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Thread: The Great Deception (NC17) Updated 6th November 2015

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    NS Senior Member Senior Member HotCrossedBunny's Avatar
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    The Great Deception (NC17) Updated 6th November 2015

    The Great Deception



































    Rating: NC-17
    Disclaimer: I don’t own Smallville, hence the lack of Chlex action in the series.
    Spoilers: Up to S4 possibly.
    Summary: What would have happened had Smallville been a soap and Chlex centric.

    Prologue

    It was past midnight and horrendously cold, the kind of night that everyone should be curled up in bed fast asleep. Evidently, most people were; there was only one car speeding along the long stretch of highway which lead deep into the Kansas countryside. The lone Jaguar battled its way through the howling wind and pounding rain which slammed against it.

    The driver craned forwards straining to make out the road through her puffy streaming eyes as the windscreen wipes fought ineffectually against the torrent of water which almost drove the vehicle backwards. Her hands gripped the steering wheel as they battled their way forwards, with only headlights to combat the darkness which surrounded her. She had no idea where she was going. She just knew that she had to get away.

    Her breath came in harsh pants, interspersed with occasional choked sob as she tried desperately to come up with some plan of action beyond simply escaping. There was a sign some way ahead although mostly covered by foliage. With some difficulty – being as she had to keep both hands on the wheel and her eyes on the road – she managed to negotiate the voluminous layers of white silk and lace around her legs to slide further forwards. Her corset digging into her rib cage, she leant so that her nose was almost pressed against the glass and, with only a few metres to spare, she deciphered the town name on the sign.

    She ignored the exit, forging ahead, still hoping that something would occur to her. She tried to think but was too overwhelmed by the relentless pounding in her ears of the rain, the stinging of her eyes, and the crippling pain in her chest. She felt like death. Actually, death might have been preferable.

    An angry cry shattered her concentration. She glanced in the rear view mirror. Her heart constricted even more painfully. Her darling angel was nestled in his car seat and was just stirring from sleep. The one thing left in her life. The one things worth living for.

    “It will be all right, darling”, she tried to coo but her voice came out distorted. So much for never lying to her child.

    She fixed her eyes back on the road, blinking back the tears, her heart shattering even further as she heard another squall. She would have to find somewhere to stop soon she just had to …

    She let out a blood curdling scream mimicked by her child as another car came out of nowhere, heading the wrong way, straight for them. She yanked on the wheel, narrowly missing a head on collision only to swerve off the road, flip over and plough into a ditch.

    The screaming ceased.


    A/N: So, yeah, I don't learn. The plot bunny demands a new story and I start to write it before I have finished the others. If anyone is interested in this one and wants it to continue then please let me know.
    Last edited by HotCrossedBunny; 30th May 2015 at 20:50.

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    Re: The Great Deception (NC17) Posted 26th June 2014

    nice start curious to see where you go with this story

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    Re: The Great Deception (NC17) Posted 26th June 2014

    Interesting start, wondering who the woman and child are.

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    Spunky Chick Senior Member hfce's Avatar
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    Re: The Great Deception (NC17) Posted 26th June 2014

    I am interested. Please more...
    "Everyone seems normal until you get to know them. "

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    Re: The Great Deception (NC17) Posted 26th June 2014

    Hfce: Hello, again. Glad that you are interested. Sorry to hear about your search for work in the other thread, hope that things are better now.

    Dannibfree: Hello *waves excitedly at my new reader* We have never met before had we? I'm Catherine. Your questions should be answered in the next chapter.

    Cbrunberg: Yay! *does a little dance* Curiosity, that was what I was aiming for.

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    NS Senior Member Senior Member HotCrossedBunny's Avatar
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    Re: The Great Deception (NC17) Posted 26th June 2014

    Chapter One

    It was a freezing cold morning in early March, but inside the Luthor Mansion it was sweltering. The combination of central heating and crackling fires piled high with logs in every room had proved to be too much even for the Mid-west’s icy winds. Sheltered inside this furnace, in a room large enough to contain the local high school's gym with room to spare, sat one lone indiviual.

