Chapter 1

A stairway to oblivion is better than no stairway at all. -

The Suburban Book Of The Dead

Skyscrapers touch the sky in this place, a bridge between heaven and earth. Heat haze warps the horizon as the sun floats to a languid point between the buildings, promising a temperature that few will bother to savour.

City of contradictions, that's what he liked to call it. A place where everything veered wildly, from broken ruins to suburban bliss, while burning suns were lost and ignored in the icy control of air conditioners. A hundred conflicting cultures lived here, side by side with equal amounts of adoration and disdain.

No place on Earth quite like it.

Logan pulled his sleek, black car into the parking space with practised ease, grabbing his suit jacket and briefcase from the seat beside him as he shut and locked the doors.

He bounded up the stairs from the subterranean car park with unconscious dexterity, emerging into the brightly-lit offices he had walked into almost every day of his life.

"Use the damn elevator like everyone else, ya health-conscious lunatic," grunted Warren as he staggered past under the weight of a year's worth of box-filed receipts.

"Mornin' Warren," smirked Logan. "Need a hand?"

"No, I need a fucking chiropractor..."

Logan laughed, swinging his briefcase idly as he stepped out past the elevators and through the double glass doors leading into the main offices.

"Hey, Scott," he nodded as he passed the bored-looking security guard. Scott grunted slightly and went back to his paperback romance novel.

Grabbing a mug of coffee from the refreshment table, Logan sauntered between the scattered desks, taking a long look around his office with a certain sense of pride.

The floor was busy with people bustling forward and back, telephones ringing sporadically, the computers humming in almost perfect synch with the air conditioning...

Efficiency almost physically oozed from it.

Logan took a mouthful of coffee and grimaced, hastily spitting the stone cold liquid back into the mug.

"Morning, Logan," smiled Kitty.

"You know this coffee's cold, right?" he replied.

"Nice to see you too," replied the woman, rolling her eyes as she carried a bundle of papers to the photocopier.

"Hey! Logan!" came an excited voice.

"Bobby..." Logan spun round and doubled back to the younger man's desk.

The domain of the office junior was a small but distinctive one. Bobby was leaning backwards on the rear two legs of his chair, the small slice of desk space before him littered with assorted pieces of paper and small plastic novelty toys from fast food meals.

Logan raised his eyebrow in amusement, leaning an elbow on the corner of the cubicle wall.

Bobby pulled the one of the headphones out of his ear, the faint metallic swooshing noise emanating from it pulsing in time with the music that it played.

"Dude, I just found the most kick-ass MP3s... You should listen to some of this shit, I'm like, it's a weird, spaced out half-way point between the first half of Liquid Tension Experiment's second album and the last part of Pain of Salvation's 'Ashes' but with this riff happening that's more like..."

"You know you're not supposed to use the office computers to download this crap, don't you, Bobby?" Logan interrupted, smiling slightly.

"Hey, what's the point of this kind of bandwidth if you can't grab a few decent tunes while you work...?" he grinned in reply. "How else will the world discover the wonder of Dir En Grey? I mean it's like Japanese Cradle of Filth but with cooler guitars..."

Logan silently rolled his eyes.

"Here Bobby," he said, "I brought you a coffee."

"Hey thanks, man..."

Logan breathed a sigh of relief as he reached his office.

"Morning, Marie," he smiled as he stopped before his secretary's desk. "Any mail this morning?"

She nodded.

"Yep, it's all on your desk. A request for a copy of the Milner bids you handled last year, this morning's stock reports, the results of the Turner lawsuit and two begging letters asking for a mere five bucks a month to help starving children in third world countries and/or abused small animals. I put the shredder by your desk for you."

Logan laughed.

"So young, so cynical... what would I ever do without you?"

She raised her brow. "Heaven forbid, you would have to open your own mail..."

He smiled as he opened his office door.

Marie had been his secretary for four years now. Always meticulous, always dependable, always covering for him when he got side-tracked, utterly unflappable and so good at making up excuses for him it was almost frightening.

He smiled the grateful and happy smile of a man with what can only be classified as the world's most perfect secretary as he flipped through his mail, humming quietly under his breath.

Marie poked her head round the door.

"Oh, and Logan, Hank called three times this morning already. Can you call him back or at least give him a date for this review he's after?"

Logan groaned.

"Christ, I told him it'd be Tuesday already. He'll have it by Tuesday, no earlier, no later, and for God's sake tell him to stop calling me!"

"He's your boss, I can't easily tell him to go away," she smiled.

"I know, but a guy can dream can't he...?" said Logan, flashing her a cheesy grin.

~o~

The morning dragged on uneventfully, monotonous trails of paperwork accumulating on the corner of his desk as Logan sifted through reports.

There was a light tap on his door and Marie poked her head round.

"Logan?"

He glanced up from the document he was studying, distractedly waving her inside.

She stepped out from behind the half-opened door.

"I'm going to lunch, was there anything you wanted me to get or will you be going out for something later?"

He glanced at his watch, surprised at how late it had become.

"Uh... Going out I guess... is this time right?" he asked, holding his wrist out at her.

She stepped closer and glanced at it.

"Yep, your watch is fine... and, uh... you have a smudge on your nose..." she said, waving her finger down the left side of her face.

He distractedly rubbed his cheek with the back of his hand, smearing the mark further across his face. Marie rolled her eyes and fished out a tissue.

"You making it worse, hold still..."

She leaned over the desk and tilted his face up slightly, holding it in place with her fingers under his chin as she wiped at the smudgy black mark.

"What were you doing, reading or coal mining?" she asked with a smile as she straightened.

He wrinkled his nose and grunted.

"Thanks."

"No problem."

She stared at him for a second and then, sensing she would get no more conversation, took her leave.

The sun was high in the heat-misted sky when Logan finally emerged for lunch, stepping out of the blissfully air-conditioned building and into a sweltering, humid street.

He watched with bemused curiosity as two men wearing nothing but brightly coloured balloons wandered past, pausing to accost a terrified old lady for a photo opportunity before getting ushered on by the police.

"Heat's sent people a little crazy..." he muttered, loosening his tie.

He flipped open the top button of his shirt as well, letting the faint traces of breeze circulate nearer to his hot skin.

He was sweating slightly already, the saturated air clinging to him as he walked.

The restaurant was crowded when he got there, only a couple of free seats left among the throng of hungry shoppers that seemed to fill the place to bursting point. He parked himself resolutely in a corner, scowling at anyone and everyone who looked as though they might dare ask to share his table with him.

Somewhere on the other side of the room a baby started screaming and Logan cringed, pinching the bridge of his nose in an effort to stave off the burgeoning headache he could feel starting to creep between his eyes.

He was a man with stress. Children weren't going to fix that.

Logan ordered his usual and bolted it down, gathering his things and making his escape before the incessant, whimpering child made him even more glad he was single.

He paused for a second, curiosity making him glance over at the parents.

The pride and love they held for the squirming bundle of noise was almost palpable. He could see it smeared over their faces in broad, coloured streaks, like an impressionist painter gone crazy with a palette knife.

Logan shook his head, wrinkling his nose with a small moue of distaste.

Not in this lifetime, bub.

Besides... have to find a woman who'll put up with ya first...

~o~

They say hindsight is 20-20. It's pretty much true.

It was a good life all told, he figured, stepping out of the restaurant and back into the sweaty heat of the afternoon. Respectable, that was the word for it. A steady job and all the trappings of suburbia, and to all intents and purposes, he could claim to be pretty happy.

It was an odd thing, when you stopped to think about it. Look at him now... respected, wealthy, successful...

He had been young and wild once. Footloose and fancy-free and any other myriad euphemisms for delinquent.

And desperately miserable.

But if you'd stopped to ask him what would have made him happy he would have had only one answer.

Anything but this... Dear God, not the city, not wasting away in a cube under a sea of filing...

Too much pride for that. Too much arrogance.

But people change, and if people don't change then events seem to have an unerring way of conspiring against them.

Conspired... that was a good way of putting it.

He laughed.

He'd been only just eighteen then. Barely even a man. But that had been fifteen long years ago and everything had changed.

He remembered it vividly because he remembered how much of an asshole he'd been.

So certain he was better than the rest of the world, so certain that it was him against everyone else and then... then it had all fallen apart and he'd been left with only one option.

Only one offer to save him from himself.

He still remembered the day Hank had brought him to work in the company. It was his only chance at redemption and all he'd done was sit and complain and wonder why Hank should care about him anyway. Then he'd looked at the offices and the secretaries and cursed them for being so high and mighty and wondered silently why it was that it was that they were so special that they got to have something he could never have.

Then day after day had passed and he'd stopped complaining and had somehow ended up going higher and higher until he was the one with the office and he was the one with the secretary and he was the one that people looked at and wondered...

And he still didn't know what made them special, until it dawned on him that they weren't. They'd just been doing the same old thing for an awful lot longer.

And to all intents and purposes, he told himself, he was happy...

~o~

"Logan? Hank called, he wanted to see you in his office as soon as you got back."

Logan groaned.

"Didn't say what he wanted, did he?"

Marie shook her head and reached for his coat and briefcase. "Here, you want me to put these away while you go and see what he wants?"

"Thanks, Darlin'," smiled Logan, handing over his things. "Just put it in the office, I shouldn't be long... I hope..."

Logan knocked lightly on Hank's door.

He receive a muffled "Come in" from the other side of the wood and took a deep breath, steeling himself to defend whatever it was that he'd done this time round to merit a trip to McCoy's corner of the building.

The large man looked up from his seat behind the expansive, wooden desk.

Logan took a brief glance round, pausing momentarily as he noticed they were not alone.

"Hank? You wanted to see me?"

"Ah, Logan, this is Jean Grey," said Hank, rising from his seat and gesturing the tall woman who was seated comfortably in front of his desk. Logan looked at her, briefly acknowledging her presence before turning his attention back to his superior.

"She's from the Manhattan offices," continued Hank. "She has the papers you needed for your review."

Logan breathed a silent sigh of relief and nodded to the bespectacled redhead, shaking her proffered hand.

"Nice to meet you."

She tipped her head slightly in response.

"So you're the infamous Logan? Your reputation precedes you."

"All good I hope," he replied, arching an eyebrow slightly.

She shot him an amused glance.

"Oh, eminently so."

Logan smiled slightly in response as Hank cleared his throat.

"Yes, well... Miss Grey, I believe you wanted to deliver those papers?"

"Ah, yes," she replied, flipping open her briefcase and pulling out a manila envelope. She handed it to Logan with a small smile.

"I think everything you requested is in there."

Logan took it and quickly pulled the papers out, rifling through them briefly.

"These will be a lot of help... thank you."

Jean nodded once more.

"If you need to discuss anything then I'll be in town for a few more days yet. Delivering papers was only part of my business here. I'm meant to be helping Xavier at the annual Board of Governors meeting this week, so if you need me I shouldn't be too hard to track down. I believe Hank has my number."

Hank nodded and tapped the business card on the top of his desk.

"Yes, I believe I have that covered."

Jean smiled.

"Good. I'm sorry to have to cut this so short but I have a lot of work to do today."

"Of course, Miss Grey," said Hank shaking her hand firmly. "It was very good of you to deliver the papers personally. You could have sent them by courier, we would have quite understood."

Jean laughed.

"And miss the opportunity of meeting the infamous Logan?"

She smiled at Logan's puzzled expression. "You're quite a household name back in Manhattan you know. Rising through the ranks so fast... the managing directors are positively in fear for their jobs."

Logan smirked. "Trust me, they have nothing to worry about."

Jean snapped her briefcase shut and rose out of the low armchair she had been seated in.

"Well then, if that's everything, I'd better be going. Hank, Logan, it was nice meeting you."

She picked up her things and left Hank's office, long legs vanishing upwards into a formal, grey business suit that swayed hypnotically as she picked her way across the chaotic tangle of desks outside. Logan watched her receding form with interest.

He turned to glance at Hank who was, in turn, watching him with barely disguised amusement.

"What?"

"You're going to ask me for her number now, aren't you? 'Just in case', I understand. Perfectly reasonable request..."

Logan scowled slightly at the large man behind the desk.

"Here, here have the damn card," said Hank, waving at it him. "I severely doubt I'll need it more than you do..."

Logan grumbled and snatched it from Hank's proffering fingers.

"Great," Logan growled.

"No trouble at all, my dear boy. No trouble," smirked Hank as Logan stomped from his office.

Watching Logan stride away the large man laughed and rolled his eyes.

"Kids today..."

Logan came back to his office with a thoughtful expression on his face.

"You look like a man who just found out the tooth fairy really does exist and is apparently exceptionally skilled at ALL things oral..." commented Marie, sipping at her coffee with a raised eyebrow.

Logan shot her a dirty look.

"You've been rehearsing that, haven't you?"

"Let me guess," she smirked. "The redhead, right?"

"Jean," murmured Logan.

Marie nodded thoughtfully. "Jean... right... I saw her on the way out and frankly, I'm hurt. I thought I was the only woman in your life."

Logan shook his head and smirked.

"You're impossible, Marie."

"No, just endearingly demanding."

"Marie, darlin'," he grinned, bowing elaborately and reaching for her hand to plant a soppy kiss across her knuckles, "You are the only woman I will ever need."

She laughed, swatting him away.

"God, you're hopeless... Is that a promise, sugar?"

He grinned broadly and winked at her before walking away, closing his door behind him as she shook her head with laughter.

Logan sat down heavily on his chair as he shut the rest of the office out, rolling his head back to look at the ceiling.

God she was gorgeous... he could picture her in his mind's eye exactly as she had been seated in Hank's office, the edge of her skirt riding up her thigh a little in the low armchair she was sitting in. He marvelled at his own self-restraint. All business, like it should be, but as soon as she was gone...

He could feel the flush rise to his face as he thought about her, all long legs and willowy curves, that twist of fiery hair pinned so neatly to the top of her head.

The epitome of cool, calm rationality, with that simmer of something underneath it all... and the edge of her stockings just tantalisingly out of sight.

He liked the flirt, the tease that he glimpsed as he spoke to her.

He wondered what it would be like to make her loose control. To get to see what it was she had tucked away under that all-business exterior.

He could picture it in his mind's eye, that glorious hair unpinned and floating around her shoulders and neck, the business suit swapped for something more delicious.

Logan flexed his fingers and blinked at the ceiling.

And then there was that invitation she'd offered...

He tapped the business card lightly on the edge of his desk.

Tap... tap...

An invitation... he repeated her words over in his mind. "Shouldn't be too hard to track down..."

A flicker of doubt crept over his fantasy. It was an invitation wasn't it...?

Tap... tap...

Sort of...

He looked at the card again then, a white rectangle sitting against the dark top of his desk.

Jean Grey, the company logo, office extension and cell phone number, all printed neatly in black on the pristine card.

Exactly the same card she would give to anybody. The card she had technically given to Hank before he even entered the room.

He huffed and scowled.

Shit...

~o~

Chapter 2

And Elvis said unto Eve

"Put down that apple and back away from the tree..." -

The Suburban Book of the Dead

Blissful euphoria... that was what it was. He could have wept with happiness as chemical joy held him tight like a protective lover, the brightest colours streaking by as he travelled. It was all so perfect that night, so bright and clean, the sky so pure and sparkling, like little snatches of heaven leaking through the black velvet darkness.

They ran in slowly dribbling rivulets in the night, leaking silver bliss over a world that sang with elation.

The car had appeared out of nowhere, he remembered that much, like a fragile ball of crystal crushed under his wheels as the vehicles collided, glass shattering like a razor blade fountain into the air.

A perfect moment of silence as heaven and earth shattered...

Then there was blood... he could feel it under his fingers as he pulled himself free, sliding from the broken door window of his car and falling to the earth with a limp slither like a newborn.

The screaming was burning into his head, unsure where it came from, unsure if it was his own voice or that of another, and as the world swam in circles he saw them...

Dead and broken and white, lax faces seeping still-warm blood onto the razor-glass fountain, colouring the water majestic, royal crimson.

And still there was screaming, in his body and in his ears, watching nothing and everything as small fists punched uselessly against the air as the child struggled free from the back seat of the shattered saloon. It cried with pain and sheer blind terror as its parents watched with dispassionate, blind eyes, their world tinted translucent red, seeing nothing beyond their smiles.

The pain in his legs burned deep but he pulled himself forward, the ground sticking and clinging at his body but not stopping him from reaching those small hands and dragging them as hard as he could, pulling as far as he could, clutching as hard as a desperate man is able.

It was all noise and pain in his head, crystal shards of glass on the floor beneath him scraping at his skin as he took the child in his arms, dragging them away over the cutting asphalt, somehow holding onto her as she struggled and kicked, screaming for parents who were beyond help.

And somewhere around them there were people and it was all chaos and lights, flashing blue on the red fountain as voices shouted and radios hummed, and all through it he held her in his arms as he lay on the ground, letting her kick and scream at his body because she had no one else to kick and scream at any more.

But eventually they took her from his arms and pulled them both away, zipping her parents closed in black plastic bags as she watched their ashen white faces, suddenly numb and silent and he could have cried for letting her see that, but in an instant she was gone and there was only the darkness once more.

He bolted upright in bed, chest heaving as he panted, gasping for long, painful breaths.

His skin was clammy and cold and he rubbed his face, wiping away the sweat on his forehead, clenching his eyes shut and trying to shake away the feeling in his skull.

God, he hadn't dreamed of her in so long...

He curled his legs under him, the phantom memory of the pain making them ache inside with a dull throb.

He tossed aside the bed sheets and shuffled towards the bathroom, splashing cold water on his face as he looked up into his reflection on the bathroom mirror.

Years didn't take away the guilt. He already knew that, just like they didn't take away the scars on his legs.

His face looked haunted, he thought.

Maybe he was.

He'd changed his life that night. Sworn to make things different.

He'd taken two lives and there was nothing he could do about it. He'd shattered a family, splintering it in his fingers as chemical-induced euphoria had elated him to blissful ecstasy.

There was no forgiveness for that, no acquittal and no sentence to do it justice in his mind.

He had changed his life in belated reply but it had never quite seemed enough, never quite seemed right.

He let his tired head rest against the cool glass for a moment.

"Why can't you forgive yourself, you fool?" he murmured, though deep inside he knew why.

Because it was unforgivable.

~o~

Days dawn hot and humid here, growing and swelling as the sun rises over the sky, heat haze warping the buildings as body after body shuffles through the streets, blissfully oblivious to everything around them.

There was something desperate about days like this. It was too hot, too humid, too intense... dogs lay panting and exhausted on porch steps while children shuffled home from school, sweating and tired under the oppressive air.

Tempers are short and edges are frayed but it's too hot to argue, too hot to talk. It's the calm before the storm, emotions pushed inwards away from the surface to churn and boil and swell, away where no one can see them, away where they grow desperate.

Everything hangs in this stillness, a last moment of silence before tomorrow when the rain begins and everything comes apart. Everything is floating and insubstantial until the rain makes it real...

Hanging, floating, thick as soup, it's even hard to breathe it's so hot.

Logan leaned out of his bedroom window, elbows resting on the sill as he watched the sun carve a slow, orange arc over the sky like a needle gouging a groove into a record.

When the storm came it would be a big one, he could feel it.

Someone somewhere down the street was crying, brought to their knees by the overwhelming pressure in the air, finally finding it too much to cope with. People were close to snapping, watching the skies for the storm they all knew they needed. The storm that would break and release, the rain that would cool and burn...

It was just too damn hot.

It can't go on like this forever, something's got to give, something's got to fail. It's too calm... too calm and too quiet.

He turned back into his room, closing the window, shutting out the frustrated, angry tears and the stifling evening air.

Alone in the silence he wondered what was waiting for him when the storm broke.

Unease edged close and for the first time that he could remember he wished that he wasn't alone in the silence like he always was. Something needed to break, something needed to change.

