Panic
“It should be another fifteen minutes because of the traffic, Ms. Luthor,” John called out from the front seat.
“Understood. Thanks John.”
Lena had an arm against the window, a couple of fingers to her temple, watching as her surroundings passed by in a smooth blur. Her thoughts kept drifting back to her earlier conversation with Mxy, and she found herself getting increasingly more irritated.
Bzz.
Lena looked down at her phone to a notification from Kara. Instantly, her wave of frustration washed away, and the young CEO could feel a smile tug at her lips.
Kara: I hope your day was more successful than ours
Lena shook her head in amusement.
Lena: Define successful.
Kara: I will at mine? :) I have wine
Lena smiled at the audacity.
“John, can you please drive to Kara Danvers’ place instead?”
“Of course Ms. Luthor.”
Lena: Well I don’t have the rum
Kara: Good, your turn to get drunk
Lena rolled her eyes.
Lena: I think I’ll let John take me straight home
Kara: nooo I’m sorry :(
Kara: I'll be good
Lena rolled her eyes at her best friend’s antics.
Kara: please
Lena: I’m kidding, but I do need a change of clothes
Kara: You can borrow some of mine
Lena blinked in surprise. They had never been the type to swap clothes, except for the occasional sweatshirt.
Kara: We have a lot to discuss
There was another buzz.
Kara: don’t leave me on read Lena!
Then another moment later…
Kara: ??? so you’re not coming
Lena: I don’t remember you being this needy
Kara: :(
Lena: I told John to redirect me ten min ago
Kara: yay!! See you in a bit. Will order pizza
Lena: sounds good cat-girl
Lena smiled as she watched the dots appear and disappear as the other woman apparently tried to figure out a response.
Kara: …I thought you forgot
Lena: you’d only be so lucky
Kara looked up from her phone, huffing. She had spent the last two days being teased halfway to Timbuktu from Lena, Alex, Winn…granted, a lot of it was her own fault. But there was only so much teasing a girl could take before she went nuclear.
Taking a deep breath to calm down, she walked into the kitchen and uncorked a bottle of wine. She poured two generous glasses, a small grin dancing on her face as she imagined Lena’s reaction to the alcohol.
“Oh shit,” she swore, noticing some wine had dripped onto her shirt. She dabbed at it with a spare towel before quickly dashing into her room. She opted to switch out the turtleneck for a striped long-sleeved tee before returning back to the kitchen to try and wash out the stain.
“Today’s just really been that kind of day,” she huffed to no one in particular. Draping the shirt to dry over one of her dining chairs, she collapsed in front of her laptop.
Her google search of the night lay open.
“An age-by-age guide to bonding with your child.”
It wasn’t incredibly helpful if the reporter was being honest. Particularly, for this kind of situation. Biting her lip, Kara tried another search.
“Activities to bond with your child.”
She read the top results that came up.
Try a sport together.
See a performance.
Kara rolled her eyes, giving up on the search.
“Google is useless.”
Thankfully, a rustling outsider her door instantly brightened up her mood.
She had the door open before Lena could knock twice. It took a half-second before the smile dropped from superhero’s face as she stared at Lena in horror.
“Lena, what the hell,” she hissed in worry, pulling the woman in abruptly. Before the Luthor could get in a word edgewise, the reporter was patting her friend down and looking for a source of the red stains that had bloomed on the front of what had originally been a snow-white dress-shirt.
“Kara…” Lena started, trying to get her friend’s attention. The superhero had crouched down to get a better angle and her glowing eyes were razored in on the front of her blouse (to Lena’s intense embarrassment). The Super's nimble hands started to explore Lena's torso, gently prodding and shifting.
Finally, the CEO couldn’t take it anymore and she abruptly grabbed one of Kara’s roaming hands.
“Kara,” Lena hissed, red blotches on her cheeks a stark contrast to her otherwise pale demeanor.
“Lena, I can’t find the injury, why can’t I find the injury?” Kara rambled, looking up at Lena with abject fear in her eyes as the light quickly dimmed. “Even a quick x-ray didn’t show any signs of exterior damage…”
Lena flushed at the implications. “Did you just undress me with –” Lena cut herself off. Now wasn’t the time. “It’s not mine Kara, let alone human; someone threw animal blood at me.”
“But your heartbeat was getting increasingly irregular, are you sure you’re not…oh…” Kara trailed off, as the situation started to take hold.
