There're TEN Rogue/Gambit ficlets this time! And sketches!
SWITCHIN' IT UP LIKE WOAH!
031. Scruff
The bathroom sink is running with the door open. Rogue can hear it all the way down the hall and rolls her eyes, assuming one of the kids had left it on, but the sight she’s met with is of an entirely different sort.
“Excuse me, sir,” she drawls from the bathroom doorway, leaning arms-crossed against the frame, “but what on Earth are y’all doin’?”
Remy freezes with the shave gel and a razor halfway to his face. “Shavin’…” he says warily, cutting his eyes sideways at her. “Jus’ what it looks like.”
“Ah’ll miss the scruff, though,” Rogue says, sidling up beside him at the sink and smoothing her hand over his stubble. He leans his face into the touch.
“Dis one’s been smooth-faced b’fore, an’ didn’t hear you doin’ much complainin’ ‘bout it, girl.” He kisses her palm and turns back to the mirror.
“It’s because Ah never notice how much Ah love you all prickly an’ devil-may-care until you’ve gone clean-cut again.” Rogue slips around him to press herself against his back, one hand sliding up his chest to lightly scratch the stubble at the hinge of his jaw. “When we’re in bed an’ y’ rub your face against my shoulder-”
“-An’ other places,” Remy adds, quirking half of his mouth into a smile.
“-an’ the scruff scratches through my shirt…it feels nice.” Her arms settle loosely around his waist and she presses her cheek to his back, planting a kiss right between his shoulder blades while he goes about lathering up his face. “It’s the one thing Ah can feel without a barrier. Ah feel silly sayin’ it, but it’s like bein’ a little less far away from y’all. If that makes sense.”
“Den dis one’ll keep a goatee an’ jus’ get rid o’ de itchy neck stubble,” Remy smiles, tilting his head to see as much of his throat as possible without nicking himself. “Dat work fo’ you?”
Rogue bites her bottom lip, controlling a smile that’s far too bright a response for what seems like so small a gesture. It’s remarkable how the most insignificant things make her feel so unfathomably cared for. Overreaction? Probably. Sappy? Absolutely. But she’ll take feeling ridiculous and loved over suave and apathetic any day.
“Suits me jus’ fine.” She hops up onto the counter and takes the razor from him. He closes his eyes when she threads her fingers through his hair, angling his face where she can reach him. “Thank you, sugar.”
032. Just Like the Movies
A series of pinprick-taps rain down on Rogue’s balcony door and she whips her head around; there’s a playing card shoved into the accent slats on the glass, glowing faintly pink against the blue-black sky outside. How Remy got it up there without her noticing will apparently be a question for the ages. It’s not charged enough to do anything more than fizzle and she knows it, but she slides out of bed and snatches it anyway, preferring to err on the side of caution. Explaining a shattered door to the Professor isn’t something she’d like to pencil into her day tomorrow.
Remy’s elegant scrawl spills across the ace of spades. Come outside.
Well, alright then.
There’s gravel on the floor when she opens the door, which would explain the noise that startled the tar out of her. “You comin’?” Remy yells from the ground, leaning on his motorcycle and dressed to impress in blue jeans, a white tee, and black leather jacket dangling over his shoulder.
“In a minute! ‘S chilly out here!” Rogue leans out over the balcony, grinning like she’s just stepped into one of those goofy teenage romance movies, and disappears back into her room for a second.
“It’s August. You’ crazy.” By the time she trots back outside, robe thrown over her shoulders, he’s tapping his foot and checking an imaginary watch.
“Hold yer horses, Danny Zuko, Ah’m right here!” Rogue vaults herself over the balcony rail and Remy has a minor aneurysm when she halts about six inches from the ground, and steps gracefully out of the air.
“Girl, don’ scare me like dat,” Remy says, pressing a hand to his heart and firing up his bike. She doesn’t even try to hide the childlike grin hijacking her face. “A man don’ have enough time t’ react befo’ he remembers you don’ need catchin’.”
He helps her up behind him and she hugs his waist, face nuzzled into his back. “Sorry, love. Yer face, though, when Ah jumped? Too funny.”
“Oh hush up, girl, can’t y’ see dis one’s tryin’ t’ be romantic?”
“An’ Ah’m lovin’ every schmaltzy second of it.” Rogue presses a kiss to his back. “So, where’re we off to, mah knight in greaser armor?”
She cant hear him laugh over the engine, but she feels it. “Anywhere you want.”
033. Mississippi Moon
“That. Was too much food.”
Remy leans over from his spot on the picnic blanket to kiss her temple through her hair, ice cubes clinking in his glass of sweet tea. “Dis one didn’ force you t’ stuff you’ face, girl. Don’ be blamin’ dat stomachache on me.”
“Yeah,” Rogue groans from where she lays sprawled out on her back, seriously considering curling herself around Remy and slipping into a food coma. “But you did all the cooking. Ah jus’ cain’t resist southern food when it’s made by someone who knows what’s what. These clothes Ah’m wearin’ barely fit anymore.”
He chuckles, plugging his iPod into the speaker she’d brought with them, and riffles through the music, finally settling on the Doobie Brothers’ “Black Water”. “If y’ gotta blame someone, blame Tante Mattie. She’s responsible fo’ all o’ dis one’s culinary misdeeds. But I’m takin’ de credit for helpin’ you feel svelte again in dat pretty sundress.” He extends his hand to her. “Dance wit’ me a little?”