The peace and the solitude he had sought after for so long were suddenly not what he wanted any more.

Alone he stood, that's how it had always been. Alone to think and stand and fight and live...

But some thing, some part of him was yearning, adding to the desperate heat and the boiling tensions and the frayed nerves and the unravelling edges.

But it was alien, something he hadn't felt in so long that it confused him and he didn't know where to turn to ease it.

So in moments of crisis or confusion or fear he did what he always did.

He drowned himself, submerging heart and soul and body into the one thing that always remained constant.

Work.

Keep doing it long enough and eventually the pain goes away. You can break your back and make your fingers raw till they bleed and every second of it is a distraction, the biggest pantomime of them all.

He flopped down on the couch, turning on the TV as much for company as entertainment, pressing the mute button and letting the colourful images dance across the screen as he started right through them.

Something in his stomach ached and once again he found himself thinking about her...

Jean.

He tried not to dwell on it because when he did the ache just got worse, but somehow he couldn't seem to stop.

He told himself it was pathetic. He'd met her for all of five minutes and here he was, mooning over some woman who in all honesty didn't even know him from Adam. Some woman who, after just one meeting, had somehow seized him deep in the chest and was refusing to let go.

Some woman who'd barely even spared him a second glance.

He flipped channels idly, letting picture after picture flash past his vision without even looking at any of them.

Marie and Kitty and all the other office girls would swoon and call it love at first sight and squeal about how romantic it was. Logan just sat there, feeling his heart beat sluggishly in his stomach, trying not to dwell on the fact that he wasn't going to see her again and trying not to let it show that it mattered.

Then his finger on the remote stopped flicking and he just sat there, staring sightlessly at nothing, perfectly still in the silence as he realised exactly how lonely he was because of it.

~o~

The penthouse apartment of the city's most expensive hotel was exactly like it should be.

Expensive.

Everything screamed money, even the view over the slow sunset and the gently waking city lights. The night sky was the colour of a stack of dollar bills being burned and, as she leaned out over the balcony, Jean Grey could almost feel the heat of the fire that destroyed them.

It was beautiful up here, she had to admit that, but distant.

A stray breeze caught her hair, flicking it softly over her shoulder as she unpinned it from the tight knot at the back of her head, relishing the moment of sudden coolness against her skin.

"You should come inside. The air conditioning makes it much nicer in here."

She turned to see the familiar presence of Charles Xavier, rolling his wheelchair out onto the balcony.

Jean smiled fondly.

"I like the view."

The old man shook his head and laughed to himself.

"Is that why you spend so much time up here. And there I thought it was my charming company you sought out."

Jean turned to lean her back against the balcony rail, soft laughter lighting her face.

"MY room doesn't have a balcony..."

"You're thinking about something. I can see the signs," Xavier said as he wheeled himself closer, looking out over the glowing lights of the city far beneath them.

Jean turned her gaze back onto the horizon.

"Not a lot," she replied.

"SomeONE then," her employer amended.

Jean glanced at him.

"You're too perceptive for your own good sometimes," she commented, the corners of her lips lifting slightly.

"Jean, you've worked for me for eight years. If I can't read you by now I don't think I ever will."

She laughed at that.

"No one, really. I was just thinking how distant everything seems from up here."

Xavier leaned forward a little in his chair, casting his eyes down to the slowly crawling traffic, folding around the city like red and white snakes.

"You should go out and have some fun..." he said at length. "You shouldn't have to be cooped up all evening with me. Where's' the fun in that?"

Jean rolled her eyes at him. This was an old discussion.

"Don't start that again," she chastised. "I feel bad enough as it is leaving you to go all the way back to Manhattan by yourself."

Xavier shook his head.

"I have a driver and a private jet, I'm sure I'll cope somehow. I even have wits and ingenuity and, if all else fails, a very large amount of money. I'm sure we'll all muddle through."

Jean laughed again. "If you weren't my boss I'd tell you to stop poking fun at me."

Xavier laughed.

"It's never stopped you before."

His face turned serious again and he looked at her.

"Really though. I want you to take a night off. Go out and see the sights or something. Enjoy your youth before it's all gone and you're a wrinkly old fool like I am."

This was an old discussion too and Jean huffed.

"You're not an old fool..."

Xavier shook his head and cut her off.

"I don't care what you think. I'm your boss and you do what I tell you and I'm telling you to take a night off. Tomorrow night you are going to go out and have a good time. I don't want to hear any arguments."

"No arguments or I get fired, hmm?" she grinned, raising a brow.

"Exactly," replied Xavier.

Silence returned between them as Jean stared back out over the city.

The older man smiled and went back inside. Wherever her mind had gone it certainly wasn't with them right now. He left her to her view and she didn't even notice him leave.

The wind picked up a little, tossing her hair out in a sheet of flame behind her, the sudden gust like hands brushing against her skin.

She felt the shiver run down her spine as her mind cast the illusion of touch against her body, of soft lips against her throat... So sweet and tender and loving, those caresses were, filling her with warmth, but she wanted so much more.

She wrapped her arms around herself, wishing the embrace belonged to someone else, wishing she could feel the strength of their body behind her for real, not just an illusion.

It wasn't fair.

She held herself more tightly, leaning over the rail again to watch at all those nameless, faceless people below her, all of them so wonderfully surrounded by people, while she stood so utterly alone.

~o~

Chapter 3

Let's get serious, no let's don't, let's mime the hard bits. -

Frank Zappa

"So let me get this straight..."

Logan fiddled with his coffee mug while he leaned a relaxed elbow on the corner of Bobby's cubicle.

Bobby nodded enthusiastically, almost bouncing in his seat with excitement.

"Bullet-proof glass...?"

Bobby nodded again. "Yep! Every window and windscreen. Bullet-proof. Bought it all last night over the 'net. Should be arriving in a few days."

Logan shook his head.

"You're putting bulletproof glass in your car windows?"

Bobby beamed. "Yeah! Cool isn't it?"

Logan snorted in amusement.

"Bob, you live with your mom, in the middle of suburbia. This is hardly ghetto country we're talking about. There is no 'hood'..."

Bobby rolled his eyes, staring at Logan with the thinly disguised, patronising tolerance universally doled out to those who would not understand "cool" if it hit them with a crowbar.

"That's not the point," Bobby explained patiently. "It is cool just to know it's there. It's not like it's tinted or anything. No one's going to know any different."

Logan raised a disbelieving eyebrow.

"That's good, cause you know if you put tinted windows in a car like that I'd have to kick your ass, right?"

Bobby laughed.

"Yeah, like you could catch me..."

Logan grinned and raised a challenging eyebrow.

"So," continued Bobby. "Today's the big day, huh? Presenting that big thing of yours to the Hankster?"

Logan nodded. "Yep, another 20 minutes or so..."

Bobby smirked. "Lucky Hank. Half the women in this office are tripping over themselves to get a good, long look at your big thing..."

Logan grimaced.

"You're so lacking in tact it's almost painful, Bobby..."

"Why, thank you," he grinned, raising his cheeseburger in salute before devouring it hungrily.

~o~

Ahhh, blissful calm...

Marie closed her eyes and pushed her legs out under her desk, allowing herself a brief moment of pleasure as she stretched languidly, letting out a satisfied yawn before cracking her knuckles.

All was peace and serenity. Logan was at his big presentation, all today's letters were dealt with, no one should be calling and she smiled lazily at the thought of a good hour's worth of relaxed peace, perfect for catching up on a little light reading...

"Shit, fuck, fucking, fuck!"

Logan tore past Marie as her eyes snapped open and she watched in silent confusion as he barrelled towards his office, coat flapping behind him as he started turning the contents of his desk upside down.

"Shouldn't you be in that meeting...?" she asked, confused.

"Damn review papers!" he ground out. "I left them behind and now I can't find them!"

He started lifting up and putting down every item in his office, hunting for the missing report as Marie watched in utter confusion.

"Logan, it's..."

"Only I need it right this second and if I've lost it..." he continued, utterly oblivious as he tossed papers and forms over his shoulder, rooting madly through the items on his desk.

"But it's..."

"I told Hank Tuesday and today is Tuesday and yet I have no papers... If it's gone, I am dead in the water..." he continued, turning a drawer upside-down and shaking the contents over his desk, before feverishly scrabbling through them.

"I saw it on..."

He ignored her totally, too engrossed in his own little world.

"Hank's gonna' kill me if I can't bring the documents through and then he's going to fire me, and then I'm going to be both dead and unemployed and then I'm going to loose my house and I'll have to sleep in the car, drinking cheap bourbon out of a bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag just like that guy in that movie and then I'm gonna freeze to death on Christmas morning or something and be found a month later by some deranged old woman who'll probably try and steal my shoes..."

"Logan!" she bellowed.

He spun around to look at her, his hair and eyes wild.

"Logan, it's on the drinks cabinet behind the scotch."

His face lit up in an ecstatic smile of disbelief.

"Marie, you are brilliant! I love you!" he exclaimed, grabbing her shoulders and smacking an exuberant kiss on her lips before charging out of the office, waving the papers above his head.

Marie dizzily steadied herself against the desk, thrown off balance by the sudden reaction.

"Wow..."

~o~

It had been a VERY long day...

Night was slowly creeping over the city and Logan took a deep lungful of the evening air as he stepped outside.

Hank had kept him held up in his office for hours going over and over the details of that report and it had given him a headache.

He was tired and stressed out and, if he admitted it to himself, utterly fucking pathetic.

He leaned back against the cool glass doors of the building's main foyer, resting his head against the reassuringly solid panels.

He rubbed at tired eyes with the pads of his fingers and blinked at the darkening sky.

He had no damned clue what time it was, but everyone else seemed to have left already, quietly excusing themselves and leaving Hank and Logan secreted away, totally oblivious to the world outside.

Maybe he should go home...

The idea seemed singularly unappealing.

He'd noticed more and more in the past few months that his home was becoming less a place to live and more a bunch of rooms he went to so he could sleep.

He seemed to spend so much of his time working that everything else seemed to have fallen by the wayside, and as he gazed up at the sky it dawned on him that he didn't really like it very much.

He didn't really feel like socialising right now either, but there had to be something else between work and sleep and he aimlessly shuffled down the street, hands wedged deep in his pockets.

The bar was hazy with cigarette smoke by the time Logan arrived and he perched himself on a tall barstool, ordering a drink before easing the tired cricks out of his neck.

He didn't know the bar's name, he'd just wandered in here because it seemed marginally quieter than the other places he had walked past so far.

Logan largely ignored the other occupants of the bar, glancing briefly at the shuffling mass of bodies on the makeshift dance floor before turning his attention back to his drink.

Very productive, he thought. Between work and sleep there comes alcohol.

He somewhat morosely contemplated the whiskey in front of him before closing his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose to try and ease the exhausted ache in his head.

He felt like there was a vague sort of fog surrounding him, sitting low across his mind and full of all those annoying little things he had to remember to do. He wasn't quite able to turn it off either, stuck in a half-world where his brain couldn't quite seem to shut down.

He recognised it well. It would happen some nights and he would just lie awake, staring at the ceiling because he couldn't sleep, his mind endlessly whirling over stupid, trivial matters.

He sighed. He was under too much stress, he knew that already.

The whiskey cut neatly down his throat and he pushed the now-empty glass away, resting his elbows on the bar and letting his head droop tiredly.

"Logan...?"

His eyes flipped open at the mention of his name and he quickly scanned the crowd for a face he recognised. He came up blank until a whirl of long read hair flashed in front of his vision, seating itself at the stool next to his.

"Jean?" he asked, visibly surprised.

He hadn't expected to see her again and he stared at her dumbstruck now, the radical change in her appearance answering all those questions he had asked about what she would look like away from work.

She was wearing a sleek, black dress in favour of the conservative suit she had been wearing the last time he saw her, the hemline almost sinfully short against well-toned thighs. He gave her a dumbstruck stare but she seemed unconscious of how she looked just then, glancing contemplatively into the jostling crowd.

She turned back to him and laughed at his expression.

"Don't worry, I'm not stalking you. It's pure co-incidence, I swear."

Logan somehow dragged his mind kicking and screaming out of the gutter and managed a weak smile.

"I... I, uh, wouldn't have expected to see you here." He managed, cringing at how his voice seemed to be failing him right at this instant. "I would've thought you'd be kept pretty busy looking after all those executives...."

Jean bobbed her head from side to side slightly, loose red hair brushing softly against her shoulders.

"Yeah, I guess... but Charles apparently doesn't need me at this time of night, so I'm under orders to take in the sights of this city of yours."

Logan nodded, swallowing hard.

That ache in his stomach was back again and it tightened as she smiled at him, making him smile back at her before he even realised he was doing it. "Well... it's nice to see you again anyway. You look great..."

She blushed and it flickered across his mind that she had no idea how beautiful she looked just then.

All soft skin and warm glances... it was everything he didn't have and everything he desperately wanted.

"Uh, can I get you a drink or something?"

She smiled lightly, not failing to notice how he seemed so adorably uncertain of himself tonight.

She had him pegged as one of those corporate upstarts. Beautiful to look at but arrogant beyond all endurance but he seemed so different away from the office.

All fingers and thumbs and tripping over himself...

She had only come over to him because he was the first face she recognised and now she was glad she did.

"Sure," she smiled. "London Sunset, easy on the Grenadine."

"I have no idea what one of those is," said Logan, truthfully, "but if that's what you want then, certainly."

That got another smile out of her and Logan wondered if he could keep making her do it.

Jean watched him intently as he called over the bartender, buying a beer for himself and the London Sunset she had been craving.

She watched him move with unconscious grace, following the path of his body under the dress shirt he wore.

He had nice arms, she thought... strong and sleek and she found herself wondering what those arms would feel like wrapped around her body.

"So," he said, startling her out of her reverie. "How are you enjoying your stay so far?"

The bartender handed her a luridly coloured drink in a tall glass and she sipped it slowly before answering.

"Ah, it's alright," she murmured.

Logan took a slow pull of his beer. "Only alright?"

"Well... "She shrugged. "It's lonely, mostly. Hotel rooms aren't that exciting."

Logan looked at her over the rim of his bottle.

"Depends what you do with them," he said with a grin.

Jean blushed and rolled her eyes.

OK, and he was also a hideous flirt, but she had worked that much out on their first meeting.

She carried on regardless, trying not to laugh at the eyebrow that was creeping its way suggestively up his forehead.

"You're impossible," she laughed eventually, shaking her head in mock annoyance.

"So I've been told."

She took another drink from her cocktail to try and quell the giggles and Logan looked back to his beer, wondering exactly why it felt so good to hear her laughing.

"How long are you in town for?" he asked eventually.

Jean toyed with the paper umbrella, tapping the stick against the side of her glass.

"Another two weeks," she replied. "Only another couple of days till Charles leaves though. After that I'm taking a little vacation time to housesit for my aunt while she goes into hospital. She lives a little bit out of town but I thought it would be nice to get away from home for a while."

"Nothing serious, I hope," Logan replied, watching her sip distractedly from her glass.

"No," she shook her head. "She's diabetic, they just want to keep an eye on her for a while, so I have the place all to myself."

She sighed. Yet more time on her own...

"What about you?" she asked. "You get lonely in this city too or is there a Mrs. Logan waiting at home to keep you company?"

Logan chuckled to himself.

"No, no Mrs. Logan. I do pretty well on my own most of the time."

"Only most of the time?" she muttered.

Jean nodded to herself and looked around the bar as it steadily filled up.

A certain amount of noise was coming form the dance floor now and she raised her voice slightly to be heard over the crowd.

"You want to get out of here maybe?" she asked, turning back to face him again. "I could do with someone to show me the sights if you weren't doing anything better?"

She looked at him hopefully.

Logan didn't even bother mulling it over. What did he have to loose?

He put his empty bottle down and grabbed his coat.

"Sure, why not."

The moon looked slightly pink that night, he would remember later. And her hand had been soft when he eventually took it in his own.

And he would remember how beautiful she looked in the starlight, laughing and smiling at the things he said as he showed her everything he could think of.

It was late by the time they finished talking. Or maybe it was early.

The sun was just beginning to make its presence known against the blackness of the night sky and now they walked arm in arm through the darkened city streets, the heels of her shoes clicking softly on the concrete as they neared her hotel.

He could see the tall building looming up out of the pre-dawn light and he felt a twist in his throat... like longing but not.

Like he didn't want this to be over already.

Jean smiled and linked her other hand with his as they reached the hotel steps.

"Thanks for looking after me tonight. I had a really good time."

Logan shuffled uncomfortably, brushing his thumb over the back of her hand in slowly caressing strokes.

"Wasn't a problem. You're easy to entertain."

She laughed and held his hands a little tighter. "I've not hurled rocks in the river since I was a kid. It was more fun than I remembered."

Logan smiled self-consciously.

"You enjoyed that, huh?"

She beamed at him and he felt himself getting lost in her expression.

"Very much so. Thank you, Logan. I don't think I've enjoyed myself this much in quite a while."

"Me neither," he murmured.

Jean swallowed slowly, shivering almost imperceptibly at the feel of his thumb painting slow, gentle lines over the back of her hand.

She could almost feel the caress creeping slowly over the rest of her body, wondering if it would feel just as good if he took her in his arms and kissed her.

There was a moment of silence as her gaze locked with his, something shimmering brightly in the soft hazel depths.

"It's late..."

His voice was no more than a whisper, barely even a breath for fear of breaking the moment.

There was a small hint of disappointment that flickered in her gaze as she looked at him.

"Yes."

He swallowed nervously, feeling her fingers curled softly around his.

"I don't want it to be over yet," he murmured, honestly.

The corners of her mouth lifted very slightly and she shrugged.

"Me neither."

That got a small smile out of him and she felt it twist inside her chest, the almost pleading look in his eyes desperately begging for the same thing she wanted so badly.

"Truthfully, Logan... are you lonely in this city?"

He looked at her, unable to tear his eyes away from her softly questioning glaze.

"Yes..." he felt himself reply, and she seemed to come to a decision, her whole being suddenly so soft... so sweet.

"I'm tired of being lonely," she said.

She gave him a slight shrug and he glanced at the tall building behind her.

"We're at your hotel," he murmured. "This is where I'm supposed to say goodbye."

He swallowed hard, making no move to release her hands in the hope that maybe he wouldn't have to part from her. He didn't want to let go yet, he didn't want to loose all the things he so desperately wanted.

The temptation was sore and the need so desperate... It would be so easy to go inside with her tonight but temptation so often led to regrets and he knew that the last thing he ever wanted to do was hurt her.

Jean followed the thoughts as they shadowed over his face, the tumult of emotions battling there, trying to do the right thing.

"You don't have to leave," she whispered. " I don't want to be on my own again."

Logan's heart skipped slightly as he gazed at her, seeing nothing but honesty in her face.

He smiled softly.

"I don't want to go home."

Jean leaned forward to give him a chaste, gentle kiss.

"Then don't."

He took a breath as he felt her body so close to him, and Jean brushed her lips against his, feeling his mouth respond as they drifted closer together on the empty street.

His caress was warm and giving against her lips and she sighed happily, letting the gentle pressure of his mouth lift her from reality for a long, beautiful second.

She breathed softly into the night air as he parted from her and, missing her touch so swiftly after it vanished, he wrapped his arm around her as they walked up the hotel steps.

There was something clinging, something almost desperate about that night when he looked back on it. Clutching hard to the other in search of an ease to the loneliness, searching for an escape from the consuming solitude.

It was filled with desperate hope and wanting, holding each other impossibly close that night because they both needed it so badly.

They clung to one another tightly, never loosening the desperate grip until the emptiness inside had eased and the crushing need soothed away and, as the night wore on, there was nothing but sensation left, the feeling of the other's arms curled tightly around their body...

