NEW FIC! Keep Bleeding - Chapter 6 - NC-17: By Paradise
http://community.livejournal.com/loganandmarie/199772.html (Chapter 1)
http://community.livejournal.com/loganandmarie/202014.html (Chapter 2)
http://community.livejournal.com/loganandmarie/202871.html (Chapter 3)
http://community.livejournal.com/loganandmarie/203361.html (Chapter 4)
http://community.livejournal.com/loganandmarie/203792.html (Chapter 5)
Chapter 6
Remy sat on the floor with his back up against the bed, a bottle of bourbon in one hand, his cards in the other. The shades were drawn and he was in the dark. Rogue opened the door, freshly showered, with her suitcase in hand. She looked down at him and paused. Anger burned in his eyes as he looked her up and down. She did her best to not look guilty but hints of it showed through.
“Welcome back.”
She walked all the way in and shut the door behind her. Putting her suitcase to the side she came over to him and sat down in front of him. She’d put her ring back on, but for the first time she felt that her soul no longer belonged to Remy. She loved him, she truly did, and a part of her would always want to stay with him, but she wanted to live her life with Logan.
She reached out to him, her soft hands on his knees. Pulling back as if she were the plague, he snapped at her.
“Don’t touch me! Not after you’ve been with him!”
“Look, Remy,” she called after him as he got up and moved away from her. “This kills me too! This eats at me! You think this is what I wanted? I married the man I loved more than anything and now all I want is that back! I want…so badly to be back in that place!”
She wiped the falling tears.
“Oh yes it must be terrible for you!” he said. “It must be just awful for you to be in love with someone else.”
“It is! This isn’t the movies where it’s fun. This isn’t some little adventure that I’m having. This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done and I’ve been through some bullshit in my life. I love you. I never thought I could love anyone the way I loved you and I’m losing you. Every second I’m losing you and pretty soon I won’t have you anymore. We won’t have us!”
Then she saw the tears in his eyes.
“Ah know,” he finally said, for two seconds the anger not in him.
“I wish I could just cut myself in half and be with both of you.”
“You could wish a lot of things, Rogue. But you know what, as much as ah love you, it doesn’t hurt as much as ah thought it would.”
Rogue rolled her eyes.
“Don’t,” she countered, completely familiar with this side of him. “Don’t turn into the complete son-of-a-bitch I know you are capable of being because despite the fact that this is my fault, I will tell you to fuck off.”
“You think you’re the only one who can look at someone else?”
“Don’t.”
“You know my past with--”
“I said don’t!”
She didn’t need to hear his recall of all the women in the mansion he’d had sexual chemistry with while she was restrained in a pair of gloves, especially since she was good friends with most of them. She stood up, angry at the man she’d loved and hated throughout their short union.
“Even though you were sleeping with every person on this planet with breasts while I was still trying to control my powers, you don’t need to gloat about how easily you’ll go back to that life. Remember, I can still use my powers. You were never that close to Logan, and trust me, you don’t want to live the rest of your life seeing him from my point of view.”
Though Gambit wanted to continue to spar with her, the truth was that he really did love her, underneath it all, and he didn’t want to make a bad situation worse. So for the moment, he gave up the verbal battle.
“Alright,” he said, putting his hands up in temporary defeat. “White flag.”
She bit her lip, her vision blurred from her tears. She felt herself weakening at the realization that this was the end of them. She felt desperation in her soul, not wanting to lose him completely.
“Maybe we could still be a part of each other’s lives,” she suggested.
“Don’t do that. Don’t wrap this up in a pretty little bow.”
“But-“
“No, Rogue, you chose; you have to live with it.”
“I’m not saying I haven’t done this all wrong but I will always love you. I still love you-“
“You’ve been a slut in another man’s arms.”
“I have not been,” she replied, wishing she’d sounded more firm.
“You’ve been in his arms for months.”
“I didn’t sleep with him until you told me to find out how I felt. You have every right to be angry with me, I know, but-“
“Angry?” he challenged. “You can’t fix this!” he shouted at her. “You’ve ruined us! We will never be okay. We will never be friends.”
He came over to her and grabbed her, shaking her hard.
“Do you hear me?”
“I hear you, yes!” she cried.
