CHAPTER 30 - A New Point of View
She didn’t have too many memories of the walk back to the road, or the transfer back to the Bird. With Logan’s reassuring presence holding her close, her mind finally let the exhaustion claim her.
She woke up once when Logan had climbed into the backseat of the car, carefully juggling her while he arranged himself on the seat. Her body tingled painfully as the hot air of the car’s heater warmed her freezing skin. His gruff commands to Remy to get back to the jet faded quickly.
She woke up again -- barely -- when the jet landed back at the mansion. She had no idea how long it had taken or what time of day it was. Logan carried her along the hanger and her mind faded again.
The knife cutting into her skin pulled back and was replaced by a rounded razorblade. It slipped under the skin and started to stroke back and forth, carefully detaching her skin from her muscle. The piercing pain raced up her back in agonizing pulses. She struggled against the leather straps holding her down, screaming for it to stop. She couldn’t move, the weight on her limbs was not budging. She screamed again.
She was pulled up from the nightmare by a scream of terror. Her own. She struggled against the invisible straps with gasping pants.
“Marie!”
Logan’s strong voice cut through her frantic haze and she opened eyes she hadn’t realized were still closed.
He had his arms wrapped around her shoulders and waist, her back towards him. He was whispering soft words into her ear, though she couldn’t really tell what they were, his soft even tone easing her muscles little by little. She was sweating and shaking.
When his arms eased their tight hold, she let out a shaky breath. “Sorry...”
“Stop,” was his quick response. “Don’t fuckin’ apologize to me, Marie.” He kissed the back of her head. “Don’t ever apologize for that.”
They were in their room, windows and curtains pulled closed, leaving the room in almost complete darkness. She still wore the scrubs from the facility, as dirty as they were. She pulled away and turned to look at him. He wore a shirt and sweatpants, not his uniform. When she eyed the shirt, she could make out blood stains and dirt everywhere their bodies had touched. She looked down at her filthy hands. “How long have I been asleep?”
He pushed some of her blood stained platinum locks out of her face. His eyes darted behind her, to the clock, and then landed back on her. “‘Bout fourteen hours since we got back. It’s two in the morning.”
She hissed. “That long?” She looked around. “What day is it?”
That seemed to have struck an old wound. He growled in anger. “It’s Sunday.” He cleared his throat. “They grabbed you on Thursday. We found you yesterday morning, which was Saturday.” His voice grew strained. “I’m sorry...God, I’m so fuckin’ sorry I didn’t get to you sooner, baby.”
She shook her head and touched his cheek. “You came for me, that’s what matters.”
He took her hand in his and kissed it. “You scared me...” he whispered brokenly.
Her throat closed up and she unsuccessfully fought tears. “When I think about...what they did...” His grip on her hand grew tighter. “...God, even having your nightmares, Logan...I never realized...” A small sob broke loose and she was suddenly brought into his chest.
He gripped her tightly, growling low in his chest. “It’s killin’ me, Marie. You having firsthand knowledge of what it’s like...It’s fuckin’ killin’ me.”
She brought her face back to look at him. “I feel different now. Like my...soul...is harder. I killed men, Logan. Not like before, where it was something I really tried to avoid doing. I wanted them dead and I just...”
He nodded. “It’s instinct. Survival. Them or you. You didn’t do anything wrong, Marie. Don’t think that.”
She shook her head. “I shot a man in the head, point blank. I...”
“You made a choice,” he stated bluntly. “You didn’t take any pleasure out of it. You made a choice to survive. No one would do anything different. Not if they wanted to live.”
She sighed. She started to run her fingers through her hair and stopped at the sticky dried mess it had become. “Jesus, I’m still covered in this stuff.” She couldn’t help the tone of disgust.
He cringed. “When I brought you up here, I thought you’d want a shower. But you didn’t even bat an eye when I put you on the bed. I didn’t...you looked so exhausted...I couldn’t wake you up.”
She smiled softly. “Thanks. I was...I am. I couldn’t...I couldn’t sleep there. I was so worried they’d catch me off guard...I was just...”
