My Antonia

By Sarah

Disclaimer:Yes, I own them. Hell has frozen over, the devil bought ice skates, and pigs can fly. That is why I am writing fanfiction and have no money. In other words- no, I don't own them. I do own Antonia, Melissa, and anyone you don't recognize. I owe the title to the Willa Cather book by the same name.

Summary: If you thought one Sullivan girl was bad, try having two, in the same small town...

*****************Chapter Four

Antonia was sneaking into her uncle's house at six in the morning, when she nearly collided with Chloe. Chloe nearly screamed until she saw who it was.

"What are you doing here?" Chloe hissds, on her way out for her morning workout.

"Lex has disappeared," Antonia held back the tears that threatened to form. "He hasn't called anyone in about four hours, and his cell phone isn't on..."

"Okay, first of all, you need to calm down, second, I need to investigate, and third, we need to find him," Chloe was already thinking six steps ahead. "Tell me everything you know."

*****************

Lex opened one eye, the only one he could, and winced. His left eye was swollen shut, his head hurt, and his entire body felt like he'd gotten hit by a Mack truck. Light was shining through a crack in the wall. The room was small and looked like the interior of a garden shed. There were tools all over, and except for the lone sliver of light, it was dark. The shed smelled of mold and mildew and reminded Lex of a poem he had read long ago, Root Cellar by Thomas Roethke.

Lex moaned as he felt his last meal and all of that wine, champagne, and so on rise to the back of his throat. He leaned to the side just as his stomach heaved its contents onto the dusty floor. After vomiting, he felt a little less dizzy and a little better.

"Well...well...well...Look who has decided to join the world of the living," a voice came from the doorway behind Lex. He froze as a woman entered. She was dressed head to toe in black leather, her boots had four inch heels, and her long blonde hair was down and wild. She was tall and leggy anyway, but her long, narrow features only emphasized the length. She was not incredibly attractive, but she radiated with confidence. And Lex was scared shitless.

"Who are you?" he managed to croak.

"Call me," she paused to lean in really close, "Missy."

"Melissa Leel? You're the wife of Kyle Leel, he died last month in a car accident," Lex's memories came flooding back. He was going to die.

"Yes, my late husband was Kyle, but it doesn't matter, because I got what I wanted," she smiled a very cat-with-the-canary grin and approached. She made her way to Lex's position.

"I can give you anything you want, just let me know what you want," he told her, reminding himself he wasn't begging.

"Oh, you are," she knelt onto the ground in front of him. "I want to see you hurt as much as my husband did before he died."

"I had nothing-" he was cut off as she slapped him across his left cheek.

"Shut up! I'll do all the talking," Melissa leaned forward. "I hate you. I hate your new girlfriend. I hate your ideas, but most of all, I hate you!" She shoved him and his chair flew to the far wall, four feet away.

"I can help you," Lex explained calmly. He needed to distract her long enough for Tonia to find him. He looked up at his capturess in time to see her fist crash into the side of his face. The last thing he saw was Melissa approaching him. He held onto consciousness just long enough to think one last thought of Antonia, then he gave into the pain. *******************

Chloe and Antonia were sitting in the living room two afternoons later, researching, when there was a knock on the door. Chloe got up to answer it, and she invited the blond woman in.

"I just came by to drop off this for your father," the tall secretary smiled politely.

"Okay, he's not home, but I'll make sure he gets them, Mrs. Leel," Chloe replied as the woman departed.

"Who was that?" Antonia asked from her sprawled position on the couch. Her eyes were brimmed red from exhaustion. Research was spread all around as she and Chloe were desperately trying to piece together a profile.

"Melissa Leel, why?" Chloe asked as Antonia turned and walked to the window. Chloe slowly walked over to her cousin, "Tony?"

"She did it," Antonia said blandly.

"No, she didn't. She couldn't have," the blonde tried to protect her dad's secretary.

"Why not, why couldn't she have!?! For that matter, why couldn't Clark have done it, or Pete, or Lionel, or Bruce, or someone that just walked by!? Why not!?! Why did it have to be Lex?" Antonia's tears welled up in her eyes, but she refused to give anyone the benefit of seeing them.

Chloe said nothing and just hugged her cousin. The two stood there, next to the window, basking in the comfort the other provided. After a while, Antonia pulled away and sat back down to the research.

"Chloe, who would want revenge for something Lex hasn't neccessarily done but could have been involved in?" the dark-haired woman suddenly asked as realization hit.

"Um...Lots of people I guess. Why?" Chloe was quite confused. Her cousin was probably going crazy with all her emotions, and as far as Chloe knew, Antonia didn't share emotions.

