The second car came to a stop, and she heard the footsteps of the two men that had been waiting.
“Lois—“ he whispered, sounding even closer to her than he’d been before.
“Just a second,” she stalled.
A car door opened and slammed shut.
“Out of time,” he said, just as she felt the lock turn.
“Got it!” she said over him, as she felt his arm wind around her again.
And then she was standing in darkness.
*****
Her picks were still in her hand. His arm was still around her waist. But her vision had gone completely black. She tried to peer up at him in the utter darkness that was enveloping them.
“Nice timing,” he said.
She thought she could hear a smile in his voice. Unable to see his face, or anything at all, she couldn’t tell if his expression matched.
“Are we inside the warehouse?” she asked. It was the only logical possibility that fit the blinding night that surrounded them.
“Yes.”
“Can you re-lock the door from this side?”
She felt his arm leave her, and she slipped her pick case out of her pocket to rehome her picks. A second later, she heard two locks snick back into place.
“Can you still see?” she asked.
“Well enough,” he replied.
“Them,” she clarified. “Can you still see them?”
A short pause. “A man and a woman arrived in the second car. They’re talking to the others. The smoking men are assuring the woman that no one else is nearby.”
She snorted. “Do you recognize any of them?” She wished she had that see-through-walls power. It really came in handy.
“No,” he replied.
Jimmy’s pick kit safely stowed in an inner pocket, she put an arm out in front of her, and slid one foot forward in the opposite direction of his voice. When she didn’t crash into anything, she took another slow sliding step, and then a third.
“What are you doing?”
Was that amusement creeping into his tone? she wondered incredulously. One arm stretched out in front of her, she slid her foot forward again, keeping her base lower than usual. She might look ridiculous, she conceded. But that didn’t make her a willing object of derision! Excuse her for being just a plain human with ordinary eyesight, instead of some kind of demi-god with super-powered night vision! Not everyone had invulnerability if they crashed clumsily into furniture.
“If they’re going to stay out there chit-chatting, I’m going to take a look around,” she snipped back impatiently.
“We’re in an empty room with file cabinets along one wall. There’s an open archway across from us that leads to the loading bay. The rest of the warehouse is through there.”
She was sure now that he was helpful hero again, and not the incredible super dampener he’d been lately.
That still wasn’t going to make up for him laughing at her, though.
“Which direction are the filing cabinets?” she asked into the inky sea of nothingness.
“Too late for that,” he said with a low current of urgency. “They’re headed this way.”
“Let’s hide in the warehouse. Maybe we’ll be able to see where they're going from in there,” she said, turning back toward where she thought it was.
They both heard the deadbolt lock turn over.
“I’ve got a better idea,” he said.
She felt the wind rushing past her and realized he’d moved them. She gritted her teeth. That was the fourth time tonight she’d been whisked off somewhere without warning, and it was starting to grate on her. Lois Lane was used to having agency over where she went.
She opened her mouth to remind him of that fact, but in that exact moment realized that while she was still standing, her feet were no longer touching the ground. In fact, she was willing to bet that she was much closer to the ceiling than the floor. One of her arms wound around him so that she could grip his shoulder, and she felt him chuckle lightly in reaction. Her irritation rose another few degrees.
The door opened and soft light spilled inside.
Lois counted four silhouettes as their footsteps reverberating against the hard floor. She strained against the warehouse shadows to see where they were headed. The door closed behind them a second later pitching them all back into the endless black.
But then amber light bloomed, and Lois blinked as her eyes finally adjusted and took in the room. A man in a sport coat stood beside a floor lamp. It illuminated five green, rusting file cabinets on the wall perpendicular to the door. On the wall opposite from the door they’d entered through, two dented metal folding chairs sat side by side. The concrete floor continued from their room through the opening that he’d said led to the loading dock.
She was observing all this from high above, of course. Even though she’d known that he’d carried them aloft, it took her a second to push away the surprise at actually seeing that they were 30 feet or more above everyone else’s heads.
