Thanks to all for the input for part 1. I did take to heart some of your observations and hopefully, in Parts 2 and 3 I will satisfy those concerns.
Standard Disclaimer applies: All characters from “Lois and Clark” are the property of Warner Brothers and DC Comics. The song “Starwood In Aspen” (music and lyrics) written by John Denver. The story idea is mine, and no infringement on anyone’s copyrights is intended.
Starwood In Aspen
By Lynn McCreadie
PART 2
“Dan?” Lois called out, smacking her hand along the wall just inside the door until she located a light switch. She flipped it upward, and the cabin flooded with light. Yanking the key from the lock, she muttered an expletive under her breath, wondering why Dan would have locked the door in the first place when he knew they were coming. Thank god he’d given her the extra key at lunch. She would have been mightily put out if she had to stand outside in the freezing cold pounding on the door. It had been an unbearably long drive. An unbearably long night, and she had no patience left at all.
Standing in the small flag-stone entry, she took a moment to let her eyes grow accustomed to the light, then looked around. She gasped, delight at their accommodations overcoming her weariness momentarily. Now this was a cabin!
In front of her was large living room, sunken a few steps below the entry level. The room, although easily twenty five feet across and as many feet deep, was warmed by the massive stone fireplace taking up nearly the entire wall opposite the front door. A large couch and a couple of overstuffed chairs were clustered in front of the hearth, suggesting cozy nights spent in front of a roaring fire with a warm cup of hot chocolate. A round table with four chairs sat on one side of the room, a nice place for breakfast or a game of cards.
To her right was a powder room and to the left, a darkened kitchenette. All of the walls were of rough hewn logs giving the whole place a woodsy smell. It was a cabin all right, but it was Lois’s type of cabin. Modern, clean, and supplied with electricity, hot showers, and a flush toilet.
On opposite sides of the vast living room she noted two closed doors and imagined them to be the bedrooms. Dan had been right. There was plenty of space for two couples. Under different circumstances, she could actually imagine being glad to have the company. Of course, they would have to be radically different circumstances.
After her initial appraisal, she swept the living room again, frowning when she didn’t see any sign of Dan. No lamps had been clicked on, nor was there a fire in the fireplace. She’d expected a warm welcome, or at least some kind of welcome. Could he be asleep already? A glance at her watch revealed that it was just almost eleven, way too early to end the night.
Lois moved down the steps and into the living room. At that moment, Mayson entered the cabin and stomped her boots on the welcome mat, dislodging the snow collected from the path to the front door. Clark followed behind, carrying all of their luggage with amazing ease considering there were five full bags.
“Wow!” Mayson exclaimed as she scanned the space. “This place is great!”
Lois opened one of the closed doors, confirming that it was a bedroom. “Dan?” she called softly into the darkness, but as her eyes adjusted, she saw that the bed was neatly made. He hadn’t gone to sleep without her. At least not here.
“Where’s Scardino?” Clark asked as he placed the luggage on the floor and came to stand next to Mayson at the top of the stairs. He issued a low whistle of appreciation. “Wow, nice.”
“He’s not in that bedroom,” Lois supplied, crossing the space and repeating her search behind the second closed door. “Nor this one,” she added when her scan revealed a another bed also neatly made. Confusion wrinkled her brow. Where could he possibly be? She’d left a message for him when they left nearly three hours earlier but he hadn’t returned her call. She’d assumed he’d been skiing.
“Maybe he’s still skiing,” Clark conjectured as he accepted Mayson's coat and returned to the front door to hang them up. “In the dark,” he added with a laugh.
Mayson had moved down into the living room and stood next to a small desk, looking for a scrap of paper that would solve the mystery. “No note. The light on the phone is blinking. Maybe it’s a message…”
Lois crossed to the desk and picked up the phone. The directions for retrieving messages were neatly printed and laminated on a handy card, and she quickly punched in the appropriate numbers, suppressing a massive yawn that threatened to split her head apart.
As she maneuvered through several phone menus, Lois watched Mayson and Clark from the corner of her eye. They murmured to each other, Clark’s dark head bending down to touch Mayson’s blond one in a sharp contrast. They were like salt and pepper.
The generic voice of the phone-prompt lady came on, announcing in her neutral, accent-free tone that there were two unheard messages waiting. Lois listened, surprised when the first message was delivered in her own voice.
“Hi Dan. It’s me, Lois. I’ve just finished up the story. It’s going to be great! Really, I’m glad I stuck around to meet with Bobby Big Mouth. This exposé’s going to blow Senator Steinman out of the water. That man’d better look into a trade school ‘cause his days as a politician are over. Anyway, it’s almost eight, and we’re leaving the Planet now. Should get us up there around ten or so. See ‘ya then.”
While her message to Dan played out, Lois noticed Mayson gesture to one of the bedrooms. Clark nodded. He picked up his and Mayson’s luggage, leaving Lois’s two bags standing starkly alone in the entryway. Abandoned.
When he disappeared into the darkened room followed by Mayson, Lois fought down a wave of nausea. Suddenly Dan’s voice came on the phone, offering a blessed distraction.
“Hey Lois. This is Dan. Listen, I’m really sorry, but I won’t be able to make it up there until tomorrow. OK, calm down! I can imagine the look on your face. Anyway, I was walking out of the office, and Sergeant Walker caught me. There’s been a break in the Hobbes Bay drug case. Our informant finally…well, it ends up we got the bust planned for three a.m., and I gotta be here for it. I tried to catch you before you left but you didn’t answer your phone. Glad I gave you that extra key Hank gave me. I hate to do this, but it’s only one night. I’ll be there when you wake up, I promise. Or at least in time to hit the slopes in the afternoon. Geez, I feel really bad about this. Hope you understand. It’s work…Hey, try to get a good night sleep and I’ll make it up to you tomorrow night. I promise. Well, I better go. See ‘ya tomorrow.”