The superhero glanced down and realized one of her hands was still very much flattened against the toned stomach of her friend, and she jerked her hand away as if it had been burned.
“Sorry…” she trailed off, a light blush dusting her cheeks as she struggled to keep her voice even. “I didn’t mean to…”
For her part, Lena was struggling to remember how she normally acted. “Uh, could you just….” She gestured to her ruined attire, and Kara immediately got the memo.
“Shirt. Yes. I can do that,” Kara said, disappearing momentarily only to return with a comfortable gray sweatshirt.
“Thanks, I’ll just go…” Lena trailed off, waving her hand towards the direction of the restroom. “Though, given your earlier scan, I suppose it’s nothing you haven’t seen.” Kara flushing bright red, nodded vehemently towards the corridor. Her friend disappeared around the corner shortly after.
“Kara, you absolute moron,” she huffed under her breath. “What’s going on with you?”
Her mind flashed back to earlier in the day; at Alex implying that she was attracted to Lena.
Kara found she couldn’t look at her friend without having flashbacks to that conversation. Lena was extremely attractive as her completely innocuous but overly invasive search had just doubly-confirmed. And now, the superhero was starting to act increasingly flustered, almost like…
Kara groaned, banging a fist against her head.
Why did Alex have to say that.
“You okay there, Supergirl?” a voiced teased out. Kara paused her internal beratement to look up at her friend standing off into the distance. Kara found herself smiling back at Lena, who looked adorable in a sweatshirt that was slightly too big for her.
Who was using Kara’s sweatshirt as….a shirt….
Lena’s smile faltered slightly. “Kara?”
“Hm?” Kara suddenly shook herself out of her reverie, realizing she was staring. “Sorry, I—”
“I was just saying that I hope you didn’t mind, but I rinsed my shirt off in your tub. Not that it did any good, it’s still ruined.” The Luthor fixing her with a curious look. “Was starting to wonder if you had given yourself permanent brain damage there, when I lost you for a moment.” the Luthor joked.
Kara laughed loudly (read: awkwardly) and tried to smooth it over (read: failed spectacularly).
“No, no, woman of steel and all that,” Kara thumped her chest two times for good measure. Then she closed her eyes, cringing as she realized that Lena was being sarcastic.
“You know, I think that’s the pizza guy. Be right back.”
Then, without another glance, she used superspeed to sprint out the door.
Lena watched the woman go, confusion marring her otherwise pleasant features.
“Well, that was weird,” she breathed to no one in particular.
A moment later, Kara reappeared holding an extra-large Stilton pizza.
“Sorry…” the reporter trailed off, giving her friend a shrug. “I know I’m being weird.”
Lena licked her lips before responding, embarrassed. “I sometimes forget exactly how good your hearing is.”
Kara chuckled, the remark finally breaking the awkwardness between them. “Join the club. Everyone else does too, I’m used to it.”
Lena offered Kara a small smile as a peace offering. “Ham and pineapple?”
Kara looked at her in mock affront. “How could it be anything else?”
Lena laughed easily as she walked into the kitchen to grab a couple of plates and the wine glasses sitting on the island. Kara trekked into the kitchen behind her, noting with relief that while her thoughts might be running rampant, Kara could more or less keep them in-line. Well, at least in-line enough to function.
“It looks like you had a wardrobe malfunction as well?” Her friend raised an eyebrow, nodding towards the sweater draped over one of the chairs. Kara placed the pizza on the table.
“Not nearly as bad as yours though,” Kara remarked with a small tilt of the head. “Which reminds me that you didn’t actually tell me what happened.”
Lena crinkled her eyes in amusement.
“You didn’t exactly give me a chance. The moment I opened the door, you practically assaulted me.”
Kara immediately went bright red. The Super was starting to wonder if wildly blushing was her new permanent state. Perhaps ‘strawberry’ should be added to her growing list of unfortunate nicknames.
“In my defense, you showed up covered in blood,” Kara weakly retorted, grabbing one of the glasses of wine from Lena’s hands and taking a large gulp.
“Animal blood,” Lena corrected, as she took a seat. Kara followed suit. “And I thought human alcohol doesn’t do anything for you.”
“It doesn’t, but I got so used to pretending that it now has a strangely therapeutic effect.”
The CEO let out a small noise of surprise.
“So how did you get animal blood on you?”
“A man dumped it on me.” Lena gave Kara a pointed look. “I’m just grateful he aimed for my shirt. It would have been horrible to wash out of my hair.”
