Letting Go
by
Jenn
Author Notes: Pre-read by Andariel, who is now making interesting noises about the temptations of L/J. Go girl. You know you want to. <g>
Dedication: Eiluned and Minisinoo, without whom I never would have ever wandered into a new pairing.
Archiving: List archives, anyone who wants it, just let me know where Disclaimer: They aren't mine. I'm unhappy about this, but accepting until a wealthy eccentric recluse leaves me everything in their will <read: never, damn it>.
Feedback: All kinds accepted with powdered cappuccino for microwave use.
There was something about rainy nights that had always appealed to her--a trace of nostalgia perhaps, from a childhood spent with hot cocoa and marshmallows by the pink-curtained window of her bedroom, reading Nancy Drew and checking for hidden panels under the windowseat. Something that made her feel larger than life, that she alone could solve the mystery of the yellow lamp or the secret of the hidden stairs (and she had once, before Nancy Drew did, and still took some pride in that).
On some level, she had to guess her avocation as a doctor was an extension of that, with every gene she mapped or foreign bacteria she traced through its evolution in the human body. Perched over a microscope in her lab coat, trying to solve the Mystery of the Absorbing Skin or the Secret of Eternal Youth--not so different from Nancy in her calf-length skirts buried behind a magnifying glass and a bland personality.
Glancing at Logan walking quietly beside her, she had to admit that Nancy Drew certainly hadn't had such a fascinating field of study. Sliding her arms through the sleeves of his jacket, she fixed the collar idly, taking a simple and prosaic pleasure at wearing something that felt so much like him, letting herself lean into the solid strength of him, warm and damp beside her.
"Tired?" The arm around her waist tightened. She couldn't read anything in his voice except curiosity, realized she'd slowed her steps on the clean-swept concrete, still wet from the downpour that had trapped them in the diner for an extra hour. Smiling into the collar of his jacket, she shook her head slowly.
"Not really." Longingly, she thought of cocoa and marshmallows, wondering if room service could duplicate her mother's recipe--the secret ingredient was vanilla powder, added just before serving. She'd left home before she'd gotten the recipe in writing, however, so it could be she was missing something else. Rum extract? Exotic sugar? "Did anything happen while I was at the closing dinner earlier?"
Logan snorted slightly.
"Few protesters wandered around trying to look active." A slight, dismissive shrug of the shoulder against hers. "No biggie." Even disgruntled--he'd been itching for a fight, no release to be found in a five star hotel where the reputation of Dr. Jean Grey had to be kept better than spotless. Tension radiated from him, almost tangible in the heavy night air, and she wondered how he was keeping such tight control of himself. Unlike Scott, he hated the very concept of his public persona, his standing as an instructor at Xavier's school, a member of the staff that had to be on-hand for various formal receptions and fund-raisers.
He wanted out so badly she could feel it humming along her nerves with every movement of his body. Fascinating. Turning slightly, she came to a stop, feeling his surprise as he paused beside her, hand dropping from her body. She missed the warmth.
"Where do you go when you're in Chicago?"
One eyebrow quirked, coolly evaluating her, knowing the question she wasn't asking.
"I don't think--"
"Then don't." She paused, feeling something changing with her words, with the very fact she'd come to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk. Something that hummed with potential she wanted to explore. She couldn't remember feeling like this before in her life.
"It won't be what you think, Jean."
She remembered that first touch of his mind, so long ago, the seething, lightning-quick, primal strands of his thoughts weaving through her, memory suddenly vivid and bright, living and real. Licking her lips, she considered the step she was about to take.
Change. Reaching out, she took his hand, pressing the tips of her fingers between his knuckles, feeling the metal beneath. The fingers tensed beneath hers and the hazel eyes searched her face, looking for something--something she knew he'd find this time.
"Show me."
*****
She'd underestimated him. That was true--a kind of true that she'd been vaguely aware of all of their acquaintance, but never followed up on, not wanting to re-categorize him when he'd been slotted so neatly in her mind already. She held the glass of rum and coke with a steady hand and pressed her palm to the rough surface of the table, grounding herself into the hard reality of the smokey bar, the noisy patrons, the scrape of chairs, the screams and shouts and the massive amounts of untapped psychic energy she reveled in, never having felt anything even close to the sheer level of emotional violence that was leaking into her consciousness, staining it in brilliant colors.
It was as if she'd lived in black and white all her life, right up to this moment.
The power had gone out four times since they walked in and the problem was solved with the battery-powered lamps set up around the cage and the movement of the crowd to stock up on alcohol while the getting was good. In front of her were two empty beer bottles she and Logan had drank while he asked her silently if this was something she was ready for.
She had absolutely no idea. But she had every intention of finding out.
He was standing on the far end of the cage--his mind completely open to her, every transient emotion written clearly on the surface in stunning edges of silver-bright excitement and sharp lines of anticipation. The shift of his thoughts echoing the shift of his body as he stopped being Logan, the X-Man, the instructor, her friend, immersing himself in Wolverine, whose entire body was primed for nothing but action/reaction, adrenaline waking things in him that fascinated her. Smooth movements, the ripple of muscle, the traces of sweat from the heat of the airless, windowless room beading on his bare chest, the hazel eyes that darkened and narrowed as they took in the room.
