obsessions Chapter 18-B

Things are starting to get a little crazy this close to Christmas - - especially since I'm a big procrastinator and haven't finished either shopping, cleaning, or decorating - - so this might be the last part I remember to post this week.

If I don't post again until after Sunday - -happy holidays, everyone.

Here's part 18-B



* * *
There was the faint smell of disinfectant. It lingered in the air, no doubt clinging to stone and marble, bringing to mind unpleasant memories of hospitals. Lex refused to clench his fists, though his fingers twitched with the need.

It was cool inside, summer heat fled and fall temperatures already permeating the thick stone environs of the mansion. It would get cooler still, as winter set in. Miserable place to spend the cold months for a man that had never appreciated the cold, with all its chills and drafts, with its floors and walls like ice to the touch. It was likely his father had taken that into account when he'd sent him here. Lionel had liked his subtle punishments as much as his obvious displays of power.

Lex had vague recollections of the place swarming with police, but only bits and pieces, lurid little snapshots that fit into no cohesive place in his mind. He remembered the events preceding it with more clarity. Remembered very clearly walking into this house against all his better judgment, every instinct he had screaming to just turn around and run.

He'd only had Martha Kent at his back then, Clark's presence was somewhat more reassuring. The house wasn't screaming threat at him now, just cold, lonely resentment, like the first day he'd walked into it, after it had sat empty for years. But still, walking through that door was hard.

He took a breath and kept moving. He didn't want to visit the study, but it was right there off the main hall, doors wide open, magnetic in its pull. Clark was already heading that way, walking through those doors with as much casual indifference to what had happened inside, as he had a hundred times before. He could have passed by, let Clark explore the scene of the crime alone, but it was as if his legs had an agenda separate from his mind, taking him into that room regardless of the curl of unease starting to claw its way up his spine.

There was no blood on the floor, no police tape, or evidence that anything out of the ordinary had happened here. Just a room he'd walked into a thousand times before. Stained glass, aged stone, cold hearth; all of it familiar. Until he walked closer to where he thought Decker had fallen and stared down at a chip in the parquet floor.

"This is where - - he shot your father?" Clark asked hesitantly, but his voice sounded distant, tinny and hollow.

Lex canted his head, staring numbly at the indention, wood chipped away, a deep gouge, as if a bullet had torn through. He'd done that. When he'd been firing down into Decker's body. Surprising there was only the one miss, considering how shaky his hands had been.

There had been blood. A great deal of blood. Decker's. His fathers. It had matted Lionel's hair, stained his skin where his face had pressed against the floor. Dead eyes staring up at Lex. Accusing.

What was the last thing he'd said to him? Lex, be reasonable. Don't taunt the psychopath with the gun to his father's head. Unless he'd wanted the trigger pulled. Had he? Had he stood in this room twice and contemplated letting his father die? How much of this was his fault? How much of the blood on his hands?

"Lex?" Clark was standing next to him, brows drawn a little in concern. He'd said his name more than once.

The images on the floor faded, and it was just a floor with a bullet-made chip again . He blinked away the fog that wanted to creep in and muddle his thoughts, glanced up at Clark, who's eyes were bright and green helped Lex find that clarity he needed. "Yes. This is where it happened."

"I'm sorry," Clark said, a little helplessly.

Lex shook his head. "Don't be. It's just a room." It was just a room. Just a room. He shoved his hands in his pockets to hide the tremors.

There were things he'd never tell Clark, and what his father had done to him, callous usage to gain one advantage or another, was likely one of them. That that knowledge might have been eating at him enough that maybe, just maybe he'd pushed Decker into pulling the trigger, was another confidence he didn't need to burden Clark with.

He turned on his heel and walked out. Wanting out of the study now - - right now - - and headed upstairs to the temporary office he'd made for himself. He'd had his laptop brought to him, and any work he'd left here was almost two months old. There wasn't a lot to salvage. He'd have it all packed up anyway, sent to the penthouse in the city. The same with his personal items. The majority of his wardrobe was still here.

"Do you want to take anything now?" Clark asked, in his bedroom, pulling back the curtains and looking out the big window overlooking the rear gardens. It was getting dark out, and the hedge maze would be all shadows now.

He hadn't brought an overnight bag, having every intention of driving back to the city and staying at the penthouse tonight, then driving back tomorrow. The idea of staying here was repugnant. Martha's offer had surprised him. Mostly because he'd never assumed Jonathan would have agreed to him staying under his roof. He pulled down a leather overnight bag and put a few things in it. He picked through his collection of watches, pocketed the one his mother had given him before she died and left the rest.