Lois took her first look at the woman below. She was dressed in dark colors, though she looked to be a bit better attired than the two tattered men she’d come to meet. From Lois’ vantage point, she couldn’t see the woman’s face. Nor could she identify her from the average build and dirty blond hair.
Lois switched her focus back to the other new member of the group. The man in the sport coat had broad shoulders and wore a scowl. The creases around his mouth suggested that this was his preferred expression. He looked like a thug to her, and everything about him screamed ‘hired muscle.’ That meant the blonde woman was probably in charge here.
“How much did you move last week?” the blonde asked without preamble.
The concrete and metal enclosure made it much easier to hear, even if she was 30 feet overhead. No longer fighting the wind gusting between the buildings or the lapping of the bay, she could hear every word clearly for the first time tonight. And the echo of the little warehouse office was actually working in her favor.
Gently unzipping the pocket on her coat, she pulled out her mini tape recorder. One hand still clutching his shoulder, she zipped her pocket closed again and lifted the device in front of her face to see the buttons in the dark. She could do it by feel, and had before, but she preferred to see that the correct button was being pressed. One-handed, she rolled it over to start the record function when it suddenly slipped from her grasp.
The arm around her waist disappeared, and for exactly one beat of her heart, she was suspended in mid-air.
On the other side of that heartbeat, she’d just become sure she was in free fall, when she felt an iron hand grip her by the upper arm.
She’d managed to hold in the scream that had nearly broken free, and now she consciously forced herself not to exhale in relief. Moments like this always renewed her appreciation for Superman’s special abilities - he could move FAST!
He must have let her go in order to catch the recorder before it fell into the line of sight of those below. Then he’d moved back upward to catch her again, though she’d managed to twist herself in to a less catchable angle, she realized. It looked like she’d dropped a couple of feet, but she was nowhere near the floor. Even now he was towing her back up toward the ceiling, moving very slowly so as not to attract attention, his eyes on the meeting below.
She twisted her arm to get his attention. His eyes flicked to her and she mouthed ‘Record!”
He pursed his lips, but ignored her command, instead continuing to pull her slowly upward.
Irritated, she twisted again, jerking her arm. She felt his grip tighten in response. He gave her a look but instead of stilling her movements, she gestured with her free arm to the recorder in his other hand.
Superman didn’t roll his eyes, but she swore she could feel him fight the urge.
He turned her recording device over in his hand and depressed one of the buttons. Then he continued to pull her toward him. As he maneuvered her, she realized that he wasn’t pulling her into the same position. This time, he carried her the way he used to, one hand behind her shoulders and one beneath her bent knees.
Once settled, she had to resist leaning into him. She only now realized just how much she had missed this.
While they hadn’t exactly gone on leisurely pleasure flights before, there had always been a shared intimacy in flying together - his arms around her, cradling her to his chest, as they shared a wordless connection and affinity to the empty skies and the sunset beyond. It had always felt both soothing and exhilarating. And try as she might, particularly in these recent months, she could never quite shake the feeling that it was where she was meant to be.
But over the last few months, that had all changed.
Flights were notably faster. Last time, she’d had to turn her head away from the harsh winds they passed through at what felt like an accelerated speed. What had once been an indulgence in something that they both loved now felt perfunctory at best. During the hostage situation, he’d made dropping her off seem like a chore.
She couldn’t really bring herself to complain, though she’d been incensed in the moment. Having already lost one friend, she didn’t relish pushing Superman and therefore risking losing another. Things were already strained with both Jimmy and Perry, too, as they insisted on treating her with kid gloves. She wouldn’t further alienate Superman, too.
Still, she wondered at the new-found speed he’d poured on during their recent flights together. A hunch told her it had been his attempt to discourage conversation. That was another thing she missed between them. They didn’t have regular in-depth conversations per se, but there had always been banter and a shared understanding. It had always seemed like a unique skill of theirs to exchange a lot of meaning with few words. It had been months since she’d been able to discern any hidden meaning in his eyes.
And, of course, in perhaps the biggest change of those recent flights, he hadn’t held her nearly as close.
