Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Lois & Clark Fanfic What a Gentleman Desires (1/3)

What A Gentleman Desires - TOC

By VirginiaR

Inspired by KatherineKent’s suggestion

Rated PG

***Part 1 of 3***

Lois opened her eyes, closed them again to wipe the sleepers away, and then opened them to verify that yes, indeed, she had woken up before her alarm clock. By two minutes.

Argh!

Well, that gave her two minutes to think about that strange dream she just had. That was what had woken her up. Clark was acting so odd, so out of character, it felt as if he were from another planet or something… not that he was. If he were from Krypton…

She settled back against her pillows to imagine the possibilities.

Locked doors? No problem!

Two seconds to find a secret document? Easy peasy.

Tailing the suspect? Ha! Give us a real challenge.

Kisses to melt her kneecaps? Oh, wait, Clark already had those.

Sigh.

Unfortunately, they were never real. They were always a charade to cover up something else. To distract her from crazy, paranoid, armed men. To say goodbye. To pretend that they were about to make love.

Sigh.

Lois settled into that last memory for an extra second. The weight of his body against hers. His hand upon her hair. The want so obvious with his lips pressing against hers. The shift of his hips. She had thought…

Well, it didn’t matter what she had thought. It wasn’t real. The maid had burst in and then turned around and left, none too quickly Lois could add, and Clark had gotten up as if nothing had happened, but something had. Lois's world had shifted, tilted on its side, irreparably damaged.

Okay, fine. She hadn’t acknowledged it then how much her world had shifted, but when she had realized it, he had to go and tell her that it was all a lie.

Bleep! Bleep! Ble…

She slammed her hand down on her alarm clock. Lois sat up, smashed her pillow with her fist, and dragged her feet out of bed.

If she were going to have insane dreams, why couldn’t she dream something ridiculous like Clark as Superman? Clark, who couldn’t open that jar of pickles the other day, with the ability to literally sweep her off her feet. Now, there was a crazy thought. Instead, she had dreamed of Clark being so one-sided. Could she ever see him being so cardboard? So much like a stereotypical man, instead of the sweet, genuine, caring…

Impossible!

Clark would never think like the man in her dream! Certainly, never act like that. Maybe she had just dreamed about a man who just happened to look like Clark.

It wasn’t Clark.

It was a Clark clone.

Although, why would she dream about a Clark clone when the only real clone she’d met was Superman’s? Then again, the Superman clone had acted a bit like that Clark from her dream. Anyway, who would clone Clark? Well, besides Lois. It might explain his odd behavior as of late, though.

I love you… I’ve been in love with you for a long, long time. You had to have known.

It wasn’t true. I would’ve said anything, done anything, to stop you from marrying Luthor.

Lois frowned. Now, why did she have to go and think about that?

Oh, right. Morning. Time to face reality once more. Put a plastic smile on her face and wonder why Clark Kent wasn’t interested in her, while she secretly longed for him in her heart.

Lois stood up and padded over to the bathroom.

She should’ve known. All the signs were there.

He had sent her to the Sewage Reclamation Facility. If Clark really had been in love with her since he first met her, he never would have done that. He wouldn’t have chanced her hating him forever, instead of respecting him for standing up for her. Actually, if it had been anyone else, hate would have been her go-to emotion with revenge close behind. There was just something about Clark that was so… so… forgivable.

Hell, the two of them had been sprayed with pheromone perfume and he hadn’t stooped to do a striptease for her! Even Superman couldn’t resist Lois under Revenge’s power, but Clark only caved after two days of her throwing herself at him.

But for two whole days, Clark had been able to resist her full frontal assault on his senses. So, what does that prove?

One: Clark was a true gentleman.

Two: Clark was human, a true male in every sense of the word, and heterosexual. He had caved after all.

Three: Clark really and truly wasn’t interested in her for more than a friend; although, if she stripped for him again, he might take friends with benefits.

The big question was why. She was in good shape. She had intelligence. She could be witty. She was reasonably hot in a classy non-stripper like Cat Grant sort of way. Johnny Taylor thought so when he hired her for the Metro Club. Lex Luthor thought enough of her to propose! And he had been the third richest man in the world. Well, the second richest man, third richest individual, and top most scum of the Earth, but that was beside the point.

Lois turned on her shower.