Remy helps her to her feet, and Rogue would be lying if she said she didn’t feel a little silly, dancing with him in the middle of the lawn. But the easy strains of that languid Southern fiddle spiral lazily around them (Mississippi moon, won’t you keep on shining on me?), and swaying with him in the grass, with those strong arms around her back, might just feel like the most comfortable thing in the world. She nestles her face against his shoulder, and one of Remy’s hands wanders up to thread through her hair.
(Gonna make everything, pretty mama, gonna make everything alright.)
“This’s nice,” Rogue purrs into his shirt, warm and happy and perfectly, blissfully at ease, whiling away the summer evening with no one but her love for company. “Can we do this again, soon?”
“Mmm, when dis one gets de chance t’ re-stock de kitchen, den yes,” Remy smiles, resting his chin atop her head. “Unless you’ jus’ lookin’ fo’ an afternoon outside alone. I’d be happy t’ oblige dat anytime.”
Rogue smiles to herself, and closes her eyes. “Ah love you.” She wishes they could stay like this for the rest of the night, all relaxed and sleepy and wrapped around each other like ivy. “Y’all are too good t’ me, LeBeau.”
“Jus’ like bein’ wit’ you, chere,” he murmurs. “Dat’s all.”
(And I ain’t got no worries, ‘cause I ain’t in no hurry at all…)
034. Ignition
“Hey, Cajun!” Rogue yells from across the garage, and Remy looks up from where he’s rooting around for the basketball pump. She’s straddling his motorcycle and grinning, her hair falling across one eye, and and his brain begins violently warring over whether to find the sight drop-dead sexy or mildly alarming. “What’re the odds of y’all teachin’ me how t’ drive this thing?”
“It’s not dat dis one don’ trust you, chere,” he says, lifting her by the waist off of his baby, “But if you’ gonna learn anyt’ing, it’s gonna be on a junkier bike dan mine. One o’ Scott’s, maybe.”
She laughs and lets him set her down in front of him, tracing her fingers across the shining silver handlebars. “Ah won’ tell him y’ called his precious babies junk, don’ worry. But fair enough. Ah wouldn’ trust me with it, either.”
“C’mere. Scott won’ mind if I let y’ start de ol’ crap Harley he hasn’ started fixin’ yet. Just start, though.” Remy reaches for the key on the workbench and catches the gleam in her eye. He’d rather not give her any ideas. “Last t’ing dis one needs is highway wreck an’ third-degree burns when Scott finds out you got away from me wit’ one o’ his toys.”
Rogue’s mouth drops open in mock shock and injury. “Ah would never!”
“Nuh-uh, dis one knows dat look. You’ always up t’ somet’in.” Remy says through narrowed eyes and a sideways grin when she climbs onto the back of Scott’s banged-up old Harley, and he settles himself on it behind her. “First t’ing y’ do is kick up de stand an’ turn on de fuel valve, den pull de choke knob out.” he says, leaning down and guiding her hand to show her where it is. He hands her the key. “De ignition’s over here, by de gas tank.”
She turns it and knits her eyebrows. “Nothing’s happening.”
“Dat’s ‘cause y’ haven’t tripped de kill switch yet.” He points to the button on the right handlebar, setting his chin on her shoulder. “Turn dat on, den squeeze de clutch.” His hand over hers helps her pull in the lever on the left handlebar. “Den put you’ foot here.” Remy guides her left foot onto the gearshift. “Now half a click up puts it in neutral-atta girl, like dat. An’ now y’ hit de start button.”
The engine sputters and groans, then purrs to life beneath them and Rogue whips around, grinning like a kid with a brand-new toy. Remy laughs. “Calm down, spitfire. Let de ol’ girl warm up. Den y’ can push de choke back in an’ roll de throttle toward y’ t’ rev de engine.”
Her grin widens. “Can Ah?”
“Oh no, we done fo’ now, or Scott’ll kill dis one dead.” He turns the ignition off and trips the kill switch back up, and Rogue pouts like she’s just been denied the tastiest candy in the shop. Remy leans forward and kisses her hair tucked behind her ear. “But if you’ itchin’ fo’ a ride so bad, I wouldn’ mind sittin’ you on de back o’ dis one’s bike an’ lettin’ you cling t’ me fo’ dear life.”
035. Belle Fille
“Girl, why you gotta go an’ be like dat, wearin’ t’ings dat make dis one want t’ touch you all over jus’ t’ see me squirm?” Remy heaves a long-suffering sigh at the sight of her off-the-shoulder blouse. The filmy fabric drifts around her frame as she sweeps past him, and he reaches out to run his hands over the parts of her he can safely touch with bare hands.
“Well, Ah would kill fer a good, long, weak-at-the-knees kind’a kiss right now, but we cain’t all get what we want, can we?” She leans over him in his chair, standing between his knees, and kisses the top of his head. “Now hush up an’ let a girl feel pretty fer a little while.”
“What you talkin’ ‘bout?” he asks, drawing her closer. “Dis one has t’ suppress de urge t’ beat de tar out o’ anyone foolish enough t’ undress y’ wit’ his eyes when y’ walk into a room. I like bein’ de only man who’s earned dat privilege.”