Unlike right now.
In the present moment, he’d pulled her quite close, pressing her against his chest. But it still didn’t feel like the affection she’d once reveled in. In fact, she had the sneaking suspicion that he was trying to keep her still.
Like that would ever happen.
She fought a grin and tried to focus on the conversation below them. By now, the woman had clearly defined herself as ring-leader. It sounded like the two tattered men were her distributors. Mr. Hired Muscle didn’t contribute to the conversation, but stood behind the blonde woman looking brooding.
She wondered if he was paid by the frown.
As the drug peddlers below continued to compare numbers, she lightly adjusted her position against the steel arms holding her in place, and delicately unzipped an inner pocket. Very carefully — very, very carefully, with the fallen recorder in mind — she pulled out a small digital camera and double checked that the flash was off. She advanced the film as quietly as she could, and leaned forward to get a better angle.
She felt herself jerked backward and looked up at her current mode of transport.
Was that exasperation creeping in behind his eyes?
What did he think they were here for? Photos were evidence, and she’d made it clear that she’d come here for evidence. Chalk up one more point in the ‘wet blanket’ category.
Giving him a look that conveyed she thought he was being overcautious, she pointedly turned back toward the people below. Without leaning so far forward that her own personal safety rail would pitch her backward again, she clicked the shutter, capturing Mr. Brooding’s face. She took a second photo, careful to get a good 3/4 profile of the younger man that she’d fled from earlier. She’d have to wait to get clear shots of the other two. But at least she’d managed to get the floor and the filing cabinets in the picture, which should make it easier to link these guys to this warehouse. She advanced the film again so that it would be ready, and stowed it securely back in her pocket.
“…no discounts,” Blondie was saying.
“But we’ve pushed all our product earlier than the deadline. What about an early delivery bonus?” the older tattered man wheedled.
“You sell faster, that means you can sell more overall. That makes more profit for both of us. That’s your bonus,” Blondie replied callously.
The younger man make a ‘tsk’ sound and shifted his feet. The two tattered men looked at each other for a moment and seemed to reach some silent accord.
Then the older man said, “Fine. Then give us our next supply now.”
“Same price,” Blondie stipulated.
“Yeah, yeah,” the older man reluctantly agreed, “Same price.”
“Follow me,” Blondie said. She looked at her Muscle-Man. “Bruno, follow us.”
Lois chortled quietly at that. Mr. Brooding’s name was Bruno. It fit.
Blondie headed through the archway, her low chunky heels clacking across the cement floor. The two tattered men followed her, and ‘Bruno’ trailed after the group.
A second later, a fluorescent light flickered on in the windowless warehouse beyond.
Lois turned to her own now-brooding muscle man. “Let’s go,” she urged. “We need to get in there so I can get photos of the hand-off.”
For a second, she thought he was going to argue, but he flew them over to hover above the archway. He stared at the wall, and she assumed he must be looking through it to see the people inside the warehouse proper.
Still looking at the wall, he whispered, “Two of them are facing the door. If I move through the doorway, we’d have to go low enough that they might see us.”
“Is there any other way in?”
He looked around again before replying, “Not one that wouldn’t attract even more attention.”
“We have to get photos of them,” she insisted. “And we need to get the recorder closer.”
“I can move faster than their eyes would be able to see us, but it would be pretty uncomfortable for you.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I’m invulnerable to G-forces. You’re not.”
“I’ve never been hurt flying with you before,” she pointed out.
“I’ve never gone this fast with a passenger,” he said. “For a reason,” he added when her skepticism obviously wasn’t quelled.
“So what’s our other option?” she asked.
“I could bring the recorder in and take photos for you,” he offered. He dropped them to the ground, and she swung her legs down to stand next to him. But she held onto his arm stubbornly.
“Not on your life,” she said. “It’s my story, and I’m going with you.”
“Lois,” he said, frustration seeping into his carefully controlled tone, "I don’t think I can get us both in there safely.”
A sudden thought struck her. “Do you even do that?”
“Do what?”
