(no subject)
Chapter Two
It was almost midnight the following evening when Lex finally made it home.
Chloe had been in bed for more than an hour, but she hadn’t been able to get to sleep. She heard the subtle sounds of Lex entering the penthouse, putting down his stuff, making his way down the hall to their bedroom.
Then she felt him standing in the middle of their room for a minute, and she was sure he was watching her as she lay motionless in bed, facing away from him.
Soon, she heard the sounds of his taking off his jacket and shoes. Then a rustle of fabric that was probably his removing his tie.
He walked over to the bed and lowered himself beside her without speaking. Scooted over until he was spooning her from behind, his arms going around her all the way.
Chloe felt strange. Half of her was flooded with relief and a kind of homecoming, at the feel of his strong, warm body against hers, at the feel of his familiar arms around her.
But the rest of her was so angry. So tired. So overwhelmed with the heavy weight of awareness in her gut that just wouldn’t seem to go away.
And with the unshakeable certainty that something had changed.
Lex was breathing behind her, and his long, heavy exhales were a sure sign that he was relaxing, unwinding-after who knows how many days of stress and hard work. He must know she was awake, since he wasn’t trying to be discreet or careful as he held her against him.
She knew how much he needed this: needed his home and his family, the only place he could let go a little of the ruthless grip he held on the world. She felt a little pang of tenderness as she felt his warm breath blowing against her hair and skin, but when he lowered his face to kiss the side of her neck, she couldn’t help but turn her head to ease her neck away from his mouth.
Lex was momentarily still behind her, as if he were assessing what had caused that atypical reaction from her.
“You’re angry,” he murmured at last, still holding her against him, but not making any further advances.
“A little,” she admitted, her voice cracking strangely, as if she hadn’t used it in a long time. “But it’s more than that. It’s . . .” She had no way to put into words was it was. So she concluded weakly, “You’ve been gone a really long time.”
Lex released a long sigh and slowly rubbed her belly over the fabric of her cotton pajamas. “I know. I was gone too long.”
His admission of this undeniable fact didn’t seem to change anything about the situation or about Chloe’s inner turmoil. She replied stiffly, “Yes. It was too long.”
Lex sighed again and brushed a kiss into her hair. Then he pulled back a little and said, “I’ll be right back. I’m just going to look in on the girls.”
“Don’t wake them up,” Chloe said, her voice sharper than she’d intended. “It took me forever to get them to go to sleep.”
They’d had another difficult evening before bed-both of the girls had been crying again because their daddy hadn’t arrived as promised, before the end of what they considered the day.
“I won’t wake them,” Lex murmured, moving in bare feet to the door of their room. “I just want to see them.”
Chloe waited for him to return, feeling oddly hard and numb. It felt like she was mourning something, but she wasn’t close to tears. And the brief rush of pleasure at her husband’s return seemed totally drowned now beneath the flood of everything else.
In some ways, it had been better before he’d returned. Now . . . now . . . she was going to have to do something about what she’d finally acknowledged as wrong.
Lex returned in a few minutes and finished getting undressed in the dark. When he got back in bed, he remarked, “Anna’s in Gabrielle’s room.”
“Yes,” Chloe acknowledged. “She’s been sleeping there for weeks.” It seemed impossible that Lex hadn’t known that.
“Why?” Lex rolled over behind her again, pressing himself into her back and adjusting her so he could embrace her from behind.
“She’s been having bad dreams.”
“She has? For how long? Why didn’t you tell me?”
Chloe shrugged a little. She thought she had told him, but she could have forgotten. “You weren’t here,” she muttered.
Lex didn’t respond to that, but he wasn’t as relaxed as before. She could almost feel him watching her, observing her, assessing her behavior and putting the clues together into some kind of precise interpretation of the situation.
For some reason, it annoyed her. That he would try to so coolly and rationally figure out something that even she didn’t fully understand.
They lay in silence for several minutes, Lex occasionally massaging her belly or shoulder. After a while, however, Chloe began to feel Lex harden behind her, his arousal starting to rub against her ass.
After one instinctive jolt of answering desire in her own body, all of Chloe’s tangled emotions drowned the spark of arousal into nonexistence. She shifted uncomfortably. “I’m sorry, Lex,” she mumbled. “I just don’t think I’m in the mood to . . .”
“That’s fine,” Lex replied mildly. “We don’t have to.”
He was still semi-hard behind her, though, and Chloe felt self-conscious for no reason she could understand. This was her husband of four years, after all. And yet in some ways it felt like he’d transformed, at least in part, into someone she didn’t really know.
Or maybe she was the one who’d transformed.
Lex seemed to sense her unease. “Is it all right if I hold you?” he asked diffidently.
She knew she had hurt him. That he’d come home after a long, hard trip expecting to be welcomed completely-to be safe and cherished and loved by his family. And she had failed him in that. Felt guilty because of it. But there was something inside her that resisted it. That kept preparing her for what she knew would follow.
“I know I was gone for too long, Chloe,” Lex began, his head resting behind hers on the pillow. “There were a lot of . . .”
“Let’s talk about it tomorrow,” Chloe interrupted. She knew how hard the conversation was going to be, and she just didn’t have the energy tonight.
“All right.” Lex brushed another kiss into her hair. Nestled her more snugly against him.
Then she felt his body almost immediately relaxing. His breathing shifting into slow, even inhales and exhales.
He was asleep in less than five minutes.
And even that bothered Chloe unreasonably. That he could fall asleep so easily when it felt like her world wasn’t quite holding together.
She knew it was probably the first time in weeks he’d had a good night’s sleep. She knew that Lex only really relaxed when he was home, and so he never slept well anywhere else. And she knew he’d been working for several days and nights straight.
Of course, he needed to sleep.
She didn’t sleep though. Not at all, not all night.
She lay awake in the dark, trying to sort out what had changed. And how they could possibly change it back.
* * *
Chloe knew that Lex’s reunion with his daughters wasn’t exactly what he’d been expecting either.
He was showered and dressed before they got up the following morning-he needed to go into work to catch up on everything that had piled up in his absence-and Chloe went into the girls’ bedroom to make sure they woke up before he’d left for the morning.
So they were groggy and a little confused when Lex came into the room, looking coolly professional in his dark suit and purple tie. Gabrielle went over to give him a hug as requested, but she was quiet and wary, instead of brimming with the intense joy with which she usually greeted him.
Anna wouldn’t go over to Lex at first. She had always been a little shy, her vibrant emotions only emerging once she was comfortable. She actually hid behind Chloe’s legs for a minute, peeking out at Lex until his smile and low voice convinced her that everything was okay.
She ran over to hug him, and she even giggled a little and pronounced herself glad that Daddy was home.
Chloe was relieved that the first greeting was over. Her heart was aching in her chest-for her girls, who had to deal with their father’s long absence. And for Lex, whose face hadn’t changed at all from its mild composure, but who Chloe knew had been sharply hurt by his daughters’ hesitance.
They were going to have a family night this evening, and Chloe hoped that spending time with their father would do much to mend over the rifts that had emerged. Children were resilient, and Lex had always been a loving father. The tension, she was sure, would be temporary.
After the girls went to bed tonight, she and Lex were going to have a long talk about things. Chloe wasn’t going to continue this way, and it was long past time she’d hashed it out with Lex.
The day wasn’t as bad as she'd feared. Both girls were a little testy and so they bickered more than unusual. But Chloe had the evening to look forward to, during which they could start to work everything out.
Lex came home a little later than they’d planned, but still in plenty of time for their scheduled time together. They had pizza in the family room, and then set up to play the girls’ favorite board game.
Things were going quite well and Chloe was starting to relax for the first time when Lex’s phone rang.
Something clenched inside Chloe’s chest as Lex answered it, and Gabrielle stiffened visibly as she watched Lex walk out of the room, talking in low, urgent murmurs on his phone.
Chloe and the girls sat in tense silence until Lex returned.
His face was torn and exhausted and reluctant. “I’m sorry,” he said hoarsely. “I have to go in. It’s an emergency.”
Chloe couldn’t seem to feel anything. She was frozen. Numb. Felt . . . nothing.
Anna blinked up at Lex, “Daddy’s going away again?”
Lex’s mouth twisted. “I’m sorry, honey. I’ll just be gone an hour. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
“But tonight was supposed to be with us,” Gabrielle said accusingly, something so tight on her face it was almost unspeakable. Something that was far too sharp and knowing for a girl of only six.
“I know,” Lex acknowledged, kneeling down and stroking Anna’s soft blonde hair. “It’s not fair. But I don’t have a choice.”
Chloe’s was holding her breath as she watched Gabrielle’s face. The delicate features had started working and twitching, as the girl tried to control her emotions.
She couldn’t. Gabrielle started to choke with tears of hurt and disappointment. Stumbled to her feet and ran out of the room, evading Lex’s arm as he reached out to comfort her.
“Gabby?” Anna mumbled, wobbling to her feet as well, her huge eyes wide and swimming with tears. “Gabby’s crying?”
Then Anna started crying too. Ran after her older sister, whom she’d always adored and emulated in everything.
The frozen numbness in Chloe’s chest was starting to crack. She jerked to her feet and stared at Lex with something too intense to articulate.
“I have to leave,” Lex said, his eyes almost desperate and his voice cracking slightly. “Chloe, it might mean millions of dollars to LuthorCorp.” He rubbed an urgent hand over his face. “I’ll go and try to explain it to them.”
He was turning to follow his daughters when Chloe cut him off.
“Don’t bother,” she rasped. “If you’re going to go, then just leave.”
Then she hurried after her daughters, both of whom were crying in Gabrielle’s bedroom.
Even as she followed them, Chloe kept hoping that Lex would change his mind. That he wouldn’t be able to bear having caused his daughters to cry like this and would decide to stay here with them instead.
After a couple of minutes, however, Chloe heard the door of the penthouse open and close.
