Miles Away. With chloeas.

[dl_greenarrow]

Oliver pressed the phone to his ear as he made his way into his apartment in Star City, setting his briefcase down on the floor. A smile tugged at his lips when he heard her voice on the other end of the line. "So what are you wearing?" he teased.

Comments

[dl_greenarrow]

That really didn't make him feel any better. At all. Drawing in a breath, he rubbed a hand over his face wearily. He rose to his feet and began to slowly pace the floor.

[chloeas]

Chloe shook her head a little, "look, I get that you need to feel responsible for this or whatever, but it's not your fault, Oliver. Yeah, that was probably Lex's people trying to get me to shut up, but regardless of anything you have against Lex, I have my own problems with him. I'm sure you remember what he did to my mom?" Her jaw tightened a little and she sat up on the bed, not needing a confirmation to continue,

"If anything, having you to back me up makes the whole thing safer, it's my damn fault he caught whatever I was looking into, I should have waited until I was home to look it up, but I chose to do it at work, I knew it was dangerous but I did it anyway. And I have been looking him up for weeks now, months even, and I didn't get caught until now."

[dl_greenarrow]

He turned to look at her, his expression serious. "I'm aware, Chloe." His voice was quiet. He rubbed the back of his neck and let out a breath before moving to sit down in the chair once more. He was silent for a long moment, thinking.

He looked up at her once more. "What did you find on him?"

[chloeas]

Of course he wasn't going to let it go just like that, he was as stubborn as her and Clark.

"I was looking into all the properties his subsidiaries have purchased lately, some of them seem to be in pretty remote locations, which I'm guessing can only mean one thing..." She knew she didn't have to go further.

[dl_greenarrow]

Oliver's jaw tensed. "More thirty-three point ones." He looked away, his eyes narrowed and dark. He rose to his feet again, rubbing the back of his neck as he began to pace once more.

[chloeas]

She nodded, taking a deep breath and running her hand through her hair, "and if he got that angry about me finding those locations, there has to be something to it, he wouldn't overreact like this for nothing."

[dl_greenarrow]

"Unless you've become too much of a thorn in his side and he's tired of dealing with you," he said bluntly, turning to look at her. There was anger in his eyes. If Lex thought Chloe was a thorn in his side, he was going to have a nasty surprise coming to him in the very near future.

[chloeas]

With a deep breath she turned to look at him, shrugging, "so I'll be more careful, he won't succeed on anything, Oliver." She knew that was a lie and that if Lex wanted to get rid of her badly enough, he would.

But it didn't matter, if he got her, she would at least know she did as much as she could instead of hiding away in fear.

[dl_greenarrow]

"You're right. He won't." His jaw was still tense.

[chloeas]

"Oliver." She said firmly, her eyes on his, "I don't want you doing anything on my behalf. I can take care of myself."

[dl_greenarrow]

He held her gaze, but didn't respond. He wouldn't make her a promise he wasn't sure he could keep.

[chloeas]

She noticed his silence and frowned at him, "I'm serious, Oliver."

[dl_greenarrow]

"I know you are," he answered, his expression not changing.

[chloeas]

There was no point in arguing with him then, especially not when she was laying on a hospital bed, looking probably a lot more fragile than she felt.

"I just wish they would let me go home so I could finish my research."

[dl_greenarrow]

"I'll go talk to the nurses. See what I can find out about how long they're planning to keep you," he told her. He offered her a faint smile before heading out the door, pulling his cell phone out and dialing his personal assistant's number. "Marie, it's me. I'm going to need you to send all of the files we've been working on to my Metropolis office. I'm going to be here for awhile," he told her as he made his way to the nurse's station. "No, that won't be a problem. Thanks." He hung up the phone and looked at the nurse, offering her a smile

[chloeas]

She shifted on the bed as she waited, her head was still pounding but at least Oliver had distracted her from it. She didn't like hospitals at all, something about the smell, the colors, everything just made her uncomfortable, probably because of her long stays during her years in Smallville. Either way, she just wanted to get out of there.