“Gather evidence. Don’t you usually stop crimes as they’re happening? This doesn’t seem like your usual Friday night of super crime prevention.”
His eyes slid away from hers just as a loud grating sound reached them from the next room.
“They’re opening one of the crates in there,” he said urgently. “Give me the camera.”
“Look, it’ll be fast but it’ll be fine.”
“Lois, it wouldn’t be!”
“Just take me in,” she insisted hotly.
“Lo—is!” he shot back.
For some reason she felt a surge of shock and elation as he said her name, even though his tone was definitely annoyed now. She shook the feeling away as he held out his hand and said, “Camera.” With another impatient glance at the wall beside them, he said, “It’s now or never.”
“Ugh, fine!” Still off balance, she capitulated with agitation, unzipping her pocket. “Make sure you get their faces and the drugs in the same shot! And make sure you —“
“I know what to do,” he said steadily, taking the camera from her hand and blurring out of sight.
She crouched down beside the open archway and shook her head in disgust. Was this just another part of his crusade to keep her out of harm’s way? Was that why he’d insisted on accompanying her inside in the first place? Thinking back over the night, a lot of his actions tonight had been focused on keeping her out of sight — and out of reach — of the people she’d been following.
Come to think of it, she realized it wasn’t like him to ride along on one of her stake-outs. He usually only showed up after a final countdown had begun. …or after the fuse had been lit. …or when someone’s finger was already squeezing the trigger. …or as her temper gave way to fear and she finally called for help in the seconds left before the building was about to explode. That wasn’t the situation she was in now.
She hadn’t even been caught, yet, for goodness’ sake!
And just when did Superman take a course in investigative reporting? He’d said he knew his business with the camera. Then there was the recorder. As he’d floated them aloft, she noticed that he’d held her recorder in one hand, speaker carefully uncovered and pointed at the people below. Even though they’d be harder to spot in a darker corner of the ceiling, he’d kept them directly overhead of the criminals. It had meant that the recorder was close enough to pick up their voices. Had he positioned them because of that?
He’d naturally staged himself as a lookout as she’d picked the door lock, too. Something about the way he’d stood just over her shoulder, giving her quiet warnings about their progress reminded her deeply of something. Her senses were desperately reaching to remember and make the connection, but she couldn’t quite place it.
Maybe she could chalk up all of his behavior tonight to general competence or even common sense.
But something about it gave her a hunch that they’d been through something like this before.
One thing was certain, though. She’d never been on a stake-out with Superman.
Putting that train of thought aside, she laid low to the ground and took a chance to peer around the corner.
Only two of them had their backs to her, but it didn’t matter. All four were intent on the open brick of white powder in the woman’s hand. The younger tattered man looked like he was tasting it, and Lois made a sour face reflexively. He wiped his hand clean and nodded to the older man, who in turn nodded at Blondie. Lois couldn’t hear them from her position all the way back at the archway, but the woman was encasing the powder again. She handed it over and pulled another out of the open crate beside her. She held out her hand. The older man handed her two stacks of cash. She spent time counting it before handing over the second brick.
Lois felt a level of glee she hadn’t felt in months. Her partner for the night should have some incriminatingly iron-clad photos of this. At different moments, both the older man and the women had held both the drugs and the money at the same time. She could just see the look on Henderson’s face when he got his hands on this evidence.
And, to top it off, she’d finally recognized Blondie. Blondie had definitely worked for Luthor. She was one of Luthor’s lower-level secretaries, though apparently she’d had more access than either Lois or the police had realized.
Luthor’s old employees all seemed to have access to things they shouldn’t, she thought.
And it had been keeping her busy.
The emptiness of the holidays this year had sent Lois into a frenzy for work. It was her least favorite time of year anyway, but this year’s had been the worst since she was a kid. Lucy hadn’t made it home. Her dad was knee-deep in some research project, and she couldn’t even convince her mother to have Christmas dinner with her. She’d resorted to inviting Perry and Jimmy over on Christmas Eve, but they’d had families that actually wanted to spend time with them. And, of course, she couldn’t rely on Clark this year.
