Last time:
Lois
"She let me have it for that one," Clark said.
"Good," Dad said.
"I deserved it," Clark told him with a shrug. "I'm just glad I came to my senses and was able to convince her to keep me around," he said softly, kissing the side of my head. "I don't know what I'd do without her. I don't know what I'd do without my boys, but without Lois..." He pulled me closer to him still. "I'd be completely lost. I thank God he didn't answer my prayers for an eventual reconciliation with Lana. And that you saved her the other day, Bernie. I don't know what I would have done if she'd been hurt or worse on that transport."
"Then I am extra glad I was able to be of service," he said.
"Thank you," Daddy said suddenly. "For saving my little girl." He sighed. "Okay, we're going to have to figure out what to do about this little guy."
"And then you're going to have to move all my stuff back into our room," I told Clark.
His fingers played with the hair at my temple. "You moved it out, you can move it back?"
I turned enough to glare at him. "Now that Daddy knows, you can have it done in about three seconds. If I had to..."
He was gone.
Less than a minute later, he was back. "All done," he announced, sitting next to me, feet propped up in mid-air.
Daddy's jaw dropped again. "Wow."
*~*9*~*
~~~~~
Clark
~~~~~
Why was I nervous?
It wasn't like Lois was going to leave me if the night didn't go perfectly.
At least – I was pretty sure she wasn't.
This was still so new. The two of us.
Together.
It had been an *amazing* week together. We'd been back at work for a couple days and now it was date night. I had on my best charcoal suit and a tie I knew Lois... Well, liked would be too strong a term, but that I knew she loved to make fun of.
I took a deep breath and knocked on the front door of the house.
I could hear Lois calling to me from inside, but I also knew that she thought I was still upstairs. She opened the door and I sucked in a sharp breath.
"Hi," she said, looking a bit puzzled. "What're you doing down here?"
"I'm picking you up for our date." I looked her up and down. "You look... incredible."
She was wearing a new black dress – I guessed it was new anyway; I'd never seen it before – and pearls I knew had been her mom's.
I held out a single red rose. "For you."
"Thank you," she said, still looking at me a bit oddly. "Please, come in?"
I followed her into the kitchen, where she dug a bud vase out of one of the cabinets.
"Daddy's got the boys outside playing. I already said good-bye. Did you?"
"You have kids?" I asked, trying to keep in my self-appointed role as a first date.
She just glared at me.
"Too far?" I asked, chagrinned.
"A bit," she told me. She patted my chest as she walked by. "I already know whose bed you're going to end up in tonight so pretending this is a real first date is pushing it a bit." She bit her lip and looked at me from under her lashes. I was pretty sure she was thinking about what was going to happen in that bed later.
I grinned at her. "You think you're going to get me into bed tonight?" A plan formed in my mind.
She shrugged. "Bed, yes." She turned to look directly at me, a small smile on her face. "Clothes, maybe." She moved closer to me until she was close enough to put a hand on my tie. "Is that a problem?"
I wanted to kiss her, but I didn't. "Ms. Lane-Kent, the only thing you'll get out of me on this date tonight is a kiss. Maybe."
I wanted this date to be about us – about getting to know *us* - not a prelude to sex. And I'd told her that.
"And what about after the date?" she asked moving slightly closer to me, her breath mingling with mine. "After you drop me off and I go upstairs and change into something slightly uncomfortable?"
Her voice was low and seductive and I wasn't sure why exactly I didn't fly her up to our room at that moment.
"Well, that wouldn’t be on our date then, would it?" My tone matched hers.
"No, it wouldn't." She moved again, until she was even closer to me and it was all I could do not to kiss her senseless.
"I think we better go," I said, never taking my eyes from hers.
"I think you're right."
We stood there for another long minute before I took a deep breath and moved back. I held one arm out in front of me, in the general direction of the door. "After you."