    He was a youngish man, barely thirty with a healthy physique, handsome features (in spite of his premature baldness), and clearly more money than he could spend in several lifetimes, yet his green eyes spoke eloquently of more sorrow than one person should ever have had to bear.

    He sat behind a large mahogany desk, staring at his laptop, lost in thought. He had a million things to do, but only one thing on the screen: a picture of a gorgeous young woman who seemed to radiate light and love, holding a child. It had been a year since she had left him. Fifty-two weeks since she had betrayed him. Three hundred and sixty-five days that he had lived in hell, desperately exploiting every resource he possessed to locate her only to be met with disappointment after disappointment. Still, he refused to give up. He would scour the earth for if need be, but he would find her. He would.

    Not a single day had gone by that he hadn't thought about her. With a pang he turned away from her picture, closing his laptop as he went. He removed his passport from one draw and pocketed it before straightening his tie, as he rose to his feet and scanned his desk as he always did before leaving to check for anything out of place. He was striding purposefully towards the doors when they swung open.

    A benign expression took hold of his features before he even saw who it was.

    “Lex darling”, a petite dark haired woman greeted him with a smile, “I was just looking for you”, before rising into her tip toes to kiss him.

    “Well, you've found me”, he said, turning his head so that she could place her lips against his cheek before he wiped away the rose tinted evidence of her affections.

    She pouted slightly, it wasn't his cheek that she had been aiming for and whilst he never exactly wore what most people would consider normal attire even around the house, a jacket normally meant that he was headed out. “Are you going somewhere?”

    “Yes, I have to attend a meeting”, he placed his hands on her shoulders, “Now, what did you want to see me about?” He asked kindly.

    “Oh, it doesn't matter”, she had only going to ask him about attending a gallery opening. “A business trip? You have had a lot of them recently, is everything okay?”

    He smiled, a practised expression which, although generally convincing, never quite reached his eyes. “Everything is fine”. He was the second in command of his father's lucrative multi-national a position which did indeed require a great deal of travel, there was no reason for her to know that his seventy-two urgent conferences scattered all over the United States that year, had actually had nothing to do with the company. Just as he had no intention of divulging his mission that day to her.

    As he manoeuvred himself around the beauty, with a few well chosen words, he returned his focus to the task at hand once more. He would soon be in the air and a few short hours more might bring his hunt to a close. His normally measured tread quickened as he sped through the winding corridors of his family home out to the helicopter, in spite of his best efforts to keep himself under control.

    Since the day that she had torn his heart out, he revealed no more emotion than a stone. He never let anyone suspect the agony he lived with each day, the skill it took to remain patient and not jump out of his chair every time that a new clue came to light, the effort it took not to break down every time it turned out to be nothing more than a dead end, or how close he was hanging onto his sanity to keep from drinking himself to death every time he returned from a 'business trip' to his home without either of them.

    In spite of his famous self-control, he felt his hopes twitching back into life. Deep down he knew that this wasn't just another day, or just another clue, this was going to be the time that he found them. He just knew it. Just like he had known it every other day for the past year. He refused to even entertain, let alone accept, the idea that they might actually be gone. She had to just be hiding from him.

    These were the thoughts which plagued him on the helicopter ride and only intensified as his plane sailed east out of Kansas. By the time that they landed he was in danger of going stir-crazy, terrified that somehow they had worked out that he was on to them and that they would have left by the time that he arrived.

    “What is the situation?” Lex demanded of his private investigator as he sprang from the plane and practically sprinted for the sports' car which lay in wait.

    “We are still watching the hotel, there has been no movement. No one has been able to get a positive ID yet though”, the elder man said as he ran along side the entrepreneur. He had known him for years and his company had often done odd jobs for him, but over the previous twelve months had made enough to retire on just from the search from his lost fiancée and knew just how desperate he was to find her. He would have done it even if he had been paid although as it was he was not only paid exceedingly well, not to mention the potential bonus for finding her which ran into seven figures.

    “Right”, he dived into the car and barely gave his employee time to get his belt on before they were off.

    “A helicopter might have been faster”.

    “She would have heard it coming”, he glanced to the side before making a sharp left turn without bothering to slow down.

    “We could have held her, I ...”