"No. I'll make a list and have them pack it all up Friday. I don't need that much. God knows what I'd do with suits of armor and eight foot high grandfather clocks in Metropolis. If you want anything, you're welcome to it."

Clark laughed. "Right, because the loft really needs a little gothic flare."

Lex half smiled, swallowed and remembered some of the things Decker had told him. "He was here. In the house, weeks before he - - decided to make his move."

Clark's expression froze. "How?"

Lex shrugged, tried to make it casual, even though it felt like ants were crawling under his skin. "Construction crew after the tornado. He came in again as a day worker when my father was renovating my office. He'd been following me for months. He was at the Talon when you gave me the shard of meteor. That's how he knew."

Clark opened his mouth. Shut it. Then his eyes narrowed and he said slowly. "He was in Manhattan. When we went to Manhattan for the show - - he bumped you in the bar. He was on the street later - - I remember. It didn't occur to me until - - son of a bitch."

Clark stood there, clenching his fists so hard his knuckles popped. Lex stared, a knot in his gut. He didn't remember, and God knew the last part of that night had been a blur, but he didn't doubt Clark.

His skin crawled. The very air in this house made him jittery and uneasy, and the deeper he got within it, the more the walls seemed to close in. The urge to just run was almost overpowering.

Decker had been in this room - -his bedroom - - he'd walked these halls, stalking him, had laid hands on him that day in the hall, and this place for all its cold impracticality, had been home. Lex wasn't sure if home was a word that he'd ever be able to equate with safe again.

"Let's go." As fast as he could without demeaning himself in front of Clark. He just needed to get outside where he could breathe again.

"Okay."

He got on the road and drove. Just the quiet purr of the engine and the wind whistling through Clark's open window. It took a few miles before his hands relaxed on the wheel. The car and the road was a therapy of sorts. He'd always loved to drive. He'd gotten some of his deepest thinking done behind the wheel of a fine automobile.

"I've spent my whole life," he said into that silence. ""Trying one way or another to impress my father."

Clark looked at him silently, waiting for him to expound on that statement.

"When I was young, I tried so hard to meet his standards, read the things I thought he'd want me to read, played his little war games, and avoided anything remotely resembling a real childhood because I thought it would make him proud. I honestly wanted to make him proud. Once I figured out how impossible a feat that was, I changed tactics and spent all my energy trying to appall him. I got better results with that, until he snapped and sent me here, and I reverted back to trying to impress him again with my business acumen."

"You did pretty well for yourself here," Clark said.

Lex cast him a glance and a wry look. "That first winter here, I took multiple online business courses trying to figure out the mechanics of managing the plant. I sweated over the fine points of the buyout. If it weren't for my mother's old lawyer, offering a few suggestions, I'm not sure I'd have pulled it off."

"But you did."

"I did."

"And its sort of small beans compared to LuthorCorp."

"Inconsequential," Lex agreed. And it was, The Smallville plant was nothing, LexCorp was nothing more than a speck at the bottom of the corporate ladder. LuthorCorp was a monster, and the people at the top, the people his father had gathered to guide it were sharks of the highest caliber.

Lex was a shark, too, granted a shark with issues at the moment, but a shark nonetheless. In the sort of waters he'd been raised in, it was either be that, or be chum. But he'd been operating on instinct, years of surreptitiously watching his father's own brand of war games, and not quite three years of various colleges where he'd spent more time avoiding class than attending. If he was going to jump into that elite corporate shark tank, even if he were jumping in at the very panicle, he wasn't going to do it at a disadvantage.

"I think I'm going to finish up that degree."

"Yeah?" Clark sounded genuinely surprised.

"I'm twenty-two credits shy of a Business Master's, including the online courses last year. It's a semester's worth of classes."

"That's great, Lex. I'm trying to picture you in school, though and the image, it's just not coming. Have you decided which school?"

Lex glanced at Clark, who was grinning. "I'm considering. I've burned a few bridges that aren't repairable, but there are plenty of options."

"And you'd be doing it for nobody but you," Clark said, getting it. Getting him, better than his father ever had. Than anyone ever had.

Lex shrugged again, looking back at the road. He'd taken the roundabout way back to the farm. Circling town, down country routes bordered by fields full of fall produce. A pretty town for a drive. He didn't want to live in it.

"Have you eaten?" Clark asked, Clark having a food fixation. "Because I haven't eaten. It's always simple stuff night before Thanksgiving. Mom's saving up her cooking energy for tomorrow."

