Last time:
Lois
Suddenly, we felt it. Our eyes locked and for a minute, I could actually believe that he was the father of this baby and we were truly in this together. One of his patented Kent grins crossed his face.
"Was that it?"
I nodded. "Pretty cool, huh?"
The baby moved again and we both smiled. Clark's eyes moved to something behind me and the smile disappeared. He removed his hands and turned back to the Jeep. "Got everything?"
I didn't need to ask or look to know what he'd seen and Lana moving into my line of sight confirmed it. "I do," I finally said. "Just the cooler, I think."
Clark nodded. "I already filled it with new ice."
I turned back to the hotel. "Then I'll get it while you load the other suitcase and I'll double check the room and we can go."
Clark started to say something but I was back inside before he could. He was probably going to tell me not to try to carry the cooler, but I didn't care. It wouldn't be *that* heavy. I quickly double checked the room and bathroom then grabbed the cooler and headed back outside.
Minutes later, we were driving around to the front desk to check out. "I'll take care of it." I held out my hand. "Who has the other key?"
Lana handed it over without looking at me and I quickly escaped inside. If Clark had checked us out, I would have been left alone in the car with Lana and I had absolutely no desire to spend any more time with her – especially alone – than absolutely necessary.
*~*45*~*
~~~~~
Clark
~~~~~
We headed out of Richmond pretty early. The sun wasn't up yet – not all the way. I pulled into McDonald's and went through the drive-through to get breakfast.
I glanced over at Lois. "Bacon, egg and cheese biscuit?" I'd learned those were her favorites.
"Two. And a really big coffee. And a cinnamon roll."
I pushed the button and the window went down as we got closer to the squawk box. "Lana?" Lana never got the same thing twice.
"Coffee, Egg McMuffin, hash brown."
That was about the longest conversation I'd had with Lana since we left Met U the day before, except the whole 'I have to share a room with you and your *wife*' thing. I ordered for them and ordered myself a couple of different croissant sandwich things and a bacon, egg and cheese McGriddle thing with pancakes in place of biscuits. I hadn't tried them, but they sounded good.
We pulled up to the window and I paid for it, taking the coffees from the very bored looking teenager. I carefully handed one to Lana and put the other two in the cup holders. I took all of the creamer and sweeteners that she handed me and gave it all to Lois. Lana took her coffee black.
Lois didn't even ask what I wanted in mine, but started doctoring both of ours. She got mine right. That shouldn't have surprised me, but it did for some reason. Lana had never gotten it right.
A few minutes later, we were back on I-70 heading towards Indianapolis, then Illinois, Missouri and home. I turned on one of the playlists I'd made a couple days before.
Once she was done eating, Lana took out her laptop and I could hear her typing away on something. Lois, on the other hand, despite the huge coffee, put her pillow against the window and pulled her blanket up over her. She was asleep in minutes.
I pushed the speed limit a bit. Not too much, but hopefully enough that this trip would be over sooner rather than later. I turned the music up, too, hoping to deter Lana from any conversation. I didn't think she'd be starting one anytime soon, but just in case.
I guessed that I could thank my lucky stars or something that the two of them had both decided that being quiet was the way to go. If they had decided, for whatever reason, to cat fight, this trip would have ended very poorly. As it was, it wasn't going *well* but at least they hadn't torn each other's hair out.
I sighed. I'd never seen Lana like she was with Lois. I'd known her, literally, all my life and she wasn't mean and vindictive. I could understand it since... what happened in Latislan. Everything we'd talked about for the last few years was on hold – indefinitely as far as she knew. I'd told her that Lois and I had to stay married, but not for how long or anything else. I'd told her too much when I told her the baby wasn't mine and that the marriage wasn't really real. I could only hope that she wouldn't ever decide to air that dirty laundry in public and if she did, I was close enough to make it very clear, very loudly, that she'd misinterpreted what I'd said or something because nothing could be further from the truth.
~~~~~
Lois
~~~~~
I guessed the nap was about three hours long. I wasn't sure how I'd managed to not wake up in all that time given the coffee I'd consumed, but I was grateful. We were closing on halfway through the Richmond to Smallville leg of our trip.