Clark didn’t even try to make a move on her that night she had burst into his apartment last week when Kyle Griffin was stalking her. He had offered to let her stay the night… on his couch. He had even cuddled with her while they watched the movie, but not once did he try to make a move on her. True, she wasn’t looking her best that night, but still… something like that wouldn’t matter to Clark.

It shouldn’t matter to the man she thought Clark was.

Maybe he was as flawed as the Clark in her dream was.

***

Clark knocked on Lois’s door. Waited. When her hair dryer switched off, he knocked again.

He could hear her cursing to herself as she approached the door. He wasn’t trying to overhear what she was saying, he just could. “It’s me, Lois,” he said, so she wouldn’t have to peek through the hole.

Lois paused by the door for ten seconds before he heard her unlock the top two locks and the bottom one. Hadn’t she recognized his voice? Perhaps he shouldn’t have assumed that she would. It wasn’t as if they hadn’t been working together all that long. A year, close to eighteen months now. Although, he could easily calculate the exact length of time that had passed since he had first set eyes on…

Clark heard her footsteps moving away from the door. His brow furrowed. What now? Should he have lifted up her coffee, so she had known he had come bearing breakfast?

“It’s open,” she called from down her hall.

O-kay.

He opened the door tentatively and entered.

“I’m not quite ready,” she said from down her hall once he closed her front door, and then she swore at herself again.

“Are you all right?” Clark asked, tempted to peek and see, but knowing he shouldn’t, and so he didn’t.

“Fine. I just overslept. I’ll be right out.”

“Do you want me to take a look at your alarm clock?”

“Why would you want to do that?” Lois queried.

“Because you overslept,” he replied.

“I set my alarm clock, Clark.”

“But it didn’t go off this morning,” he said.

Lois came down the hall hopping on one foot as she put on her high heel. “Who said it didn’t go off?” she asked.

“But you said…” Clark said as she peered around the corner of her hall and he lost his train of thought as one of her beautiful brunette locks slipped across her face like a veil. Quickly realizing the direction of his mind, he shook his head. “Never mind.”

She leaned against the corner, still mostly out of sight, and pulled on her other shoe. “Was that a roundabout attempt to see inside my bedroom, Kent?” she asked in a sly tone of voice.

He flushed. He couldn’t see his face, so he didn’t know how red it was, but it sure felt hotter than that two-alarm fire Superman had helped put out at last night. He glanced away, not wanting her to see how much her words had affected him, and he mumbled some sort of feeble apology.

“Just as I thought,” Lois said and disappeared back down her hall.

She had thought he was trying to worm his way into her bedroom? Me?

“If I ever gave you the impression that I would… I’m so sorry, Lois, I would never, never invade…” he started in with a more heartfelt and adamant apology, but she stopped him once more with her presence. This time, it was her full body, which came around the bend, taking away his breath. How did she do that? His record for holding his breath had been twenty minutes when he had arrived in Metropolis, yet around Lois Lane it fell down to less than twenty seconds.

She smiled at him. “I know, Clark, that’s just what I thought.”

“Oh,” he murmured, and felt his cooling face warm again.

He hated that his love for Lois was written across his forehead in permanent ink. Not that it was permanent, but that it was there for all to see. He feared that everyone could see the writing on Superman’s face as well, how much he loved her.

How could he not love Lois? She had the fieriest, most opinionated, most stubborn, most intelligent personality he had ever had the pleasure of coming across, and it was all stuffed inside this petite frame with legs that never ended, eyes he could stare into for hours on end, and often did, and luxurious silky hair that gave him chills whenever it brushed his cheek.

Lois Lane was explosive. That was just what she was. She had all this personality bottled up inside the body of a goddess, and if she didn’t let it out, he was sure she would self-combust. He honestly believed that was why they would be a perfect fit. She needed someone with the strength of Superman to help her stay together, sometimes literally. And he needed… well, simply, her.

Clark held out his hand. “Your coffee,” he said, changing the subject.

She smiled at him as if he had told her that Superman had personally made it himself and kissed the cup before handing it to Clark to give to her. Tempting though that might be, Clark knew his boundaries and that certainly would be crossing the line. But, oh, to know that his kiss would be caressing her palm, while she drank her coffee…

“Thanks,” Lois said briskly, taking the coffee, and picking up her briefcase. “Ready?”

He nodded and followed her out the door.

As she locked her numerous locks, she said, “You know, Clark, it’s about time… long past time, actually, for you and me to eat lunch at my Uncle Mike’s.”

