(no subject)
“Yes!” Chloe burst out, wanting to claw some sort of emotion onto his face. “No! I don’t know.” She was about to lose it again, so she paused to suck in a few desperate inhalations. “I think I love you,” she admitted hoarsely. “I just don’t think I’m in love with you . . . like that.”
“Then I don’t know why this should bother you so much.”
Chloe felt that same wash of rage again. “If you don’t know why I would be hurt by this,” she gritted out. “Then you are absolutely hopeless when it comes to normal human feelings. I trusted you, and we were . . . together in a lot of ways. And I was always honest with you . . . as much as I possibly could be. I never tried to string you along or keep you hanging by giving you any hope. All of that was your choice. I would understand if you wanted to move on-I wouldn’t be happy, but I would understand. But to do it like this. To try to keep it a secret. And so soon after Saturday night . . . which, which meant something to me . . .”
“It meant something to me too,” Lex said quietly, as controlled as she was uncontrolled.
It was all starting to make sense. Horrible, heartbreaking sense. Lex had made himself too vulnerable with her that night. He'd lost too much control. Exposed himself too much. Which meant he would have to seek power and independence by distancing himself from her afterwards.
And what better way than to fuck someone else.
He'd even said, that night, that she didn't know everything he'd done.
Maybe this wasn't even the first time.
He was Lex Luthor--could never be anyone else. And his cold, defensive nature might prove stronger than the parts of himself he was learning to cultivate with her and Gabrielle.
“Right,” she said bitterly, stifling a flood of tears. “It meant so much that you went out the next day and fucked some other woman. How moving.”
Lex sighed, and something on his face changed. “Chloe,” he began, reaching out to cup her cheek with his hand.
Chloe yanked his hand away from her, hating the feel of its warmth and strength against her cheek. “What exactly do you expect to happen now? If you were hoping to push me into something with this, then you’re woefully mistaken. You’re a free man, and you can do what you want. I know you didn't do this on purpose to hurt me, and I guess I can understand why you did it at all. But there’s no way I can continue the way we were after . . . this. I’m not saying we can’t be friends and partners with Gabrielle, but things are going to be . . . different . . . from now on. I mean, I can't make love to you, if . . . if you're fucking someone else.”
“Chloe,” Lex said again, his voice making it sound as if he were trying to get her attention.
“Maybe I shouldn’t be so, so . . . affected by this. I know you’ve been waiting a long time and haven’t gotten anything to show for it. But that was always your choice.” Her anger was starting to fade now and she was on the verge of breaking into the tears that had been lingering from the beginning. She stared up at his handsome, immobile face with hazy eyes. “But I thought . . . I was sure . . . I trusted you.”
“Chloe,” Lex said one more time, taking her face in both of his hands. Before she could pull away again, he held her gaze deeply with his. “I didn’t have sex with Karla last night.”
Chloe thought for a moment that she might actually be sick. The whole world was spinning chaotically around her. “What?” she whispered helplessly.
“I didn’t have sex with her last night,” Lex repeated, his hands firm against her face, the nameless expression in his eyes absolutely overwhelming. “You were right. I couldn’t have done that after what happened between us on Saturday night. I couldn't have done that at all--feeling the way I feel about you. Your faith in me wasn’t misplaced.”
“But . . .” Chloe stuttered. “But you just said . . .”
“I said I had sex with her,” Lex clarified. “I didn’t say when.” He shook his head slowly and gave her a half-smile. “I had sex with Karla a year and a half ago. I haven’t even seen her in months. Those pictures must be old. Mary Carlyle lied to you.”
Chloe felt like she was strangling. “But . . . but . . . you let me think . . . just now . . . all this time . . .” A flood of recognition slammed into her. “You bastard,” she gasped. “You knew all this time what I thought. And you let me think . . . You were just torturing me . . .”
Lex slanted her a dry look. “Not torture for my own amusement. I was simply checking something.”
Gasping again, Chloe lost it. “Bastard,” she exclaimed again, pummeling him wildly on the chest as the reality of the situation finally hit home-in excruciating relief she could only handle by giving into a less intense feeling: rage. “You did that on purpose. I was devastated. And you took advantage of it. Bastard. I thought . . . I thought . . .”
She kept hitting him helplessly on the chest, but he wasn’t pulling away. Instead, he just wrapped his arms around her and pulled her against him. “I know,” he murmured, “I know. I’m sorry.”
Chloe burst into tears, her relief and joy finally swelling up to swallow her anger. “Bastard,” she gurgled wetly into the jacket of his suit. “Vindictive bastard.”
It would have been nice if she'd been able to get through this crisis without breaking down, and without making a blubbering fool of herself.
But she'd always cried more easily than she was comfortable with--she had, even before she got pregnant, even as far back as highschool. And, for some reason, the possibility of Lex with that supermodel had nearly torn her whole world apart.
“I really didn’t do it out of spite,” Lex assured her, one of his hands stroking her back. “I was . . . . desperate.”
Her mind was too befuddled to sort out what exactly he meant by that. She just relished the release of all of her tension and trauma, relished the feel of Lex’s warm, firm body against hers, the feel of his arms surrounding her.
The assurance that he hadn't fucked that supermodel.
The certainty that he was still hers.
Her storm of emotions didn’t last very long, so soon she was able to pull herself away from him. Peering up at his face, she asked hoarsely, “So you didn’t fuck that woman last night?”
He shook his head. “Of course not. And I’m a little disappointed you ever believed I did.”
Ignoring this unreasonable piece of injustice, Chloe focused on more pressing matters, “And you didn’t plant those pictures to make me jealous or anything?”
Lex gave her an exasperated look. “I might be a manipulative bastard, but I wouldn’t do something to intentionally hurt you like that.”
“And so you’re only guilty of taking this one spontaneous opportunity to torture me a little?” she persisted.
“Not torture you,” Lex corrected. “To get an unguarded reaction from you.”
Chloe sniffed. “Well, I’m still rather peeved about that, but I guess I can forgive you.”
Lex smiled at her-the first real smile all evening. “Good.”
Rubbing at her face, Chloe said, “That was an unexpected emotional ordeal that I wasn’t remotely prepared for. But at least it didn’t last very long.”
Lex cleared his throat. “I’m not sure I’m ready to put this behind us yet.”
Chloe jerked and stared up at him. “Huh?”
Something new entered Lex’s eyes-smoldering beneath the blue-gray depths of them. It wasn’t lust, but it was just as hot, and intense, and exhilarating. “I’d like to talk a little more about how you reacted just now.”
Chloe gulped. Croaked, “You would?”
He nodded. Murmured, with a flickering, intimate smile on his lips. “Tell me again exactly why I should believe that you don’t love me.”
* * *
Chloe gulped. “What?”
Lex’s lips twitched again. “I know you pretty well by now. A year ago, the possibility of my fucking another woman wouldn’t have fazed you. Something has changed, and it’s counterproductive to keep denying it. You wouldn’t have reacted so dramatically if your feelings didn’t run deep.” He raised his hand and slid his fingers through her messy hair. “I’m starting to think your denial of feelings for me isn’t as simple as you’d like me to think.”
Chloe took a step backward, forcing Lex to drop his hand. “Lex,” she began reluctantly, her heart dropping into her gut. “Lex, I haven’t been lying to you. Don’t get your hopes up. I know I reacted . . . dramatically just now, but that doesn’t mean that I’m in love with you.”
A knot of fear tightened in low in her belly, and she started breathing erratically-dreading this conversation for more reasons than one, but primarily because of the way she knew it would end up hurting Lex.
Lex shook his head slowly. Took a step closer to her. “I’ve never pursued this conversation before, mostly because I had no desire to hear why and how you don’t love me. But I’m wondering now if there’s more to your feelings than you’ve ever admitted to me.”
“No, Lex,” Chloe insisted, shaking her head too-far more urgently than he had. “I’ve never lied to you about this. I promise. I’m not trying to hide any secret feelings from you.”
“I know that,” he acknowledged, something quiet and thoughtful on his face. “But maybe there’s something here that you’ve never even admitted to yourself.”
Chloe groaned and felt sick again-this time a duller and heavier sensation than her panic earlier. “Lex,” she whispered, putting one hand one her stomach. “Please, don’t.”
He tightened his lips, stubbornness evident in the set of his chin. “Chloe,” he said calmly, “I would really like to discuss this.”
She released a harsh, textured gust of air. “Fine,” she relented, her heart hammering painfully in her chest. “We’ll discuss this. Just remember it was your idea.”
He nodded. “Understood.” After a pause, he glanced back out the window, although Chloe doubted he was really seeing anything in the view. “You claim you don’t love me . . .” he began.
Chloe interrupted, “I do love you. I’m just not in love with you.”
Lex’s brow furrowed and he turned back to look at her. “I know I’m not an easy man. There’s a lot about me that you’ll naturally find questionable. And I wouldn’t blame you if you’d rather not commit yourself to me . . . and everything that comes with me. But at least let me know that’s the issue.”
“It’s not,” Chloe said in a rush. “Of course it’s not. I know who you are. I don’t . . . agree with everything you do, but that’s not the issue here. I've already dealt with all of that. If I wasn’t prepared to have you in my life, I never would have told you I was pregnant.”
Lex’s face changed slightly. Looked slightly impatient. “Then what is it?”
“I told you. I love you, but I’m not in love with you.” She wondered how many times she’d have to say it-before he finally understood it. Prayed it wouldn’t be too many for Lex to handle.
Lex looked thoughtful again. “And how can you tell the difference?”
Feeling helpless and frustrated, Chloe tried to explain, “I just can. I don’t have that in love feeling for you.”
Lex’s jaw clenched almost imperceptibly. “You don’t?”
“No,” she said hoarsely. “Lex, I’m sorry. “Do we have to . . .”
Lex ignored her question. “If you don’t have that in love feeling for me, then how exactly do you love me?”
Chloe swallowed hard. Tried to think clearly, despite her rising dread and anxiety, so that she could give him a good answer. “I love you more like, like . . . family.”
The lines in his forehead deepened as he drew his eyebrows together. “Like family?” he repeated blankly.
Making a distressed noise in her throat, Chloe reached out to put her hand on his chest in an attempt to comfort him, knowing her words were hurting him and barely able to stand doing so. “Yes,” she affirmed weakly. “Like family. Not like . . . in love.”
A muscle was jumping in Lex’s temple. “Like a brother?” he asked thickly.
Chloe’s eyes started to burn, but she forced herself to compose herself. “Um,” she mumbled, dropping her hand back to her side. “Yeah, not exactly, but I guess that’s close to how I feel.”
It wasn’t the right analogy for her feelings, but she couldn’t think of an analogy that came close to being close enough.
Lex almost winced at her words, and he looked back at the window for a moment.
After a tense, painful silence, he turned back to her. Arched his eyebrows. “Like a brother you want to have sex with?”
Chloe blinked. Felt her belly flip-flop. “Um, yeah. I said it wasn’t exactly like a brother.”
Lex shook his head. “So you love me like family, and you want to have sex with me?”
Nodding mutely, Chloe blushed a little-couldn’t understand why she’d gotten so self-conscious about all of this lately.
“I feel the same way about you,” Lex bit out, a slight sheen of perspiration breaking out on his forehead. “Doesn’t that equal love?”
“No,” Chloe insisted. “It doesn’t. Being in love feels different than this. It’s distinct and unmistakable. And I’m so sorry, Lex, but I’ve never felt that for you.”
Now, Lex was looking more confused than anything else-as if there was a mystery here that would torment him until he’d solved it. “How do you know?” he asked, his voice husky with frustration. “It sounds like you’re just buying into all of these fairy-tales and romance novels, where love is some magical experience that arrives out of nowhere in a storm of fireworks to sweep you away. That’s not really how it works. I think what you feel for me might actually be love.”
The emotion was starting to close up in Chloe’s throat again, but she managed to force out, “It’s not. Why are you making me repeat this over and over again? And I know what love is. And, in some ways, it is like a fairytale-but it happens in the real world too.”
Something was snuffed out in Lex’s eyes-the warm glint of hope that had been present since her breakdown earlier-and the loss of it made Chloe’s eyes blur, made her heart lurch, made her hands shake. Lex gritted out, “So you’ve experienced love before? Just not with me.”
