Snow day today made me want to write. I know this chapter will be the beginning of what most of you have probably been waiting for.

Thank you to TheWeirdGirlFromDownTheRoad, Affectionate-Sinner, ujemaima, Laurel, definevintagexx, andGen3683icy6.

Happy Reading!


Allison's body suddenly felt numb. She managed to walk to the furthest corner of the kitchen where Addison couldn't see her.

"What do you want?" she whispered harshly to the nasally voice on the other end.

He let out a cackle that made her separate her ear from the phone and glare at it, as if he could see her.

"Well," he started finally gathering control of himself, "I…well you have a little bit of a problem and little ole me, was uh going to help you."

"I don't have a problem."

"I uh, beg to differ, Ace, see I had a meeting with the mob to-day, and this one big fellow, Gamble, well see we didn't really hit it off. He uh wants me dead, which is fine, see I'll kill him tomorrow (Allison winced at the word kill), but my associates and I (he laughed) have reason to believe he knows about you."

Allison swallowed hard; how did this happen?

"No need to uh fear, but I think it might be best if you come and visit your brother for a couple of days." He spoke the last part very slowly as if to tell her it wasn't an option.

"You want me to come to where you are? Yeah right, Jack, if you think I'm going to stay-"

"It's that or you and the kid's life, doll."

She looked over at the toddler splashing around in the bathtub and her heart sunk.

"Does he know about Addison?"

"Nope-uh." His answer was quick and clear.

"Fine. I'll come, but I'm dropping Addison off at the Conwell's."

"Okey Dokey," he giggled, "I'll have someone pick you up there in twenty minutes."

Before she could respond he hung up.

Twenty minutes wasn't a lot of time, so she quickly dialed Janet's number.

The little girl clutched onto Allison as they walked up to the townhouse. Janet was more then willing to take the young girl and even more excited when Allison told her she was going out with "friends". Dornan and Janet always wanted her to socialize outside of Nathan and Jack, but friends never came easy to her.

Clearly it still didn't.

Janet had the door open before Allison was even halfway to the door.

"Hello Addison!" She greeted the youngster who continued to cling to her mother.

"Thanks for taking her on such short notice. Whitney doesn't have a three-year-old to worry about, she can just go clubbing at any time."

"Oh don't worry about it, darling, you need to get out every once and awhile. How about I take Addison for the weekend so you can have more time to go out."

Taking a breath Allison hesitated. Jack said he planned on taking care of this Gamble problem tomorrow, but what if something happened. Maybe having Addison gone a couple extra days would be smart.

The blonde handed the little girl off to the older woman and smiled, "That actually sounds like a good idea, I'll let you know for sure tomorrow."

Janet's face lit up, obviously not expecting that answer, but she looked absolutely delighted.

Allison kissed the top of the little girl's head, "I love you baby please be good for grandma."

The tired toddler buried her head into her grandmother's neck closing her eyes, mumbling a "bye mommy."

"Did you want to come in for a couple minutes, dear?" Janet asked watching the young mother look at her daughter with sad eyes.

Allison quickly looked up and smiled, "No, I have to get going."

"Alright, be safe and have fun," she said giving her one last smile before walking into the house and closing the door.

For a moment Allison had convinced herself that she was going clubbing with friends, but when she remembered her life was actually in danger she hugged her coat closer to her body and began the short walk to the corner of the street, out of sight from the townhouse waiting for her ride.

Nearly a minute later a old pickup truck pulled next to her and when Allison looked into the truck, she became fearful after not recognizing the driver.

He reached over and opened the passenger door, "Get in," he said simply not even aware that the young woman before him was apprehensive.

"Did he send you?" she asked taking a couple steps towards the truck.

"Yeah, come one Allison, he'll be pissed if we're late."

She scoffed, that did sound like him, she stepped into the truck and once she closed the door the man sped off.

They didn't say much to each other, but Allison did take a minute to look him over. He was surprisingly attractive and looked well kept. She had expected her brother to pick her up but if it were someone else she didn't think they would look so nice.