He kissed her forehead. “We should get you cleaned up.” He sighed and lifted her off his lap and placed her on the bed. “Wait here.”
She watched him go into the bathroom. He turned the small light on and turned on the shower. Looking down at her hands, she swallowed thickly. It was so normal for him to do just that, and it made her heart squeeze painfully.
When she looked up, he was leaning against the door, arms crossed. “It’ll take a while, Marie...to get used to having it be a part of you. I’ll help you.”
She smiled and almost broke down in tears again. He knew exactly what it was like to be her right now. It was...comforting. He came towards her and took her hands. She swung her feet over the edge and stood shakily. She laughed self-consciously. “You’d think with this healin’ I’d be able to get up on my own.”
He grunted. “It’s the nerves. You’re still worked up. It’ll take awhile for your head to come down from all this.” He walked with her to the bathroom and closed the door, letting the steam build up.
Carefully, slowly, he peeled off the blood-covered shirt. She stood there, letting him lead her motions. He was being so tender, she couldn’t find a reason to assert she could do it herself. He pulled the scrub pants down and lifted her feet one at time to pull them off.
Normally this sort of attention would lead to passionate moments, but he didn’t look at her with that heat in his eyes. He looked at her with a different kind of passion. She couldn’t place it. He stripped off his own shirt and sweats before stepping into the shower before her. After adjusting the water temperature, he reached a hand out to her and helped her climb in.
Within seconds, brick red water filled the bottom of the tub. He helped her lean back into the spray, letting water run down her hair. He ran his hands through her knotted locks, gently picking out pieces of dried blood, vomit and dirt. The water still ran red.
He growled softly. She opened her eyes to look at him. He was angry. “It’s not all mine, Logan.”
He clenched his jaw. “Most of it is.”
She sighed. “It’s over.”
“It’s not fuckin’ over, Marie.” His voice was low and dangerous. “It’s over for you. But it’s not for me.”
She looked at him as he spread shampoo into her hair. “What do you mean?”
He massaged her scalp softly, in complete contradiction to the force of his words. “I’m going to San Francisco today, to finish this.”
She’d closed her eyes to enjoy his ministrations. Now she opened them. “Finish what?”
He worked his fingers through the hair at the base of her scalp. She almost purred. “Worthington and I are gonna have a few words...maybe more. This ends today. If he thinks he can put a bounty on your head and live, he’s got another thing comin’. Only thing keepin’ me from outright slaughterin‘ the man is the inconvenient fact that he’s Warren’s father. He’s a good kid.”
She swallowed. “You think that’ll work.”
He didn’t blink. “I’ll make it work.”
She sighed. He held her head back into the spray again and worked the shampoo out. He put more shampoo into her hair and repeated the entire process. The water still ran red. After two more cycles of shampoo, her eyes closed the entire time, they finally moved on to conditioner. He worked it into her hair softly, kissing her eyes as she rocked into his grip. “Marie...”
His voice was strangled. She opened her eyes to see his struggling face. He clenched his eyes and struggled to control his breathing. “I need you to tell me...” He opened his eyes and looked at her as he held her head gently. “I need to know...” She looked at him curiously. “Did they...did anyone...hurt you...touch you?”
She reached for his face, softly tracing the lines of his jaws. “No, Logan. Nobody touched me.”
He let out a shaky breath and crushed her in his arms. “Thank fuckin’ God.”
She almost laughed. “My thoughts exactly.” He pulled away, smiled at her small joke and continued on to the soap.
He squeezed the body wash into his cupped hand and rubbed it together some before starting at her neck. Slowly, he rubbed away splotches of blood and dirt. She couldn’t help but ask. “What happened? At the college?”
He sighed. “Six people died. Gunshots.” He growled. “Fuckers didn’t care who they hit.”
Suddenly, the memory came crashing back. “Jubes!” Her body jerked and he shushed her.
“She’s fine.”
She let a huge breath escape in relief. He moved on to her shoulders and arms.