"What if this pyschopath has decided that Lex was responsible for this travesty, even if he wasn't? This could make the person believe that Lex should pay for whatever was done, and this, inturn, could create a "darker" side of the person," Antonia was on a roll now. "This means that the situtation could have happened within the last six months. Which means we need to double cross all of the recent accident reports with employees at Luth-sorry, LexCorp."

"I've got it covered. Tony, why don't you go take a nap? I can call Clark and we can go through this in no time," Chloe was trying to help her cousin, she knew this was going to be a big burden for her.

"No, I need to see this through to the end," Tony insisted, shaking her head.

"And how much good will it do Lex if, when we find him, you can't help because you're suffering from exhaustion?" Chloe easily countered her cousin.

"Fine, wake me the moment you find anything, and I mean anything," Antonia agreed, she went up to her room to take just an hour long nap.

Chloe phoned Clark and asked him to come over. Getting there in record time, Clark helped Chloe narrow the suspect list down in no time, and when she wasn't looking, Clark snuck in a few fast scans. Within two hours they had the list narrowed down to twenty people.

Clark and Chloe were sitting on the couch, going over the list just one more time, when Antonia came downstairs. She was very rumpled.

"I thought I told you to wake me when you found something," Antonia scolded. She sat down in the armchair next to Chloe's side of the couch.

"We would if we had found something," Chloe answered, looking at her cousin.

"Let me look at the list," Antonia held her hand out for the printout. She picked up a pen from the coffee table, which was littered with papers, and went through the list, making marks where she thought fit. She muttered little comments as she went through. Then, after a bit, she handed the paper back to Chloe.

"Fran Hannle, Charles Kendall, Meli-" Chloe looked up sharply. "Why Melissa Leel?"

"I narrowed it down to people's whose spouses or children had died. She just happened to be on the list of five people," the dark-haired woman shrugged.

"Why don't we just split up the whole list? I can call Pete and Lana, and we can each take four," Clark suggested, trying to be the peacemaker.

"That sounds like a good idea, Clark," Antonia said, too tired to do much fighting. "Use my cell," she tossed it at the friends.

Clark called Pete while Chloe called Lana, and in twenty minutes, the five were sitting around the kitchen table with the list of suspects and a map of Smallville.

"Okay, we are looking for any type of storage facillity in the back yard or somewhere on the property. Also, if the suspect tries to avoid talking to you, it could mean something. Lastly, and this goes more for Chloe and myself, if there is anything unusual, do not, and I repeat do not, go on without someone. We'll meet back here in an hour to brief," Antonia nodded and checked everyone.

"One thing," Pete asked. At Antonia's nod, he continued, "What are we supposed to talk to them about?"

"Say you are taking a poll on which fundraiser would be most effective for the school and try to get them to talk about it," Antonia answered, her voice tired. Everyone looked at the map one last time and split up. They all took their own cars, or in Clark's case, said they were going to get their car.

Antonia had the last five, and she had a feeling none of them had anything to do with it. Three were in their late fifties, early sixties, and all their spouses had died by car accidents. The fourth one was an elderly woman whose son had died by one of the "Freaks-of-the-Weeks." The fourth was a young man whose daughter had died in a boating accident. None were really shocking nor did they involve Lex in anyway.

Lana had had two couples and a middle-aged man. The couples had just been in accidents and one of the four was paralyzed. The middle-aged man's wife had left him for a janitor in the plant, and she had died when her plane crashed. All were talkative and helpful.

Clark's list consisted of the first five people, none of which seemed too avoid him, and all of which lived in an apartment complex or the senior center. Pete's were all victims of "Freaks-of-the-weeks" and two had moved.

Chloe's people were the interesting ones. One was a couple whose son had died last week, and they weren't very cooperative. The third person had been fired by Lionel after her husband ran off with Lionel's secretary, but the person had been hired back by Lex. The fourth person was a young man whose father had died in a farming accident related to LuthorCorp. The last one on her list was Melissa Leel. Since she only had five minutes left, Chloe decided to go home and maybe avoid going to the Leels'.

When the five regrouped, it was decided that two would go to the Leels' front door, two others would sneak around behind the house, and the last would stay in a car with the engine on for an easy escape route, if they were right.

Chloe thought it would be best for her and Lana to go to the front door. They were two teenage girls, and Chloe knew Melissa. Antonia and Clark would go around back, and Pete, after some arguement, would stay in his car with Antonia's cell phone. Pete, knowing Clark's secret, decided it would be best to send him with Antonia, but that made it no less difficult. *******************