This wasn't a thinking man's sport. But then, a thinking man wouldn't last fifteen seconds in that cage, and she shifted her chair until she was inches away and could feel the psychic aura of the crowd pulling her in, their excitement, their need, their impatience to see blood spilled and watch men fight like animals.
She felt stripped, naked, but forced her caution down, let herself wade in by inches--into the crowd's desire, Logan's anticipation, his opponent's harsh pleasure, wanting to feel what they felt, focusing abruptly until she could feel Logan's body like her own. Into the woman she could so easily have become, a creature of pure sensation.
The first punch hit his jaw with the force of a sledgehammer, pushing her abruptly into her own body, raising a hand to the ghost of pain in her face, flushing with the excitement. Addictive, to feel him move, to feel his animal-anger as his opponent danced away. Lead them in, make it look good, make it look more real than it could ever be, because no human male could stand against Wolverine in the ring and win.
They tried, though, and that was a kind of pleasure too.
Jean pushed her way back in at the next punch, taking it with an empathic shiver of her body and followed Logan's answering swing, every movement smooth and precise and controlled--he wasn't using all his skill, not even close, or the man would be dead. Reaching farther in until she could feel it all, the way metal-enhanced fists could bury themselves in human flesh, the strong odor of sweat and fear and excitement, the crowd roaring in their ears.
The sheer joy he took from freeing himself, even if it was transient, for those few moments in the ring, being what he truly was beneath the human exterior. How much he loved what he did, with every fiber of his being, rich in satisfaction and need and a thousand variations thereof that worked their way under her skin and lighted every nerve in her body. Her hands were clenched into fists on the table as she breathed out with him, echoing his soft growl deep in her throat, eyes wide and fixed on the double viewpoint of seeing the fight through bars and seeing their opponent through Logan's eyes.
Jean stood up almost unconsciously, edging toward the cage, surrounded by hot bodies as she opened herself to the frantic energy, screaming with them at the next punch, shocked at herself in some distant corner of her mind, busily analyzing mob mentality and wondering if a telepath was more or less vulnerable than a mundane. Clinically charting her own physiological reactions to the shouts and the bets and the fevered tension and blind adoration that surrounded her, body and mind.
:::Just let it happen, Red.:::
Smiling when Logan met her eyes, hot and bright and more alive than anyone she'd ever met, any mind she'd ever touched, any--
--her body reacted when the last punch threw the man into the floor, but her eyes were locked to Logan's, as the lips parted with a low growl and a kick before he turned back to the crowd, someone--a woman--pressing a shot glass through the bars that he downed in a single swallow. Dr. Grey retreated from consciousness as Jean opened herself completely to everything around her.
Feeling the burn of his raw whiskey in her stomach, drinking her rum and coke that wasn't enough and grabbing a shot off a waitress with a telekinetic pull, throwing it back with a tilt of her head and grabbing the fence in one hand, leaning into it.
"AGAIN!" The announcer was saying something, challengers were lining up, and she wondered if they thought they could beat him. God no, they didn't think that, but they wanted--they wanted to say they'd faced him, they wanted to say they'd taken what he could give them, they wanted--
She closed her fingers tightly over the wire and freed her soul to the feeling. Screaming, shouting, Logan's pure joy reverberating through her, ordering two shots in a voice that didn't sound like her own, wanting to crawl inside and face those men herself and let them go down under her hands and her mind. Pulling herself up so their eyes met as the next man fell, the shot glass in her hand and reaching out. He took it from her fingers, bending to nip the inside of her wrist before he threw it back and she shut her eyes to absorb the feeling.
The third opponent was no challenge at all--not enough, not enough, not *close*, nowhere to release the energy, and when the fourth appeared almost instantly, Jean held up her money and called her bet, taking her shot with a twist of her head, unwilling to tear her gaze away from the men inside. Logan was already moving, and Jean smiled as they began, taking the next glass from the waitress and watching/feeling the first punch that slashed across their connection.
:::Fuck.:::
Jean stumbled slightly, her grip on the cage holding her upright, rushing inside Logan to feel it all, see if she was right, and catching his interest, the first real challenge of the night. The crowd seemed to sense it too--on the fringes of her mind she explored their reaction, their instinctive knowledge that they were finally going to watch something challenging, something *real*, more real than anything they'd seen before.
The second punch was harder, something snapping and Jean tasted blood when she bit down on her lip from the pressure, then another punch, sending Logan to the floor in shock. Jean pushed herself back from the fence, keeping her grip as Logan got to his feet and the men circled each other, his entire mind sharpening, focusing, removing the last traces of inhibition and control and Jean tightened her fingers to go with him, wanting to know everything.