Lois slammed the receiver down, not bothering to erase the message. “Damn!” she muttered. Damn! Damn! Damn!
“What is it?” Clark had emerged from the bedroom in time to see her slam down the phone.
Lois looked away from his concerned frown, not wanting to tell him what had happened. For some odd reason, she felt embarrassed. Basically, she’d just been stood up.
For a brief minute, she wondered if she could fake it. Pretend that Dan was in the bathroom all this time and couldn’t come out of the bedroom because he was…undressed and…exhausted. With a sigh, she realized that sooner or later Clark would figure out that something was wrong. Especially when Dan failed to show up for breakfast. Or lunch.
“Dan’s not coming up until tomorrow. He had a break in a case he was working on and had to stay in Metropolis.” She tried to sound upbeat but it came out a little more on the shrill end of things.
“Oh. Hmmm,” Clark shoved his hands in his jean pockets and looked very uncomfortable. “Well, do you want to go back?”
Lois thought for a minute. What she really wanted to do was throw something across the room. If the gods had conspired to plan her worst possible weekend, they couldn’t have done a better job. First the whole double date fiasco. Now Dan was standing her up. For work! How lame was that?
The thought of another two hour plus ride back to Metropolis with Clark and Mayson nearly brought tears to her eyes. Despite the frustration she felt building underneath her skin, she forced herself to sound reasonable. “Uh, no. No, that’s crazy. It’s already eleven and besides, why go back just to turn around and drive up again tomorrow. No, I’ll be fine.”
Mayson chose that moment to emerge from the bedroom. “What’s up?” She looked expectantly from Clark to Lois and back again. Lois resisted the urge to scream.
“Dan can’t make it up until tomorrow,” Clark explained, talking very slowly as if Lois had received news of some tragic accident and required very gentle handling. Mayson gave him a perplexed look. “Work,” he added with a nod.
“Ohhh,” Mayson said, sudden understanding lifting her blond eyebrows. She looked at Lois with a tinge of what Lois thought might be pity. “Wow, that really sucks.”
“That’s one word for it,” Lois muttered, crossing her arms tightly across her chest.
She caught the sideways glance Clark and Mayson shot at each other and it served to fuel her mounting rage. Here she was on what was supposed to be a romantic weekend away with Dan, suddenly finding that she had become the biggest third wheel since the invention of the tricycle. Her anger bounced from Dan and his stupid drug bust to Clark for the smug smile she thought she’d seen him give Mayson, then back to Dan for inviting Clark in the first place.
A heavy silence filled the air while Lois fumed. Finally, Mayson gave voice to what they were all feeling. “Yeah…this is kind of awkward.”
Lois started abruptly and marched up the stairs to where her luggage sat. Grabbing a bag in each hand, she turned to face Clark and Mayson who watched her with wide eyes. What, were they afraid she was going to have a meltdown?
“I think I’m just going to turn in. It’s been a long day, and I’m really beat.” She beamed like a beauty contestant and walked down the steps, heading for the vacant bedroom that had just become her own private suite.
Clark stepped forward, reaching a hand out as if to stop her. “Lois, are you sure you’re all right?”
She smiled so wide her face hurt. “Yep. Fine. Just great. See ‘ya tomorrow.” She nodded at Mayson. “‘Night.”
“Night,” Mayson replied. Both Clark and Mayson watched her silently as she crossed the room, and she felt like somebody’s poor, ugly cousin who got dumped on prom night.
She reached the door and a new, horrifying thought crossed her mind. Just because she and Dan wouldn’t be getting any action didn’t mean that Clark and Mayson would refrain. The fireplace was in that great big living room, and what if one thing led to another…she felt a blush creeping up her neck.
“Um. I shouldn’t need anything out here so you can just…well, I’ll be in my room, and I won’t come out unless it’s really, really important so I shouldn’t see anything. I mean, if you two are…I wouldn’t see it so… don’t worry about me.” With every word she spoke, her mortification multiplied, and she silently prayed that a giant hole would just swallow her up right then. “I’ll be fine and just see you in the morning. Tomorrow. Morning.”
With a click, Lois closed the door and leaned against it heavily. This was it. She was in hell.
**
Clark stared at the closed door, his heart pounding. It had worked. By some magic, his very presence at the cabin would prevent Lois from consummating her relationship with Scardino. Had his powers surpassed the boundaries of the physical world and moved into the ethereal where dwelt such wish-granting creatures as leprechauns and fairies? If so, he was going to have to rethink this whole altruistic attitude. It could get out of hand.
In truth, he felt sorry for Lois. She’d looked so dejected, a state he couldn’t quite reconcile when it applied to his partner. Disappointment he would have completely understood. Anger had been more than expected. But Lois looked as if she’d lost her best friend. Did she really care so much for Scardino?
The prospect that she held such strong feelings sent a stabbing pain through Clark’s heart. Had she really been looking forward to spending time alone with Dan? That reality hurt almost as much as it would have had Scardino been waiting to greet her with open arms and a bottle of chilled champagne. Almost.
Besides, he knew that Scardino’s delay only meant avoiding the inevitable for a few extra, blissful hours.
He’d never personally had the experience, but he’d seen it in action. Apparently, removing a band-aid slowly was far more painful than ripping it off quickly, in one violent action that occurred so fast the shock overpowered the pain. Instead of facing it head-on and getting it over with, Clark was going to be forced to stew a good twenty four hours, knowing what was to come. And the knowing was almost worse than the doing. Almost.