He almost looked like Tyson Beckford. He was strong and intimidating but at the same time, his facial features were relatively soft, almost like a big teddy bear.

She decided that instead of sitting her, she might as well talk to the man who currently held her life in his hands.

"How long have you been, working for him?"

It took him a moment but he first responded with a light chuckle and looked over at her, "You don't even know my name and that's the first question you ask me?"

She looked back at him before he turned his attention back to the road, "Would you even tell me your real name?"

"Touché," he replied before falling silent again.

Allison had basically even up but after a couple of minutes he answered.

"3 weeks," he said look back at her then to the road.

"Is there any particular reason you would want to work for him?"

He let out a wholehearted laugh, "I pretty much hate the world as much as he does."

That was a rather disturbing answer.

"What did he tell you about me?"

"Not a whole lot, basically you were in trouble, I needed to bring you to him or get a bullet between the eyes."

"And you're not curious about me?"

He shrugged, "I guess I'd be lying if I said I wasn't, but it's not my business and I know better then to ask questions."

"Right," she replied leaning her head against the window falling silent once again.

"You're just going to leave me there, huh? I wasn't going to ask you any questions, but now that you bring it all up."

She couldn't help but grin and let out a soft laugh, so he wasn't completely heartless like he put on. The teddy bear theory wasn't completely dead.

"I uh, knew him before the Joker was born."

That seemed to completely catch his attention; the shock in his face was imminent but like a true thug, he held back.

"Wow, I mean I knew Nathan was close to him, but I didn't think anyone knew him before."

"Yeah, since I was a preteen, Nathan is my brother."

"No shit." He shook his head, "that was probably the last thing I expected."

"What? You thought maybe I was a hooker who had dirt on him or something, or maybe you just thought I was a good fuck."

"Whoa easy. I might have thought something like that but not right after I saw you. You're hot, but you don't carry yourself like a hooker, trust me I know some hookers."

"Fascinating."

"Well we're here."

She looked out the window at a very familiar abandoned warehouse.

"Lasher Avenue hasn't changed much."

He looked over at her and raised an eyebrow, "ya used to hang out on Lasher?"

Sighing she opened the truck door, "more then you might think."

He led her into the building, which when first opened appeared completely abandoned until you got through the first doorway towards the back.

Once they entered a group of about eight men were sitting around in a makeshift living room, kitchen, and dinning room. A set of stairs was all the way in the corner, which looked to lead up to an old office with windows overlooking the entire place.

The room was big enough to hold cots, which were pushed near each other in the far corner of one side of the room.

It wasn't clean, but it also wasn't incredibly disgusting. For men she supposed it was livable.

Some of the men stopped what they were doing to look at the pair.

Some stared a little too long while others smiled at her escort.

"Hey Arms! We just started a new round of Hold 'Em you want in?"

"Sure Chuckles, just let me escort our guest upstairs."

The man, Chuckles, didn't respond, just looked at Allison and winked before looking back at the other men.

"Come on," her escort, now known as Arms said gently taking her arm and leading her upstairs.

Right at the top of the stairs there was a closed heavy metal door.

"Boss, I'm back with the girl."

"Come on in, Ace," his voice echoed from the other side.

Arms gave her one last grin before walking back down the stairs.

Allison slowly opened the door and stepped in.

The room was dimly lit and although it wasn't masterfully decorated it was clean. There was a door on the other side that she assumed to be a bathroom. The bed was probably a full size and when her gaze made it to her right she saw him, sitting at a desk in the corner.

He was in full costume, aside from his coat that was hanging up. It was the same purple suit she had seen him in on the TV. His makeup was slightly faded but stilled applied.

She swallowed the lump in her throat. Sure there was a level of fear, but she knew by now he would never hurt her. Why even bother bringing her here if he didn't care?

"So you moved on from the mob, I see."

Her arms crossed lazily over her chest and she casually popped a hip to the side.

His tongue flipped his bottom lip before a long and eerie grin stretched across his red painted face.

