Better Than Anyone

By: aspdstra

A/N: So of course nothing is ever the way it seems in Writer Land. You think you'll be ready and rearing with new material and then a mack truck hits your life. I had this chapter already written as well, just no time to post it. At any rate, thanks to the reviewers/followers/favoriters (especially The Fallen Sky, holy hell do you know how to make someone's day). Things get a little more heated in this bit too so snaps to those of you who dig that sort of thing. I'm hoping it won't be another 9 months before I finish this. R&R just the same!

By the time Clark had rejoined humanity, or at least the part of humanity that was represented in the Kent kitchen, he was pleasantly surprised to find two things: luggage, and a fast-talking Lois yammering away on her cell about airline tickets. He approached the familiar sight of Chloe, sitting on a bar stool and nursing what looked like a mug of hot chocolate.

"Any idea what's going on," he whispered into her ear while taking a seat next to her.

She looked at him. "Well as it turns out, Senator Kent's presence at the National Education Convention is required sooner rather than later - apparently she was supposed to leave tomorrow, but now they want her there by tomorrow -"

"And Lois is having a hard time switching the flights."

Nodding, she finished her thought. "Exactly."

Clark eyed Lois in her heated debate. "It's a wonder she hasn't won over whoever it is with her sunny charm and disposition."

She begrudged the giggle that came out of her. "Yeah…so…I guess 'later' might be here sooner than you think."

He barely had a chance to gulp when his mom came in from the family room to hang up the house phone.

"That was Lionel. I told him about our troubles," she paused briefly to throw a worried look in Lois' loud direction, "and it seems he's generously offered us the service of his private jet."

Clark and Chloe looked at each other skeptically, then at Martha, who in turn voiced their inaudible opinions. "And yes, I know that it seems odd for me to even be considering taking him up on his offer, but…he has proven himself."

The pointed looks she gave them didn't go unnoticed, but the moment was shattered by Lois' irate entry. "Seriously, if I never meet another brainless, pig-headed, egotistical…what's with all the 'conspiracy theory' faces?"

No answer.

Chloe, ever being the one to think on her feet, interjected. "Lionel's letting you use his jet."

Lois transferred her stare to Mrs. Kent. "You told him no way in hell, right?" Martha evaded eye contact, so Lois pressed on. "Right?"

"Not in those words. At first, I just…kindly refused. But Lois really, what other choice do we have? We need to be there by tomorrow morning…and judging by your little maniacal dissertation a minute ago, we didn't get our original tickets switched over to tonight, did we?"

Clark snorted a laugh at Lois' expense and was prepared to keep enjoying the experience until Chloe gently elbowed him in the ribs. It didn't hurt, but it shut him up, and Martha had a motherly glare of disdain ready for him in case Chloe needed back-up.

Ignoring Clark, Lois relented. "Fine. I guess if we have to…" The faint sound of a car honking appeared to be her final straw. "Okay. NO ONE is that fast."

Martha grinned at Lois' antics and started gathering their things. "He'd already sent his limo driver over before I even spoke with him. I guess he knew we were desperate."

"Gotta love those Luthors…anticipating needs, one Kent at a time," Clark said in an uncharacteristically snarky manner.

Even Chloe had to laugh. "How long have you been keeping that one hidden away?"

He smirked. "Wouldn't you like to know…"

They shared a knowing eye exchange, hinted with some not-so-subtle flirting, but neither Martha nor Lois took notice amidst the bustle of departure.

"Okay Clark, sweetie, Lois and I will be back tomorrow, kind of late, so you'll be on your own for dinner -"

"I'll check in on him and see what I can do, Mrs. Kent," Chloe cut in, doing a little need-anticipating of her own.

Martha smiled gratefully while giving Clark his goodbye kiss. "Thanks Chloe, stay as long as you like. You two try to stay out of trouble."

"Yeah, and don't have too much of my cake - I think it made the goat a little tipsy," Lois called over her luggage-burdened shoulder on her way out the door with Martha.

Chloe and Clark stood shoulder to shoulder, waving and seeing them off. It wasn't until they saw the brake lights disappear around the bend that they closed the door and looked at each other.

Chloe grinned. "Well…turns out I can stay as long as I like."

Clark leaned on the door behind him, tucking his hands in his pockets. "I heard." Another one of their quiet eye exchanges took place before he grinned and spoke again. "So what am I going to do with you?"

Her grin turned into a smirk and she slid her arms through his so they circled around his waist, their lower halves pressing together. "I dunno, Clark…what are you going to do with me?"

Borrowing one of his hands, he caressed the side of her face, slowly brushing a blonde strand of hair behind her ear. Seemingly on its own, his mouth connected with hers for a moment until he felt the need to say something. "We need to talk."

Chloe let him know what she thought of that idea by reinitiating the kiss, this time using her tongue to make sure the message came across loud and clear. He straightened an inch or five so his height once again became an advantage, though that was as far as he got where regaining control of the situation was concerned. Before he knew it, they'd traveled up the stairs, down the hallway, and through the door leading to his bedroom. He almost tripped over a laundry basket in the middle of the floor, forgivably distracted with both the task of kissing and Chloe's hands wandering underneath his shirt.

It wasn't long before the shirt, and numerous parts of his resolve, were disposed of, and the two of them came tumbling down on top of his bed with a ceremonious thud. A muffled moan from Chloe signaled that he might've been crushing her a bit, but she gave no other indication of a complaint, her fingers working nimbly at the belt and button fastening his jeans. A sudden burst of reality brought things to a shuddering halt, and Clark shot off the bed, skin flushed and thoroughly out of breath.