Kara huffed. “You said that. Why. How. When.”
Lena sighed. “It was after I was walking back from visiting with Mxy and Lily. He stopped me in the lobby of the hospital.”
Kara found herself tensing up but held herself back from interrupting.
“He said something along the lines of – ‘people that date aliens are no longer human and should be slaughtered like the animals they are’. And the rest….” Lena flicked her hand into the air.
“Lena, that’s horrible.” Kara reached across the table to gently squeeze her friends hand before letting go. “I am so, so sorry….” The Super trailed off as a thought struck her.
“How…do you know it’s animal blood?” Kara almost hated to ask the question.
“I wouldn’t have known without testing it. But he said as much. ‘Next time, it won’t be animal blood that's all over you.'’”
If looks could kill, none would be safe from Kara’s smite.
“I wish you called,” she gritted out, furious at a man she never met.
Lena scoffed.
“And say what, exactly? Someone threw blood on me? Supergirl, please teach them a lesson?”
“I – “ Kara stuttered, not sure of how to respond. “I could have done something. Lena, next time they might not be just satisfied by ruining a shirt. He literally said as much.”
Lena’s eyes softened at the worried look Kara was giving her.
“I get it. I might have been a tad...capricious...about the situation. If Kara Danvers is opting to talk instead of eat then how can I not listen.”
Kara ran a hand through her hair, relieved that the other woman was finally starting to take this seriously. Her stomach let out a loud grumble at Lena’s reminder.
“I’m eating, I’m eating,” she said, throwing open the pizza box and grabbing a couple of slices. Lena laughed, picking up one of her own.
A few minutes passed in comfortable silence before Lena posed a new question.
“Can I ask you something?”
Kara looked at her friend, blinking. “Uh-oh, the last time you asked me that…”
Lena chuckled, shaking her head. “We don’t have to talk about it.”
Kara shook her head vigorously. “No, no. Ask whatever you want. I’m an open book,” she beamed across the table before furrowing her brow. “I’m probably going to regret that, huh?”
Laughing lightly, Lena responded, “No, it’s nothing bad. I was just wondering…”
Kara nodded, motioning for the other woman to go on.
“You never seemed this concerned before…did something happen?” she asked, surveying Kara with close scrutiny.
The reporter paused, sitting back in her chair, thinking about how to word it.
“Remember how I told you Mxy sent me back in time? And all those times ended badly?”
Lena nodded, almost imperceptibly.
“Well badly meant you either got hurt, kidnapped, or killed. Well, except for the last one where I died instead.” Kara added as an afterthought.
Lena put her glass down, surveying the other woman with a curious look.
“And I just…I couldn’t live through watching you get hurt Lena. Or worse. I already imagine the moment someone I love gets killed because of Supergirl. Every single time I wake up. And I just…” she trailed off, looking away as her eyes started to water.
“I saw you die, Lena. Because I couldn’t protect you.”
I can’t imagine a world without you in it. The words froze on the tip of her tongue as she found herself unable to actually say the words out loud.
“I didn’t know Kara,” Lena softly responded. “I’m sorry.”
Kara chuckled, briefly tipping up her glasses to rub at her eyes. “No, how could you,” her voice wavered. “When I never told you.”
Lena took a sip of wine, appearing to be deep in thought.
“I won’t be able to always have someone with me Kara,” she finally said. “It’s just not possible.”
Kara let out a breath, wringing her hands. “I know Lena, and I wouldn’t ask you to.”
“But,” the Luthor continued, giving her friend a long, unreadable stare. “I can be a little more careful. I’m well-aware I’m a little more vulnerable than the others.”
Kara gave Lena a shaky smile before raising her glass in appreciation.
“Thanks Lena. Now…” she trailed off, clearing her throat as she attempted a very not-subtle change in conversation. “Tell me what you found out from Mxy?”
Lena slowly nodded, choosing her words carefully.
“Mxy’s the one who saved Lily from the lab, Kara.” Kara’s eyes shot up, and she stared at Lena in shock.
“What?”
“He’s the one that dropped her off at the hospital…when we took her in as our charge. She was so sick at first…and she couldn’t speak. It took us awhile to realize exactly why and what we needed to do.” Lena took a sip of wine. “Fun fact, the hospital staff were the ones that named her Lily.”
Kara frowned, but let Lena continue on uninterrupted.