    “No”, his voice cut through the air like a whip, “I have already told you. Your men only touch her if there is absolutely no other way to keep her from leaving, otherwise stay out of her way. I am the only one who can get her to leave with me”.

    “Right”. He knew better than to doubt his boss although even he was getting scared by him at that moment. He gripped the door handle until his knuckles turned white, relieved when they finally came to a screeching stop outside a small, slightly run down, hotel.

    “She is staying somewhere like this? I'll kill her!” He hissed as he took in the faded décor.

    “I'm sure ...” he broke out, seeing that the man had already leap from the vehicle taking no more pains to secure it than an ordinary person would have a bottle of water they had ceased to desire.

    One of the other agents on the case jogged up to show him the way and they raced up several flights of stairs without pausing until he was faced with a shabby door.

    “Chloe, open this damned door right now”, he bellowed and hammered it.

    There was no answer.

    “Chloe”, he shouted.

    Still there was no sound.

    He glanced to the side by saw the man nod to say that she defiantely could not have left.

    “Right, stand back”, he ordered and took several steps back only giving her enough time to get clear if she was nearby before slamming his foot into the wood, not even blinking as the weak plywood splintered. “What is she thinking being somewhere like this?” He torn into the room, scanning the room quickly to see that there was no one there. He headed straight for the only door, nearly ripping it off its hinges before coming to an abrupt halt.

    “Where is Chloe?” He demanded of a woman who was cowering in the centre of the bedroom, holing a child in her arms. “Are you the maid?”

    “I don't know what you are talking about, whoever you are ...”

    “You know damned well who I am”, it wasn't arrogance, everyone did. He ate up the space between them, “Give me the child”.

    “No, Sir, please, I ...”

    The child gave a lusty cry and turned her head slightly, enough for Lex to make out the features. It was definitely a girl and not the one he was searching for. He paled. It couldn’t be. It just couldn't be. He took a step back.

    “Where is she?” He repeated his question.

    “I don't know who you are talking about”.

    “Today at precisely 8:35 am, a child was treated for earache at the local hospital. That child and its mother used a health insurance card which I paid for, they left the hospital immediately afterwards against the doctor's expressed instructions but were described as being blonde haired and green eyed”, Lex spoke slowly and deliberately. “My men were quick enough to see them leaving and to track them here, to this hotel, to this room. Explain, where you got the card”.

    “I didn't steal it”, she protested holding the child close to her.

    “I'm not accusing you of stealing it, yet. I merely want to find its rightful owner. If, however”, his voice became soft and extremely dangerous, “I am not fortunate in this, then questions might start being asked. It would be a shame if this little girl ended up in care wouldn't it?”

    “No, please Sir, I don't know anything about ...” She protested.

    “Why don't you start by telling me exactly what you do know”, he suggested. “We can have a little information exchange. Someone I trusted stole something extremely valuable of mine and I want it back. She fled, God only knows where, and has been attempting to hide from me ever since – far too successfully for me to believe that she had really disappeared or that she is not being helped by someone”, he eyed her suspiciously, even though there was no way that she had the resources (or, as far as he knew) the inclination to do so.

    He walked around the room, “You would think, with resources like mine, that it would simply be a matter of waiting until she made a mistake. Used her health insurance. Her social security number. You know, I even have people scouring medical records every day just to make sure that something doesn't slip through. I know far more about the number of twenty-four year old women with children than I have ever wished to, and yet … nothing”.

    “That must be very frustrating for you”, she said shakily, holding onto her baby tightly.

    “You have no idea”, he said with a look which stated that if she crossed him then she would. “Just between the two of us”, ignoring the fact that his detectives in the other room could probably hear everything they were saying through the paper thin walls, “I think that it is starting to effect my judgement, but of course, that is one of those things that you can never be certain of”.

    He came back around so that he was standing right behind her, looking into the eyes of the child who now had her head resting on her mother's shoulder. Lex took her hand between two long fingers and shook it gently, making her smile, “Hello little lady, I'm sorry to hear that you aren't feeling too well. Am I to take it that you went to the doctor's this morning?”

    “Yes Sir, it was us. No one else was with us”, the woman answered for her baby who merely continued to grin. She wanted to turn around or else to flee but she couldn't move her legs.