She’d thought of him a lot that night, as she’d stared out at the silent snow coming down outside her window. The gathering emptiness had been as cold as the gathering snow.
She’d been throwing herself into her work before the holidays, but after that night… After that she’d been required a more relentless pace to keep her steady. When she didn’t find as many big leads in Metropolis as she thought there should be, she started hunting for smaller stories. And she began her investigations with what she knew best: the many-headed hydra of Luthor Corp and its seemingly endless list of illegal subsidiaries and illicit affiliates.
Even after Luthor’s step away from power… She grimaced, remembering his literal step off the city’s tallest building… Even after that, and after power grabs by Arianna and Nigel and endless other lower-level bosses all over the city, The Boss’ absence still left a vacuum in the Metropolis underworld that even Superman hadn’t halted.
Lex was just the gift that kept on giving.
She could really pick them, she castigated herself for the thousandth time.
She’d found that several seemingly honest Luthor Corp employees had become opportunists during the power flux.
Once it had become clear that at least some of his enterprises had been legitimate, the city had attempted to bail out a handful of Luthor’s local companies, which would have given some stability to the Metropolis work force. Unfortunately, competitors and outside interests had swooped in to take hold of the most lucrative bits of the legitimate operations. Among them had been the company headed by the now-third richest man in the world, Wayne Enterprises. Those take-overs had more often than not been hostile. Sometimes the companies were sold off piecemeal. Sometimes they were even purchased just to be permanently dismantled. Luthor had left many more enemies than friends, and his former employees were forced to bear the brunt of that enmity. As a result, many of them had lost their jobs as the business world had laid siege to the once untouchable Luthor Corp. And so, some of his previous employees had made creative use of their Luthor Corp knowledge as a stop-gap between their last job and the unemployment line.
In fact, she’d followed a trail unknowingly laid by one of them right to this warehouse tonight. Her sources indicated there would be a sale here from a fledgling distributor. The warehouse, of course, was owned by a shell company that was four degrees away from Luthor Corp. It looked like a distant connection, but she knew what it really meant. It was one of Lex’s special project warehouses, and probably one that stored something nasty, since its connection to its owner had been concealed.
So she hadn’t lied earlier - not exactly. She
had spoken with Henderson about the drug case, after all. In passing, he’d mentioned that his old partner, who’d switched departments recently, had gotten saddled with a case that wasn’t going anywhere. Still smarting from her lonely holiday, Lois perked up at the sound of an unsolved mystery in the city. After some prodding, Henderson took pity and gave her a few off-the-record details on the sudden influx of cocaine into the west side high schools.
Lois had quickly figured out that she’d already been working the case from the other end. Only, she hadn’t mentioned that part to her big blue boy scout. Knowing Superman’s dislike of Lex Luthor, even in death, perhaps it was better this way. No need to tell him she was chasing one of Luthor’s ghosts tonight.
The sound of the crate lid scraping into place called her attention back to the Luthor Corp cast-off and her cohorts. Her gaze flicked upward but it seemed that her partner for the evening was well out of sight. She looked back at the group. The two men had bagged the bricks and were heading toward her, followed closely by Blondie and Bruno the Brooding.
Lois maneuvered herself backward and away from the opening.
She was either flat on the ground or up in the air on this assignment, she thought sourly, brushing off her knees. Regardless, right now she was fervently hoping she’d be back in the air before the first of the peddlers came back into the room.
“Superman!” she whispered as loudly as she dared. “Our new friends are going to see me in a second.”
She scanned the little room again — nothing but a floor lamp, which was much too thin to hide behind, and a group of filing cabinets, which wouldn’t give her much cover. She might make it to the door, but its opening would give her away.
Stepping backwards, she headed for the far, dark corner of the room.
“Superman!”
She kept an eye on the archway, but didn’t see any sign of blue spandex.
“I know they’re dumb, but there’s no way they’ll miss me in here.” She could hear the group’s footsteps approaching her now. They were getting closer very quickly. “Superman! Please!”