“Mxy visited every few weeks, catching her up on the real world. And that child absorbed information faster than any human should have been able to…” she trailed off, fixing Kara with a wry grin. “But I suppose she is half-Kryptonian.”
“Also your daughter,” Kara couldn’t help but interject, referencing the young CEO’s genius-level intellect.
Lena scoffed lightly, shaking her head, but didn’t challenge the implications of the remark.
“Mxy’s also the reason she knew about…well, things she shouldn’t have known about.” Lena abruptly finished, not wanting to bring up certain conversations. “Lily asked about her parents frequently, so Mxy showed her videos of us.”
“And that’s why she thinks we’re together,” Kara breathed out, in realization.
Lena sighed. “Not exactly.”
Kara looked at her in confusion.
“Kara…” Lena trailed off, not knowing exactly how to break the news. “Lily is weak. Weaker than most kids her age, because her immune system is still in its infantile stages. It’s been a few months, so it’s had time to build up a little but…”
“But it’s not strong enough…” Kara whispered in growing horror.
“It’s strong enough for the surgery, but only under the best circumstances. And Mxy has run several scenarios through that TV of his.”
Kara blinked at her.
“What are you saying, Lena?”
“Kara, the only situation he’s seen where the surgery is successful is one where she has a strong tie to this world. Particularly…”
“If she has a family to come back to.”
Lena nodded. “That’s right.” The woman took a long drink of wine as an uncomfortable silence settled overhead. “So he might have purposely framed the videos to look a little more romantic in nature than they otherwise were.”
“I don’t want to lie to our daughter, Lena,” Kara finally whispered. “My own big fat lie nearly destroyed our friendship. I swore I was done building relationships on something that wasn’t true.”
Lena blinked, her eyes clouding suddenly.
“What choice do we have? Even if she hates us, at least she’d be alive. And it doesn’t have to be a complete lie,” Lena continued, defiantly. “We can still make sure she has a place to come back to.”
“But it wouldn’t be with us as a family.”
And unfortunately, Lena didn’t have a response to that. The Luthor finally gave an awkward jerk of her head in acquiescence to the problem before taking another sip from her glass.
“What I don’t understand,” Kara said after a long silence. “is why Mxy is going through any of this.”
“You don’t know?” The Super hesitated in her response, hearing the sudden tension in Lena’s voice.
“Don’t know what?”
“I can’t believe this…” Lena muttered. “He told me you knew.”
Kara shook her head in confusion, eyes baffled. “Knew what, Lena?”
“Kara, the imp proposed to you.”
The Super scoffed, looked at Lena incredulously. “That was years ago Lena…you can’t be…”
“He’s still in love with you,” Lena deadpanned. “He’s doing this for you.”
And Lena, for her part, couldn’t for the life of her figure out why her heart suddenly felt so heavy.
The rest of the evening more or less flew by in a blur. And as the hours passed, so did the number of drinks she consumed. Lena grew increasingly quiet, until she found herself rather vacantly sitting on the couch.
Noting the time, Kara walked over to her windows and closed the blinds before joining her friend on the couch.
She doubted the imp would try anything again (especially this soon), but she didn’t want to take any chances.
Kara watched the other woman silently, unsure of what to say. Even as she attempted to focus on the most important thing (Lena’s mental wellbeing), her mind couldn’t help but wander back to the thought-of-the-hour.
Attractiveness.
Even drunk, hair disheveled, and sullen… Lena must have been the most beautiful woman that Kara had ever seen.
“Kara.”
Kara bit her lip out of guilt, snapping out of stupor. Shit, had Lena noticed?
“Yeah?”
“Wait until after the surgery.”
Kara blinked, feeling like she had missed something.
“Sorry?”
There was a moment of silence.
“To date Mxy.”
“Are you insane,” Kara spluttered, backing up from her friend like she’d seen a ghost.
Lena turned to look at her, emerald eyes cool and unreadable. “It’s logical Kara. Objectively, he’s handsome and completely devoted. He saved your daughter for you Kara.”
The look on Kara’s face could only be described as horrified.
“So that means I should date him? Just because he’s in love with me and is a good guy…well…imp?”
Lena didn’t respond instantly.
“Why not? It makes sense,” she said slowly, giving the Super an indecipherable look before smiling. “I’m happy for you actually.”
Those words felt like a stab to the heart, and Kara blinked trying to process the emotion.
“I’m just…worried…it might jeopardize Lily if you acted too soon.”
Kara swallowed thickly, unsure of what was going on with either of them.