Lex had gone back to work after all.
* * *
When Lex returned two hours later, Chloe was packing a suitcase.
She’d put the girls to bed shortly after Lex left, and they’d eventually fallen asleep in exhaustion. By then, Chloe had known what she needed to do. So she didn’t waste any time, didn’t give herself a chance to talk herself out of it.
She was neatly folding shirts and stacking them in the suitcase when Lex came into the room-his eyes utterly drained and haunted, as if this evening had been too much for him.
He immediately snapped into urgency when he saw what Chloe was doing. “What’s going on?” he demanded, striding over to stare down at her half-packed bag.
“I’m packing,” she said simply, turning away from him to go back into the closet and get some more clothes.
“Chloe?” Lex persisted, following her, grabbing her arm and swinging her around to face him. “Why are you packing?”
“I’m leaving,” she explained, the words almost sticking in her throat. When she saw the brief flash of shattering anguish on his face, she qualified quickly, “For a couple of weeks. I need to get away and think things through.”
Lex’s face was composed again, but there was a barely suppressed panic visible beneath his composure. “What do you mean by get away?”
“I mean,” she replied, taking a deep breath and trying to keep her voice calm. “Things aren’t working. I need to figure everything out. I can’t do that here.”
“What?” Lex’s fingers were clenching spasmodically around Chloe’s upper arm, so tightly that it actually hurt. “What?”
The broken look on his face was about to undo her resolve, so Chloe shook off his hand and kept moving to the closet.
Lex had gotten himself under control by the time she returned to the bedroom. His face was cold now, and hard-what she knew was an automatic defense against anything that threatened to hurt him.
“Are you actually telling me that you’re thinking about leaving because I had to unexpectedly go into work this evening?” Lex’s voice was cool and cutting.
She swallowed. Stared down at the suitcase. Couldn’t believe she was doing this. “You aren’t really stupid enough to think it’s just because of what happened tonight.”
Lex was directly beside her, his tense presence very distracting. “I know I was gone on the trip for too long. But that’s only happened once. And I’m not sure it deserves this severe a response.”
Chloe took a shuddering breath and folded up a pair of pants to place in the suitcase. “This isn’t just about your being gone for a month. It’s about all of it. Your work has become more important than your family.”
Lex grabbed her shoulder again and turned her to face him. His intensely urgent eyes were almost mesmerizing. “Work is not more important than my family. How can you say that? I’ve been dealing with a lot of very unusual pressures at work lately, and they’ve ended up eating up too much of my time. But it has nothing to do with what is important to me.”
Chloe shrugged slightly. Pulled away from him again. “I’m sure that’s how you feel. But all I know is how you act. When you have a choice between your family and work, you always choose work.”
Lex released a frustrated groan and lowered himself to sit on the bed next to her suitcase. “I don’t always have a choice,” he insisted. “I know it seems to you like I do. But-at the risk of sounding patronizing-I’m not sure you understand the kind of pressure and stress that’s involved in running a corporation as large as LuthorCorp. There are some things I simply can’t not do. The result would affect the company’s future and the future of everyone connected to LuthorCorp. I have certain responsibilities to thousands of people that I can’t just put aside.” He was speaking earnestly now, having moved past his protective coldness in a real attempt to make her understand. “Often, when you think I have a choice, I really don’t. At least not one I can responsibly make.”
Chloe shook her head. His words made sense. But Lex was the one who didn’t understand. Chloe had known all of this already. “Why do you think I complain about your work as infrequently as I do? It always seemed petty for me to whine about not having you home for dinner when a fortune or someone else's future was at stake.” She met his eyes. “But, no matter how much a person understands and tries to tolerate, there will always come a point when you can’t take it anymore.” She paused for a moment. “This is that point for me.”
Lex must have recognized she was serious because his brief attempt to explain his perspective to her suddenly flared up into a new rush of stifled panic. “Chloe,” he said roughly. “This isn’t fair. I’ve been home one day, then I leave to go into work at a bad time, and now you suddenly declare you can’t take anymore. I’ve had no preparation for this. How the hell could I have tried to make it better?”
Chloe’s throat was aching so much she could barely breathe. And she couldn’t stand to look at Lex’s expression anymore. She stared back down at the clothes in her suitcase. Pretended she was straightening them. “I’m not sure it would have made any difference.”
“Damn it,” Lex growled, jerking back to his feet with the momentum of his indignation. “That’s ludicrous. You’re saying that I’m not home enough, but then you say it wouldn’t make any difference if I was.”
She shook her head and blew a few wisps of hair out of her eyes. “That’s not what I meant.”
Lex stood in frozen silence for a moment, staring fixedly at a spot on the far wall. Chloe knew he was thinking, his mind working with rapid precision as he sorted through reasons and possibilities.
Finally, he rubbed a frustrated hand over his damp scalp and began, “I can see I’ve made some mistakes.” His tone was low and hoarse, and he seemed to be thinking quickly as he spoke. “I knew it wasn’t good that I was gone for so long on this trip, although I couldn’t see any way around it. And obviously I know how upsetting it was that I left you and the girls this evening, just when they were starting to relax with me again. I shouldn’t have left tonight. I see that now. I should have . . . figured out something else to take care of the crisis. And I should have worked harder to get home from the trip sooner than I did. But I just thought . . .” His voice broke off, as if he’d hit a block in his throat.
Chloe was listening carefully, although part of her knew that nothing he said tonight would really make any difference in what she knew she needed to do. “You thought what?” she whispered.
Lex’s face twisted strangely, which was a sure sign he was about to admit something that was too deep and private for him to get spoken easily. “I thought the point of family was that you could make mistakes. The last few weeks have been really difficult; the entire project nearly blew up in my face. But I just kept thinking about you and the girls, waiting for me. You know what things used to be like . . . for me. And it took me a long time to finally trust that there were people in the world who loved me, regardless of . . . my nature, regardless of how unworthy I am. Because of that, I just thought that . . . I could count on you . . . to understand.”
Chloe knew how hard that had been for Lex to say. His voice had grown more and more thick and gravelly, and he could no longer look her in the eyes.
He wasn’t a man who opened up easily. Six years ago, it had taken him months to open up enough to tell her that he loved her at all. So the fact that he had come this far-that he was willing to say something so raw and naked to her-meant something to Chloe, despite everything.
Her chest was flooded with love, with tenderness, with grief. And with a kind of bitterness, that even his blunt sincerity couldn’t fix things.
“You were right,” Chloe responded at last, putting her hand on her breastbone because her chest was hurting so much. “In a lot of ways, you were right. You can trust us and count on us.” She sucked in a harsh breath. Made herself continue. “But the problem is that you’re thinking only about yourself.”
Lex glanced up, as if he were surprised.
It told her something.
“You haven’t even thought about how difficult these last weeks have been on us. I know how hard you were working and how stressed and overwhelmed you were. But you weren’t the only one who had a hard time.” Her voice was growing clearer now, and louder with conviction. Gesturing toward the closed door of her bedroom, she continued, “Your daughters had to spend a month without you, at an age where that kind of thing really has consequences. A couple of nights ago Anna was afraid that she didn’t even remember what you looked like.”
Lex’s mouth dropped open slightly. “She what?” He lowered his eyes, but not before she saw the anguished surprise reflected there.
“And Gabrielle . . .” Chloe had to swallow before she finished her sentence. “Gabrielle-who adores you more than anything in the world-actually told me that she hated you.”
She couldn’t look at Lex after she said that. Knew what she’d see in his face, and couldn’t stand to witness it.
There was a long unbearable silence before Lex rasped, “Why?”
“Because you kept promising you’d come back but never did.” Chloe pushed her hair back impatiently from her face. “Did you even think about what that would do to them? To have their father keep breaking his promises to them?”
“But . . .”
“I know you didn’t do it on purpose. I explained it as much as I could. But I also had to comfort them when they kept crying about it.”
Lex turned on his heel and started striding out of the room.
“Lex,” Chloe demanded loudly. “Where are you going?”
“I’m going to apologize,” Lex muttered. “To make sure they know . . .”
This time, Chloe hurried over and grabbed Lex by the arm. “No. They’re asleep. If you wake them up now, you’ll just confuse them.” He seemed to resist, to still be trying to pull away, but Chloe hung on resiliently. “You can talk to them in the morning. Gabrielle doesn’t really hate you. You know that as well as I do. But do you realize how much she had to be hurting for her to say that . . . about you?”
Of course, Lex realized it. The knowledge of it had almost leveled him. His face and posture were still composed, but the coiled tension was so tight in his body that she was afraid he might shatter.
“I see your point,” Lex said at last, roughly and still not fully meeting her eyes. “I wasn’t looking at the whole picture. I figured they’d miss me some, but I didn’t think it would . . .” He shook his head jerkily. “I was just expecting you all to be waiting for me, without thinking about what the waiting might do to the girls. I was foolish. I made a mistake. I won't do it again. But that doesn’t explain why you’re still packing.”
And this was maybe the hardest thing at all. Chloe dropped her arms to her sides. Turned back toward her open suitcase on the bed. “Because,” she mumbled. “The girls aren’t the only ones who've been hurt.”
Lex was perfectly still for a long, pregnant moment. Then, “Chloe . . .” The word was a thick caress, and he took the two steps over until he could pull her into his arms. “Chloe, baby, I’m so sorry. You know how much I love you. That’s never going to change.”
Chloe was shaking, and she felt so safe and secure in Lex’s arms that it took all the strength she had to pull out of his embrace. “I know,” she choked, the emotional pressure in her chest pushing her into tears at last.
Eventually, strong emotion always did.
Rubbing her eyes in exasperation, she continued, “I know you love me. That’s not the point. This isn’t just one incident. It’s not just the last month. You’ve been prioritizing work over family more and more for the last year. It’s getting worse, not better. And I’m, I’m . . . getting lost. And I need to get away in order to find my way again.”