"Chloe wait -"

In a similarly disoriented predicament, Chloe sat up, fixing him with a curious stare tinged with slight annoyance. "Clark, what's the matter?"

He fumbled over his words, the lack of oxygen not helping him in any way. "I…w…" Her raised eyebrow gave him a clue that she wasn't in the mood for any of his typical bumbling excuses, so he tried his best to express accurately what he was trying to say. "We can't do this, Chloe."

She'd had a feeling something like this would come up; she'd just been hoping that maybe, just maybe, there would've been more of a delay between then and now. Swallowing hard, she decided he'd have to make it a little harder than that if he wanted her go give up so easily. "Do you mind explaining to me what you mean by that?"

He could tell by her wounded tone that she thought he had stopped things from progressing for an entirely different reason than he actually had, so he backtracked. "It's not - it's not that I don't want to. That's not it at all. I j…"

Sighing, she shook her head. "What, Clark…"

Clark gulped and pressed through, the truth of the situation having long passed the point of being avoided. "I just don't want to hurt you." She hadn't been expecting that. Good. Still, he felt uneasy being so vulnerable on the subject - maybe even a little embarrassed, and he had a feeling his body language might have given him away. "When I'm doing…the kinds of things we were doing, I get…I feel like my brain is really…fuzzy. Like I'm losing control."

Her skeptical expression melted away into endearment, and she smiled at him. "Clark…that's kind of the whole point. Come 'ere…" She patted the space next to her and waited until he occupied it before gently stroking his back and threading her fingers through his hair. "One of the best parts about…that…is you do lose your mind a little, y'know? You don't think so much."

"But that's the problem, Chloe," he interjected. "I've seen what happens when I don't think - when I'm not in control…of my abilities. Bad things happen…people get hurt. And I couldn't stand it if you were one of those people. I'd never forgive myself."

Her smile warmed at his sincerity as she continued to offer tactile comfort. "I hear what you're saying, Clark, I do…but…being on a maniacal rampage and reeking havoc while under the influence of meteor rocks is a little different than having sex." She saw he was prepared to interrupt her again, and she silenced him with an index finger on his lips. "And I know you think that it's basically the same thing, but it's not. The difference is none of those people are conscious of what you can do - none of them know who you really are. And I'm glad that I do…because I know that you would never hurt me, Clark…not even if you thought you couldn't help it. I trust you…more than I've ever trusted anyone…I even trust you with my life, which I don't think for a second is at risk in the first place, but I'm just letting you know." She added that in speedily when she saw his expression turn worrisome, the corner of her mouth quirking in a grin. "You don't have to be scared. I'm not."

Clark soon matched her grin and looked down momentarily at the material of his jeans. Well…when she put it that way. His reluctance and reservation notwithstanding, he had a feeling he wasn't going to win this argument. He also knew Chloe was no fool - in fact far from it - so if she could trust him, maybe he could trust himself too.

Turning his face toward her, he looked into her eyes before leaning in and capturing her mouth in a languid kiss, which she readily reciprocated, her hand reaching up to cradle his face while he slid an arm around her. Clark eventually used the arm as leverage in bringing her onto his lap, her thighs resting on either side of him, and he returned the disrobing favor, slowly working her top up and over her torso and tossing it somewhere unimportant. He took a moment to appreciate the bra she was wearing (since she probably wasn't going to be wearing it that much longer), or moreover what was being covered by the bra - yeah, there was definitely some more detailed exploration required. Her neck arched toward his mouth as he paid special attention to the spot behind her ear and rolled them over, placing her gently underneath him and settling in the space between her legs.

What probably surprised Chloe more than anything was the level of expertise Clark had seemed to acquire in the art of foreplay. She'd, of course, always had her hopes that Clark would eventually learn how to woo her in an effective manner - but even that meant assuming she would have to show him a thing or two first. Once again, Clark Kent proved he was full of surprises. In his own time, he moved his efforts away from her neck and kissed a trail down the middle of her torso, his lips nearly burning the skin left in their wake while his hands finished the task of unbuttoning her jeans and working them down and over her hips. Thankfully, they were easily disposed of, and Clark returned his attentions to the spot on her abdomen between her navel and the low-riding elastic of her underwear where he continued placing open-mouthed kisses around her hipbones and along her inner thigh. Her eyes fell shut briefly but it proved long enough to miss one open-mouthed kiss in particular, positioned keenly over the apex of her thighs, and she felt the slightest hint of teeth strategically graze the concealed bundle of nerves.

Now that wasn't very nice.

Well okay…it was very nice, but it was also very, very cruel. She inhaled sharply with a gasp that tapered off into a moan and some muddled version of his name, which only served to encourage and entertain him that much more, as proven by the smirk adorning his badly behaving mouth. That was it. Things needed to move quicker or one of them was going to die.

Desperately out of breath already, Chloe eased him away from her into a standing position and pointed to his lower half. He took the silent gesture as a command to get rid of the clothing he still wore, which consisted of basically everything but his long-forgotten T-shirt. She figured he'd be kept busy for a little while and went to work getting rid of her bra. No sooner had she turned her head and blinked then she found him in the exact position she'd made him abandon moments before, now completely naked and sliding her underwear down and off her legs. He'd used his powers on her, that tricky, clever little bastard. When had Clark Kent become so…naughty? So decidedly devilish? Whatever was responsible for the change, she decided she liked it and pushed the thought far back into the recesses of her mind.