Chloe nodded helplessly and looked down at the floor. “Yeah. I have. I told you I wasn’t deceiving myself. I know what it feels like to be in love, Lex. And I don’t feel that way toward you.”
Lex was absolutely motionless, except for that fluttering muscle in his temple. His eyes were like ice now, and Chloe was almost relieved-because she didn’t think she could bear seeing the gaping wounds he must be hiding behind the stoic composure. “Toward whom then have you felt that way?” he inquired, his voice so controlled it was unnatural.
“Lex,” Chloe tried again, moving her hand back to his chest, where she imagined she could feel his heart pounding. “Lex, can’t you just let it go? You don’t want to hear this . . .”
Lex closed his hand around her wrist and pulled Chloe’s hand away from the lapel of his jacket. But he kept holding her hand, his fingers hard and unyielding. “Tell me.”
Chloe took a deep breath. Figured she’d get it over quickly, since there was no way to make this gentle. “I have been in love before,” she began, her voice wavering just a little. “I was in love with Clark.”
Abruptly, Lex dropped her wrist and jerked back to look out the window. Anyone else would think Lex wasn’t feeling anything-he’d reverted back to his professional façade of hard control.
But Chloe knew she had hurt him, and she wanted to hug him, to comfort him, to soothe away some of his pain.
Wasn’t allowed to do any of that. Could only watch and blindly hope this wasn’t hurting him as much as it was hurting her.
“Lex,” she began, finally not able to stand it any more. She was about to reach out for him again, when he turned back toward her abruptly.
“Chloe,” he demanded thickly, something tense and almost angry in his eyes. “Are you telling me that you’ve convinced yourself that you don’t love me because of some sort of adolescent fantasy? You’re a smart woman, and I can’t believe you’d be so foolish.”
Chloe suddenly felt a little less tender toward Lex. “It wasn’t an adolescent fantasy. This is the truth. I’m not being foolish here.”
Lex tossed his head impatiently. “Chloe, I thought I was in love with Lana for almost two years. But I eventually managed to snap out of my stupidity and try to forget such an utterly humiliating experience. We all have silly infatuations like that when we’re young. It has nothing to do with a mature, adult relationship.”
Chloe squeezed her eyes shut for several seconds, trying to think through her words, despite the way her emotions were running riot inside her. “Lex, I know how this must appear to you. But the way I felt for Clark was different than the way you felt for Lana.” Before he could object to this, she pressed on, “You had built Lana into a dream of a perfect woman, made up of memories of your mother and fantasies of purity and kindness and belonging. Your feelings were never for Lana herself-just for the imaginary woman you had convinced yourself she was. Once you came to terms with the fact that it was a just a fantasy, then Lana herself-as a person-was nothing to you but a symbol.” Chloe sucked in a breath. “Right?”
For an agonizing moment, as Chloe waited for his response, she felt a wave of visceral sympathy for Lex. She was slammed with a sudden fear that she was mistaken about the situation with Lana, that maybe Lex actually had really loved her. And-if Lex felt about Clark the way Chloe felt about Lana-then his heart must be ripping in two.
Like hers was-if only briefly-at the possibility that Lex could have ever actually loved Lana.
Finally, Lex nodded. “Yes. That’s right. But you can’t tell me that you didn’t do something similar with Clark.”
“I didn’t,” she burst out, moving back into her momentum now that that irrational terror had been diminished. “I loved Clark. I loved him-who he really was, not just a fantasy I’d made of him. I know you don’t want to hear this, Lex, but it’s the truth. I was really, truly in love with him. And, had he returned my feelings back then, I think we had the potential to be really happy together.”
Lex’s eyes became blank again. “Are you saying you . . . still . . .”
“No,” she interrupted. “I don’t still love him. I grew up. Realized that he’d never love me, and then I guess I just outgrew him. I don’t want him anymore. And I don’t want anyone like him. The point is that I was in love with him then, and I don’t have the same feelings for you.”
Lex pressed his lips together tightly and furrowed his brow. “Chloe, love doesn’t always feel the same . . .”
“But it’s not even close to being the same,” Chloe exclaimed, her insistence becoming more impassioned as Lex’s stubbornness became more and more frustrating. It was like he was just asking her to break his heart-over and over again. “I know that was love. And I don’t feel the same way toward you.”
Lex’s face didn’t change, but he took in one shaky breath. Then said with remarkable composure, “Try to describe to me exactly how you felt for him and don’t feel for me.”
Chloe groaned, “Lex . . .”
“Please.”
Swallowing over her dry throat, she took a few deep breaths and tried to sort out all of her feelings. “I felt . . . in love with him. It totally absorbed me, overwhelmed me. I thought about him all the time. Being with him was absolutely exhilarating, and I always had to tear myself away from him.” She shook her head. “It’s so hard to describe. But, when it came to Clark, I lived in this constant agony and ecstasy, and it just carried me away, like I was always . . . flying.”
Lex met her eyes with a hard, impersonal gaze. “And you don’t feel like you’re . . . flying with me.”
Shaking her head urgently, Chloe pushed a few flyaway hairs out of her flushed face. “No. With you, it’s not that constant agony and ecstasy. And I don’t feel like I’m flying. I feel kind of . . . grounded. Centered. At peace, sort of. Like I do with family.”
Lex was silent, staring intently at her face, as if he couldn’t quite comprehend what she was telling him.
“In my experience,” Chloe continued, her voice breaking on every other word, “Love kind of . . . sweeps you away.”
Lex swallowed. “And you’ve never been swept away by me.”
“No,” Chloe affirmed, shaking her head and wishing she could tell him something different. “I’m so sorry, Lex, but I’ve always felt like . . . myself with you. I’ve never been swept away. Loving Clark felt like it changed my whole world.”
“And I haven’t?” Lex muttered, his voice almost raw.
She shook her head one more time. “No. No. Through Gabrielle, of course you have. But my feelings for you? No, you haven’t.”
Lex had sort of fit himself into her world. Hadn’t changed it. Not like Clark had.
With a sudden jerk of his head, Lex turned on his heel and paced across the room.
Chloe didn’t stop him. Didn’t follow him. Let him take the time he needed to compose himself again.
She knew there was only so much pain and vulnerability Lex would be able to take before he shut down, hardened himself the way he’d been only a year ago.
Chloe prayed he wasn’t at that point yet.
Using the time to pull herself together, she went over to sit down on the sofa. Rubbed her eyes. Blew a gust of air up onto her heated face. Tried to focus on her breathing, the way she had when she’d given birth to Gabrielle.
Lex paced the room for a minute, before he returned to her. He lowered himself onto the sofa beside her, and his face wasn’t tense and closed-off anymore.
In fact, he looked matter-of-fact and determined, and there was something glinting in his eyes.
For some reason, his expression made her heart jump anxiously and her belly clench in nervousness. “Lex?” she asked faintly.
Drawing his brows together, he met her eyes with a half-smile. “I’ll admit to not enjoying hearing you say that. But I’m starting to think we might be dealing with a matter of definitions.”
Chloe gaped at him, disoriented by the sudden shift in mood. “Huh?”
His lips twitched-an amused, ironic expression that warmed Chloe’s heart, even in the midst of her confusion. “Very lucid response. I mean, I think our problem is our varying expectations when it comes to love. I’ve been waiting for all this time for you to feel for me the way I feel for you.” One of his eyebrows arched. “And I’ve just realized that you already do.”
With an urgent gasped, Chloe shook her head violently. “No, Lex. I don’t. I’m not in love . . .”
He put a hand up, stopping her words. “Let me finish. You have certain expectations for love based on your experience in the past. And so you’ve never believed that the way you feel for me might actually be love too.” Chloe had opened her mouth to object again, but Lex stopped her with a look. “But I think it’s simply a matter of semantics. Words can never adequately express such feelings anyway. What matters is that you already feel for me the way I’ve wanted you to.”
That hot, intense smolder had returned to his eyes-not lust, but something akin to it-and it almost took Chloe’s breath away.
It also made her want to cry, since she was sure it was prompted by a misunderstanding. “Lex, I’m not in denial or anything. And, as confused as I’ve been, I’m really not stupid. I know . . .”
“You like me?” he prompted abruptly, shifting on the couch until he was facing her. “You like spending time with me?”
“Of course,” she mumbled. “You know that. In fact, months ago I was telling Lois that, on my list of favorite people, you’re number f-“ She cut off her words, realizing with a gasp that, sometime in the last few months, Lex had moved from number four to . . . a higher number.
He wasn’t above her father or Lois in her heart-certainly not above Gabrielle-but her feelings for him had somehow unconsciously moved to the same level as her feelings for them. There was no way to sort out the ranking anymore.
Lex was watching her curiously. “Number what?”
“Nothing,” Chloe muttered, not sure how to express her new revelation. “But, yes, of course I like you.”
“And you care about me?” Lex pursued, moving back into his stride, after the brief distraction had faded. “You care for me like family?”
“Yes,” she responded. “I do. But Lex . . .”
“And you trust me? Respect me? You feel for me-hurt when I hurt, are happy when I’m happy?”
“Yes, to all of that, but Lex . . .”
“And you . . . enjoy having sex with me?” Lex continued, something tightening in his body, like an energy coiling up with increasing pressure at every moment.
Chloe pushed her hair back impatiently. “Yes, of course. I can barely keep my hands off of you most of the time. But you don’t understand . . .”
“And you feel like you can . . . open up to me? That you can share things with me that you wouldn’t want to share with anyone else?”
Letting her head drop back, Chloe groaned in frustration. “Yes, Lex. Of course. You knew all of this before. What exactly is your point?”
“Chloe Sullivan,” Lex gritted out, so much conviction in his tone that she straightened up instinctively. “That’s exactly how I feel about you.”
Chloe gaped at him. “But you love me.”
He narrowed his eyes, looking vaguely exasperated. “Precisely.”
Something was fluttering inside her-starting deep in her belly and moving up to her chest, centered around her heart. She stared at him blindly, trying to figure out what was happening here. “But you love me,” she repeated in a hushed voice. “Isn’t there more to it than what you just said?”
“Of course, there’s more to it,” Lex acknowledged. “It’s indefinably complex. But it isn’t some sort of magical experience. It just is”
Chloe felt like crying again-sure she was going to have to hurt Lex once more, after he had found this new hope. She gulped. Whispered, “But it’s not love . . . for me.”
He winced slightly, as if she had struck him, but then he obviously convinced himself to push on. “You’re just not calling it love,” he said calmly. “But, Chloe, it’s the same feeling.”
“Lex,” she rasped, feeling once again on the verge of tears. “Lex, don’t do this. Don’t make me keep saying . . .”
“I won’t,” he assured her, reaching out to tuck a stray strand of hair behind her ear. “You don’t have to say it. You don’t have to love me, the way you think you’re supposed to. I don’t care what you call it. I want you to feel this way about me-the way you already do.”
It felt like her world had turned upside down. She was dizzy and disoriented, and she had no idea what to say. It couldn’t possibly be as simple as this. As words. “Lex?”
“I mean it,” he said clearly. He met her eyes-expressed something absolutely unwavering in his gaze. “This isn’t a pathetic attempt to get you any way I can. I mean this. I don’t care if you can never say you love me and believe it. I just want . . . what we already have together.”
Chloe couldn’t do anything but blink. Felt unstable. Out of control. Like nothing made sense anymore.
But underneath the bewildered confusion, a thread of hope had sprung up in her heart. A way for both of them to have what they wanted-when she’d never believed it was possible.
She needed support, stability, comfort-and she instinctively turned to Lex for those things, even though it was hardly appropriate at the moment.
She had to twist her hands together, to keep them from reaching out to Lex.
“Chloe,” Lex said softly.
She glanced up from the cushion of the sofa. Focused on Lex’s composed, confident face.
“Come here.”
There should have been something incongruous about it. Something that made her cringe. An independent, confident woman, clinging to Lex for comfort-when she was the one who’d hurt him.
But she ignored the incongruity. Scooted over until she was pressed up against him.
Then he put his arm around her and heaved her up into his lap.
“Lex!” she gasped in surprise, her body intuitively settling against him, her arms draping around his shoulders.
“Listen to me, Chloe,” Lex insisted softly, his voice unrelenting and right at her ear. “I’ve finally figured this out. You don’t have to feel guilty anymore about not giving me what I want. You already have. This is what I want. I don’t care if you don’t think it’s love.”