~o~

He woke in the light of the morning sun and kissed her softly, her naked body still pressed against him as she mumbled in her sleep, burying her head closer into his shoulder.

"It's morning..." he rumbled drowsily, his hand gently soothing up and down her spine as he took in the warm, sleepy scent of her.

He eyes blinked open and she stretched in his embrace, running a hand over his arm and shoulder in response.

"Let's stay here..." she mumbled, smiling as she felt his chest hitch with quiet laughter.

"Much as I would love to, it's already half past nine... I was supposed to be at work thirty minutes ago."

He sighed heavily into the pillow.

"There's nothing like real life to get in the way of living..." he muttered and Jean raised her head to look at him.

"A morning philosopher. I'll have to remember that..."

~o~

"You're late Logan..." Marie grumbled from somewhere behind a mountain of paper.

"Uh... yeah... I'm sorry about that..." Logan mumbled, looking sheepish.

Marie didn't look up from where she was furiously typing something on her computer.

"You were supposed to be here for nine. That German guy in your office is starting to get REALLY pissy..." she warned.

Logan blanched. "Oh... oh..." Words failed him so he resorted to the classic. "Fuck!"

Marie nodded silently, eyes glued to her screen.

Logan hastily kissed Jean goodbye, giving her a tight squeeze.

"Marie, this is Jean, Jean this is Marie, and I REALLY have to go now..." he said.

He grabbed an armful of papers from Marie's desk and bolted, leaving Jean standing in surprise.

Marie looked up from her work with a start, noticing Jean for the first time.

"Uh... hi," Jean smiled nervously, slightly thrown by her sudden abandonment.

Marie blinked in confusion a couple of times looking back and forth between Jean and Logan's office door.

"Was he wearing yesterday's suit...?" she wondered out loud. Jean opened her mouth to reply but Marie cut her off. "No, wait... I don't need to know..."

She grinned and raised her hand over the desk.

"I'm Marie, by the way..."

Jean shook her hand and nodded in return. "I'm Jean... and I think I've been abandoned..." she commented.

Marie snorted slightly with amusement.

"Yeah, the guy flew in all the way from Berlin and Logan forgets to turn up on time..."

Jean cringed slightly.

"Sorry... that was kind of partially my fault... will he be OK do you think?"

Marie glanced up from her computer.

"What, Logan? Ah, he'll be fine. He could sweet-talk his way out of anything."

Jean nodded, a lop-sided grin lifting her face.

"Look," said Marie, "He could be another couple of hours yet. He's got a lot of ass-kissing to do. You want to leave a message maybe?"

~o~

Logan staggered out of his office several hours later and, waving goodbye to a substantially sweeter looking European businessman, he flumped face down on the edge of Marie's desk.

"Tell me that's it, tell me I can go home now..." he groaned.

Marie raised an eyebrow at him.

"No, but you have a lunch date..."

"Who with...?" he mumbled dejectedly.

Marie frowned slightly.

"Oh I don't know... some tall, leggy redhead that you abandoned here this morning..."

Logan's head jerked up.

"Jean? Where'd she want to meet?"

Marie handed him a piece of notepaper with Jean's flowing handwriting on it.

It had the name of a restaurant, a time he should meet her and the address of her aunt's house where she was staying, just in case she missed him.

"She seems nice..." muttered Marie.

Logan nodded, reading the note again.

"You have a sappy smile on your face, sugar..." she added before returning to her typing.

Logan laughed and stuffed the note in his pocket.

"Yeah, I hate to tell you, but you've got some competition for my undying devotion... but I think I already missed my dinner date. I should have been there ten minutes ago."

Marie shrugged. "Could go anyway... never know, she might feel like waiting."

Logan nodded and left the office, fingering the piece of paper in his pocket.

~o~

The restaurant was dark and strangely empty for the time of day, tucked away in a lost corner of the city.

It was gloomy inside, the glare of the midday sun leaving Logan temporarily blinded by the contrast.

The low, smoky atmosphere was oppressive in the heat, lying like haze throughout the building as it slowly pulled into focus. It blanketed the air, muffling the noises from the street beyond and Logan cast a cursory glance around the room. He slid into an unoccupied booth and settled himself on the ancient, cracked leather.

There was no sign of Jean though that wasn't surprising. It would be just as easy to miss her in the fog as it would for her to have already left.

He'd call her later and arrange to meet her tonight instead, but as he was here now he may as well get lunch.

He signalled the bored-looking waitress over to his table and placed his order before leaning back in the comfortable old seating to properly take in his surroundings.

There was virtually no one there except for him and the waitress. Two bent old men were arguing over a chessboard in the far corner opposite a grossly overweight woman chain-smoking cheap cigarettes, fat, greasy fingers feeding a huge pile of nachos into her mouth.

There was only one other patron in the building. A man over on the other side of the room dressed mostly in black. He was hunched aggressively in his chair as if he were expecting some great threat to pounce out on him from the woodwork, his defensive posture hiding most of his face.

He seemed to be observing everything that went on with razor-keen eyes, jet black orbs set deep into his head. From what Logan could see he was tall and almost painfully skinny, his sharply angular face half hidden in the smoky shadows.

Logan's skin prickled as the man's eyes caught his own. It was like a cold hand reaching into his chest and slowly squeezing the life out of him, and Logan looked away, focusing instead on the hot food that had just been slammed down on the table in front of him.

He ate quickly, feeling all the while like he was under intense, microscopic surveillance.

It was disconcerting. Every time he chanced a look upwards, those black razor eyes were trained on him, unflinching in their scrutiny.

The longer he sat there the more choking the atmosphere became until it almost seemed to claw at his throat as he swallowed.

He hastily stood up, flinging some bills on the table before bending down to pick up his briefcase.

It was getting hard to breathe.

There was a light brush against his body and a tiny rush of cool air as the restaurant door swung open and shut. As Logan cast a final look around the room, he noticed that the black clad figure was gone.

Logan stuffed his hand in his pocket as he walked out, habitually checking that he had everything.

The piece of paper with Jean's address on it was gone... and so was his wallet.

~o~

Chapter 4

I'll need a new bookmaker, says I. God hands me a list of names.

"When you're on a million," says he, "We'll do Wall Street."

And we do. -

The Suburban Book of the Dead

"I'm really sorry for not meeting you at lunch," said Logan sadly as his car pulled into a peaceful, leafy street.

The nighttime darkness hugged the low houses and everywhere was blissfully quiet.

Jean shrugged. "It's OK, you don't have to explain. Your secretary said you might be a while. I'm just sorry I made you late in the first place."

Logan shook his head. "Yeah, well I'm sure I can think of something that'll heal my mortal wounds..."

"You're being sarcastic."

"Yup."

The car glided almost silently through the deserted street, all but a few of the houses bathed in darkness.

"Odd little restaurant you picked though," he added. "You been there before?"

Jean shook her head. "Nope, but I passed by a few days ago and I thought it looked interesting. Atmospheric."

Logan snorted. "Yeah, atmospheric. Synonymous with weird in my experience."

He laughed quietly to himself. "You probably didn't see him but there was this guy sitting over in the far corner. I swear, he was dressed in black like some deranged Navy SEAL reject..."

"He was still there when you turned up?" Jean asked in surprise.

Logan glanced at her. "Yeah...You saw him too?"

She nodded. "He was staring at me the whole time I was eating. It was starting to creep me out actually, that's why I didn't stick around..."

Logan nodded. "Bastard stole my wallet."

Jean cringed in apology. "I'm sorry... next time I'll try to pick somewhere less..."

"Disgusting?" suggested Logan.

Jean laughed. "Wasn't quite the word I was looking for, but yeah, disgusting..."

The car turned onto the slightly sloping driveway of a squat little house, neatly nestled between a couple of large trees in the front yard. Logan turned off the engine and gestured outside the car window.

"Well, this is it... Is it to the lady's liking?"

Jean undid her seatbelt and climbed out of the car, taking in the building before her.

"Nice place," she said honestly.

The house was small and neatly maintained but, despite the fresh coat of paint, it somehow seemed to scream "Bachelor" into the quiet aura of suburban family bliss that surrounded it.

In all honesty it looked a little unlived in, but then again, in all honesty Logan seemed to pretty much live in his office.

"I hope you don't mind dogs..." Logan added as he fished the keys out of his pocket.

Jean followed him up the porch steps as he unlocked the door.

"You have a dog?" She looked surprised.

"What?" He raised his brow at her puzzled expression. "Hey, it's suburbia, he came with the house..."

Jean laughed as Logan pushed the door open, a slightly dishevelled, elderly, grey Irish Wolfhound ambling over to greet them.

"Hey there..." she smiled.

"Mrs. Leiberman from next door comes in and checks on him while I'm not around... he sleeps mostly though," added Logan, depositing his keys onto the small table by the door. "Usually at Mrs. Leiberman's. She's kinda' fond of him."

The dog sniffed at Jean's outstretched hand, leaving behind a string of slobber on her fingers.

Logan cringed. "Sorry, let me get that..."

He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped the clinging drool from her hand as she laughed again.

"I think he likes me..." she smirked, ruffling the dog's tousled head.

Logan sighed and rolled his eyes, unable to stop the beginnings of a grin from twitching his face.

"Jean, this is Bo. Bo... try not to drool on Jean any more, OK?"

The dog cocked his head slightly and went back to sniffing her dress.

"Bo. That your name, huh?" she smiled, scratching the animal behind the ears.

"His full name's Bo-staff," Logan mumbled sheepishly, taking her coat and hanging it with his own.

Jean looked at him.

"That's a really odd name for a dog."

Logan shrugged. "They're extendable, and when I got him he just... kept growing."

Jean raised her eyebrow.

"I thought he came with the house?" she teased.

"He did. I got the house as a puppy as well."

"Uh huh... right... so is your house called Bo-staff too?"

Logan shook his head.

"No actually... Nightstick. I thought seeing as the house was bigger it would be ironic."

Jean laughed at him.

"You're a very silly man," she teased, pulling him down by the shirtfront for a swift, affectionate kiss.

"Well thank you. I hope that too meets with the lady's approval."

"Oh, eminently. Lead on."

"Dinner?"

"Dinner."

~o~

"Comfortable?"

She looked up from where she was sprawled lazily over the couch and nodded at him.

"Yup."

She wriggled into the yielding leather a little further as if to prove her point, then grinned.

"This is a very comfortable couch."

He laughed as he made his way towards her, pausing only to kick off his shoes as he went.

"Well then, I'm glad my money wasn't wasted."

They were both a little drunk, a result of the tequila slammers she had insisted she wanted to drink, and he looked down at her lazily stretching across the leather and figured it had definitely been a good idea. The slow, lazy, sensual stage of intoxication. The point where alcohol makes nerve endings dance.

She reached up and grabbed his tie, bending him downwards as an amused smile broke across her lips.

"So, you. We got all evening. What do you think we should do with ourselves?"

He raised an eyebrow slowly.

"Well you're a smart woman, I'm sure you can think of something."

She pursed her lips, playing the silk of his tie over her fingers as she thought.

"Hmm... how about you... me... handcuffs... whipped cream..."

She paused. "Any questions?"

"Only one."

She looked at him. "And what's that?"

He grinned. "Who gets the handcuffs and who gets the cream?"

Jean laughed slightly. "Oh I think you should wear both of them, tequila makes me hungry."

She wound the silk around her fist and reached out with her free hand to trace his lips with her thumb.

"In more ways than one."

She gave the soft cord a tug and he followed his tie, sinking down onto the sofa to stretch out beside her on the cushions.

"Brought you down to my level at last."

"Wouldn't want to be anywhere else."

She smiled and gave his tie a final yank, pulling his lips into contact with hers for a hard, passionate kiss as his hand tightened on the curve of her waist.

Her fingers against his jaw kept them firmly together as she angled her head to increase the contact, the tip of his tongue momentarily flashing against her bottom lip, chasing the sweetness.

She sighed slowly, tasting him against her mouth, the hint of the tequila and faintest traces of the dinner he'd prepared.

His arm wrapped around her, holding her against his chest as it sent a shiver down her spine, his caress causing a tremor of heady desire as she parted her lips, feeling the delicious warmth of his tongue brush against her own.

Jean moaned quietly as he deepened the kiss, intoxicated by the heated slide of his tongue, floating and rising and falling as he stroked her back.

There was warmth and need and sweetness in his touch and, oh God, there was hope, there was finally hope in there and it was so addictive...

Addictive feeling him this close to her after so long spent alone. Addictive feeling every nerve ending spark, his lightest touch making her desperate for more, making her want to cling onto him and never let go.

She could feel it in her heart and in her soul, the need, the pure, physical ache for human contact.

She wrapped her arms tightly around his shoulders, enjoying every second of being very thoroughly kissed by the wonderful, beautiful man beside her, his slick, strong tongue roaming freely inside her mouth.

It echoed in Logan's chest too, a deep, painful wrench that cried and begged for someone to be close to. Someone to fill the empty spaces, someone who wanted him, and finally he understood what it was and what he wanted, and now he had it he had no intention of letting go.

He grudgingly broke for air, his arm resting around her waist and holding her tightly, clutching her with a desperate embrace as he speckled her face with soft, light kisses.

Every single one of them said I love you, and Jean closed her eyes in slow, lazy happiness, hugging him back just as hard as he rubbed warm circles along her hip and side.

He never wanted to let go, never wanted this moment to end and he knew he was addicted.

Desperate for her touch and her presence, intoxicated from breathing the same air, feeling the warmth of her closeness, the crush of her arms hugging him tightly.

She could feel the heated moisture of his breath caressing her cheek as he looked at her with dark, pleading eyes.

Everything she had ever wanted was looking directly back at her.

She could see his heart and his soul and she knew then, with perfect clarity, that she had fallen hopelessly, helplessly in love with him.

That was all the realisation she needed and she desperately latched onto his mouth again, clinging to him tightly as she was swept away by the heady, intoxicating rush that followed.

The feel of his hand on her breast, caressing her through the clothes she wore, strong fingers pushing against her hardening nipple as she duelled with the soft, slick tongue invading her mouth.

It created heat inside her body, a twisting pull that sought friction, invasion, capture...

She drew one leg up over his hip as they lay together, feeling his twitch of response followed by renewed heat in his caresses, a sure, firm pressure rolling against the straining, flushed nipple he had under his fingers.

She whimpered a little, desperate to feel the heat of his mouth on her breasts instead of the stiff rub of her lace bra, yearning for pressure to ease the throbbing high between her legs.

She could feel the hardness of his arousal starting to make itself known against her abdomen and she tried to rub herself against him, seeking the answering thrust from his body that would make the yearning cease.

He pulled her slowly to her feet, all the while their bodies entwined with each other as he walked her towards the bedroom, burying his face in her neck to kiss and nibble the sweet-scented skin he found there.

The edge of the bed hit her knees and she sank down gratefully onto the plush quilt, drawing him with her to lie side by side on the yielding mattress, locking his mouth in a desperate, heated kiss as his hands roamed across her body.

She rolled onto her back, flinging her arms luxuriously above her head as he pulled apart the front of her shirt, nimble fingers making quick work of the little pearl buttons. She looked up into passion-glazed eyes as he leaned over her, devouring her hungrily with his gaze before his lips sank against her skin, tasting her neck and collar bone with ravenous need.

Her white lace covered breasts heaved as she panted, his mouth caressing lower down her chest to taste and lick bared flesh, strong fingers pulling down the cups of her bra.

She shuddered at the rough drag of the lace then at the blissful feeling of freedom, hardened nipples straining into the warm night air as the stretched lace that gathered under her breasts pushed the soft globes upwards. His lips skimmed around the tender peaks, kissing softly the sides of each breast before slowly pressing his opened mouth around one darkened bud, the heat and the wet then the slow slide of his tongue making her moan and arch in his arms.

She whispered his name as he lifted his head, leaving a patch of flushed, damp skin behind before lightly thumbing it, her legs twisting on the sheets in answer to the throbbing ache burning between them.

Thumb running slow, even circles around one nipple he leaned down to attend to the other, tracking just the tip of his tongue lightly over the flat tip. She gasped and twitched at the contact, bringing her arms down to wrap around his tousled head and hold him firm. He obliged, licking slowly against the sensitive peak while thumbing its counterpart, her little moans and whimpers of pleasure enflaming his already swollen desire.

She tasted delicious and he sucked slowly before transferring his mouth back to the cooling, damp nipple he had abandoned, giving it an affectionate lick before sliding down her body.

He pushed her skirt up around her hips before taking hold of the waistband of her lacy white panties, peeling them slowly down her stockinged legs and pausing only to lap softly at the bare skin of her inner thigh. It made her shudder and flex towards him, seeking his mouth higher as he stroked her legs with the flat of each palm, the seam between her thighs growing damp with each more intimate caress.

He slid down off the bed then and peeled his shirt off, well-toned chest flexing as he tugged it over his head. Jean raised passion-glazed eyes to look at him, lifting herself onto her elbows as he slowly unfastened his belt.

The tightness under her breasts was growing constraining and she reached behind herself to unfasten her bra, shrugging it off along with the shirt. Somehow she raised herself unsteadily to her feet, taking a step towards Logan and covering his hands with her own as he undid the button on his fly.

He let her take over, sighing with relief as she unfastened his pants, letting them drop down over his hips and onto the floor as he reached around behind her, fiddling with the clasp on her skirt for a second before releasing it. The dark fabric fell into a pool around her feet as he pulled her mostly naked body against his, capturing her lips again as he guided her back towards the bed.

Bare skin against bare skin... no better feeling in the world...

He swung them round as they sat, bringing her to rest astride his lap, his jutting erection trapped between their two bodies as he held her close, one hand sliding up between them to cup a bared breast as her fingers wandered across the lines of his chest.

He rolled her still-damp nipple between his fingers, making her squirm against him as she ran her hands down his hard stomach, tracing the line of hair that lead down low onto his abdomen.

She looked at him hungrily, naked want flashing in her eyes as her stocking-clad legs tightened against him, her palm flat in the middle of his chest pushing him backwards to lie on the sheets.

She shuffled forwards slowly until the underside of his heated erection nestled just against her mound, her weight resting on her knees as she raised herself up, her hands reaching down to grasp him in long, cool fingers.

He craned his neck to look at her, panting harshly as she wrapped her hands around his swollen length, his chest heaving with each brush of her fingertips.

Then slowly, agonisingly slowly she dragged him against her centre, leaving him slick and wet as she brushed his flesh against the naked heat of her core, letting just the head of him part her soaked lips to run fleetingly against the tight bundle of nerves inside.

They seemed to moan as one, him at the burning, desperate heat, her at the electrical flash of pleasure it caused as his darkened head rubbed against her clit. It made her want more and she let him slide slowly between her lips once again before changing the angle of her hips, teasing for an eternity before she finally pressed herself down onto him, impaling her body sharply on his length.

She whimpered loudly, shaking with blissful shock as he filled her deep inside, stretching her body open, the sudden penetration sending a miasma of euphoric sensations into her head.

She was close to screaming, her face creased into a mask of blissful concentration as she thrust her hips forwards against his pelvis.

Logan collapsed backwards hard, falling into the sheets as she sat astride him, the feel of his hardness moving inside her channel making her whole body burn.

He thrust up into her fluttering centre as best he was able, feeling her clench against his length as she bucked her hips against him again, the brush of silk against his thighs and heat and wetness of her sex driving him insane. He moaned and slammed his head into the sheets as she sped up her thrusts, letting her set a torturous rhythm against his aching body.

She rode him hard and desperate, rolling her pelvis against him as much as she could as he clutched blindly towards her breasts, stroking and teasing her nipples as she rolled her head in pleasure.

Jean leaned backwards slightly, grunting with each sharp little jerk of her hips as she moved her body so that he rubbed tight against the front wall of her channel. His hard intrusion rolled against the sweet spot inside her as she flexed her hips in desperate, sporadic thrusts, gasping in blatant need as she battled for climax.

