Déjà Vu
Chapter 8
Chapter 8
“I don’t know what your interest is in Chloe Sullivan, Queen. But stay away from her.”
Oliver sat at his desk, phone to his ear. He leaned back in his chair, propping his feet up on the desk, crossed at the ankles. “What’s the matter Lex? Afraid I’ll steal away one of your employees?” Oliver was expecting this; he’d already spoken to Chloe who told him that unfortunately, she couldn’t get away to meet him. He was consoled by the fact that she’d sounded terribly disappointed.
“Not at all, I’m simply wondering why a man who once dated Chloe’s cousin, now has his sights set on her. Are you making the rounds through all the females in the family? Her mother is lovely as well. Although, she is rather quiet.”
Oliver chuckled humorlessly. “It was coffee, Lex, not a marriage proposal. She’s an old acquaintance. No harm in that.”
“Stay away from her.”
“Or what? If anything, you’re little possessive display and harmless threat, has just made her increasingly worth pursuing. Unless you have romantic notions of your own, what is she to you, anyway?”
“She’s a friend, and she’s not been well. I’ve been helping her, and I don’t need you to ruin what progress she’s made.”
“Ah, you mean the memory loss? Yes, I found it odd when she didn’t remember me, but I doubt one coffee date would ruin her progress, which begs the question; what are you so worried about?”
Lex hesitated. When Chloe had come to him wanting an afternoon away, and telling him why, he could immediately sense her infatuation with the blonde billionaire. It was more than coffee to her, and Lex couldn’t allow it. He’d told her that regrettably, he had work for her to do, and that she’d have to let Mr. Queen know that she couldn’t meet him today. “Nothing. Just… leave her alone,” he growled, and hung up, ending the call abruptly.
Oliver pressed the end of the phone to his chin thoughtfully, a slow smile spreading on his face. Lex was worried, and anything that caused anxiety for Lex, had to be a good thing.
* * * * *
She stepped out onto the rooftop, closing the heavy door behind her, sensing rather than seeing him in the shadows beyond the subdued lighting. “I’m here. Alone. What do you want?”
“I want you to remember who you are, Chloe.” Came the distorted voice, not far from her, and she’d wondered how long he’d been there, hidden.
She took a step toward his voice. “Well unfortunately, Mr. Arrow, I don’t.”
The Green Arrow had been there awhile. He had wanted to be certain that she’d be alone, and so he’d waited on the roof of the ISIS building long before she was due to arrive, making certain that she was neither followed nor accompanied by anyone. He stepped out of the darkness and near the edge of the dim array of illumination provided by a small utility light above the door she’d just exited. He moved closer to her, setting down his crossbow, making a show of hands in a gesture to let her know that he was effectively unarmed. “Let me help you. I can help you regain your memory if you’ll come with me.”
“Lex says...”
“Lex.”
She overlooked the disdain in his voice. “Lex says you’re a terrorist. And from the information I’ve found, it certainly looks as though you are.” She took a few steps around him, keeping her distance. “But I’m also aware of your charitable activities. It seems you’re a regular modern-day Robin Hood.”
“Has he submitted you to more of his ‘treatments’? Convinced you that I’m the enemy?” He took a step in the opposite direction, as they circled one another, but he moved closer, and she gained no distance.
“I don’t trust Lex, but I don’t know if I can trust you, either.” She paused, eyeing him skeptically. “Is that your interest in me? Because you know I’m researching you? You’re afraid I’ll find out who you really are and expose you to the world?”
It was like a dance, Oliver thought randomly, the way they moved around each other slowly, each step bringing them gradually closer to one another. “No. I’m well aware of your intelligence, and your ability to uncover the truth on your own. But, Lex has shown you his truth. Let me show you mine.” He stepped closer, and saw her eyes widen slightly. “I’d never hurt you,” he said reassuringly, standing nearly beside her now, holding a gloved hand out to her. “Come with me,” he urged quietly.
Here he was. The man who’d invaded her mind, holding his hand out to her, offering her his truth, and something more, something else she wasn’t certain she wanted to think about. “No. I’ve agreed to talk, nothing more.”
“I have proof. If you’ll come with me, I can show you.”
“The truth is, I came here because you haunt my thoughts and dreams, and I want to know why.” She looked away from him then, the self-admonishment in her voice, evident. “Apparently, I have some unhealthy fascination with you.” Her eyes sought him again, finding he’d moved closer. “I came here because I want to know why Lex wants to see you dead. I want to know why you’re interested in some of his business ventures and research facilities. I want to know what you know about him.” She didn’t trust him enough to reveal what she’d discovered, but if she could find out what he knew, it might confirm her suspicions about Lex. As she spoke, he continued to circle her moving closer still. “What are you doing?” She asked, reaching for the tazer gun in her purse.
