11.
~ "Selina, what is it you do?" Harvey asked eagerly. Dent was on her right while the wait staff was serving the first course.
They were all at dinner after having their pictures all taken by the newspaper photographer. The photographer, a very pretty young blond woman had done the honors with her smart phone only. When the mayor made a sarcastic comment about her indifference to the job, she was quick witted about her response.
"I'm a journalism student and an unpaid intern, sir." she said. "I wasn't allowed to check out the more expensive cameras. The main press crew will be at the party tomorrow."
"Well, we'll see if you'll be working at the Gotham Harold after this." the mayor snapped.
"We'll see." the young woman said sarcastically.
Selina hadn't enjoyed the experience of standing around with Bruce and Mr. Lambisie having her picture taken. She tried to smile, but it didn't feel right.
"These aren't going to be in the paper are they?" she whispered to Bruce before the blond girl was done.
"Probably not. It's the circus they want for the society pages." Bruce whispered back.
"What do I do?" Selina mimicked back at Dent at dinner.
"Yes, are you still in school? What's your major? What kind of work do you want to go into?" he asked.
Dent was a handsome man. Older than her, but that was hardly noticeable. Gordon seemed to like him and that was something in his favor.
"I'm kinda roughing it right now." she said feebly.
"Good idea." Dent said with a charming smile. "Get yourself together, find your passion before you go off to college and blow all your money for school."
Selina smiled and nodded.
"Bruce, what are you doing with yourself?" Harvey Dent asked. Selina looked to her left at the table. Bruce Wayne seemed annoyed at something, his features pulled into a scowl.
"Studies." he said darkly.
"You're in your sophomore year at your father's school. Isn't that right?" Dent asked.
"Junior." Bruce said. "Double major of economics and physics."
"Double major is a lot to take on." the mayor said. "You need to have fun. Lord knows I never took on so much in college. I was in the fraternity of course and we had a party every other week."
Gordon looked annoyed and Selina could just imagine what he was thinking.
"So, Bruce, how did you and this charming young lady meet?" Mrs. VanBrown asked.
Mrs. VanBrown was the matriarch of the wealthy VanBrown family of Gotham. There were museums and galleries and opera houses with her name on it. She was just as influential as the Wayne family had been.
"Several years ago." Bruce said. Selina glanced at him. She wanted to tell this rich old lady that she had met Bruce when she saw his parents murdered in cold blood. But such a thing might hurt him, and she didn't want that.
"We had mutual friends." Bruce told the older woman.
"I see." Mrs. VanBrown said. "And Selina, where in Gotham do you live?"
"I-" Selina started to say before Bruce interrupted her.
"Detective Gordon, I read the oddest thing in the paper the other day. About a group of credit card forgers tired up in a church?" Bruce asked.
Gordon looked a little surprised about the turn of the conversation but played along.
"Yes, it was a local crew. Making fake cards and selling fake jewelry. Nothing too big time." Gordon said.
"Where was this?" Mrs. VanBrown asked.
"The narrows." Gordon said.
"That whole area needs to be torn down." Another woman, the wife of someone important said. "There is nothing but criminals there. All those disgusting tenement houses. It makes the whole city look bad."
Selina had to bite her tongue.
"It's not that easy." the mayor said casually. "The city can't just condemn an entire three square miles. Those buildings still belong to people."
"What do you suggest, Mr. Lambisie?" Gordon asked.
The sound of his voice made everyone stop their arguing and look at the GCPD detective who was so good at pissing off the wrong people.
Selina felt the tension of the moment and looked nervously from Gordon to Lambisie. She didn't really know this man, although the name sounded familiar. She couldn't exactly remember where she had heard it before. Something about sheep, she thought.
Lambisie, dressed in a fine Italian cut suit smiled at Gordon.
"Politics aside, the mayor is right. If the owners of the buildings are not willing to sell out, then that must mean they are happy with the way things are." he said with a contented, cat like grin. "After all, they would have sold the land to the city if there was no profit in it." he added.
"The narrows is a breeding ground for crime. That's the profit in it." Gordon challenged.
Lambisie shrugged.
"I know nothing about such politics. I'm a building contractor." he said.
Selina took in his smooth hands and well manicured nails. He had never worked with his hands before.
Harvey Dent moved in closer to her.
"We are ruining this nice dinner party with all this talk of crime." he said with a laugh. "I get enough of that at work."
Selina could smell his aftershave he was so close and it wasn't unpleasant.
"So, Miss. Kyle, what do you like to do for fun?"
~ It was an excruciating dinner for Gordon. He had called out Lambisie and been shot down. Harvey Dent hadn't even backed him up, but that was typical Harvey Dent. No wonder everyone called him two-face. He always seemed to be by your side, but when things got rough, Harvey bailed.