He felt so good she didn't want it to end, torn between hurtling blindly for sharp release or denying the feel of his hard cock inside her, his fingers rubbing her nipples, the burning fire within... all to make it last longer...

Then he thrust his hips sharply into her just as she came down, bashing her clit hard against his pelvic bone, taking the decision away from her as the tidal wave began to break.

She panted his name under her breath, screwing her eyes closed as the feeling grew within her, blinding her in the crescendo as her fingers dug impossibly hard into his shoulders.

He wrapped his hands around her hips, moving her for the last few moments before the universe exploded inside her body. One last thrust and she clenched around him desperately, his panted name becoming a breathless, guttural croak as the force of her contractions drew him deep inside her passage, a hot burst of fluid filling her as he reached the very crest of his peak.

There was a moment of perfect silence, two bodies riding a wave of perfect completion, tensed and euphoric, heated and full, every muscle in her body gripping him as tightly as it was able... Then Jean gasped and shakily slumped forwards onto his chest, her damp hair clinging to her forehead as she panted her relief against his skin, aftershocks still twitching inside her core.

She tiredly rubbed her face against his chest and listened to his wild heartbeat thundering beneath her ear as she slowly came down from her high, shifting ever so slightly against his slowly softening body.

He wrapped his arms tiredly around her, pressing a warm, shuddered kiss by her ear before rolling them both over, curling up against her as they succumbed to exhausted peace and then eventually slumber.

~o~

Chapter 5

Macbeth hath murdered sleep... - Anon

The darkness has eyes, he discovered. Eyes that watch without compassion or mercy.

They watch in silence, observing all they can, creeping into you like smoke curling under a door.

They watched him now, unknown, unseen, caressing and crawling like millipedes over his skin, thousands of tiny fingers skimming across sensitive flesh as they slithered from side to side.

In his sleep, Logan curled a little tighter around the warm body in his bed.

Sight in the darkness, touching flesh and bone, fingers trailing over him as the shadows crept across the landscape.

They saw, they touched and they wanted.

The two figures lay silent and asleep, naked and contentedly meshed together in slumber. The blanket had been tossed aside in the heat of the night and now lay rumpled at the foot of the bed, curled in a forgotten tangle as the shadows slipped silently over them.

The air hung low and heavy in the room, the temperature still high even in the depths of night, humidity embracing them like a blanket.

But despite the heat and despite the comfort of that warm, sleepy body curled against his, Logan shivered.

Hairs prickled along his shoulders, gooseflesh smattering over his back before disappearing again as quickly as it had arrived.

Slowly he opened his eyes, his body tingling with untraceable sensation, as if someone were stroking the air, millimetres above him.

He could almost feel the warmth of their palm as it curled over the slope of his arm, not even whispering against him, just there... hovering...

He twisted his neck round, looking over into the empty space behind him.

Moonlight streamed through the window, the curtains hanging open to let a perfect square of silver-blue light shimmer over the bed, illuminating him with moon-white highlights.

Slowly he uncurled himself from Jean's body, sliding off the bed and silently walking to the window, the open curtains hanging heavily in the thick air.

The moon cast long shadows over the world outside as he leaned against the sill, the dark light of the nighttime leaving frozen tendrils over the landscape, preserving it in time like aspic encasing the scene.

Outside was perfectly still.

He shuddered again.

Only the top half of his body was visible from beyond the window, but his nakedness left him feeling exposed. Like being on show to the creeping darkness... being studied by something that he couldn't quite focus on.

Vulnerable...

There were things in the shadows that crept towards the house and there were things that crawled over his bare skin. Slowly they were touching him, little hints of sensation that glittered as black as ravens waiting to pick at the carrion...

He could feel himself gripping the windowsill hard against his palms, fixated on the darkness outside.

Searching every last shape and flutter, every movement catching his eyes as if awaiting some unknown terror.

But for what he was searching, he wasn't quite sure.

He didn't realise how hard he was breathing until his breath began misting on the pane, didn't realise how fast his heart was beating until it pounded against the inside of his ribs.

The darkness seemed to enclose everything and it transfixed him...

The eyes smiled then, black clad fingers stroking the lines of his flesh from the depths of their hidden place, tracing slowly and intricately over his naked body as he stood at the window.

They caressed and petted gently as if they held him in their palm, taking in everything about him. Every curve, every line, every form...

Touching every part of his flesh as intimate as a lover, as if they could feel him under their fingertips.

Peeling the glove from one hand, the bare palm vanished into the front of the loose, black pants, finding ready heat and need and rubbing it furiously.

They lived in the darkness, licking their lips as they imagined licking his body, stroking the air around his shape as they imagined running their hands over his skin... his perfect, succulent flesh...

They pinned him in the window like a butterfly staked out by a collector. He hung naked for them as bare fingers teased and fucked the heat of their own body, climaxing in a rush of slick fluid as they crushed him in their palm.

Logan shook himself hard.

He brusquely yanked the curtains shut, his fingers gripping the fabric so tightly they turned white.

He stood there for another painfully long second, staring blankly right through the material.

The sudden paranoia unnerved him, and he could feel fear in his heart and he didn't know why.

He sat heavily on the bed and ran shaking hands through his hair.

In the tented darkness he felt safer. What you can't see can't hurt you and with the curtains pulled tightly the outside world was no longer there to creep against him.

He lay down on his side, pulling Jean's limp, sleeping body tightly against his chest. She huffed and fidgeted a little but quickly settled once more, warm and solid and real in his arms.

He eventually drifted back into sleep, feeling more protected with the curtains shut and the blanket pulled tightly around them both.

It was the slowly rising sun that woke him next and he buried his head deep into the pillow, grudgingly succumbing to wakefulness once more, putting the restlessness of the night before down to nothing more than the drink.

Jean stirred slightly in response and nuzzled her back closer into his arms, letting him inhale the sleepy fragrance of her skin.

His hand stroked her smooth stomach, idly rubbing soft circles against her body as he yawned.

His eyes blinked open to the warm sunlight easing through the curtains and he smiled at the way it made her bare skin glow.

The soft slope of her shoulder poked out above the blankets, flushed with the colour of morning and he leaned down to brush his lips across it.

She smiled in her drowsy state, sighing as he buried his nose in her neck, breathing her in before pressing soft kisses against her shoulder.

His thumb stroked lightly against the underside of one breast and she moaned sleepily, twisting round in his arms to face him so his hand could rub warmly against the small of her back instead.

She looked beautifully serene... naked and relaxed and sleepy and comfortable in his arms.

He kissed her chin and her forehead, making her scrunch up her nose as she fought to stay asleep.

He grinned evilly to himself and slid down the bed, taking an exposed, pink nipple lightly between his lips and kissing it.

She moaned sleepily and as she rolled onto her back he placed a kiss in the valley between her breasts before he cast a glance up to her slowly waking face.

"How do you feel?" he asked, gently nuzzling at the creamy white flesh beneath him, pressing soft kisses to the sides of each breast in turn.

She squinted slightly, blinking away the sleep and stretching with a satisfied mumble.

She finally levered her eyes all the way open and smiled down at him.

"Mmm... pretty good actually..."

Logan lightly rubbed her hip and side as he eased himself back up the bed, pinning her body beneath his.

Jean shuffled under his weight comfortably. "...though I have the weirdest hangover..."

Logan softly kissed her collarbone. "Oh?"

"Yeah..." she replied, flexing her fingers to shake some life back into them. "My head is fine, but my ARM is throbbing."

He laughed then, amusement lighting up his face.

She shook her head. "Really, it's like a one-limb-centred migraine..."

He smirked against her skin.

"Just have to distract you from it then..." he murmured, slowly claiming her mouth in a hot, delicious kiss.

She sighed happily, closing her eyes in bliss at his tender attention.

"Mmm, you're a wonderful man..." she murmured softly, smiling as he slid back down her body.

"Flatterer," he grinned, the tip of his thumb skipping back and forth over the edge of a pink nipple, making her squirm.

His hot mouth descended on its partner and she bit her lip at the sweet-hot sensation of his rough tongue on her flesh.

She wrapped her legs around him as she arched her spine, flinging her arms high above her head.

"You give very good wake up calls..." she purred.

Logan laughed again, moving to her other breast and giving the neglected bud a long, slow lick.

"It's ten o'clock," he murmured, nuzzling lazily down her body.

She squirmed underneath him, the hot sensation between her legs building suddenly as his tongue flashed out over her hip bone.

"Time for your ten a.m. alarm call."

Jean moaned as he pressed his mouth lower, centering finally between her legs, pressing warm, lingering kisses on the inside of each thigh before softly parting her moistened opening.

She sighed at the sensation as his tongue lightly fluttered against her core, taking her, tasting her...

The hot, wet press of his mouth on her sex was agonisingly good and she writhed pathetically on the tousled sheets.

Logan was in sweet-tasting heaven, cradled between yielding thighs as he made her squirm and whimper under his caress, feeling her every response as he slowly wiggled the tip of his tongue into the hot space between her thighs.

She hissed and tensed, curling with delicious anticipation as he licked her, feeling the flat of his tongue lap hungrily at the musky flavour of her body.

He licked and sucked blissfully at wet, pink flesh, his mouth caressing and devouring with wanton gluttony, making her buck and whine under his ministrations.

His tongue skipped around the tight bundle of nerves that nestled inside her and he centred his attention on it, lavishing it with sure, rolling pressure as he gently slipped a finger into her wet, beckoning channel.

Her body twitched and contracted around his intruding digit as he luxuriously sucked and teased her clit, flicking it with his tongue as he dragged a long finger in and out of her welcoming depths.

The friction was delicious, the long slide of his finger in her core, rolling and teasing her burning flesh before he slipped in a second digit, curling them both together inside her channel.

It was too much, too good...

His tongue on her clit and his fingers filling her...

She cried out in breathless pleasure, clamping hard around his touch as her body contracted, the ecstasy ploughing through her mind sending sharp pinpoints of light along every nerve, shuddering hard before she slumped bonelessly onto the sheets.

"Oh, that was so much better then a wake-up call..." she murmured breathlessly, sated and limp against the bed as Logan wrapped himself around her.

She could feel his own arousal pressing against her and she turned in his embrace so that they could lie facing each other, letting the drowsy, morning sunlight bathe them both with streams of warm yellow.

Logan gave her a satisfied smile.

"Better than the hotel then...?" he teased, pressing a kiss behind her ear.

She nodded slowly, letting her hand rub small, gentle circles on his side.

"Definitely... you have to be in the penthouse suite before you get oral sex from the bellboys at breakfast time..."

She closed her eyes with a lazy smile, her long red hair fanned out over the pillow behind her.

Logan grunted contentedly, letting her hands wander across his body, leaving warm trails everywhere she touched.

Her fingers brushed down onto the top of his thigh, tracing the pale, dimpled scars that criss-crossed his leg before sliding back up and wrapping around his erection.

He hissed slowly, smiling into her neck as she caressed the hot, hard flesh in her hand.

"Frisky this morning...?" he purred.

"Well, you did such a good job of waking me up..."

She laughed at the whimpered moan he let out as she stroked him harder, her thumb rolling around in irregular patterns up and down his shaft as she moved her hand.

"Ungh... you evil... evil... woman..."

He huffed the words into her neck, interspersing them with breathless kisses.

"Like that, do ya...?" she teased.

His arms around her tightened as he rolled onto his back, bringing her with him in a tangle of limbs.

"Oh yeah..."

She laughed and propped herself up on her knees, straddling the tops of his thighs and perching there, an amused grin splitting her features as she idly stroked him.

He sprawled out contentedly, like a cat who got all the cream as she played with his erection, her hips gently sliding forwards until she was pressed against the underside of his hardness, trapping him between her hands and her body.

He moaned quietly, flexing beneath her with a contented huff.

"Lusty little thing, aren't you?" she teased.

"Oh, definitely. No better way to... start your day..."

He gasped softly as her fingers ran circles around the darkened head.

"You feel like maybe... helping me out instead of... viciously teasing me like... this...?"

His eyes rolled shut and he groaned low in his chest as she wrapped her fist tightly around him in response, pumping with calculated vigour before feeling a rough shudder run through him.

"You mean like that...?" she laughed.

His head twisted to one side, pressing his cheek into the cool sheets as he nodded.

"Oh... oh... definitely..."

"Hmm, I'll remember that..." she said, raising herself up to her knees.

He knew what she'd do before she did it, the space behind his eyelids growing unimaginably huge as she slowly sunk herself down onto his body, encasing him in a sheath of hot, soft, grasping pleasure.

"Oh... God..."

He drew the words out until they were nothing but a shuddering breath, his neck arching back as she sunk down to the hilt.

She felt the burning heat of his palms clinging desperately to her hips as she moved against him slowly, feeling the rippling pull of his thickness shifting inside her with every twitch of her body.

Her head dropped forward, her hair cascading over her face as she moaned, loving the feel of him inside, increasing her pace until she thrust her hips hard against his body, the pull and slide of his erection buried deep and bringing nothing but white sparks of pleasure.

A sheen of sweat broke out across her forehead under the canopy of hair, her face pulling tight in ecstasy as his hands on her waist began to guide their movements, his hips raising to meet her and drive himself full and hard between her legs.

"Unnf..."

She puffed uselessly with every thrust within her body, tightening her muscles around him and milking him hard for every sensation she could find.

He grunted in response, his mouth dropping open slightly as they began to loose their rhythm.

Breathing became difficult, every sense in her struggling through the chaotic, frantic movements, everything now about the search for release. No finesse, no grace, just her body on his, her hands twisting uselessly in the writhing mass of sensation as she bucked and strained above him, gasping for air as his thrusts drove the oxygen from her lungs.

It was fast and it was hard, a keening cry of absolute rapture shuddering up her spine until her head tilted back and gave it voice, her body tightening painfully as every muscle contracted, centering solely on the hard, thrusting cock between her thighs in a white-hot explosion of release so strong it almost bordered on pain.

She felt every detail, like time itself had slowed, the shudder that ran through his body before he found release, the heat and the wet, the tightening of his fingers into her flesh as he filled her with his fluid, the cry of pleasure on his lips as it ended...

She slumped forward, exhausted, limp against his heaving chest, holding onto him like she never wanted to let go.

He could feel her hot, panted breaths against his shoulder, his arms tightening around her smooth, naked back as he sunk deeply into the soft sheets on the bed, clutching onto her desperately.

He swallowed hard, letting his body slowly unwind, stroking her back unconsciously as she began to relax.

"Wow..."

He nodded. "Oh yeah wow."

She laughed then, the shake of her body transferring down through his.

"They should make wake-up calls an Olympic event... damn it I'm exhausted again now..."

He smiled, letting his hands wander over her perfect, soft flesh as he spoke.

"The Swedish Porn Olympics, maybe. I don't think they'd allow this on network TV..."

He thought about that for a second. "Well, maybe in Europe..."

She laughed again, shaking her head against his chest.

He sighed and let her snuggle down comfortably against him, his hands coming to rest gently on the small of her back.

Jean blinked wearily and closed her eyes for a second, listening to his heart beat under her cheek in the quiet.

It seemed so elemental. Earthy and animal and real. A living, breathing body to curl up with as opposed to an endless array of empty hotel beds.

I love you... the words hovered at the front of her head but never quite found voice. Too burned. Too jaded. Too tired to try again.

Too scared he might not feel the same.

Comfortable quiet enveloped them, Logan's grip around her loosening as she shuffled on top of him.

"Bathroom..." she mumbled eventually, kissing his chest before climbing off the bed, padding across the bedroom floor towards the door.

He smiled as he watched her go, rolling onto his side and yawning sleepily.

She pottered back a few minutes later, sliding back under the sheets and curling up on her side to face him. He still had his eyes closed, but he smiled at her.

"Hey."

She felt his arm reach for her under the sheets and scooted a little closer, bringing her hand up to stroke softly across his cheek.

His skin was warm and smooth under her fingertips, dark lashes resting gently shut as she lay her palm against his jaw, sliding closer to steal a swift kiss.

"I'm going to miss this..." she said quietly. "I have to go back to Manhattan soon."

Logan frowned, his eyes blinking open.

"When have you got to leave?"

"Uhh..." she squinted slightly in thought. "The twenty third."

Logan paused for a second, working it out in his head.

"So you're only here for a few more weeks?"

She shrugged.

"I guess..."

He looked thoughtful.

"So what happens then?"

He shifted his grasp on her waist and rolled her a little more securely into his body.

"Then we'll see."

She caught his look and smiled gently.

"I mean, let's wait and see what happens. I'm not after a holiday romance but I'm not after an epic affair either. They've never worked out too well for me in the past. I guess I don't know what I want."

"Something normal," murmured Logan, sleepily.

Jean laughed.

"Yeah... normal sounds good."

They lapsed into silence for a moment, just enjoying the tender caress of the other, relishing in the moment of closeness.

"I like this..." Jean said at length.

Logan nodded from his half-slumber.

"Just having someone there when I wake up in the morning. Even if it's not forever..."

Jean nuzzled her cheek sleepily against the pillow.

"Even if it's just for these next few days."

Logan nodded again and pressed his face against her hair wistfully.

He'd tasted something exquisite and he knew he wanted more. It was a hunger being fulfilled on the most intrinsic level and he wasn't sure he'd be able to give it up again once the weeks were over.

He ached from the inside, out. Every piece of him crying out for the fact that he had found something he needed more than life itself, and it could all be taken away so easily...

He held it in his arms, feeling hot breath against his skin, hurting so badly because it was so real yet so insubstantial.

She could be gone soon, and she would have taken what was left of his heart with her.

Jean fidgeted in his arms, getting more comfortable as slumber reclaimed her and she sighed drowsily, already mostly asleep before a thought struck her, a thought she was too tired to rationalise.

"Come home with me..." she yawned.

Logan looked down at her sharply. Still half asleep she didn't notice his movement.

"I'm tired of being lonely," she mumbled, "And I think that I'm in love with you. What else do we need?"

The air seemed to shimmer and Logan clenched his eyes tightly shut as her words filled him.

God he needed her so much... loved her so utterly...

"Nothing at all..." he murmured, pulling her pliant body tightly against his own.

She loved him... Maybe for once something in his life would turn out right. Maybe for once he stood a chance.

Maybe for once he would be happy.

~o~

Chapter 6

The truth is flexible, white hot, but it soon becomes brittle when tempered with cold bullshit. -

Robert Williams

Here is where madness is born, Dante's circles of hell ringing deep and true as sense looses its footing.

The clean black painted walls were still tacky with moisture, clinging and engulfing without let or respite.

It was dark, light shut out with the black, deep tar of a mind gone beyond.

Beyond light, beyond cold sense, the sweating, grasping shadows consuming everything, the heat and the stench unbearable.

Sitting...

Just sitting...

Staring at the blackness and feeling its heat.

Sweating and wanting and aching but never moving, just there, in that moment.

There's a glimmer in haunted eyes, the last flicker of logic, the last dying breath of reason gasping for air as it slowly suffocates in the swelling, pulling mud.

There but for the grace of God, but everyone knows that God loves a sense of irony, so it gasps and thrashes and dies.

The darkness feeds a twisted head, the back-smeared paintbrush falling to the floor with a wet slap beside the half-empty paint pot.

Wet droplets caress the can as if it were bleeding pure midnight, letting it puddle and stain the bare wood floor.

It doesn't matter.

~o~

Days trickle past like cold treacle, the summer heat winding up a notch to make the air sticky and thick. The office air conditioning system hummed audibly above the chatter of the workers, trying in vain to keep them all cool in the unending hot weather.

"So have you heard the rumour?"

There were a lot of rumours and, as far as this office went, Kitty knew them all. She looked up from her sandwich to find Bobby hovering over her table, grinning from ear to ear.

