“So you’ll teach me?” Rogue looked up from her cereal bowl. “To fight?”
“Is that what you’ve been working up to?” Logan was amused. After all her beating around the bush, she’d finally gotten to the heart of what she wanted to ask. Though he had learned that she never seriously trained due to a series of setbacks early on that had eroded her confidence and some of the team’s. Instead, she’d focused on learning to control her mutation, which was only marginally successful.
“Yes. Will you?” She had those big, hopeful eyes fixed on him. He’d already found that he had difficulty resisting her, and that look only made it worse.
“No,” he answered, watching her hope fizzle. “But I’ll teach you self-defense.”
“What?” Her brow wrinkled in confusion. She wanted to know how to fight not to run away, she already knew how to do that.
He got up from the table, taking her bowl with him to the kitchen sink. “You need to learn to protect yourself before anything else.”
“Okay.” She felt the hope rise again, at least he would teach her a useful skill. That was a start.
Two - no, three weeks? Rogue couldn’t even remember anymore. They’d taken to practicing outside in the mornings before it became too hot. Thankfully, he’d found several locations where the ground wasn’t hard or full of rocks. It didn’t make sense at first as they practiced all sorts of things that didn’t appear to go together. Truthfully, the only reason she didn’t complain was that the training drew them closer physically.
After a while, she noticed she wasn’t hitting the ground as often and not from his lack of trying to put her there. Then came the day when she evaded his grasp and slipped from his hold on her. It wasn’t much, not against Logan, but against a regular man it would be a start.
The next time she let it go to her head and promptly ended up on her back. She sighed, and he raised an eyebrow but offered a hand up. That’s what she got for letting her ego get ahead of her skills.
Rogue took his hand, but instead of letting him help her up, she decided to try a maneuver he’d used on her before. She hooked her foot behind his ankle and jerked hard. He truly was an unmovable mountain of muscle, she thought as he chuckled at her.
Giving a small tug she acquiesced, and he hauled her to her feet. “Not bad, but it needs some work,” he commented. At her dejected look, he continued, “Would it make you feel better if I went down to give you a false sense of superiority?”
Her mouth twisted a little. “Maybe,” she replied sullenly.
He could see she didn’t believe it and was glad she was making an effort to go beyond the basics he was teaching her. They could call it a day and give her a break, but that wouldn’t further her survival skills and that was his ultimate goal.
“Can you get out of this?” he asked, tightening his grip on her forearm. He stayed quiet as she analyzed the situation.
She made a few half-hearted attempts, trying out stomping on his foot and kicking his leg. He let her work through all the obvious attacks even she knew would not work. With a huff, she stared at him in frustration, but he wasn’t letting her off the hook.
“I want to do one of those… jab thingies,” she said making a motion with her free hand. “But you’ve got my good arm.”
Logan smiled at her, “There is no good arm, only the one you use more often.”
Closing her eyes to his patronizing look, she took a deep breath and thought about what she wanted to do. She’d already given away the jab so that would be useless. A hand thingie came to her mind next, and she mentally cursed herself. It wasn’t a thingie; it had a name like all the moves they’d done and if she was going to change her ways; she needed to make the complete change.
Rogue knew her best chance was to fake him out. Not that she would, but someone not attuned to her or with super senses might be fooled. Forming the jab with her hand, she shifted her feet into a better position and started for a point on his lower chest. Mid-way, she flattened her hand out and made a knife strike to his collarbone.
It was awkward and unpracticed and she’d been right; she saw the moment he knew what she was attempting. Saw the uptick of a lip into a smile as he let her proceed and though it was nowhere near the worst hit he’d ever taken, he wasn’t quite the solid mountain she’d made him out to be in her mind.
“You flinched,” she crowed triumphantly. “I did it.” Remembering her ego lesson from earlier, she added, “I might have a chance against a mall cop.”
Chuckling at her enthusiasm, Logan brought up another accomplishment she’d overlooked. “That’s not all,” he said, glancing down where they still held onto each other.
Her brow furrowed and he could almost see the wheels turning in her head, trying to calculate the time. “Fifteen minutes,” he finally told her.
They’d had a discussion when he first began training her about her control. She’d talked as if it was a fact of life that she would never be able to touch others. That was when he insisted that she quit wearing layers and those gloves. The reason was two-fold; the layers in summer made her stick out and if she acted like she’d never have control, then she wouldn’t.
Within seconds she got out of his handhold even though he hadn’t loosened his grip. What he didn’t see coming this morning was her throwing herself at him in a massive hug. He knew immediately he’d made a mistake.
Her body molded to his, fitting perfectly, hitting all the right notes. He needed to put an end to this minor celebration before either of them got a stupid idea stuck in their head. She pulled back slightly, and he turned his head to tell her they should get back to work.
The words never left his mouth as a kiss that was meant for his sideburn landed haphazardly on his lips. Not a perfect match, but good enough to surprise them both. Her scent subtly changed to attraction. The same scent he’d been catching more and more often that was getting hard to ignore.
When her lips softened, forming a proper kiss, his body rushed to respond. His mind was mere seconds behind and he dropped her like a hot potato. “Got work to do,” he grunted out.
Rogue stumbled backward as he broke the embrace. Turning, she found her balance and starting spot, using the extra moment to figure out what went wrong.
It was obvious they had both found the impromptu kiss nice. His body reacted just as much as hers had. She didn’t see the problem until she remembered one of his rules. They weren’t written down anywhere, and he hadn’t directly spoken of them. Probably more like guidelines to make these jobs run smoother.
Never get involved in the personal lives of clients. He’d already stretched some of his rules and she knew part of that was because of Xavier and partly because he liked her. This was the first hint that his feelings might go deeper than friendly. For a pro like Logan, that could be a problem.
With a sigh, she turned back toward him. Now was not the time to hash this out. His demeanor had changed, and she knew to shift back to work mode. They would get nowhere discussing it today.
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