Promise Me, Chapter 9

Clark/Chloe
Season 6, "Promise"
Rating: Adult. If you're under eighteen, please go elsewhere now.
Disclaimer: These characters belong to the CW and DC Comics, not to me.
Read Chapter 8 here.
Read the story from the beginning here.

Clark made love to Chloe a second time, more slowly, but just as fervently. True to his word, he didn't freak out on her this time, not even when his heat vision activated. In fact, he seemed to really be enjoying himself, if his groans and gasps and cries were any indication.

Afterward, he buried his nose in her hair and shifted slightly so that he wasn't pressing her into the wall. Obviously he was trying harder not to squish her.

"Chlo," he said, sounding so relaxed that his voice had slowed to a drawl. Their bodies were still linked, and she could feel their combined moisture wetting her thighs. "I guess I better go talk to Lana now."

She lifted her head and looked back at him. She apparently didn't manage to keep the slight trepidation she felt out of her eyes, because he smiled wryly.

"No, I am not going to ask her to run off with me." His arms tightened around her. "Have some faith in me, Chlo. I wouldn't have made love to you if you weren't the one I wanted."

Her moment of worry faded, and she smiled up at him. Clark wanted her, not Lana. Everything was perfect.

"All right," she answered. "Just come back to me soon, okay?"

His smile widened.

"I promise."

*****

By the time Lana heard the heavy clomp of Clark's workboots on the polished hardwood floor of the hallway, she was already fully dressed in her wedding gown, and was working on attaching the long tulle headpiece to her hair. He knocked, and she glided over to the door and opened it.

Clark stood there in the long hallway, looking rumpled and disheveled. He'd obviously just finished having sex with Chloe in the wine cellar, and hadn't done a particularly good job finger combing his hair afterward. Bastard.

She lifted an eyebrow in a supercilious way she'd borrowed from Lex. "Yes?"

She'd expected him to shuffle his feet in nervous embarrassment. The farmboy she'd always known did that a lot, whenever he was in a situation that made him uncomfortable. But Clark seemed to have grown up a bit in the past hour, because he didn't shift his weight from foot to foot, or stare at the floor, or do any of the things that showed that he was nervous. He just looked at her steadily.

"We need to talk."

She lifted her chin, trying to look regal. "I don't think we have anything to talk about."

"Don't do that." His voice was sharp. "Quit acting like you're the wounded party here, Lana. You've got no reason to be upset with me."

"You told me you loved me." She heard the brittleness in her own tone, but couldn't seem to prevent it. "You said you loved me. You asked me to leave Lex. And then... and then you and Chloe..."

He sighed, and some of the annoyance drained out of his eyes. "I was wrong," he said. "I guess I loved Chloe all along, but I just didn't realize it."

She tried to look like he hadn't just stabbed a knife through her heart, metaphorically speaking. "You never seemed to love her all that much before."

"I was scared," he answered simply. "I was afraid to admit to myself what I really felt for her. But I don't see why you should care, anyway. Last week you told me you'd decided to marry Lex."

She swallowed hard to steady her voice. "You're right," she said softly. "I don't really care all that much. I love Lex." She tried to force a smile, but she suspected it was wobbly and unconvincing. "I guess... I guess my ego was just a little bruised."

Some of the hardness left his expression, and he smiled slightly. "Yeah, I guess I can understand that. We're okay, then?"

She looked at him, imagining him strapped to a lab table, begging for mercy. The orgasmic feeling of heat built in her again, swirling low in her abdomen, until she throbbed with it.

"Yes," she said, smiling back at him. "We're okay."

"Good." He dropped his eyes and shuffled his feet. Apparently the nervous farmboy was back. "And, um, the other stuff you saw..."

She thought about denying she'd seen anything, then decided that was fruitless. "You mean the part where you appeared out of nowhere, ripped the door off its hinges, and then soldered it back on with your eyes?"

He glanced up and nodded, still looking extremely uncomfortable.

"You're obviously a meteor freak," she said calmly. "But the truth is, I already suspected that."

"Yeah." He glanced away again, looking even more awkward than before, and she wondered if there was something else he was concealing. "Yeah, well, the thing is, I was wondering if you could, you know, not tell anyone."

She raised her eyebrows, doing her best to look offended. "You mean like Lex?"

"Especially Lex, yeah."

"Of course I won't tell anyone, Clark. Not Lex. Not anyone. You can trust me."

He turned his head and looked at her, his green eyes deadly serious. "You promise?"

She looked back. In her mind's eye she imagined herself and Lex standing there, watching him writhe in pain, listening to him pleaed for her to stop torturing him. She imagined him bloodied and beaten, imagined tears running down his face, imagined the sound of his voice screaming in agony. The images made a warm pleasure surge through her veins and light up her nerves.

She looked up at him with her sweetest smile.

"I promise," she said.

*****

"I really have to get ready for the wedding," Chloe said. She trotted up the stone stairs of the wine cellar next to Clark. "I'm kind of a mess right now."

He glanced at her, seeing her disheveled hair and clothing, smelling the odor of sex that clung to her, and he grinned, feeing really happy for the first time in too long a time. "I think you look great."

"Please." She rolled her eyes. "The truth is, I really don't want to attend the wedding. After what Lana did..."

"She seemed like she was sorry, Chlo."

"Did she say she was sorry?"

Clark thought about it. "Well, no, but... she was just curious. I think you of all people can relate to that."

Chloe made a little snort of disgust. "Yeah, except when I'm curious I don't lock people into refrigerated stone prisons."

"I don't think she intended to leave you there to freeze, Chlo. She was right outside."

"Still, that's not the way BFFs behave."

"No, it's not. You're right. But she did promise not to tell anyone my secret. Especially Lex."

"That's something, I guess." Chloe sighed, and he saw a flicker of sorrow in her eyes. He guessed she was just as distressed by Lana's betrayal as he was. "I promised I'd be her maid of honor, so I don't suppose I can really back out at this stage. But I don't think the two of us can ever be really close friends again."

"Yeah." He nodded as they left the house and emerged into bright sunlight. "I can understand that."

She headed for her Yaris, which was parked on the sweeping circular driveway, and he trailed behind her. "I have to go get my gown on. But I'll see you at the wedding. You are going to be there, right?"

"Are you kidding?" He grinned. "You really think I'd pass up a chance to see you in a formal gown?"

"I wouldn't want to miss the chance to see you in a tux, either. And besides, it'll give us a chance to spend some more time together."

At the car, she turned around to face him, and he bent to kiss her goodbye. Just for a second, he thought he saw a pale face at one of the upper windows, staring at them. Watching them. But then it disappeared.

"I'm looking forward to it," he said, and brushed his lips over hers.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and held him close for a moment. "And you're going to dance with me, right? Because you owe me a dance, farmboy."

"Of course I'm going to dance with you." He put his arms around her and pulled her against his chest, remembering a dance they'd shared, long ago, which had been interrupted because of Lana.

But now he realized he didn't love Lana, and he was no longer afraid of hurting Chloe. There were no obstacles left between him and Chloe, nothing that could possibly interfere in their relationship.

"Trust me, Chlo," he said into her hair. "This time, nothing is going to get between us. Nothing."

She sighed against his chest, sounding just as happy as he felt. "Really?"

He smiled and held her a little more tightly.

"I promise," he said.

-The End-