He was behind her now, and Chloe stood motionless, her pulse pounding and her breath quickening at the brush of his body at her back. “I’m showing you the reason I haunt your dreams in the only way I can right now.” His head descended as he slipped a gloved hand around her waist, fingers splayed over the flat of her stomach, pulling her back against him.
“By assaulting me?” She attempted to move away from him, tazer gun now in her hand.
He tightened his hold, preventing her from movement, pressing her body closer to his. “Wait. Listen to me. I’m willing to risk being tazered just to stand this close to you, Chloe. Hear me out.”
She seemed to relax somewhat, and accept his invasion of her space, and the pressure of his body against her back. But she was still wary, he felt the nervous tension in her body, and Oliver thought she’d use the tazer, and run away at any moment.
“We know each other very well. Your fascination isn’t odd at all. You’ve had me equally fascinated for a long time now. It’s not unhealthy at all. In fact we get along well, and are pretty happy together in spite of our crazy lives.”
If all he’d said were true, this man knew her and maybe he could help after all. “Tell me what you know about me?” she asked softly. She really wanted to know.
Chloe felt his lips against her hair as he spoke. “You went to Smallville High School where you were the editor of the school paper,” he began slowly. “You interned at the Daily Planet. Your father’s name is Gabe, your mother is Moira; I’ve met them both. Your best friend is Clark Kent. Your cousin is Lois Lane. I know you have an insatiable curiosity that gets you into trouble, and that’s why you decided to meet me again. I know you can’t function without your first cup of coffee… I know about your meteor ability.”
Gradually, he calmed her, soothed her as he continued to speak.
“You’re loyal and trustworthy, intelligent, quick-witted, stubborn, and sometimes you lack confidence in yourself when you shouldn’t. You’re also very giving and will do just about anything to help those you love if you can. Your smile can light up a room, turning every man in it to mush, and when you’re angry those same men run for cover. You’re independent and strong-willed, yet vulnerable. You’re a truth-seeker, and you fight against injustices. Ask me anything about you, I know the answers, I can fill in the blanks.”
Chloe felt as though entranced, lulled by his deep, altered voice so close to her ear behind her, she closed her eyes, and her head fell back against his chest as he spoke. She allowed it when he’d slipped his other arm around her, enfolding her, cradling her with both arms now, and he began to rock her ever so gently in small, slow, intermittent swaying motions as he pressed his cheek to the top of her head. Under the voice distortion, his tone was almost pleading, begging her to remember anything. What was it about him that drew her? Was telling the truth? It seemed that way. Maybe that’s why she felt so comforted by his presence now. She should be afraid of him, it was crazy not to be, but oddly she wasn’t, and something about being in his arms felt safe.
Oliver felt her body relax against his, knowing he had her rapt attention, and continued speaking, nuzzling her hair. “Lex had you kidnapped, he must have done something to you, some experiments I don’t know, to cause you to lose your memory, and the reason those treatments don’t help, is because he’s keeping you from remembering.”
“I know that now. It took me awhile, but I figured it out. I still don’t remember things. I don’t remember you,” she whispered, her eyes still closed.
Oliver was becoming desperate for her to remember something, anything about him. And she was here, in his arms again, and he was willing to do anything to keep her in his embrace, even for a few moments. She was not averse to his touch, and obviously intrigued by him. Maybe there was something there he could work with. Against his better judgment, he found himself wanting to kiss her and touch her more intimately, the way he’d done for six months before she was missing. He didn’t want to frighten her, she didn’t remember him, but he couldn’t help himself. He turned her in his arms slowly, locking his hands against her spine, holding her close. She gazed up at him, a vaguely sensuous light passing between them. She didn’t move, not even when he lowered his head and she felt his breath against her neck.
“How would I know that you love to be kissed right here?” he whispered, touching soft warm lips just under her ear. Nuzzling her, his breath fanning her neck.
Chloe shivered and closed her eyes, unconsciously tipping her head to give him better access. “I don’t know,” she whispered. There was something so familiar about the way he held her, and the way his mouth felt against her skin, and even something about the sound of his voice through the distorter, and the smell of leather, that had her stomach fluttering and her heart pounding wildly. His nearness overwhelmed her. “Why…did you just do that? Why would I let you?” she breathed. “I want to know, I want to remember but I can’t.” Her hands had stilled over the leather-covered expanse of his hard chest, her tazer gun long forgotten.
“You want me to touch you. You always have.”
She could hear the arrogance in his voice. “Let me guess, because you’re so irresistible?” she scoffed, half-heartedly. She had once originally thought to pull his hood down, and possibly reveal his identity, but those thoughts were long gone, as he seemed to be casting some spell around her since she’d first seen him, leaving her senseless.