She smiled at me and there was something in her eyes I hadn't quite learned to read yet. My hand found its way to the small of her back, gently guiding her even though she didn't need me to. I just liked touching her, even just a little bit like this.
"So where are we going?" she asked as I opened the passenger door of the Jeep.
"This little restaurant I know. It has incredible pasta and chocolate cake that I think you'll like. And dancing."
I loved dancing with Lois. It was one of the first things we'd done together that, looking back, should have shown me we'd make a great pair. At the time, of course, I'd been in love with Lana, but we'd won the Tush Push Contest in Bremerton two months or so after we met.
The day she got pregnant with Christopher.
The day we'd both nearly died.
I shook my head slightly to clear it – I didn't want to think about that.
Dancing with Lois was okay to think about. I didn't know how many times we'd danced together since then. Quite a few. The time I remembered most – besides earlier in the week before I asked her to marry me all over again – was the night after she'd told me she was in love with me. She'd given me – us – a cruise for Christmas and our second anniversary. While there, on our second anniversary, she'd told me that she'd fallen in love with me. The next night had been one of the formal nights on the cruise and we'd danced together for a very long time – probably an hour and a half or longer.
Why couldn't I have seen it then? Looking back, it was so clear, but at the time...
"What're you thinking about?" Lois asked quietly from her side of the car.
"Dancing with you on the cruise," I told her. "And wondering why I was stupid for another eighteen months."
"Not tonight, Clark, please," she said looking out her window. "I don't want to talk about all that tonight."
"I was really thinking about how much I love dancing with you," I said, reaching for her hand. "And how I'm hoping I get to dance all of my dances with you."
"You won't," she informed me. "More than anyone else maybe, but you'll still have to dance with your mom and Granny and..." She gave me a smile and rubbed her thumb along my hand. "But I hope you don't dance with them like you dance with me."
I pulled her hand to me and kissed the back of it. "Not even close."
I pulled up in front of the little restaurant in Pittsdale. It was a nice enough place that it had valet service – most non-fast food restaurants in Pittsdale did; it was an upscale community after all.
I walked around the car and offered Lois my arm. She threaded her hand through it and I found my other hand on top of hers. I'd found just about every reason under the sun to touch her in the last week. Little touches, like holding hands or putting a hand on her shoulder while we worked on a story at work or any other of a million little ways I'd never realized I missed before.
We had reservations and were seated quickly.
We'd spent part of the day earlier combining households – things we should have done a long time ago but hadn't. We now had joint checking and savings accounts, but I'd kept money out for this. I wanted to pay for it myself. It was a guy thing I thought.
It wasn't long before we were eating some of the best pasta I'd ever had. We talked about just about anything but the fact that we were already married. I told her some stories about growing up. She told me more about her mom and sister, her eyes filling with tears as she said she'd give almost anything to have them there with her.
"Would you like to dance?" I asked as we finished our meal.
She nodded. "I'd like that."
I held her chair for her as she stood up and took her hand, leading her to the dance floor.
I didn't remember us immediately dancing so close before. Usually, we'd get closer as the dance or dances went on, but this time, Lois moved right in close to me, my chin at her temple.
"You're the right height," I told her quietly.
~~~~~
Lois
~~~~~
Of course that's what he would think of. I rolled my eyes at him.
"Of course I am," I informed him. "I have shoes on tonight."
I loved being in his arms. I always had. I thought the first time he'd ever held me at all was after we'd won the dance contest in Bremerton. I'd sort of flung myself at him when we won. That night, I'd fallen asleep – or really, more like passed out – with an arm wrapped around him, his bare skin on mine and had woken up in his arms, not realizing we'd made love in the meantime and just happy that we'd survived. I didn't know how many times I'd been in his arms for one reason or another since then, but this was different. He wanted to hold me in a way he never had before and that made it different. The difference was palpable.
We danced for three or four songs and then headed back to our table where a piece of chocolate cake waited.
Clark held my chair and then sat down across from me before cutting a small bite of cake off and holding it out to me.