    “Well now we are getting somewhere, aren't we little one?” He addressed his questions to the little angel before him. There was silence as he stroked his thumb over the back of her thumb. The mother shivered, frozen in place.

    “You must be incredibly grateful to whoever gave you access to that health insurance card”, he hypothesised, “doctors can be extremely expensive, especially with a little one”.

    “Yes”, she somehow managed to croak out the syllable.

    “I take it that you don't have much money”, he didn't need to wait for her to answer to know that he spoke the truth, “this is a rather dangerous area, any number of things could happen. It is certainly no place for a baby”.

    “Please sir”, shock and desperation swinging her around. The baby let out a cry at having lost sight of her new playmate and turned around with her mommy.

    He pretending to examine their surroundings, actually just disguising his expression from them. “No place at all”, he said thoughtfully. “Living in a place like this, what do you think that her chances are?”

    “We will manage somehow, I will provide for her, I will ...” She clung to her child.

    “Steal from someone else?” He raised an eyebrow.

    “I didn't steal I ...” She broke off.

    “I am not accusing you of anything, I just want the truth”, he closed the gap between them. “The woman who stole from me, I need to find her. I am going to find her, and you are going to help me. Tell me what happened”.

    She opened her mouth, then closed it. She didn't know what to do.

    “Disloyalty is a terrible thing”, he said understandingly, “but not as terrible as prison, I assure you. Not as bad as never finding employment again so long as you live. Not as bad as losing your child to a fo -”

    “Eight months ago”, the words jerked from her, “eight months ago we were in Kansas. My little one was ill and we went to the doctor, she got her medication but I had no idea how I was ever going to pay for it. The debt was just so large. Then I met another woman, she had a card for her and her child which said that she didn't need any more. We … we swapped. She took the debt and I took the card. She said that she needed to escape and …. and …”

    “Was she hurt? Did she have a child with her? Did she ...” He choked on his own words.

    “No”, the first answer came out easily, the second with a shocked expression, “No, no child”.

    Lex felt the blood draining from his face. “You are sure? There was no child?”

    “I'm sure, she didn't have a child with her at least. We were in a hospital, I don't know why she was there, we...”

    “You swear to God that you are telling me the truth?” He asked, about to grab her by the shoulders and only just refraining at the last second. “You swear?”

    “I swear”, she said. Her voice was weak and shaky but sounded sincere.

    He swore loudly, then called for his detective. “Find out everything you can from her, any trace, sliver of information, anything and look into it. Then, take her, set her up in one of the company apartments and get her a job in the company as anything she is trained to do with full benefits”. He was about to take his leave of her, possibly even come close to appologising for scaring her so, but then the baby made a noise which sounded like “Bguguga”.

    His heart constricted as if caught in a vice. He left without a backwards glance, never knowing that she had been lying. She had done just as she was instructed, and he had been as generous as Chloe had told her that he would be.

    ~*~

    “Sir”, the detective finally broken the silence which had permeated the car ever since they had got in it. He was relieved that at least this time he had been allowed to drive, but although he wasn't actively fearing for his life he was even more nervous and disconcerted than before.

    During the course of their acquaintance, he had witnessed Lex Luthor in many states of emotions from boiling anger to silently fuming but never as he was now; just sitting there listlessly.

    He swallowed, wishing that he didn't have to broach the subject which had been nagging at him for a year, but he couldn't reconcile it with his conscience to keep silent any longer. “I don't want to be a defeatist, but has it ever occurred to you that ...”

    “Don't”. It wasn't so much a word as an inhuman snarl, like that of a wounded beast.

    “Sir?”

    “If you value anything you have, including your health, you will not continue with that line of thought. They are fine. They are both fine”, Lex announced, decidedly. “She is playing me!” That had to be it. They had to be alive, if not how could he still be drawing breath? How could the world still be spinning?

    They were alive and well and mocking him. This was the thought that kept him going through the long plane ride back to Kansas. When he finally descended he was exhausted, too far gone to even try to master a smile for his butler.

    He was weary beyond belief. If he had any sense he would go straight to bed but he didn't. He never did. As with every day he ended it in the basement. He made his way through the racks of wine, no longer noticing the cold or the smell of cork and stone which he had once found so soothing, as he neared the end of the final rack. He reached out his hand and placed his thumb against the grove in one of the old stones to be greeted by a new door way materializing in front of him.

