Chapter Twenty-One
“Ah”, Chloe sighed in pleasure, “don’t take this the wrong way Lex because you know that I had a fantastic time in Metropolis, but it’s so good to be home!”
“No offence taken”, he assured her, privately pleased that she was thinking of his home was hers as well. Well, his guest house at any rate.
Chloe flopped down onto the settee and patted the side next to her.
“Tired?” Lex inquired as he sat down beside her.
“A little, last night was exhausting”, they hadn’t got to bed until 3 in the morning and had had to get up again at 7 for the flight back to Smallville, “and the helicopter always gives me a headache”.
“Do you want to go to bed?” Lex asked, “Or an aspirin?”
He was used to travelling helicopter, but during the first few years not only had he almost pissed himself he had suffered from headaches for hours afterwards. “I wish that you had told me that it effects you like this, we could have driven”.
“Nonsense, it would take far too long, I’m just being silly. I’ll be fine in a few minutes”, she dismissed his concerns.
“Chloe, you are really quite pale”, he studied her closely.
“I’ll be fine”.
“Why don’t you go to bed, you are obviously tired”, Lex countered.
“Because it is 9 o’clock on a Monday morning and I’ve just had a week off. I’m going to work”, honestly she couldn't nap now.
“You didn’t have a week off, you were working bloody hard and helped me a great deal”, Lex argued, “Go to bed”.
“Lex”, she started again.
“I’m not playing with you Chloe”, she looked really pale, “come on”, he reached under her legs ans around her shoulders and lifted her up easily.
“Lex”, she protested. 1. She could walk. And 2. She was not going to bed in the middle of the morning for anyone.
“Yes”, his tone brooked no disobedience, but he should have known that Chloe would try anyway.
“You can’t just keep on lugging me around!”
“I think that you will find that I can, will and that it is better not to argue with a Luthor”, he said as he walked off with her, determined on his course of action. She was going to bed.
“I will argue with a Luthor whenever I please”, she declared, even as she allowed him to carry up the stairs, simply because it wasn’t safe to argue with him there. She would kill them both if she did.
“I know sweetie”, he assured her as he carried her into her room and placed her back on the bed. He hadn’t been in her room before, it was oddly girlie considering it was his Chloe’s. She’d made a cold guest room far more homely. It even had a cuddly toy on the bed. “There, now you can tell me off as much as you like”, he offered.
“It’s not funny”, she complained.
“I know”, he smiled down at her, “do you want me to get you some aspirin or something?”
She pursed her lips together. Some aspirin sounded heavenly at that moment, but she could hardly tell him so after the fuss she had just put up about not needing him to pander to her.
“I’ll take that as a yes. It’s okay, you don’t have to ask”, he kissed her temple better. He dashed down to the kitchen and got her: some aspirin; two large glasses of water; and two bowels of the muesli - which he had brought several weeks before and he noticed that she had not opened - and returned. He paused in the open doorway for a few seconds, staring at her. She looked small and weak and pale. Her eyes were closed, part of him didn’t want to wake her and felt guilty about taking her to the hospital. She had needed rest, maybe she had picked up a bug while they were there.
“Don’t just stand there staring at me”, she said, without opening her eyes.
He smiled, “You know me too well”.
“Yep”.
He closed the door softly with his foot before he continued over to the bed where he sat down next to her, placing the tray on his lap.
Chloe looked over to him, opening her eyes seemed to be a bit of a struggle. “You want two bowels of cereal?” She asked sleepily.
“No, one of them is for you”, he used his hand to brush her hair out of her face and feel her forehead. She was a little warm.
“I don’t need cereal, just some aspirin”, she sighed, knowing that she should protest about his taking her temperature like this but not having the energy; she could feel an argument brewing between them already and hoped to avoid it.
“You need cereal if you don’t want to damage your stomach”, he said, helping her sit up and ignoring her wrinkling nose. “And don’t worry, healthy cereal won’t kill you”.
“You are really bossy, do you know that?” She complained.
“I have been informed of that fact before”, mostly by her.
“Yeah, well start to work on it”, she sat up slowly and accepted the cereal as well as the aspirin (knowing that she wouldn’t get one without the other) and took the pills. She and tried to munch some of the muesli and discovered what she had always suspected: she really didn’t like muesli.
“Come on Chloe, you can manage a bit more than that”, Lex cajoled.
“No, I can’t”, she returned the bowel to the tray with a little more force than was strictly necessary, splashing some of the milk over the side.
“Chloe, what’s wrong with you?” Lex demanded.
“Nothing”, she said with something between a huff and a sigh.
He raised an eyebrow.