"Probably... What rumour?"

"About Logan and his lady. You know? That chick with the red hair who was here the other day?"

Kitty half nodded, her interest piqued.

"Tell me more."

Bobby grinned again, almost hopping from one foot to the other in excitement.

"Well, guy from payroll said he heard that Logan was thinking of transferring to Manhattan. Said he thinks it's a real possibility he could be leaving us. I just heard him talking about it in the bathroom."

Kitty's jaw dropped.

"Oh my God! You're kidding me."

Bobby shook his head.

"Nope... He was down there the other day asking about relocation forms from the payroll department. Gonna' ask him about it later, but I'm thinking it's a real possibility."

Kitty clapped her hands excitedly, dropping her sandwich onto the tabletop. "Awwwww! It must be serious if he's thinking about moving to be with her! Oh, bless his romantic little heart! I always knew there was a squidgy centre in there somewhere..."

Bobby laughed.

"Trust me, it's got nothing to do with romance."

"It doesn't?"

Bobby shook his head. "No... Logan finally got laid..."

Kitty shrieked in annoyance and Bobby ducked sharply as her sandwich went flying past his ear.

~o~

"Marie, I have a job for you..."

Those words never herald anything good for a secretary, Marie thought. She looked up from her work to find Logan hovering uncertainly around her desk, distractedly picking things up and putting them back down again.

"Yes...?"

"You know any good florists?"

She almost laughed at the look on his face. Part pleading, part hideous embarrassment.

"Florists?" she clarified. "As in flowers?"

He nodded.

"One or two... why?"

"You, uh... think you can do me a small favour?"

She sighed internally. Yet more words that spelled extra work for her.

"And this favour would be what, exactly...?"

She peered at him cautiously.

Logan shuffled his feet. "I need you to send someone some flowers for me. I have so much stuff to get done today and I'm not going to get time otherwise. You think you can fit it in?"

Marie sighed, nodding grudgingly.

"Sure, Logan... who, where and what, exactly? And what, out of interest, did you do wrong to herald this grovelling floral apology?"

"Roses..." he said, an unreadable look spreading across his face. "The red ones. You know, not just the little red ones but the big red ones with the really dark petals... and they're, uh... they're for Jean... and I didn't do anything wrong, I just thought she might like them."

Marie smirked. "Ohh... I see." She laughed a little. "Ahh, young love. Like Valentine's day. Invented by bank managers to make us overdrawn."

Logan frowned.

"You might have to track her address down though."

Marie looked surprised. "How come?"

He sighed. "I lost the note she left when my wallet was stolen the other day and I..."

"Can't remember the address?" Marie filled in.

"Yeah..." Logan rubbed the back of his neck in embarrassment.

The woman rolled her eyes. "Really, you are utterly useless."

She started to root swiftly through her Rolodex and with a small grunt of satisfaction she removed a neatly indexed card, brandishing it directly in Logan's face.

"This address, by any chance?" she asked.

He stared at the paper for a second.

"Yeah... how did you..."

"How did I know? Cause I know you all too well. I don't go giving you the only copy of important notes. You'd loose your own head if it wasn't nailed to your neck."

Logan's eyes widened. "Hey!"

Marie smirked.

"Well come on, our office bachelor goes all gooey over a girl, it's not as if we're going to let him lose her address."

Logan blinked. "We...?"

Marie flashed him an evil grin.

"I ran off about forty copies. There's one in every Rolodex in the office..."

She waved her pen around suggestively and Logan groaned.

"Oh you are an evil, evil woman..."

Marie giggled. "Oh yes, but this is why you love me so."

"Sometimes I have my doubts."

She stuck her tongue out at him playfully and Logan sighed.

"So anyway..." he continued, gathering together the last shreds of his dignity. "If you can tear yourself away from being the office dating bulletin board, think you can take care of it for me?"

Marie smiled softly.

"Yes, I'll take care of it, oh romantic fluff-ball that you truly are."

She shook her head at his responding scowl. "You really do love her don't you...?" she smiled, watching his face as it creased into a sappy little grin.

He nodded slowly.

"I really do,"

Marie laughed.

"My God, I never thought I would see the day..." she shook her head. "It's such a shame we're going to be losing you to Manhattan in a couple of weeks."

Logan's mouth dropped open slightly.

"Where did you hear that? No one's supposed to know anything about that yet..."

She smirked again. "Don't worry, Logan. I'll be the very definition of discretion."

He sighed. "Thanks... the last thing I need is for this to get spread around everywhere before it's even been decided on."

"Logan...!"

The unexpected shout made him twist around sharply, jumping slightly as he turned to find Bobby right behind him, grinning widely in a slightly disconcerting way. He raised his eyebrow, taking a small step back.

"Bobby."

"Logan, Logan, Logan..."

Bobby smirked irritatingly, gaining a slightly blank stare in response.

"Yes, me Logan, you Bobby, no Jane, her repeat fees were too expensive for us..."

Bobby ignored him.

"So... Manhattan... I hear it's very nice in the spring time..."

Logan rolled his eyes.

"Does everybody know about this?"

Marie nodded.

"Guy from payroll told Bobby and Bobby told Kitty and Kitty told just about everybody... "

Bobby shushed her, waving his hands agitatedly.

"So is it true?"

Logan sighed. "I don't know. Probably... possibly..."

Bobby whooped in excitement, slapping Logan hard on the arm.

"Yeeees! Logan finally got lucky! Break out the parade, our boy has found himself a woman!"

Logan pinched the bridge of his nose, his forehead crinkling in despair as Bobby bounced off, spreading the news to anyone who would listen and also most of the people who wouldn't.

"Well, that went well... so much for discretion," smiled Marie.

~o~

Chapter 7

You make very few friends travelling north on a south-bound freeway. -

Lazlo Woodbine

I saw the devil tonight.

He was laughing at me.

He laughs at everyone, but tonight he laughed only at me, fire dancing in his pretty eyes as he rips apart my soul.

He takes and he steals. He knows the fears in my heart and he plays them. He sees the weakness in my soul and he embraces it.

He enacts my terrors before me, waiting for his ovation and, helpless, I stand for him, a captive audience to his endless performance.

My tears are his applause, the fear and the pain in my heart his encore.

He laughs at me over and over again but I want to take it back.

I'm taking everything back.

He stole and he borrowed, promising pitch tar lies to me but he will not have his curtain calls.

No more, no more clinging black, his tongue sweet as honey, dark as night as he whispers his false vows in my ear.

No more half-truths, no more faithless promises.

I gave my life and blood and soul to the devil and now I will have everything back.

Every time you forget about me, then I take from you. Every time you think or speak or breathe of anyone but me then I will hurt you.

It is my promise. My vow to you, and this time I intend to keep it.

I'll keep it because I saw the roses being delivered to her home. A smiling face and a huge bouquet and she gasped and laughed in delight. I saw her take them in her hands, pressing her face to the blooms to inhale their scent.

I saw it all. I knew who had sent them. I knew it was him. I knew his secretary had ordered them. I knew everything.

I knew it all and I watched it all from the deepest darkest shadow and I saw her laugh and I saw her smile and I saw her close the door after the delivery boy was gone. I knew he got big tip for his trouble because she was so happy. So sparkling with joy.

I knew because I saw it, I watched it, and then... I took it.

I laughed for the devil in my soul as I made my world about me. As he made my world before.

~o~

He hadn't had a chance to call her all day, a mountain of neglected work stealing the hours out of his hands, but he had spoken to her only that morning. Kissing her goodbye after they spent the night together in his room, promising to come by that evening. Promising that he would see her then.

Her place for a change, after work.

She had laughed and said he'd never be able to keep her away, especially if it meant more sex because he really was a horndog and was she ever glad about that...

He'd blushed and made an offhand comment about it having been a while, and maybe she shouldn't get her hopes up about it lasting.

He remembered her laugh and she'd said something in reply that he couldn't quite remember now.

He smiled to himself as he drove though the dim evening sun, imagining the look that would have been on her face when she got the flowers. She should have had them by now. Marie said she'd ordered them at lunchtime and said the delivery company assured she'd have them by 6 and it was now almost 7...

She had to have got them by now and he hoped she liked them.

His car pulled into a quiet little back street, neatly lined with endless suburbia. He checked the address he had scrawled hastily on his arm before he left the office, late as usual, the last person out after everyone was already at home.

He followed the house numbers, counting up towards hers, finally spotting it nestled between a little copse of bushy, green trees.

His car pulled silently into the driveway and he bounced out the vehicle, pocketing his keys before hurrying up the steps to the front door.

He was about to knock when he realised that the door was already open.

Logan paused, all humour suddenly fading from his face. The door hadn't been forced but the inside was dark and quiet as if there was nobody at home.

He checked the number on his arm against the number on the doorframe and they definitely matched, but the house was silent and dark.

"Jean...?"

There was no reply and he lightly pressed his fingertips to the wood, the door swinging open silently on its hinges.

The dark interior betrayed nothing and Logan took a worried look around the walls, trying to see if anything was missing or obviously out of place.

He could feel his heartbeat speeding up in his chest as he tentatively stepped inside, reality taking a step backwards as he was greeted by the heavy perfume of flowers.

He stopped in confusion.

His hand groped for the light switch, fumbling over it in the darkness until it suddenly blazed to life, making him squint with the sudden brightness.

The red carpet was strewn with deep crimson rose petals, littering a path up the hall and stairs, the scent so strange yet so familiar.

He smiled in relief, shaking his head in amusement at his own paranoia.

"Jean, you sentimental girl..."

He flipped the door closed behind him, shutting it with his heel. He shrugged off his jacket, draping it over the coat rack behind the door as he looked around.

Slowly he followed the littered path of petals, along the hall and towards the stairs, lips quirking with amusement as each step crushed the fragrant plants beneath his feet, releasing more of the wet, heady fragrance into the air.

It left dampened splodges on the sides of his black shoes as they were ground into the pile of the carpet, the moisture almost squelching underfoot.

Petals littered each step and he half wondered how many roses had sacrificed their blooms for this venture.

"Jean, baby, what are you up to...? He called quietly. There was no reply and he stifled the childish, mischievous grin that threatened to consume his features.

He almost slipped on the thick layer of petals as he neared the top of the stairs, the cascade growing deeper under his feet the further up the steps he got, the scattering downstairs growing into a thick bed on the last few stairs.

He carefully picked his way through the mountain of blooms, watching his feet more carefully as he climbed.

The landing was coated in a soft, thick drift of red and, as he reached the top of the stairs, he quickly glanced up from the crushed flowers at his feet.

His heart froze, something in the depths of his body cracking painfully.

"Jean...?"

It was long after the police had left that he cried, retching violently into the toilet as their blue flashing lights took her away, zipped in black plastic, covered in crimson red blooms.

Long after they had been and gone, talking and questioning and taking his statement as he calmly told them everything he knew. Long after they had driven him home, ashen and white, making sure he got back inside safely, shaking their heads in their condolence and driving away once more as they left him so utterly alone.

The tears cascaded uncontrollably down his face then, his stomach knotting and convulsing as he tried to dispel the image that seemed to be seared irreparably into his soul.

It clawed at his heart and he cried out in desperation, the scream of the damned as he saw her in his eyes, so white and so red...

He clutched at his head in desperation, shaking violently now that there was no one there to see him, now that he didn't even have to pretend to be strong.

The scent had been so thick, so mixed with the flowers that he hadn't even been able to tell they were so merged with her blood... Hadn't been able to tell the carpet was soaked with the red of her pain, hadn't known that he had walked on the last of her life as he had smiled and imagined the delights that awaited him at the top of those stairs...

Not when all that had awaited him was her brutal murder, her body almost inside out as some sick fuck had left her.

So red... so red and so white...

His head burned because it hurt so much...

He rocked back and forth in the corner of the bathroom, not daring to move because he knew his legs would never carry him, not daring to venture outside because he knew that it was still scrawled on the walls of her home and he could see it scrawled in his mind as if it was still here before him.

"You took it all..." he whispered, over and over as he rocked, the words sliding with blood on the whitened wall of his mind.

The room was bleeding, that's how it had looked, the letters rough and irregular as if someone had hacked them into its flesh for him to read.

You took it all.

~o~

From the corner of the black, black, red, red room a small radio hummed with static. It crackled and popped until long fingers twisted the dial, the white noise thinning and evaporating into nothing and then slowly it became the quiet, subdued strains of The Carpenters wafting lightly into the air.

"Why do birds suddenly appear, every time you are near..."

The figure hummed along softly, a smile catching their upturned lips as they turned on the mottled, old sink taps, filling the washing up bowl with lukewarm water.

"Just like me, they long to be..."

It gushed over the sides in a lazy slew as those same hands dropped wet, red steel into the pool.

Butcher knife, pliers, a half-rusted hacksaw blade...

"Close to you..."

Sweet red blood curled away from metal and into the clear water, gushing over the sides of the bowl and away, diluted to nothing down the drain.

The figure sang along, the words barely audible as they mumbled under their breath, contemplatively picking meat from the bent teeth on the saw blade.

It had once been a good woodworking saw. It had never been intended to see bone and it had chewed messily through tissue and cartilage, snagging over and over, ripping and tearing as it pulled loose stretches of skin.

More blood sluiced away as thin hands crushed a lump of torn meat between the flat pads of finger and thumb.

Not carpentry... butchery.

~o~

I see you... you don't see me but I see you with clarity like the finest diamond, light reflecting and refracting and warping through you until you are just this rainbow of bright, bright, shimmering colour and I am nothing to you.

Nothing but black, always black.

Same old shit just on a different night, same as always, same as before...

The way of it, the unending, bleak white way.

I'll give it all to you. Give as you take.

You took my life and my soul, everything I had. Your touch healing as it burned, blackening as it soothed. Scars inside never fading because of you, because of what you did.

Never a second glance for the ones you cut down, never a spare thought.

The pain in my head never ceases, the sound of your voice never fading. You gave me this, never asking, never questioning, never even pausing to understand what you did to me.

I feel the bile rising when I think of you. I feel it burning in my throat and my stomach, but I won't let it up, won't let it out. I'm saving it all for you.

All for you... always and forever...

~o~

...shoulders dislocated, left shoulder blade shattered... ...torn ligaments connecting the... ...found in the abdominal cavity. Severe trauma to... ...missing fingers on the left hand... ...complete removal of the sexual organs... ...jagged incision... ...severed fingers later found inserted into... ...belief that it was a psychosexual act, the perpetrator...

It was all too much...

He stopped reading, stopped listening, stopped even being able to see after the first six lines of the coroner's report.

They had asked him so many times if he was sure he wanted to read a copy, if he was sure he could cope...

He knew... he knew he would never be able to read it but there was some part of him that had to know. Had to know what she'd felt, had to know what she'd lived through.

Died through.

And he hated it.

He walked in a bubble. That was the only way it could be described. Sounds fell muted and hollow against his ears as if everything was so strangely far away.

He woke up like every morning and showered and dressed and stepped outside because he had nothing else to do, nowhere else to go.

The rush of oblivious lives screamed past on either side of him like a man standing in the space between speeding trains. He could feel the pull of their speed on his body, the vacuum left by their passage, but he could never quite touch it...

The inside of his head ached, body exhausted through lack of sleep, eyes sore from staring endless hours at the blank ceiling. It wasn't just the fear of seeing her in his eyes when he closed them...

So many things kept him awake at night, but the dreams invaded his mind when he did finally sleep.

They were what cemented it all. Dreams of blood and pain and crystal red fountains.

Inside he was screaming but as he climbed the stairs he swallowed it all. He couldn't fall apart, couldn't let himself be seen like that so he pushed it down.

Swallowed it like so much bile in the back of his throat, letting the caustic yellow fluid burn.

It was taking him apart piece by piece, one hand in his stomach and the other in his heart, cold fingers squeezing living flesh until it stilled.

The walls seemed painfully close as he climbed the stairs that morning, feet plodding slowly and methodically on the familiar steps, not letting his mind touch on reality because if it did everything would fall apart.

"Logan...?"

Scott froze at the top of the stairs, his usually indifferent features pulled tight as he saw the man climbing towards him.

"Go home Logan. You don't want to be here."

His hands were shaking and his face white as he moved to block Logan's path, putting himself firmly in front of the door.

"You don't want to see this..." Scott murmured softly.

Logan paused on his climb up, the bubble around him soaking away the urgency in the guard's voice.

"See what?" Logan looked at him curiously.

"I'm telling you, go home..."

A hint of blind panic now and it filtered through this time, the strained worry in Scott's voice, the white-knuckle grip he had on the door at the top of the stairs...

"What happened...?"

The bubble fractured and Logan picked up his pace, bounding up the last few stairs and moving to push past Scott's halting grasp.

"I'm telling you, go home. Go home and wait for the police, you don't want to see this..."

"Scott, what happened?" he demanded, frantically wrenching the other man's hand from the doorknob and almost toppling through as the door swung open.

Kitty spun round at the clatter, her face white as she stood with the rest of the staff, every one of them solemnly gathered around his corner office.

His heart seemed to lurch into his stomach and he could feel the bile shift and churn as he looked at them, cold, nauseating dread freezing in his guts.

Bobby was the first to recover, sounding grave for the first time in his life.

"We... we weren't expecting you in today..."

Logan looked round at them, each one of them watching his every movement as he slowly let go of the door handle, stepping out from the stairwell.

Scott followed behind him, resting a firm hand on his shoulder.

"Please go home."

It was a last-ditch plea, always destined to fail.

Logan shook his head mutely, eyes dancing over the drawn faces of his colleagues as they watched him, letting Scott's hand slip away as he walked towards them.

"We don't know how it happened..." whispered Kitty, forlornly.

Logan swallowed, watching with a churning stomach as the crowd parted before his office, seeing people disperse around him, watching them reform once again after he had gone past, like oil through water.

His shaking hand settled on the familiar brass handle that led to his room and, for the first time in his memory, Marie's desk empty as he walked past.

Marie...?

He glanced round as a sudden stab of fear hit him, the irrational notion of maybe...

But her silent face was watching with the others and he turned back to the door, letting it glide inwards effortlessly with the lightest brush of his fingertips.

The stench hit him first, the cloying thickness and the rancid smell of the viscera that slopped over his desk, the dismembered dog hanging limply by it's throat as it spun slowly from the ceiling fan.

His eyes grew wide in horror, the matted, grey fur hanging limply by a black leather collar.

"Bo...?"

Tendrils of darkening, congealed blood swayed slowly from it's eviscerated stomach, leaving a sticky trail as it slowly rotated, coating papers and documents with gore.

It contrasted sharply with the pasty white intestines that were slowly turning brown in the humid city air.

He turned away and clenched his eyes shut, covering his mouth and nose to fight back the sudden nausea.

He felt a sturdy hand on his shoulder as someone pulled him away, hearing the door click shut as they closed the scene behind him.

He didn't know how badly he was shaking...

He looked up with desperate eyes, praying that he hadn't seen it, looking for something that said he was wrong... but the shaken looks on his colleague's faces told him everything he needed to know.

Marie pushed to the front of the crowd and pulled him into a fierce hug, feeling him trembling in her arms.

"I'm so sorry..." she whispered.

He pulled away unthinking, numb inside as he stared into nothingness, dead from the brain down to try and ease the pain.

"Who did this...?" he whispered, hands tensing by his sides.

"The security tapes are missing," murmured Scott. "Police are on their way."

Logan felt the anger surge inside him, fuelling the pain and grief as they crashed and merged in his stomach, a maddening, primal cry boiling up until it rattled in his head, barely clamped down by the sheer force of will that he would not let break.

~o~

Silence.

It's dark here once more.

Darkness sits and remembers how she screamed and it makes it smile. Makes it laugh.

Because it will take everything, just as he took everything, and when it is done he will once again have nothing...