Rogue laughs. “Now that’d be somethin’ t’ see, you dealin’ death an’ destruction nex’ time we’re out. Ah’m envisioning many singed bystanders…”
“Jus’ protectin’ you’ honor, mon belle fille. An’ we ain’t never goin’ t’ no bars t’gether, o’ Remy’ll end up in jail fo’ assaut an’ battery.” Before she has the chance to push him away, he pulls her close and breathes her in, holding her steady with sure hands at her waist. She giggles and struggles for a second, but there’s no fight in her, and soon enough she drapes her arms around his neck. Remy kisses where he can reach between her breasts and lets her go. “But in all seriousness, what you sayin’ bout feelin’ pretty, chere?”
She sighs. “Ah tagged along t’ some mall somewhere with Kitty an’ Jubes earlier, an’ the two of them kept duckin’ in an’ out of stores, tryin’ things on, an’…Ah dunno, Ah’m afraid o’ doin’ things like that when there’re so many other people milling around. Lord only knows what Ah might do if Ah brushed against someone by accident.” Rogue scratches his back through his shirt, just to touch him. “‘S havin’ t’ hang back all the time. Ah cain’t act like a girl with the rest of ‘em like Ah want to.”
“If it’s any consolation,” he says, “dis one’ll never show his face in public wit’out sunglasses. Got too much guff fo’ dese eyes as a kid. It ain’ de same t’ing, but-”
“Y’all can relate, kind’a.”
“Mais oui. An’ fo’ de record, you’ more den enough girl fo’ dis one.” Remy pulls her down into his lap. “An’ I’m a greedy man who wants every inch o’ dat girl fo’ himself.
036. As Long As You'll Have Me
She lies on her side next to him, his head pillowed on her arm, and toys with his hair, smoothing it back from Remy’s face in slow, even strokes. His eyes are half open, but linger shut a little longer each time he blinks, and sleep vies against Rogue for his attention. A single filigree ray of silver light ekes through her curtains and falls across his lips, and she runs one gloved fingertip along its path.
“Christ, Rem, ah love your eyes,” she murmurs. He barely hears her through the whisper of a dream beginning to steal through his thoughts. “Y’ look at me an’ Ah feel like Ah could fall into them an’ burn forever. Like there’s no one else in the world but you an’ me.”
He turns his face into her shoulder and sighs, sinking further into sleep. Rogue presses a kiss to his hair. “Sometimes Ah wonder what god smiled on me when Ah met you, or what Ah did t’ be so lucky. Ah don’t deserve it. Ah’m selfish an’ awful an’ a miserable, whining wreck half th’ time.”
Small, sleepy sounds gather at the back of his throat, releasing with the long rush of breath she feels against her neck. She wants to pull him closer, but her cheek would end up against his forehead. She feels far away.
“An’ y’all are so sweet an’ silly an’ patient with me. Y’all have no sense, fer bein’ with someone who cain’t even kiss y’ properly, but…y’ don’ know how much it meant t’ me, that y’all were never afraid o’ what Ah could do t’ you. Ah’ve forgotten what it felt like, without you. What it’s like t’ be afraid t’ be held, an’ t’ hold someone else. Ah never want t’ remember.”
Remy shifts lower against her body in his sleep, and Rogue lays her cheek against his hair, feeling the slow rise and fall of his chest beneath her palm. “Yer a better man than anyone Ah know, m’love. Someday Ah’ll be able to show you that like you deserve, but Ah’ll do mah best tryin’ fer now. As long as you’ll have me.”
037. Paralyzing
Remy rotates his shoulders, stretching and wincing with each pop and crack of his joints. She grimaces for him from the other side of the bed.
“Everythin’ okay, sugar?”
The ripples of muscle underneath his skin shift again with each swing of his arms, hoping the movement will loosen them back up. “Yeah, jus’ a little sore. Misjudged a pole-vault workin’ with Piotr in de DR an’ m’ fingers on’y jus’ caught de edge o’ de opposide roof. Took some work t’ hoist m’self up.”
Rogue crawls onto the bed and kneels, beckoning him over. “C’mere. Let me take care of you.” Remy moves to yank his shirt back on, but she shakes her head. “Leave it off fer now?”
His eyebrows knit. “You sure? ‘S not like you.”
She nods, biting her lip and peering at him from beneath a lock of silver hair. “Ah’m all covered up. ‘S alright.” She leans over to take his hand. “‘M not afraid o’ hurtin’ you.”
That’s enough reassurance for him, and Remy stretches out on his stomach beside her, arms sliding up beneath the pillows and holding still as she throws her leg over him to sit gingerly on the backs of his thighs. Her soft, thin gloves smooth over the expanse of his back, gently at first, then back up to press harder into his shoulders. Every touch is deliberate and sure, and Rogue sets about working the kinks from his muscles one by one. She moves slowly, varying the pressure with each contented sigh that passes his lips, following his requests to push harder or touch him more softly depending on where he hurts the most. Her thumbs knead circles between his shoulder blades and slide along either side of his spine, fingers press and rub into the small of his back, and she takes such sweet, languid time with every last inch inch of him that it almost lulls Remy to sleep-if not for the heat that’s rushed below his belt with her every touch. Nothing else in the world exists but her hands. The last thing she does is reach up to work the muscles in his arms and it feels so good he moans into the pillow.
“Can’t move. Too relaxed,” he groans. “Girl massage paralyzin’.”
“Then don’t,” she says, and changes position on top of him to face the opposite way, straddling his back. “Glad it feels good, but Ah’m not quite done.” He feels her fingertips press the muscles in his ass and after a minute of sweet torture he can’t quite take anymore. Remy turns onto his back beneath her and she yelps at the sudden thrust of his hips into hers.