He hadn't. Not since breakfast back at the beach house, and the two drinks he had on the flight over.

He was a little hungry. Besides, the simplest things made Clark happy. Apparently him eating was one of them.


Clark made sandwiches. A fair number of them. He stacked them on a plate, tossed Lex a bag of potato chips and a pair of cold soda and told his mom, who was putting the finishing touches on a pie about to go into the oven, that they were heading out to the loft to eat and watch a dvd.

Which was fine with Lex, since Clark's father kept casting glances at him, as if he didn't know quite how to deal with the fact that his wife and son had accepted Lex so wholeheartedly into their home. He kept expecting a reminder that he'd been warned off the property, or at the very least a stern warning that the man would tolerate no funny business with his underage son. Instead what he got were a few scrutinizing looks, like the man was trying hard to figure him out in between nursing a long necked beer.

Lex wouldn't have minded a little alcoholic relaxation himself, just a little something to ease the tension. In the year and a half that he'd known Jonathan Kent, he'd never seen him hold his tongue on something near and dear to his heart. And non-standing prejudices against anyone with the Luthor name aside, Lex had fucked his sixteen year old son. So unless Martha had neglected to share all her insights on the matter with her husband - -and Lex decided it was a good possibility she hadn't since he hadn't been threatened with either a shot gun or a call to the sheriff - - either Jonathan hadn't figured it out himself, or the man was taking his presence with unnerving good stride. Maybe Martha had slipped a little herbal something extra into his supper.

It had been a long time since he'd been in the loft over the barn. Nothing had changed. Same old beat up couch, same red throw, same rustic bookshelves and desk. The telescope was folded up and off to the side, but then Clark had used it mostly to spy on Lana anyway.

"Tomorrow, when its light, I'll show you the ship," Clark promised, clearing off room for the food on the makeshift coffee table that consisted of two crates and Indian weave throw over the top.

Lex ran his fingers across the back of the couch, wandered to the loft window and stared out across darkened fields. He'd come here a lot, back when he'd been seeking to get that little bit closer to Clark. Back when he'd been pursuing something he hadn't really thought he'd ever had a chance of ever getting. Testing his limits, or Clark's. God knew he had a perverse penchant for it - - pushing that little extra bit, until something inevitably gave.

With Clark it had come in the form of inhibition freeing red meteor rock. Without it, Clark might have just continued to blush, and stubbornly pretend he wanted things he really didn't, and jerk off to subconscious desires and hate him self afterward. Him and every other closeted gay man in the world. Closeted gay alien man. Big addendum.

He looked at Clark's dark head, silky thick hair, perfectly formed bone structure and marveled that he had the most unique being on the planet portioning out clumsily made ham sandwiches on paper plates in the loft of an old barn. Or more significantly, he simply had the most unique being on the planet. His.

"Come eat before the flies get the scent and start trying to get their share," Clark suggested.

Charming. He'd never had the pleasure of eating up here and fending off the inevitable insect population that one might find frequenting a barn. He did rather miss the city.

The ham was fresh baked and salty, and really actually rather good. Lex consumed his share of the sandwiches, drank carbonated sugar water, and sat back on the couch, while Clark brought out a selection of dvd rentals.

It was a small TV, and the Clark's father was too cheap for statalite, so the dvd player Clark had perched on top of the set was a Godsend considering the quality of the local channels out here. Lex walked out to his car to get his laptop, giving Clark free reign to choose a movie.

Clark had a buddy cop comedy on when he returned. Clark liked the franchise and had seen the movie countless times before, once even at the mansion, where Lex had happily endured it, if it meant two hours in a darkened room with Clark.

That viewing had seen them seated a discreet, proper distance apart, Clark no more thinking about closing it, than he'd been thinking about particle psychics. Clark edged over this time, while Lex was waking up the laptop. Not close enough to crowd, but near enough that there was barely a hand's breadth between them.

"So, if you do this, you thinking of starting in the winter semester?"

"Probably."

Clark drew his knees up, booted feet on the makeshift coffee table. "And in the meanwhile - - are you going back to the beach - - or Metropolis?"

Lex pulled up the LuthorCorp private server connection, logging in under his old password. There'd been restrictions on his access before - - information he couldn't access, places he couldn't go, blood-relation not placing him high enough in the food-chain to warrant it. They were still there. He hadn't bothered until now to start delving into the underbelly of the company. He'd have to make a call Friday and arrange to have his security clearance upgraded.