Something exhilarating and joyful and vastly relieved was starting to flood up into Chloe’s throat. But she couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t believe the universe could give her this kind of gift-without expecting some kind of recompense.
“Lex,” she rasped, stroking his scalp despite her determination to keep her hands to herself. “Lex, but it’s not fair to you. You love me. I don-“
He shook his head. “You feel everything you told me before?”
“Yes,” she acknowledged, wondering how they’d ever gotten themselves into this bizarre scenario. “Of course I do.”
His blue-gray eyes were quiet and thoughtful-but that same heated fire was smoldering just under the surface.
Chloe vaguely wondered if that fire had always been present. If she’d just finally come to know him well enough to recognize it for what it was.
Wondered how she’d ever believed that this man was cold and heartless-when the heat, the emotion that was coiled up under his polished surface, was threatening to scorch her into ashes.
“Do you think it’s merely temporary? That, at some point, maybe when Gabrielle grows up, you’ll feel differently about me?” His words were distant and impersonal, but the look in his eyes was anything but.
“No,” she burst out. “Of course not.”
“Would you rather be with another man?” he continued, his hands spanning her hips, just above her ass.
“No,” she exclaimed again. “Don’t be stupid. I haven’t even thought about another man for . . . for months.”
“Then we’re good,” Lex concluded, looking absurdly pleased with himself. “This is what I want. So stop feeling guilty and stressed about it, and let’s just enjoy it.”
It felt like her head was going to explode-she was so overjoyed and relieved. “Are you sure?” she persisted, her fingers resting on the back of his neck as she looked down at him. “Lex, it doesn’t seem fair. You love me. And I might never be able to say that to you.” Part of her was tempted to say it anyway-to lie to him, just so she could make him happy.
But she’d been honest with him so far. And it had turned into one of the best relationships in her life. She wasn’t going to start lying now.
He shrugged. “So don’t say it. Just tell me how you do feel.”
For the first time, Chloe’s lips curled up in amusement. “Uh, baby, I don’t think there’s a name for how I feel for you.”
Lex smiled up at her and cocked an eyebrow. “So make one up. It’s just a name, after all. Don’t call it love. Call it . . . scotch.”
Chloe’s mouth dropped open. “Scotch? Why scotch?”
Shrugging again, he smirked at her. “Why not? I like scotch.”
She actually giggled and then buried her face in the space between his neck and shoulder. He smelled so familiar-so warm, and rich, and Lex-like. When she lifted her head at last, she said breathlessly, “So I’m supposed to say that I . . . that I scotch you?”
Lex’s lips twitched irrepressibly. “Sounds good to me.”
Chloe burst into rippling laughter, which wasn’t far distant from tears. His arms were tight around her, and she burrowed into him intimately. “Lex,” she said at last. “Lex, are you sure?”
“I am,” he assured her. “I’m sure. The name itself just isn’t that important. Maybe . . . maybe our circumstances forced us to skip over those flying feelings you were expecting. Or maybe they’ll come later-when you aren’t expecting them. Or maybe you’ll never get them, because love shapes itself in different ways. In any case, this is what I want. What I have with you. Your feelings match mine, Chloe. I’m certain of it.” He looked slightly uncomfortable, as he always did when he said something so naked. But he pressed on resolutely, “If I hadn’t been so intent on protecting myself, I would have figured it out earlier.”
Chloe let out a breath: a breath it felt like she’d been holding for months. “Okay. If you’re sure. I really do want what I have with you. I’m just so afraid that I’m being selfish and taking advantage of your feelings, so I can get all the perks without really deserving them.”
“You’re not taking advantage of me.” Lex shifted beneath her, pulling her head down until their lips were almost touching. “Believe me. You’re not.”
He closed the distance between their lips, and Chloe sank into the kiss, her hands sliding up to stroke his smooth scalp, causing him to moan into her mouth.
“Lex,” she mumbled, her voice smothered by his mouth and his seeking tongue. “Lex, you’re the strangest man I’ve ever met.”
“And you’re definitely the strangest woman,” he replied, sucking on her lower lip.
Chloe groaned and tightened her fingers around the back of his skull. “But you’re pretty incredible.”
He tore his lips away. Slid his hands down to palm her ass. With an ironic twitch of his eyebrows, he murmured, “About time you realized that.”
She chuckled warmly and kissed him again. Started rubbing her body against his, a deep pressure building up inside her-centered in her heart and between her legs. Smiling against his lips, she asked, “So, does this mean we can have a lot more sex?”
“I certainly hope so,” Lex replied, one hand moving up to her breast. “I’ve been rather . . . deprived on that level recently.”
“So have I,” Chloe agreed, stroking down his chest and belly until she found his groin. Discovered he was starting to harden. “Twice in six months.”
Lex grunted and leaned his head back against the sofa, watching her with deep, tender eyes. “Four times in nine months,” he added. He shook his head. “Hopefully, now we can start making up for lost time.”
“Indeed.” Chloe was growing more and more aroused, just from gazing down at his hot, relaxed form. “So shall we do it on the couch? And I get to be on top this time?”
He smiled. “If you want.”
She moved to straddle him, still wearing her jeans. And she had pushed off his jacket and was just starting to unbutton his shirt when she heard a sound that was most unwelcome.
Gabrielle started to wail from the nursery.
Chloe slumped against Lex and grew still, listening intently. “Please, pumpkin,” she whispered. “Not now. Please not now.”
Gabrielle kept squalling.
“Should we check on her?” Lex asked, his voice slightly stiff.
“Let’s wait for a minute. Sometimes she’ll settle down and fall back to sleep.”
They waited, Chloe still straddling Lex and his hands still cupping her ass.
But the baby’s cries didn’t get any softer. In fact, they became more intense until Chloe recognized them as anguish.
Every instinct in her body screamed at her to go to her daughter, so Chloe untangled herself from Lex. “Poor thing. I better check on her.”
She stumbled the first few steps, still totally caught up in her previous embrace with Lex. Glancing back at his slouching form, she murmured, “If I’d known we were going to . . . get together this evening, I would have gotten a babysitter.”
* * *
As soon as Chloe walked into the nursery, she knew something was wrong.
It smelled like something was wrong.
In the light from the hall, she peered into the crib at her crying, flailing baby. Reaching down to pick her up, Chloe realized that the problem was more than just a dirty diaper.
What should have remained in the diaper had seeped through Gabrielle’s sleeper and onto the bedding of the crib.
“Oh, pumpkin,” she murmured, lifting Gabrielle out of the crib. “What a mess. No wonder you’re screaming.”
She felt the familiar, instinctive disgust at having to deal with a poop from hell. But she ignored it and carried Gabrielle over to the changing table. “Let me clean you up,” she told her daughter. “Then you’ll feel better again.”
As she unsnapped the sleeper, however, she realized that this particular diaper was much smellier than normal. And much runnier. And there was a lot more in it.
Furrowing her brow, Chloe asked, “Are you sick, pumpkin?”
“Is she all right?” Lex asked from the doorway. “She’s sick?”
Chloe shrugged, feeling kind of sick herself. “Diarrhea,” she explained. “If this is all, then she’s probably all right.”
Lex frowned. “Do you need any help?”
Chloe made a face as she pulled off the most disgusting diaper she’d ever seen. The smell nearly made her gag. But she managed to force out, being careful not to breathe in, “If you’re brave enough, you could change the bedding in the crib and put the soiled sheets into the washing machine.”
Lex lifted his eyebrows at her skeptically, but Chloe barely noticed as she tried to roll up the dirty diaper without getting too much of the runny poop on her hands.
Gabrielle was still bawling, kicking her legs violently and flinging around small drops from the remnants that still smeared her bottom and thighs.
And just think. Five minutes ago, Chloe had been looking forward to a sexy, satisfying evening.
Now, she couldn’t even imagine feeling sexy. She had smeared poop on her hands and a couple of drops on her face and her shirt.
Lex had pulled off the bedding from the crib and carried it to the kitchen, where the washer and dryer were located.
Chloe concentrated on cleaning up her daughter. After using ten baby wipes with little effect, Chloe picked up her naked baby. “Maybe we should just give you a bath,” she murmured, hugging Gabrielle against her and patting her back, trying to comfort her enough to get her to stop crying.
Gabrielle didn’t stop crying. In fact, her bawls escalated into agonized screams.
“Sweetie,” Chloe soothed helplessly. “What’s wrong? Do you still feel bad? I don’t know what you need.”
Gabrielle was squirming desperately against Chloe, and her screams were piercing Chloe’s ears. Trying to decide whether she should just put another diaper on her or try to give her a bath to clean her up, Chloe kept patting Gabrielle’s back.
She noticed the baby felt warmer than she should, but she didn’t know if it was a fever or just the result of her screaming so long and so loud.
In another moment, Chloe’s reflections were pointless.
She felt something warm and wet against her belly.
Glanced down and saw that Gabrielle was peeing on her. “Oh, pumpkin,” she sighed, her stomach churning uncomfortably. “Thank you very much”
Just then, however, it got worse.
Gabrielle really did have diarrhea. And it wasn’t over yet.
And so Chloe wasn’t just peed on. While Chloe stared in stunned disbelief, she saw her jeans and shirt, even her shoes, were soiled with both urine and a stream of liquid poop.
Chloe stood frozen. Holding her sobbing baby. Absolutely helpless and unable to decide what to do.
“Chloe?” Lex said, appearing once more in the doorway. “Is everything . . .” He stopped, obviously assessing her condition with widening eyes.
Chloe felt like she was choking, all of the emotion of her endless evening swelling up. “The poor pumpkin is sick,” Chloe gurgled, hugging Gabrielle against her, too stunned the even process the disgusting mess on her clothes.
Lex stepped over. “It’s just diarrhea, isn’t it?”
Hearing Lex Luthor say diarrhea was enough to shock Chloe back into composure.
“Yeah,” she agreed, holding Gabrielle out a little so she could look at the baby carefully. “She probably has a bellyache, which is why she’s crying. I’m wondering if she’s a little feverish, though.”
“Give her to me,” Lex suggested. “I’ll try to clean her up. You need to go change your clothes.”
“But I need to . . .” she automatically objected, unwilling to let even Lex take her daughter away from her when she was sick. Then Chloe forced herself to be reasonable. Her clothes were absolutely disgusting and needed to be changed. “Right. Thanks. I’ll be right back.”
As she walked toward her bathroom, covered with pee and baby shit, she concluded that-even though she and Lex had finally worked things out-there was absolutely no way she’d be having sex tonight.
* * *
A few hours later, all three of them were sprawled on the sofa in the living room, the television set to a cable news station, but the volume muted.
Lex was sprawled out, propped up against the corner of the couch, his legs parted to make room for Chloe. Chloe was sprawled out on top of him, leaning back against his chest, her head lolling back against his shoulder. And Gabrielle was sprawled out on top of Chloe, nestled against her chest, finally sleeping soundly after a very unpleasant few hours.
Both Gabrielle and Chloe had gotten cleaned up. Chloe had changed into sweats, while Gabrielle was just wearing a diaper.
Lex had made a few calls-probably waking up nationally acclaimed pediatricians in the middle of the night-and had informed Chloe of what she'd already known. That their main concern was that Gabrielle might get dehydrated. So they should look out for the signs of that, and otherwise not worry too much.
Apparently, breastfeeding was good for diarrhea and for keeping the baby from getting dehydrated. So Chloe had tried to nurse Gabrielle, who’d cried and squirmed for an hour before she’d finally relented to latch on and suck.
They’d had to change one more disgusting diaper, although there was less there than in the previous one.
But eventually things seemed to settle down. Gabrielle seemed to start to feel better. Her little body cooled down and she stopped crying. And there seemed no danger of her getting dehydrated.
Until finally she’d fallen asleep on Chloe’s chest.
Chloe was finally starting to relax herself. She was exhausted and still upset-having gotten more worried about Gabrielle than the situation had called for.
Just the idea of Gabrielle’s wellbeing being threatened was enough to cause Chloe to panic.
Chloe’s arms were holding onto her daughter. And Lex’s arms were holding onto both of them.
“She seems to be better now,” Lex murmured, after a long time of silence.
Chloe nodded, turning her head so she could catch a glimpse of Lex’s face. “Yeah. I think she is.” She gently stroked the smooth skin of Gabrielle’s bare back. “Poor little pumpkin.”
