“Ah don’t know what Ah want,” she tells Logan, and there’s truer words never spoken. She’s twisting her gloves between her fingers, pulling them taut.

“Ah don’t- Ah don’t know how. To ask, Ah mean. Ah don’t know to ask about… this. About us. Ah just… Ah just want some practice, y’know? Is that… Is that weird?”

And she turns to stare at her oldest friend, her face flushing red. Brown eyes shy and wide as saucers- and Christ if ever there was a time she doesn’t wanna look like a Kid then this is it- Her heart in her mouth. Unable to believe that she’d actually admitted that. Unable to fathom why those words had just popped outta her mouth. Logan is standing at the door to her room, one hand on the doorknob: He’d had his back to her, the monkey suit Hank’d forced him into for her birthday party drenched from their dash out of the car. But now he’s looking right at her, wondering no doubt where the Hell that’d come from. Whether he’d heard her right- Though he had to know he had. Because she’d asked him- She’d told him she wanted to-

Jesus, she’d propositioned him four months to the day since she that damn night with Bobby.

A picture of her former boyfriend’s annoyed, defensive face pops into her head and she pushes the image forcefully away.

Marie swallows then, suddenly feeling defenceless as what she’d said really registered. The fear of admitting the only thing she really wanted-would ever really want- making her feel sick to her stomach and weak. But she hasn’t told Logan too much, she reasons. She’s just told him she wants some… practice. Someone to show her the ropes, sexually. Someone to help her reclaim that sense of rightness her own hands, her own body used to give her. That sense of rightness that having sex with Bobby seemed to take away. As she thinks this she moves to sit on her bed, unable to meet Logan’s gaze, the strength going out of her. The feel of his shocked stare on her skin a heavy, mortifying weight as she tucks her feet beneath herself and tries to pretend she hasn’t (possibly) just fucked up as badly as she thinks she has.

But he closes the door quietly. Locks it.

Walks over to her.

Marie tries (unsuccessfully) to raise her gaze from the floor, because she honestly isn’t sure she can bear to hear what comes next.

Feels the bed dip with his weight then, as he sits beside her. Tries taking a deep breath then but she can’t, the air won’t fill her lungs. She realises she’s shaking and she isn’t sure she’ll ever be able to stop it; From the corner of her eye she sees him cock his head to the side, hazel eyes hooded now and- and warm. Searching. Hands clenched on his knees, his shoulders stiff and straight as an arrow. The relaxed, agile Logan she’s used to suddenly a thing of the past. He lifts one hand to place on hers and instantly she stiffens; The comforting gesture could only be a prelude to the Dear Marie speech she knows is on the way and she fights its coming even as she tells herself it’s something she has to accept, has to hear. Because she couldn’t ever let herself forget that she was still that girl nobody wanted, still plain, virginal old Marie with the poisonous, untouchable skin.

Bobby had told her that.

But Logan sighs as he sits beside her. Shakes his head like he doesn’t know what else to do for her. Marie feels what’s left of her heart curl up and turn to dust in her chest.

“You can’t hurt me, he says softly then. “Don’t ya know that by now?”

And he shakes his head again, his expression turning rueful. Sad. “You won’t hurt me- I know you think you will but fer Chrissakes Marie…”

And he takes a deep breath, swallowing.

Those hands tighten again, the ghost of his claws moving beneath the skin.

“If you want me to touch you,” he’s saying, “If you want anything from me, you just gotta ask, little darlin’.” A beat. “I thought you knew that. Of course I’ll help you… practice.”

And before she can stop him he lays his hand against her cheek, the skin protected by the veil of her hair. Presses a quick, chaste kiss against her forehead before pulling away. For a second she can’t let herself believe that she’d just heard what she’d heard, tells herself that she must’ve lost her mind or been tricked by a telepath or slipped into another dimension or, or something. Because there was no way in Hell James “Logan,” Howlett just told her that.