“Glad t’ see yer movin’ again,” Rogue gasps.
The grin sliding over his lips promises all kinds of trouble. “Mus’ be a miracle.”
038. Bedtime Stories
It’s almost midnight, and Remy LeBeau has been nowhere to be seen for the past couple of hours. Rogue creeps through the quiet mansion in her pajamas, hoping he won’t mind she’s going to go to bed without him if he’s disappeared much longer.
“Remy? Where’ve you-” She peers around the doorframe of the library and smiles, the kind that sneaks across your lips and can’t help but steal the corners of your eyes and squeeze your heart a little in the process. Her love is out cold snoring in one of the window seats, a half-finished copy of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban dangling from his hand, with seven-year-old Rahne Sinclair in teddy-bear print pajamas passed out cold in his lap.
Rogue stands there for a minute, leaning against the doorjamb, branding the sight into her memory and tucking it away where no one else’s thoughts can reach or taint it. But she can’t imagine it’s terribly warm, leaning up against the window like that, and darts quietly down the hall to the linen closet.
Remy stirs for a second, the sound of her retreating footfalls almost enough to set his ears alert, but by the time she returns with an armload of blankets he’s already sunken further back into sleep. Carefully she drapes one huge, fluffy duvet over him and Rahne, tucking in as much of the edge as she can between the two sleepyheads and the cold glass without waking them. Marking the page in their book, Rogue sets it aside and settles herself in beside them on the floor, wrapping the last of the blankets into a den around herself and ducking beneath his free arm, her cheek against the seat cushion.
“G’night, you two.”
039. Consuming
Her body works him long and slow and the stroke of her taking him, over and over, steady like the heartbeat that pounds in his ears keeps him hanging back just at the edge, and Remy can almost taste the tension coiled in her, the sweet anticipation of things hanging, taunting her, just beyond her reach. Her heat around him thrums with his pulse, his hips roll into her and he can’t keep from-closer, closer, closer, ohhh God, chere, jus’ like that, jus’ there-
And in that moment he pulls Rogue’s mouth down to his and everything, every sound and taste and blazing, sweet sensation in his body comes rushing through her head, molten white heat and the sheer, heart-swelling immensity of feeling she cannot name crashes down so consuming and wild that she breaks away and collapses, sobbing from the force of it, against his chest. Her lungs feel tight and over-used as she fights for air, her entire body boneless with release as she shakes in his arms and Remy struggles to run trembling fingers through her hair. He feels the warm, wet slide of her tears as they seep through his shirt.
“‘M sorry…fo’ forcin’ you,” he rasps; the broken sobs and jagged rise and fall of her breath against him feel painful to his sluggish nerves and he hopes to heaven that he hasn’t hurt her.
“No, sweet,” Rogue pleads, laying her palm against his cheek. “Ah’m jus’…” She has no words for it, the waves of his release still rocking through her like…like nothing she can even find the words for. “Overwhelmed. Ah cain’t…Ah don’ know how t’…”
Remy smiles weakly, closing his eyes and letting his hand slide down to rest at her back, the weight of his own arm too heavy to hold in her hair. “Wanted y’…t’ feel what I do…wit’ you.”
She wraps herself closer around him, pressing her face to his shoulder. His love still pulses through her as her breathing eases down and she struggles to contain it as the tears streak hotly down her face. “Ah love you doesn’ sound like enough, comin’ from me,” Rogue murmurs.
Oblivion steals the last of Remy’s strength, and he has just enough breath left to sigh. “Go…t’ sleep, girl.”
040. A Betting Game
Rogue slides up behind him at the counter, running one hand up his chest and the other down the ridged muscles of his stomach. Her fingers tease at his skin through his shirt. Remy leans back against her, growling low in his throat, and reaches one hand around to squeeze at the back of her thigh.
“Only one way t’ settle this, Cajun,” she says into his ear. One slender hand slips into his front pocket, and he’s just starting to enjoy the warm dance of her breath over his neck when she sharply withdraws the deck of cards from his pants and dances back away from him. Wearing a smirk on those wine-red lips of hers, that he’d much rather watch closing around something other than the card she’s taken between her teeth. “Play ya fer it?”
His lips slide into his own sinful, matching grin and takes the deck back from her. “Dis one’ll let you pick de game, since de win’ll be mine either way.”
“Y’all will be eatin’ those words in a minute, Ah promise!”
“Ah, chere,” he laughs, “we’ll see, won’ we? So, Draw, Stud, o’ Hold ‘Em?”
“Ah’m likin’ the sound o’…” Rogue eyes him up and down, and runs her tongue over her bottom lip. “…stud poker fer tonight.”
“An’ you’ always de one callin me fresh.” He shakes his head and deals her in.
Turns out it wouldn’t have mattered which variant she chose, because she finds herself thoroughly trounced, best out of five.
“Fine. Ah rescind mah earlier statement. Y’all win.” Rogue tries to hide her smile behind an injured sulk and throws her hands up in defeat. “Y’ get t’ be the naked party in th’ shared shower. But so help me, Remy, if Ah find out y'all had an ace up yer sleeve or were stackin’ the deck-”
He pulls out her chair and picks her up by the waist, laughing against her shirt and testing the flesh of her shoulder with his teeth. “-Could you blame dis one fo’ it?”