~o~

Chapter 8

I'm only dancing cause I can't stop shaking...-

John Spencer

Days were hot and evenings were clinging. Twilight had begun to settle over the sky, casting long purple bruises over the city.

Can't sleep, can't eat... it claws at you like sickness, the heat and the sweat.

He couldn't take sitting in his house any more, little reminders of her scattered everywhere, everything surrounding him sparking tiny fragments of memory that shimmered and vanished again as swiftly as they arrived.

They were insubstantial, whisked away by the low, heavy cling in the air, but fraction built upon fraction until all he could think about was her.

He was left wanting and incomplete.

Sitting alone on the couch where he'd kissed her, lying alone in the bed where they'd made love, eating alone at the table where she'd laughed and drunk tequila until midnight.

He tore his hands through his hair, barking his frustration at the torpid evening sky. Everything inside was welling to the surface, squeezing and pressing and desperately seeking a release valve, the pressure building almost to the verge of pain.

He stood in the centre of the room and suddenly, desperately wanted to cry.

Turning the screw he swallowed it down again.

The door slammed loudly as he left, stepping into the world outside and into the wall of humidity beyond his room.

~o~

"Hey there you. You're looking far too lonely for a big city like this. How can that be, huh?"

He didn't know what made him pause. Didn't know what made him stop and turn to look at her.

Desperation makes you do strange things.

He missed her... he missed her so much and it hurt so deeply inside...

That was what it had taught him. That it wasn't the grief that hurt it was the loneliness that follows. It was the feeling of having something so profoundly beautiful snatched away from your fingers.

The burn and the ache were slow and grinding and in that split second he would have given anything to have her back again, anything at all... even for just a taste of what he'd lost.

She looked at him again and snapped her gum and shrugged in a non-committal way as if to say that she really didn't care either way, the decision was up to him.

He drowned himself.

He didn't catch her name and she was gone before dawn... in fact she was gone before midnight. They'd returned to his place, fucked once and then she'd taken her money and left as swiftly as she arrived, and if he wasn't so tired and in so much pain he'd be screaming at himself.

It had hurt, far more than he had expected it to because it was nothing like what he'd lost.

Yes she'd fucked him expertly, bringing him off while barely even breaking a sweat, but there had been nothing...

Nothing at all...

He clutched the pillow close to his chest, burying his face in the top of it.

If he imagined real hard he could almost make believe that it was a woman, long and lean curled around him, hair spilling over his hands, holding him tightly in return.

Almost.

He could almost believe that it was her, pressing her body against him while she slept, curled up tightly in his arms like she had been so many times before.

Almost... But not quite.

Up in smoke. Evaporating into the swiftly fading light as if she'd never been there in the first place.

Truth be told he hadn't wanted the woman there. Still didn't, never had. Didn't want the cheap smell of her perfume that clung to his sheets or the sickly sweet taste of her body.

She clawed at him still, even though she was long gone into the night.

It wasn't her he was thinking of, wasn't her he wished he could breath in as he sighed into the pillow.

But what he wanted he could no longer have and that hurt... it hurt so bad that for the second time that night he curled up and suddenly wanted to cry.

Lost again, he let it take him.

~o~

Red-rimmed eyes peered blearily round the door, squinting into the painful brightness of the world beyond.

"Hey, Logan."

Bobby shuffled uneasily on the doorstep, one hand wedged deep into the pocket of his jeans, the other tightly clutching a plastic grocery bag.

He was pretty sure he shouldn't be here, but something had compelled him this afternoon. He wasn't quite sure what, but he had headed out into the muggy heat anyway, a man on a mission of mercy.

Or something like that.

Now he cocked his head at the tousled hair and bare shoulder he could see half poking out from behind the door.

Logan sighed, squinting against the bright glare of the setting sun.

"Go 'way, Bob..."

The younger man shook his head.

"Nope. Can't do it."

Logan grunted, resignedly shuffling aside and letting him through he front door.

Bobby hesitated for a second, a look of pity flickering across his face as he took in his Logan's state. He looked like hell warned up, which probably wasn't too far from the truth.

He followed him silently through to the kitchen, resting the grocery bag on the counter.

Logan's eyes were still red and sore, his hair and sweat pants obviously both well slept in, and Bobby started unpacking the contents of the bag with a sigh.

"Brought you some milk and bread and stuff," he said. "Thought you might not have had the chance to get any."

Logan remained silent, arms folded across his chest as he leaned back against the work surface.

"Don't dress up or nothing for me, eh...?" Bobby murmured, a lop-sided smile flickering and then dying on his face.

Logan shook his head. "Just go home..."

The younger man exhaled and scratched the back of his neck nervously.

"Look, Logan... I know that it doesn't mean anything, but I feel like I ought to be doing something. You did so much for me already. You gave me so many things and helped me so much when no one else would, I feel like I should be doing something in return."

He looked down at his hands, rubbing them together nervously.

"And I know that everyone seems to say it at a time like this, but I do know what you're going through, and right now the last thing you need is to be spending all your time on your own."

Logan turned away, resting his hands on the counter, snorting as he shook his head.

"Yeah, well that's just great. Why don't you go and join all the other well wishers on this street? You can start a "Make Logan have fun" committee, or something."

Bobby flinched. "You know that's not what I meant."

"You and everyone else," Logan grumbled. "You don't have a clue, any of you."

Bobby shook his head. "You don't know that. We've all had our share of tragedy."

"Bull shit," Logan spat. "You don't know, you CAN'T know."

"Right," Bobby said, sourly. "You're right, Logan, of course you are. I don't know what it's like to loose somebody I loved. How can I? I'm just a kid, I don't know anything. Of course I don't."

Angry sarcasm positively oozed from his words and Logan huffed in annoyance.

"I don't need to be mocked."

"I'm not mocking you," Bobby replied. "But you can't say that I don't know how it feels. I know how much it hurts. I know what it feels like to have everything in your world tipped upside-down and inside out. It hurts so much that the last thing you want to do is acknowledge the fact that maybe, maybe this isn't all about you. That you're not the only one who's felt like this, because it's so horrible, and it hurts so much that no matter what anyone says it doesn't help."

Logan stared blankly at the counter as Bobby rubbed at his face.

"I know what it's like, alright? I've been there. I've felt it. I lost my father before I was even sixteen. It's like having a limb ripped off."

Logan closed his eyes for a second. "I'm... I'm sorry, OK?"

Bobby shrugged. "Don't be. There's nothing that anyone could have done. It's just something that happened."

Logan almost laughed at that.

"Just something that happened... God, sounds so fucking simple like that, doesn't it?"

Bobby wedged his hands deep into his pockets as he shrugged pragmatically.

"In a way it is. Hurts... hurts a lot... I won't lie to you. It's all you can think about for a while. Every second of every day, that's all you can seem to think about. How you'll never see them again. All the little things that they used to do, all the things you never noticed. Suddenly they're not done any more."

He shuffled his feet distractedly.

"You know, my mom kept his toothbrush in the pot in the bathroom for nearly 8 months...? She just never thought to take it out and throw it away. Maybe she just couldn't. Maybe she needed it there. All the little things that, when they're gone, that's when it's really all over. She needed it because she couldn't let go of them. Me, I wanted to get rid of it the same day. Wanted it away from here, because every time I looked at it, it reminded me of the fact that he wasn't there. Woulda' hurt like a bitch too, throwing it in the trash, but it was what I always felt that I needed to do. Like making it concrete. Easier to accept. But I never said anything and she never brought it up and one day she spring-cleaned and finally threw it out. And you know, I almost missed it being there."

He laughed bitterly.

"Stupid, right? It's just a toothbrush..."

Logan could feel his face start to burn and he willed the tears back down.

"Yeah..." he murmured. "Toothbrush..."

Bobby pursed his lips, taking a breath before looking round the kitchen.

"I'm not gonna' lie to ya, and I know you don't want clichés, Logan. It gets better. Eventually it gets better. It never completely stops hurting, but it gets better than this."

Logan slumped forwards to let his elbows rest on the solid counter top.

"Barely even knew her..." he muttered.

Bobby swung himself up to sit on the counter beside the grocery bag he'd brought. He rummaged through it until he came to a can of beer.

Cracking it open he took a long swallow before speaking again.

"Don't have to know someone long to miss 'em."

Logan rubbed at his eyes before resting his chin on his hands.

"Guess so."

Bobby regarded the man across the kitchen for a second, his back still to him as Logan leaned over the hard worktop.

"Cut me some slack here, Logan... I know you were never the most loquacious of people, but you're supposed to be my boss, this is hard enough as it is."

Logan laughed.

"Should have fired you for harassing me at home..."

Bobby grinned, shaking his head in amusement.

"That sounds more like you..."

Logan slowly turned back round, his eyes never really leaving the floor.

"It's really hard, Bobby..."

He looked up then and his eyes were haunted. Sunken and red with grief they echoed soul-deep hurt.

"What they did to her... how could they do that? What could she have ever done that was so bad that she deserved this?"

The sinking evening sun glittered through the kitchen window, casting a dark, orange light through the room.

Bobby shook his head. "It's not a case of deserving something. No one deserved what happened to her. No one should ever have had to go through what she did."

Logan swallowed, resting a hand over his chest.

"Then what did I do? They left a message on the wall... I sent her roses, there were roses all over the floor..."

Bobby shook his head vehemently, cutting Logan off before he could say another word.

"No! No, this is not your fault. You can't blame yourself for this. This has nothing to do with you, or with her. What happened was not your fault and you can't blame yourself when you did nothing wrong."

Logan shook his head, clenching his eyes shut against the emotions churning inside him.

"How could they do it to her? How could they...?

Bobby shrugged.

"I don't know, Logan. I just don't know."

Logan huffed in frustration, running his hand over his face.

"Christ, I wish I wasn't so tired all the time... It's too fucking hot."

Bobby took another drink from his can of beer and nodded silently.

"Fuckin' hot, fuckin' humid. Kind of weather that sends people crazy. You know more people commit suicide in the summer than they ever do in winter?"

Logan glanced at him from across the kitchen.

"They say it's cause in the winter they don't notice their depression so bad. When everything's grey and everyone's miserable then how can you tell you're any different to anyone else? Summer just makes the contrast brighter."

Bobby swung his legs idly, scuffing his heels against the cabinet beneath him.

"And March really does make people mad. Institution admissions go up in that month too..."

Logan snorted.

"You know a lot about this crap?"

Bobby laughed and nodded.

"Yeah... After my dad died I spent about a year and a half living under a rock. You pick up a lot of useless shit about crazy people along the way."

~o~

Bobby left a few hours later, stepping out into the slowly cooling night air, leaving Logan to flump back into bed again.

He'd made sure the other man had eaten and that there was food in the fridge before letting him go back to sleep, and Bobby had quietly turned out the lights and locked the door before leaving, stepping onto the porch as a car pulled up across the street.

Marie climbed out, stopping short in surprise at seeing Bobby emerging from Logan's house.

"Bobby...?"

The young man blinked in confusion.

"Hey..."

Marie met him halfway across the street, glancing at the darkened windows before looking back at the man before her.

"I was just gonna' visit Logan..." she said. "See if he needed anything. How is he?"

Bobby shrugged noncommittally.

"Bearing up. Not great. If you wanted to see him it'll have to wait, he went to bed just as I was leaving."

Marie glanced at her watch in surprise.

"It's barely even 10 o'clock... He's usually up for another couple of hours..."

Bobby shook his head.

"He's depressed, Marie, like he has every right to be. Makes you do strange things. If he wants to shut everything out in sleep for a while then it's probably best to let him do it."

The woman looked concerned.

"He didn't say if he needed anything, did he?" she asked.

"Taken care of already, " Bobby replied. "Talk to him tomorrow, OK? He's holding it together, but let him sleep."

Marie nodded resignedly.

"Yeah... I'll see you at work, OK?"

Bobby nodded.

"Yeah."

~o~

There's a coldness in they eyes in the darkness as they watch the scene on the street. A bitterness that runs cold and hard and true. The woman and the boy before them.

There's a twisting in their need to see everything, and a compulsion to bend everything they see into the sculpture they are creating. Living clay to ease and press and tear until it forms the shape they desire.

They wet their lips in thought before they begin again, considering their clay.

Their sculpture is made of pieces, but it is the space between the pieces that makes the sculpture.

And for now, they wish to consider only the space.

~o~

Chapter 9

Every man nowadays has his disciples, and it is always Judas who writes the biography. -

Oscar Wilde

Kill me. Piece by piece.

Touch the midnight and feel the dark.

The product of a sick mind, I know what they say. That I'm wrong, but I know I'm right.

I see the justice that was denied. And every piece of you that I kill...

It kills me too, but like cutting away the chaff. Burning away the infected edge of my wounds. It hurts but it has to be done. Until the wounds are clean and ready to heal.

Until we are even together. Until you know my pain. Until you feel it too. Until you understand.

We are not done.

I know what they say... that I lead your trail and you follow blind, but it is not true.

Though maybe it should be.

Does the sinking pull of the inevitable hurt your soul? Does it wake you in the nights when I see that you don't sleep?

Afraid of what comes when you close your eyes?

I can be all that you want and more.

If that is what you want then that is what I shall be. Just for you. Always for you.

Everything you deserve.

~o~

Gossip is so tasty. How we love to eat it.

It's an old proverb. As true then as now and Bobby listened to the chattering voices with barely concealed disgust.

"I heard he's falling apart."

"Nervous breakdown, so they say."

He seethed quietly by the coffee maker, a sudden defensiveness tightening in his posture.

People had been giving him an odd berth all week and initially it had puzzled him. Not so now though. No, now it was blindingly clear.

People by nature are cowardly, bigoted and scared.

Logan had lost. Not been to work in weeks. It sparks stories and rumours and everyone knew Bobby was the only who had actually seen him in that time.

They felt guilty by association. Guilty for the gossip they ate.

"Mental illness... it's tragic you know. My great Aunt Doris was-..."

"Said he might never come back to work. It's just a rumour, you know, but..."

"Say it was that dog that did it. Finally pushed him over the edge..."

Bobby slammed the jug back into the machine with hands shaking in fury, slopping half the contents over the counter top before glaring hard across the room.

"Shut up!"

His angry bark quieted the chattering voices, startling them into momentary silence as they twisted their heads around to look at him.

"Don't you even have one fucking ounce of compassion...?"

His face was stormy, pulled tight in impotent fury.

"Don't you get it?" Bobby glared at each of them in turn. "They murdered his girlfriend. Someone broke into her home and killed her. Violated her. Tortured her!"

He spat the words like they were a bitter taste in his mouth.

"They left her body so mutilated she was barely even recognisable, and then they left a trail for him to follow so that he could find her. Bloodied and abused and already dead because he never had a hope of getting there in time!"

The group had fallen into shamed silence, fidgeting nervously. Bobby watched them disdain.

"But that's not it, see...? Yeah, lots of people lose a loved one and he WAS back at work, remember? But that wasn't the end because they're killing him too. Little piece by little piece. Wearing away at whatever strength he has left because they will not leave him alone!"

He slammed the mug back down on the counter, no longer wanting the coffee it contained. The brown liquid splashed over the rim, seeping onto the work surface before running and pooling with the spillage from the coffee machine. It leaked over the edge of the counter, dribbling onto the floor below in a messy, hot splatter.

Bobby walked away, not caring as it stained the carpet a dark, murky brown.

~o~

The passage of time is a purely fluid thing, subjective to the last, gushing and crawling with equal measure.

Days, weeks, months, mean nothing if the seconds cease to tick.

He'd taken the batteries out of the clock.

The unending, methodical division of time had driven him to his knees, the gap between each second vanishing slower and slower the more he willed them to pass.

Because time heals all wounds...

Logan grasped onto that and prayed. He figured it hadn't been long enough though because God it still hurt. Not the sharp, raw sting of before, just the low, throbbing ache that underscored every thought. The leeching, sinking pull that sapped away his energy.

He was tired. So tired...

He watched an unchangeable world from the other side of glass, the people passing by without a care in their heads because they didn't know. They couldn't know. They had never tasted true darkness and inside he hoped they never would.

But he took the batteries out of the clock and he could have been here forever for all he knew, moving from window to window, changing the view.

He saw the world moving past and he was jealous.

But that was when he felt it... the fire inside... the first life in his soul for what seemed like forever. Sparked by a movement he never should have seen. His eyes for that second on that space and he saw it...

Standing there at that window looking at nothing and suddenly there was something that couldn't have been caused by the wind or the neighbour's cat. A shape in the bushes, a dark patch skulking amongst the greenery... A figure in black pinning him with invisible eyes for just that endless split second, and he was out there before he could even think, barrelling towards it so fast they barely even had time to register his presence before they were knocked flying, his weight pinning them to the unforgiving ground.

"Just what the hell do you...-"

Recognition hit hard and he snarled in unmitigated fury, the black-clad figure under his hands squirming uneasily.

"You!"

The figure from the restaurant all those days ago, the brush of air as his wallet vanished, the paper with Jean's address on it...

They collided as one and he screamed his fury, his grip tightening mercilessly around the man's collar.

"You! You fucking murderer! I'll fucking kill you for what you did to her!"

The man choked against the white-knuckle fingers grabbing him around the neck.

"Don'... don' know what you mean... I jus'..."

Logan slammed his head hard into the ground and the man cringed in pain.

"Stop... I... Aagh!"

Logan loomed over him, breathing hard, cold, bloody murder written in his eyes.

"You killed my girlfriend, you slaughtered my dog, I will make you pay, God damn it!"

The man struggled underneath him, his wiry, thin frame no match for Logan's visceral bulk

"You don' know what you talkin' 'bout. You fuckin' crazy! Remy never even met yo' girl..."

The man's accent sounded weedy through fear and Logan tightened his grasp.

"You LIAR!" he screamed. "You killed her, God fucking damn you, you killed her!"

He was shaking the man viciously now, kneeling across his thighs and stomach as he pinned him to the floor.

"NON!" The man screamed angrily, finally somehow wrenching Logan's hands from his collar and fixing him with a dark black look of indignant anger.

"Remy, he is a t'ief not a murderer. Not a maimer of dogs..." He sneered the last part, his mouth parting in a moue of distaste.

Logan punched him hard in the face, the man's nose cracking sharply.

"You stole my wallet, you stole the paper with her address on, you fucking killed her, you sick, sick bastard. You deserve to rot in every fucking kind of hell for what you did!"

Remy clutched limply at his gushing nose while Logan's hand tightened round his collar again.

"Remy din' steal no address..." He spat a small glob of blood out from between his lips. "Stole you wallet, stole you money. Dat he admits to. Din' steal no iddy bit of paper. Paper ain't worth nuthin'. Paper end up in the trash."

Logan glowered at him angrily, panting with barely controlled rage.

"You're a sick fuck," Logan spat.

The man seemed to give in then, realising that no matter what he said the person currently pinning him to the floor would never believe anything that came past his lips.

He sagged limply backwards onto the earth, his hands falling away from his bloodied nose. His lips parted as he drew in a long breath revealing vivid red-stained teeth.

Go ahead, he thought. Let him call the police. A charge for petty theft was better then being sat on by this psycho.

"Fuck you..." he grumbled.

The grip on his throat tightened as Logan roared, slamming the man's head onto the parched earth again, the audible crack signalling the end of consciousness.

~o~

Flashing blue and red police lights cast flickering shadows across Logan's front lawn as they took the man away, cursing loudly in French.

Logan watched, seething in angry silence as the police officer droned on beside him, spouting pointless trivialities about police procedure.

Logan just watched as they bundled a squirming, muddied man into the back of the car, their eyes meeting for a brief flash of mutual disgust before he ducked into the vehicle.

Behind them a car passed unnoticed though the darkness.

The road disappeared under endlessly spinning wheels as it cruised by the flashing police cars to speed away down empty streets.