Gordon also didn't like the way he was talking to Selina. She was a kid after all and Dent was hitting on her. By the look on Bruce's face, he didn't like it either.
After dinner, they party went into a grand sitting room for drinks. The younger men naturally flocking around Selina who looked uncomfortable at the attention.
"What's Lambisie doing here, Bruce?" Gordon asked.
"Business dealings. Nothing personal." Bruce said.
The young heir to the Wayne fortune was eyeing Selina and Harvey suspiciously.
"He's a gangster, Bruce." Gordon huffed.
"Thought you got rid of all the organized crime, Gordon." Bruce said. His dark eyes never leaving Selina.
"Are you aware that he owns the jewelry shop that got robbed?" Gordon asked. "It's under a dummy corporation and the FBI can trace it all back to him. They are building a case against him as we speak."
"Well, it's the government, they won't work too fast." Bruce said lazily.
"Will they find evidence that Wayne Enterprises has been importing conflict diamonds? You tell me, Bruce, what am I supposed to think about your having Lambisie over to dinner?"
"You're supposed to have a good time." Bruce said.
Gordon looked to where Bruce was glaring.
Selina as standing in front of the fire with Harvey Dent, John VanBrown Jr and another of Gotham's elite pretty boys talking to her.
"You should have asked the photographer to stay. They might have left Selina alone with another young lady here." Gordon said smugly.
"Vicki." Bruce said.
"What?"
"The photographer? The Marilyn lookalike? Her name was Vicki Vail. I invited her to the circus tomorrow." Bruce said.
"You have Selina here and you're hitting on other women? What is wrong with you?" Gordon hissed.
Bruce gave him an annoyed look and left him to break up the pack of suiters that had flocked around Selina.
~ "Thank you." Bruce said.
It was well after midnight and Selina felt the pain from her hip and rib starting to hurt her again.
"You're welcome." she said bitterly.
"Are you mad at me?" he asked.
All the guests were gone and Wayne Manor was empty for the night. Only the echoes of their voices could be heard through the halls. Selina just wanted to go back to her room, take her pain medicine and got to sleep.
"No." she said. Her voice angry.
"Selina." he sighed. "I'm sorry that Harvey-"
"Bruce, you have me meet your little friends who have all gone to fancy colleges and summer in the Hampton's and you think I can compete with that? This isn't Pygmalion, you can't put me in a fancy black dress and parade me around and think I'll fit in." she said harshly.
"Selina, you did fit in." Bruce told her. Hadn't she seen that everyone loved her?
"Bruce, I'm not one of you." Selina told him. "I can't smile pretty and keep my moth shut for that idiot mayor. Why did you insist on putting me in that position?"
"Because you are my guest just as much as he is and more important to me than he ever will be." Bruce said coldly.
Selina glared at him.
"Bruce, I'm not a good person." she said. Her breath seeming to leave her body.
He reached out for her but she moved away.
"Selina, I know what you are."
"No you don't." she snapped. "You only know what I tell you. You've never understood what its like to have to fight your whole life just to stay alive. To never have a safe place to run to. Then you bring me here, with all your rich friends and dress me up like this. It's just like when we were kids. I'm not apart of your world. I can't do fancy dinners or socialites!"
"Fine." Bruce said. "We don't have to have any more dinners. You suggested the whole party."
"I didn't want to be apart of it!" she said hotly.
Bruce watched her fold her arms over her body. It was the same speech she had given him when they fought as teenagers.
"I didn't get hurt slipping in the rain on my way home from work." she said in a cold, detached tone.
"Selina, stop." Bruce ordered.
"I was on the rooftops. I was being chased by some freak because I had been trying to rob a jewelry store. It went bad, and I got hurt. That's why I called you. Because in all the world, I know I can count on you. Ivy has vanished, and I've been living in some poor futures brokers apartment while they were on vacation. I sold everything I could from that apartment and didn't regret it. It's who I am, Bruce. You think I'm a good person, and I'm not." she said sadly.
Bruce knew all of this. Or at least he suspected it. Still, the truth hit him hard.
"Selina, you don't have to be like that anymore. You know that. You know I still love you." he said.
"You don't even know me!" she cried. Tears were filling her eyes and for the first time ever, he watched them fall. "You don't know the real me. What I had to do to survive. It changes you and you can't go back. I steal so I don't have to work as a hooker, so that I have value to the thugs on the streets. They leave me alone because in all the world, there isn't anyone who can break a safe better than me. There isn't anything I can't break into. It's been the only thing I've ever been good at. You think I can change? That I can just become a socialite and stay here in your castle? That I could be your wife?"
She shook her head as if he were a fool.
"That girl you think I am, never existed. You can dress her up like a queen, but she's still evil." Selina told him bitterly.