"Metropolis." He hadn't been one hundred percent certain before. He thought he was now. If he didn't test his limits now, he'd never find his footing. He could deal with the press of the city - - he had to.

"You sure?" Clark asked.

Lex canted his head, giving him a look from under his brows. "No. But I can't hide forever, so I might as well make the plunge."

"It wasn't hiding, Lex, if it was something you needed to do."

Clark edged a little close, shoulder brushing his. Clark had picked up patience somewhere. God knew he hadn't learned it from Lex. Subtlety wasn't his strong point though. He made a point of stretching, and his arm ended up along the back of the couch behind Lex. Lex had never had that particular maneuver pulled on him before, but then he'd never actually been with a man longer than it took to practice the sex act, before. At least not willingly.

He shivered and pushed that thought from his mind. Relaxed into Clark just to show it who was boss, and Clark sighed and let his arm slip down off the couch back and onto Lex's shoulders.

His body was getting better at accepting being up close and personal without the reflexive twitches. At least with Clark.

He idly cruised the current LuthorCorp project list - - at least the one's his security clearance allowed him to access - - narrowed his eyes at the name of a project LexCorp had been underbid for and his father had denied all knowledge of - - while Clark entertained himself with the movie. It was a companionable way to spend the evening.

Jonathan Kent only stomped out once, around ten, as if he couldn't help himself from checking to make sure there was no elicit sex taking place in his barn, with the excuse of reminding Clark that he needed to be up early to deliver the rest of his mother's baked goods. Clark had removed his arm from around Lex's shoulders, but hadn't bothered to put distance between them. The computer in his lap had prevented Lex's immediate instinctive urge to do it himself, without having to juggle electronics. He rather wished Clark had edged away just a little, because slouched on a sofa, thigh to thigh, shoulder to shoulder to shoulder was only marginally less incriminating than various other things Jonathan could have caught them doing. And God knew there had been a time when Lex had imagined pushing Clark down on this very couch and perpetrating some of those things.

Lex went very still in lieu of guiltily sliding away, while Clark's father pursed his lips and gave them a disapproving look. But then, Lex wasn't that familiar with the nuances of Jonathan Kent's looks, very seldom having gotten anything that didn't smack of disapproval. Maybe that was just his normal expression. Maybe he'd offer Lex the keys to the farm and the deed to his son while he was wearing it.

"I know, Dad. I'll be up bright and early and get everything delivered," Clark promised, not seeming effected by the glower.

"God," Lex breathed when the sound of his boots had receded down the loft stairs and out the barn.

Clark's arm fell back around him. "He's okay. That was okay." Clark assured him.

"Right. So this feeling I keep getting of him thinking about shooting me - - it's all overactive imagination?"

"He wouldn't shoot you."

"You realize the last time he caught us this close together, neither one of us had clothes on. I'd lay odds, that if he'd had a gun, he'd have shot me that day."

Clark opened his mouth, thought about that, then colored a little. "My dad doesn't shoot people. Besides which, that wasn't your fault - -and yeah, I guess if you look at it like that - - you gotta wonder what was going through his head."

"Personally, I rather not know."

Clark grinned, and slouched a little deeper so they were eye level. "Can I kiss you?"

Lex blinked. The question catching him off guard.

"I mean, if you don't want to, that's okay," Clark assured him, all big eyes and lush mouth. "I just thought - - well, I thought it'd been a long time since I kissed you - - and maybe you'd be okay with trying it - - no pressure - -"

"Shut up." His heart did pound a little at the prospect, but then his heart had pounded and his pulse had raced at the prospect of kissing Clark before any of this had happened. Funny how the body reacted much the same to fear as it did to passion. But it was just a matter of leaning in, of brushing his thumb across Clark's mouth, petal soft and so very addictive. Clark's lashes fluttered down, black and thick, a little shaky breath escaping him at Lex's touch.

He brushed his mouth over Clark's. They both shivered, that light contact electric. He kissed him again, soft exploration of lips, fingers weeding through the hair at the back of Clark's neck, the texture of that no less appealing.

It was pleasant, the scent of him, the taste of him, the feel of him. This heady warmth that filled his head and swelled something inside him - - but didn't reach far enough down to stir interest in his cock. Which was disconcerting on the one hand, because generally, just looking at Clark across a room could get him hard, and a relief on the other, because this wasn't the time or the place to be contemplating sex. But still, it worried him, that lack. Made something rancid lurch in his gut when memories surfaced of not being able to help getting hard in that basement. Of Decker working at it, hand or mouth or vibrating tool working him up to an erection he very badly hadn't wanted. And yet, here, now he couldn't feel the stirring with Clark.