“Clark?”
Clark blinked, pulled from his thoughts. He offered a sheepish smile. “I’m sorry. What were you saying?”
“Just that I feel kind of bad for her. Do you think we should do something?” Mayson wondered, glancing back at the closed door.
He shrugged. “I don’t think there’s anything we can do. Besides, she’ll get over it. If anyone should understand sacrifices made in the name of one’s job, it’s Lois.”
“He’s DEA, right?”
“Yeah,” Clark sighed.
He’d always suspected that part of what Lois found attractive about Scardino was his exciting career. It was one line of work that offered as much danger and intrigue as her own. Now Clark thanked heaven that Scardino’s job had been the thing to keep him away. Maybe if it provided enough inconveniences, she’d decide he wasn’t worth it. Lois tolerated such annoyances from her own professional life but he doubted she’d be so understanding when someone else tried to offer the same excuse more than a couple of times.
Mayson retrieved the purse she’d left sitting on the desk, carrying it to the large round table where Clark stood, leaning against the high back of a chair placed around it. “How’d Lois get hooked up with a DEA agent?” she asked as she began to search through the various pockets and compartments of the black leather bag.
“He was investigating a car bomb that we connected to a story we were working on. Had to do with the Resurrection Pill and a guy named Stanley Gable,” Clark offered by way of explanation, wondering what she might be searching for. Women’s purses always offered such mystery to Clark, full of the odd bits and pieces that made the whole sex so intriguing.
“Gable. Gable. That name sounds kind of familiar.” She stopped rummaging in her bag, looking ahead with slightly squinted eyes as she tried to place the name. Her face brightened when she made a connection. “Was he an ex-STAR Lab guy?”
Clark nodded. “Yeah. Gable was smuggling this Resurrection Pill to some prisoners to get them out. The pill made it seem like they were dead. He was behind the car bomb that killed a security guard who we think was about to confess that he’d helped smuggle the pills in or knew what was going on. Turns out the explosives expert who made the car bomb killed Scardino’s partner a few years back.”
“I remember, now,” Mayson started nodding, placing one hand on her hip. “About two months ago, right? I almost got that case but the DA assigned it to another assistant. Didn’t this Gable guy try to release some kind of deadly virus all over town?”
“That’s the one,” Clark confirmed.
“And our old pal Superman stopped him just in time.” She chuckled under her breath, a short derisive bark that made Clark shift uncomfortably.
“Superman helped out a little,” he admitted, offering no specifics. He knew she wouldn’t appreciate them regardless of what this particular rescue had entailed.
“Man, I don’t know how we all got along without him. It’s a wonder that Metropolis managed to function before he dropped into town and...” She paused, looking up with a small smile of contrition. “Sorry.”
Clark smiled his acceptance of her apology, but he didn’t think her spoken sentiment was completely heartfelt. Mayson simply refused to see any good in Superman. No matter how many times he pulled off some kind of miraculously heroic effort, she always found the thread to unravel the whole thing, making Clark feel somewhat stupid and quite often a bit like a glory hound. He did his best to avoid the whole topic, having determined that he might never be able to tell this woman who he really was.
Mayson looked upward and stuck her tongue out of the corner of her mouth as she allowed her hand to do a deep sea exploration of the darkest depths of her handbag. “So, why’s he still in Metropolis?”
“Who?”
“Dan,” she clarified, then pulled her hand out with a small object clutched tightly in her fist. “Ah-ha!” she shouted triumphantly, showing him a black tube that he guessed was a lipstick. “I mean, those DEA boys are a pretty wild bunch. They don’t usually stick around too long after a case is wrapped up.”
“Yeah, well, this one stuck,” he muttered. Stuck like chewed gum sticks to the bottom of your shoe.
Mayson had removed the top of the tube and was carefully stroking a deep red crayon of color across her lips, confirming Clark’s guess that what she’d found was lipstick. His satisfaction in his accuracy was quickly replaced by an odd sensation in his stomach, the way that she was applying the cosmetic making him feel a little like a teenager looking at a forbidden magazine. It was such a sensual thing, so female and so intentional in its implication.
He looked away and cleared his throat. “Do you want some tea?” he asked, his voice still slightly scratchy.
Mayson stopped her application and looked at him. “Uh...yeah. Sure.”
“I think Lois brought some groceries.” He told the lie easily to probably one of the few people in Metropolis who would believe it flat out. Mayson had no knowledge of Lois’s aversion to all things domestic. He started for the door, calling over his shoulder as he grabbed his coat. “They’re still in the car. I’ll go get them.”
Mayson stared at him, her lipstick poised in mid-air. He gave her a big smile as he closed the door, exhaling loudly in the frigid darkness.
He figured he had about three minutes to fetch the tea so he took his time flying back to his apartment, letting the night air cool his heated face. While there he gathered a tin of cookies his mom had made as well as a bottle of wine and some cheese and crackers. Enough for a picnic.
By the time he touched back down in front of the cabin, he felt much more in control. He took a deep breath and entered with the brown bag of groceries clutched tightly in his arm.
“Whew, I think it’s getting colder,” he remarked, a bit too jovially.
As he moved into the cabin’s small kitchenette, he glanced out to the living room to see Mayson bending over a small cabinet. She stood when she heard his voice and smiled.
“I put on some jazz,” she called out, gesturing at the cabinet which he assumed held a stereo. “Is that OK?”
“Yeah.” He listened for a moment, the soft Miles Davis filling the room. “Sounds nice.”
Clark grabbed two mugs from a mug stand sitting on the counter. The kitchenette was small but included all the necessary equipment for an easy meal.
“This place is really great,” Mayson observed appreciatively as she explored the living room. “That stereo is state of the art. I think there must be speakers hidden in all of the walls.”