“Chloe,” Lex insisted. He seemed to be actively holding himself back from touching her, now that she'd pulled away from him. “I messed up. I can see that. And I know I don’t deserve for you to forgive me. But how is leaving going to help? How can I change if you’re not here?”
Her eyes were burning as painfully as her throat now. In another minute she was going to be sobbing for real. “You still don’t get it, Lex. I’m not trying to punish you. This isn’t to make you suffer or to make some sort of dramatic point. You’re not the only one who’s made this situation into what it is. I’ve made it too. I’ve let this happen to us, to me. And I need to get away-for a little while. I’m not even sure who I am anymore.”
Lex’s jaw was clenched so tightly that a little muscle was working in his cheek. He was staring at her, with that hint of panic growing deeper in his eyes. “Is this about having to give up your career?”
Chloe made a face. “Not exactly. Maybe a little. It’s connected some, I guess. But it’s not the main thing.”
“I thought you’d reconciled yourself to that,” Lex said, looking suddenly wary. “I know it was hard for you, but you said . . . I thought you were happy being a wife and mother.”
“I am,” Chloe burst out, the tears streaming out of the corners of her eyes now. “I am. I want to be a wife and mother.” She squeezed her eyes shut and choked over her rising sobs. “But I want to be Chloe too.”
It wasn’t a very good explanation, but Lex seemed to understand. He closed down, shutting off his expressions and responses the way he always did when something hurt too much. Finally he muttered, “Aren’t you still Chloe?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted, turning around so he wouldn’t see how hard she was crying. “I’m not sure.”
There wasn’t anything else she could do, so she moved back to the bed and folded another pair of jeans into the suitcase, her eyes still streaming with tears.
Lex recovered more quickly than she’d expected, and he stepped over to gently put his hand on her shoulder. “Chloe,” he murmured, mildly, huskily, “Chloe, I had no idea you were worried about losing your identity.”
“I know. I didn’t tell you. That’s part of the problem. As I said, you aren’t the only one who’s contributed to this situation.”
“But why can’t we work this out together,” Lex urged, his voice almost pleading. “We both need to deal with some things, but surely we can do it better together. We can’t work on being a family if we’re apart.”
She nodded and sniffed urgently. Tried to compose herself the way Lex had. “I know. And we will work on it. But I need some time without you first.” Before he could object, she hurried on. “I know what will happen if I stay. This will have scared you, so you’ll be attentive and loving and sweet for weeks or maybe even months. And it will feel so good to have you back again that I’ll just fall back into our old patterns. And then weeks from now, or months, or however long it takes, you’ll get absorbed in work again, you’ll pull more and more away, and I’ll just let it happen-because I still won’t really know who I am or what I want out of life. I need to get away, Lex. I need to think through this . . . objectively.”
“But you’re not supposed to think about your family objectively,” Lex insisted. “You’re supposed to think about us with your heart.”
Chloe was crying again. Louder than before. But she forced out between sobs. “I love you, Lex. That hasn’t changed. But I want to love myself too.”
Lex’s head jerked to the side, and she was relieved she couldn’t see his eyes. His dress shirt was wrinkled and slightly damp in the middle of his back, and there were more lines than she remembered beside his eyes and mouth. She knew how drained he was after working so hard for the last month. She knew she was slamming him with this on the day after he’d returned. And she ached for him, as much as for herself.
“Please let me go. Just for a couple of weeks. Then we’ll go from there.” She needed for him to accept this-at least in part-if she was ever going to make it out the door.
Lex swallowed hard. Gave a slight nod. Still wasn’t looking in her direction.
Chloe released a shuddering sigh. “I’m going to take the girls to my dad’s.”
Lex’s head jerked back toward her. “You’re taking the girls?”
Gulping, she admitted, “I was planning to.” She sucked in a long breath. Managed to force out, “I guess I don’t have to.” She wondered if she could possibly go two weeks without having her babies with her. “If you think you can take off of work so you could be with them . . .”
Lex’s lips pressed together. “I could cut back a little, but I can’t take the time off completely right now.”
She nodded resignedly. “Then I’ll take them with me.”
“So, after being away from them for a month, I won’t be able to see them for two more weeks?” Lex’s voice was cold again-but she knew it was prompted by pain.
She shook her head roughly. “No. Of course, you can see them. We won’t be far away. You can come down as often as you like to spend time with them. I hope you do. They need you. They’re your daughters, Lex. I’m never going to try to take them away from you. They’ll always be in your life.”
Lex slowly raised his eyes to meet hers, as if they’d been too heavy to lift. He murmured hoarsely, “And you?”
Chloe started sobbing again, her present pain coupled with pain that was years old. Hated herself for being so weak, but she couldn’t possibly stop. “I just need a couple of weeks, Lex. Then we’ll go from there.”
Lex lowered his head again, as if he were accepting the stroke of his doom. And Chloe saw he wasn’t going to argue anymore.
So, still sobbing, she went back into the closet to get her shoes.
She had been wrong. She’d thought Lex had done all the arguing and pleading he was going to do. He'd always been a proud man, and there was only so far he would lower himself. But when she returned to the bedroom, Lex was waiting for her. He reached out to grip her upper arms. “Chloe,” he said thickly. “Chloe, please don’t leave me.”
“I’m not leaving for good,” she gasped, the tears overflowing in her eyes again so that Lex’s urgent face blurred in front of her. “Just for a couple of weeks.”
“That’s what always happens,” he insisted, his eyes as naked as she’d ever seen them.. “You’ll leave for a week or two. Then you’ll want a trial separation. Then you’ll be calling your divorce attorney. Chloe, I don’t deserve you. And I haven’t treated you and the girls as I should. But please don’t leave me.”
Her sobs were loud and raspy now, and it felt like they were tearing her apart. She exerted all the control she had remaining to subdue the sound so she wouldn’t wake up the girls. “Lex, I don’t want a divorce. I promise. I just want a couple of weeks.”
He didn’t say anything. Just held onto her arms in a grip of silent desperation and stared at her pleadingly.
Finally, Chloe couldn’t stand it anymore. She loved this man so much, and she was starting to wonder why she had ever wanted to leave him.
Gently, she pulled out of his grasp. “We’ll leave in the morning. Please, come down to see the girls in Smallville as often as you can. And-if necessary-we’ll work out a way to get them back up here, maybe next weekend.”
“How long . . .”
“I don’t know,” she choked. “A couple of weeks. Long enough for me to figure things out.”
Lex’s expression broke for just a moment. “Chloe?” he breathed gratingly. “Chloe, are you sure you’re doing the right thing?”
She shook her head. Wiped the rest of her tears away. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I have no idea if this is right. Maybe this is the worst thing I could do. But it’s the only thing I can think of.”
* * *
The next morning, Chloe was sitting on Gabrielle’s bed and Lex on Anna’s, as they told them they were going to visit their grandfather with their mommy for a week or two.
Anna had been excited when she heard she was going to visit Grandpa, and she’d scrambled off her bed with her favorite stuffed puppy so she could go and start packing her toys.
She must have taken her pajama bottoms off during the night, because she was wearing just the blue and white top and her pink panties.
Lex, who was fully dressed in a suit and tie, grabbed Anna before she could scurry toward the hallway. Then he pulled her up and settled her on his lap.
Chloe had wanted to be close to Gabrielle, since she knew that the older girl would understand more of what was really going on. Gabrielle’s face was tense and suspicious, and-when Chloe put an arm around the slender shoulders-her daughter jerked away from her.
“You’re not coming too?” Gabrielle asked, meeting Lex’s gaze with matching eyes.
Lex shook his head. “I’m going to stay here.”
Anna fidgeted in Lex’s lap until she was peering up at him. “Daddy isn’t coming to Grandpa’s?” Her lip wobbled a little.
Lex stroked the tangles of blonde hair. His touch and gaze were so tender it nearly broke Chloe’s heart. “I have to stay here and work. But I’ll come to visit you there.”
This seemed to satisfy Anna, who snuggled against him and played with his tie.
Chloe was anxiously watching Gabrielle’s tight face. The pretty little features were twisting almost imperceptibly.
“Are you and Mommy getting a divorce?” Gabrielle asked, sitting stiffly upright in her bed and still looking at Lex accusingly.
Shaking his head soberly, Lex said, “No. We're not. You’re just going to visit your grandpa for a couple of weeks.”
Gabrielle turned toward Chloe questioningly, and Chloe-a sharp pang in her chest-nodded at her encouragingly. “It’s just a visit, pumpkin. Nothing for you to worry about.”
Gabrielle didn’t look convinced. She pushed her long red hair behind her ears and glared coolly at her father. “Is this because you were kissing that lady in the paper?”
Chloe gasped. “No! Of course, not.”
But Gabrielle was still waiting for Lex’s reply.
His face remained mild and gentle when he replied, “Your mommy knows that the paper was just making up a mean story. It has nothing to do with your visit to your grandpa.”
Anna had been contentedly amusing herself by flapping Lex’s tie around, but at this she started to frown. “Why was daddy kissing that lady?”
“Yeah,” Gabrielle agreed, much more pointedly. “Why were you?”
Chloe could see Lex swallow, but his expression never wavered. “You know how I sometimes kiss your Aunt Stella on the cheek when I say goodbye? I was doing the same thing with that lady. She was . . . sad about something, and I was being nice to her.”
Lex had explained the situation to Chloe the previous morning, and Chloe knew he was telling the truth. It hadn't made it any less mortifying, however, for her husband to be gossiped about in the tabloids.
Gabrielle was still frowning.
Lex seemed to notice this too. “Who is the most beautiful woman in the world?” he asked seriously.
“Mommy!” Anna happily burst out.
Gabrielle’s answer was mumbled, but she said, “Mommy,” too.
“And who do I love more than anyone else in the world?” Lex pursued, stroking Anna’s soft little foot with his thumb.
“Us and Mommy!” Anna declared.