He smiled against the curve of her neck. He’d missed her snark; he’d missed everything about her.
“What else do you know about me?”
His lips moved softly, grazing a sensuous path over her jaw line and cheek. “I know how good you taste,” he continued, his lips moving dangerously close to hers. “I know every sound you make,” he breathed. His eyes, hidden from her, closed over as he brushed his nose against hers. “The way you reach for me, and your fingers dig into me and pull me closer when I’m inside you.” his lips touched hers soft as butterfly wings.
She seemed receptive to his kiss until his last sentence somehow snapped her out of her stupor. Her eyes flew open. She pushed at his chest, avoiding his lips. “No. It’s not true. You’re lying.” Yet some part of her knew he wasn’t. There was something… something about this mysterious man in green leather she couldn’t put her finger on, something potent, and real that she couldn’t explain. She’d felt it last time too, and now even more so.
Oliver knew he’d possibly gone too far, but right now he’d do anything to jog a memory, and admittedly, he’d been dying to kiss her. “I know about the little birthmark you have on your backside,” The Green Arrow lifted his head slightly to see her shocked expression. He spared her a confident smirk. “Yes. You know it’s true, Chloe.” He raised a gloved hand, caressing her cheek with the backs of his fingers. “You feel something, don’t deny it.”
Her brows knit in confusion. She couldn’t lie; she did feel, an overwhelming attraction to him. “We were lovers.” She shook her head. “How?”
“Not were. Are. We are lovers.”
“I-I wouldn’t do that with someone I didn’t care about. I must have cared about you very much, and now I don’t even know you.”
Her last words pained him, but he tried not to show it. “It’s not that way at all. You do know me, Chloe. Better than anyone. You know who I really am.”
She was silent for long moments, simply staring up at him. Chloe suddenly remembered something he’d said to her the last time she’d seen him. “You love me,” she stated as a simple matter of fact.
“Yes.”
She looked away from him. “I’m sorry, there are just so many questions, I-I don’t know… what to believe, who to trust, where to begin.”
“What else do you want to know? Ask me anything.”
“How…how long, have we, uh…you know.”
“About six months before you were missing, but we’ve worked together and known each other for two years.”
“Okay,” she said, deep in concentration, trying to grasp for any memories of him. Chloe gazed up at him again. “Where did we meet?”
He smiled briefly then, looking oddly out of character as his Green Arrow persona. “In a barn.”
He had a beautiful smile, and once again her brain struggled to make connections, because she knew she’d seen that smile before. In spite of herself, Chloe found her own lips curving upward slightly. “How romantic. I don’t think anyone would make that up.”
“It’s true.”
“Why do you hide your face behind a hood and dark glasses, and use a voice distorter?”
“What I do is dangerous.”
“Obviously. And the targets you choose?”
“I’m protecting people. You called me a terrorist, and maybe to those I target, I am. I believe the end sometimes justifies the means, but I’m not the enemy. I’m one of the good guys, Chloe. Lex is the enemy. Some part of you must know this. Why does he have you watched? What would he do if he discovered the little meeting you’re having with the Green Arrow right now?”
“I have my own opinions about Lex.” She stared up into the face of the Green Arrow, wishing she could see his eyes. She decided to play devil’s advocate. “What if I remember who you are, your real identity? Aren’t you worried, I’ll tell Lex?”
“No. Because once you remember who I am, you’ll remember what I am to you. You’d never tell him.”
“You’re pretty sure of yourself.”
“I’m sure of you.”
Chloe dared to reach up and touch his cheek with her fingertips, as though memorizing him, moving them softly over his lips and chin, stopping briefly over his dimple. It was missing from the police sketch, and yet so distinguishable, she’d wondered why no one ever drew it in…
And then, a jolting shock of realization coursed through her entire body. There was no mistaking that chin, or those lips, that smile. She’d seen him yesterday at the mansion; he must have left the envelope in her bed. She was almost certain it was him, but she didn’t want to reveal her knowledge just yet. Suddenly she felt dizzy, her knees weak. If she was right, it meant that Oliver Queen was the Green Arrow, and dear God it meant that they were lovers. He loved her.
Chloe could barely breathe. How had that happened? She never recalled meeting Oliver Queen ever, until she’d bumped into him at the Talon, and she wished with all her heart that she could regain her memories of him. Emotions whirled. Sadness, for the loss of what she had, anger for what had happened to cause her to lose it. She lowered her forehead against his chest, the tazer gun falling from her hand. She gripped his bicep, leaning against him for support.
“Are you all right?” Arrow asked worriedly, sensing the sudden change in her.
Chloe took a few deep breaths before she as able to answer him. “Yeah,” she whispered, trying to collect herself.