He goes to move away and she grabs his wrist, stopping him. Not able to meet his gaze, her eyes riveted on the spot where is tie lies slightly askew on his shirt, a spot which corresponds roughly with his heart. He takes a deep breath, the action filling his chest, his entire torso. It’s too intimate, too real somehow, and Marie has to look away, her gaze going instead to her own hands. Staring for a split second at where her fingers are caught in the sleeve of his soaking jacket, the dampness prickling against her skin. Without her even willing them to, her hands reach out for the buttons on his jacket, her fingers shaking- She can’t do this- She cannot do this-

He lets out a hissing breath like her touch burns him, though he doesn’t move to stop her.

Instead he leans into her, as if he wants her to touch him so much he can’t help himself. As if what she’s doing is welcome… Wanted… Everything that the Rogue’s touch has never been before. Again Bobby pops into her head, again Marie pushes him away. What happened between them happened, she can’t bear to dwell on it now. Instead she takes a deep, sharp breath, letting the heat of Logan’s body reach out for hers. At some point- she can’t remember when- he’d begun tracing circles on her arms, warming her as she shivers in her damp dress. She lets out a small sigh of satisfaction, his breath against her neck as she leans her head to one side, bearing her throat. Her breasts aching and heavy with arousal, their nipples tightened into little, hard points. “Tell me, Marie,” he’s saying softly in her ear, “Tell me- I wanna hear you say it-”

Ah can’t, she thinks. Ah can’t. Ah can’t. Ah can’t. Ah can’t.

“Ah want you.”

Her voice doesn’t sound like hers when she says it, all smoky and longing and wanton. Adult. But she says it all the same. “Ah want you.”

More than Bobby.

And suddenly she opens her eyes- when had she closed them?- reaching up and kissing him, just like she’s always wanted to do. The kiss is sweet- clumsy- just as she’d known it would be. Even kissing isn’t something she’s done a lot of, and again she’s forced to push a away a wave of worry. Of shame. That feeling of just not being enough. Bobby said... But, she tells herself sternly, she’s not thinking about Bobby. She’s not thinking about anything but her and Logan and right now. Logan doesn’t seem to be complaining, she tells herself, about her body or her clumsiness. Instead his arms have tightened around her, pulling her close and pressing her tightly against him. The bigness of his body against her smallness wanted and bewildering and arousing all at the same time.

“You okay?” he says softly, and even though he’s tracing his hands over her shoulder-blades, her hair, her ass, she can’t shake the feeling that he really cares about the answer. “You with me, Marie? You with us?” And she manages to swallow past the lump in her throat and nod a nervous yes. The grin he shoots her is pure him, bright and friendly and handsome and scary at the same time, and it elicits an answering, goofy grin in her.

“Uh-huh,” she says softly, and it surprises her, how breathless she sounds now.

“That’s what I wanted to hear,” he grins, kissing her again.

Her arms go around his neck again this time, pulling him closer. Her nose digging into his throat, breathing him the scent of him, her small, deft fingers curling in his hair. Her hands are shaking, twisting into his skin and some part of her is screaming that she should stop now, that she doesn’t know what she’s doing and that he’ll laugh at her, pity her, push her away- But he doesn’t.

In fact it doesn’t feel like he’ll want to push her away ever again.

Instead he grins as his hand tangles through her hair, moving her head and angling her mouth so that it moves more closely against his. A pleased, lust-drenched sound she’s never heard before vibrating through his chest as she responds, his tongue wet and velvety and hot inside her mouth. Within seconds she’d pushed the jacket off his shoulders, opened the remaining buttons on his shirt. Her mouth watering at the sight of him just shirtless, those nearly-black eyes on hers. Again she feels that overwhelming wave of embarrassment at how inexperienced she is- The women he’s used to wouldn’t stop and stare, they wouldn’t gawk open-mouthed at the sight of a man who wasn’t even naked- and she almost stops, doubt and shyness moving coldly through her veins and making that jittery high she’d been on shudder to a halt. He frowns at her and she looks down again- That’s becoming too much of a favoured manoeuvre- and then-

“Ah won’t know what to do,” she stammers. “You’re- you- And Ah’m- Ah’m- me and-” She shakes her head, unable to form the words. It’s way too embarrassing.