Lex nodded, and then gave Gabrielle a half-smile. “So why would I want to kiss anyone else?”
Gabrielle’s face relaxed just a little, and Chloe couldn’t resist giving her shoulders a comforting squeeze. This time, Gabrielle didn’t pull away.
But Chloe and Lex’s older daughter was just as stubborn as both of her parents. And she was just as deep and driven as Lex. She wasn’t ready to let go of this subject yet.
“Is this because Mommy is mad at you for being gone so long?”
Six years old, and already so intuitive. Chloe’s heart ached for the girl, and she grieved that she couldn’t protect her for any longer from the truth of the world.
Lex shook his head. “Mommy wouldn’t leave just because she’s mad at me. She’s taking you and Anna for a visit. Don’t you want to see your Grandpa?”
He should have known Gabrielle wouldn’t be distracted so easily. Her eyes were narrowing ominously as she persisted, “Is it because you yelled at her last night?”
Lex blinked. Then closed his eyes briefly to hide their expression.
“No,” Chloe insisted in an urgent rush. “Daddy didn’t yell at me.”
“He did so.” Gabrielle’s chin was jutting out mulishly. “I heard him.”
Chloe was afraid she would strangle on the lump in her throat-at the knowledge that their impassioned argument had been overheard, at least in part-but this was too important. “He was just talking loudly. He wasn’t yelling at me, pumpkin.”
Gabrielle was so tense now she was shaking with it. And her eyes never left Lex’s face. “You made Mommy cry. I heard.”
Chloe was about to cry again, and more so as she saw the brief, shattered expression in Lex’s eyes as he gazed at his daughter.
Then it got worse. Anna gasped, “Mommy was crying?” She wiggled until Lex let her down off of his lap. Then she ran over to cling to Chloe’s leg. “Mommy is sad?”
“Mommy isn’t sad,” Chloe lied, feeling the tears burning in her eyes again. “I’m fine, sweetie.” She pulled Anna up into a quick hug, wanting to comfort and cherish her baby as much as she could.
But now Lex was sitting by himself on the other bed, as if both of their daughters had sided with Chloe against him.
He looked handsome and sophisticated, sitting incongruously on a child’s messy bed. But he also looked so . . . lonely.
The way he’d looked before they’d become a family.
She almost couldn’t do it. Couldn’t leave him. Couldn’t take the girls with her. Even though she knew it was something she needed to do.
But, as she held her daughters against her, she remembered them crying together because their daddy hadn’t come home like he'd promised. And that gave her enough determination to say, a little shakily, “Daddy has to leave for work before we get all packed to leave. So you need to say goodbye to him now.”
Chloe eased Anna back down to the floor. “Can you give him a kiss goodbye?”
Anna eagerly ran over to be picked up and hugged tightly in her father’s arms. Lex held the tiny girl much longer than usual-his dark suit an odd contrast to Anna’s pajama top and pink panties-and Chloe could only imagine how much Lex must be hurting.
Afraid she was going to break down completely, Chloe pulled herself to her feet. Cleared her throat and surreptitiously wiped her eyes when Gabrielle wasn’t looking.
Anna’s mouth was wobbly again when she pulled back to look at Lex’s face. “Why can’t Daddy come to Grandpa’s too?”
Lex swallowed again. And his voice was slightly rough as he answered. “I have to stay here. But I’ll come to visit you soon.”
This news relieved Anna again, and she seemed basically content when Lex lowered her to the floor.
While Anna ran back over to Chloe, Lex stood up from the bed too.
“Your turn, pumpkin,” Chloe murmured, when Gabrielle hadn’t moved from where she sat in her bed. “Say goodbye to Daddy.”
Gabrielle’s lips were trembling, but she jerked her head to the side stubbornly and hugged her arms against her chest in protective gesture.
“Pumpkin?” Chloe breathed, feeling like her heart would throb its way out of her chest.
Lex took a step over to Gabrielle’s bed. “Won’t you say goodbye to me?”
His voice was low and calm, but Chloe knew he must be grieving inside.
Gabrielle shook her head, her shoulders already starting to shake. She was so much younger than Lex. Couldn’t hide her emotions nearly as well. “Why should I?” she choked out.
Lex gazed down on Gabrielle, and Chloe remembered the first time he’d ever looked at his daughter. How utterly vulnerable he’d been in the face of his feelings for her. How he’d had to leave the room, just after she’d been born, because he couldn’t deal with the way the emotions had leveled him.
“Because I love you,” he replied softly, the texture evident in his voice. “And because-even if you’re mad at me right now-I’m still your daddy.”
Gabrielle lost the fight against her feelings. She started to sob in choked little gasps, and she held her arms out almost pleadingly. “Daddy.”
Lex gathered her in, held her, cradled her against him.
Anna was whimpering, so Chloe knelt down to comfort her. But her eyes never left Lex hugging Gabrielle, the depth of his love evident in the way desperate way he held onto her.
Chloe would have been crying, but the ache inside her had grown too intense for tears.
When Lex finally pulled away, he stood in the middle of the room blankly, as if he couldn’t see, as if he had no idea what he was supposed to do.
Giving Anna one more kiss, Chloe stood up. “We can talk to Daddy tonight on the phone,” she said, pitching her voice as optimistically as she could. “And he'll visit us at Grandpa's soon. Say goodbye before he has to leave for work.”
Anna and Gabrielle said goodbye once more, and Chloe put a hand on Lex’s back, propelling him forward.
He could barely walk. He seemed to be in some sort of stunned daze. But she managed to get him out of the girls’ room and down the hallway.
“Lex,” she murmured, unable to keep her hands from cupping his face tenderly as she faced in front of the main door of the penthouse. “I know this is terrible, and if I could think of anything else, I would do it. But I don’t know what else to do.”
Lex raised his hands, to cover hers on his face. His palms were warm against her cold hands. “Chloe,” he murmured hoarsely, his eyes naked, devouring her. “Chloe, baby, please come back to me.”
Chloe gasped frantically, trying to suck down enough air to keep standing. “I will. I promise. I just need a couple of weeks.”
She didn’t know if he believed her.
But he took one of her hands off his face. Turned his head so he could press a tender kiss into her palm.
Then he left. And Chloe stared at the closed door behind her.
Wondered if she was doing the right thing. The best thing. The only thing there was to do.
Wondered if doing it would end up hurting them all more than it would help.
* * *
The heavy awareness in gut she'd been experiencing for weeks made it clear that this was something she needed to do. But, despite this underlying knowledge, that night, Chloe was lying in bed alone, still wondering whether she'd made the right choice.
The day had gotten better after the heartbreaking morning. The girls were excited about seeing their grandfather, and the change in scenery did a lot to distract them. Even Gabrielle had unwound and had had fun trying to catch lightning bugs in Gabe’s huge yard with Anna.
Gabe’s house was warm and welcoming, and Chloe felt the well-worn surroundings comfort her with the sense of familiarity. The distraction had helped her too, as had her father’s unquestioning, supportive presence, and she felt something unclench in her gut that hadn’t been unclenched for weeks.
She still felt just as sad and confused, but it wasn't quite as unbearable.
It got bad again that night, however. After she’d put the girls to bed in the guest room next to hers, she’d gotten ready for bed herself and tried to read some. But she couldn’t concentrate. And eventually she’d turned off the light and felt a brutal ache of loneliness.
She cried a little bit, but mostly she just laid awake-felt scared and uncertain and bewildered and so many things that she couldn’t possibly sort out.
She wasn’t even sure what she was doing. Or why she was doing it.
After a while, she heard a noise. Then saw her bedroom door swing open.
Chloe raised her head as she saw Gabrielle come into the room, followed by Anna. Gabrielle was holding Anna’s hand.
As the girls approached the bed, Chloe asked, “What is it? Is something wrong?”
Now that they were closer, Chloe could see that Anna’s face was scrunched up and Gabrielle’s eyes were silently anxious.
“Anna was scared,” Gabrielle explained.
Anna nodded earnestly. “The house makes bad noises.”
“Oh,” Chloe murmured, reaching out to stroke Anna’s arm. “Old houses always make noises like that. They’re not bad.”
Anna frowned and her mouth wobbled a little. “They is bad.” She was eyeing Chloe pleadingly.
Chloe didn’t have the heart to refuse. Didn’t even want to refuse.
She lifted the covers invitingly. “Did you want to sleep in here with me tonight?”
Anna’s only answer was to scrabble into bed as quickly as she could and cuddle up beside Chloe.
Chloe felt a well of tenderness. Always wanted her baby to be as safe and close as she was now.
Gabrielle was still standing there watching them. Would never admit that she wanted to stay as much as her little sister did.
“Did you want to sleep in here too?” Chloe offered. “There’s lots of room.”
Anna’s head popped up. “Lots and lots,” she agreed, obviously eager for her sister to sleep with them.
Gabrielle shook her head, although she was eyeing the bed longingly. “Just Anna was scared.”
Chloe nodded soberly. “I know. You were very nice to take care of her. But she might feel better if both of us were here with her.”
“Yes,” Anna affirmed. “Gabby stay too.”
“Okay,” Gabrielle agreed. Her voice made it sound as if it weren’t a big deal, but she crawled in quickly and curled up eagerly beside her sister under the covers.
Chloe could reach both of them, so she stroked their hair and shoulders soothingly until their breathing slowed down and they fell asleep.
By then, Chloe was close to sleep herself. She was suddenly utterly exhausted and could barely keep her eyes opened. She felt a little better now, with her daughters so close to her, their childish breathing lulling her to sleep.
But her last thought before she drifted off was of Lex. She wondered if he was sleeping tonight. If he was thinking of her and the girls. If he hated her for leaving him the way she had.
Chloe knew too well what it was like to lay awake in that huge bed, staring at the other, empty side.
So her final conscious awareness was a raw ache for Lex, who was sleeping in the vast, silent penthouse all alone.