    As he stepped forwards into the darkness lights flicked on one by one and there was the sound of rock grinding against rock as the door automatically closed and locked itself behind him. This was his most important room.

    The whole chamber was bathed in an odd florescent glow from the harsh lights above. They revealed that below the mansion there was an entire laboratory, in the centre of which sat a hunk of metal. It would have been difficult even for a car aficionado to have identified it as a black Jaguar in its current state, but his scientists had. His scientists had combed every inch of the vehicle and its surroundings to piece together what had happened. Every plausible theory had been expounded upon, models had been made, digital reconstructions created, the best minds in the world involved but every single one of them came to the same conclusion. Both occupants had got out from the car under their own steam before it had burst into flames.

    He had known that she had got out from the second that he had heard about the crash, every millimetre of ground had been covered in the search for the body, no hospital in the local area had any record of anyone with injuries from a car crash – or anything similar – coming in that week let alone that night, the horrible thought always flashed that she might have been picked up by someone with nefarious intent but today proved that that couldn't be the case.

    She was alive and she was mocking him.

    He put his hand through part of the wreckage in a rather pointless display of manly temper. It said something for his current state of mind and anxiety that he did not feel it.

    He ended his day the way that he ended all of the others, resolving to put this behind him and not let the search consume his life, knowing full well that even as he lay next to his fiancée that his thoughts would be of the woman who had betrayed him and that the following morning when there was the faintest whiff of a possibility of a clue concerning her whereabouts … he would be off again.

    A/N: Hello again, I hope that you liked it if you read it. Either way, tell me what you think. Did you think that Lex was mean? Do you think that Chloe is hiding? Is she dead? Do you think that someone is hiding her? Ummm ... anything else?

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    Re: The Great Deception (NC17) Posted 26th June 2014

    Just got a chance to read this story for the first time and I am hook. Please updates soon.

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    NS Senior Member Senior Member HotCrossedBunny's Avatar
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    Re: The Great Deception (NC17) Posted 26th June 2014

    Trckyrcky: Thank-you, I'm happy that you are reading it. There will be an update later today so it will be ready whenever you next have time to read. Hope that life isn't being too stressful. *waves*

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    Re: The Great Deception (NC17) Posted 26th June 2014

    Chapter Two

    The following morning, the engine of his car roared as he raced down the highway, the same one she had disappeared on three hundred and sixty-six days ago.

    Lex was an idiot. It wasn't the first time that this idea had occurred to him in his thirty years on the planet, but never before had it slammed into him as viscerally as the night before. At one o'clock that morning, when he had been staring up at the darkened ceiling of his bedroom, teetering at the edge of his enormous king sized bed to evade the grasping limbs of Lana - a woman regularly mistaken for a supermodel - determined not to think about Chloe he had realised that he was certifiable. Not to mention, a complete and utter unadulterated idiot. He had let emotion and fear get the better of him. In no other situation in his life would he ever have allowed that to happen.

    When his initial enquiries had turned up nothing, he had allowed himself to get into such a blind panic that he had flown all over the country every time a piece of software registered a voice that sounded like hers, or a face that somehow resembled hers turned up on a CCTV camera, following connection after connection, family friend after family friend. He had bugged her father's house in Florida and while she hadn't 'officially' contacted her Dad in the last year, and Gabe refused to tell him a damned thing, he knew that they must be talking somehow. They were too close not to. Odd phrases he had caught from the house via the microphones had also sent him to weird and weirder parts of the country until he had discovered that Gabe was just reading a travel guide for reasons best known to himself. As if that weren't bad enough, Lex had had a team of experts scouring hospital and medical records only to finally come to a realisation: she had never left the state. It was the only thing that made sense.

    He pulled over to the side to park illegally where the accident had occurred. His conviction that not only was she close by but that she (or someone else on her behalf) had been running him ragged on purpose did not stop his heart growing heavy at the sight. Even though the scorched grass was now thriving once more, he could not shake the image of the burnt wreckage from his mind. The horrific image which had greeted him a year ago when he had come across the scene.