“Pardon?” he asked, knowing he heard her correctly but still not understanding.

“My Uncle Mike’s Café Americana is over on the Southside. Don’t play coy with me, Kent. You know all about my father’s brother, the ex-Marine, who bakes like a dream. I’m sure you read all about him when you researched my background when we became partners,” Lois said, heading down the hall to the elevator.

His jaw dropped open. “I would never…”

“Really? You let yourself be partnered up with someone whom you’ve never done a background check on?” she scoffed, clearly not believing him.

“I didn’t have to do a background check on you, Lois,” he retorted. “When you’re partnered with the best, you just give thanks, and try to keep up. Everything else doesn’t matter.”

Lois raised an eyebrow at him. He knew flattery where her ego was concerned was the best way to sooth the Mad Dog, not that he had said anything that could be refuted. She merely shook her head and took a sip of her coffee.

“Anyway,” she started up again, once the elevator doors opened. “We should have lunch down there today.”

Seeing that she had forgiven him for his journalistic faux pas, Clark couldn’t help but smile radiantly at her. She wouldn’t have to ask twice. He would follow her to the moon if she asked, and she knew it. “That sounds nice.”

*

“Don’t think you’re not paying, either,” Lois said, skipping down the steps of her front stoop. “You still owe me for your losses at the poker table.”

“I’ll be forever in your debt,” he replied from behind her.

“If you keep playing like that, you will be,” she said, realizing that she was walking down the street alone. Turning around, she saw that Clark was holding the door to her building open for that blonde woman in 404 with her two towhead kids, babe in her arm, and another one on the way.

Bet she isn’t thinking that ‘blondes have more fun,’ now, Lois thought to herself.

As soon as the family passed through, Clark smiled at them and jogged to catch up with Lois.

“You’re going to miss a bunch of scoops being that gentlemanly, Clark,” she warned.

“Good thing you’ll be right there to catch them for us, then,” he replied. “Partner.”

“Just see to it that I’m not stuck doing all the heavy lifting,” she retorted.

Clark smiled at her in that way he did as if he found something funny in what she said. “I’ll be sure hold up my end,” he assured her.

“What?”

“I’ll be sure…”

“No, what’s with the smile?” Lois probed, pointing at his face.

“I can’t smile?”

“Don’t be silly, Clark. Nobody can smile like you do,” she snapped.

Instead of disappearing, his smile only grew larger, more radiant, as if harnessing the power of the sun.

“What does it mean, though?” Lois said, stopping and jabbing him in the chest.

Clark chuckled. “Does a smile have to mean anything, Lois? Can’t I just smile because today is a beautiful day, and we’re outside enjoying the sunshine as we walk to work?”

Lois pressed her lips together and harrumphed before continuing to march down the street. She hated it when he avoided her questions with questions. She was a reporter. She knew what he was doing.

Several blocks later, they missed the pedestrian crossing because Clark had stopped to help a couple of Norwegian tourists find their way to their hotel. Of course, Clark spoke Norwegian. The man had been more places in the world and had a better ear for languages than Superman had.

As she waited, drinking her coffee and tapping her foot, Lois was reminded of her dream. She looked this pair of tourists over and wondered if Clark had volunteered to help just because he could speak their language or because they were blonde, buxom co-eds, who didn’t realize that shorty-shorts weren’t appropriate in Metropolis in autumn, or ever. Really, they could cause a major ten-car pile-up with those outfits. It seemed that even her partner wasn’t immune to feminine wiles.

The question was why didn’t he notice hers?

Clark pointed down the street, gave some directions, and handed the tourists back their map. The co-eds smiled, waved, and said something that sounded an awful lot like a recommendation for a date to Lois’s ears before they walked on.

“What nice girls,” Clark said to Lois, rejoining her to wait for the pedestrian crossing to change again.

“Clark, can we just get one thing straight? If they’re old enough for you to date, they’re ‘women’ not ‘girls’,” Lois corrected, starting across the street despite the red hand.

He grabbed her arm and held her back as another crazy Metro cabbie zipped by. “They’re nineteen, and only just graduated from high school, Lois. Certainly not old enough for me to date; therefore, ‘girls’ was the right word,” he said, letting go of her arm two seconds later as the red hand became a green walking person.

“I bet Jimmy would side with me,” Lois grumbled, although inwardly smiled that he considered those potential runway models still children.