They spare little more than a glance to the scene, eyes flickering momentarily over Logan's defensive posture.

By all accounts it should have been raining. It fit the mood, puddles reflecting the watery moonlight as the vehicle exploded through their calm surfaces, shattering the reflected sky into a million tiny pieces.

Like every film noir, like every horror cliché, the rain should splatter on the windshield, swept away with the endless squeaking swish of the wipers.

But the roads are dry and it will not, cannot rain.

The pavements were still hot, radiating the day's collected warmth back out into the humid night and the hunched figure in the car didn't truly care either way.

Silhouetted against the darkening sky they had but one thing on their mind.

A hand slipped out to sightlessly pat the tool bag on the passenger seat, making that physical check on its presence every few minutes as if afraid of it vanishing.

Fingers skim a well-thumbed hardback book while the eyes remain on the road ahead. Yellow post-its jut from the bent pages with spidery notes in black ink naming and referencing each marked section of the dog-eared old Haynes manual.

They have been pored over again and again and again until the theory contained on them was memorised inside and out. Until every last letter was known and absorbed and understood.

Until everything was perfect, because the one thing they have is patience. Patience in abundance.

The hand returns to the steering wheel, satisfied that their cargo was still secure, and the car vanishes into the darkness as quickly as it arrives, leaving nothing more than the faint smell of exhaust.

~o~

His silhouette cast black shadows against the windows, like the ghost of a specimen on display as he turned off the lights, pulling the blanket around his shoulders despite the night's warmth.

Logan buried his face in the pillow, his heart still beating roughly within his chest even though the police were long since gone.

He breathed a deep sigh, curling his fingers into the soft cotton sheets as he tried to quell the lingering anxiety inside.

It had disturbed him more than he ever thought it could, that man's neck in his hands, feeling the all-consuming hatred that just made him want to scream and cry and kill all at once.

He'd never wanted to kill anyone before, feeling the crush of someone's windpipe in his grasp...

He shook himself. He didn't want to think about it because it scared him. The very idea of it terrified him because with one final squeeze and one final shake he could have killed him. A third death on his conscience and this time there was no narcotic haze to blame it on. No accident to assist...

It would have been cold-blooded murder and he would have become no better than the man he killed.

The old adage that you always become that which you most despise seemed to ring in his head as he tried to sleep, his skin crawling as he felt the crush of a fragile neck in his fists.

~o~

"Eyes in the darkness, shining bright..."

It was whispered, singsong in the night stillness. The cunning smile of the Cheshire cat followed, not vanishing for hours, floating in the shadow just beyond view. Just beyond sight and hearing and understanding. Every night.

Time and time again...

Always in the blackness. In the heavy dark air, sweaty with unspent frustrations. Muscles are hunched in the limbo between unreasoned anger and abject despair.

These are days with a heavy rock soundtrack, bass growling in the shadow. The pounding in their head almost seems to speak as slowly the figure stands, fumbling for the mobile phone lodged deep in their pocket.

A slim hand reaches out to lower the volume on the personal stereo, the noise fading to a light, tinny background twitch as they settle in to watch.

Then wait.

~o~

It's dark and peaceful here, twinkling lights shimmering like the moon reflecting on rippled water.

Closer...

See the city, sleeping like a baby, so coddled and warm. Wrapped in cotton to protect it from harm.

Harder...

See the streets, dark and quiet and softly breathing, damp from light summer rain.

Deeper...

See her face, blank and confused and sad and torn.

See it explode...

The image shatters into noise as her face shatters into agony, watched by the helpless as she rears out of the flame, like a serpent from the pit with fire for eyes.

Tears stream down her face as she screams in exquisite pain. The noise is deafening as the city explodes in lightening, her cry one of pure hurt, her blinding, burning tears, falling like rain across the dampened streets.

Hollowed, black, empty sockets where once there were eyes... they're everywhere. They're in him, on him, choking him...

Woman and child as one, dead and gaunt, flesh pulled tight over withered bones as she wraps her fingers around his throat, sinking them through his flesh as he rips at her paper-thin arm, handfuls of dry, flaking skin coming away under his fingers even as her grip tightens...

~o~

His heart felt like it was trying to break out of his ribcage.

Logan gulped at air desperately as his sweat-soaked body bolted upright from the tangled sheets, panic-widened eyes staring blindly into the void for what seemed like eternity.

Then it clicked and he whimpered, chest still heaving as he swung his legs out of bed, bringing his head down to rest between is knees as he fought the dizzy spell that had overcome him.

He battled his laboured breathing back down into some form of regularity and slowly looked around him.

The sheets felt saturated and unpleasant beneath his hands and he slowly pulled himself out of bed, stumbling to the bathroom to throw cold water over his sticky, clammy skin.

He looked at his chest and shoulders, still flushed from the panic, then down at his legs, still scarred like always.

Sometimes he wished he could wake up and the scars could have been just another part of the dream, but they never faded and he knew they never would.

Then he looked at his ashen face and had to close his eyes.

"Like looking at the damned..." he mumbled.

He'd seen her face tonight and way back in the very corner of his mind he wondered about her. About what had become of her. About who she grew into.

Then in that same corner he wondered about how much she must still hate him.

God, that never went away, did it?

The guilt... the flutters of anxiety inside your chest when things get quiet enough to let you think.

He tried not to think any more. Tried to always keep his mind away from what had been and instead tried to focus on what is. He didn't let himself think any more. He forced himself to exist.

But sometimes he couldn't help it... couldn't help but remember, and every time he did it hurt just as badly as it had the time before. It never got better, it never got easier. No matter what anyone had told him, all those damn years ago, the scars had never healed.

He wondered if her scars were as bad as his... if she still bled for her family like he did. If she still hurt because of him.

He sunk down limply onto the bathroom floor, draping his arms over his raised knees, staring sightlessly into the nothing.

Somewhere in the next room, the phone rang.

Logan glanced up at the doorway, letting the handset ring a couple more times before lifting himself up off the floor.

He picked up the receiver, rubbing his eyes blearily as he yawned a hello.

"Can't sleep?"

The voice was unfamiliar and his head twisted round to the open bedroom curtains as it spoke again.

"I saw your light. What keeps you up at night, Logan?"

His face hardened.

"Who are you?"

There was silence, then a smile in the voice.

"You know who I am."

He strode across the room and snapped the curtains tight shut. That made the voice laugh.

"Feeling paranoid? What did you do, Logan, to hate yourself so much?"

He could feel anger and fear and hatred mixing inside his chest, his fist tightening painfully around the phone.

"Just what the hell do you want from me?"

There went that laugh again, maddening and sickening both at once.

"Ahh... What you took... I shall take..."

Glee echoed down the telephone and he shivered despite the heat of the room.

"It's easy, see? You took everything. I want it all back."

There was a click and the line went dead, leaving Logan with the receiver still pressed hard against his ear, shoulders heaving up and down with each harsh breath.

He stood like that for some time before hurling the handset across the room as hard as he could, hearing it crack against the far wall.

He was shaking, his hand burning like the receiver had been on fire.

They laughed like this was some kind of joke... a deadly game they were playing for laughs just because they could.

And the kicker was that he probably deserved it...

~o~

"Mr. Lebeau has now officially been charged with murder though he is still pleading innocent. However I would like to thank you for your help in bringing him to justice. Thanks to you we also him charged with a whole battery of theft and trespassing..."

Logan stopped listening after a while. In all honesty he didn't care.

He'd returned to work only a few days later because the gnawing paranoia was too much to cope with.

That was his cure-all... work. One which he had neglected all too much this past couple of weeks. The place to drown all thoughts in a sea of triviality and business lunches. The only place to escape the things that waited for him at home.

Not that here was much better any more. A space seemed to form around him where once there had been people.

Friends.

Now they looked at him with pity or with confusion or worse yet, with fear. They avoided him when they could, unsure of how to be any more. Whether to speak of things or not. Whether he was as fragile as the rumours said because none of them wanted to be the one that got blamed if he broke.

But it was better then the paranoia because that was still there when he got back in the evenings. The crawling, seeking, brush of air against his skin that set his teeth on edge and made the hairs down his back stand on end. Their pity he could leave every evening but the feeling of being eternally naked in unknown eyes... that wouldn't go away.

He put the phone back in the cradle, running a hand down his face in exhaustion as he let the chatter and hum of the office wash over him.

At length he looked up and saw Marie leaning against the doorframe, a sympathetic look on her face in response to the tired, drawn one on his.

"They didn't charge him, did they?"

He shook his head.

"On the contrary, they formally charged him this morning."

Marie smiled widely.

"Well that's great news...!"

He snorted his laughter at the thought.

"Doesn't matter, Marie. It wasn't him."

She stepped inside the office looking at him strangely, smile dissolving from her face.

"What do you mean it wasn't him? You found him in your back yard, watching you... The police just charged him..."

Logan shook his head again.

"Wasn't him..." he said, simply. "I caught a petty thief in my yard. A pickpocket, not a murderer."

Marie stared at him. "What... what makes you so sure?"

He looked down at the desk, a sudden, hot wave of guilt passing through him.

"I just know."

Marie shivered.

"Well then, Jesus, I hope they find who did it soon... gives me the creeps just thinking about."

She wrapped her arms around herself as she left and Logan sighed deeply.

It wasn't the man they had, not just because he'd been in custody the night of the call, but because Logan didn't owe him anything.

What they wanted was what he took.

What they'd taken was his family... and there was only one person from whom he had ever stolen that much.

He remembered his dream and winced.

He'd wondered how much she must still hate him. The answer now was painfully obvious.

~o~

Chapter 10

Plato is a bore. - Friedrich Nietzsche

"Oh, Bobby, you are GOOD..."

A self-congratulatory smile spread over his face as the car's engine roared to life and he punched the air in satisfaction, bouncing in his seat with a victory dance.

"Sweet... very, very sweet..." it was impossible to keep the stupidly happy grin from taking control of his whole face so he didn't even bother, yelling his success to the garage roof.

It was his pride and joy, everyone knew that. They'd listened to excited daily updates as the car had taken form, from the engine out, the hunt for parts, the body panels, the painting, the seats... and now, finally, finally it was ready.

He whooped one more time in excitement. A fully restored vintage Daimler and it was all his. Every inch of bodywork, every nut and bolt and screw. Every penny he'd earned in the past three years was finally a living, breathing entity.

The engine sounded clear and true. Idling too high maybe but he could sort that out, and he sat gleefully caressing the wheel, listening to the result of so many hours of labour.

It was the smell that was the first thing to hit him though, a crease of worry slowly creeping over his face as haze began to fill his view.

Like mist, but hotter, more sulphurous...

Twisting and opaque it clouded out from the far corner of the car as Bobby hastily scrabbled to remove the keys, the billowing cloud of exhaust starting to sting at his eyes as it filled the cab.

Metal fell free but the engine didn't die and Bobby stared in shock, the keys sitting loose in his palm while the billowing cloud of exhaust spread and thickened.

The smoke filled the car frighteningly fast, drowning his lungs with burning, white fire. He could taste it on his tongue as it filled his nose and eyes and throat, creeping down inside him with white, spectral fingers.

Desperate hands clawed at the door release, finding purchase and wrenching the lever, but the door stayed shut, even as he threw his whole weight into it.

Shaking fingers twisted the window crank but it swung limply as it failed to engage the mechanism to roll down the glass.

He scrabbled over to the other side, wrenching the lever desperately as he kicked at the door in vain.

Coughing and choking and burning, pale hands slammed against the windows, unable to break them, unable to breathe in the thick, soupy air.

"Help me! Please...!" His pleas were desperate and always destined to be in vain, fists hammering uselessly at the bulletproof glass he had wanted so badly as his lungs screamed in pain.

"Somebody... please, let me out!"

Voice rough and raw, his throat burned from the smoke and exhaust billowing around him, his sight blurring until he could almost believe he saw a figure in the haze. A spectre of darkness and death, warped into the fog.

Breathing hurt. His eyes streamed, stinging from the fumes around him, his body growing both desperate and pathetically weak at the same time. The suffocating haze made drawing a simple breath nothing but pain.

He gasped and wheezed, finding nothing but chemical fog in his lungs as he panted desperately, pleading to the spectre or anyone that could hear him.

"Please..." despairing now, breathless begging, skin pressed hard against the glass.

But no one came.

~o~

The news wasn't taken well when Bobby's mother called Hank that morning. Everyone had been silent and shocked, a deep numbness filling each face as it was announced.

She had cried on the phone, Hank told them, and said that Bobby wouldn't be coming back. He'd been found dead in his car last night and while police weren't ruling out foul play they weren't yet ruling out suicide either.

Bobby had been a troubled young man, they said. His mother had found him with the car doors unlocked and the keys still in the ignition. It seemed almost an open and shut case.

Some of the office girls cried. Some of the men shook their heads. Everyone else looked at Logan.

His reaction had been impossible to gauge, like thunderclouds rolling over dark mountains. Without a word he had clenched his fingers and walked away, the door to his office slamming with explosive noise in the pained silence.

Slowly the assembled group had parted with only muted, subdued conversation returning amongst them. Only one topic of conversation though, and the grave, drawn faces gathered listlessly around the coffee machine were testament to that.

~o~

Too much, too soon, too raw...

Fuck this, fuck it all.

The world is falling apart around your ears. What can you even hope to do to stop it?

His chest hurt because he knew he couldn't cope. Couldn't keep facing this spectre day in and day out as it picked off everyone he had ever cared about.

He knew it wasn't suicide. He knew it couldn't be.

Bobby had his problems, God knows everyone did, but not this way, not like that, he wouldn't, he just...

Just...

Just what?

Turn around and face the fucking facts, Logan.

He knew it inside, with a painful stab of conviction, but damn it, what if the police were right...?

That night spent in his kitchen, Bobby on the counter drinking beer after beer, talking endlessly about life and death and whatever happened in his mind in between...

The kid had talked about it often enough, about the possibilities, about the desire...

But it had been an illustration, hadn't it? A way of explaining in his own way that Logan wasn't entirely on his own.

Talking about the strange, compelling, aphrodisiac quality where an end to everything was so much better then waiting through the pain... but every time he'd ended with a laugh and said he was too coward. Too scared that it would hurt or that it wouldn't work. Too scared of what would happen to the people he left behind.

So, what if it was true? What if he had finally broken?

His own mother didn't seem to even try and contradict it and what did that say?

Logan scowled and shook his head, taking a slow sip of water from the cup on his desk.

It just said she was hurting too much to even know which way was up right now.

Fuck this, it wasn't true. It couldn't be true.

That was the crunch, he'd said, Bobby looking at him with crystal clear certainty in his eyes. Knowing his mother... knowing that after his father died she would never have coped to loose both of them. Fear for her had somehow outweighed the pain and that was what had pulled him through it.

Logan closed his eyes, crunching the Styrofoam cup between hard, numb fingers.

Even if he hadn't suspected it before, he knew now with total certainty...

This was never going to end.

~o~

It was dark by the time that Hank made his final rounds of the office. The low lighting cast long shadows over the eerily silent banks of computers.

In the day they positively hummed with people, but in this waning half-light they stood silent like dark, stone monoliths.

Keys in hand, Hank prepared to lock up for the night, flipping off the lights in the staff lounge with a distracted flick of his finger.

It had been an exhausting, stressful day and he was tired. Worn down by a long and emotional talk with Bobby's mother this morning all he wanted now was to go home and crawl into bed.

It was only by chance that he noticed the light seeping out from beneath Logan's door.

Hank silently peered inside, expecting a forgotten desk lamp or something, but Logan still sat at his desk, unmoving as a carved marble statue save for endlessly restless fingers twisting round and round a battered pair of headphones.

Dark, glazed eyes seemed to stare unblinkingly through them, focusing intently on a point about two inches from the surface of the desk.

His eyelids blinked closed, squeezing hard shut momentarily as if squelching back the burn of grief.

Hank looked on sadly as watery, reddening eyes gazed listlessly into nothingness, fingers twirling and twisting and endlessly turning over and over and over...

They only paused when large, warm fingers stilled them with a firm pressure, resting a whiskey glass on the desk in their place as Logan's head slumped into his hands.

"I know what you're thinking," Hank murmured. "But no matter what, you did a good thing when you brought that boy into this office."

Logan shook his head, not touching the drink in front of him, just clenching his eyes tightly shut.

"I signed his death warrant," he mumbled bitterly.

Hank shook his head.

"We both know that's not true. You did what you did for him because you saw yourself. You recognised in him everything you went through and you tried to save him from that."

Logan slammed his fist down onto the wood, exploding in a sudden burst of anger.

"I saved him from NOTHING!"

He rose to his feet, tipping the chair backwards with an angry, frustrated shove.

"I saved him from nothing. I brought him here and he ended up being killed."

His eyes blazed with impotent fire, helpless against everything that seemed to be boiling up around him.

Hank stared back, cool, strong, so calm it was almost unbearable.

"You saw yourself in that child. You saved him from what you had to go through. You never knew this would happen. You cannot blame yourself for bringing him into this situation when it is not your fault."

Logan clenched his eyes shut once more, taking a deep breath as he battled to reign in his emotions.

A dark, helpless tear escaped down his cheek as he swallowed.

"He didn't deserve this..." he whispered.

"Neither do you," Hank replied.

Logan seemed to waver then, pain eventually winning out as Hank pulled him into a tight hug. The pressure was comforting in a way. An anchor in a storm because God knows everything around him was blowing apart.

"Flaky as hell and useless as a chocolate teapot, but I could see it in you. You were a good kid," Hank murmured, releasing him.

Logan snorted, massaging tired eyes with the flat pads of his fingers.

Hank shook his head. "If I could have spared you both from this then I would have, but some things are beyond our control. For better or worse we're stuck with them and no amount of ranting and raving will ever make them change."

Logan glanced down to the floor, an expression of splintered pain dancing across his face.

"He deserved a better shot, Hank..." he whispered. "He deserved to have a chance."

Logan swallowed painfully. "He deserved everything I had and so much more. He deserved to have a life..."

There was the crunch. The rub. The dark burn.

Everyone was dying.

Everyone he loved was simply falling away and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

~o~

Down breathless streets it creeps, the first hint of cool air. The first breath of a change in the season.

Overhead, clouds begin to form across the city skyline, darkening the evening light with a heavy presence, and in the shadow below, their figure stalks, watching him in the light.

Always watching...

He takes off his shirt, illuminated in the orange glow of the room, his silhouette cast against the curtains like a shadow puppet against the screen.

They finally reach out to his shape, outlined in the window, caressing his flesh through glass like he once more sits in the palm of their hand.

It is close enough because they have watched him so long that they know every detail. Whether they can see him or not, they know him by touch this way. It feeds the hot strain between their legs and they reach down to masturbate, pumping hard and finding again that it only comes now when they can crush him.

The hand tightens around his shadow, squeezing the life out of him as they climax, breathy pants filling the evening twilight as they slowly come back to themselves, heart rate slowing and wetness seeping through the black pants they wear.

They like the night... the streets and the smells. The hint of another world, like Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere, a place where you can loose yourself and no one will ever notice.

This is their London Below. A spot where they sit and loose themselves and he never notices.

The nights cover them like a blanket of down, protecting them as they see him at his window, watching as he looks so sad...

Don't be sad. Be sorry.

~o~

Sleep, according to Shakespeare, is the season of all natures and the balm of hurt minds, but despite that it does not soothe him.

He lies in the darkness, awake despite best intentions, unable to let go of the day.

A soft breeze flutters the curtains around the open window, the sunset lighting the sky on fire. He watches it through half-lidded eyes, watching the sky burn, wishing it would take him too.

He knows despair, the helpless surrender when you wonder why you bother. The drag of the hopeless, and this time there is no Bobby to save him from himself. No painful, overbright optimism that both grates and soothes.

Never wanted it less but never needed it more.