Remy smoking.
And some cuties being cute with each other.
Teary eyes.
031. Scruff
The bathroom sink is running with the door open. Rogue can hear it all the way down the hall and rolls her eyes, assuming one of the kids had left it on, but the sight she’s met with is of an entirely different sort.
“Excuse me, sir,” she drawls from the bathroom doorway, leaning arms-crossed against the frame, “but what on Earth are y’all doin’?”
Remy freezes with the shave gel and a razor halfway to his face. “Shavin’…” he says warily, cutting his eyes sideways at her. “Jus’ what it looks like.”
“Ah’ll miss the scruff, though,” Rogue says, sidling up beside him at the sink and smoothing her hand over his stubble. He leans his face into the touch.
“Dis one’s been smooth-faced b’fore, an’ didn’t hear you doin’ much complainin’ ‘bout it, girl.” He kisses her palm and turns back to the mirror.
“It’s because Ah never notice how much Ah love you all prickly an’ devil-may-care until you’ve gone clean-cut again.” Rogue slips around him to press herself against his back, one hand sliding up his chest to lightly scratch the stubble at the hinge of his jaw. “When we’re in bed an’ y’ rub your face against my shoulder-”
“-An’ other places,” Remy adds, quirking half of his mouth into a smile.
“-an’ the scruff scratches through my shirt…it feels nice.” Her arms settle loosely around his waist and she presses her cheek to his back, planting a kiss right between his shoulder blades while he goes about lathering up his face. “It’s the one thing Ah can feel without a barrier. Ah feel silly sayin’ it, but it’s like bein’ a little less far away from y’all. If that makes sense.”
“Den dis one’ll keep a goatee an’ jus’ get rid o’ de itchy neck stubble,” Remy smiles, tilting his head to see as much of his throat as possible without nicking himself. “Dat work fo’ you?”
Rogue bites her bottom lip, controlling a smile that’s far too bright a response for what seems like so small a gesture. It’s remarkable how the most insignificant things make her feel so unfathomably cared for. Overreaction? Probably. Sappy? Absolutely. But she’ll take feeling ridiculous and loved over suave and apathetic any day.
“Suits me jus’ fine.” She hops up onto the counter and takes the razor from him. He closes his eyes when she threads her fingers through his hair, angling his face where she can reach him. “Thank you, sugar.”
032. Just Like the Movies
A series of pinprick-taps rain down on Rogue’s balcony door and she whips her head around; there’s a playing card shoved into the accent slats on the glass, glowing faintly pink against the blue-black sky outside. How Remy got it up there without her noticing will apparently be a question for the ages. It’s not charged enough to do anything more than fizzle and she knows it, but she slides out of bed and snatches it anyway, preferring to err on the side of caution. Explaining a shattered door to the Professor isn’t something she’d like to pencil into her day tomorrow.
Remy’s elegant scrawl spills across the ace of spades. Come outside.
Well, alright then.
There’s gravel on the floor when she opens the door, which would explain the noise that startled the tar out of her. “You comin’?” Remy yells from the ground, leaning on his motorcycle and dressed to impress in blue jeans, a white tee, and black leather jacket dangling over his shoulder.
“In a minute! ‘S chilly out here!” Rogue leans out over the balcony, grinning like she’s just stepped into one of those goofy teenage romance movies, and disappears back into her room for a second.
“It’s August. You’ crazy.” By the time she trots back outside, robe thrown over her shoulders, he’s tapping his foot and checking an imaginary watch.
“Hold yer horses, Danny Zuko, Ah’m right here!” Rogue vaults herself over the balcony rail and Remy has a minor aneurysm when she halts about six inches from the ground, and steps gracefully out of the air.
“Girl, don’ scare me like dat,” Remy says, pressing a hand to his heart and firing up his bike. She doesn’t even try to hide the childlike grin hijacking her face. “A man don’ have enough time t’ react befo’ he remembers you don’ need catchin’.”
He helps her up behind him and she hugs his waist, face nuzzled into his back. “Sorry, love. Yer face, though, when Ah jumped? Too funny.”
“Oh hush up, girl, can’t y’ see dis one’s tryin’ t’ be romantic?”
“An’ Ah’m lovin’ every schmaltzy second of it.” Rogue presses a kiss to his back. “So, where’re we off to, mah knight in greaser armor?”
She cant hear him laugh over the engine, but she feels it. “Anywhere you want.”
033. Mississippi Moon
“That. Was too much food.”
Remy leans over from his spot on the picnic blanket to kiss her temple through her hair, ice cubes clinking in his glass of sweet tea. “Dis one didn’ force you t’ stuff you’ face, girl. Don’ be blamin’ dat stomachache on me.”
“Yeah,” Rogue groans from where she lays sprawled out on her back, seriously considering curling herself around Remy and slipping into a food coma. “But you did all the cooking. Ah jus’ cain’t resist southern food when it’s made by someone who knows what’s what. These clothes Ah’m wearin’ barely fit anymore.”
He chuckles, plugging his iPod into the speaker she’d brought with them, and riffles through the music, finally settling on the Doobie Brothers’ “Black Water”. “If y’ gotta blame someone, blame Tante Mattie. She’s responsible fo’ all o’ dis one’s culinary misdeeds. But I’m takin’ de credit for helpin’ you feel svelte again in dat pretty sundress.” He extends his hand to her. “Dance wit’ me a little?”