It was almost midnight the following evening when Lex finally made it home.
Chloe had been in bed for more than an hour, but she hadn’t been able to get to sleep. She heard the subtle sounds of Lex entering the penthouse, putting down his stuff, making his way down the hall to their bedroom.
Then she felt him standing in the middle of their room for a minute, and she was sure he was watching her as she lay motionless in bed, facing away from him.
Soon, she heard the sounds of his taking off his jacket and shoes. Then a rustle of fabric that was probably his removing his tie.
He walked over to the bed and lowered himself beside her without speaking. Scooted over until he was spooning her from behind, his arms going around her all the way.
Chloe felt strange. Half of her was flooded with relief and a kind of homecoming, at the feel of his strong, warm body against hers, at the feel of his familiar arms around her.
But the rest of her was so angry. So tired. So overwhelmed with the heavy weight of awareness in her gut that just wouldn’t seem to go away.
And with the unshakeable certainty that something had changed.
Lex was breathing behind her, and his long, heavy exhales were a sure sign that he was relaxing, unwinding-after who knows how many days of stress and hard work. He must know she was awake, since he wasn’t trying to be discreet or careful as he held her against him.
She knew how much he needed this: needed his home and his family, the only place he could let go a little of the ruthless grip he held on the world. She felt a little pang of tenderness as she felt his warm breath blowing against her hair and skin, but when he lowered his face to kiss the side of her neck, she couldn’t help but turn her head to ease her neck away from his mouth.
Lex was momentarily still behind her, as if he were assessing what had caused that atypical reaction from her.
“You’re angry,” he murmured at last, still holding her against him, but not making any further advances.
“A little,” she admitted, her voice cracking strangely, as if she hadn’t used it in a long time. “But it’s more than that. It’s . . .” She had no way to put into words was it was. So she concluded weakly, “You’ve been gone a really long time.”
Lex released a long sigh and slowly rubbed her belly over the fabric of her cotton pajamas. “I know. I was gone too long.”
His admission of this undeniable fact didn’t seem to change anything about the situation or about Chloe’s inner turmoil. She replied stiffly, “Yes. It was too long.”
Lex sighed again and brushed a kiss into her hair. Then he pulled back a little and said, “I’ll be right back. I’m just going to look in on the girls.”
“Don’t wake them up,” Chloe said, her voice sharper than she’d intended. “It took me forever to get them to go to sleep.”
They’d had another difficult evening before bed-both of the girls had been crying again because their daddy hadn’t arrived as promised, before the end of what they considered the day.
“I won’t wake them,” Lex murmured, moving in bare feet to the door of their room. “I just want to see them.”
Chloe waited for him to return, feeling oddly hard and numb. It felt like she was mourning something, but she wasn’t close to tears. And the brief rush of pleasure at her husband’s return seemed totally drowned now beneath the flood of everything else.
In some ways, it had been better before he’d returned. Now . . . now . . . she was going to have to do something about what she’d finally acknowledged as wrong.
Lex returned in a few minutes and finished getting undressed in the dark. When he got back in bed, he remarked, “Anna’s in Gabrielle’s room.”
“Yes,” Chloe acknowledged. “She’s been sleeping there for weeks.” It seemed impossible that Lex hadn’t known that.
“Why?” Lex rolled over behind her again, pressing himself into her back and adjusting her so he could embrace her from behind.
“She’s been having bad dreams.”
“She has? For how long? Why didn’t you tell me?”
Chloe shrugged a little. She thought she had told him, but she could have forgotten. “You weren’t here,” she muttered.
Lex didn’t respond to that, but he wasn’t as relaxed as before. She could almost feel him watching her, observing her, assessing her behavior and putting the clues together into some kind of precise interpretation of the situation.
For some reason, it annoyed her. That he would try to so coolly and rationally figure out something that even she didn’t fully understand.
They lay in silence for several minutes, Lex occasionally massaging her belly or shoulder. After a while, however, Chloe began to feel Lex harden behind her, his arousal starting to rub against her ass.
After one instinctive jolt of answering desire in her own body, all of Chloe’s tangled emotions drowned the spark of arousal into nonexistence. She shifted uncomfortably. “I’m sorry, Lex,” she mumbled. “I just don’t think I’m in the mood to . . .”
“That’s fine,” Lex replied mildly. “We don’t have to.”
He was still semi-hard behind her, though, and Chloe felt self-conscious for no reason she could understand. This was her husband of four years, after all. And yet in some ways it felt like he’d transformed, at least in part, into someone she didn’t really know.
Or maybe she was the one who’d transformed.
Lex seemed to sense her unease. “Is it all right if I hold you?” he asked diffidently.
She knew she had hurt him. That he’d come home after a long, hard trip expecting to be welcomed completely-to be safe and cherished and loved by his family. And she had failed him in that. Felt guilty because of it. But there was something inside her that resisted it. That kept preparing her for what she knew would follow.
“I know I was gone for too long, Chloe,” Lex began, his head resting behind hers on the pillow. “There were a lot of . . .”
“Let’s talk about it tomorrow,” Chloe interrupted. She knew how hard the conversation was going to be, and she just didn’t have the energy tonight.
“All right.” Lex brushed another kiss into her hair. Nestled her more snugly against him.
Then she felt his body almost immediately relaxing. His breathing shifting into slow, even inhales and exhales.
He was asleep in less than five minutes.
And even that bothered Chloe unreasonably. That he could fall asleep so easily when it felt like her world wasn’t quite holding together.
She knew it was probably the first time in weeks he’d had a good night’s sleep. She knew that Lex only really relaxed when he was home, and so he never slept well anywhere else. And she knew he’d been working for several days and nights straight.
Of course, he needed to sleep.
She didn’t sleep though. Not at all, not all night.
She lay awake in the dark, trying to sort out what had changed. And how they could possibly change it back.
* * *
Chloe knew that Lex’s reunion with his daughters wasn’t exactly what he’d been expecting either.
He was showered and dressed before they got up the following morning-he needed to go into work to catch up on everything that had piled up in his absence-and Chloe went into the girls’ bedroom to make sure they woke up before he’d left for the morning.
So they were groggy and a little confused when Lex came into the room, looking coolly professional in his dark suit and purple tie. Gabrielle went over to give him a hug as requested, but she was quiet and wary, instead of brimming with the intense joy with which she usually greeted him.
Anna wouldn’t go over to Lex at first. She had always been a little shy, her vibrant emotions only emerging once she was comfortable. She actually hid behind Chloe’s legs for a minute, peeking out at Lex until his smile and low voice convinced her that everything was okay.
She ran over to hug him, and she even giggled a little and pronounced herself glad that Daddy was home.
Chloe was relieved that the first greeting was over. Her heart was aching in her chest-for her girls, who had to deal with their father’s long absence. And for Lex, whose face hadn’t changed at all from its mild composure, but who Chloe knew had been sharply hurt by his daughters’ hesitance.
They were going to have a family night this evening, and Chloe hoped that spending time with their father would do much to mend over the rifts that had emerged. Children were resilient, and Lex had always been a loving father. The tension, she was sure, would be temporary.
After the girls went to bed tonight, she and Lex were going to have a long talk about things. Chloe wasn’t going to continue this way, and it was long past time she’d hashed it out with Lex.
The day wasn’t as bad as she'd feared. Both girls were a little testy and so they bickered more than unusual. But Chloe had the evening to look forward to, during which they could start to work everything out.
Lex came home a little later than they’d planned, but still in plenty of time for their scheduled time together. They had pizza in the family room, and then set up to play the girls’ favorite board game.
Things were going quite well and Chloe was starting to relax for the first time when Lex’s phone rang.
Something clenched inside Chloe’s chest as Lex answered it, and Gabrielle stiffened visibly as she watched Lex walk out of the room, talking in low, urgent murmurs on his phone.
Chloe and the girls sat in tense silence until Lex returned.
His face was torn and exhausted and reluctant. “I’m sorry,” he said hoarsely. “I have to go in. It’s an emergency.”
Chloe couldn’t seem to feel anything. She was frozen. Numb. Felt . . . nothing.
Anna blinked up at Lex, “Daddy’s going away again?”
Lex’s mouth twisted. “I’m sorry, honey. I’ll just be gone an hour. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
“But tonight was supposed to be with us,” Gabrielle said accusingly, something so tight on her face it was almost unspeakable. Something that was far too sharp and knowing for a girl of only six.
“I know,” Lex acknowledged, kneeling down and stroking Anna’s soft blonde hair. “It’s not fair. But I don’t have a choice.”
Chloe’s was holding her breath as she watched Gabrielle’s face. The delicate features had started working and twitching, as the girl tried to control her emotions.
She couldn’t. Gabrielle started to choke with tears of hurt and disappointment. Stumbled to her feet and ran out of the room, evading Lex’s arm as he reached out to comfort her.
“Gabby?” Anna mumbled, wobbling to her feet as well, her huge eyes wide and swimming with tears. “Gabby’s crying?”
Then Anna started crying too. Ran after her older sister, whom she’d always adored and emulated in everything.
The frozen numbness in Chloe’s chest was starting to crack. She jerked to her feet and stared at Lex with something too intense to articulate.
“I have to leave,” Lex said, his eyes almost desperate and his voice cracking slightly. “Chloe, it might mean millions of dollars to LuthorCorp.” He rubbed an urgent hand over his face. “I’ll go and try to explain it to them.”
He was turning to follow his daughters when Chloe cut him off.
“Don’t bother,” she rasped. “If you’re going to go, then just leave.”
Then she hurried after her daughters, both of whom were crying in Gabrielle’s bedroom.
Even as she followed them, Chloe kept hoping that Lex would change his mind. That he wouldn’t be able to bear having caused his daughters to cry like this and would decide to stay here with them instead.
After a couple of minutes, however, Chloe heard the door of the penthouse open and close.
Lex had gone back to work after all.