“Jimmy’s twenty-one, and therefore they would fall within five years of his age. So, of course, he would side with you,” Clark replied, and then added almost under his breath, “Plus, he values his health.”

“What?” Lois snapped, tripping over the curb on the other side of the street.

“What, what?” he returned, catching her elbow and making sure she didn’t fall.

Sometimes, she just wanted to clobber that man, she thought, jerking her elbow away from him. Maybe it would knock some sense into him.

*

Lois brushed off the droplets of coffee that had landed on her sleeve when she tripped. “By your logic, Clark, you should be calling…” She paused. “You’re twenty-eight, now, right?” Then she continued before he could do more than nod. “Twenty-three year old women ‘girls’.”

Clark was tired of this subject. Something was clearly bothering Lois. “Granted, Lois. You’re right, and I’m sorry.”

Her step perked up at this acknowledgement. She glanced over at him under her lashes and gave him a shy smile, which caused his heart to skip a beat.

“Are you annoyed that I stopped to help those girls?” he asked, and then quickly corrected himself. “Women?”

“No, no,” Lois said slowly. “It’s best that they went to their hotel room to change, since someone obviously had stolen their clothes.”

Suddenly, he knew what was wrong. “Were you jealous of those women?”

“Those girls?” Lois scoffed. “Hardly.”

“You’re so jealous!” he crowed. “Just as you were jealous of Toni Taylor of the Metro gang. Admit it!”

“I’ll admit that Toni Taylor irked me, but I was not jealous!” Lois insisted. “I still can’t see how you were interested in that… that…” She paled. “Woman.”

“I wasn’t. Charlie King was. It was just a cover, Lois, just as you weren’t really interested in Stoke,” he reminded her. “Anyway, you’re the one who brought up the whole ‘diagram’ scenario.” Point to him. “It’s not my fault that Toni found me more charming than Johnny Taylor found you.”

Her lips pressed together in a frown. “Johnny Taylor hired me because of my legs. He never even heard me sing or dance until rehearsals,” she said. “Are you going to tell me that you didn’t enjoy kissing Toni?”

He grinned and leaned closer. “I’ve kissed better.” Namely, you, Lois Lane.

“Who? That other Toni?” At his confused expression, she continued. “Dr. Antoinette Baines?”

“Oh. I didn’t kiss her!” Although, Clark thought, he bet Lex Luthor had with Dr. Baines and then some, but that wound was still too raw for him to mention.

Lois scoffed. “I was sitting right there, Clark. You kissed.”

But her back had been towards him. How had she known Toni had kissed him? “What was I supposed to do? Head butt her?”

Lois groaned in what must have been frustration. “For starters!” She tossed her empty cup into a trashcan. “She was trying to kill us.”

Okay, he’d grant that argument, if his head butt wouldn’t have knocked Dr. Baines’s skull across the room.

“I bet if Miranda hadn’t sprayed the whole newsroom with Revenge, you would’ve been plying her with ideas of playing hooky.”

Miranda? “You are jealous!”

“Well, you’re a broken record,” Lois retorted and marched off. “Always repeating yourself!”

Huh?

“Why don’t you try something new for a change?”

“Something new?” he echoed, completely lost. “What do you mean?”

She tossed her hands up in defeat and hurried off, making it across the next intersection before the pedestrian sign changed to red, stopping him. He would give her a few minutes to cool off as he tried to figure out what exactly was bothering her this time.

That was one of the things Clark loved most about Lois. She was completely unpredictable. Never a dull moment with her. He doubted he would ever truly understand Lois, but, oh, what fun he would have trying.

His love for her notched up another level, once more overflowing and warming him with happiness. He loved that she was jealous of all those women who had found him attractive. Perhaps it meant that she was giving him a second look from over the edge of the rock wall surrounding her heart.

The question was would she like what she saw?

***

“Clark?” Lois asked hesitantly, as his fork of chocolate cake with raspberry sauce lifted to his mouth. “Did you find Linda King attractive?”

“What?” he gasped, pausing the movement of his fork just long enough for a drop of the sauce to land on his tie. He shook his head at the randomness of this question. “Uh… I wouldn’t call her ugly.”

“You dripped,” she said.

“Now, Lois, that’s unfair. Just because I thought Linda was pretty doesn’t mean I would have ever made a move on her. I respect your opinion and our friendship more…”

Lois pointed at his tie. “You have raspberry sauce on your tie, Clark,” she said, interrupting him before he went on praising Linda King’s so-called good looks. “You dripped, you drip.”