"Sleep okay?" Clark asked.
I nodded and stretched as I yawned. "Where are we?"
"Illinois."
"What's that leave? Two more states?"
"Yeah. We'll drive all the way across Missouri until we're almost to Oklahoma then head north then west again into Kansas. Once we're in Kansas, it's about an hour and a half or so to Smallville."
"Ah. Do we go through St. Louis?"
"We can or we can go around it. It's Saturday so I don't think the downtown traffic will be too bad. It's not baseball season so there's no Cardinals game. If there was or it was rush hour on a weekday we'd want to go around for sure. Have you ever been there?"
I shook my head as I held the blanket around me a little tighter. "Mom used to talk about how she and Dad went up in the Arch once when they were there, but I've never been."
"Then we'll have to go through downtown. We'll still be on the highway, but you'll be able to at least see the Arch and Busch Stadium and maybe a couple other things."
"Sounds good, but I'm going to need a bathroom soon."
He smiled. "I figured you might. About ten minutes?"
I nodded and rested my head against the pillow, closing my eyes. I'd noticed Lana was asleep but she woke up about not long after I had. I pretended to still be asleep.
"Where are we, Clark?" she murmured sleepily.
"Near Greenville, Illinois getting ready to stop. Lois has to go to the bathroom and she needs to stretch and walk around a bit anyway."
It seemed like we were slowing down a bit and then we came to a stop and I could hear the blinker.
I heard Lana mutter something, but I couldn't quite make out what it was. Probably something derogatory about me. It irritated me, but I couldn't quite bring myself to be mad about it. Not after the way her life had turned upside down because of me.
Clark came to a quick stop and turned the engine off. I didn't open my eyes until I heard the back door open and Clark tell Lana to get out.
I looked over my shoulder to see Clark seething and holding the door open. I couldn't see Lana's face but I was certain she was mad. Once she was out, Clark slammed the door shut, grabbed her arm and pulled her away from the car. As much as I wanted to stay and at least watch whatever fight it was they were about to have, the urge to empty my bladder would not wait any longer. I opened the door and realized Clark had pulled into the large parking lot and stopped on the edge. I sighed and started walking.
~~~~~
Clark
~~~~~
"Get out." I yanked the back door open and waited for her to climb out.
Lana glared at me as she got out of the Jeep and I slammed the door behind her. I was careful not to hurt her, but I still grabbed her arm and led her away.
"What the hell are you doing?" I asked as she finally wrenched her arm away from me.
"What?" She crossed her arms and stared at me.
"That comment."
"What?"
"Calling my wife a whore. That was completely uncalled for."
"It's true," she hissed back at me.
"No. It's not."
"Really? Then who's the father of her baby?" She looked like she was almost gloating.
"I am." I didn't want to hurt her anymore than I already had, but I had to. Navance flashed through my head reminding me why.
>I will decide if I want to keep her for myself or share her with my comrades. It all depends on how satisfied she keeps me between now and then.<
The thought of Lois in the hands of that bastard scared me badly enough but... what he'd do if he got his hands on the baby, especially if Lois had a girl...
>And if the child is a girl, as soon as she is old enough, she will follow in the footsteps of her mother. Until then, she will be a servant in my house... There are many men who like very young, innocent women... I'm sure you do, as well.<
The thought turned my stomach again and I had to do what I had to do.
"You told me it wasn't your baby," she said, her eyes filling with tears.
"I lied," I lied. "I didn't want to hurt you any more than I had to. I knew it was going to break your heart that I'd married Lois and was going to stay married to her even after we got home. I didn't want you to think I'd cheated on you, too."
The tears were streaming down her cheeks. "You made love to her?"
I shrugged. "How else would she get pregnant with my baby?" I was being a bastard. I knew I was, but I didn't have a choice. I should have let Lana believe it from the beginning and I had to make her believe it now.
"At the cabin?" she whispered.
"You want details?" I asked, eyebrows raised, stomach churning. "You want to hear that we woke up naked in each other's arms and when I saw her lying there I was overwhelmed with the desire to kiss her? And when I did, she didn't stop me? And I kissed her and she kissed me and we made love? Is that what you want to hear?"
