In Lex's estimation, Clark has become a very good liar. He used to give himself away with eyes downcast and a softening of his voice, or the way he'd try to stand still but move beneath the skin. He doesn't do that anymore. Now, when he comes home at dawn instead of dusk, he smiles and says, "Sorry, Lois had a lead." His gaze doesn't waver, he settles down in a boneless sprawl, one muscled arm falling in a possessive drape across Lex's chest. Relaxed. A comfortable liar.

And it's always Lois, isn't it? "Sorry, grabbed a sandwich with Lois." "Sorry, I'm late, Lois had a flat." "Sorry, I was looking over Lois' article before we put it to bed." Already inclined to dislike Lois, Lex is starting to hate her. The sound of her name, the scent of her perfume on Clark's clothes, opening the Daily Planet and seeing her smug, cattish smile on the editorials page.

Lex had bottomed out an entire tech industry stock by selling low, abruptly, everything he had- and people pay attention to Lex Luthor when he sells a stock. Lane Biotex ceased to exist overnight, just because Lex was sick of seeing the unconnected name on his ticker in the morning. Then the little bitch accused him of insider trading. Couldn't prove it because it wasn't true, but that was just one more thing to damn her, as far as Lex was concerned.

She wrote love letters to Superman with one hand, and dug her nails into Clark with the other. Whatever fascinated Clark about her, maybe the vague, passing resemblance to Lana, maybe she'd just battered him into it, it was enough that Lex no longer believed Clark's stories about insomnia and just liking to walk the streets at night. He didn't believe him when he claimed he'd spent the night in a greasy diner, watching mobsters trade money for guns for this story they were writing.

They. That particular word, that particular choice of word, especially grated. The only 'they' Clark Kent had any right to was Lex and Clark. No "us" with Lois in it, no "we" with her nimble little fingers threaded through it. Sometime, shortly after starting at the Daily Planet, someone must have told Clark that the best way to hide something was to hide it in plain sight. He'd fooled Lex for a while, but now the neverending prevalence of Lois Lane in Clark's days and his nights made it clear. He was fucking her, and he thought he could get away with it.

Lex Luthor does not share. This is what he thinks about, standing over Lois' bed, and it takes no effort at all to put two bullets in her head. He got the gun from a Sofia Gigante- her Frankie has been fucking around too, and needs to be taught a lesson- so Lex drops the piece from his gloved hand and lets it lie like a black snake on white sheets turning red. Lex thinks it's funny, in a very tired, and mirthless way. So many people say they'd kill for love.

So few of them mean it.