“Ah won’t know what ya want shuggs,” she says eventually. Voice tiny. “Ah won’t be able to-” she gulps, “To make you feel good…”

And she squeezes her eyes shut. Bites her lip again.

This is, hands down, the single most mortifying moment of her entire life.

But Logan doesn’t seem embarrassed. Doesn’t even seem that surprised. He just stares down at her, smiling this strange…gentle smile she’s never seen him wear before, his expression clearing like he’d just figured something out.

“Is that what’s bothering you, darlin’?” he asks. “Cuz I don’t expect you t’know,” he continues softly. “You couldn’t- You’re not telepathic. And I wouldn’t want ya t’be neither.” His smile grows wolfish, sending a flash of pure lust through her. “Not when you’re fucking perfect as you are.”

“So you’re not disappointed?” Man, she hates herself for saying that. She sounds so damn… needy.

He brushes one of the white stripes back off her face, smiling.

“Sweetheart, you could never be a disappointment, you know that. Don’t you?” She nods, shy all of a sudden, despite the arousal dripping like honey through her veins. Apparently Logan isn’t convinced because he tips her chin up to look at him. It’s a strangely sweet gesture, coming from him, and it makes a correspondingly strange sort of warmth burn in her chest. “Besides, isn’t the point of practice that you find out what works fer you?” he asks her. “This isn’t- I ain’t doin’ this if it’s just about proving something to yourself after you dumped that moron Drake…”

Marie looks up at him, her blood running suddenly cold. She’s not sure she wants to find out what the Mansion gossips have decided about her’n Bobby. “It’s… It’s not just that,” she says quietly. “Ah always… Ah always knew how to- Ah always knew what worked for me. That was never a problem. But makin’ the other person happy…”

Logan speaks over her. “Sex is about two people, Marie.” He’s staring at her still, that same weird, warm look on his face. “Yeah, you try and please the other person but…” He pushes at her white stripes again. Kisses her forehead. Sighs. “Look, way I see it, a man’s lucky enough to have you in his bed, he’s damn well gonna be ecstatic. He needs any more than you and he ain’t worth the fuckin’ trouble.”

Her grip on his hair tightens. “No man really means that,” she murmurs.

He cocks an eyebrow. “You callin’ me a liar now?”

“No!” It takes her a moment to realise that he’s joking. She can’t help herself; at the realisation she just has to kiss him, placing soft, sweet little butterfly kisses along his jaw, his neck. “But,” she mumbles into his skin, “but Ah wanna know…What a man likes…What you like… ”

“Then I’ll show you,” he says, and there’s something about his tone as he says it that makes the hair on the back of her neck stand up. That makes her nipples tighten and her belly flutter, wetness, sweet as molasses, dripping between her thighs. “But if you want me to do that,” he says, whispering into her collar-bone, and now its his turn to place hot, wet little kisses along her skin there, “then first you have to show me what you want.” He looks up from his position against her, hazel eyes dark and warm as chocolate. “Deal?”

Marie bites her lip, a little scared but a lot more turned on. “Deal.”

“Glad we sorted that out.” Again he kisses her. “Now let’s get this started, darlin’…”

And he moves his arms, tightening them around her. Forcing her hips into his, the outline of his hardening cock pressing into the flesh between her legs. Marie gasps and presses back, chasing the sensation. Wanting more pressure. She presses her hips up until she can feel the buttons at the seam of his pants’ crotch against her panties and that tiny ridge feels better to her than anything has before. Feels almost as good as her fingers would there. But it’s not quite enough and if Logan says he wants to know what she wants… She reaches around and takes the big, strong hand that’s squeezing her ass now, bringing it around to hang between them. His fingers in hers, she drags it down and shows him what she wants, lacing their fingers together before pressing them into the wetness between her thighs.

“Like this?” he asks and she nods, moaning as his fingers- bigger, longer than hers- hook up inside her panties. Pushing them aside and pressing further upwards, spreading her wetness. Filling her. His thumb pressing against her clit in a way that makes her moan.