Remy helps her to her feet, and Rogue would be lying if she said she didn’t feel a little silly, dancing with him in the middle of the lawn. But the easy strains of that languid Southern fiddle spiral lazily around them (Mississippi moon, won’t you keep on shining on me?), and swaying with him in the grass, with those strong arms around her back, might just feel like the most comfortable thing in the world. She nestles her face against his shoulder, and one of Remy’s hands wanders up to thread through her hair.
(Gonna make everything, pretty mama, gonna make everything alright.)
“This’s nice,” Rogue purrs into his shirt, warm and happy and perfectly, blissfully at ease, whiling away the summer evening with no one but her love for company. “Can we do this again, soon?”
“Mmm, when dis one gets de chance t’ re-stock de kitchen, den yes,” Remy smiles, resting his chin atop her head. “Unless you’ jus’ lookin’ fo’ an afternoon outside alone. I’d be happy t’ oblige dat anytime.”
Rogue smiles to herself, and closes her eyes. “Ah love you.” She wishes they could stay like this for the rest of the night, all relaxed and sleepy and wrapped around each other like ivy. “Y’all are too good t’ me, LeBeau.”
“Jus’ like bein’ wit’ you, chere,” he murmurs. “Dat’s all.”
(And I ain’t got no worries, ‘cause I ain’t in no hurry at all…)
034. Ignition
“Hey, Cajun!” Rogue yells from across the garage, and Remy looks up from where he’s rooting around for the basketball pump. She’s straddling his motorcycle and grinning, her hair falling across one eye, and and his brain begins violently warring over whether to find the sight drop-dead sexy or mildly alarming. “What’re the odds of y’all teachin’ me how t’ drive this thing?”
“It’s not dat dis one don’ trust you, chere,” he says, lifting her by the waist off of his baby, “But if you’ gonna learn anyt’ing, it’s gonna be on a junkier bike dan mine. One o’ Scott’s, maybe.”
She laughs and lets him set her down in front of him, tracing her fingers across the shining silver handlebars. “Ah won’ tell him y’ called his precious babies junk, don’ worry. But fair enough. Ah wouldn’ trust me with it, either.”
“C’mere. Scott won’ mind if I let y’ start de ol’ crap Harley he hasn’ started fixin’ yet. Just start, though.” Remy reaches for the key on the workbench and catches the gleam in her eye. He’d rather not give her any ideas. “Last t’ing dis one needs is highway wreck an’ third-degree burns when Scott finds out you got away from me wit’ one o’ his toys.”
Rogue’s mouth drops open in mock shock and injury. “Ah would never!”
“Nuh-uh, dis one knows dat look. You’ always up t’ somet’in.” Remy says through narrowed eyes and a sideways grin when she climbs onto the back of Scott’s banged-up old Harley, and he settles himself on it behind her. “First t’ing y’ do is kick up de stand an’ turn on de fuel valve, den pull de choke knob out.” he says, leaning down and guiding her hand to show her where it is. He hands her the key. “De ignition’s over here, by de gas tank.”
She turns it and knits her eyebrows. “Nothing’s happening.”
“Dat’s ‘cause y’ haven’t tripped de kill switch yet.” He points to the button on the right handlebar, setting his chin on her shoulder. “Turn dat on, den squeeze de clutch.” His hand over hers helps her pull in the lever on the left handlebar. “Den put you’ foot here.” Remy guides her left foot onto the gearshift. “Now half a click up puts it in neutral-atta girl, like dat. An’ now y’ hit de start button.”
The engine sputters and groans, then purrs to life beneath them and Rogue whips around, grinning like a kid with a brand-new toy. Remy laughs. “Calm down, spitfire. Let de ol’ girl warm up. Den y’ can push de choke back in an’ roll de throttle toward y’ t’ rev de engine.”
Her grin widens. “Can Ah?”
“Oh no, we done fo’ now, or Scott’ll kill dis one dead.” He turns the ignition off and trips the kill switch back up, and Rogue pouts like she’s just been denied the tastiest candy in the shop. Remy leans forward and kisses her hair tucked behind her ear. “But if you’ itchin’ fo’ a ride so bad, I wouldn’ mind sittin’ you on de back o’ dis one’s bike an’ lettin’ you cling t’ me fo’ dear life.”
035. Belle Fille
“Girl, why you gotta go an’ be like dat, wearin’ t’ings dat make dis one want t’ touch you all over jus’ t’ see me squirm?” Remy heaves a long-suffering sigh at the sight of her off-the-shoulder blouse. The filmy fabric drifts around her frame as she sweeps past him, and he reaches out to run his hands over the parts of her he can safely touch with bare hands.
“Well, Ah would kill fer a good, long, weak-at-the-knees kind’a kiss right now, but we cain’t all get what we want, can we?” She leans over him in his chair, standing between his knees, and kisses the top of his head. “Now hush up an’ let a girl feel pretty fer a little while.”
“What you talkin’ ‘bout?” he asks, drawing her closer. “Dis one has t’ suppress de urge t’ beat de tar out o’ anyone foolish enough t’ undress y’ wit’ his eyes when y’ walk into a room. I like bein’ de only man who’s earned dat privilege.”
