FIC: Smallville - Upward Mobility

[fajrdrako_fic]

Title: Upward Mobility
Author: fajrdrako
Fandom: Smallville
Genre: Slash
Characters: Pete Ross/Lionel Luthor
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Not mine, no claims, all property of Warner/DC.
Note: No spoilers. Pete Ross finds someone who will understand him. Originally posted at the Smallville Slash Archive.


Upward Mobility

Pete Ross lay in bed, trying not to think about Clark Kent, and the chain of events that had brought him to this particular bed with this particular man.

It was a luxurious bed, because Lionel Luthor demanded the best of everything. Pete had never before slept on sheets with such a fine weave. He had never been tended by room service at the touch of a button. The bathroom (all gilt and mirrors) was bigger than his bedroom at home at home in Wichita. He'd never walked on a carpet quite so silky, or been called 'sir' so often by deferential staff who probably thought him a whore.

Or maybe they didn't. He didn't know what they thought. This wasn't his world, not yet. But with Lionel's help, he was learning his way around in it.

He'd never drunk liquor so expensive. In the past, his only experience with drugs had been accidents sparked by Smallville meter rocks; now he had access to the finest grades of chemical miracles.

He had never tasted food so exquisitely prepared by the finest chefs in Metropolis, the higest paid. He preferred his mother's cooking, but it might be a while before he tried it again. She would not approve of his current living arrangements. She might accept that her little boy was gay. She might accept his - phrasing it delicately - alternate lifestyle. But giving himself to a Luthor? That she would never forgive.

Clark had done the same, with another Luthor. But he had stayed in Smallville, among the small minds and the small ambitions. Clark never asked what Lex might give him. Clark had never had it like Pete had it now.

Or had he? Pete couldn't be sure what Lex had shared with Clark. Once, he had thought Clark trusted him with his secrets. So stupid! Clark had kept the secret of his alien nature through ten years of friendship. He had kept the secret of his relationship with Lex for two. And when Clark had told him, for Pete, that had been the last straw.

Pete was sure Clark had been a virgin before Lex Luthor, same as Pete had been two... three days ago. Had Clark and Lex also come to expensive hotels, groped each other in limousines, tossed money around like confetti?

Pete didn't know Lex well enough to be sure, but he didn't think he was as much into conspicuous consumption as his father. Was it Lex's money that had attracted Clark, or something else? Chrisma? Cleverness? How had he fascinated, fooled, and ultimately seduced Clark?

It didn't matter now. Pete's friendship with Clark was over. It had been a false friendship anyway, based on lies. He had believed Clark was human. He had believed Clark loved Lana. Lies, all of it, just like his own hollow affection for Chloe that had hidden an even more futile attaction to Clark. Deluded, nave, he had believed then what he wanted to believe about trust and the goodness of the world. Now he knew that everyone lied.

Pete cast a sideways look at Lionel, who was still asleep, one arm thrown heavily over Pete's chest, his breath warm against Pete's shoulder. The weight of his arm made it impossible for Pete to move. He didn't care. He liked the sense of being owned, being valued. Clark hadn't valued him, not once Lex came onto the scene. It was as if Pete had become invisible.

Clark had told Pete he was an alien. He had not told Lex. He had never told Lex. When Pete had asked him about it, Clark had replied, "I don't dare. It's too dangerous for him."

So: no alien secrets divulged on the expensive pillows of Luthor Manor. Lex might wonder why Clark survived so many accidents, how he could move so fast, why his body was unmarked and unscarred - but he didn't know. Pete knew.

It was a source of pride, that Clark had told him.

But that had led nowhere, and he had seen Clark turn away from him, preferring to play pool or strip poker or whatever it was he was doing those long evenings with Lex before fucking the night away. Pete wondered what would have happened if he'd made a play for Clark himself. He'd thought about it, back there in Smallville, when they were both young. Clark had seemed so beautiful and vulnerable. He thought it impossible. Clark was straight, naive, and so shy. So sweetly in love with the untouchable Lana.