“And you?” Lex added, nuzzling her hair. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” Chloe assured him, smiling slightly. “I’m okay, now that she’s okay.”
In fact, she felt strangely safe and content, in Lex’s arms, holding their baby. It was one of those sappy, saccharine moments. But it didn’t feel either sappy or saccharine.
It just felt . . . good. And right.
And it didn’t even make Chloe’s cynical nature want to cringe.
“Maybe we should put her back in bed, so she can get some sleep,” Lex suggested, his husky voice very close to her ear.
Chloe whimpered involuntarily and hugged Gabrielle a little tighter. Couldn’t stand the thought of releasing her baby, when she’d been sick not long before.
Thus far, Gabrielle had always been a very healthy baby. And Chloe felt a random surge of deep sympathy for parents of children who were really sick.
Even seeing Gabrielle miserable from a case of diarrhea was bad enough.
Lex leaned his head forward. Pressed a kiss into the side of Chloe’s neck. “Chloe,” he murmured, “You need some sleep too.”
“I’m fine,” she insisted, snuggling back against Lex. “I just want to . . . to hold her for a little longer.” Then a thought struck her like a blow. And she realized that she’d forced Lex into a very domestic situation, after he’d already made himself far more vulnerable than he was naturally comfortable with.
Maybe he needed to get away and recover.
“But if you need to . . . to go . . . or if you’re getting stiff and uncomfortable with me lying on top of you,” Chloe began awkwardly, her cheeks flushing in embarrassment as she realized she’d made Lex cuddle with her, on top of changing gross diapers and witnessing her covered with shit.
She couldn’t see his face, but she thought he must be rolling his eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous. You haven’t heard me complain.”
Chloe let out a breath. “Oh. Good. Sorry.” She glanced up at his face. “I’m very cozy like this, but I know that guys don’t always like to be so . . . cozy.”
Lex chuckled faintly. “I’m man enough to muddle through a little coziness without having a breakdown.”
Chloe smiled warmly and pressed a kiss onto Gabrielle’s little head. “Glad to hear it.” After a moment, she added, “Seriously, Lex, I know you always get up early. So if you need to get home and go to bed . . .”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
It was perhaps the most inexplicable, unexpected thing in the whole tumultuous evening.
But the words made Chloe happier than she could remember.
* * *
Eventually, Chloe put a sleeping Gabrielle back into her crib. Then Chloe took a shower and changed into simple cotton chemise.
When she came out of the bathroom, she saw Lex standing in the doorway to the dark nursery.
“Is she all right?” Chloe asked, coming up to stand beside him.
“Yes.” Lex turned to look at her, something flaring in his eyes when he took in her bare arms and legs, his eyes focusing on her nipples which were visible beneath the thin fabric. “She’s sleeping.”
“I’m exhausted,” Chloe told him. “I’m going to bed.” After a pause, she added, “You can spend the night if you want, or you can head home. Either way is fine.”
After studying her face, he said, “I’ll spend the night, but I think I’ll take a shower first.”
Chloe wasn’t sure if she was relieved by his decision or not. She wanted him around, of course, but she wasn’t sure she was up for any late night activities.
And she really didn’t want to disappoint him after they’d finally come to an understanding.
Chloe went to get him a towel. Then she turned out the most of the lights and crawled into bed, feeling both restless and almost at peace. Unable to fully process everything that had happened, Chloe lay in a blissful kind of stupor-just on the edge of sleep.
A few minutes later, Lex came into the dark bedroom. Chloe was on her side, facing the opposite direction, but she heard him approach the bed. Then felt the mattress shift as he got under the covers beside her.
He rolled over until he was spooning her from behind, one of his arms draped over her.
She grabbed his forearm and hugged it against her chest. “Hi.”
“Hi,” Lex replied, a smile in his voice.
“I’m not sure I’m up for sex tonight,” Chloe said reluctantly. “I was, but after Gabrielle, and all the diapers, and . . .”
“It’s okay,” Lex assured her, his bare chest warm against the back of her shoulders. “We can just sleep if you’d like.”
Pressing a kiss into his palm, Chloe felt another wash of guilt and worry. Began, “Lex, are you sure . . .”
“Stop,” Lex said curtly. “I’m not a child. I know what I’m doing. You aren’t taking advantage of me. You’re giving me as much as you’re getting.”
Chloe released a long breath and didn’t answer again. Just lay with Lex and wondered how the universe had given her this.
It wasn’t perfect. Wasn’t a fairytale or a fantasy or some sappy, romantic story. She was still slightly worried that she didn’t feel for Lex the way she was supposed to. And she had to remind herself to be mad at Lex tomorrow for the way he’d manipulated her earlier.
But this was good. Seemed right. And-as stupid as it sounded-it made Chloe feel like her family was finally complete.
She felt Lex shifting behind her. Felt his bare legs sliding against hers.
Then felt something different in the heat of his body-something tense and coiled.
Started to wonder if he had any clothes on.
“Are you naked?” she inquired, reaching down under the covers so she could feel at his hip.
He was. Naked. She felt the flesh of his firm ass beneath her fingers.
“I didn’t have anything to wear to bed,” he explained smoothly, an edge of amusement in his voice.
Chloe huffed. “Well, I hope you don’t think your nakedness is going to seduce me. I’m exhausted and kind of in a daze.”
“Perfectly all right,” Lex assured her. “I wouldn’t dream of seducing you with my nakedness. I’m tired too.”
Shifting her hips, Chloe rubbed her butt against Lex’s groin. “It doesn’t feel like all of you is tired,” she said accusingly, when she felt his hard flesh move against her dips and curves.
“Involuntary physical response,” Lex explained matter-of-factly, “From pressing my cock into your ass. Just ignore it.”
Chloe couldn’t ignore it. She kept shifting restlessly, feeling his erection pushing against her.
And she was starting to wonder if she even wanted to ignore it.
If only she wasn’t quite so tired and drained.
“Well,” she relented, feeling a tight pressure develop between her legs as she kept feeling Lex’s cock-now at the juncture where her thighs met her ass. “Maybe I’m a little bit in the mood. But, seriously, I don’t have much energy. If we do anything, it can’t be wild and sexy.”
“Nothing wild and sexy,” Lex replied agreeably, his hand sliding up to cup one of her breasts. “You won’t even have to move.”
Chloe snorted in amusement. “Sounds hot.” She was sort of rocking back against him now, an arousal building up at her center as she felt Lex’s body behind her, as she felt his skillful fingers on her nipple.
“Believe me,” Lex murmured huskily, his voice as erotic as a caress. “It will be.”
Chloe felt a tingling thrill at his words and moaned softly as she moved her head against the pillow. Her thighs kept rubbing together, and she started rocking back rhythmically into the little pushes Lex was making against her ass.
His bent his neck so he could nuzzle the side of her throat, his mouth warm and wet and delicious. His lips found her pulse and he sucked on it, his tongue fluttering in a way that made Chloe groan and arch back against him.
Then Lex’s hands started moving more purposefully, stroking over her breasts, her belly, her hips, her thighs-teasing her into a pulsing arousal.
Her eyes were still blurry, her eyelids heavy and tired. And her mind was in a hot kind of tired daze, as her body was moving purely on instinct.
It wasn’t long before Lex slid his hand between her legs, nudging at her intimate flesh. Found it wet and swollen-more than ready for him.
Without speaking, he rolled away from her briefly and opened the drawer to her nightstand. Found the condoms she kept there. Tore one packet open and put the condom on.
Chloe lay in anticipation, still on her side, and her pelvis was rocking gently as she waited for Lex to enter her.
It was silent in the room, except the mingled texture of their breathing, when Lex spooned her again, easing her upper body forward some until she was bent slightly at the waist. Then he lifted her leg to make room for him.
Slid his cock inside, the hard substance of it stroking her inner flesh lusciously as he filled her.
Chloe released a husky moan of pleasure and flattened one of her hands against the sheet in front of her. Her hips gave a few involuntary pumps back against his pelvis, longing for friction to ease the throbbing ache at her center.
Then Lex started to thrust into her, his motion steady and constant. He hadn’t started as slowly as normal, but he wasn’t out of control either. His cock slid in and out of her clinging inner muscles with a delicious, satisfying cadence.
His breathing accelerated, became faster and louder in her ear.
Chloe gasped as she felt the beginnings of an orgasm developing. Clutched at the sheet. Felt her hips pumping in time with his thrusts, despite her fatigue.
Feeling overwhelmed with the sensations of being filled and surrounded by Lex, Chloe turned her head blindly to look back at him, wanting to share this with him, wanting to witness his pleasure.
He shifted slightly until he could meet her lips. Kissed her deeply. Clumsily. Their tongues tangled as their mouths moved passionately against each other, the rhythm of the kiss somehow matching the rhythm of their motion.
The kiss broke off, leaving both of them gasping desperately. Lex began to grunt softly, pulling her thigh up more to give him better penetration.
Chloe whimpered, her fingers fisting in the sheet, the pressure building beneath her belly.
She wasn’t going to come though. Not without a little help. With another whimper, she brought her hand down to her clit. Started to rub it in tight little circles.
Let out a groan of relief as the stimulation pushed her further toward climax.
Lex’s breath was hot and damp against her skin, and his cock was driving into her-not forcefully, but powerfully.
Then Chloe felt his hand on hers, pushing her fingers out of the way. She gasped in disappointment, as she lost the stimulation.
Then his fingers had replaced hers, massaging her clit in a way that made her let out a mewling sound of pleasure.
She clutched at the bedding again and closed her eyes. Felt Lex’s cock and his hand sweep her away in an agonizing kind of ecstasy.
Her orgasm swelled up, causing the muscles in her belly and thighs to tense in preparation. Her body started moving in little jerks, as the anticipation caused her to huff out silly sounds of pleasure and frustration.
Then Lex bit down on the side of her neck-not brutally, but hard enough for her to feel his teeth.
The sharp sensation unleashed all the gathered tension inside her. She came, convulsing against him, gasping out sounds like “Ah, ah, ah!” and feeling rippling waves of pleasure wash over her.
Lex’s momentum had built up as Chloe began to come down, and she could hear him grunting wordlessly, feel the rapid pumping of his cock inside her clenching muscles.
She turned her head, looked back at him almost blindly. Saw the deep, hot intensity in his eyes.
Knew what it meant.
Knew he must see the same thing in her eyes, as she was flooded by feelings of possessiveness and tenderness, even as he was fucking her from behind.
“Lex,” she breathed. Had nothing else she could say, but knew she didn’t have to. Knew he’d understand.
His face twisted as his pelvis jerked against her, the pressure coiled up unbearably inside him, right before the moment of release.
Then he came. Chloe felt his climax pulse through him. Heard him choke on a strangled exclamation. Saw his expression transform before he buried his face in her hair.
He clung to her trembling body. And she clung once again to his forearm.
Didn’t want to let him go, even when he tried to draw back, so he could pull his softening cock out of her and take care of the condom.
She let him go, of course, and lay shuddering in damp exhaustion until he returned to the bed and pressed up against her back again. His body was hot, relaxed, almost pliant behind her.
Chloe darted her head back to give him a quick kiss on the chin, her sense of irony returning in the wake of all the intensity of the evening. “Well, it was very nice, but I had to move a little.”
Lex chuckled. “Very sorry. I’ll try to do better next time.”
Hugging his forearm against her chest-since it was the only part of his body she could hug in this position-Chloe was suddenly overwhelmed with tenderness, with affection, with something that might not feel like it was supposed to feel, but was still undeniably love.
Maybe it didn’t matter that she didn’t feel in love the way she had with Clark.
With no other way to express her emotions, she slanted a warm, teasing look back at him. “You know what?”
“What?” Lex murmured, pressing a few little kisses into the part of her face he could reach.
“I think I . . . scotch you.”
Lex chuckled warmly again and mumbled against her skin. “Same here.”
Despite her tender feelings and physical satisfaction, Chloe couldn’t help but break into a ripple of giggles. “Listen to us,” she gasped, “I think both of us might be a little insane.”
Lex smiled. Settled her more snugly against him. Replied in a drowsy voice, “Then it’s a good thing we managed to find each other when we did.”
Chloe was feeling drowsy too. Couldn’t wait to go to sleep. Couldn’t believe that Lex was in bed with her and that it wasn’t just one in a series of random fucks. He’d be there in the morning. For her. For Gabrielle. For both of them.