“It is nice,” he agreed, filling the mugs with water. He decided against using his heat vision and placed the mugs in the small microwave.
“How’d Lois find this place?” she asked.
Clark studied the control panel on the microwave, wondering how long it would take to heat up the water sufficiently. “I think it belongs to a friend of Dan’s at the MPD. He mentioned coming up here a couple of times,” he explained absently, deciding that three minutes was probably long enough.
“Geez, I didn’t know the guys at the MPD made such good money. This place must have cost a fortune.”
“Too rich for my blood, that’s for sure.” He’d moved to the door of the kitchenette and watched Mayson make her tour of the living room.
“Maybe there’s a story there,” she mused, picking up a brass bookend that was shaped like an eagle and examining it closely.
“You think?” At that moment, the microwave beeped, and he returned to place the tea bags in the perfectly heated water. Locating a spoon, he allowed the tea to steep, then removed and discarded the bags.
“This must be the guy. Here in this picture with the two kids.” Mayson held up a framed photograph that showed a man and two teen-aged kids dressed in full ski gear, smiling happily at the camera as they leaned on upended skis, surrounded by snow-covered trees.
She put the photo back in its place on the top shelf of the bookcase and accepted the mug he handed to her. “Thanks.”
They both took a tentative sip of tea, and Mayson smiled a little. Clark smiled back, totally unprepared for what came next.
“Clark, I was kind of surprised when you called to ask me up here. You’ve always been so...hesitant before...” she trailed off, watching him closely.
Clark swallowed hard, a big gulp that would have surely scalded his esophagus had he been a normal human. “I know. I guess I was just waiting to...make sure,” he stammered.
“And are you sure now?” She took a slow sip, looking up from the mug through her eyelashes.
He paused for a minute, thinking how he could answer the question honestly. “As sure as ever.”
“I’m glad. I really like you, Clark. I mean, I really like you.” She set her mug on the table and placed her hand on his chest lightly.
Clark tightened his grip on his own mug, stopping just before the ceramic handle was crushed. He suddenly felt like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming Mack truck.
Before he could respond to her declaration, she continued. “It’s been great these past few weeks, getting to know you better and all. But, I don’t know. It just felt like something was missing. Like you were holding back.”
As she made her observation, Mayson ran a slender finger down the center of Clark’s flannel shirt, slipping it between the overlapping edges and brushing the wooden buttons with a perfectly manicured fingertip. It was a thoroughly intimate gesture, and Clark felt his chest tighten. She’d touched him before, but this was the first time he had no reason to stop her.
He coughed away his discomfort and stepped back, glancing around for a suitable distraction. His gaze lighted on the massive fireplace and the neat stack of logs ready for use. “Uh…maybe I should build a fire.”
Mayson gave him a small smile. “That would be nice. Then maybe we could work on making a little of our own heat.”
His eyes widened and a warm flush crept into his face. Trying to hide his embarrassment over her bold statement, he quickly turned to the cold hearth. Retrieving her mug, Mayson followed behind and curled up at one edge of the deep, chenille-covered sofa, tucking her feet beneath her. She watched him as he placed logs onto the grate and arranged them with more care than an entire troop of Boy Scouts working on a merit badge.
Clark took deep breaths, trying to quell the panic that had settled into his stomach. This was it. The moment he’d waited his entire life to reach. It couldn’t have been more perfectly arranged, either. A cozy ski cabin. Fire burning in the fireplace. Attractive woman eyeing him beneath her long lashes. It was the stuff of romance novels and late night cable movies. So why wasn’t he running to take advantage of the situation?
Unlike it might for most men his age, Clark’s virginity didn’t cause him a lot of inner turmoil. Perhaps it was because he knew that this state was purely a result of conscious choices he’d made and not a lack of opportunity. He didn’t suffer doubts about his desirability that would serve to hack at his confidence. As modest as he was, he didn’t try to deny the fact that his well muscled body was an asset. There had been women in his life. Willing women. And when the time was right, he didn’t believe he’d have a problem ending his self-imposed celibacy.
At first he’d avoided intimacy because the unpredictable nature of his burgeoning powers had proven too frightening. He lacked the ability to control his strength and responses under the most ideal of situations. Adding the lethal mix of teenage hormones and high sexual energy wasn’t something he wanted to risk, so he ended nearly all of his high school dates with some lingering kisses and a tight hug or two. It had been the beginning of his nice-guy image, one that caused him to blush in the locker room but kept him out of trouble.
By the time he reached college, Clark had gained control of his abilities but a new fear took up residence in his mind. Becoming physically involved with a woman would mean allowing her into his world, possibly exposing his secrets to someone who might, intentionally or unintentionally, hurt him. Trust became paramount, and the more he saw of the real world, the more tightly he held that virtue to his chest. It would take a special woman to break through his carefully constructed defenses, and until he met her, he would wait.
In truth, he’d never considered the one night stand as an option. There was the little bit of the Midwestern moral upbringing that lingered, stressing the importance of sex as part of a loving relationship. Not quite sold on the absolute of marriage before sex, he had no unwavering conviction that drove him to wait for his wedding night if the right woman and the right moment arrived fortuitously into his life. However, in nearly thirty years, he’d never felt so strongly about a single person that he’d had to give much thought to the choice of whether to “do it” or not.
More importantly, the thing that had held him back from meaningless relationships based on a purely physical attraction was the iron-clad bond between Clark’s body and his mind. Because his body was the source of all that made him different, he could not divorce his emotions from it. He’d spent a lifetime melding his mind with his muscles so that he could control the powers that were both his gift and his curse. He could no more imagine separating the two so that his body could experience the pleasures of the flesh even if his mind held no such connection than he could imagine putting his brain on a shelf.