“Just like that,” she murmurs and Jesus, it feels so good she can’t stop herself. She’s pressing up against his fingers, riding them. Biting at her lips, one hand going to her left breast to knead and squeeze and tease while her other hand digs into Logan’s wrist, keeping him where she wants him to be. With an impatient hiss Logan reaches down and pulls off her underwear, balling them into the corner. Once bare Marie twists and writhes, her legs tightening together. Control slipping more until she grabs the back of his head and pulls his mouth down to tongue her right nipple through the fabric of her dress even as his fingers keep up their torturous pace. He snarls- at the pressure on his hand or the back of his head, she’s not sure which- but when she tries to move he moans that he doesn’t want her to stop. The hand not between her legs (the one still squeezing and teasing her ass) snaking around to yank down the front of her dress. Pulling tautly at her bra until her breasts come free and then it’s his tongue, his teeth against bare flesh. Sucking and nipping. Making her moan louder. Her entire body shifting and tightening, hunting down her pleasure until it’s all she can see-

Feel-

Remember-

And just like that the pressure breaks inside her. Just like that she comes apart in his mouth, his hands. Comes apart right in front of him, for the first time in her life letting someone else witness that most private part of her. That part she couldn’t bear to let even Bobby see. She lets out a long, low, drugged growl and any other time she’s be mortified at doing that in front of another person. Any other time she’d hide her face and feel ashamed. But it’s Logan and he brought her to this and she really can’t give a flying fuck because it feels so damn amazing she doesn’t want it to end. Can’t bear it to. She can feel the ripples of it still threading through her, the pleasure almost more acute in the aftermath than it was in the eye of the storm. Through lowered lashes she looks down to see Logan, his hand still pressed between her thighs. His mouth still filled with her. He presses a final, suckling kiss to her breast and then looks up at her, and there’s this surprised, happy, youthful look in his eyes that she’s never seen before. Before she can ask anything he pulls her head down to kiss her and this time he’s the one who’s a little clumsy. Passion and pleasure taking the place of skill as if he can’t bear making a pretence of his control anymore.

“That was…” She’s sure there’s an end to that sentence out there somewhere, but she really can’t think of it right now.

“Yeah, it was,” he grins, voice certain, arms still around her. “Wanna try for more?”

She kisses him so hard that for a moment she thinks they might both pass out. “Uh-huh,” she manages to whisper. “Ah want- Ah need- Can we-?”

And she reaches up impatiently and pulls her dress over her head, grinning as Logan helps her. It lands in a bundle right beside her panties, leaving her only in her bra, her breasts hanging loose over the cups. She reaches behind, quickly opening the clasp and throwing the bra away. Logan’s mouth latches onto the underside of her left breast again, muttering between pressed kisses what pretty tits she has, how good they fuckin’ taste. Again mortification and embarrassment try to raise their head, again Marie beats them back. This feels way too good to be embarrassed about. Feels way too right to call a halt. She can feel Logan’s hair between her fingers, feel the warmth of his tongue as he swipes it against her flesh. With shaking hands she reaches down and undoes his pants, pulling them down and off. The feel of bare flesh against her hands- so he does go commando- making her skin practically vibrate.

With a laughing huff of breath she pulls his head up to hers. Kissing his lips, taking the lower one between her teeth as she pulls back. He follows her, eyes growing darker, more serious, hands moving down to regain their place at her backside. His fingers are ten heavy pricks of pressure and pleasure against her bare ass. His entire torso pressed against hers so hard that she can barely breathe. Marie’s heart stutters a little, pleasure and desire and a sense of something else, something new, overcoming her. She lets herself sink into Logan’s kiss, her nipples rasping against the hair on his chest, his heartbeat a tattoo against her own. He takes one of her hands and guides it down to circle his length, his hiss of pleasure as she makes contact making her snarl and grin. “Show me the way, darlin’,” he tells her and his voice has gone so low, so rasping that she can barely hear the words. “Show me where you want me- Put me inside you-”