    Lex climbed out of the car and down the steep incline to stand exactly where the burnt out vehicle had once been and surveyed the surrounding areas. He knew that he would not find any new clues, his men had combed the area for months, but he knew that this was the starting point. He had allowed himself to be swayed earlier.

    There had been one other car on the road at the time of the crash, which had somehow ended up flipped over on the other side of the carriage way. Thankfully someone had come along and seen it and called for help – the paramedics guessed – within half an hour, by which time the Jaguar was burnt to a crisp but empty. The driver of the other car – a drunken man whose leg had been caught on a jagged piece of metal swore – once Lex had beaten the truth out of him and then ensured that he would spend the rest of his life in prison – that no one had driven along the road in the intervening time, and that he had never had the relief of passing out. And from then on teams of people had been combing the area.

    He swallowed as he imagined the scene, wishing desperately that he could have been there. No, if he had been there he would never have let her run in the first place. He would have protected her.

    She must have got herself and the baby out of the car and headed out across the fields. The problem was that they were so surrounded by corn and (thankfully) there was no blood so it had been impossible to work out which direction she might have taken. At the time it hadn't occurred to him that she might not want him to find her, he had been searching hospitals and offering rewards for information. Now, he saw that he had been wrong.

    There were a dozen farm houses within a two mile distance – the maximum distance she would have been able to limp between the accident and helicopters with motion detectors starting their rounds. One of them must have taken her in, then sent her somewhere before he started banging on their doors two days later. His brow furrowed as he took out his phone and called his lawyer.

    “Did you manage it?” He demanded, without preamble.

    “Yes, sir. The bank foreclosed on all of the mortgages and loans in the area, all of which have been deferred to you. No line of credit of any type will be forthcoming”.

    “Excellent”. He hung up. Someone knew something and they would tell him.

    After a day spent travelling from farm house to farm house, reinterviewing everyone with a combination of bribery and threats it was revealed that the young woman and her child had indeed stumbled to one of the houses and been taken in. They had wanted to take her to the hospital but she had refused, instead asking that they called a doctor from a private clinic and never to tell anyone. They said that they had seen such fear in her eyes they had agreed and been extremely relieved when the doctor came and took her away.

    Lex could have kissed them he was so grateful, but instead he settled for signing their farm over to them. Finally he knew that they were both safe, they had both survived and according to the family: had been tired and scared but otherwise fine. The only sign of violence was a large bruise across the woman's cheek which he knew (only too well) had not been from the accident.

    Before he left he had the phone records from that night draw up and got the number of the doctor. He had of course gone through all of the phone records before but it hadn't registered before as it was just a local mobile number. Nothing officially connected to medicine or unusual for a Kansas farmer. He called it in, by the end of that night he would be one enormous leap closer to finding them.

    It was already dusk by the time that he got home, and he found Lana waiting for him in the living room.

    “Hello darling”, she greeted him in a flurry of hugs and air kisses.

    “Good evening”, he said kindly, but could never bring himself to call her darling. She could live in his house, spend his money, possibly become his partner one day, but she would never be 'darling'. There could never be two.

    “Would you like a drink?”

    “I'd love one”, he answered gratefully as he sank into the high backed arm chair.

    He watched her as she sailed across the room to pour him a generous measure of scotch. She was beautiful, she always had been. She had the same grace, ingenuousness, and gentle spirit that he had always admired. He had almost forgotten about that, along with a lot of things about her. They hadn't spent much time together lately, he hadn't spent much time with anyone actually. Not since Chloe's disappearance.

    He smiled at her as she brought him his drink and allowed her to perch on the arm of the chair, even wrapping his arm around her waist as he took a sip of the amber liquid, his eyes fixed on her features. As always he was hit by an overwhelming sense of her purity, and then …. something else, flickering just below the surface.

    He couldn't quite remember how their relationship had started after Chloe's abandonment. She had just somehow ended up in the house, he had needed someone and had chosen her. To think that something he had once schemed for now came so easily to him and he didn't even want it.

    “You look very nice this evening”, he commented evenly.

    “Thank-you, it is new”, it was indeed a very fine silk robe.