And Chloe could be there for him too. She was actually allowed to be.
Lex was right.
What they had was real.
And it didn’t matter that it didn’t have a name.
“Then I don’t know why this should bother you so much.”
Chloe felt that same wash of rage again. “If you don’t know why I would be hurt by this,” she gritted out. “Then you are absolutely hopeless when it comes to normal human feelings. I trusted you, and we were . . . together in a lot of ways. And I was always honest with you . . . as much as I possibly could be. I never tried to string you along or keep you hanging by giving you any hope. All of that was your choice. I would understand if you wanted to move on-I wouldn’t be happy, but I would understand. But to do it like this. To try to keep it a secret. And so soon after Saturday night . . . which, which meant something to me . . .”
“It meant something to me too,” Lex said quietly, as controlled as she was uncontrolled.
It was all starting to make sense. Horrible, heartbreaking sense. Lex had made himself too vulnerable with her that night. He'd lost too much control. Exposed himself too much. Which meant he would have to seek power and independence by distancing himself from her afterwards.
And what better way than to fuck someone else.
He'd even said, that night, that she didn't know everything he'd done.
Maybe this wasn't even the first time.
He was Lex Luthor--could never be anyone else. And his cold, defensive nature might prove stronger than the parts of himself he was learning to cultivate with her and Gabrielle.
“Right,” she said bitterly, stifling a flood of tears. “It meant so much that you went out the next day and fucked some other woman. How moving.”
Lex sighed, and something on his face changed. “Chloe,” he began, reaching out to cup her cheek with his hand.
Chloe yanked his hand away from her, hating the feel of its warmth and strength against her cheek. “What exactly do you expect to happen now? If you were hoping to push me into something with this, then you’re woefully mistaken. You’re a free man, and you can do what you want. I know you didn't do this on purpose to hurt me, and I guess I can understand why you did it at all. But there’s no way I can continue the way we were after . . . this. I’m not saying we can’t be friends and partners with Gabrielle, but things are going to be . . . different . . . from now on. I mean, I can't make love to you, if . . . if you're fucking someone else.”
“Chloe,” Lex said again, his voice making it sound as if he were trying to get her attention.
“Maybe I shouldn’t be so, so . . . affected by this. I know you’ve been waiting a long time and haven’t gotten anything to show for it. But that was always your choice.” Her anger was starting to fade now and she was on the verge of breaking into the tears that had been lingering from the beginning. She stared up at his handsome, immobile face with hazy eyes. “But I thought . . . I was sure . . . I trusted you.”
“Chloe,” Lex said one more time, taking her face in both of his hands. Before she could pull away again, he held her gaze deeply with his. “I didn’t have sex with Karla last night.”
Chloe thought for a moment that she might actually be sick. The whole world was spinning chaotically around her. “What?” she whispered helplessly.
“I didn’t have sex with her last night,” Lex repeated, his hands firm against her face, the nameless expression in his eyes absolutely overwhelming. “You were right. I couldn’t have done that after what happened between us on Saturday night. I couldn't have done that at all--feeling the way I feel about you. Your faith in me wasn’t misplaced.”
“But . . .” Chloe stuttered. “But you just said . . .”
“I said I had sex with her,” Lex clarified. “I didn’t say when.” He shook his head slowly and gave her a half-smile. “I had sex with Karla a year and a half ago. I haven’t even seen her in months. Those pictures must be old. Mary Carlyle lied to you.”
Chloe felt like she was strangling. “But . . . but . . . you let me think . . . just now . . . all this time . . .” A flood of recognition slammed into her. “You bastard,” she gasped. “You knew all this time what I thought. And you let me think . . . You were just torturing me . . .”
Lex slanted her a dry look. “Not torture for my own amusement. I was simply checking something.”
Gasping again, Chloe lost it. “Bastard,” she exclaimed again, pummeling him wildly on the chest as the reality of the situation finally hit home-in excruciating relief she could only handle by giving into a less intense feeling: rage. “You did that on purpose. I was devastated. And you took advantage of it. Bastard. I thought . . . I thought . . .”
She kept hitting him helplessly on the chest, but he wasn’t pulling away. Instead, he just wrapped his arms around her and pulled her against him. “I know,” he murmured, “I know. I’m sorry.”
Chloe burst into tears, her relief and joy finally swelling up to swallow her anger. “Bastard,” she gurgled wetly into the jacket of his suit. “Vindictive bastard.”
It would have been nice if she'd been able to get through this crisis without breaking down, and without making a blubbering fool of herself.
But she'd always cried more easily than she was comfortable with--she had, even before she got pregnant, even as far back as highschool. And, for some reason, the possibility of Lex with that supermodel had nearly torn her whole world apart.
“I really didn’t do it out of spite,” Lex assured her, one of his hands stroking her back. “I was . . . . desperate.”
Her mind was too befuddled to sort out what exactly he meant by that. She just relished the release of all of her tension and trauma, relished the feel of Lex’s warm, firm body against hers, the feel of his arms surrounding her.
The assurance that he hadn't fucked that supermodel.
The certainty that he was still hers.
Her storm of emotions didn’t last very long, so soon she was able to pull herself away from him. Peering up at his face, she asked hoarsely, “So you didn’t fuck that woman last night?”
He shook his head. “Of course not. And I’m a little disappointed you ever believed I did.”
Ignoring this unreasonable piece of injustice, Chloe focused on more pressing matters, “And you didn’t plant those pictures to make me jealous or anything?”
Lex gave her an exasperated look. “I might be a manipulative bastard, but I wouldn’t do something to intentionally hurt you like that.”
“And so you’re only guilty of taking this one spontaneous opportunity to torture me a little?” she persisted.
“Not torture you,” Lex corrected. “To get an unguarded reaction from you.”
Chloe sniffed. “Well, I’m still rather peeved about that, but I guess I can forgive you.”
Lex smiled at her-the first real smile all evening. “Good.”
Rubbing at her face, Chloe said, “That was an unexpected emotional ordeal that I wasn’t remotely prepared for. But at least it didn’t last very long.”
Lex cleared his throat. “I’m not sure I’m ready to put this behind us yet.”
Chloe jerked and stared up at him. “Huh?”
Something new entered Lex’s eyes-smoldering beneath the blue-gray depths of them. It wasn’t lust, but it was just as hot, and intense, and exhilarating. “I’d like to talk a little more about how you reacted just now.”
Chloe gulped. Croaked, “You would?”
He nodded. Murmured, with a flickering, intimate smile on his lips. “Tell me again exactly why I should believe that you don’t love me.”
* * *
Chloe gulped. “What?”
Lex’s lips twitched again. “I know you pretty well by now. A year ago, the possibility of my fucking another woman wouldn’t have fazed you. Something has changed, and it’s counterproductive to keep denying it. You wouldn’t have reacted so dramatically if your feelings didn’t run deep.” He raised his hand and slid his fingers through her messy hair. “I’m starting to think your denial of feelings for me isn’t as simple as you’d like me to think.”
Chloe took a step backward, forcing Lex to drop his hand. “Lex,” she began reluctantly, her heart dropping into her gut. “Lex, I haven’t been lying to you. Don’t get your hopes up. I know I reacted . . . dramatically just now, but that doesn’t mean that I’m in love with you.”
A knot of fear tightened in low in her belly, and she started breathing erratically-dreading this conversation for more reasons than one, but primarily because of the way she knew it would end up hurting Lex.
Lex shook his head slowly. Took a step closer to her. “I’ve never pursued this conversation before, mostly because I had no desire to hear why and how you don’t love me. But I’m wondering now if there’s more to your feelings than you’ve ever admitted to me.”
“No, Lex,” Chloe insisted, shaking her head too-far more urgently than he had. “I’ve never lied to you about this. I promise. I’m not trying to hide any secret feelings from you.”
“I know that,” he acknowledged, something quiet and thoughtful on his face. “But maybe there’s something here that you’ve never even admitted to yourself.”
Chloe groaned and felt sick again-this time a duller and heavier sensation than her panic earlier. “Lex,” she whispered, putting one hand one her stomach. “Please, don’t.”
He tightened his lips, stubbornness evident in the set of his chin. “Chloe,” he said calmly, “I would really like to discuss this.”
She released a harsh, textured gust of air. “Fine,” she relented, her heart hammering painfully in her chest. “We’ll discuss this. Just remember it was your idea.”
He nodded. “Understood.” After a pause, he glanced back out the window, although Chloe doubted he was really seeing anything in the view. “You claim you don’t love me . . .” he began.
Chloe interrupted, “I do love you. I’m just not in love with you.”
Lex’s brow furrowed and he turned back to look at her. “I know I’m not an easy man. There’s a lot about me that you’ll naturally find questionable. And I wouldn’t blame you if you’d rather not commit yourself to me . . . and everything that comes with me. But at least let me know that’s the issue.”
“It’s not,” Chloe said in a rush. “Of course it’s not. I know who you are. I don’t . . . agree with everything you do, but that’s not the issue here. I've already dealt with all of that. If I wasn’t prepared to have you in my life, I never would have told you I was pregnant.”
Lex’s face changed slightly. Looked slightly impatient. “Then what is it?”
“I told you. I love you, but I’m not in love with you.” She wondered how many times she’d have to say it-before he finally understood it. Prayed it wouldn’t be too many for Lex to handle.
Lex looked thoughtful again. “And how can you tell the difference?”
Feeling helpless and frustrated, Chloe tried to explain, “I just can. I don’t have that in love feeling for you.”
Lex’s jaw clenched almost imperceptibly. “You don’t?”
“No,” she said hoarsely. “Lex, I’m sorry. “Do we have to . . .”
Lex ignored her question. “If you don’t have that in love feeling for me, then how exactly do you love me?”
Chloe swallowed hard. Tried to think clearly, despite her rising dread and anxiety, so that she could give him a good answer. “I love you more like, like . . . family.”
The lines in his forehead deepened as he drew his eyebrows together. “Like family?” he repeated blankly.
Making a distressed noise in her throat, Chloe reached out to put her hand on his chest in an attempt to comfort him, knowing her words were hurting him and barely able to stand doing so. “Yes,” she affirmed weakly. “Like family. Not like . . . in love.”
A muscle was jumping in Lex’s temple. “Like a brother?” he asked thickly.
Chloe’s eyes started to burn, but she forced herself to compose herself. “Um,” she mumbled, dropping her hand back to her side. “Yeah, not exactly, but I guess that’s close to how I feel.”
It wasn’t the right analogy for her feelings, but she couldn’t think of an analogy that came close to being close enough.
Lex almost winced at her words, and he looked back at the window for a moment.
After a tense, painful silence, he turned back to her. Arched his eyebrows. “Like a brother you want to have sex with?”
Chloe blinked. Felt her belly flip-flop. “Um, yeah. I said it wasn’t exactly like a brother.”
Lex shook his head. “So you love me like family, and you want to have sex with me?”
Nodding mutely, Chloe blushed a little-couldn’t understand why she’d gotten so self-conscious about all of this lately.
“I feel the same way about you,” Lex bit out, a slight sheen of perspiration breaking out on his forehead. “Doesn’t that equal love?”
“No,” Chloe insisted. “It doesn’t. Being in love feels different than this. It’s distinct and unmistakable. And I’m so sorry, Lex, but I’ve never felt that for you.”
Now, Lex was looking more confused than anything else-as if there was a mystery here that would torment him until he’d solved it. “How do you know?” he asked, his voice husky with frustration. “It sounds like you’re just buying into all of these fairy-tales and romance novels, where love is some magical experience that arrives out of nowhere in a storm of fireworks to sweep you away. That’s not really how it works. I think what you feel for me might actually be love.”
The emotion was starting to close up in Chloe’s throat again, but she managed to force out, “It’s not. Why are you making me repeat this over and over again? And I know what love is. And, in some ways, it is like a fairytale-but it happens in the real world too.”
Something was snuffed out in Lex’s eyes-the warm glint of hope that had been present since her breakdown earlier-and the loss of it made Chloe’s eyes blur, made her heart lurch, made her hands shake. Lex gritted out, “So you’ve experienced love before? Just not with me.”
Chloe nodded helplessly and looked down at the floor. “Yeah. I have. I told you I wasn’t deceiving myself. I know what it feels like to be in love, Lex. And I don’t feel that way toward you.”
