The LexCorp atrium smells like ozone and burnt coffee at two in the morning — the building’s soul stripped down to fluorescent hum and the slow, mechanical breath of the servers. Rain paints the city in quicksilver outside the glass. It should be easier to think in this light.

It isn’t.

Clark has been circling your desk for twenty minutes.

Not literally—he’s trying to look casual about it—but every excuse to pass by feels thinner than the last. A forgotten file. A refill on cold coffee. A question he already asked you an hour ago. It’s past midnight at LexCorp. Most of the lights are off. The cleaning crew hasn’t even come through yet. Outside the glass walls, Metropolis hums low and distant, like the city is holding its breath.

You’re still here.

Of course you are.

Clark leans against the edge of a cubicle, tie loosened, sleeves rolled up, glasses sliding down his nose. He looks tired in the way only he ever does—shoulders heavy, jaw tight, eyes too sharp for a man who’s supposedly just a reporter killing time.

“You can’t keep stonewalling me,” Clark said, voice low, rougher than he meant it to be. He hated the way it sounded—needy, almost angry. Hated more that it was honest. “People are getting hurt. If you know something, anything—”

He knows you’re scared. He can hear it in your heartbeat. He knows you’re trying to be careful. But he also knows Lex better than anyone alive, and every second you hesitate feels like another second Lex gets to stay ten steps ahead.

Clark steps closer.

“You said you wanted him stopped,” he murmurs. “You said you were helping.”

Finally, you meet his eyes. His breath hitches. He can never get over how beautiful you are. How smart. What had started as honest pestering, journalistic integrity, he told himself, had turned into late nights huddled up together between case files that were above both their pay grade. Something sharp flickers between you—anger, exhaustion, something messier underneath.

“I am helping,” you snap. “And it’d be easier to focus if you weren’t hounding me.”

His jaw clenches, planting his hands on your desk, boxing you in before he realizes it. “You’re risking everything,” he continues, voice low. “Your job. Your safety. And you won’t even tell me what you’ve found.” “Because if I tell you, you’ll try to fix it.”

He doesn’t deny it.

“That’s what I do.”

Your hands shake as you gesture between them. “You don’t get it, Clark. I can’t just hand you pieces of LexCorp’s internal operations and hope it doesn’t blow back on me. You think Luthor doesn’t have eyes everywhere?” He takes another step forward.

“And you think I’d let him hurt you?”

Your breath stutters.

So does his.

Clark scrubs a hand through his hair, frustration finally cracking through his careful restraint.

“I’ve been watching you run yourself into the ground for weeks,” he admits. “Every time I ask how you’re doing, you lie. Every time I offer help, you shut me out. And I’m trying—I’m trying because you're—”

Everything? Something more than just…acquaintances? He opens his mouth to say something, closes it when he realizes that nothing he says is coming out the way he wants it to. He’s in front of you in all of 3 strides, sinking to his knees with all the reverence of a repentant sinner. His forehead is a grounding weight against your thighs, and his palms slide up gently to squeeze at your calves.

“M’sorry,”

He huffs out against the fabric of your skirt, and it’s a complete 180 from the Clark Kent you know. But even under all that devotion is still the boyscout you know. The Clark who would rather jump into a tub of kryptonite than hurt you. He lifts his head, chin perched atop your thighs, bright, blue eyes looking up at you through his unfairly wispy lashes.

“You drive me crazy,”