It was delicious. Almost as good as Clark's cake.
"You have no idea what it does to me when you do that," he said quietly.
I looked over at him. His eyes were dark with desire.
"What?" I asked innocently. I wasn't quite sure what I'd done to evoke such a response, but I thought I'd do it again.
He held out another bite of cake and I closed my lips around it as he pulled the fork away. My eyes closed as the delectable chocolate frosting assaulted my taste buds.
"That," he whispered huskily.
I was sure I was bright red and more careful as he fed me the rest of the cake.
We finished the cake and talked for a while longer before deciding it was time to head home.
He walked me to one of the doors to our wing of the house.
"I had a great time tonight," he said, one hand resting on my cheek.
I turned my head slightly into it. "Me, too."
He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me close to him before kissing me – long and slow and undemanding.
A nearly perfect kiss.
"Good night," he whispered when he pulled away.
"It's been a great night."
He gave me another soft kiss before letting me go. "We should do this again sometime."
I nodded. "Definitely."
One more kiss and he was gone.
I sighed happily and headed inside, going up to our room and expecting to find him waiting for me, but he was nowhere to be seen.
I went into the bathroom and changed into a nightgown before taking my hair down and brushing it out. I finished getting ready for bed and headed back into the bedroom.
I noticed a definite chill as I opened the bathroom door and I smiled slightly as I realized Clark had a fire going. It was way too warm for that unless he'd chilled the room down some.
In front of the fireplace was a mountain of pillows and blankets.
Clark was reclining in the middle of them wearing the black silk shirt and boxers he had earlier in the week.
"What exactly did you think was going to happen tonight?" I asked him, an amused tone to my voice I was sure.
He didn't turn to look at me, but I saw him shrug as I walked his direction. "I just know how much you love a fire and chocolate covered strawberries." He finally turned to look at me and I could hear his breath catch. He stood in front of me. "You look beautiful. Is this what I think it is?" he asked, running a finger under the spaghetti strap.
I nodded. "I haven't worn it since then," I told him. "Not since the first time we really made love."
"You look as beautiful tonight as you did then," he told me. He looked like he wanted to kiss me but instead took my hand and led me to the area in front of the fireplace. He sat back down and pulled me next to him.
"This isn't part of our date, is it?" I asked as I got comfortable.
He shook his head. "This is me feeding my wife strawberries," he said, holding one out for me and then pulling it back and stealing a kiss instead.
I kissed him back, more enthusiastically than I had downstairs. He pulled away and this time let me have a big bite. When I finished, I took a strawberry and fed it to him.
We took turns until they were gone.
He suddenly stopped everything and looked at me, a very serious expression on his face. "I love you."
"I love you, too," I told him, leaning in for a kiss.
This one started soft and sweet but grew quickly in intensity. "I don't want to hurt you," he whispered. "The floor's hard," he told me by way of explanation as he resisted my attempt to pull him on top of me.
I'd told him how much I loved the feeling of his body on mine, but he was right. Pushing the thoughts from my head, I focused on kissing him.
On him kissing me.
On the feel of his skin under my fingertips.
On the feel of his fingertips on my skin.
On the sensations of making love with him.
"Are we sleeping here?" I murmured, as we snuggled into the pillows and he pulled a blanket over us.
"I don't think that's a good idea. Christopher will be up early so we probably need to be at least clothed and he'd want to know why we had a fire in June.
"Good point," I said, snuggling in closer to him. "That's all your responsibility, including getting me clothed again.
He chuckled. "It's much more fun getting you unclothed."
"I know, but you make good points and I don't want to move."
"I know."
A few minutes later, we were snuggled in our bed, clothes back in place.
"You know, if all our dates are going to end like that, I think I want you to ask me out again."
"That wasn't part of our date."
I yawned as I felt sleep overtaking me. "Well, regardless, I hope you ask me out again."
"Don't worry," I heard him say as I drifted off. "I plan on it."
*****
TBC