“Oh,” he murmured, blushing as he gazed down at his yellow tie with a big red dot on it.

“You better go wash that out or it’ll stain,” she said. It would be a shame to ruin one of his more somber ties.

Clark nodded and stood up.

“Dab, don’t rub,” Lois suggested as he wandered back towards the restroom at Café Americana. As soon as he was out of sight, she took a big bite of her chocolate raspberry torte and moaned with a satisfaction usually reserved for Clark Kent and Superman kisses.

“What was that about, honey?” asked her uncle.

Lois sat up straighter and wiped her mouth with her napkin. “Good cake, Mike, as always.”

“Thank you, but I was referring to the third degree on your partner. Isn’t Linda King that girl who stole your story in college?” Uncle Mike asked.

“How do you know about that?” she asked.

He grinned at her and winked. “They only take the best in the Marines, honey.”

She waited.

“You mentioned her at Christmas dinner that year,” he reminded her.

Uncle Mike had moved back to Metropolis the year she had started college and had invited her to spend her holidays with him. A promise of Christmas away from her folks with a home cooked meal was too much for Lois to refuse.

“Actually, it was you who suggested I should retire and open a restaurant.”

Lois didn’t recall that. “Only proves that I’m always right,” she said, giving him a huge smile. “That meal was delicious.”

He leaned towards her. “You’re avoiding the subject.”

“What subject?” Lois lied innocently.

An explosion erupted in the kitchen and before either of them could react, Superman was there blowing it out.

Superman nodded to Lois and disappeared around the edge of the building. He returned with a man and locked his wrist to the handle of the dumpster in the alley. “Tell the police that this man is responsible for the bomb,” he told them, before taking to the skies once more.

“Thanks, Super…” But he was gone. Lois jumped to her feet, her mobile phone already open. “Clark?” she called towards the restaurant as she dialed 9-1-1. She had sent him inside to use the restroom. Oh, God! What have I done? “Clark!”

“9-1-1. What’s your emergency?” a voice said in her ear.

“Café America on the Southside has just been bombed… No, I can’t hold!” she screamed into the phone.

“Don’t waste your breath, honey. The last time I called, it took over two hours for an officer to show,” Uncle Mike explained. “Just look at the neighborhood. We just don’t get the priority attention we used to before the neighborhood declined.”

“Clark!”

“I’m right here, Lois,” her partner said, stepping up behind her and setting his hand on her shoulder.

“Where have you been?” she snapped, taking out her leftover anxiety on him. He could have died.

“The restroom. I was washing my tie,” Clark said, lifting the tip of his tie. He nodded to the man, swearing up a blue streak from his position at the dumpster. “I saw him out the window. He was holding a bomb. I saw everything.”

A witness. Yes! They got ‘em now. Lois turned and hugged him. “That’s terrific news, Clark.” Realizing what she was doing, she quickly let go of him. “Do you know that 9-1-1 put me on hold? Can you believe it? That operator isn’t going to survive after I’m finished with her.”

“It’s not her fault if the city doesn’t have the resources,” Clark began, defending a woman he hadn’t even met.

Lois couldn’t believe him. Actually, since it was Clark, she could. “Well, I’m going to get the bottom of this. As soon as the police arrive, I’m going to lodge a complaint and then write an article about it when we get back to the Planet. This is unacceptable!”

Clark nodded. “I agree.”

“We were lucky that Superman happened to be flying by,” she said, setting her hand on Clark’s arm. She didn’t know what she would do if she lost Clark. She didn’t even want to think of that possibility, and he didn’t even know how she felt about him. She should really tell him. She opened her mouth.

“9-1-1. What is your emergency?” a voice said into her ear and she realized she had still been waiting on hold.

Well, perhaps this wasn’t the best moment to bring up how much she loved Clark. He would just assume it was motivated by the bomb, which it wasn’t. After they got back to the office would be better.

“Café Americana over on Southside has been bombed. Superman was able to put out the fire and catch the suspect, but we need an officer here to do the actual arresting,” Lois told the woman on the phone.

No, she couldn’t tell Clark this at the office. Too many people. Too many interruptions. Not enough privacy.

Tonight! Yes, Lois would stop by his apartment tonight after all this craziness had calmed down, and she would tell Clark that she loved him.

***End of Part 1***

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