The footsteps were close enough that they’d make it through the archway in about a second.
“Sup—“
Her breath caught in her chest as the overwhelming sensation of being pulled sharply against gravity overtook her.
“A little warning might be nice,” she groused in a whisper, as she dug her hands into his shoulders, fighting a moment of dizziness whilst in mid-air.
He’d been right about moving too fast with a passenger, after all. She dropped her head on his shoulder to stave off the nausea and took shallow breaths.
“I told you that you wouldn’t like it fast,” his voice said into her ear.
Was Superman teasing her again? She mustered up a dirty look for him but her attention was captured by the group moving below her.
The two tattered men crossed the concrete floor directly under them and walked out through the still unlocked door.
Amatuers, Lois thought smugly. They hadn’t even locked the door while showing off where their drug supply was stashed! Anyone could have walked in! It was a shame she hadn’t just had Henderson’s partner come with her tonight. He could have stumbled upon the door she opened for him and they’d have wrapped this up by now.
Brooding Bruno turned off the lamp and met Blondie at the door. They both exited and a moment later, Lois heard one lock turn over, and then another. Footsteps receded into silence. One car started and pulled away. The other followed a moment later.
He lowered them to the ground at a what she considered a reasonable pace for the first time that evening.
Lois expelled a breath, fishing a pen light out of another pocket. “Well, that was easier that I thought it would be.”
She heard him click off the recorder and he handed it to her.
“Thanks,” she said, double checking the tape.
“It was recording,” he said, sounding a little maligned.
“I know,” she said absently, rewinding the tape. “I always check it. Force of habit.”
He raised an eyebrow and her irritation from earlier resurfaced.
“I wasn’t implying anything about you!”
He didn’t look like he believed her, but he didn’t reply. If she didn’t know better, she’d think he was intentionally trying to wind her up.
“I wasn’t! Please, I have a little more faith in you that that!” she said, condescendingly. “Honestly, you’re acting exactly like —“
The air left her lungs.
Clark. She’d been about to say Clark.
She closed her eyes against the slash of pain that lanced through her collapsing chest.
“Lois?” His voice was soft.
She worked her mouth but no sound came out. Opening her eyes, she pushed the pain back down, relegating her emotions back to the place she kept them hidden during the day. She squared her shoulders, swallowed, and forced herself back to business.
“Are those lead-coated?” she deflected, gesturing to the file cabinets.
“What?” he asked, looking nearly as off-kilter as she felt.
“The file cabinets. Can you see through them?”
He glanced over at them. “Yes.”
“Well,” she gestured impatiently toward them.
“Well?” he asked, sounding earnestly confused.
“Well, can you scan through them for some kind of ledger or inventory or something related to our guys? I’m sure most of it’s outdated, but maybe we’ll get lucky.”
He had that look on his face again — like he was going to argue. “Shouldn’t we be heading to the police now?”
“We’re heading to the police next. But the more we can give them, the easier it will be for them to get a warrant for this place,” she said convincingly.
“And the more you’ll be able to print in tomorrow’s edition,” he said knowingly.
Could she make it? How much time had passed since he’d pulled her out of the alley? She checked her watch. It’d be tight, but… “If I’m really lucky, I might just make deadline.” Looked back at him with pleading eyes, she theorized, “But if I have to search through all five of these, it’ll take more time before we can get the police down here, which means more time with those criminals out on the streets before they’re arrested.” She warmed to her theme, “And that means more drugs potentially in the hands of harmless kids.”
She knew she was milking this, but it was worth the chance.
“You’re incorrigible,” he said, before moving toward the cabinets.
“Oh, thank you, thank you!” she grinned, following him as he passed her.
He stopped in front of the first cabinet.
She shifted her weight from foot to foot impatiently.
“Well?” she asked a second later.
He glanced back at her and chuckled. “Lois, I know that I’m fast, but this is still going to take me a minute!” Still grinning, he shifted his gaze back to the cabinet in front of him.