“Lena, look at me…” she grabbed her friend’s arm, forcing the woman to turn and meet her gaze.
“As great of a guy as Mxy is proving to be, I can’t help who I’m attracted to.”
Kara winced at her choice of words. Worst possible time to be talking about attraction when she was gazing at a friend who was pulling her in with the force of a tornado.
“But…” Kara interjected, intercepting the Luthor as the CEO had indubitably been opening her mouth to protest.
“Even if I was, I would wait until after the surgery.”
That seemed to satisfy her tipsy friend, and Lena closed her mouth with a nod in the affirmative.
“Good.”
Kara let out a breath, still feeling sick. She turned away, fiddling with her watch.
“So why’d she do it?”
Kara frowned, startled by the non-sequitur.
“What?”
“Andrea. You never said what you and Alex found out.”
Kara could feel the flush start to creep up her neck as she started to relive the memories.
“Yeah well…” she sighed, loudly. “What Mxy did in those videos, he did in the photos.”
Kara could practically hear the other woman thinking. Even drunk, her mind processed faster than most.
“Photos. As in plural.”
Kara nodded stiffly. “Yep. That combined with the threat of her competitors having the details of such a scoop…”
“Well that was anti-climactic,” Lena breathed, putting her glass down.
Kara shrugged. “I don’t know what we were expecting, to be honest.”
“You mean because Mxy can’t manipulate thoughts, so it would have had to be something along those lines.”
Kara’s hands stilled their nervous fiddling in surprise. “Yeah. He told you?”
The corners of Lena’s lips quirked upwards as she shook her head. “No, but if he had that ability, you’d have been dating him a long time ago.”
Kara grimaced. “Ugh, don’t joke.”
“I still can’t believe everything he did for you.”
The line stirred up a memory for Kara.
“Can I ask you something?” Lena looked at the woman, eyes starting to grow heavy with sleep.
“Hm?”
“We spoke about my reactions and revelations when we met Lily…but we never spoke about yours.”
The line seemed to unsettle Lena, as she blinked rapidly to process the statement.
“What do you want to know?” she said finally, looking significantly more sober than she had five minutes ago.
“What was Lily talking about? With the Kryptonite?”
“Oh…” Lena frowned, shaking her head. “It was during the Worldwide Unity Festival.”
Kara’s eyebrows shot up.
Oh.
“Someone came in wanting to kill you with a knife made out of kryptonite.” Lena chuckled.
“I told her over my dead body.” Lena paused, pursing her lips. “Well, not in so many words, but the gist was there.”
If there was a look for –you can’t be fucking serious--, it’d be plastered all over Kara’s face.
“She thought about it. Decided it wasn’t worth it. Then left.” Lena shrugged.
“Not that interesting of a story.”
Kara had a sneaking suspicion Lena was downplaying the event, even drunk. “So she just left, when forced with the option to kill you to get to me.”
Lena nodded slowly. “Yep.”
“Was it your mother?”
Lena blinked. “No. She doesn’t want you dead. At least, not right now anyways.”
Kara gave a grunt in acknowledgement.
“Plus, she probably would have done it,” Lena added as an afterthought.
“L-Lena,” Kara stuttered, aghast. The woman in question fixed Kara with an amused look.
“It’s okay, Kara.” She leaned over towards her friend, bopping her on the nose with a single finger.
Kara’s breath hitched.
Lena was so close that Kara could feel her breath. Pools of emerald threatened to overwhelm Kara and drown her.
How could someone be so…
“I’ve told you Kara. You’re all the family I need. I couldn’t be happier that it’s you….with Lily….” With that, Lena succumbed to the heavy wave of sleep she’d been fighting off. Kara found herself with one rather inebriated Luthor sleeping lightly on her chest.
Kara’s heart thrummed painfully.
Oh Rao.
Alex walked out of the shower to the sound of loud knocking at her front door.
“What the hell?” she muttered, grabbing a gun from her dresser before slowly moving towards the entrance.
“Alex, it’s me, open up.” A loud voice called from the other side.
Frowning, Alex put the gun down before opening the door to a very disheveled looking Kara.
“Alex, we need to talk,” Kara said, storming in.
“Kara it’s 11 at night, couldn’t this wait until the morning?” The Director gestured to her appearance. “I was just about to go to bed.”
Kara gaped at her. “Oh Rao, did I wake Kelly?”
Alex shook her head. “No…no, she’s visiting her mom. She’s not here right now.”