Lex was absolutely motionless, except for that fluttering muscle in his temple. His eyes were like ice now, and Chloe was almost relieved-because she didn’t think she could bear seeing the gaping wounds he must be hiding behind the stoic composure. “Toward whom then have you felt that way?” he inquired, his voice so controlled it was unnatural.
“Lex,” Chloe tried again, moving her hand back to his chest, where she imagined she could feel his heart pounding. “Lex, can’t you just let it go? You don’t want to hear this . . .”
Lex closed his hand around her wrist and pulled Chloe’s hand away from the lapel of his jacket. But he kept holding her hand, his fingers hard and unyielding. “Tell me.”
Chloe took a deep breath. Figured she’d get it over quickly, since there was no way to make this gentle. “I have been in love before,” she began, her voice wavering just a little. “I was in love with Clark.”
Abruptly, Lex dropped her wrist and jerked back to look out the window. Anyone else would think Lex wasn’t feeling anything-he’d reverted back to his professional façade of hard control.
But Chloe knew she had hurt him, and she wanted to hug him, to comfort him, to soothe away some of his pain.
Wasn’t allowed to do any of that. Could only watch and blindly hope this wasn’t hurting him as much as it was hurting her.
“Lex,” she began, finally not able to stand it any more. She was about to reach out for him again, when he turned back toward her abruptly.
“Chloe,” he demanded thickly, something tense and almost angry in his eyes. “Are you telling me that you’ve convinced yourself that you don’t love me because of some sort of adolescent fantasy? You’re a smart woman, and I can’t believe you’d be so foolish.”
Chloe suddenly felt a little less tender toward Lex. “It wasn’t an adolescent fantasy. This is the truth. I’m not being foolish here.”
Lex tossed his head impatiently. “Chloe, I thought I was in love with Lana for almost two years. But I eventually managed to snap out of my stupidity and try to forget such an utterly humiliating experience. We all have silly infatuations like that when we’re young. It has nothing to do with a mature, adult relationship.”
Chloe squeezed her eyes shut for several seconds, trying to think through her words, despite the way her emotions were running riot inside her. “Lex, I know how this must appear to you. But the way I felt for Clark was different than the way you felt for Lana.” Before he could object to this, she pressed on, “You had built Lana into a dream of a perfect woman, made up of memories of your mother and fantasies of purity and kindness and belonging. Your feelings were never for Lana herself-just for the imaginary woman you had convinced yourself she was. Once you came to terms with the fact that it was a just a fantasy, then Lana herself-as a person-was nothing to you but a symbol.” Chloe sucked in a breath. “Right?”
For an agonizing moment, as Chloe waited for his response, she felt a wave of visceral sympathy for Lex. She was slammed with a sudden fear that she was mistaken about the situation with Lana, that maybe Lex actually had really loved her. And-if Lex felt about Clark the way Chloe felt about Lana-then his heart must be ripping in two.
Like hers was-if only briefly-at the possibility that Lex could have ever actually loved Lana.
Finally, Lex nodded. “Yes. That’s right. But you can’t tell me that you didn’t do something similar with Clark.”
“I didn’t,” she burst out, moving back into her momentum now that that irrational terror had been diminished. “I loved Clark. I loved him-who he really was, not just a fantasy I’d made of him. I know you don’t want to hear this, Lex, but it’s the truth. I was really, truly in love with him. And, had he returned my feelings back then, I think we had the potential to be really happy together.”
Lex’s eyes became blank again. “Are you saying you . . . still . . .”
“No,” she interrupted. “I don’t still love him. I grew up. Realized that he’d never love me, and then I guess I just outgrew him. I don’t want him anymore. And I don’t want anyone like him. The point is that I was in love with him then, and I don’t have the same feelings for you.”
Lex pressed his lips together tightly and furrowed his brow. “Chloe, love doesn’t always feel the same . . .”
“But it’s not even close to being the same,” Chloe exclaimed, her insistence becoming more impassioned as Lex’s stubbornness became more and more frustrating. It was like he was just asking her to break his heart-over and over again. “I know that was love. And I don’t feel the same way toward you.”
Lex’s face didn’t change, but he took in one shaky breath. Then said with remarkable composure, “Try to describe to me exactly how you felt for him and don’t feel for me.”
Chloe groaned, “Lex . . .”
“Please.”
Swallowing over her dry throat, she took a few deep breaths and tried to sort out all of her feelings. “I felt . . . in love with him. It totally absorbed me, overwhelmed me. I thought about him all the time. Being with him was absolutely exhilarating, and I always had to tear myself away from him.” She shook her head. “It’s so hard to describe. But, when it came to Clark, I lived in this constant agony and ecstasy, and it just carried me away, like I was always . . . flying.”
Lex met her eyes with a hard, impersonal gaze. “And you don’t feel like you’re . . . flying with me.”
Shaking her head urgently, Chloe pushed a few flyaway hairs out of her flushed face. “No. With you, it’s not that constant agony and ecstasy. And I don’t feel like I’m flying. I feel kind of . . . grounded. Centered. At peace, sort of. Like I do with family.”
Lex was silent, staring intently at her face, as if he couldn’t quite comprehend what she was telling him.
“In my experience,” Chloe continued, her voice breaking on every other word, “Love kind of . . . sweeps you away.”
Lex swallowed. “And you’ve never been swept away by me.”
“No,” Chloe affirmed, shaking her head and wishing she could tell him something different. “I’m so sorry, Lex, but I’ve always felt like . . . myself with you. I’ve never been swept away. Loving Clark felt like it changed my whole world.”
“And I haven’t?” Lex muttered, his voice almost raw.
She shook her head one more time. “No. No. Through Gabrielle, of course you have. But my feelings for you? No, you haven’t.”
Lex had sort of fit himself into her world. Hadn’t changed it. Not like Clark had.
With a sudden jerk of his head, Lex turned on his heel and paced across the room.
Chloe didn’t stop him. Didn’t follow him. Let him take the time he needed to compose himself again.
She knew there was only so much pain and vulnerability Lex would be able to take before he shut down, hardened himself the way he’d been only a year ago.
Chloe prayed he wasn’t at that point yet.
Using the time to pull herself together, she went over to sit down on the sofa. Rubbed her eyes. Blew a gust of air up onto her heated face. Tried to focus on her breathing, the way she had when she’d given birth to Gabrielle.
Lex paced the room for a minute, before he returned to her. He lowered himself onto the sofa beside her, and his face wasn’t tense and closed-off anymore.
In fact, he looked matter-of-fact and determined, and there was something glinting in his eyes.
For some reason, his expression made her heart jump anxiously and her belly clench in nervousness. “Lex?” she asked faintly.
Drawing his brows together, he met her eyes with a half-smile. “I’ll admit to not enjoying hearing you say that. But I’m starting to think we might be dealing with a matter of definitions.”
Chloe gaped at him, disoriented by the sudden shift in mood. “Huh?”
His lips twitched-an amused, ironic expression that warmed Chloe’s heart, even in the midst of her confusion. “Very lucid response. I mean, I think our problem is our varying expectations when it comes to love. I’ve been waiting for all this time for you to feel for me the way I feel for you.” One of his eyebrows arched. “And I’ve just realized that you already do.”
With an urgent gasped, Chloe shook her head violently. “No, Lex. I don’t. I’m not in love . . .”
He put a hand up, stopping her words. “Let me finish. You have certain expectations for love based on your experience in the past. And so you’ve never believed that the way you feel for me might actually be love too.” Chloe had opened her mouth to object again, but Lex stopped her with a look. “But I think it’s simply a matter of semantics. Words can never adequately express such feelings anyway. What matters is that you already feel for me the way I’ve wanted you to.”
That hot, intense smolder had returned to his eyes-not lust, but something akin to it-and it almost took Chloe’s breath away.
It also made her want to cry, since she was sure it was prompted by a misunderstanding. “Lex, I’m not in denial or anything. And, as confused as I’ve been, I’m really not stupid. I know . . .”
“You like me?” he prompted abruptly, shifting on the couch until he was facing her. “You like spending time with me?”
“Of course,” she mumbled. “You know that. In fact, months ago I was telling Lois that, on my list of favorite people, you’re number f-“ She cut off her words, realizing with a gasp that, sometime in the last few months, Lex had moved from number four to . . . a higher number.
He wasn’t above her father or Lois in her heart-certainly not above Gabrielle-but her feelings for him had somehow unconsciously moved to the same level as her feelings for them. There was no way to sort out the ranking anymore.
Lex was watching her curiously. “Number what?”
“Nothing,” Chloe muttered, not sure how to express her new revelation. “But, yes, of course I like you.”
“And you care about me?” Lex pursued, moving back into his stride, after the brief distraction had faded. “You care for me like family?”
“Yes,” she responded. “I do. But Lex . . .”
“And you trust me? Respect me? You feel for me-hurt when I hurt, are happy when I’m happy?”
“Yes, to all of that, but Lex . . .”
“And you . . . enjoy having sex with me?” Lex continued, something tightening in his body, like an energy coiling up with increasing pressure at every moment.
Chloe pushed her hair back impatiently. “Yes, of course. I can barely keep my hands off of you most of the time. But you don’t understand . . .”
“And you feel like you can . . . open up to me? That you can share things with me that you wouldn’t want to share with anyone else?”
Letting her head drop back, Chloe groaned in frustration. “Yes, Lex. Of course. You knew all of this before. What exactly is your point?”
“Chloe Sullivan,” Lex gritted out, so much conviction in his tone that she straightened up instinctively. “That’s exactly how I feel about you.”
Chloe gaped at him. “But you love me.”
He narrowed his eyes, looking vaguely exasperated. “Precisely.”
Something was fluttering inside her-starting deep in her belly and moving up to her chest, centered around her heart. She stared at him blindly, trying to figure out what was happening here. “But you love me,” she repeated in a hushed voice. “Isn’t there more to it than what you just said?”
“Of course, there’s more to it,” Lex acknowledged. “It’s indefinably complex. But it isn’t some sort of magical experience. It just is”
Chloe felt like crying again-sure she was going to have to hurt Lex once more, after he had found this new hope. She gulped. Whispered, “But it’s not love . . . for me.”
He winced slightly, as if she had struck him, but then he obviously convinced himself to push on. “You’re just not calling it love,” he said calmly. “But, Chloe, it’s the same feeling.”
“Lex,” she rasped, feeling once again on the verge of tears. “Lex, don’t do this. Don’t make me keep saying . . .”
“I won’t,” he assured her, reaching out to tuck a stray strand of hair behind her ear. “You don’t have to say it. You don’t have to love me, the way you think you’re supposed to. I don’t care what you call it. I want you to feel this way about me-the way you already do.”
It felt like her world had turned upside down. She was dizzy and disoriented, and she had no idea what to say. It couldn’t possibly be as simple as this. As words. “Lex?”
“I mean it,” he said clearly. He met her eyes-expressed something absolutely unwavering in his gaze. “This isn’t a pathetic attempt to get you any way I can. I mean this. I don’t care if you can never say you love me and believe it. I just want . . . what we already have together.”
Chloe couldn’t do anything but blink. Felt unstable. Out of control. Like nothing made sense anymore.
But underneath the bewildered confusion, a thread of hope had sprung up in her heart. A way for both of them to have what they wanted-when she’d never believed it was possible.
She needed support, stability, comfort-and she instinctively turned to Lex for those things, even though it was hardly appropriate at the moment.
She had to twist her hands together, to keep them from reaching out to Lex.
“Chloe,” Lex said softly.
She glanced up from the cushion of the sofa. Focused on Lex’s composed, confident face.
“Come here.”
There should have been something incongruous about it. Something that made her cringe. An independent, confident woman, clinging to Lex for comfort-when she was the one who’d hurt him.
But she ignored the incongruity. Scooted over until she was pressed up against him.
Then he put his arm around her and heaved her up into his lap.
“Lex!” she gasped in surprise, her body intuitively settling against him, her arms draping around his shoulders.
“Listen to me, Chloe,” Lex insisted softly, his voice unrelenting and right at her ear. “I’ve finally figured this out. You don’t have to feel guilty anymore about not giving me what I want. You already have. This is what I want. I don’t care if you don’t think it’s love.”
Something exhilarating and joyful and vastly relieved was starting to flood up into Chloe’s throat. But she couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t believe the universe could give her this kind of gift-without expecting some kind of recompense.