Things didn't turn out to be the way he'd thought they were. Lana didn't seem so untouchable now. (How many men had she loved?) Clark didn't look so naive, considering that for two years (maybe longer) he'd been sex-toy to richest man in Smallville and no one had known, no one had a god-damned clue, least of all Pete Ross, his former best friend. After two years in Lex Luthor's bed, it was unlikely Clark had any shred of innocence left in him.

Clark wasn't the only one who could play mind-games, not to mention body-games. Four days ago, Pete had been hitch-hiking out of Smallville when one of the Luthor limos picked him up. He would have refused the ride if it had been Lex in the car, all smarm and superiority. Instead it was Lionel Luthor. You'd think he'd hate the old man more, since Lionel had ruined his family, long ago. Once, he had hated Lionel, as all his family did. Things changed. Pete hadn't forgotten the past, but he didn't hold it against Lionel. In fact, he had a secret admiration for the man who had deftly ruined his family.

He and Lionel also had a shared grievance. Lionel didn't get along with Lex either.

So in the limo, it hadn't taken much acting skill to hang on Lionel's words, to stare at him with open admiration. To accept his invitation for a drink. To accept his offer of a drive all the way to Metropolis. To accept, after a time, a few discreet caresses. To return unspoken promises with silent, meaningful smiles. To follow innuendo to its final place: to go to bed with Lionel Luthor. Take that, Smallville and everyone in it.

If Clark could be Lex Luthor's secret lover, Pete could be Lionel's.

He'd thought he knew a lot about sex, from seeing his cousin's porn tapes. After a couple of hours with Lionel he knew he knew practically nothing, but he showed he was eager to learn. Lionel was a fine mentor: step by step, stripping away his defenses and his pride. To say no to anything Lionel wanted was to invite excoriating humiliation. To say yes was to find an escalating whirlwind of sensuality.

He wondered if it was true, that Lionel Luthor had seduced Martha Kent, the way some people said. Clark never believed it, but Pete wasn't so sure. Lionel was persuasive, magnetic, compelling... and insatiable. That might appeal to Martha in the same way it appealed to him. To fall under Lionel's control was to discover an exciting new world. Had Lionel taken Martha's breath away, too?

Pete didn't feel like the same person he was three days ago. He'd lost his virginity, and all sense of shame. Taking the plunge into what he used to call a gay relationship - something that had seemed overwhelming in its implications - meant nothing, now. Just words. People did what people did, to and with each other. He didn't even feel jealous of Clark and Lex now. Why should he? If he met Clark now, one of them would be a stranger.

We wondered if Clark and Lex had done all the things Lionel had done with him. He didn't believe it, yet. Lex was maybe leading Clark down a slope, while Lionel had taken him to the edge of a cliff where they'd stepped together into the chasm. Three days ago he'd never had sex, or designer drugs, or bathrobes made of burgundy silk with his monogram in gold. He felt like a creature reborn.

Pete's life had been at an impasse: studies that meant nothing, a new life in a city that wasn't friendly. Lex had taken his place in Clark's life, the was adrift from the Rosses and the Kents. He couldn't picture the future.

Lionel offered him a myriad of choices. If he wanted, Lionel would send him to business school, or for a law degree. Or he'd buy him a racing car, maybe get him a tryout for the Sharks. The choices were his.

The price was to be here, in luxury, in pain in because Lionel Luthor was insatiable and they'd done too much, too fast. It had been a confusing discovery of pleasure and desire, need and submission, and at the end of it, pride. Confidence. Hope.

He wasn't an ignorant farm boy now. He had a future. He could forget Smallville, forget Clark.

He needed what Lionel could give him as much as Lionel needed what he had to offer.

He turned his head, and saw that Lionel was awake, watching him. He smiled. "Good morning," Pete said, his voice husky.

Lionel touched his face in a gentle caress. "Pete?" he said. "Tell me what you know about Clark Kent."

- end -