It wasn’t that he had never experienced desire or the urges natural to any healthy man. He’d just learned to control them, as he had learned to control his extraordinary strength, his heat vision, and his ability to fly. For Clark, sowing his wild oats had consisted of many heated kisses, caresses and the occasional grope, but nothing that would land him anywhere near the Stud of the Month column in a skin magazine. The ladies in his life had never minded his hesitancy or lack of experience. He had never dated any one single woman long enough for it to become an issue. Until Mayson. And after two months, it had become an issue.
Now, as he struck the match against the tinder and placed the small flame to the kindling, he knew that his reasons were gone. He had control of his strength, and his fear that he might hurt Mayson was nonexistent. They’d been dating for a while. He knew that he could trust her. She cared about him and he cared for her. Neither of them was going anywhere, and theirs was a relationship that had a future if he chose it. The time was right.
Standing up, he brushed his hands on the front of his jeans. Taking a deep breath for courage, he turned around. He was ready. Ready!
“That should do it,” he said, trying to cover up his nervousness. He noticed the way Mayson relaxed against the sofa, so comfortable and trusting. She certainly didn’t seem to be feeling any nervousness.
“It’s kind of late for a fire, actually.” He glanced at his wrist as if consulting a watch, but the fact that he wasn’t wearing one only emphasized his discomfort with the situation. “I mean, if you’re tired, I understand. We don’t have to…I mean, it’s OK if…”
Mayson smiled and patted the spot next to her, and he moved stiffly to join her. Perching on the very edge of the sofa, he leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees while he watched the flames take hold of the perfectly stacked logs. Yep, he was ready. Oh, so ready.
He just wasn’t quite sure how to start. Should he just kiss her? Or maybe he should ask her if she wanted to go to the bedroom and change into something more comfortable. Or maybe he should go change into something more comfortable…
Suddenly, Mayson’s hands gripped his shoulders from behind, squeezing in a gentle massage. He jumped at her touch. “Geez, Clark. You’re really tense,” she noted as she kneaded the hard muscles between her fingers and thumbs. “You need to loosen up.”
Yep, loose. He need to loosen up because he was ready. Rea-dy! Closing his eyes and leaning his head back slightly, he tried to let the rhythmic motion of her hands lull him into a relaxed state. Instead, as her fingers moved lower to stroke the upper edges of his pectoral muscles, the fluttering in his stomach increased to the intensity of a small hurricane.
“So, do you think she’s asleep yet?” she murmured softly.
“Who?” he croaked out, startled by her question.
“Lois.”
“Um, yeah. I guess so. She seemed pretty tired,” he offered feebly as she kneaded the muscles of his arms and then moved back up to his shoulders.
“I feel kind of funny about this,” Mayson remarked, her voice huskier than Clark could remember it ever being. “You know. I mean, before…when I thought that she and Dan would be…well, now it seems kind of weird for us to...you know.”
He nodded absently. “Yeah. I know what you mean.” Weird didn’t even come close to describing this situation.
“Well, if you think it would be better, I suppose we could…wait. Or…something.” She paused in her massage, and he could tell by her tone that she wanted him to disagree with her.
The sad thing was, her words filled him with an odd relief. A second miracle had occurred, and he had been presented with an open door he could use to make an easy exit. With a simple word of agreement and an expression of sympathy for his partner’s bad luck, Mayson might understand his reluctance. He could postpone indefinitely taking the final step that would make his break from Lois final.
He felt a twinge of guilt. “Yeah, I suppose that would be the nice thing to do…” he started, noncommittally.
She took his neutral comment for what she hoped it would be and resumed her massage, which was becoming more of a caress. “Of course, it’s a shame if all of us had to suffer just because Dan got caught up at work. I mean, after all, we wouldn’t expect her and Dan to sit around playing cards if one of us got called away.”
“Mmmmhmmm,” he agreed with a squeak as her arms wrapped around his neck and she unbutton the top button of his shirt, dipping her hand down his now open collar to brush across the center of his chest.
Having perfected the supreme awareness of his body and its reactions as he’d needed to do, Clark turned his attention to the sensations spreading throughout his belly. This wasn’t nervousness. It wasn’t fear, he determined. What he was feeling was…desire. Good old fashioned, red-blooded American male desire.
Because why wouldn’t he feel desire in such a situation? A beautiful blond was using her hands to massage his chest, her warm breath caressing the back of his neck. If that didn’t inspire desire, then he had problems way bigger than he’d ever imagined.
Twisting around to face her, he pulled her close, kissing her tentatively. Mayson gasped with surprise then wasted no time. She wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him down with her as she reclined into the cushions of the sofa. “Mmmmm, Clark. This feels so nice.”
He took her encouragement and deepened his kiss, sending his tongue on an exploratory search of her welcoming mouth. He’d certainly gotten to this point before. No uncharted territory here. He could handle this. No problem. The churning in his stomach stilled a bit, and he focused on what he was feeling. Overall, he had to say he felt…nice. Yes, this definitely felt nice.
Mayson was warm and soft beneath him, moving seductively and pressing herself into all of the right spots. Her fingers stroked the hair at the nape of his neck, then moved forward to the top of his shirt. Deftly she undid the rest of the buttons, sliding her cool hands inside the soft cotton fabric and around to caress his bare back. Whoa! This was definitely something new. He was far from naked, but suddenly, he felt very exposed.