“I’m a grown woman, Lex”, she said in a tone filled with exasperation. “I’ve got a headache and I’m tired but I am a grown woman and you should treat me as such”.
“I do”, he protested placing down his own bowel and giving her his undivided attention.
“No, you don’t. You don’t tell an adult what to eat. Or what to drink. Or when to rest. Or not to do their job. You don’t ... You don’t”, a wave of pain sliced through her temple and she clasped her hand to it.
“Chloe”, he moved their things to the side and helped her to lie down. Once she was reclining, Lex joined her and began to stroke her hair, their original conversation temporarily put on hold as he asked, “There, is that better?”
“A little yes”, her head was spinning, but only slightly.
“Come here”, he wrapped his arms around her and held her close until she nodded to say that she felt better, she had just moved too quickly.
“Good, now let’s get one thing straight”, he cupped her face to make sure that she was staring into his eyes. She complied although she was getting sleepier by the second. He wanted to let her sleep, but he couldn’t, this needed to be sorted out. “Stop being a little brat”.
“I’m ...”
“Yes you are”, he held onto her. “I’m not treating you like a child, I’m treating you exactly as you treat me and yes I do worry about you because I know that if I let you you would work yourself into an early grave”.
“You see this is just the point, let -”
“You use the same vocab”, he interrupted her.
Her aching brow crinkled, making it feel even worse. She wasn’t sure if she did speak to him in the same way that he spoke to her and her brain really wasn’t working that well. She opened her mouth to expression disbelief at his last statement but before she should he declared once more that she did. “Okay, let’s just say (for the sake of argument) that I do. It doesn’t come across the same and I do it about things that matter, not food”.
“Food matters”, he stated simply.
“Well yes, but you don’t eat as well”. Honestly he was acting as if she were this terrible irresponsible person while he was perfect.
“That’s different”, he said as if that solved everything.
“Why? Why is it different Lex? Give me one good reason why it’s -” She demanded, wishing that she could stand up to make her point but felt dizzy even lying down.
“Because I can’t lose you”.
She blinked. He was lying next to her, his mouth barely three inches from hers, the words - even spoken as they were in a hoarse whisper - were just about audible but she couldn’t believe it. She blinked a few more times in bewilderment.
“I didn’t mean to upset you, I never meant to snap or to raise my voice”, he continued to whisper, he didn’t want to hurt her head. “I”, his throat constricted but he forced passed it, “I have lost everyone I have ever loved or even cared about”.
She continued to stare at him. She must be getting a fever; Lex never opened up this much.
“You probably know that my mother died of this mysterious illness”, he continued. She nodded then wished that she hadn’t. Lex’s large hand moved up so that his thumb to massage her temple. “You don’t know what it was, do you?”
“Cancer?” She had done a lot of research on the Luthors and their family history and that had been one of the things that peaked her interest but even Chloe had known better than to ask.
“No, a common cold”.
“What”, Chloe asked, startled, “how is that even possible?” They were living in the 21st century - or rather, the very end of the 20th when his mother had succumbed to sickness -, people did not die of trifling little things like colds.
“She was a society wife, the life and soul of every party and ridiculously beautiful. She looked like a perfect statue”, he paused at the memory, “but it wasn’t natural. She barely ate. Sometimes because she was dieting and had self esteem issues, sometimes because she just forgot. Or she was busy taking care of everyone except herself”.
“I’m sorry”, Chloe whispered reached out for him.
“I have a younger brother too”, he continued and was unsurprised to note the shock in her eyes. Julian had been well hidden. “He was born weak and sickly and I know that my mother blamed herself; she had been depressed and hadn’t eaten much during several stages of the pregnancy”, he explained slowly. “Julian he ... He just died in his sleep one night. He was only a few weeks old”.
“Oh Lex”, she clung to him, no idea how to make this any better.
“It wasn’t her fault but she thought that it was. She thought that it was something that she had caused by not eating, by not taking her vitamins. Then, she stopped eating all together.” He swallowed. “She got a cold and just went to sleep and didn’t wake up, like Julian. I went home from school and my brother was gone, my mother was gone, my nanny was gon-”
“She died too?” Chloe exclaimed before she could process the words.
“No Lionel just sent her away”.
She blinked away tears as a painful ball formed in her throat.
“It’s alright, I’m not looking for sympathy I just want you to understand. I don’t think that you are weak, I know that you are not. But if you think for one second that I’m going to let you slip away from me ...”
“I’m not going anywhere, she promised.
That wasn’t strictly true. Very soon after this was asleep. Lex borrowed one of the laptops he kept there and worked next to her as she slept. Really she couldn’t be allowed to be by herself at a time like this.
