CHAPTER 7: Deserving (Part 2)

The young tycoon saw her hazel green eyes glisten with unshed tears, her delicately made-up lips just a few breaths away from his, and remembered a night twelve years ago- a night he had never managed to forget for more reasons than one. It was the day Lionel had been sentenced to life imprisonment after Chloe´s testimony in court- the epilogue of a three-month seclusion during which he and General Lane had joined forces to shelter her from harm. She had just resurrected from her exile and escaped almost unscathed from the attack of a meteor freak Lionel had sent to murder her and who Clark and Lois had inadvertently directed to her in their amateurish attempts to prove she wasn´t dead.

Lex could still visualise the bloody corpses of the security detail assigned to Chloe in the safe house he had provided for her and Gabe; he had been on the verge of losing his sanity when he entered the living-room to find Clark already there and saw the blood splattered on the floor and the walls. Then came the rescue from the old foundry- a rescue Lex couldn´t take credit for since Clark had played the hero once again and saved her without giving away his Kryptonian secret. She had survived and helped the young CEO put Lionel away where he belonged, and Lex had cracked.

The trial had lasted long into the afternoon and a limo took Lex and Chloe away from court and the media circus. He distinctly remembered the drive, not so much for what was said as for the thoughts and feelings which were raging inside of him- thoughts and feelings which threatened to consume him. He´d thought he´d feel nothing when the gavel went down and the judge passed the sentence; he´d told himself he was doing a service to the world by putting a monster away. Lionel was as good as dead to him- after all, hadn´t the old man said Lex was worth nothing to him? Hadn´t he committed his first-born to an asylum, subjected him to ethically questionable experiments, tried to murder him? Hadn´t he offered Clark as a lab rat at Summerholt, taken advantage of a heartbroken teenager and attempted to kill her twice? Lex knew he shouldn´t feel anything, but he did and he couldn´t process it. Lionel was a monster, a twisted psychopath who hadn´t hesitated to murder his parents and tried to off his son in a similar fashion; still Lex wanted the bastard to love him and Chloe had learnt about this deep yearning the day she had broken in LuthorCorp on one of her investigative exploits and inhaled that meteor-laced serum which gave her the power to get the truth from anyone.

She was looking at him now just as she had at the hotel room the night the trial was over- the night when Lex had fought against everything that was deeply engrained in him thanks to Lionel- feelings and emotions were only for the weak. She had said nothing, only touched his shoulder as he sat on the sofa with his head in his hands trying to chase away the tears that were threatening to spill and the anguish which was gathering in his chest. He had felt her soothing presence, that delicate feminine perfume of lilacs which reminded him of Lillian, and the dam had broken down. She was the only one who knew- the only one who had heard it from his mouth- that he craved the bastard´s love.

Lex had raised his eyes and met her look- the look of a green seventeen-year-old who had been awakened to the ugliness of life and deceit by a man whose only purpose was to show he could 

manipulate everyone like a puppet master and crush anyone at will. Lex heard the words that left her mouth- words that spoke of love and new beginnings- and locked his eyes with hers; those idealistic green pools promised the world to the jaded twenty-three-year-old son of a bastard. However, Lex chose to see pity in them; it was so much simpler, so much fairer to a girl who had the world before her. He wouldn´t be the Luthor to destroy her, he promised himself the night that he had turned down the gift of her innocence.

Twelve years later they had come full circle. They were back in a hotel room- he more jaded and hurt, and she more mature but still the same girl of the luminous smile who had seen beyond his armour of ruthlessness and cool detachment and offered him the dream of happiness.

¨Lex? ¨she murmured questioningly, leaning closer into him.

´God, forgive me, ´he told himself as he cupped her face with his hand and brushed her lips with his.

She was asking him to believe that dream was possible, and he needed to believe because, despite the years and all the hurting, God or Providence was giving him a second chance to embrace what he had let slip through his fingers.

Although he´d tried to protect her from the darkness in him, she kept coming back to him time and time again. He wanted to put the world at her feet... to give her her childhood dream on a silver platter... The Daily Planet... but it seemed a jaded thirty-something billionaire and father of two was all she wanted. The part of Lillian that still lived in him urged Lex to follow his heart, hold Chloe and never let her go.

The young woman stood on tiptoe and, snaking her arms around his neck, brought her petite frame closer to Lex. Feeling her soft curves pressed against him and savouring the sweet taste of coffee and mint which was so much hers, broke down the last of his defences. He´d forget the Luthor in him till the morning and let the light envelop him. He needed her love and her faith in him to face whatever fate had in store for them come tomorrow.