Clark focused on the sounds around him, trying to still the twitch that resumed somewhere near the region of his stomach. There was the pounding of his heart, which he was pretty sure that Mayson could hear even without the aid of super hearing. For her part, Mayson’s heart was beating quickly, like stiletto heels on a tile floor. The sound had an almost urgent quality, driven by anticipation. Her breathing was rapid as well, and he thought he heard a low moan from somewhere deep inside her chest.
Around them, the room was full of familiar sounds. The fire crackled and sparked. The refrigerator issued a low hum from the kitchenette. The vanity in the powder room had a slow drip. Across the room, something was thumping slowly. It was slightly muffled, as if it was coming from inside the bedroom.
Momentarily distracted, Clark stopped mid-kiss and lifted his head. Who or what could be thumping on the wall? Scanning the length of the room, he didn't see anything unusual. He frowned, trying to determine the source of the odd sound.
Before he could use his x-ray vision to search inside the bedroom, Mayson looked up at him. “Clark? Is something wrong?”
He gave a small shake of his head, and she leaned up to recapture his kiss. Trying his best to ignore it, he found he just couldn’t. The reporter in him had kicked in. He had to know what was making that thump.
It was a steady sound, slow and rhythmic. The pulsing was oddly comforting, an almost familiar tempo awakening memories of warmth and safety. Mayson had moved from his lips and was gently nibbling at the side of his neck. Tilting his head slightly, he honed in on the beat, tuning out every other sound around him. Thump-thump. Thump-thump. Thump-thump.
It was another heartbeat. Lois’s heartbeat.
He felt a gasp erupt in his chest and held it back before it could escape. He could hear Lois’s heartbeat. No wonder the sound had been so familiar. It was a rhythm he heard subconsciously nearly every day of the week and dreamt about every night. It seemed to be calling to him, asking him to remember that she was only a few yards away. Reminding him that there was something left undone.
It was at that moment when he realized how he’d managed to find himself in this place. Honestly, there had been at least twenty ways he could have gotten out of the invitation, but he hadn’t really tried that hard. And the excuses he’d given himself on the long drive up were just delusions, distractions from the real reason he had placed himself within hearing distance of anything having to do with Lois and Dan. The reason he’d invited Mayson when it would have been an easy white lie to say that she already had plans without even making a single phone call.
Clark needed to see Lois with Dan. Needed to know that she had made the choice to be with another man and actually witness it with his own eyes, at least as far as something like that could be accomplished respectably. Only by forcing himself to look the ugly truth directly in the face would he be able to move on himself. He just didn’t know how else to let her go. Like a red hot poker placed against a gaping wound to cauterize it, it was a drastic measure that was far from pleasant, but in the end, an effective way to heal a wound. If you survived the procedure at all.
In one night, the final cut was supposed to have been made. By sharing themselves with other people, they were declaring a mutual surrender to the fates conspiring to keep them apart. Now, one of them had reneged on the bargain, albeit unwillingly. The romantic umbilical cord connecting them had failed to be severed cleanly, the remaining attachment strong enough to send a shared pulse back and forth between them.
Lois’s heartbeat was strangely slow, and he imagined that she must be sleeping. He’d seen her asleep before, and the image of her dark hair contrasting with the white pillow, her thick eyelashes fanned in a crescent on her creamy cheeks made his own heart quicken. The sheets would be draped across her, molding to her curves like a gentle caress. When she slept, Lois lost every edge that the alert woman prided herself on. She became soft. All woman. His stomach contracted sharply, and he felt a stirring that had yet to occur with Mayson’s touches…
Dear God! He was kissing one woman while he was thinking of another. What kind of man was he? He was using the image of Lois to generate the passion he needed to be with Mayson. This was just so wrong on so many levels, and he felt furiously ashamed.
Forcing thoughts of Lois from his mind, he shoved Mayson to the front. It wasn’t silky auburn hair that he was stroking. It was blond. And those weren’t dark brown eyes that were lidded with desire. They were clear, bright hazel ones. The responses of his body were the direct result of the gentle caresses and heated kisses that Mayson was trailing along the bare skin of his neck and chest. And she deserved nothing less than his full attention.
Besides, Lois’s failure to meet the unspoken terms for the permanent dissolution of their non existent relationship was temporary at best. Soon she would pay her part of the tab and they would leave the restaurant. Partners at work, yes. And hopefully, friends. But lovers, never. He didn’t need to hear Lois making love with Dan Scardino to know that now.
Lois was a dream. Mayson was real. Warm and receptive and real. With a fierce determination, he wrapped his arms around Mayson’s slender frame and drew her against his chest. She pulled back slightly to look into his eyes, her own full of questions at his sudden fervor, and he lowered his mouth to hers with a new forcefulness, sinking them both deeper into the plush cushions of the sofa.
He was tired of waiting. He was ready.
***
Sitting up slightly from where she reclined against the headboard, Lois reached for the bottle sitting on the bedside stand and noted that over half of the liquid in it had disappeared. Had she drunk that much wine? She must have because a painful pressure in her abdomen indicated that she had to use the bathroom in the worst way.
Swinging her legs over the edge of the bed, she ignored the slight spinning of the room. She wasn’t drunk or even tipsy. It wasn’t dignified to get drunk alone. She’d just figured it was stupid to waste the wine, still slightly chilled from its day spent in the trunk of her car, tucked next to the new black teddy which, unlike the wine, remained wrapped in her suitcase. Too bad for Dan that there wouldn’t be any left for him. He’d better bring his own bottle.
Hitting the light inside the bathroom, she groaned when she noticed a piece of brown cardboard attached to the closed toilet lid with some pieces of silver duct tape. Squinting, she leaned down and read the words scrawled in thick black marker. “Toilet broken. Please do not use.” A plunger stood next to the commode, an exclamation point of warning in case she doubted the plumber’s diagnosis.