~*~
“Are you going to humour me all day because you think that taking my to Metropolis somehow made me ill?” Chloe asked from where she still lay on her bed with Lex sitting next to her.
“Well they were very long hours and stressful meetings”, he defended himself, he wasn’t being over protective, “and I knew that I shouldn't have let you eat all of that crap”.
“Hey, you’re not the boss of -”
He raised an eyebrow.
“Well, you’re not. Your depressing life story doesn’t mean that you can’t try not to be quite so patronizing”, she said, they had already established that she didn’t want him sympathy or her clinging to him trying to hug the hurt right out of him.
He lowered his head to hers so that she could feel his hot breath against her skin, “If you want a best friend who isn’t going to hang onto you and protect you and try to keep you around for as long as humanly possible then run off and find Pete. If not shut up and behave yourself”.
He straightened up and found a pillow immediately dumped in his lap. He supposed that that was her take on a punishment. “Now now, that isn’t very nice”, he rebuked her, “you know that in the state you are in I cannot retaliate”, he moved it onto his other side.
“Well, could you at least give me that one back?”
He looked down to see that it was, in fact, the pillow that she had been using. He smiled but did as she requested, making sure that she was comfortable before starting again, “I’m not letting anything happen to you”.
“Good”, she reached out and patted him. “Can I have my laptop now, please?”
“You are not working today if you are ill”.
“Well then what am I supposed to do? I can’t just lie her like a big lump”, she complained.
“Does your head still ache?” He stroked her scalp as if that could relieve the ache.
“Yes”, she admitted grumpily.
“Then you are going to lie there like a lump”, he said decidedly going back to his work.
She lay there silently, pouting and thinking of a winning argument.
“You are really bored and are just being quiet because you don’t want to disturb me, aren’t you?” Lex sighed after a few minutes of the silent treatment.
“Yes”.
He reached over to the bedside table to draw out a pad of paper and pen, he knew that she kept there - just because he had helped her move in of course - and handed it to her.
“I don’t have any great ideas which cannot wait to be jotted down”, she admitted.
“Aw, I’m sure that you have one or two”, he coaxed.
“No”, normally she did but her head felt as if it were full of cotton wool. Well, cotton wool, porridge and pain to be more precise.
“Think of a devious plan to get Lana and Clark together, you can make mind maps, flow charts, detailed ...” He trailed off as he noted that she was already starting to scribble. Hopefully she would he happily occupied thus until she fell back to sleep again. One plan couldn’t put too much stress on her. He went back to working on his laptop, an hour later he stopped. “Alright, I have to know”.
“Know what”, she looked up from her pad which was now covered in her swirly writing.
“What you are doing?”
“Creating the plan”, she thought that he might be getting sick too. His brain didn’t seem to be working either.
“For an hour?”
“I like to be thorough”, she said with a shrug.
“Come on then, let’s see what you’ve got!” He looked at it and then the next page, and the next and the next. “God Chloe, people have gone to war with less information than this”.
“Well, I like to be prepared especially when considering the ramifications”. She knew that he was the same way.
“What?”
“That they find out”. Yep, he was definitely getting sick too.
“Doubtful, besides what are they going to do? Afraid that Clark will smack your bottom if you are naughty?” He rolled his eyes at her, “I think that he is probably used to you after this many years”.
“No of course not, Clark would never do something like that”, Chloe protested, blushing furiously.
“Probably why he can’t keep a woman”, he scoffed.
“That makes no sense”. She was going to make him take his temperature later, he was definitely coming down with something.
“That’s only because you’ve never had a decent fuck”, Lex dismissed her idea.
“Lex”, she was on the verge of delivering a stinging set down when he interrupted: “You admitted it yourself!” She bristled, “Yes, but there is no reason to rub it in when I’m feeling lousy”.
“I’m not rubbing it in, just mentioning it”, he smiled, “and you know that I am always happy to remedy that for you”, he teased.
She rolled her eyes, not taking him seriously for a second. “No thank-you, your method of love making sounds too rough for my liking”.
He smiled, “I’ve never had any complaints”
“Hmmm ...”
He paused, “Seriously though Chloe, anyone you are with should give it to anyway you want.”
“I’ll bear that in mind”. She lay and closed her eyes for a few seconds as he continued to read her pages but wanted to see his reactions. “So, what do you think?”
“Too many options, too many possibilities to fail. And I’m not sure how we are going to find a fourteen foot golf ball and make it look like a coincidence”, he started to list the difficulties with her plan.
“Well then, what do you suggest oh clever one?”
“Something simple. Something clean. Something easy.”
“Something ....”
“Something downright Lexian”, he gave an evil grin.
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