"Lex? You okay?"

He stared at Clark, who was looking at him with big, worried eyes. Clark had the computer, which had begun to slide off his lap in his big hand and was carefully setting it on the table. He didn't take his eyes off of Lex.

"I'm okay," he said it reflexively.

"You sure?" Clark asked.

He swallowed, shut his eyes for a moment, deep breathing, beating back the memories. He needed to conquer this. Needed to prove to himself that he was stronger than this.

"Clark, I'm fine." He leaned back in, pushing Clark back, taking Clark's mind off worrying about him by another kiss, slipping a tongue between Clark's open lips and into the moist warmth of his mouth. Clark groaned, hands moving to Lex's hips, shifting to let Lex bear him back. Clark had no issues with erections, Lex felt his through his jeans.

A little stab of panic hit him, he staved it off with a growl into Clark's mouth, and a knee pressed tight against the bulge between his legs. Clark whimpered into his mouth and Lex bit his lip, hard, plunged his tongue into Clark's mouth, raked his fingers up his sides.

"Lex - -" Clark pulled back, staring up at him with wide bright eyes.

"What? You wanted to make out. Let's make out."

He covered Clark's mouth again, stabbing his tongue like he was fucking, and Clark made sounds and went with it for a few moments, pliable and hard under him, before he shuddered and pushed Lex back.

"Lex." Clark's fingers wrapped around his arms, implacable restraint, holding him back when he went to drive back down, angry, inexplicably angry.

"Breathe," Clark told him sharply. "Lex, just breathe."

Was he not? His head did feel faintly light. Dizzy. His hands were shaking. He wasn't sure when they'd started. Clark was flat on his back on the sofa, lips red and flushed, worried. The bulge Lex had his knee jammed tight against had started to deflate.

"Oh - - God," He didn't know where that had come from. That almost fugue state of - - what? Violence? The need to control, maybe? Not Clark so much as himself. He felt sick.

"You're okay," Clark drew him down, gentle, careful, arms loose around him. "We're okay."

He shut his eyes, the shaking spreading out from hands to the rest of him. Clark's hands moved across his back, concentric circles, fingers pressing into knotted muscles.

"I don't know where that - - I didn't mean - -"

"Lex, its okay." Clark kneaded his shoulder, the back of his neck. He pressed his cheek against Clark's shoulder, face against Clark's neck and let Clark work out the tension.

"It's not your fault. This happens," Clark said, softly.

"What?"

"With people who've been through the sort of thing you have. I've done some reading - -"

God. Lex almost laughed. Clark had been reading. He shut his eyes, swallowing back the lump in his throat.

"I shouldn't have pushed. If you're not ready, you're not ready."

"Stop trying to sound like the adult here."

Clark snorted softly and brushed his lips against the top of Lex's head. Lex let out a long breath, whatever tension had built up to send him off the deep end, dissipated. He pressed his mouth to the pulse behind Clark's jaw. Moved to Clark's lips, tongues grazing and breath mingling. Clark's hands never stopped their rhythmic motion on his back. Soothing, easing away the background static that wanted to creep up and crackle at the edge of his nerves.

This time he didn't need to convince himself this was doable. This time it was just instinct and Clark and it was easy to let himself melt into him.

Until a horse snorted in the barn below and he started, lifting his head and listening for the sound of footsteps.

Clark looked up at him, amused. "Its not my dad. I've got an ear out."

"Forgive me if the idea of your father walking in on us makes me jumpy."

"You're scared of my dad?"

Lex rolled his eyes. He wouldn't have admitted it, not so long ago. No matter how physically intimidating Jonathan Kent could be when he got right up and yelled at you in your face, admitting weakness was simply not acceptable. At present, those Luthor ideals had lost a little of their impact.

"I'm justifiably cautious."

Clark grinned. "I guess it is getting late. And he might decide to make one more trip out here just in case I forgot about getting up early - -"

"Umm. Parents are thoughtful that way."

"So I guess," Clark sat up, dislocating Lex from his prone position to one of straddling Clark's hips. "We should probably go in so he's not sitting in there worrying."

Lex looked down and lifted a brow. "We wouldn't want that."

Clark kissed him, a slow deep one, that made things inside Lex curl up and tighten and quiver. He broke it, licking his lips.

He swung a leg over and reached for his laptop. "If you're planning on being up at the crack of dawn, feel free not to wake me."

Clark grinned and followed him down the loft steps and out of the barn.

To be continued . . .