Logan stared at the new and smooth skin on his forearms. The hair hadn’t grown back completely; instead there was soft stubble. With his healing there was no way to know that just a scant twenty minutes ago they had been burned beyond all recognition. Logan’s arms had been covered in second and third degree burns. His eyes moved from his arms to the man sitting across from him. He didn’t know his name, didn’t give a rat’s ass what it was either, all he wanted was to forget the whole thing and get back to Marie. Had she told them that she was pregnant? What had they done to her? Had he been right to tell her that it would keep her safe?
Wolverine growled loudly in his head, he believed that telling them that his mate was pregnant was exposing her to a greater threat.
“What was your first contact with the target?” The man cleared his throat and repeated the question that Logan had ignored.
He thought back to earlier in the day. It had actually been close to midmorning when they had awakened them in their cell. They put some kind of sensory deprivation helmet on him before they’d let him step foot outside and only removed it after a short helicopter ride and a ten minute car ride.
The file they had handed him on the target hadn’t been what he’d expected. Instead of some mutant they wanted to trap and control, he found page after page of evidence on a serial killer who had been released on a technicality. His victims had been mutant girls no older than 22. He’d hunted them down like animals and taken them from their homes before mutilating and finally strangling them. Reading all the news articles and court documents on the man made him itch to get his claws into him.
He knew what Stryker was doing, giving him something that could get on board with to try to ease his way into assassinating people who didn’t deserve it. He should have saved that kind of thing for Scott, but Logan was willing to take it nonetheless.
After reading all of the trial information he found a sheet of current information about the man in the back of the folder. He memorized it and they cut him loose.
“I found him in his backyard.” Logan replied, remembering letting the Wolverine loose to hunt. He’d been grilling on his patio, having dinner with some friends. He growled from the cover he’d found in the neighbors yard and for a second the man had looked up, but a comment from his friend refocused his attention.
“How did you end up at the warehouse on 5th street?”
Logan growled and was silent while he thought. He’d spent the afternoon waiting on the man’s friends to leave and afterward had followed him to the warehouse. “Tracked him there,” Logan said aloud to the room in general.
The place had reeked of fear. It was the first thing that he’d noticed about the place, before even the filth and the scent of old blood. He’d meant to take his time going through the warehouse, he really had but the soft whimper of pain and brought him to a full run through the rooms. What he found would have made any man sick to his stomach and Logan wasn’t spared that emotion.
“How is it that there came to be a witness to the event?”
The growl that escaped his throat was more threatening than his last had been. The girl had been half dead and burned up when he’d burst through the thin office wall. He got a face full of heat before the man turned the blowtorch to the hands that had imbedded themselves in his stomach and thigh. Still he felt the blood flow, warm and sticky, over his knuckles as he released the claws. He angled them upward, toward the man’s chest before he released them again. By the time the man was dead the skin on his arms was flaking off, showing new and clean instead of blackened and cracked.
“Why? Because there was no way I was going to hand her over to you fuckers and give her another set of scars that wouldn’t heal long after the event was over. Because you have too many hostages as it is. Because I don’t want you thinking I’m just going to roll over and do you dirty work or you. Take your pick.” Logan’s claws shot in and out as he roared at the man questioning him in such a calm and collected manner.
Of course they’d been concerned about a possible witness instead of a real live victim. He growled again as the pain of the electric shock shot through him. The only thing that he could think was that he was glad that Marie wasn’t around or they might have decided to use her as his whipping boy.
It was a long moment before he could do more than lie on the floor and pant. If anything, he thought, this would give him a healthy sense of control over his reflexes. They waited until he was coherent before they brought him back to his cell. When they opened the door he wasn’t two steps in before Marie crashed into him, clinging for dear life and drinking in his scent.
He picked her up and carried her to their mattress before the guards decided that they were going to do anything. The lock clicked into place behind him.
Logan spent a long minute just holding her while she cried. He wasn’t sure what had happened while he was gone, but he’d get it out of her later rather than sooner. Now he just growled softly to her and held her close to him, glad to have his mate back in his arms.
He would do anything to make sure that this was the one thing that was never taken from him, even if it meant being a weapon.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
What was Logan doing while he was away?
The Dark warning comes in here a little.
The Dark warning comes in here a little.
Chapter End Notes:
Well, I warned you! And they're finally back together, yay!