“Lex,” she rasped, stroking his scalp despite her determination to keep her hands to herself. “Lex, but it’s not fair to you. You love me. I don-“
He shook his head. “You feel everything you told me before?”
“Yes,” she acknowledged, wondering how they’d ever gotten themselves into this bizarre scenario. “Of course I do.”
His blue-gray eyes were quiet and thoughtful-but that same heated fire was smoldering just under the surface.
Chloe vaguely wondered if that fire had always been present. If she’d just finally come to know him well enough to recognize it for what it was.
Wondered how she’d ever believed that this man was cold and heartless-when the heat, the emotion that was coiled up under his polished surface, was threatening to scorch her into ashes.
“Do you think it’s merely temporary? That, at some point, maybe when Gabrielle grows up, you’ll feel differently about me?” His words were distant and impersonal, but the look in his eyes was anything but.
“No,” she burst out. “Of course not.”
“Would you rather be with another man?” he continued, his hands spanning her hips, just above her ass.
“No,” she exclaimed again. “Don’t be stupid. I haven’t even thought about another man for . . . for months.”
“Then we’re good,” Lex concluded, looking absurdly pleased with himself. “This is what I want. So stop feeling guilty and stressed about it, and let’s just enjoy it.”
It felt like her head was going to explode-she was so overjoyed and relieved. “Are you sure?” she persisted, her fingers resting on the back of his neck as she looked down at him. “Lex, it doesn’t seem fair. You love me. And I might never be able to say that to you.” Part of her was tempted to say it anyway-to lie to him, just so she could make him happy.
But she’d been honest with him so far. And it had turned into one of the best relationships in her life. She wasn’t going to start lying now.
He shrugged. “So don’t say it. Just tell me how you do feel.”
For the first time, Chloe’s lips curled up in amusement. “Uh, baby, I don’t think there’s a name for how I feel for you.”
Lex smiled up at her and cocked an eyebrow. “So make one up. It’s just a name, after all. Don’t call it love. Call it . . . scotch.”
Chloe’s mouth dropped open. “Scotch? Why scotch?”
Shrugging again, he smirked at her. “Why not? I like scotch.”
She actually giggled and then buried her face in the space between his neck and shoulder. He smelled so familiar-so warm, and rich, and Lex-like. When she lifted her head at last, she said breathlessly, “So I’m supposed to say that I . . . that I scotch you?”
Lex’s lips twitched irrepressibly. “Sounds good to me.”
Chloe burst into rippling laughter, which wasn’t far distant from tears. His arms were tight around her, and she burrowed into him intimately. “Lex,” she said at last. “Lex, are you sure?”
“I am,” he assured her. “I’m sure. The name itself just isn’t that important. Maybe . . . maybe our circumstances forced us to skip over those flying feelings you were expecting. Or maybe they’ll come later-when you aren’t expecting them. Or maybe you’ll never get them, because love shapes itself in different ways. In any case, this is what I want. What I have with you. Your feelings match mine, Chloe. I’m certain of it.” He looked slightly uncomfortable, as he always did when he said something so naked. But he pressed on resolutely, “If I hadn’t been so intent on protecting myself, I would have figured it out earlier.”
Chloe let out a breath: a breath it felt like she’d been holding for months. “Okay. If you’re sure. I really do want what I have with you. I’m just so afraid that I’m being selfish and taking advantage of your feelings, so I can get all the perks without really deserving them.”
“You’re not taking advantage of me.” Lex shifted beneath her, pulling her head down until their lips were almost touching. “Believe me. You’re not.”
He closed the distance between their lips, and Chloe sank into the kiss, her hands sliding up to stroke his smooth scalp, causing him to moan into her mouth.
“Lex,” she mumbled, her voice smothered by his mouth and his seeking tongue. “Lex, you’re the strangest man I’ve ever met.”
“And you’re definitely the strangest woman,” he replied, sucking on her lower lip.
Chloe groaned and tightened her fingers around the back of his skull. “But you’re pretty incredible.”
He tore his lips away. Slid his hands down to palm her ass. With an ironic twitch of his eyebrows, he murmured, “About time you realized that.”
She chuckled warmly and kissed him again. Started rubbing her body against his, a deep pressure building up inside her-centered in her heart and between her legs. Smiling against his lips, she asked, “So, does this mean we can have a lot more sex?”
“I certainly hope so,” Lex replied, one hand moving up to her breast. “I’ve been rather . . . deprived on that level recently.”
“So have I,” Chloe agreed, stroking down his chest and belly until she found his groin. Discovered he was starting to harden. “Twice in six months.”
Lex grunted and leaned his head back against the sofa, watching her with deep, tender eyes. “Four times in nine months,” he added. He shook his head. “Hopefully, now we can start making up for lost time.”
“Indeed.” Chloe was growing more and more aroused, just from gazing down at his hot, relaxed form. “So shall we do it on the couch? And I get to be on top this time?”
He smiled. “If you want.”
She moved to straddle him, still wearing her jeans. And she had pushed off his jacket and was just starting to unbutton his shirt when she heard a sound that was most unwelcome.
Gabrielle started to wail from the nursery.
Chloe slumped against Lex and grew still, listening intently. “Please, pumpkin,” she whispered. “Not now. Please not now.”
Gabrielle kept squalling.
“Should we check on her?” Lex asked, his voice slightly stiff.
“Let’s wait for a minute. Sometimes she’ll settle down and fall back to sleep.”
They waited, Chloe still straddling Lex and his hands still cupping her ass.
But the baby’s cries didn’t get any softer. In fact, they became more intense until Chloe recognized them as anguish.
Every instinct in her body screamed at her to go to her daughter, so Chloe untangled herself from Lex. “Poor thing. I better check on her.”
She stumbled the first few steps, still totally caught up in her previous embrace with Lex. Glancing back at his slouching form, she murmured, “If I’d known we were going to . . . get together this evening, I would have gotten a babysitter.”
* * *
As soon as Chloe walked into the nursery, she knew something was wrong.
It smelled like something was wrong.
In the light from the hall, she peered into the crib at her crying, flailing baby. Reaching down to pick her up, Chloe realized that the problem was more than just a dirty diaper.
What should have remained in the diaper had seeped through Gabrielle’s sleeper and onto the bedding of the crib.
“Oh, pumpkin,” she murmured, lifting Gabrielle out of the crib. “What a mess. No wonder you’re screaming.”
She felt the familiar, instinctive disgust at having to deal with a poop from hell. But she ignored it and carried Gabrielle over to the changing table. “Let me clean you up,” she told her daughter. “Then you’ll feel better again.”
As she unsnapped the sleeper, however, she realized that this particular diaper was much smellier than normal. And much runnier. And there was a lot more in it.
Furrowing her brow, Chloe asked, “Are you sick, pumpkin?”
“Is she all right?” Lex asked from the doorway. “She’s sick?”
Chloe shrugged, feeling kind of sick herself. “Diarrhea,” she explained. “If this is all, then she’s probably all right.”
Lex frowned. “Do you need any help?”
Chloe made a face as she pulled off the most disgusting diaper she’d ever seen. The smell nearly made her gag. But she managed to force out, being careful not to breathe in, “If you’re brave enough, you could change the bedding in the crib and put the soiled sheets into the washing machine.”
Lex lifted his eyebrows at her skeptically, but Chloe barely noticed as she tried to roll up the dirty diaper without getting too much of the runny poop on her hands.
Gabrielle was still bawling, kicking her legs violently and flinging around small drops from the remnants that still smeared her bottom and thighs.
And just think. Five minutes ago, Chloe had been looking forward to a sexy, satisfying evening.
Now, she couldn’t even imagine feeling sexy. She had smeared poop on her hands and a couple of drops on her face and her shirt.
Lex had pulled off the bedding from the crib and carried it to the kitchen, where the washer and dryer were located.
Chloe concentrated on cleaning up her daughter. After using ten baby wipes with little effect, Chloe picked up her naked baby. “Maybe we should just give you a bath,” she murmured, hugging Gabrielle against her and patting her back, trying to comfort her enough to get her to stop crying.
Gabrielle didn’t stop crying. In fact, her bawls escalated into agonized screams.
“Sweetie,” Chloe soothed helplessly. “What’s wrong? Do you still feel bad? I don’t know what you need.”
Gabrielle was squirming desperately against Chloe, and her screams were piercing Chloe’s ears. Trying to decide whether she should just put another diaper on her or try to give her a bath to clean her up, Chloe kept patting Gabrielle’s back.
She noticed the baby felt warmer than she should, but she didn’t know if it was a fever or just the result of her screaming so long and so loud.
In another moment, Chloe’s reflections were pointless.
She felt something warm and wet against her belly.
Glanced down and saw that Gabrielle was peeing on her. “Oh, pumpkin,” she sighed, her stomach churning uncomfortably. “Thank you very much”
Just then, however, it got worse.
Gabrielle really did have diarrhea. And it wasn’t over yet.
And so Chloe wasn’t just peed on. While Chloe stared in stunned disbelief, she saw her jeans and shirt, even her shoes, were soiled with both urine and a stream of liquid poop.
Chloe stood frozen. Holding her sobbing baby. Absolutely helpless and unable to decide what to do.
“Chloe?” Lex said, appearing once more in the doorway. “Is everything . . .” He stopped, obviously assessing her condition with widening eyes.
Chloe felt like she was choking, all of the emotion of her endless evening swelling up. “The poor pumpkin is sick,” Chloe gurgled, hugging Gabrielle against her, too stunned the even process the disgusting mess on her clothes.
Lex stepped over. “It’s just diarrhea, isn’t it?”
Hearing Lex Luthor say diarrhea was enough to shock Chloe back into composure.
“Yeah,” she agreed, holding Gabrielle out a little so she could look at the baby carefully. “She probably has a bellyache, which is why she’s crying. I’m wondering if she’s a little feverish, though.”
“Give her to me,” Lex suggested. “I’ll try to clean her up. You need to go change your clothes.”
“But I need to . . .” she automatically objected, unwilling to let even Lex take her daughter away from her when she was sick. Then Chloe forced herself to be reasonable. Her clothes were absolutely disgusting and needed to be changed. “Right. Thanks. I’ll be right back.”
As she walked toward her bathroom, covered with pee and baby shit, she concluded that-even though she and Lex had finally worked things out-there was absolutely no way she’d be having sex tonight.
* * *
A few hours later, all three of them were sprawled on the sofa in the living room, the television set to a cable news station, but the volume muted.
Lex was sprawled out, propped up against the corner of the couch, his legs parted to make room for Chloe. Chloe was sprawled out on top of him, leaning back against his chest, her head lolling back against his shoulder. And Gabrielle was sprawled out on top of Chloe, nestled against her chest, finally sleeping soundly after a very unpleasant few hours.
Both Gabrielle and Chloe had gotten cleaned up. Chloe had changed into sweats, while Gabrielle was just wearing a diaper.
Lex had made a few calls-probably waking up nationally acclaimed pediatricians in the middle of the night-and had informed Chloe of what she'd already known. That their main concern was that Gabrielle might get dehydrated. So they should look out for the signs of that, and otherwise not worry too much.
Apparently, breastfeeding was good for diarrhea and for keeping the baby from getting dehydrated. So Chloe had tried to nurse Gabrielle, who’d cried and squirmed for an hour before she’d finally relented to latch on and suck.
They’d had to change one more disgusting diaper, although there was less there than in the previous one.
But eventually things seemed to settle down. Gabrielle seemed to start to feel better. Her little body cooled down and she stopped crying. And there seemed no danger of her getting dehydrated.
Until finally she’d fallen asleep on Chloe’s chest.
Chloe was finally starting to relax herself. She was exhausted and still upset-having gotten more worried about Gabrielle than the situation had called for.
Just the idea of Gabrielle’s wellbeing being threatened was enough to cause Chloe to panic.
Chloe’s arms were holding onto her daughter. And Lex’s arms were holding onto both of them.
“She seems to be better now,” Lex murmured, after a long time of silence.
Chloe nodded, turning her head so she could catch a glimpse of Lex’s face. “Yeah. I think she is.” She gently stroked the smooth skin of Gabrielle’s bare back. “Poor little pumpkin.”
“And you?” Lex added, nuzzling her hair. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” Chloe assured him, smiling slightly. “I’m okay, now that she’s okay.”