“It’s a long story, but she’s back and fine. Still in the medlab, though. Hank wants to keep her down there another day or so, to make sure the wounds don’t get infected.” He was massaging the dirt from her hands and wrists when he sighed. “We saw the security footage...from the school.”
She looked up. “What did you see?”
He grimaced. “All of it.” Her heart broke a bit for him. She wouldn’t have been able to handle watching him in that kind of ordeal. “The parking lot, the lecture hall...” He growled. “Watched you and that fuckin’ shit eatin’ prick get into it...” he sighed.
“Logan...” She didn’t really know what she would say to him.
He leaned in and kissed her savagely. She had to hold onto his shoulders to keep from falling. When he pulled back his eyes were twinkling. “You did everything right. You kept your head on straight, kept your cool...and if you hadn’t had such a rough time of it, I would keep that thing in our room as a souvenir, watching it anytime I wanted to see how beautiful you are when you fight.”
She let a laugh burst out. “Here I thought I’d gotten the tar beat out of me.”
He looked at her and she could see his eyes held that same passion. Not for intimacy...something else. “That’s what made it so amazin’ to watch. He was better than you, technically. But you kept goin’, keepin’ it together. You found the hit and you took it.”
She smiled in dawning understanding, finally figuring out what that passion in his eyes was. “Are you trying to say you’re proud of me?”
He smirked. “Yeah. Pretty much.”
She laughed softly. “That’s the first time you’ve ever said that....in regards to my fightin’ skills. You’re always raggin’ on me about my timin’ and all...”
He looked up from his position below her where he was washing her legs and feet. “That ain’t gonna stop, Marie.” He finished washing her body and held her under the spray again, letting the soap wash away. “I’m not lettin’ you get off the hook for those things. You’ve still got stuff to work on. All I’m sayin’ is that you showed some real mettle in there, and I noticed.”
She grinned at him when he grabbed some more soap and started to work the grunge off her face carefully. She closed her eyes so he could clean her face more thoroughly. “Good. Soon as I get some more sleep, we can start sparrin’ again."
He stopped suddenly.
“No.”
She opened her eyes and he was glaring at her.
“Logan. I’m all healed. I don’t...”
“You’re also pregnant,” was his no-arguments-about-it statement. “You’re not sparrin’ anymore. And you’re also not goin’ on missions.”
Her cheeks colored in anger. “Logan...”
“Close your eyes,” was his rough command. She grumbled and obeyed. He ran soap over her face. “You’re on leave. End of story.”
She let the water rinse away the soap. Opening her eyes, she could see he didn’t even consider this a conversation, just him telling her the verdict. “You’re not being reasonable, Logan.”
He slammed the knob over to off and shoved the curtain aside. And the look on his face, she knew all too well. This conversation....was over. She sighed. She was too tired to keep on it. She’d deal with it later.
He wrapped her up in towels and dried her off tenderly, despite his aggravation. She stood quietly as he finished drying her and left to bring her panties and an old shirt of his. He left the bathroom again.
She smiled. It was as much of a give as she was going to get right now. He knew she liked sleeping in his old worn shirts. She pulled it over her head.
She reached for her brush and worked the knots out of her hair. She slipped her panties on and opened the door, walking back into their room. He was finishing changing the sheets. She watched as he tucked in the edges and threw the cover back over.
He stood and faced her. After a second, he raised an eyebrow. “You comin’?”
She smiled softly and crawled onto the bed. God, she was clean and warm and she didn’t hurt and she was just...so...tired. How quickly sleepiness started taking over caught her by surprise. She felt a twinge of fear at the idea of sleeping and dreaming again. “Logan?”
He settled up behind her, wrapping his arm around her waist and pulling her in close. “Yeah?”
She trembled. “Don’t leave me alone, okay?”
He tightened his grip and kissed the back of her head. “Never.”
Fin
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Laaaaast Chapter! Hope you enjoy it! Many thanks to my BETA, doctorg! It's been a fun ride! : )
Chapter End Notes:
I hope you enjoyed the story. It's my first and I really put a lot into this! Would love to hear all your thoughts in REVIEWS! : )