan closed his eyes, dropped his shoulders, sighed.
“Did she see you?” he asked.
“I think so.”
“And you’re still naked?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well, you better do something about that in the next ten seconds, ‘cause that’s how long you’ve got ‘til she—“
Bang. Bang. The old door rattled on its hinges from the force of Storm’s blows.
“—gets here,” Logan finished, adding under his breath, “Must have flown up the fucking stairs.”
Rogue scurried to the closet, grabbed a long-sleeved sweatshirt and sweatpants and pulled them on.
“Rogue, I hope you’re decent, because I’m coming in right now!” the weather witch announced as she thrust the door open and marched into the room. Some of the stress left her face as she glanced at Rogue and saw that she was no longer in the buff. Then she turned on Logan.
“You didn’t ask if I was decent,” he noted, trying to deflect the blow he knew was coming.
“That, Wolverine, would be a waste of breath,” she shot back.
Tell me something I don’t know, why don’t you?
“Storm, stop it! This isn’t Logan’s fault. Let me explain, will you?” Rogue interjected.
“No. I want Logan to explain what he was doing in your bedroom, alone, with the door closed, while you were stark naked!”
“I don’t suppose you happened to notice that I am fully dressed, did you? Or that I was eight feet away from Lady Godiva—with my back to her—when you saw me in the window?”
“I wouldn’t necessarily call an undershirt and jeans ‘fully dressed’. You’re barefooted, too, but I’m more concerned about what she wasn’t wearing than what you are.”
Rogue had had all she could take. “Hello? I’m standing right here! Stop talking about me like I’m not even in the room. And Storm, just shut up for a minute and let me talk!”
Ororo’s steely gaze came to rest on Rogue’s flushed face. “OK. Talk.”
“I was in the shower. I got dizzy and fainted. Logan heard me fall. He found me out cold on the bathroom floor and carried me in here. I woke up. He turned around so I could get dressed. I had just gotten off the bed when you looked up and saw us both. Logan’s right; he had his back to me the whole time.”
As she spoke, she kept her attention focused on Ororo. But when she mentioned Logan’s name, she glanced at him, riveting her gaze to his for one split second and giving her head an almost imperceptible shake.
He got the message as clearly as if she’d shouted it at him: Don’t tell her.
His brow wrinkled in disagreement. She did that tiny head shake again and he gave her an equally sneaky nod. The whole exchange took place in the time it took Ororo to blink.
“You fainted? Are you all right?” Ororo moved toward Rogue, put an arm around her shoulders.
“Now that you mention it, I am feeling a little woozy again. I think maybe I should just go back to bed,” Rogue fibbed, stepping out of Ororo’s embrace and sitting on the bed.
“That’s probably a good idea. I’ll send Jean up right away. Logan, come with me. Now.” Her tone left no room for contradiction, so he fell in behind her as she left.
Before he closed the door behind him, he turned to look at Rogue. She was looking right at him and the joy in her eyes was unmistakable. It nearly killed him. He must have flinched somehow, and she must have noticed, because the glow he’d seen in her face just then disappeared, like someone blowing out a candle. Shutting the door at last, he wondered how long she was going to hate him for what he was about to do.
---End Chapter 2.
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