    He drained his glass and placed in on the table next to him. He had never bothered himself about Lana's spending habits, he had given her a credit card after the first time that they had slept together post Chloe and didn't even look at what she used it for.

    He had realised on the drive home that this lack of attention to what was going on in his own home had been a mistake. He had been looking outwards for his fugitive when he should have been looking at his circle of family, friends and escort. Someone was hiding her.

    Lex smiled, “This isn't an attempt to get my attention, is it?” He asked as he placed his hand on her knee.

    She moved her head to the side and gave him the doe eyes which he had once thought of as the epitome of pure innocence. God, he had been a gullible fool.

    “I haven't been a good boyfriend recently. The last year has been”, he paused, he studied her expression as he searched for the right word, “difficult”.

    “I know”, her voice was understanding and warm. Her eyes were large and soft. And she was beautiful. It would have been so easy to give in, to allow himself to be comforted by her.

    He ran his hand on her leg before pulling her into his lap, eliciting a gasp, “You”, he ran his hand across her cheek, bringing their faces close together, not a flicker would escape him as he said, “You're the only one I can trust, aren't you? The only one who is always honest with me. Who is always on my side”.

    “Of course”.

    Her delivery was perfect. Neither too fast nor too slow. Her eyes did not stray from his and her face remained passive. There was nothing to tell that she was lying and yet he knew, so absolutely, that she was.

    She had betrayed him too. It was only fair he supposed considering what he had tried to do once, but he couldn't quite get over it. He didn't feel hurt, just shocked by his own idiocy. He stared hard at the woman before him and realised for the first time that he didn't know a thing about her. Torn between the urges to laugh and put his fist through a wall, he strove to remain calm.

    “Lex”, she whispered his name, concerned by his silence. “Is something wrong?”

    There was a definite tremor of something.

    “Yes, something is very wrong, terribly wrong”, he said. “I have been taking you for granted and I've lied to you”.

    At first she looked relieved, then confused.

    “I have a confession to make. I have never stopped looking for Chloe”.

    Yes, there was definite fear in her eyes now.

    “I just can't forget about her and I am worried about the boy”, he continued with his explanation.

    “He wasn’t yours”, Lana reminded him.

    Lex's jaw shut firmly.

    “I'm sorry darling”, she obviously realised that she had said the wrong thing, and tried to make amends, “I know how much you loved him. We all did. But he wasn't yours, we have no idea whose he was and, as much as it pains me to say it”, she really did look pained, “Chloe wasn't who we thought that she was either. She was just using you for your money and she used that poor sweet innocent baby as a pawn”.

    “I know. Believe me, I will never forget, or forgive that”, he still felt the knife in his heart every time he thought of it. “But it doesn't change anything. I love him more than anything in this world and I don't believe that Chloe was just after my money. There was more to it than that”, he shook himself out of his dark musings, “anyway, it doesn't matter”.

    She looked at him sceptically.

    “It doesn't”, he answered steadily. “I made a promise the day that he was born that I would love and protect him whatever happened. Lack of biological connection doesn't change that. If Chloe is somewhere out there with him, hiding from me or something else, I don't know what exactly. She needs to be here with me, with us, surrounded by the people who love her and will support her. She isn't even in contact with Gabe, well, I'm sure that she is somehow but not the regular variety. That isn't right”.

    “She was always so close with her Dad”, Lana agreed, “I just don't want you getting hurt again Lex”, she wrapped her arms around his neck and rested her head on his shoulder so that her face was obscured from his sight. “Besides, after a year you aren't going to find her, I mean, she must be in another country or something. I hate to see you torturing yourself like this”.

    His hands tightened around her. How had he been so blind?

    “Actually, I have got the final piece of the puzzle. I found the all important clue this afternoon”, he said in a calm manner, as he felt her heart-rate quicken slightly. There were some physical signs of nerves that even she could not hide.

    “So you know where she is?” Lana asked, gingerly sitting up and peering at him.

    “Not quite yet”, he admitted. “But I will receive a call to tell me in”, he raised his arm to examine his watch, “the next, oh say, ten minutes”.

    “That's fantastic”, the smile which showed every single one of her pearly whites was a little too dazzling. “I will leave you to take your call in private”, she kissed him on the cheek, “Come and find me when you are done”.