* * *
When Lex returned two hours later, Chloe was packing a suitcase.
She’d put the girls to bed shortly after Lex left, and they’d eventually fallen asleep in exhaustion. By then, Chloe had known what she needed to do. So she didn’t waste any time, didn’t give herself a chance to talk herself out of it.
She was neatly folding shirts and stacking them in the suitcase when Lex came into the room-his eyes utterly drained and haunted, as if this evening had been too much for him.
He immediately snapped into urgency when he saw what Chloe was doing. “What’s going on?” he demanded, striding over to stare down at her half-packed bag.
“I’m packing,” she said simply, turning away from him to go back into the closet and get some more clothes.
“Chloe?” Lex persisted, following her, grabbing her arm and swinging her around to face him. “Why are you packing?”
“I’m leaving,” she explained, the words almost sticking in her throat. When she saw the brief flash of shattering anguish on his face, she qualified quickly, “For a couple of weeks. I need to get away and think things through.”
Lex’s face was composed again, but there was a barely suppressed panic visible beneath his composure. “What do you mean by get away?”
“I mean,” she replied, taking a deep breath and trying to keep her voice calm. “Things aren’t working. I need to figure everything out. I can’t do that here.”
“What?” Lex’s fingers were clenching spasmodically around Chloe’s upper arm, so tightly that it actually hurt. “What?”
The broken look on his face was about to undo her resolve, so Chloe shook off his hand and kept moving to the closet.
Lex had gotten himself under control by the time she returned to the bedroom. His face was cold now, and hard-what she knew was an automatic defense against anything that threatened to hurt him.
“Are you actually telling me that you’re thinking about leaving because I had to unexpectedly go into work this evening?” Lex’s voice was cool and cutting.
She swallowed. Stared down at the suitcase. Couldn’t believe she was doing this. “You aren’t really stupid enough to think it’s just because of what happened tonight.”
Lex was directly beside her, his tense presence very distracting. “I know I was gone on the trip for too long. But that’s only happened once. And I’m not sure it deserves this severe a response.”
Chloe took a shuddering breath and folded up a pair of pants to place in the suitcase. “This isn’t just about your being gone for a month. It’s about all of it. Your work has become more important than your family.”
Lex grabbed her shoulder again and turned her to face him. His intensely urgent eyes were almost mesmerizing. “Work is not more important than my family. How can you say that? I’ve been dealing with a lot of very unusual pressures at work lately, and they’ve ended up eating up too much of my time. But it has nothing to do with what is important to me.”
Chloe shrugged slightly. Pulled away from him again. “I’m sure that’s how you feel. But all I know is how you act. When you have a choice between your family and work, you always choose work.”
Lex released a frustrated groan and lowered himself to sit on the bed next to her suitcase. “I don’t always have a choice,” he insisted. “I know it seems to you like I do. But-at the risk of sounding patronizing-I’m not sure you understand the kind of pressure and stress that’s involved in running a corporation as large as LuthorCorp. There are some things I simply can’t not do. The result would affect the company’s future and the future of everyone connected to LuthorCorp. I have certain responsibilities to thousands of people that I can’t just put aside.” He was speaking earnestly now, having moved past his protective coldness in a real attempt to make her understand. “Often, when you think I have a choice, I really don’t. At least not one I can responsibly make.”
Chloe shook her head. His words made sense. But Lex was the one who didn’t understand. Chloe had known all of this already. “Why do you think I complain about your work as infrequently as I do? It always seemed petty for me to whine about not having you home for dinner when a fortune or someone else's future was at stake.” She met his eyes. “But, no matter how much a person understands and tries to tolerate, there will always come a point when you can’t take it anymore.” She paused for a moment. “This is that point for me.”
Lex must have recognized she was serious because his brief attempt to explain his perspective to her suddenly flared up into a new rush of stifled panic. “Chloe,” he said roughly. “This isn’t fair. I’ve been home one day, then I leave to go into work at a bad time, and now you suddenly declare you can’t take anymore. I’ve had no preparation for this. How the hell could I have tried to make it better?”
Chloe’s throat was aching so much she could barely breathe. And she couldn’t stand to look at Lex’s expression anymore. She stared back down at the clothes in her suitcase. Pretended she was straightening them. “I’m not sure it would have made any difference.”
“Damn it,” Lex growled, jerking back to his feet with the momentum of his indignation. “That’s ludicrous. You’re saying that I’m not home enough, but then you say it wouldn’t make any difference if I was.”
She shook her head and blew a few wisps of hair out of her eyes. “That’s not what I meant.”
Lex stood in frozen silence for a moment, staring fixedly at a spot on the far wall. Chloe knew he was thinking, his mind working with rapid precision as he sorted through reasons and possibilities.
Finally, he rubbed a frustrated hand over his damp scalp and began, “I can see I’ve made some mistakes.” His tone was low and hoarse, and he seemed to be thinking quickly as he spoke. “I knew it wasn’t good that I was gone for so long on this trip, although I couldn’t see any way around it. And obviously I know how upsetting it was that I left you and the girls this evening, just when they were starting to relax with me again. I shouldn’t have left tonight. I see that now. I should have . . . figured out something else to take care of the crisis. And I should have worked harder to get home from the trip sooner than I did. But I just thought . . .” His voice broke off, as if he’d hit a block in his throat.
Chloe was listening carefully, although part of her knew that nothing he said tonight would really make any difference in what she knew she needed to do. “You thought what?” she whispered.
Lex’s face twisted strangely, which was a sure sign he was about to admit something that was too deep and private for him to get spoken easily. “I thought the point of family was that you could make mistakes. The last few weeks have been really difficult; the entire project nearly blew up in my face. But I just kept thinking about you and the girls, waiting for me. You know what things used to be like . . . for me. And it took me a long time to finally trust that there were people in the world who loved me, regardless of . . . my nature, regardless of how unworthy I am. Because of that, I just thought that . . . I could count on you . . . to understand.”
Chloe knew how hard that had been for Lex to say. His voice had grown more and more thick and gravelly, and he could no longer look her in the eyes.
He wasn’t a man who opened up easily. Six years ago, it had taken him months to open up enough to tell her that he loved her at all. So the fact that he had come this far-that he was willing to say something so raw and naked to her-meant something to Chloe, despite everything.
Her chest was flooded with love, with tenderness, with grief. And with a kind of bitterness, that even his blunt sincerity couldn’t fix things.
“You were right,” Chloe responded at last, putting her hand on her breastbone because her chest was hurting so much. “In a lot of ways, you were right. You can trust us and count on us.” She sucked in a harsh breath. Made herself continue. “But the problem is that you’re thinking only about yourself.”
Lex glanced up, as if he were surprised.
It told her something.
“You haven’t even thought about how difficult these last weeks have been on us. I know how hard you were working and how stressed and overwhelmed you were. But you weren’t the only one who had a hard time.” Her voice was growing clearer now, and louder with conviction. Gesturing toward the closed door of her bedroom, she continued, “Your daughters had to spend a month without you, at an age where that kind of thing really has consequences. A couple of nights ago Anna was afraid that she didn’t even remember what you looked like.”
Lex’s mouth dropped open slightly. “She what?” He lowered his eyes, but not before she saw the anguished surprise reflected there.
“And Gabrielle . . .” Chloe had to swallow before she finished her sentence. “Gabrielle-who adores you more than anything in the world-actually told me that she hated you.”
She couldn’t look at Lex after she said that. Knew what she’d see in his face, and couldn’t stand to witness it.
There was a long unbearable silence before Lex rasped, “Why?”
“Because you kept promising you’d come back but never did.” Chloe pushed her hair back impatiently from her face. “Did you even think about what that would do to them? To have their father keep breaking his promises to them?”
“But . . .”
“I know you didn’t do it on purpose. I explained it as much as I could. But I also had to comfort them when they kept crying about it.”
Lex turned on his heel and started striding out of the room.
“Lex,” Chloe demanded loudly. “Where are you going?”
“I’m going to apologize,” Lex muttered. “To make sure they know . . .”
This time, Chloe hurried over and grabbed Lex by the arm. “No. They’re asleep. If you wake them up now, you’ll just confuse them.” He seemed to resist, to still be trying to pull away, but Chloe hung on resiliently. “You can talk to them in the morning. Gabrielle doesn’t really hate you. You know that as well as I do. But do you realize how much she had to be hurting for her to say that . . . about you?”
Of course, Lex realized it. The knowledge of it had almost leveled him. His face and posture were still composed, but the coiled tension was so tight in his body that she was afraid he might shatter.
“I see your point,” Lex said at last, roughly and still not fully meeting her eyes. “I wasn’t looking at the whole picture. I figured they’d miss me some, but I didn’t think it would . . .” He shook his head jerkily. “I was just expecting you all to be waiting for me, without thinking about what the waiting might do to the girls. I was foolish. I made a mistake. I won't do it again. But that doesn’t explain why you’re still packing.”
And this was maybe the hardest thing at all. Chloe dropped her arms to her sides. Turned back toward her open suitcase on the bed. “Because,” she mumbled. “The girls aren’t the only ones who've been hurt.”
Lex was perfectly still for a long, pregnant moment. Then, “Chloe . . .” The word was a thick caress, and he took the two steps over until he could pull her into his arms. “Chloe, baby, I’m so sorry. You know how much I love you. That’s never going to change.”
Chloe was shaking, and she felt so safe and secure in Lex’s arms that it took all the strength she had to pull out of his embrace. “I know,” she choked, the emotional pressure in her chest pushing her into tears at last.
Eventually, strong emotion always did.
Rubbing her eyes in exasperation, she continued, “I know you love me. That’s not the point. This isn’t just one incident. It’s not just the last month. You’ve been prioritizing work over family more and more for the last year. It’s getting worse, not better. And I’m, I’m . . . getting lost. And I need to get away in order to find my way again.”