"There are bigger fish to fry, sweetheart. A Batman is much more fun then overrated mobsters. Plus they uh paid for my suit, do you like it?"

He stood up from his seat and brushed off any lint that might exist.

"It's um…purple."

"Plum actually, but do you like it ah?"

"Sure," she was tired of this small talk, "I see you like to kill innocent people and tape it now."

He burst out in laughter; she had expected him to react that way. Killing people was hilarious after all.

"He was dressing up like the Batman, he was going to die sooner or later, I was just sending a message."

His tone was extremely mocking when he said Batman; Allison immediately thought of Bruce and was still unclear how much of a danger Jack would be for him.

He noticed the look of concern on her face, but he let dangerous assumptions dictate his response.

"Does it make you sad Allison?" Him using her full name immediately pulled her from her thoughts to his eyes.

He took a slow step forward, "To know that I'm not that bad boy fantasy you used to mix up in that head of yours. I'm much worse then the 'bad boy' I make him run away, scream for his life. I don't feel remorse for slicing smiles into faces of people I've never met. I'm not that handsome older guy you're going to live happily ever after with," he licked his lip again as he continued to step closer, his head now cocked to the side, "I have these nice scars now and I'm going to make sure the world know about them." His voice became dangerously low, as he was merely a foot from her, "I'm not attractive to you anymore, does that make you depressed?"

He giggled as if mocking her "depression" that she didn't know she was feeling.

She stood there merely blinking at him. He might have thought he just taped into some secret she was trying to hide, but really he had just opened up to her without knowing.

While she began to contemplate everything he was saying he took off into the bathroom. She heard the sink turn on but all she was doing was pondering.

She seemed to just glide over to the bed and sat on the edge of it.

Did she not find him attractive?

His appearance was different and frightened her…no frightened wasn't the right word, it had stunned her to know that he had a knife tearing through the sensitive flesh of his face.

Sure, she couldn't deny that as a teen he was her "bad boy". Maybe in a lot of ways he still was.

She had spend so much effort in the last month shielding Addison from him and trying to figure out her relationship with Bruce that she didn't allow herself to think about any romantic feelings with Jack.

Clearly he had been thinking about her.

His little declaration was more like a confession whether he wanted to admit to that or not.

He wasn't as different as he thought he was. Maybe he thought he was above society's superficial tendencies, like appearance but he wasn't. At least not when it came to being around her. There was no denying that.

When he walked out of the bathroom and Allison looked at him impulse took over.

His face was completely clean of all makeup.

His scars seemed to disappear to her and she was looking at Jack, the first man she ever loved and the father of her child.

Maybe this was just an illusion, but she suddenly felt seventeen again and she was looking at her 22-year-old crush. Not the Joker. She didn't have room in her heart for both, not right now, but she had to let Jack know what he meant to her and even with the scars he was the most handsome man she had ever laid eyes on.

She wanted to kiss him.

Before she could convince herself not to, she stood up from the bed as her feet carried her closer to him.

He had only taken a couple steps from the bathroom as she approached him. An initial look of curiosity graced his face, but as she got closer curiosity became realization, but he too seemed to be frozen in an alternate universe and as she became nearly inches from him. She brought her lips to his.

And he let her.

Well are you happy? Review? Please?

As promised:

TheWeirdGirlFromDownTheRoad- it is cruel to leave cliffhangers but I think it makes things more exciting and at least I didn't take too long to update. Hopefully you agree!

Affectionate-Sinner- Well now you know did it surprise you? Probably not it wasn't some master idea or anything.

Ujemaima- I can pretty much guarantee some Joker/Batman showdowns inspired by a certain blonde main character.

Laurel- Thank you, I hope for a similar response this time around.

Deinevintagexx- I like that kind of storyline too. I think it brings a whole new element to it and although a lot of people seem to have done it, I'm trying to put a slightly different spin on mine. I hope you continue to enjoy.

Gen3683icy6- Well despite the cliffhanger I hope you didn't feel you had to wait too long.