    “You can count on it”, he took her hand and kissed it before letting her sliver away.

    Lex rose to his feet, retrieved his glass and walked over to the decanter to pour himself another measure of scotch before casually strolling back through the mansion into the security room. Once there, he focused the camera in Lana's private sitting room onto her computer and watched with interest as she logged into an online bank she had never told him about and began to close several accounts.

    He didn't even really need to hear from the men now but he took the call anyway. He knew that he was being manipulated.

    He had another glass of scotch and then made his way up to bed.

    When Lana came in a few minutes later, looking surprisingly calm she found her partner of sorts standing in the middle of the room, staring directly at her.

    “Did they call?” she asked, trying to sound nonchalant.

    “Yes, as a matter of fact they did”, he replied slowly, noting that she was unwilling to look directly at him. She walked over to the dressing table and sat down, focusing on brushing her hair. She allowed the silk of her nightgown to fall off one shoulder.

    He smirked. It was a feeble attempt to seduce him.

    He could catch a glimpse of her expression in the mirror, her mouth was drawn into an 'o'.

    “Would you like to know what they had to say?”

    “Of course, have they found them?”

    “No, they found a doctor who came and took her away from the a farmhouse near by the accident”, not that he called one and a half miles near all things considered. It made his blood boil to think of her walking all of that way, in her wedding dress, the baby in her arms, after suffering such a crash. “He was a private practitioner used almost exclusively by rich families who are having … problems”.

    Lana swallowed. “Problems?”

    “Unwanted pregnancies, adoption, that sort of things normally”, the words stuck in his throat.

    “You don't think that she would have ...”

    “Since that phone call I have wondered, I just have to hope not. It is always possible that he was just used as a way out of the situation, he is a regular doctor too”, he reminded himself as much as Lana.

    “Well, that is good”, Lana continued to brush her hair.

    “Yes, the question becomes, how did she know about him?” Lex baited the trap carefully.

    Lana froze. “Why shouldn't she know about him?”

    “Simply because I never told her about him. He is not the most reputable man alive and I had no intention of ever letting him near my child”, he fought hard to keep any note of accusation from his tone.

    “He isn't your ...”

    “I know”, he snapped. “But I never told her about him. So how did she know? None of her accounts have been touched, so how is she surviving?” He asked as he walked over to her and placed his hands on her shoulders, “How does she have the resources to send me all over the country looking for her?”

    “Lex, I ...”

    “Lana, I suggest that you consider your next words very carefully”, his voice was low and dangerous.

    She opened her mouth to protest but then risked looking at his reflection in the mirror. He knew. He knew and she was about to be out on her ass if she didn't try to paint this in the right light.

    “I'm sorry Lex”, she felt his fingers tighten slightly. “I know that she hurt and betrayed you and I hated her for that but I just couldn't let her go out into the world with that little baby without something”, her eyes filled with tears. “I just couldn't Lex”.

    “You gave her the name of that doctor?”

    She paused and then hung her head, “Yes, I didn't know what he did. I had just heard him spoken about as being a good doctor and discrete”. In light of the new information, that word took on a new meaning, “I thought that he was a paediatrician or something, I didn't know Lex. I swear”.

    “You opened an account with my money in it for her”. He knew that she didn't have any money of her own. “You gave her the number of a potentially dangerous doctor. What else?”

    “Nothing, I swear Lex. I did nothing else”, her tiny body was surging with adrenaline and fear.

    “Your laptop, your credit cards, your phone, everything. I want it now”, he stressed the final word.

    Shaking she did as he demanded. Then, she stood there, in the room that they had shared, watching for hours as he went through every vestige of information on the devices before calling in someone else and consigning them to him.

    When he finally stood up she found her voice, even if it did quaver terribly as she asked, “Lex, where are you going?”

    “She hasn't touched the accounts. The doctor has no information newer than ten months old. I'm going to get a drink”.

    A/N: So, what did you think?

  10. #10
    NS Full Member
    Join Date
    27 Aug 2009
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    315

    Re: The Great Deception (NC17) Posted 26th June 2014

    interesting. looking to see what happen next.

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