She sighed, leaving him to it and glancing around her. There really wasn’t anything else of interest in the room. Wandering into the main warehouse, she looked around. Dusty. It wasn’t full by any stretch, but it wasn’t empty either.
Making her way over to the crate that Blondie opened, she stopped to inspect it. Careful not to touch it and disturb the fingerprints already there, she examined the sides and lid. It had the same marking as the other crates, but its lid wasn’t affixed.
She moved to the crate behind her and realized that its lid wasn’t affixed either. She pulled the lid off and aimed her light into the box.
Electrical cables.
Innocuous and therefore boring, she assessed.
She propped the lid back on and moved to the next crate in the same direction. It was also open and upon investigation also held cables. Following the breadcrumbs back toward the door, she examined the next three crates. They were identical. She dug around through the one nearest the door she’d come in through. The cables were heavy and didn’t want to shift after sitting so long in their position. She managed to dig nearly halfway down without finding anything suspicious.
She gave up on it and headed back to Blondie’s crate again. Stepping past it, she examined the lids on the far side, heading deeper into the warehouse.
They were closed.
Had Blondie just come in and opened crates until she’d found something that piqued her interest? Had it really been that simple?
Did that mean that every single property Lex had owned still held some sort of vice yet to be unleashed upon Metropolis? How many were left undiscovered? Worse yet, how many were out there on the streets already?
Her shoulders slumped at the dour future that laid itself out before her. She hadn’t married Lex, but she was still stuck with him. Tonight proved to her that she’d be hunting Lex’s ghost for years — tracking down other crates like Blondie’s, ferreting out a story if there was one, and keeping all of Pandora’s many boxes out of the wrong hands. Even with all her skills, her confidence in her own talent, and the inside track on Luthor, the job already felt like an insurmountable climb.
She didn’t want to do it on her own anymore.
Alone, in the dark, she desperately wished for her partner back.
When had her life become this waltz of specters? She was chasing one ghost and yearning for another.
The wave of missing him caught her off-guard and easily pulled her into its undertow.
It was an emotion she had spent hours learning to tamp down. Every day, she craved the indulgence of missing him. But she’d discovered that if she gave in, it would effectively be the end of her day. So she only let herself slide into the obsidian melancholy of those memories once she was alone in her apartment at the end of her day. As the sun drowned below the horizon line, she would give way and bury herself deep in her graveyard of regret. It was long past that time now, and her mind and body were insisting upon their usual routine.
Already overwhelmed, she let herself succumb.
Clark, she thought reverently, swaying slightly on her feet as she let darkness and the memories of Clark Kent weave around her. She missed his solid presence, his dependability, his teasing grin. She missed his ability to stumble upon useful clues. His arm folding around hers as they walked down the city streets. The amused look in his eyes when she was saying something completely outlandish. The safe haven as he stood at her shoulder in the midst of whatever tempest she’d tossed them into. The warmth of his hand on her lower back. His easy camaraderie. His innate kindness. His better angels screaming down all of her inner demons. His ability to make her feel better about anything, even herself.
She’d realized agonizingly late that she didn’t want to be just Mad Dog Lane anymore. She wanted to be part of a team. She wanted to be Lois and Clark.
She missed her old life acutely.
The one with him in it.
In this new colder, colorless life, missing Clark was the best part of her day.
“Got it!”
Spinning toward the sound, she realized belatedly that her eyes were expressing her still-raw sadness.
“Lois?” His voice became soft again.
Getting sloppy, she thought, already compartmentalizing. She dropped the penlight, using her movement in retrieving it as a cover to dash the tears from her eyes. It gave her the moment she needed to compose herself and reaffix her endlessly taxing, but convincingly normal Lois Lane persona.
“What did you find?” she asked, in a passably normal tone.
“What were you doing in here?” he asked gently, not answering her question.
“I was looking through the crates to see what other trouble Blondie might be getting herself into,” she said with deliberate wryness.
She headed toward him, leaving Clark’s memory in the darkness behind her. It would still be there for her later. A curse. A blessing. He was always waiting for her.