With a heavy sigh, she leaned against the sink. Man, she didn’t even have the luck to pick the bedroom with a working toilet. With a frown, she recalled that Mayson had taken dibs on the other bedroom. Therefore, it was that woman’s fault that she couldn’t even pee. In fact, this whole miserable weekend was Mayson’s fault.
Well, it wasn’t Mayson’s fault that Dan hadn’t shown up, she admitted grudgingly. But it was her fault that Lois felt so miserable about it. Mayson had her man and Lois had her…wine. Or was it because Mayson had Lois’s man and Lois had…nothing? It was just too hard to figure out. Just leave it that Mayson had someone and Lois had no one.
She had no one, and she was stuck in this room with nothing to do but think. She wasn’t sleepy. She’d endured the endless drive up to the cabin, curled in the back seat of the Cherokee feigning sleep so that she could keep her eyes closed against the sickening displays of affection between Clark, who drove, and Mayson, who flirted. Mayson reaching across the seats to finger the well-trimmed hair at the back of Clark’s neck. Clark’s low chuckle at some clever bon mot from Mayson. It had been enough to turn her stomach.
Now she was paying for her defense strategy. Pretending to sleep had resulted in an actual half-hour cat nap, enough to give her a second wind which she had planned to use up with Dan. The extra energy along with the adrenaline boost from her anger at…well…everyone conspired to make sleep impossible for at least a couple of hours.
She’d made several laps of the bedroom, and while more than adequate in size for its intended uses, it was far too small of a cage for her. She’d opened every empty drawer, examined the five framed prints scattered about the room, and tried to discern why anyone had ever thought that the brown and gold bedspread was attractive. A glance behind the two closed doors revealed a walk-in closet and a darkened bathroom.
Fetching her cell phone from her purse with the intention of returning Lucy’s call, she’d rolled her eyes in disgust when she discovered the battery was dead. No wonder Dan hadn’t been able to reach her. She was sure that somehow, it was Clark’s fault that she’d failed to charge the battery the night before but she couldn’t quite work out the actual connection.
Briefly, she’d thought of doing a little work, but that option was preempted when she encountered the bottle of wine while digging through her bags looking for a pen that actually contained ink. The bottle held one of her favorite Napa Valley merlots, and she’d packed it thinking that she and Dan would enjoy a glass or two. Now she viewed it as survival rations.
Lois had made neat work of the cork with her handy Swiss army knife, glad for the millionth time that she had purchased it instead of the souvenir cuckoo clock on that post-college graduation trip around Europe. Solving the problem of a glass had proven to be more challenging, and eventually she gave up the ghost, deciding that it was only her germs after all as she began swilling directly from the dark bottle.
Of course, now she was paying for her over indulgence. She glanced around the bathroom, taking in the various options. She could try to ignore her bladder, but that idea was quickly discarded. In fact, if she didn’t do something soon, the whole point would be moot, and she’d be standing in the middle of an embarrassing puddle. She glanced at the shower. She hadn’t done that since she was four, and she’d be damned if she’d stoop that low now.
Pursing her lips in thought, she remembered the powder room just to the right of the entry. Leaving her room might mean she’d run into Clark and Mayson. Her bladder pinched painfully, and she returned to the bedroom, glancing at the clock sitting next to the bed. 12:30. Surely they’d have…left the living room by now? Really. It had been over an hour since she’d slunk away in mortification. And if they weren’t gone, well, it served them right!
She pressed her ear to the door, listening. For what? Voices? Heavy breathing? Moans of passion? She snorted with disgust. That’s all she needed. For Mayson to be a screamer. The distance between the two bedrooms was well over twenty feet and two thick log walls offered sound insulation, but if she heard even the tiniest whimper, she’d lose it.
With a determined sigh, Lois cracked open the door and peered out carefully. No one in sight and the door to the second bedroom directly across from her was tightly closed. A bright fire burned in the hearth giving the room a warm glow that, although pleasant, was surely some sort of fire hazard, she noted with a frown. It wasn’t like Clark, the original Boy Scout, to leave a fire unattended. Maybe they were so carried away by their passion that they forgot to put it out. The thought twisted her stomach painfully, and she turned away from it. Let the place burn down for all she cared.
Even assured that she was alone, she tiptoed across the space and up the four short stairs to the small powder room. In short order, she relieved the painful pressure in her bladder and washed her hands, all without the aid of light. She didn’t want to risk catching a glimpse of herself in the vanity mirror, her redden eyes and splotched face evidence of her misery that she didn’t need.
A mere five steps from the safe haven of her bedroom, she heard the rustle. With a panicked jerk and practice born of many a night raid, she pressed her back against the wall, flattening herself into the shadows cast by the flickering firelight. Focusing all her energy on slowing her breathing so the rapid rise and fall of her chest would not give her away, she glanced toward the menacing sound. It came from the space in front of the fireplace, blocked by the low-backed sofa that faced the crackling flames. Damn! How had she not noticed that spot, perfect for an intimate interlude in front of the fire?
Terrified of what she might witness, she stared transfixed as Clark stood, looking down on what she guessed to be Mayson lounging on the soft chenille covered sofa. His blue flannel shirt was untucked and, it appeared, unbuttoned. With the fire burning behind him, his features were darkened, but she had no trouble imagining the firm expanse of smooth chest that Mayson was most likely admiring. Lois suddenly felt cheated, as if someone had taken the last cookie from the jar leaving only the sweet aroma behind to tease her.
Extending his arm downward, Clark pulled Mayson up from the sofa. Lois exhaled inwardly, grateful to see that the blond still wore her own sweater and was not showing Clark the same amount of skin that he felt no compunction about showing her. Her relief was short lived when Clark gave a gentle tug and Mayson stood only inches from him, her head tilted back in open invitation.