“Chloe?”
“I’m fine.” She lifted her eyes to his face once more, and reaching up to continue her gentle explorations of his features, now wanting to be certain that this was the man she thought he was.
Oliver remained still, allowing her to have her soft touchings. She was trying to remember, trying to learn him by heart all over again. Her touch made him ache for her. “Come with me, Chloe,” he murmured, even the distorter couldn’t hide the longing in his voice.
“No. Not yet. It’s too dangerous for both of us now,” she whispered, gently tracing his bottom lip with a forefinger.
“He’ll only continue to subject you to more treatments.”
“He won’t. I’ve convinced him that I no longer need them. He thinks I’ve lost my ability, so now my usefulness to him is limited, and his interest in me is waning.”
“Have you lost it?”
“I don’t think so. Repressed, maybe.”
“Like your memories.”
“Yes.”
“You can’t stay there.”
“There’s something I have to do first,” she said, as her fingers skimmed gently back over his cheek once again.
“What do you have to do?"
“I can’t tell you all of it. Not yet. Let’s just say you aren’t the only person I’m digging up some dirt on, and if I’m right, about… about everything, I’ll give you what I find, and I’ll go with you.” Her hand trailed down the side of his neck, finally coming to rest over his heart.
“And if you’re wrong?”
“I’m not wrong.”
“You’re investigating Lex, right under his nose.”
“Maybe.”
“It’s dangerous, Chloe. He’s dangerous.”
“So are you, but in a different way, I think.”
“I’d never hurt you.”
“I still won’t go with you yet.
“You’re still stubborn. If he finds out, he’ll hurt you.”
“He won’t. Do you want me to trust you?
“Yes.”
“Then trust me, Archer.”
His luscious mouth curved in a small smile.
“What is it?”
“You usually reserve that moniker for me during missions.”
“Well, then, I must be on a mission.”
“If you won’t come with me, then please take this,” He released her long enough to remove a small jump drive he’d hidden against his forearm, just inside the edge of his glove, took her hand, and placed the small device into it. Chloe glanced down at the small green oblong drive in her hand, warm from his skin. “It should answer more of your questions.” He pressed a lingering kiss to her forehead, wrapping his arms around her, pulling her to his chest. “I don’t want you to go back there, and it’s going against everything I am to let you leave.” He whispered against her temple. “I trust you, it’s Lex I don’t trust, and I won’t be there to protect you.”
“I can handle Lex, and take care of myself.”
“I know you can, Chloe… it’s just… it’s not easy for me to let you go again.”
“I have to do this.”
Arrow simply nodded his understanding, unable to speak. He lowered his arms reluctantly, releasing her, and then took a few steps back from her, retrieving his crossbow, aiming and shooting an arrow above his head toward the higher, neighboring rooftop and then tugging on the line, testing it.
“Wait,” she called, stepping up to him quickly. She then stood in front of him, suddenly turning hesitant and flustered.
Oliver looked down at her, his arm raised above him, holding onto the crossbow, ready to make his exit. He waited. She seemed to want to say something, gathering her courage. Instead, she surprised him by suddenly reaching up, wrapping one hand around his neck, pulling him down and stepping up on her toes. She touched her mouth to his, kissing him softly, shyly, experimentally at first. His free arm swept around her waist, pulling her up against him, deepening the kiss, daring to part her lips further, passing the tip of his tongue between and over lush softness. The kissing grew more impassioned, and she matched him, lips and tongues meeting, hot and demanding and powerful. Chloe became lost in him, filled with him.
*
“I love your kisses. I could kiss you forever.”
He chuckled. “And I’d let you.”
“How thoughtful of you.”
“I have no choice, I’m addicted to yours.”
*
Chloe pulled away from him slightly, her lips swollen from his kisses. Once again, she looked away, confusion clouding her features as she stepped back, touching her moistened lips with her fingertips. She gazed up at him then, her eyes alight with discovery.
“I’ll meet you again soon,” he said, deeply affected by her kiss, wishing he could simply carry her off with him, but she was bent on accomplishing her mission, and he knew she’d refuse him still. And then he was lifted into the sky, swung away, leaving Chloe to stare up after him, breathless.
Something elusive flashed in her mind once again at the sight of his departure.
*
“Hold onto me.”
“Where are we going?”
“It’s a surprise.”
*
Chloe blinked, futilely grasping as the memory slipped through her brain. A fleeting vision, just on the edge of sight. Tears of frustration appeared, unbidden to her eyes as she tried to call it back to her, tried to remember. Whatever it was, it was a happy memory, it was exciting, and it was about him. She opened her fist, gazing down at the jump drive, wiped her eyes quickly, and headed back toward her car.
End Chapter 8
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