“Chloe,” Lex insisted. He seemed to be actively holding himself back from touching her, now that she'd pulled away from him. “I messed up. I can see that. And I know I don’t deserve for you to forgive me. But how is leaving going to help? How can I change if you’re not here?”
Her eyes were burning as painfully as her throat now. In another minute she was going to be sobbing for real. “You still don’t get it, Lex. I’m not trying to punish you. This isn’t to make you suffer or to make some sort of dramatic point. You’re not the only one who’s made this situation into what it is. I’ve made it too. I’ve let this happen to us, to me. And I need to get away-for a little while. I’m not even sure who I am anymore.”
Lex’s jaw was clenched so tightly that a little muscle was working in his cheek. He was staring at her, with that hint of panic growing deeper in his eyes. “Is this about having to give up your career?”
Chloe made a face. “Not exactly. Maybe a little. It’s connected some, I guess. But it’s not the main thing.”
“I thought you’d reconciled yourself to that,” Lex said, looking suddenly wary. “I know it was hard for you, but you said . . . I thought you were happy being a wife and mother.”
“I am,” Chloe burst out, the tears streaming out of the corners of her eyes now. “I am. I want to be a wife and mother.” She squeezed her eyes shut and choked over her rising sobs. “But I want to be Chloe too.”
It wasn’t a very good explanation, but Lex seemed to understand. He closed down, shutting off his expressions and responses the way he always did when something hurt too much. Finally he muttered, “Aren’t you still Chloe?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted, turning around so he wouldn’t see how hard she was crying. “I’m not sure.”
There wasn’t anything else she could do, so she moved back to the bed and folded another pair of jeans into the suitcase, her eyes still streaming with tears.
Lex recovered more quickly than she’d expected, and he stepped over to gently put his hand on her shoulder. “Chloe,” he murmured, mildly, huskily, “Chloe, I had no idea you were worried about losing your identity.”
“I know. I didn’t tell you. That’s part of the problem. As I said, you aren’t the only one who’s contributed to this situation.”
“But why can’t we work this out together,” Lex urged, his voice almost pleading. “We both need to deal with some things, but surely we can do it better together. We can’t work on being a family if we’re apart.”
She nodded and sniffed urgently. Tried to compose herself the way Lex had. “I know. And we will work on it. But I need some time without you first.” Before he could object, she hurried on. “I know what will happen if I stay. This will have scared you, so you’ll be attentive and loving and sweet for weeks or maybe even months. And it will feel so good to have you back again that I’ll just fall back into our old patterns. And then weeks from now, or months, or however long it takes, you’ll get absorbed in work again, you’ll pull more and more away, and I’ll just let it happen-because I still won’t really know who I am or what I want out of life. I need to get away, Lex. I need to think through this . . . objectively.”
“But you’re not supposed to think about your family objectively,” Lex insisted. “You’re supposed to think about us with your heart.”
Chloe was crying again. Louder than before. But she forced out between sobs. “I love you, Lex. That hasn’t changed. But I want to love myself too.”
Lex’s head jerked to the side, and she was relieved she couldn’t see his eyes. His dress shirt was wrinkled and slightly damp in the middle of his back, and there were more lines than she remembered beside his eyes and mouth. She knew how drained he was after working so hard for the last month. She knew she was slamming him with this on the day after he’d returned. And she ached for him, as much as for herself.
“Please let me go. Just for a couple of weeks. Then we’ll go from there.” She needed for him to accept this-at least in part-if she was ever going to make it out the door.
Lex swallowed hard. Gave a slight nod. Still wasn’t looking in her direction.
Chloe released a shuddering sigh. “I’m going to take the girls to my dad’s.”
Lex’s head jerked back toward her. “You’re taking the girls?”
Gulping, she admitted, “I was planning to.” She sucked in a long breath. Managed to force out, “I guess I don’t have to.” She wondered if she could possibly go two weeks without having her babies with her. “If you think you can take off of work so you could be with them . . .”
Lex’s lips pressed together. “I could cut back a little, but I can’t take the time off completely right now.”
She nodded resignedly. “Then I’ll take them with me.”
“So, after being away from them for a month, I won’t be able to see them for two more weeks?” Lex’s voice was cold again-but she knew it was prompted by pain.
She shook her head roughly. “No. Of course, you can see them. We won’t be far away. You can come down as often as you like to spend time with them. I hope you do. They need you. They’re your daughters, Lex. I’m never going to try to take them away from you. They’ll always be in your life.”
Lex slowly raised his eyes to meet hers, as if they’d been too heavy to lift. He murmured hoarsely, “And you?”
Chloe started sobbing again, her present pain coupled with pain that was years old. Hated herself for being so weak, but she couldn’t possibly stop. “I just need a couple of weeks, Lex. Then we’ll go from there.”
Lex lowered his head again, as if he were accepting the stroke of his doom. And Chloe saw he wasn’t going to argue anymore.
So, still sobbing, she went back into the closet to get her shoes.
She had been wrong. She’d thought Lex had done all the arguing and pleading he was going to do. He'd always been a proud man, and there was only so far he would lower himself. But when she returned to the bedroom, Lex was waiting for her. He reached out to grip her upper arms. “Chloe,” he said thickly. “Chloe, please don’t leave me.”
“I’m not leaving for good,” she gasped, the tears overflowing in her eyes again so that Lex’s urgent face blurred in front of her. “Just for a couple of weeks.”
“That’s what always happens,” he insisted, his eyes as naked as she’d ever seen them.. “You’ll leave for a week or two. Then you’ll want a trial separation. Then you’ll be calling your divorce attorney. Chloe, I don’t deserve you. And I haven’t treated you and the girls as I should. But please don’t leave me.”
Her sobs were loud and raspy now, and it felt like they were tearing her apart. She exerted all the control she had remaining to subdue the sound so she wouldn’t wake up the girls. “Lex, I don’t want a divorce. I promise. I just want a couple of weeks.”
He didn’t say anything. Just held onto her arms in a grip of silent desperation and stared at her pleadingly.
Finally, Chloe couldn’t stand it anymore. She loved this man so much, and she was starting to wonder why she had ever wanted to leave him.
Gently, she pulled out of his grasp. “We’ll leave in the morning. Please, come down to see the girls in Smallville as often as you can. And-if necessary-we’ll work out a way to get them back up here, maybe next weekend.”
“How long . . .”
“I don’t know,” she choked. “A couple of weeks. Long enough for me to figure things out.”
Lex’s expression broke for just a moment. “Chloe?” he breathed gratingly. “Chloe, are you sure you’re doing the right thing?”
She shook her head. Wiped the rest of her tears away. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I have no idea if this is right. Maybe this is the worst thing I could do. But it’s the only thing I can think of.”
* * *
The next morning, Chloe was sitting on Gabrielle’s bed and Lex on Anna’s, as they told them they were going to visit their grandfather with their mommy for a week or two.
Anna had been excited when she heard she was going to visit Grandpa, and she’d scrambled off her bed with her favorite stuffed puppy so she could go and start packing her toys.
She must have taken her pajama bottoms off during the night, because she was wearing just the blue and white top and her pink panties.
Lex, who was fully dressed in a suit and tie, grabbed Anna before she could scurry toward the hallway. Then he pulled her up and settled her on his lap.
Chloe had wanted to be close to Gabrielle, since she knew that the older girl would understand more of what was really going on. Gabrielle’s face was tense and suspicious, and-when Chloe put an arm around the slender shoulders-her daughter jerked away from her.
“You’re not coming too?” Gabrielle asked, meeting Lex’s gaze with matching eyes.
Lex shook his head. “I’m going to stay here.”
Anna fidgeted in Lex’s lap until she was peering up at him. “Daddy isn’t coming to Grandpa’s?” Her lip wobbled a little.
Lex stroked the tangles of blonde hair. His touch and gaze were so tender it nearly broke Chloe’s heart. “I have to stay here and work. But I’ll come to visit you there.”
This seemed to satisfy Anna, who snuggled against him and played with his tie.
Chloe was anxiously watching Gabrielle’s tight face. The pretty little features were twisting almost imperceptibly.
“Are you and Mommy getting a divorce?” Gabrielle asked, sitting stiffly upright in her bed and still looking at Lex accusingly.
Shaking his head soberly, Lex said, “No. We're not. You’re just going to visit your grandpa for a couple of weeks.”
Gabrielle turned toward Chloe questioningly, and Chloe-a sharp pang in her chest-nodded at her encouragingly. “It’s just a visit, pumpkin. Nothing for you to worry about.”
Gabrielle didn’t look convinced. She pushed her long red hair behind her ears and glared coolly at her father. “Is this because you were kissing that lady in the paper?”
Chloe gasped. “No! Of course, not.”
But Gabrielle was still waiting for Lex’s reply.
His face remained mild and gentle when he replied, “Your mommy knows that the paper was just making up a mean story. It has nothing to do with your visit to your grandpa.”
Anna had been contentedly amusing herself by flapping Lex’s tie around, but at this she started to frown. “Why was daddy kissing that lady?”
“Yeah,” Gabrielle agreed, much more pointedly. “Why were you?”
Chloe could see Lex swallow, but his expression never wavered. “You know how I sometimes kiss your Aunt Stella on the cheek when I say goodbye? I was doing the same thing with that lady. She was . . . sad about something, and I was being nice to her.”
Lex had explained the situation to Chloe the previous morning, and Chloe knew he was telling the truth. It hadn't made it any less mortifying, however, for her husband to be gossiped about in the tabloids.
Gabrielle was still frowning.
Lex seemed to notice this too. “Who is the most beautiful woman in the world?” he asked seriously.
“Mommy!” Anna happily burst out.
Gabrielle’s answer was mumbled, but she said, “Mommy,” too.
“And who do I love more than anyone else in the world?” Lex pursued, stroking Anna’s soft little foot with his thumb.
“Us and Mommy!” Anna declared.