“Oh good, that’s a relief.” Alex noted dryly that her sister didn’t look relieved at all. The Superhero had picked up one of Alex’s knickknacks and was nervously fiddling around with it.
“What’s going on Kara.”
Kara started pacing. “Alex…you, you…”
Alex narrowed her eyes, slightly concerned.
“This is all your fault Alex; you’ve got to help me fix this.”
“Excuse me?”
Kara had put down the object and was now back to nervously wringing her hands.
“It’s got to stop, Alex.”
“Wha – Kara, slow down. You’re going to burn a hole in my floor.”
Kara whirled around to stare at her.
“But Alex…”
Alex grabbed Kara’s arms and held her gaze.
“Breathe, Kara.”
After a few seconds, Kara visibly calmed down. The Director found herself wondering what could have possibly riled the superhero up so much.
She redirected Kara towards the couch.
“Is this about Lily?”
Kara’s head bowed, and she shook her head mutely.
“Okay…” she drawled, a little lost.
“Did Mxy do something else?”
Another shake of the head.
So that only left…
“Is it Lena?”
Kara buried her face in her hands.
“What am I going to do, Alex?” came the muffled reply.
“Do…you want to talk about it?” Alex said hesitantly. “Did Lena do something again?”
Kara looked up, sharply. The Director noted that her sister’s complexion was far paler than normal.
“No. She’s done nothing besides be a good, wonderful and amazing human being.”
Alex’s brow furrowed in confusion.
“Okay…”
“It’s just that…ever since you implied I found Lena…” Alex blinked. Oh.
“It’s all I can see now Alex.” Unable to contain herself, the superhero got back up and started pacing.
“Hell, I literally molested her when she got to my apartment.”
“You what?”
“And every time she’s talking, I can barely concentrate. All I think about is how perfect she is.” She threw a hand to emphasize the point. “How attractive she is. With her gorgeous green eyes, her sumptuous lips, her perfect --”
“Jesus Christ, Kara, I get it. I don’t need the blow-by-blow.”
”Rao, make it stop Alex.”
Breathing deeply from the rant, Kara finally sat back down.
“Hey…come here.” Alex murmured, gathering her sister up in a hug. She held her for a while, sighing as she heard a couple of sniffles.
“Hey…” Alex straightened up, holding her sister at arm’s length. She noted with dismay that there were tears in Kara’s eyes.
“So you have a crush on a girl.” Alex said slowly, squeezing her sister’s arm to prevent her from looking away again. “It’s not the end of the world, Kara.”
“She’s going to hate me, Alex.”
“Hey – that’s not true. Any idiot could tell that she loves you. How could she not?” Alex gave her a half-smile.
The words didn’t have the intended effect though, and Kara’s expression fell.
“She loves me without this attraction, Alex. This thing will ruin everything.”
Alex licked her lips, considering her next words carefully.
“Have you thought about talking to Lena about all of this?”
Kara jerked away, pinching the bridge of her nose.
“Now’s really not the best time.”
Alex scoffed. “There’s never a best time Kara.”
“No…I mean,” Kara struggled for the right words. “Lily needs to believe Lena and I are together. Or she’ll die during the surgery.”
Alex blinked slowly. She felt there was a lot of information missing there, but now was really not the time to probe the dejected Super.
“What? Is that why…”
Kara nodded.
“If I spill all of this on Lena and it goes sour…” The Super took a deep breath.
“I’d never forgive myself if Lily died because of me.”
The reality of the situation finally started to dawn on Alex. “I understand. I’m sorry, Kara.”
She watched her sister nod her head rapidly before burying herself in the crook of Alex’s shoulders.
“We’ll figure this out,” Alex promised. After a minute, a sly thought came to mind.
"You know the bright side to all of this?"
Alex heard her sister grunt.
"I completely 100% believe that those photos were rigged."
Kara gave a strangled laugh, and she sat up rubbing at her eyes.
“I better go. I don’t want Lena to wake up in the middle of the night, wondering where I am.”
Alex frowned. “She’s at your apartment right now?”
Kara closed her eyes, sighing. “I might have plied her with a bit too much wine tonight.”
Alex paled.
“Kara. Did you learn nothing?!"
The Director closed her eyes, attempting to massage away the beginnings of a headache.
"I better not wake up tomorrow to another ridiculous headline."
Silence greeted her, and Alex found herself opening her eyes again.
Kara was gone.