“Nothing worthwhile in the other open crates,” she pressed on before he could speak. “We’ll let Henderson’s boys sort out the unopened ones. What did you come up with?”
Not waiting for an answer, she stopped by his side and shone her light onto the papers in his hand.
“Names? And dates and correlating numbers and — are those license plate numbers?” Interest lit within her.
“One of them matches the car that you followed here tonight,” he told her.
“A list of distributors!” She patted him on the shoulder with mounting excitement. “That’s amazing!”
He materialized her camera from somewhere and held the pages out to her. She turned on her flash and photographed them one at a time.
She practically beamed at him. “Now we go to the police. Let’s get those back into place.”
“Already ahead of you,” he said, blurring out of sight.
“Show-off,” she muttered, and heard his answering laugh from the small room in front of her. She headed back toward him and used her penlight to zero in on the outer door.
Zippering her camera back into her pocket, she triple checked her recorder — again — and reached for the door.
“Ready?” she asked.
The door opened before her hand could touch it.
“Ladies, first,” he said lightly, ushering her through. His hand landed lightly on her lower back as she passed him.
The sensation of familiarity was excruciating and undeniable.
She stopped dead and twisted back to look at him.
And she really looked at him for the first time that night.
“What?” he asked, studying her face.
Yes, what? her mind echoed. What was happening?
She was transported back a lifetime ago.
Clark’s hand on her lower back, warm through the red organza layers of her dress, as they slipped together past the bouncer at the door. The noise of the casino made it hard to hear him as they entered, so he’d guided her through the warm press of bodies toward a slot machine where they could pause to get a look around. They had stopped, just like this, and she had caught an appreciative look in his warm, darkening eyes before he’d hidden it. It was in that moment she’d decided that her flirty red dress had just become her new favorite.
“Lois?” The gentleness in Superman’s voice led her out of the casino, though it resonated in a discordantly familiar way.
“I was just thinking…” she said, still staring starkly at him in the dim alley, tracing the lines of his face with her eyes.
He waited patiently for her to continue.
She snapped herself out of the daydream.
Things that seem too good to be true usually are, she told herself ruthlessly.
“We should lock the door,” she said, willfully dislodging his hand by bending down to kneel beside the rusted lock. She rummaged for her kit, and finding it, fished out two picks and got to work. “If they come back before we do, they’ll realize someone’s been here. We don’t want them moving the evidence before the MPD can get back to it.”
“Lois Lane, the only person I’ve ever known to use a lock-pick to LOCK a door,” he chuckled.
“I’m a woman of many skills,” she retorted, finishing the easy lever-lock swiftly and moving to the deadbolt.
She looked at him askance. There was a devil on her shoulder tonight, which was a pity because they’d finally fallen back into their old routine.
But… that wasn’t right. This had never been her routine with Superman.
Something pushed her to ask, “So, how did you enjoy your first night moonlighting as an investigative reporter for the Planet?”
His expression froze.
“You’re good at it, too,” she said daringly, forcing her voice to stay casual.
“Thank you,” he said politely.
“So?” she prodded.
“So…?”
“So, how did you like it?”
“Well… it’s not how I usually work.” It sounded like he was hedging.
The lock turned over into place and she pocketed the pick. She stood, facing him and tucking her hair behind one ear. “It’s nice having a partner, though.” Her voice had lowered without her permission. “Isn’t it?”
Their eyes met and held.
“It’s nice to have a partner,” he agreed, his tone low and intense.
She took a small step closer. “Ever consider going under cover as a reporter?” she asked.
He could never say ‘yes,’ of course. But even as she asked it, she was absolutely sure he wouldn’t say ‘no.’
He hesitated before replying quietly, “It’s tempting.”
His response hung in the air between them.
There was something there, so tangible she could almost, almost grasp hold of it.
Finally, he cleared his throat. “We should head over to the precinct.”
She nodded and he slipped one arm beneath her knees, another around her back. As they alighted into a star-filled sky, she couldn’t help but wonder…
How tempting?*****