Lex nodded, and then gave Gabrielle a half-smile. “So why would I want to kiss anyone else?”
Gabrielle’s face relaxed just a little, and Chloe couldn’t resist giving her shoulders a comforting squeeze. This time, Gabrielle didn’t pull away.
But Chloe and Lex’s older daughter was just as stubborn as both of her parents. And she was just as deep and driven as Lex. She wasn’t ready to let go of this subject yet.
“Is this because Mommy is mad at you for being gone so long?”
Six years old, and already so intuitive. Chloe’s heart ached for the girl, and she grieved that she couldn’t protect her for any longer from the truth of the world.
Lex shook his head. “Mommy wouldn’t leave just because she’s mad at me. She’s taking you and Anna for a visit. Don’t you want to see your Grandpa?”
He should have known Gabrielle wouldn’t be distracted so easily. Her eyes were narrowing ominously as she persisted, “Is it because you yelled at her last night?”
Lex blinked. Then closed his eyes briefly to hide their expression.
“No,” Chloe insisted in an urgent rush. “Daddy didn’t yell at me.”
“He did so.” Gabrielle’s chin was jutting out mulishly. “I heard him.”
Chloe was afraid she would strangle on the lump in her throat-at the knowledge that their impassioned argument had been overheard, at least in part-but this was too important. “He was just talking loudly. He wasn’t yelling at me, pumpkin.”
Gabrielle was so tense now she was shaking with it. And her eyes never left Lex’s face. “You made Mommy cry. I heard.”
Chloe was about to cry again, and more so as she saw the brief, shattered expression in Lex’s eyes as he gazed at his daughter.
Then it got worse. Anna gasped, “Mommy was crying?” She wiggled until Lex let her down off of his lap. Then she ran over to cling to Chloe’s leg. “Mommy is sad?”
“Mommy isn’t sad,” Chloe lied, feeling the tears burning in her eyes again. “I’m fine, sweetie.” She pulled Anna up into a quick hug, wanting to comfort and cherish her baby as much as she could.
But now Lex was sitting by himself on the other bed, as if both of their daughters had sided with Chloe against him.
He looked handsome and sophisticated, sitting incongruously on a child’s messy bed. But he also looked so . . . lonely.
The way he’d looked before they’d become a family.
She almost couldn’t do it. Couldn’t leave him. Couldn’t take the girls with her. Even though she knew it was something she needed to do.
But, as she held her daughters against her, she remembered them crying together because their daddy hadn’t come home like he'd promised. And that gave her enough determination to say, a little shakily, “Daddy has to leave for work before we get all packed to leave. So you need to say goodbye to him now.”
Chloe eased Anna back down to the floor. “Can you give him a kiss goodbye?”
Anna eagerly ran over to be picked up and hugged tightly in her father’s arms. Lex held the tiny girl much longer than usual-his dark suit an odd contrast to Anna’s pajama top and pink panties-and Chloe could only imagine how much Lex must be hurting.
Afraid she was going to break down completely, Chloe pulled herself to her feet. Cleared her throat and surreptitiously wiped her eyes when Gabrielle wasn’t looking.
Anna’s mouth was wobbly again when she pulled back to look at Lex’s face. “Why can’t Daddy come to Grandpa’s too?”
Lex swallowed again. And his voice was slightly rough as he answered. “I have to stay here. But I’ll come to visit you soon.”
This news relieved Anna again, and she seemed basically content when Lex lowered her to the floor.
While Anna ran back over to Chloe, Lex stood up from the bed too.
“Your turn, pumpkin,” Chloe murmured, when Gabrielle hadn’t moved from where she sat in her bed. “Say goodbye to Daddy.”
Gabrielle’s lips were trembling, but she jerked her head to the side stubbornly and hugged her arms against her chest in protective gesture.
“Pumpkin?” Chloe breathed, feeling like her heart would throb its way out of her chest.
Lex took a step over to Gabrielle’s bed. “Won’t you say goodbye to me?”
His voice was low and calm, but Chloe knew he must be grieving inside.
Gabrielle shook her head, her shoulders already starting to shake. She was so much younger than Lex. Couldn’t hide her emotions nearly as well. “Why should I?” she choked out.
Lex gazed down on Gabrielle, and Chloe remembered the first time he’d ever looked at his daughter. How utterly vulnerable he’d been in the face of his feelings for her. How he’d had to leave the room, just after she’d been born, because he couldn’t deal with the way the emotions had leveled him.
“Because I love you,” he replied softly, the texture evident in his voice. “And because-even if you’re mad at me right now-I’m still your daddy.”
Gabrielle lost the fight against her feelings. She started to sob in choked little gasps, and she held her arms out almost pleadingly. “Daddy.”
Lex gathered her in, held her, cradled her against him.
Anna was whimpering, so Chloe knelt down to comfort her. But her eyes never left Lex hugging Gabrielle, the depth of his love evident in the way desperate way he held onto her.
Chloe would have been crying, but the ache inside her had grown too intense for tears.
When Lex finally pulled away, he stood in the middle of the room blankly, as if he couldn’t see, as if he had no idea what he was supposed to do.
Giving Anna one more kiss, Chloe stood up. “We can talk to Daddy tonight on the phone,” she said, pitching her voice as optimistically as she could. “And he'll visit us at Grandpa's soon. Say goodbye before he has to leave for work.”
Anna and Gabrielle said goodbye once more, and Chloe put a hand on Lex’s back, propelling him forward.
He could barely walk. He seemed to be in some sort of stunned daze. But she managed to get him out of the girls’ room and down the hallway.
“Lex,” she murmured, unable to keep her hands from cupping his face tenderly as she faced in front of the main door of the penthouse. “I know this is terrible, and if I could think of anything else, I would do it. But I don’t know what else to do.”
Lex raised his hands, to cover hers on his face. His palms were warm against her cold hands. “Chloe,” he murmured hoarsely, his eyes naked, devouring her. “Chloe, baby, please come back to me.”
Chloe gasped frantically, trying to suck down enough air to keep standing. “I will. I promise. I just need a couple of weeks.”
She didn’t know if he believed her.
But he took one of her hands off his face. Turned his head so he could press a tender kiss into her palm.
Then he left. And Chloe stared at the closed door behind her.
Wondered if she was doing the right thing. The best thing. The only thing there was to do.
Wondered if doing it would end up hurting them all more than it would help.
* * *
The heavy awareness in gut she'd been experiencing for weeks made it clear that this was something she needed to do. But, despite this underlying knowledge, that night, Chloe was lying in bed alone, still wondering whether she'd made the right choice.
The day had gotten better after the heartbreaking morning. The girls were excited about seeing their grandfather, and the change in scenery did a lot to distract them. Even Gabrielle had unwound and had had fun trying to catch lightning bugs in Gabe’s huge yard with Anna.
Gabe’s house was warm and welcoming, and Chloe felt the well-worn surroundings comfort her with the sense of familiarity. The distraction had helped her too, as had her father’s unquestioning, supportive presence, and she felt something unclench in her gut that hadn’t been unclenched for weeks.
She still felt just as sad and confused, but it wasn't quite as unbearable.
It got bad again that night, however. After she’d put the girls to bed in the guest room next to hers, she’d gotten ready for bed herself and tried to read some. But she couldn’t concentrate. And eventually she’d turned off the light and felt a brutal ache of loneliness.
She cried a little bit, but mostly she just laid awake-felt scared and uncertain and bewildered and so many things that she couldn’t possibly sort out.
She wasn’t even sure what she was doing. Or why she was doing it.
After a while, she heard a noise. Then saw her bedroom door swing open.
Chloe raised her head as she saw Gabrielle come into the room, followed by Anna. Gabrielle was holding Anna’s hand.
As the girls approached the bed, Chloe asked, “What is it? Is something wrong?”
Now that they were closer, Chloe could see that Anna’s face was scrunched up and Gabrielle’s eyes were silently anxious.
“Anna was scared,” Gabrielle explained.
Anna nodded earnestly. “The house makes bad noises.”
“Oh,” Chloe murmured, reaching out to stroke Anna’s arm. “Old houses always make noises like that. They’re not bad.”
Anna frowned and her mouth wobbled a little. “They is bad.” She was eyeing Chloe pleadingly.
Chloe didn’t have the heart to refuse. Didn’t even want to refuse.
She lifted the covers invitingly. “Did you want to sleep in here with me tonight?”
Anna’s only answer was to scrabble into bed as quickly as she could and cuddle up beside Chloe.
Chloe felt a well of tenderness. Always wanted her baby to be as safe and close as she was now.
Gabrielle was still standing there watching them. Would never admit that she wanted to stay as much as her little sister did.
“Did you want to sleep in here too?” Chloe offered. “There’s lots of room.”
Anna’s head popped up. “Lots and lots,” she agreed, obviously eager for her sister to sleep with them.
Gabrielle shook her head, although she was eyeing the bed longingly. “Just Anna was scared.”
Chloe nodded soberly. “I know. You were very nice to take care of her. But she might feel better if both of us were here with her.”
“Yes,” Anna affirmed. “Gabby stay too.”
“Okay,” Gabrielle agreed. Her voice made it sound as if it weren’t a big deal, but she crawled in quickly and curled up eagerly beside her sister under the covers.
Chloe could reach both of them, so she stroked their hair and shoulders soothingly until their breathing slowed down and they fell asleep.
By then, Chloe was close to sleep herself. She was suddenly utterly exhausted and could barely keep her eyes opened. She felt a little better now, with her daughters so close to her, their childish breathing lulling her to sleep.
But her last thought before she drifted off was of Lex. She wondered if he was sleeping tonight. If he was thinking of her and the girls. If he hated her for leaving him the way she had.
Chloe knew too well what it was like to lay awake in that huge bed, staring at the other, empty side.
So her final conscious awareness was a raw ache for Lex, who was sleeping in the vast, silent penthouse all alone.