He shoved her back out of his arms and she lightly fell to the ground. Remy was disgusted with himself and her. He couldn’t stay in this room, facing her. Rogue laid on the floor, crying to herself and it wasn’t his place to comfort her. He wanted to. He wanted to wipe the tears away and fix it, but he couldn’t. So he looked at her one more time then opened the door, leaving.
Rogue curled herself up in a ball on the floor, crying like a baby. The bedroom door was open and Storm and Jean filtered in and gathered her up.
“Rogue!” they cried.
Storm pulled Rogue up into a sitting position and laid her head on her lap. Jean took her hands.
“It’s okay,” Storm said.
“What did he do?”
Rogue buried her head in Storm’s stomach.
“He just yelled at me,” she sobbed.
Storm cupped the back of her friend’s head and kissed the top of it.
“It’s okay,” Storm said, rubbing her back. “It’ll take time but it’ll get better.”
“I’ve lost my husband.”
“Hey, hey look at me.”
Rogue looked up at Storm’s face with watery, bloodshot eyes.
“You have a wonderful new life ahead of you. You have a man who loves you and you love him. You two have been connected forever and have always loved each other. Hold onto what you have to look forward to. Not what you’ve lost.”
“He’s coming,” Jean said, hearing him inside her mind.
“Really?” Storm asked, still rubbing and comforting Rogue. “Okay.”
Just then Logan peeked inside the room to see the three of them on the floor. Rogue looked up at him, sad and teary-eyed.
“What happened?” he demanded.
“Maybe we should leave you two alone,” Storm said, getting up with Jean.
“We’ll be downstairs if you need us,” Jean said, letting go of Rogue’s hands.
Logan crept down on the floor with Rogue and slipped his hands beneath her legs and back, lifting her up as if she were a rag doll. Setting her on the bed he laid down beside her, holding her.
“What happened?”
“He was so angry,” she whispered. “I don’t know what the hell I was thinking but I guess I wanted us to part with grace. We didn’t.”
“Did he hurt you?”
Rogue shook her head. “No, he just yelled at me. I thought he might for a moment but he didn’t.”
“He scared you,” Logan said, slightly surprised.
“For a moment.”
“I’ll kill him.”
“I did sleep with you.”
“With his knowledge and if I recall, his suggestion.”
“Doesn’t mean he wanted me to go through with it.”
She shook her head.
“The point is, he lost me. We lost each other and it’s over. That’s a very hard thing. We were everything to each other and I realized I wanted something he couldn’t give me.”
Logan tipped her face up to his.
“If you were willing to go through that for me then that makes me the luckiest man in the world.”
She took his hand in hers. “Get me out of this room,” she commanded softly.
He briskly lifted her up, cradling her in his arms as he carried her down the hallway to his room. Ten minutes later they faced each other on the floor, talking barely above a whisper.
“What’s going on in that head of yours?” Logan asked, tapping it lightly with his index finger.
She gave him a small smile. “That…no matter what happens, no matter what you do, I understand. I love you the way you are. I knew what I was doing---”
He almost magically pulled her silky body beneath his and kissed her thoroughly. Her stomach involuntarily sucked in and her heart pounded loudly against her chest. His hand slipped up under her leather skirt and beneath her panties, like he’d done it a thousand times, which annoyingly, she was used to, and her hands tried to stop him.
“Wait,” she whispered.
“Do we have to? I wanna get on this baby thing.”
She exhaled a laugh. “Well, I’m still married and I took my birth control pill this morning so, knock that idea out of your head.”
She traced his eyebrow with her finger.
“I’m not going to lose you,” he stated.
She shook her head. “Never.” She propped her elbow up and rested her head in her hand. “And you can just be quiet with me. You don’t have to explain anything to me. I know; I understand - from the rage to the need to find answers, to the underlying want to truly find peace.”
He felt something ugly inside him break free when she said that. Maybe he should’ve felt invaded that she knew many of his deepest, darkest secrets, but he didn’t. He felt secure that they were inside of her. He felt something so much deeper than drowning his sorrows in beer or sex. He pulled her shirt back down over her stomach and gently rested his head against her heart.
She didn’t say anything. She had never felt more connected to him than she did right now. He trusted her. He allowed her to be strong for him. She caressed his hair and let him release the demons he had inside of him, using her strength to do so.
He loved her, and that was all she needed.
~~~~The End~~~~