In fact, she felt strangely safe and content, in Lex’s arms, holding their baby. It was one of those sappy, saccharine moments. But it didn’t feel either sappy or saccharine.
It just felt . . . good. And right.
And it didn’t even make Chloe’s cynical nature want to cringe.
“Maybe we should put her back in bed, so she can get some sleep,” Lex suggested, his husky voice very close to her ear.
Chloe whimpered involuntarily and hugged Gabrielle a little tighter. Couldn’t stand the thought of releasing her baby, when she’d been sick not long before.
Thus far, Gabrielle had always been a very healthy baby. And Chloe felt a random surge of deep sympathy for parents of children who were really sick.
Even seeing Gabrielle miserable from a case of diarrhea was bad enough.
Lex leaned his head forward. Pressed a kiss into the side of Chloe’s neck. “Chloe,” he murmured, “You need some sleep too.”
“I’m fine,” she insisted, snuggling back against Lex. “I just want to . . . to hold her for a little longer.” Then a thought struck her like a blow. And she realized that she’d forced Lex into a very domestic situation, after he’d already made himself far more vulnerable than he was naturally comfortable with.
Maybe he needed to get away and recover.
“But if you need to . . . to go . . . or if you’re getting stiff and uncomfortable with me lying on top of you,” Chloe began awkwardly, her cheeks flushing in embarrassment as she realized she’d made Lex cuddle with her, on top of changing gross diapers and witnessing her covered with shit.
She couldn’t see his face, but she thought he must be rolling his eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous. You haven’t heard me complain.”
Chloe let out a breath. “Oh. Good. Sorry.” She glanced up at his face. “I’m very cozy like this, but I know that guys don’t always like to be so . . . cozy.”
Lex chuckled faintly. “I’m man enough to muddle through a little coziness without having a breakdown.”
Chloe smiled warmly and pressed a kiss onto Gabrielle’s little head. “Glad to hear it.” After a moment, she added, “Seriously, Lex, I know you always get up early. So if you need to get home and go to bed . . .”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
It was perhaps the most inexplicable, unexpected thing in the whole tumultuous evening.
But the words made Chloe happier than she could remember.
* * *
Eventually, Chloe put a sleeping Gabrielle back into her crib. Then Chloe took a shower and changed into simple cotton chemise.
When she came out of the bathroom, she saw Lex standing in the doorway to the dark nursery.
“Is she all right?” Chloe asked, coming up to stand beside him.
“Yes.” Lex turned to look at her, something flaring in his eyes when he took in her bare arms and legs, his eyes focusing on her nipples which were visible beneath the thin fabric. “She’s sleeping.”
“I’m exhausted,” Chloe told him. “I’m going to bed.” After a pause, she added, “You can spend the night if you want, or you can head home. Either way is fine.”
After studying her face, he said, “I’ll spend the night, but I think I’ll take a shower first.”
Chloe wasn’t sure if she was relieved by his decision or not. She wanted him around, of course, but she wasn’t sure she was up for any late night activities.
And she really didn’t want to disappoint him after they’d finally come to an understanding.
Chloe went to get him a towel. Then she turned out the most of the lights and crawled into bed, feeling both restless and almost at peace. Unable to fully process everything that had happened, Chloe lay in a blissful kind of stupor-just on the edge of sleep.
A few minutes later, Lex came into the dark bedroom. Chloe was on her side, facing the opposite direction, but she heard him approach the bed. Then felt the mattress shift as he got under the covers beside her.
He rolled over until he was spooning her from behind, one of his arms draped over her.
She grabbed his forearm and hugged it against her chest. “Hi.”
“Hi,” Lex replied, a smile in his voice.
“I’m not sure I’m up for sex tonight,” Chloe said reluctantly. “I was, but after Gabrielle, and all the diapers, and . . .”
“It’s okay,” Lex assured her, his bare chest warm against the back of her shoulders. “We can just sleep if you’d like.”
Pressing a kiss into his palm, Chloe felt another wash of guilt and worry. Began, “Lex, are you sure . . .”
“Stop,” Lex said curtly. “I’m not a child. I know what I’m doing. You aren’t taking advantage of me. You’re giving me as much as you’re getting.”
Chloe released a long breath and didn’t answer again. Just lay with Lex and wondered how the universe had given her this.
It wasn’t perfect. Wasn’t a fairytale or a fantasy or some sappy, romantic story. She was still slightly worried that she didn’t feel for Lex the way she was supposed to. And she had to remind herself to be mad at Lex tomorrow for the way he’d manipulated her earlier.
But this was good. Seemed right. And-as stupid as it sounded-it made Chloe feel like her family was finally complete.
She felt Lex shifting behind her. Felt his bare legs sliding against hers.
Then felt something different in the heat of his body-something tense and coiled.
Started to wonder if he had any clothes on.
“Are you naked?” she inquired, reaching down under the covers so she could feel at his hip.
He was. Naked. She felt the flesh of his firm ass beneath her fingers.
“I didn’t have anything to wear to bed,” he explained smoothly, an edge of amusement in his voice.
Chloe huffed. “Well, I hope you don’t think your nakedness is going to seduce me. I’m exhausted and kind of in a daze.”
“Perfectly all right,” Lex assured her. “I wouldn’t dream of seducing you with my nakedness. I’m tired too.”
Shifting her hips, Chloe rubbed her butt against Lex’s groin. “It doesn’t feel like all of you is tired,” she said accusingly, when she felt his hard flesh move against her dips and curves.
“Involuntary physical response,” Lex explained matter-of-factly, “From pressing my cock into your ass. Just ignore it.”
Chloe couldn’t ignore it. She kept shifting restlessly, feeling his erection pushing against her.
And she was starting to wonder if she even wanted to ignore it.
If only she wasn’t quite so tired and drained.
“Well,” she relented, feeling a tight pressure develop between her legs as she kept feeling Lex’s cock-now at the juncture where her thighs met her ass. “Maybe I’m a little bit in the mood. But, seriously, I don’t have much energy. If we do anything, it can’t be wild and sexy.”
“Nothing wild and sexy,” Lex replied agreeably, his hand sliding up to cup one of her breasts. “You won’t even have to move.”
Chloe snorted in amusement. “Sounds hot.” She was sort of rocking back against him now, an arousal building up at her center as she felt Lex’s body behind her, as she felt his skillful fingers on her nipple.
“Believe me,” Lex murmured huskily, his voice as erotic as a caress. “It will be.”
Chloe felt a tingling thrill at his words and moaned softly as she moved her head against the pillow. Her thighs kept rubbing together, and she started rocking back rhythmically into the little pushes Lex was making against her ass.
His bent his neck so he could nuzzle the side of her throat, his mouth warm and wet and delicious. His lips found her pulse and he sucked on it, his tongue fluttering in a way that made Chloe groan and arch back against him.
Then Lex’s hands started moving more purposefully, stroking over her breasts, her belly, her hips, her thighs-teasing her into a pulsing arousal.
Her eyes were still blurry, her eyelids heavy and tired. And her mind was in a hot kind of tired daze, as her body was moving purely on instinct.
It wasn’t long before Lex slid his hand between her legs, nudging at her intimate flesh. Found it wet and swollen-more than ready for him.
Without speaking, he rolled away from her briefly and opened the drawer to her nightstand. Found the condoms she kept there. Tore one packet open and put the condom on.
Chloe lay in anticipation, still on her side, and her pelvis was rocking gently as she waited for Lex to enter her.
It was silent in the room, except the mingled texture of their breathing, when Lex spooned her again, easing her upper body forward some until she was bent slightly at the waist. Then he lifted her leg to make room for him.
Slid his cock inside, the hard substance of it stroking her inner flesh lusciously as he filled her.
Chloe released a husky moan of pleasure and flattened one of her hands against the sheet in front of her. Her hips gave a few involuntary pumps back against his pelvis, longing for friction to ease the throbbing ache at her center.
Then Lex started to thrust into her, his motion steady and constant. He hadn’t started as slowly as normal, but he wasn’t out of control either. His cock slid in and out of her clinging inner muscles with a delicious, satisfying cadence.
His breathing accelerated, became faster and louder in her ear.
Chloe gasped as she felt the beginnings of an orgasm developing. Clutched at the sheet. Felt her hips pumping in time with his thrusts, despite her fatigue.
Feeling overwhelmed with the sensations of being filled and surrounded by Lex, Chloe turned her head blindly to look back at him, wanting to share this with him, wanting to witness his pleasure.
He shifted slightly until he could meet her lips. Kissed her deeply. Clumsily. Their tongues tangled as their mouths moved passionately against each other, the rhythm of the kiss somehow matching the rhythm of their motion.
The kiss broke off, leaving both of them gasping desperately. Lex began to grunt softly, pulling her thigh up more to give him better penetration.
Chloe whimpered, her fingers fisting in the sheet, the pressure building beneath her belly.
She wasn’t going to come though. Not without a little help. With another whimper, she brought her hand down to her clit. Started to rub it in tight little circles.
Let out a groan of relief as the stimulation pushed her further toward climax.
Lex’s breath was hot and damp against her skin, and his cock was driving into her-not forcefully, but powerfully.
Then Chloe felt his hand on hers, pushing her fingers out of the way. She gasped in disappointment, as she lost the stimulation.
Then his fingers had replaced hers, massaging her clit in a way that made her let out a mewling sound of pleasure.
She clutched at the bedding again and closed her eyes. Felt Lex’s cock and his hand sweep her away in an agonizing kind of ecstasy.
Her orgasm swelled up, causing the muscles in her belly and thighs to tense in preparation. Her body started moving in little jerks, as the anticipation caused her to huff out silly sounds of pleasure and frustration.
Then Lex bit down on the side of her neck-not brutally, but hard enough for her to feel his teeth.
The sharp sensation unleashed all the gathered tension inside her. She came, convulsing against him, gasping out sounds like “Ah, ah, ah!” and feeling rippling waves of pleasure wash over her.
Lex’s momentum had built up as Chloe began to come down, and she could hear him grunting wordlessly, feel the rapid pumping of his cock inside her clenching muscles.
She turned her head, looked back at him almost blindly. Saw the deep, hot intensity in his eyes.
Knew what it meant.
Knew he must see the same thing in her eyes, as she was flooded by feelings of possessiveness and tenderness, even as he was fucking her from behind.
“Lex,” she breathed. Had nothing else she could say, but knew she didn’t have to. Knew he’d understand.
His face twisted as his pelvis jerked against her, the pressure coiled up unbearably inside him, right before the moment of release.
Then he came. Chloe felt his climax pulse through him. Heard him choke on a strangled exclamation. Saw his expression transform before he buried his face in her hair.
He clung to her trembling body. And she clung once again to his forearm.
Didn’t want to let him go, even when he tried to draw back, so he could pull his softening cock out of her and take care of the condom.
She let him go, of course, and lay shuddering in damp exhaustion until he returned to the bed and pressed up against her back again. His body was hot, relaxed, almost pliant behind her.
Chloe darted her head back to give him a quick kiss on the chin, her sense of irony returning in the wake of all the intensity of the evening. “Well, it was very nice, but I had to move a little.”
Lex chuckled. “Very sorry. I’ll try to do better next time.”
Hugging his forearm against her chest-since it was the only part of his body she could hug in this position-Chloe was suddenly overwhelmed with tenderness, with affection, with something that might not feel like it was supposed to feel, but was still undeniably love.
Maybe it didn’t matter that she didn’t feel in love the way she had with Clark.
With no other way to express her emotions, she slanted a warm, teasing look back at him. “You know what?”
“What?” Lex murmured, pressing a few little kisses into the part of her face he could reach.
“I think I . . . scotch you.”
Lex chuckled warmly again and mumbled against her skin. “Same here.”
Despite her tender feelings and physical satisfaction, Chloe couldn’t help but break into a ripple of giggles. “Listen to us,” she gasped, “I think both of us might be a little insane.”
Lex smiled. Settled her more snugly against him. Replied in a drowsy voice, “Then it’s a good thing we managed to find each other when we did.”
Chloe was feeling drowsy too. Couldn’t wait to go to sleep. Couldn’t believe that Lex was in bed with her and that it wasn’t just one in a series of random fucks. He’d be there in the morning. For her. For Gabrielle. For both of them.
And Chloe could be there for him too. She was actually allowed to be.
Lex was right.
What they had was real.
And it didn’t matter that it didn’t have a name.