The world condensed into pure sensation--the screams of the crowd, the heated, sweaty people pressed close around her, a punch to the jaw that staggered her, almost falling if so many bodies hadn't been forcing her upright. A kick that should have doubled the man and only seemed to wind him, another punch that knocked Logan into the fence wall inches away. Jean's breath left her in a hiss, a growl building in her chest as Logan caught himself, spinning away when the man attacked, ending with a kick to the back of the knee to bring him down. Fists lashing out, and Jean felt the blood trickling down her chin and her throat, forced herself to breathe through the feel of knuckles on her cheek, on her jaw, darting into her stomach.
Logan letting go completely and her voice was hoarse from screaming with the multitudes around her, her shields completely down, carried into and through the bloodlust she'd only seen, never *comprehended*, never felt in every fiber of her body. Wolverine was grinding his opponent into the ground, and it was a shock like pain when the announcer called the end and two men rushed in to remove the fallen competitor.
Jean breathed out and blinked, watching them carry the bloody, bruised man away and Logan was moving to the door. Slowly, so slowly, she worked her way out of the people, absently grabbing his shirt off the table, pulling his jacket over her body as he collected his winnings.
Waiting at the table when he pushed her hips against the edge, mouth closing over hers hard, licking the blood away from her chin and following its line down her neck, hands locked on her waist, smoothing up her back then down to her hips, tracing her body possessively. She slid her fingers over the sweat-slick shoulders, tilting her head up and his mouth was on hers, tongue stabbing past her teeth, running lightly over hers. Pure lust radiating through him, through her when she responded, as he explored her mouth, bit her lip, the scab reopening and traces of iron slicking through her mouth.
All sharp senses of taste and feel and scent, the connection between them still open when he bit her shoulder and lifted his head--
:::Not like this.::: Ignoring himself when he pushed a leg between hers, lifting her onto the table, grinding against her. Jean sucked in a sharp breath, running her nails down his back.
:::Just like this.::: Let him feel the rush inside her, the need that was spiraling up from her guts, as she pressed against him, lowering her head to lick his shoulder, sharp-spicy with the taste of sweat and other men's blood, his blood, slowly to the warm throat and the hard pounding of his jugular against her tongue.
A hand buried itself in her hair and jerked her back--startled, she met the hazel eyes, unable to form a coherent sentence.
"It won't be what you think, baby," he whispered, leaning so close so his lips touched hers. She didn't care, reaching out with hands and mind, still feeling the high of adrenaline rushing her system. She wanted the release he'd gotten in the cage, wanted to fight him and take him, pushing inside him with her mind the same time he entered her body, snap the connection into place and never lose this feeling.
"Logan--" she whispered. He had to understand, he had to feel it--she knew he felt it, he wanted her, it was written along every muscle of his body, coloring every thought in his mind.
"I'll never let you go. Ever."
His shields snapped down, locking her out completely, shock washing over her so suddenly she stiffened and his hands left her, grabbing his shirt from the table beside her and pulling it on. The hazel eyes burned when they met hers--but he only took her hand and pulled her down, leading her out under the gazes of the crowd who'd probably wondered if they were going to do it on the table right then, right there.
Jean realized, as they emerged into full rain that soaked her instantly, that it was exactly what would have happened.
He wasn't any more relaxed--if anything, the tension was hotter and stronger and she knew when he dropped her off in her hotel room he'd be gone again, wandering through Chicago's night life and finding another bar and another woman--a woman he could have, a woman that could be whatever he needed and forget in the morning.
Not her.
"Logan--" No idea what to say, how to broach the idea--no real idea what she was thinking, what she'd been thinking to do any of this, with power humming along her nerves and her mind still reaching for his. His hand in hers was impersonal, keeping her at a distance, utterly unexpected, too familiar.
"Let's just get back."
Rain crawled inside the collar of the jacket, trickling down her throat, wet and chilly, cooling the sweat on her body, cooling the heat of her mind.
Damn this anyway. Jean came to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk and Logan actually pulled her along two extra steps before she utilized her TK and brought them both to a halt. The big body turned slowly, hand dropping from hers, hazel eyes guarded. He wanted to be anywhere from here.
"What are you afraid of?"
He didn't answer, and she saw the rain had cut through his shirt, soaking it, cooling his skin, washing away the traces of blood on shoulders and neck. Water drizzling from his hair into his face, and an impatient hand swiping it away, leaving a trail of bright red that faded almost instantly on the wet skin.
"Logan, look at me." Hazel eyes cautious, but she read something in them, something that was still heat and her, and feelings she'd ignored for far too long. Taking a cautious step toward him--he was so wired she didn't know if he'd bolt--reaching out until she found his hand, running her fingers over his, brushing her nails over his palm. Closing her eyes, for a moment, just a moment--
--she stood at the very edge of everything. Everything she'd seen and felt that night, everything she'd known and thought she'd known, everything that was the man in front of her and, more unfamiliar by far, everything that was Jean Grey.
Raised his hand to her lips, pausing to brush a kiss across the palm, breathing him in. Jean opened her eyes.
"Don't let me go."
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