Lois cringed, desperately wishing she were any place but in that room. She’d rather spend a month alone on a deserted island with her mother than be watching this. Or a year covering dog shows and bar mitzvahs. Any where but standing against the wall while Clark and Mayson kissed right in front of her.
Lois shuddered. What had she been thinking? When this whole tragedy was constructed, why hadn’t she put her well-shoed foot down? This was supposed to be her romantic weekend as much as Dan’s, and she should have insisted that they leave the…horny teenagers…in Metropolis. For crying out loud, when had she ever led someone railroad her like this? She was Lois Lane, for Pete’s sake!
Unless, of course, some deep part of her had wanted Clark to come along. She tossed that idea out the window immediately. It was ridiculous. Beyond considering. Why in the world would she have wanted Clark to come with them? Clark along on a romantic weekend with Dan was like rain on a picnic. Sand in your ice cream cone. Anchovies on your pizza. He would have made it completely impossible for her and Dan to do what it was they had planned on doing, sucking every romantic impulse out of her. Then her list would have remained incomplete, the final item unchecked. Instead of her woman-in-love glow, she would have shown up to work on Monday with nothing more than a raccoon tan from her ski goggles.
Besides, even if she ever did admit that maybe she might have possibly in some small remote way wanted Clark to come along, which of course was completely ridiculous, there was absolutely no way she wanted Mayson there. It was bad enough watching the woman throw herself at Clark every day. Lois certainly didn’t want to watch it on her romantic weekend away.
The minutes stretched until Lois was sure that she’d been standing in the shadows for an hour, yet Clark hadn’t make the final move. Finally, Mayson placed her hands on his shoulders and lifted up on her toes, placing her lips upon Clark’s. He placed his hands on her waist, and their kiss deepened.
As Lois watched, she felt the heavy lump that had settled in her stomach split into smaller pieces, one of which traveled upward to stick painfully in her throat. The back of her eyes started to burn, and she blinked hard, forcing the sting to recede to the back of her mind. A bitterness spread across her tongue, and she swallowed hard against it.
Their two bodies cast in silhouette by the firelight looked exactly like the cover of a romance novel, two lovers embracing, totally lost in each other and oblivious to the world around them. Lois vowed at that moment that she would never read another romance novel again. Or at least one with such an image on its jacket.
Thankfully, before Lois could catch a glimpse of a rogue tongue or any other intimate gesture, Mayson broke their embrace. She stepped back, trailing her fingers down the length of Clark’s arm as she walked slowly away, toward the closed door of the bedroom that Lois now knew had not yet been used. Lois held her breath, afraid that the blond would see her hiding out in the open as she was, but the door shut with a soft click, leaving Lois alone with Clark.
Clark stared at the door, still motionless after Mayson’s seductive departure. When finally he moved, it was to turn to face the fireplace, his thick arms reaching up to grasp the mantle as he leaned against it heavily, his head dropping slightly.
Lois watched him as he watched the flames. She took deep breaths, a tentative calm replacing the near hysteria of seconds earlier. Feeling a bit more in control, she felt her muscles relax, an odd sensation as she hadn’t realized they’d seized up in the first place.
<What’s he waiting for?> she wondered bitterly. Mayson probably had divested herself of that sweater by now. If he didn’t hurry, the woman might slap him with some kind of contempt order or something. Lois suppressed a laugh, imagining Mayson’s argument in front of a judge. “I’m sighting him for failure to provide services in a timely manner.”
Come to think of it, Lois mused, what was she waiting for? Clark’s back was to her and she could slip into her room, finish off the bottle of wine and try to forget the sight of Clark and Mayson standing in front of the fire, melded into one being.
Instead, she remained where she was, fixated on Clark’s broad back. The firelight created a halo that surrounded him, putting his body in high contrast silhouette. She admired the way his wide shoulders tapered into his trim waist and hips. She wondered if his skin would feel warm from the fire burning so close to him. If she were to run her hands across the length of his arms and down his back, would he feel as solid and hard as he looked? Was his dark hair as thick and silky as she imagined it would be if she were to run her fingers deep into it?
For a moment, she felt compelled to go to him. She even took a step forward before she realized what she was doing and slammed back against the wall. She must be drunk.
Suddenly, Clark turned and looked at the door to Lois’s bedroom. She held her breath, praying that he hadn’t seen her standing like some kind of voyeur. That’s all she needed, to have Clark think she was some kind of sick-o who tried to get her jollies by watching him and Mayson just because her own boyfriend was too busy to make it up to see her.
Her luck held and he looked away, across the room at the door where Mayson had disappeared. He raked a hand through his dark hair, and Lois felt her pulse quicken. Hadn’t she just imagined doing that herself? Even concealed by the dark, she could feel her face turn red in embarrassment, as if she’d been caught peeking through his window to watch him undress. That thought made her gasp. If he took off his shirt, she would certainly give herself away when she landed on the floor in a heap.
With a sigh so heavy that she could hear it from where she stood, Clark walked to Mayson’s closed door. He paused in front of it for a long minute, and Lois thought that his shoulders drooped slightly. It was almost like he didn’t want to go into that bedroom, and she felt a strange surge of elation pass through her. Then he softly turned the handle and pushed the door open. He closed it behind him silently.
Lois felt herself sliding down the wall to the floor, a movement made painful by the rough logs abrading against her sweater-clad back. She bit her lip and focused on the pain, welcoming it as a distraction from what she had just witnessed. Only a half hour ago, several doses of wine had finally stopped the tears that now coursed down her cheeks once again. This time, she didn’t fight them.
to be continued…