Rogue laughs. “Now that’d be somethin’ t’ see, you dealin’ death an’ destruction nex’ time we’re out. Ah’m envisioning many singed bystanders…”
“Jus’ protectin’ you’ honor, mon belle fille. An’ we ain’t never goin’ t’ no bars t’gether, o’ Remy’ll end up in jail fo’ assaut an’ battery.” Before she has the chance to push him away, he pulls her close and breathes her in, holding her steady with sure hands at her waist. She giggles and struggles for a second, but there’s no fight in her, and soon enough she drapes her arms around his neck. Remy kisses where he can reach between her breasts and lets her go. “But in all seriousness, what you sayin’ bout feelin’ pretty, chere?”
She sighs. “Ah tagged along t’ some mall somewhere with Kitty an’ Jubes earlier, an’ the two of them kept duckin’ in an’ out of stores, tryin’ things on, an’…Ah dunno, Ah’m afraid o’ doin’ things like that when there’re so many other people milling around. Lord only knows what Ah might do if Ah brushed against someone by accident.” Rogue scratches his back through his shirt, just to touch him. “‘S havin’ t’ hang back all the time. Ah cain’t act like a girl with the rest of ‘em like Ah want to.”
“If it’s any consolation,” he says, “dis one’ll never show his face in public wit’out sunglasses. Got too much guff fo’ dese eyes as a kid. It ain’ de same t’ing, but-”
“Y’all can relate, kind’a.”
“Mais oui. An’ fo’ de record, you’ more den enough girl fo’ dis one.” Remy pulls her down into his lap. “An’ I’m a greedy man who wants every inch o’ dat girl fo’ himself.
036. As Long As You'll Have Me
She lies on her side next to him, his head pillowed on her arm, and toys with his hair, smoothing it back from Remy’s face in slow, even strokes. His eyes are half open, but linger shut a little longer each time he blinks, and sleep vies against Rogue for his attention. A single filigree ray of silver light ekes through her curtains and falls across his lips, and she runs one gloved fingertip along its path.
“Christ, Rem, ah love your eyes,” she murmurs. He barely hears her through the whisper of a dream beginning to steal through his thoughts. “Y’ look at me an’ Ah feel like Ah could fall into them an’ burn forever. Like there’s no one else in the world but you an’ me.”
He turns his face into her shoulder and sighs, sinking further into sleep. Rogue presses a kiss to his hair. “Sometimes Ah wonder what god smiled on me when Ah met you, or what Ah did t’ be so lucky. Ah don’t deserve it. Ah’m selfish an’ awful an’ a miserable, whining wreck half th’ time.”
Small, sleepy sounds gather at the back of his throat, releasing with the long rush of breath she feels against her neck. She wants to pull him closer, but her cheek would end up against his forehead. She feels far away.
“An’ y’all are so sweet an’ silly an’ patient with me. Y’all have no sense, fer bein’ with someone who cain’t even kiss y’ properly, but…y’ don’ know how much it meant t’ me, that y’all were never afraid o’ what Ah could do t’ you. Ah’ve forgotten what it felt like, without you. What it’s like t’ be afraid t’ be held, an’ t’ hold someone else. Ah never want t’ remember.”
Remy shifts lower against her body in his sleep, and Rogue lays her cheek against his hair, feeling the slow rise and fall of his chest beneath her palm. “Yer a better man than anyone Ah know, m’love. Someday Ah’ll be able to show you that like you deserve, but Ah’ll do mah best tryin’ fer now. As long as you’ll have me.”
037. Paralyzing
Remy rotates his shoulders, stretching and wincing with each pop and crack of his joints. She grimaces for him from the other side of the bed.
“Everythin’ okay, sugar?”
The ripples of muscle underneath his skin shift again with each swing of his arms, hoping the movement will loosen them back up. “Yeah, jus’ a little sore. Misjudged a pole-vault workin’ with Piotr in de DR an’ m’ fingers on’y jus’ caught de edge o’ de opposide roof. Took some work t’ hoist m’self up.”
Rogue crawls onto the bed and kneels, beckoning him over. “C’mere. Let me take care of you.” Remy moves to yank his shirt back on, but she shakes her head. “Leave it off fer now?”
His eyebrows knit. “You sure? ‘S not like you.”
She nods, biting her lip and peering at him from beneath a lock of silver hair. “Ah’m all covered up. ‘S alright.” She leans over to take his hand. “‘M not afraid o’ hurtin’ you.”
That’s enough reassurance for him, and Remy stretches out on his stomach beside her, arms sliding up beneath the pillows and holding still as she throws her leg over him to sit gingerly on the backs of his thighs. Her soft, thin gloves smooth over the expanse of his back, gently at first, then back up to press harder into his shoulders. Every touch is deliberate and sure, and Rogue sets about working the kinks from his muscles one by one. She moves slowly, varying the pressure with each contented sigh that passes his lips, following his requests to push harder or touch him more softly depending on where he hurts the most. Her thumbs knead circles between his shoulder blades and slide along either side of his spine, fingers press and rub into the small of his back, and she takes such sweet, languid time with every last inch inch of him that it almost lulls Remy to sleep-if not for the heat that’s rushed below his belt with her every touch. Nothing else in the world exists but her hands. The last thing she does is reach up to work the muscles in his arms and it feels so good he moans into the pillow.
“Can’t move. Too relaxed,” he groans. “Girl massage paralyzin’.”
“Then don’t,” she says, and changes position on top of him to face the opposite way, straddling his back. “Glad it feels good, but Ah’m not quite done.” He feels her fingertips press the muscles in his ass and after a minute of sweet torture he can’t quite take anymore. Remy turns onto his back beneath her and she yelps at the sudden thrust of his hips into hers.