Marie’s never done that before but she does her best, shimmying and writhing until he’s at her entrance. She can feel the press of his cock-head teasing her slit, the width and heat of it delicious and hot. With a small moan she lowers herself down, taking him inside her in increments. Centimetre by centimetre, inch by delicious inch, stopping only to kiss him and acclimatize. Let him widen her. The slow, heavy, tight slide of it more delicious than anything else they’ve done thus far. She knows this must be Hell for him, knows he must want her to go faster. But he doesn’t say anything, just whispers and moans how good it feels to be buried, balls-deep, inside her. To be taken in his girl. Eventually she comes to the end of it, his pubis pressing tightly against her ass and pussy. His cock buried so deep inside her, she thinks he might be touching her heart. She stares at him with wide eyes, allowing herself to appreciate the sensation; When she looks at him he has his eyes squeezed tight, the veins on his neck corded out with the effort of not moving. Of letting her keep control. She kisses his eyelids, his nose, whispering his name softly. His eyes drift open and when he sees her he grins.

“So fuckin’ good,” he murmurs, and she nods, agreeing with him.

“Better than anything else,” she says. An mischievous impulse steals through her. “Unless, of course, Ah move…”

And with that she does move, raising herself up on her knees, then bringing herself down again. Logan’s hands tightening on her ass as she does it, his pleasure coming out in a deep, low moan. As she begins to ride his hands drift up, arms wrapping tightly around her waist now. With each pull up she feels his grip on her tighten, with each press downwards he hisses out cuss words, muttering about how good she feels, how much he wants her here. How much better this is than anything he’s imagined. Within minutes they’re both covered in sweat, both moaning and panting and helpless as they move together. Marie’s shifted herself so that her clit presses against Logan’s pubic bone every time she raises herself up; It’s so wet and so hot and so right she thinks she might be dying. But dying could never feel this good. Again that wave rises up to meet her, again in washes over her. Bliss is let loose like a hurricane inside her, her insides bursting into honeyed, pleasure-filled knots. She screams her completion, never more aware of its pleasure than when it’s passing- And then suddenly she’s on her back, Logan’s hips pistoning into hers, her darlin’ chasing his own release. It takes longer and comes harder than hers had done, his body jerking and spasming even as he calls her name, bites his lips bloody at the sound of it-

And then it’s over and they’re lying on their backs, staring up at the ceiling. Wrapped around one another.

Logan’s hands are gentle against her back, and Marie’s never felt safer or more wanted in her life.

“Enough practice?” he asks eventually, and she can tell by his tone that he’s sleepy. It warms her heart that he hasn’t made a move to get her out of the bed, though he must know how dangerous it would be to sleep with her- After all, what if her mutation turns itself back on?

But though he must understand the danger he pulls her closer, waiting for her answer. Her head tucked in under his chin, her hands tracing delicate patterns against his belly, his abs. “Ah suppose it is,” she tells him. “Though Ah never did get to find out what you wanted…”

He grins at her, somehow managing to look both devilish and sleepy. “Should have thought that was obvious, darlin’,” he says. He murmurs the next part into her hair. “All most men want is a woman like you.”

She blinks. “Like me?”

“Yeah, y’know: Awesome. Gorgeous. Kickass. Willing to show you what she wants to give you something back in return.” He presses another kiss to the crown of her head. “Like I said, Marie: Awesome. Now get some sleep, if you want more practice tomorrow…” For a moment he feels him tense though his tone is playful.

“Unless, o’ course, I’ve taught you everything you feel you need to know…”

In the darkness red floods her cheeks, and Marie curls in on him. She’s not sure she wants him to see how much she wants more of… this. More of the sex and the pleasure and the being with Logan. More of the feeling safe and wanted after sharing something so intimate with someone she knows so well. But she figures if he’s asking, he mustn’t have a problem with doing it. He wouldn’t offer to try again if he didn’t enjoy it a little bit. So she presses a quiet, muffled kiss to his bare chest and murmurs, “Yes, Logan, Ah’d like to try more tomorrow…”

She’ll never know it but Logan falls into a deep sleep, smiling at what she said to him.

Because he knows if she gives him the chance to practice with her, he’ll win her heart yet.