The tears had picked up speed as I spoke. Technically, I hadn't lied. I'd asked her questions and asked if that was what she wanted to hear, but I never actually said we'd been together. Legally, the baby was mine. I was Lois' husband so under both Latislani and New Troy law, I was the father of record. Period.
"Is that true?"
I didn't answer her. "Or do you want to hear that the other two nights I spent in her bed, we weren't completely dressed?" That was also technically true. I didn't have my shirt on either night. My heart shattered again at the look on her face. I hated what I was doing to her, but her life wasn't in danger if I left her.
"So why...?" Her voice, and my heart, broke.
"Because. I didn't want to hurt you any more than absolutely necessary. I love you. I always have, for as long as I can remember, but I have a baby coming with Lois and we got married and we have to make this work because of that baby. How I feel or felt about you doesn’t matter anymore. But at the same time, none of this is her fault. She never would have come on to me. And she didn't." That was the truth. I hadn't come on to Lois either, but the implication was there. And on top of it, I was angry and it was bleeding through. "*I'm* the one who made arrangements for us to get married. If you have a problem with it, you take it out on me. You leave her alone. You leave the baby alone. And you and Linda stay the hell away from her." I meant it. I meant every word. And I was sure she knew that.
"You're a bastard," she whispered.
I sighed and my head hung as the anger bled away. "I know. I'm sorry you got hurt; that you're still getting hurt, really I am, but she's my wife and she's having my baby. If you have a problem with her, take it up with me, but I'll protect the two of them with my life." I already was. "Leave her alone."
She turned and headed towards the gas station, arms wrapped around herself. I sighed and pulled the Jeep up to the pump and filled it with gas.
Lois was waiting outside when I moved the Jeep to the building.
"I'll be right back," I told her. I needed to go to the bathroom, too. I just hoped they didn't get into it while I was gone.
~~~~~
Lois
~~~~~
I sighed, but didn't get back in yet. We had something like seven hours left and I didn't want to spend any more of it sitting down than I had to. I stretched my back and twisted from side to side.
"You okay?" Clark asked quietly as he stood next to me.
"Back hurts."
"Gonna make it another seven hours?"
"Do I have a choice?" I asked back.
"Not really, I guess. Unless you want to stay in Greenville for the next week or so."
"I'll pass, thanks." I wrapped my arms around me as best I could. "Are you okay?"
He shrugged. "Yeah." He looked around then spoke quietly. "I told her that I lied."
"About what?" I asked just as quietly.
"That the baby really is mine. That we slept together at the cabin." He didn't look at me.
"Ah." I didn't look at him. "We did sleep together at the cabin." He'd lied to her. He'd done what was necessary to protect me and the baby even if it meant breaking her heart all over again. And that just added to the guilt I was already feeling from time to time. My eyes filled with tears, but I tried not to let him see.
He rolled his eyes. "Fine. That I got you pregnant at the cabin."
I sighed and willed the tears back in. "I don't suppose you have any way to just fly us all there in a few minutes or something, do you?"
He didn't say anything.
"Relax," I told him. "Even if there was an airport handy, it wouldn't be worth the hassle."
"Yeah." He looked around again, but more nervously than he had the last time. "Listen, I was hoping to make it all the way to Springfield, Missouri from here before we stop again. That's about four hours. It's only about two and a half hours from there to Smallville.
Can you make it that long?"
I nodded. "I think so."
"Do you want a drink then? Or to stop and get something to eat or do you just want to have sandwiches?"
"Sandwiches are fine and if I want to make it all the way to Springfield, I better not drink a whole lot. My bladder's only about the size of a walnut."
Lana chose that moment to come out of the convenience store. I tried not to look too closely at her, but I could tell her cheeks were blotchy and her eyes were red. She went straight to the Jeep and climbed in the back seat. Almost immediately, she put her pillow against the window and covered herself completely with her blanket.
I sighed. "Let's go. The sooner we get going..."
"...the sooner we'll get there."
A few minutes later, we were back on the road, the only noise in the Jeep coming from Clark's playlists and what I was sure were Lana's sniffles.
*****
TBC