Lost for now to depression in his own private Hades, the thing that eats his soul. A place of unending winter where the pain cannot be shared, it just has to be endured.

No route for therapy, no desire to explain. You can't take your therapist on a day trip to hell because there is no room for moral support.

It's a part of his personality, this Hades, a part that has to wallow in the grief before it can understand, before it can forget and accept and move on. No hellfire and brimstone, but it is darkened with raw hurt, a wound that won't close, blood that won't stop.

He lies in the darkness to mourn, on sheets faded with laundered wear, the smell of the soap powder ingrained into the fibres as he buries himself in them.

Soap now forever associated with this moment, the smell renewing memory sharp in contrast. Like the first time he knew death.

He doesn't cry. Refuses to cry. Content to wallow as the night pulls closer, as the sky sinks into the dark.

Clouds bubble on the horizon bringing a cold breath into the stifled heat, a shiver of anticipation and more, brought softly against his foetal shape, but he rolls into the blankets until it is stifled under the damp body heat stored in the fibres.

Let the rain come.

~o~

Chapter 11

They call me the Devil's Disciple. I knew from the first that the devil was my natural master and captain and friend. I saw that he was in the right, and that the world cringed to his conqueror only through fear. -

The Devil's Disciple - George Bernard Shaw

I was never much a believer in anything. Not love, not soul, definitely not God...

I watched myself from inside my head and I finally saw the truth. That God, Yahweh, whatever you want to call it, does not exist. There is no higher power and there is no greater truth. There is just here, now, and cold, clinical fact.

I watched myself from the inside of my head and I knew him.

Ask me once upon a time and I believed in them all, the fates that ruled our lives on the throw of their dice, I knew they existed, I could hear the rattle of their game.

But that was before.

The truth silenced them, irreparably, stifling their laughter. The truth killed them.

The truth kills me along side because it's also the reason that you're dying. That you will die. Because you have to see the truth and I have to make you understand what you did to me... Because you killed me with a look and a glance so I in turn must make you end, just like you snuffed out everything I ever dreamed of.

Taking your life will end mine. I know that and I know the price is high. I feel my insides swell with blood but it has to be worth it in the end... it has to be.

Nothing can cost this much with no reward. No one can sacrifice as I have with no compensation.

So eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die.

~o~

One more. One last piece until the sculpture was complete. The spaces filled and the cracks sealed.

Art in the eye of the artist.

The last fragment is held in shaking, reverential hands, fluttering between numbed fingers, senseless with the anticipation.

Art in the destruction then art in the rebirth. Beauty in the plan as the final corner slots everything together, just as folded paper slots into the envelope.

Tacked to his door to await his return, his destruction, his rebirth. The final move before the end of the game. Knowing he won't be long, it's the anticipation that makes them stay in the shadow, just at the corner until they're sure it's been received, before slipping away into the night. Everything has to be perfect. He has to know that there is one last job to do. Two more people to die. And they know they won't have to wait much longer because they know him like they know themselves, understand exactly how he works, know it has to be soon...

The completion of the masterpiece, make or break by the last stroke of the brush.

And they knew they were right when they heard him crawl home, late in the evening, the beginning of night, heavy feet stumbling up the driveway then pausing on the very top step because they wrote him a note.

A letter on his door in a plain white envelope, a lingering testament to the last of his dreams so beautifully typed, written perfectly to mock.

Catch me if you can, it said, try and make it the last.

Cause you know who'll be next, and it was right then that it seemed so obvious. Because they take the ones he loves. The people he can't live without. They would take another tonight, they'd as good as promised that already and he reached blindly for his cell phone, dialling numbers with shaking hands.

He heard the ring play on, chanting in his head to please God pick up, don't let it be too late already. Don't do this again, don't hint and tease and draw him on in a game he can never hope to win...

But it rang and rang and he forgot all about going home for the night, shoving the phone back in his pocket and almost falling down the porch steps in the haste to reach his car, just as the very first drops of rain began to fall.

~o~

"Marie!!"

His fists beat a staccato rhythm on the door, hammering at it with all his strength as he screamed at the wood.

"Marie! For fuck's sake, open the door!"

There was silence within, silence and dark and he tried to beat louder to make himself heard over the roar of blood in his ears.

The obvious choice, the next one they would take, the next innocent life to be slaughtered.

"Marie!!"

He almost fell through the door as it was opened a crack, Marie's wide-eyed expression on the other side taking one look at the sodden, screaming figure on her doorstep before trying to slam it shut again.

Logan wedged his foot in the corner of the frame before she could though, face like thunder as she flinched back from him a little, the half-light in the hallway only now illuminating his face.

"Logan? Christ, you scared me!"

"Are you alone?"

He snapped the words at her and she winced slightly.

"Well, yeah, I guess..."

He cut her off, pushing her back inside and slamming the door shut behind him.

She looked at him, like a defensive predator slinking in her hallway.

"Logan, what's going on...? You look... you look like a crazy person or something..."

He didn't answer her, instead steering her towards the back of the apartment and into the kitchen, bundling her along brusquely.

"Logan!" she squeaked in surprise. "What's going on...?"

"Why didn't you answer the phone?"

She faltered for a second. "I... I was in the bathroom, I didn't hear it ring. What's happening?"

When he didn't answer she twisted out of his grip, turning to face him as she crossed her arms over her chest. She glared at him defiantly.

"What are you even doing here at this time of night? I was just about to go to bed..."

He looked edgy, nervous almost. Twitchy.

"I'm in trouble, Marie."

She cocked her head to one side, pouting slightly as if expecting more of an explanation.

"What kind of trouble?"

He sighed deeply, not sure how to put it.

He decided on blunt.

"I... I killed someone..."

He heard her shocked gasp and had to look away, cinching his eyes closed as he tried to explain.

"Long... long time ago," he clarified. "Long before I met you. Long before I started working here. Whole other fucking lifetime ago..."

He chanced a quick glimpse of her face again, reading nothing but blank shock there.

"And now someone... they want revenge. They're taking like for like and it's all my fault, Marie! Everything that's happened, it's all my fault!"

The words came easier than he would have initially feared, spilling out like a geyser ready to erupt, finally finding a flash point.

"All my fault..." he murmured again, the first hint of a shake finding his voice.

"I... I, uh, we should..." Marie stuttered stupidly, eyes roving the kitchen, looking at everything except him.

"I don't know what to say..." she finally admitted. "I mean, fuck, this is kind of unexpected..."

He rubbed his forehead nervously, glaring at the floor, unable to even look at her.

He looked white as death, she thought, drained and tired, his hands trembling as he fidgeted ceaselessly in her kitchen.

"You should... uh, I'll get you some coffee or something..." she said at last. "You're shaking like a leaf."

He blinked at his hands as if noticing them for the first time before curling them into fists and wedging them into his pockets, hiding the nervous tremble against his sides.

"We shouldn't say too long," he muttered.

She reached for two mugs, filling one for him and one for herself.

He just couldn't seem to stand still, like a man possessed, half expecting some unknown force to leap out of a cereal box and attack him.

She handed him his mug and he grimaced as he swallowed it down, letting the bitter taste kick at his throat, the heat of it warming his insides.

It did little to soothe him, however, the mug clattering against the worktop as he slammed it down, fixing her with an intense stare.

"Finish that and then we leave. I have to get you out of here, Marie."

She put her mug back down on the counter, her brows scrunched together in confusion.

"Why...?"

He stared at her like she had totally lost her mind.

"Because it's not safe. I'm in trouble and, because of me, you are in trouble. I have to get you out of here. I have to get you somewhere they can't find you."

She raised her eyebrow at him quizzically.

"But... but I don't understand. The police arrested that guy the other night. You said so yourself."

Logan huffed in annoyance, starting to pace in the small area afforded to him in her kitchen.

"Because it's not him... it never was! I told you that the same fucking day!"

She sighed in exasperation, watching him get more and more agitated as every second passed, panting and huffing under his breath as he stalked around the room.

"Logan, you've got to calm down, you're going to hyperventilate."

"But... but you don't understand!"

He grabbed her roughly, fingers digging into the tops of her arms, shaking her slightly in frustration.

"It's not him. It's not, because it's still happening! It's not over, it's going to... Jesus, it's not going to stop!"

He pushed her away again and Marie shook her head sadly, watching his agitated pacing.

"Logan, please... just listen to me? I know this has been hard on you. I know that. God knows I understand, but you have to let this go... Christ, you're going to make yourself crazy."

She ran her hands through her hair distractedly as she continued.

"Jean is gone and so is Bobby and I'm sorry about that. God, I'm so sorry, but there is nothing you can do to change that. There is nothing you can do to make it better. Bobby killed himself, for God's sake, there IS no one else to blame!"

Logan shook his head.

"No. You're wrong. You're wrong, Marie. You're wrong...!"

She could feel frustration building inside and she finally snapped at him.

"Oh stop it! For God's sake stop! Let it go!"

"But I can't!"

Logan screamed it back, almost snarling in anger and frustration and desperate pain.

And for a moment there was absolute silence.

Then he grabbed her shoulders again, forcing her to look at him.

"It's still happening, Marie. It's going to keep on happening. Someone is going to die tonight, don't you understand?"

She shook her head, pulling free.

"Why did you come here, Logan?"

"Don't you get it...?" he cried. "Don't you see... you're..."

He shook his head, rubbing his hand across his face.

"You're..."

"I'm what, Logan?" she asked. "In danger? Why should I be in danger?"

"Because... next on the... you'll be n-..."

And he just blinked at her.

Something felt wrong. He felt wrong... Like stupidity fogged his thoughts. Like there was numbness in his fingers, and he squinted at her as if he couldn't quite focus on what he was seeing.

"Because..."

Because suddenly it was so hard to think.

She watched him, a strange smile on her lips as he staggered roughly to one side, leaning against the counter for support.

"Because I'm what, Logan?" she pressed again, watching him intently, watching as he heaved for breath and his face tightened against the heavy pull on his limbs.

"What... did you do to me?" he choked.

He clutched at the counter top, leaning his weight against the surface as it suddenly became so much harder to stay upright.

Dizzy... so dizzy... he blinked at her again, then at the coffee cup he had drained, sitting on the counter in front of him, spinning sickeningly like the room.

"Because I'm next?" she asked, ignoring him. "I'm touched by your concern, really I am."

He gaped at her in disbelief before toppling over heavily, flopping onto the floor as the counter slipped from his numbed fingers, sagging down like a sack of damp flour onto the tiles.

He blinked through heavy eyelids and the dizzy spin of the room, watching her put aside her cup as his body fell into heavy numbness.

"But you shouldn't have worried yourself so much."

It seemed like she was talking from a long, long way away, everything getting hazier as she walked towards him, her voice getting fainter until it was almost gone.

"Because it's out of your hands..."

~o~

He woke, not certain how much later, but his shoulders ached and his fingers burned with pins and needles, his arms bound tightly behind his back, each wrist lashed to the opposing elbow.

He felt sick as he swam to consciousness, the vibrating hum of an engine sounding painfully loud in his ears, only muted by the heavy rattle of raindrops pelting the world around him.

His head flopped back slowly, eyes opening a meagre slit just in time to see them pull over, the car he was riding in splashing to a halt as the dark figure beside him killed the lights and engine.

He shivered in the cold blast of air as the door was flung open, the figure grabbing his shirt collar and pulling him sideways out of the seat, his limp, numbed body falling heavily to the ground with a small, pained grunt.

The rain lashed down from the sky, hitting the asphalt with such venom that it seemed to try and launch itself back upwards again, catapulted away from the sodden, waterlogged street before plummeting earthwards once more, peppering the turbulent puddles with viciously angry splashes.

The kind of rain that soaked to bone, lightening flicking briefly overhead before the roll of thunder followed it.

His clothes were sodden, his white shirt turning translucent as it clung to his skin, fabric sticking like heavy glue. It dragged him down, made struggling hard as he was pushed over onto his back with a booted foot, bound and sore muscles groaning as his weight fell on them.

Then he was dragged, unable to struggle, away from the asphalt and into the mud of a churned up patch of wasteland, slippery and clinging as he was pulled to his knees, opening his eyes only in time to see her beating him down.

He turned his face up to the rain, crying out in primal need as it pelted down onto him, raindrops splashing onto his tongue as he screamed before falling, the wet, flooded ground sluicing around his body.

The cry died on his lips as he ran out of pretence, losing the last grip on the shreds of the life he recognised, losing the last hope of reality.

"What do you want with me...?"

Half desperate cry, half pitiful plea, he screamed it to the darkness and the rain, his hands balling into fists against their ropes as he heard her laughing.

He screwed his eyes closed as if he were waging an internal war with insanity, begging it, pleading it to leave his mind, to leave him with peace.

This was not real, this could not be real...

"Why...?" he asked again, despair stealing his eyes as she stood before him, lit by the sudden flicker of lightening. "Why are you doing this to me...?"

Her face held no warmth, no comfort. Just the certainty that he was going to die, and he saw it with brilliant clarity. Staring his death in the face, her hands tightening around the baseball bat she had pressed into the ground before her.

Rotted wood palettes littered the black tar mud, tyres and broken couches and rats, down in the filth where she wanted him, already in his grave.

And then she started laughing... a shattering sound, cold enough to freeze the rain as it covered him.

"You had true love..." she laughed. "And you could have been happy. You alone. You in a world of billions..."

Glee and hatred, mixed as one when she spoke. Bitterness leavened with the sweetness of revenge.

"All of it could have been yours while the rest of us got nothing! But now..."

She paused, the smile that split her face widening brightly.

"Now, we will never know."

She laughed then too, pure, white madness cracking from her body as she threw back her head in the wild insanity of the moment, the wind suddenly picking up in answer to the hilarity she felt.

His heart beat so hard in his chest that it physically hurt, her voice whirling and forming in his skull, slamming into his forehead with every smile, every gesture.

He screamed then, raw and primal, yanking desperately at his bonds to try and ease the burn, blindness stealing his sight and she gloated on his tears.

She kicked him, hard in the stomach, watching him curl uselessly in on himself as he bent with the pain.

"You said you loved me, Logan. You said you couldn't live without me. You said, you said, you said... You PROMISED ME!"

She was screaming at him now too, sheets of water cutting paths through the mud, a crack of lightning shocking the sky.

"True, fucking love, Logan, that's what I could have given you, what would have been yours for the taking, what you could have enjoyed every second for the rest of your miserable, snivelling, worthless little shit life, but no. You had to have HER, you had to have perfection. I wasn't good enough for you, huh? Not tall enough? Not thin enough? Not pale enough? Not red enough? Well she's pretty fucking useless now isn't she?!"

She screamed in blind rage, the bat in her hands swinging wildly and crashing through the rotted wood beside her.

She yelled and raged, shattering it to splinters with her raw hatred while he curled up in the mud, body coiling and winding and aching with the noise and the madness.

"You said you loved ME!"

She shrieked it over and over, howling with the wind as she turned on him once more.

Her shadow flickered over him as another angry rip of lightening severed the heavens, the deep roll of the thunder shaking the very earth beneath him.

"You lied..."

Her voice was suddenly ice cold and calm, her fingers gripping tighter and tighter around the bat in her hands, shaking with insane hatred.

The wind picked up, billowing her hair and her clothes out to one side, the lightening illuminating the shimmering madness in her soul.

"You disgust me," she sneered, watching him with revulsion on her features as she swung the bat wildly above her head, cracking it downwards with all of her force onto his shoulder, making him scream as he tried to roll out of it's way.

He wasn't fast enough and he felt the glancing blow explode through him, collar bone snapping like a dried twig as she spat on him, raising the bat above her head again before bringing it down inches away from his ear.

It splattered mud over his hair and face on the impact, denting the ground with a wet thud.

"Next time it'll be your fucking head!" she yelled.

He lay panting in the saturating mud, rainwater streaking over his face as the downpour continued unabated. He couldn't feel his shoulder but he gasped as each movement sent white-hot shards of pain down the length of his arm.

"I'm sorry..." he whispered, coughing as the rainwater tried to force its way past his lips.

"You're sorry...?" her voice was disbelieving. "You're SORRY...?" laughing now. "He's sorry. You hear that, world? He's fucking sorry now."

Her insane, shredding cackle echoed into the darkness, through the noise of the rain slapping against the sodden earth.

"Too little, too late. You're sorry... You're sorry for yourself. Sorry YOU ended up in this situation. Not sorry for what you did to anyone else. Only ever sorry for you."

"I'm sorry...!" he wailed, feet slipping against the mud as he desperately tried to slither away, unable to clutch his fractured shoulder while every movement filled him with numbing, blind shards of pain.

"You're pathetic." She spat it at him accusingly. "And to think I loved you."

She sneered the words as if disappointed in herself as well as him, and then her voice shifted into something almost bordering on tender. Wistful.

"I loved you so much."

She discarded the bat and dropped down by his head as he tried to wriggle away, reaching out to touch his face, water dripping from the ends of her fingers as the rain pelted down.

He closed his eyes and flinched as she ran her fingertips over his neck, regretting the movement instantly as the stabbing pain in his shoulder flared angrily inside. He gulped for breath as her grip fastened on his chin, twisting his face round so she could see him.

He couldn't stop the breathless whimper that escaped as the shattered bones in his shoulder seemed to grate together under his skin, the sound lost in the wildly raging storm.

"Loved you so much, Logan..."

Her words were a low, sharp hiss against the white noise of the hammering rain, growled directly into his ear to be sure he was listening.

"Loved you so much I could kill for you. Because they fooled you into loving them more."

Her fingers tightened around his chin, gripping his jaw with bruising force.

"And it hurt, so much... making you hurt. But I had to do it. Don't you see?"

She shook her head, wet tendrils of hair slapping against her face.

"I had to do it because you were supposed to love me, not them... they were wrong. I had to save you from them and I had to punish you for leaving me. Punish you for following them."

Her voice was a fierce whisper against his face as she leaned closer.

"I killed for you. Piece by piece. One by one. I saw how you died inside every time, always hoping that each time I made you bleed you would come back to me. Look for comfort from me. Praying every time I punished you that you might choose me again. But you never did, did you? And now it's just you and me and you still don't love me like you're supposed to, Logan. Even when they're all gone. Even when there's only the two of us left."

Her hand rolled down from his chin to his neck, wrapping securely around his throat.

"So I have to keep punishing you. Keep on punishing you until you love me."

He moaned in stifled pain as her hand ran down from his neck to his shoulders, then lower until her palm lay in the centre of his breastbone.

"Because it's the only way. This is your last chance, Logan. The last time I can do this for you."

Then she swooped down and kissed him, crushing his lips hard under hers with the weight of jealousy, bitter with the taste of desperation filling his mouth

Slowly she stood, pulling herself from the mud and turning to face the wind as the storm pelted them both. Her shadow flickering over him as another bolt of lightening cut across the sky.

"One last chance we have. So I have to make you hurt, Logan. I have to kill you slow. I have to make sure you remember it all because this is the last fucking shot I have."

She turned back to him, fixing him with a desperate stare, one hand reaching into the depths of her coat and pulling out a gun, the grey silver barrel shaking uncontrollably as she pointed it at him.

"You're dying inside with the pain aren't you? The hurt and the loss," she asked. "I saw it inside you."

She spoke fast and desperate, hands quivering as his eyes grew large with fear, unable to move, flat on his back in the cloying slime.

"One more to kill you, isn't that right, Logan? Kill you long and slow. Maybe death will make you hurt enough to love me at last, isn't that right, Logan? Kill you with the knowledge."

She fixed her eyes with his, a look of desperate, desperate pain casting her features as for one brief second the world fell silent, the gun glimmering in the half-light as she pressed it hard to the side of her own head.

Perfectly still, an instant that lasted eternity, hypnotised by her eyes as they burned into his until she finally spoke again...

"Kill you with the guilt."

And then she fired.