“Glad t’ see yer movin’ again,” Rogue gasps.
The grin sliding over his lips promises all kinds of trouble. “Mus’ be a miracle.”
038. Bedtime Stories
It’s almost midnight, and Remy LeBeau has been nowhere to be seen for the past couple of hours. Rogue creeps through the quiet mansion in her pajamas, hoping he won’t mind she’s going to go to bed without him if he’s disappeared much longer.
“Remy? Where’ve you-” She peers around the doorframe of the library and smiles, the kind that sneaks across your lips and can’t help but steal the corners of your eyes and squeeze your heart a little in the process. Her love is out cold snoring in one of the window seats, a half-finished copy of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban dangling from his hand, with seven-year-old Rahne Sinclair in teddy-bear print pajamas passed out cold in his lap.
Rogue stands there for a minute, leaning against the doorjamb, branding the sight into her memory and tucking it away where no one else’s thoughts can reach or taint it. But she can’t imagine it’s terribly warm, leaning up against the window like that, and darts quietly down the hall to the linen closet.
Remy stirs for a second, the sound of her retreating footfalls almost enough to set his ears alert, but by the time she returns with an armload of blankets he’s already sunken further back into sleep. Carefully she drapes one huge, fluffy duvet over him and Rahne, tucking in as much of the edge as she can between the two sleepyheads and the cold glass without waking them. Marking the page in their book, Rogue sets it aside and settles herself in beside them on the floor, wrapping the last of the blankets into a den around herself and ducking beneath his free arm, her cheek against the seat cushion.
“G’night, you two.”
039. Consuming
Her body works him long and slow and the stroke of her taking him, over and over, steady like the heartbeat that pounds in his ears keeps him hanging back just at the edge, and Remy can almost taste the tension coiled in her, the sweet anticipation of things hanging, taunting her, just beyond her reach. Her heat around him thrums with his pulse, his hips roll into her and he can’t keep from-closer, closer, closer, ohhh God, chere, jus’ like that, jus’ there-
And in that moment he pulls Rogue’s mouth down to his and everything, every sound and taste and blazing, sweet sensation in his body comes rushing through her head, molten white heat and the sheer, heart-swelling immensity of feeling she cannot name crashes down so consuming and wild that she breaks away and collapses, sobbing from the force of it, against his chest. Her lungs feel tight and over-used as she fights for air, her entire body boneless with release as she shakes in his arms and Remy struggles to run trembling fingers through her hair. He feels the warm, wet slide of her tears as they seep through his shirt.
“‘M sorry…fo’ forcin’ you,” he rasps; the broken sobs and jagged rise and fall of her breath against him feel painful to his sluggish nerves and he hopes to heaven that he hasn’t hurt her.
“No, sweet,” Rogue pleads, laying her palm against his cheek. “Ah’m jus’…” She has no words for it, the waves of his release still rocking through her like…like nothing she can even find the words for. “Overwhelmed. Ah cain’t…Ah don’ know how t’…”
Remy smiles weakly, closing his eyes and letting his hand slide down to rest at her back, the weight of his own arm too heavy to hold in her hair. “Wanted y’…t’ feel what I do…wit’ you.”
She wraps herself closer around him, pressing her face to his shoulder. His love still pulses through her as her breathing eases down and she struggles to contain it as the tears streak hotly down her face. “Ah love you doesn’ sound like enough, comin’ from me,” Rogue murmurs.
Oblivion steals the last of Remy’s strength, and he has just enough breath left to sigh. “Go…t’ sleep, girl.”
040. A Betting Game
Rogue slides up behind him at the counter, running one hand up his chest and the other down the ridged muscles of his stomach. Her fingers tease at his skin through his shirt. Remy leans back against her, growling low in his throat, and reaches one hand around to squeeze at the back of her thigh.
“Only one way t’ settle this, Cajun,” she says into his ear. One slender hand slips into his front pocket, and he’s just starting to enjoy the warm dance of her breath over his neck when she sharply withdraws the deck of cards from his pants and dances back away from him. Wearing a smirk on those wine-red lips of hers, that he’d much rather watch closing around something other than the card she’s taken between her teeth. “Play ya fer it?”
His lips slide into his own sinful, matching grin and takes the deck back from her. “Dis one’ll let you pick de game, since de win’ll be mine either way.”
“Y’all will be eatin’ those words in a minute, Ah promise!”
“Ah, chere,” he laughs, “we’ll see, won’ we? So, Draw, Stud, o’ Hold ‘Em?”
“Ah’m likin’ the sound o’…” Rogue eyes him up and down, and runs her tongue over her bottom lip. “…stud poker fer tonight.”
“An’ you’ always de one callin me fresh.” He shakes his head and deals her in.
Turns out it wouldn’t have mattered which variant she chose, because she finds herself thoroughly trounced, best out of five.
“Fine. Ah rescind mah earlier statement. Y’all win.” Rogue tries to hide her smile behind an injured sulk and throws her hands up in defeat. “Y’ get t’ be the naked party in th’ shared shower. But so help me, Remy, if Ah find out y'all had an ace up yer sleeve or were stackin’ the deck-”
He pulls out her chair and picks her up by the waist, laughing against her shirt and testing the flesh of her shoulder with his teeth. “-Could you blame dis one fo’ it?”
Remy smoking.
And some cuties being cute with each other.
Teary eyes.