Howdy folks, thanks for patiently waiting for this next installment…and here it is! Thank you all for the kind words after the last chapter! Hopefully, you'll enjoy what's happening in this particular tale!

…

The Bat and the Cat Come Back

Eleven

Selina woke up and stared at the ceiling. She'd been dreaming and now her heart was pounding in her chest. Bruce was still sleeping soundly next to her, so she carefully climbed out of bed and left the bedroom behind her.

Selina knew precisely where she needed to go. The roof. Keeping her ears open, she listened to make sure Bruce wasn't following her. She wanted to be alone.

At three AM, there was still an eerie glow coming off of the city. Lights were always on in Gotham City.

It had been two weeks since she'd met with Eddie and Pamela Isley. And something since then had been nagging at her, but she couldn't figure it out.

Gotham was cool this time of the year. Usually September in Gotham meant an oppressive heat and then in October, the kids would be lucky if they didn't have to wear snowboots to go trick-or-treating.

Selina walked right over to the edge of the building and surveyed the street below. Heights hadn't ever bothered her. But her mom and sister had a horrible fear of them. It was weird the things that she remembered about them.

She continued her walk around the perimeter of the roof and she stopped when she found a metal box hidden in the shadows. Crouching down, she pulled it to her and opened it.

She gasped.

Gold, silver, platinum and gem stones of all colors stared back at her. The box was half-full of jewelry and expensive trinkets of all kinds, shapes and sizes. Immediately, a memory flashed into Selina's mind. She was breaking into someone's apartment. She was taking their things.

In the flash, she saw a reflection in the mirror and it was definitely her.

Selina slammed the lid back on the box and shoved it away. What was going on? Why could she only remember bits and pieces? And if she was disappearing in the middle of the night, how had Bruce not noticed?

Putting the box back where it had been, she went back to the stairs and went to work in Bruce's office. She was going to figure out what was wrong.

…

Bruce Wayne climbed out of bed and stretched. Selina was not in bed, but that didn't surprise him. Since being back in Gotham, she'd become an early riser. He wasn't sure why, but it happened.

He immediately headed for the shower. There was a board meeting at Wayne Enterprises and he wanted to make his presence know in light of the seemingly generous offer from Luthor. All of these board members except Lucius Fox, thought he was a party boy who never grew up and squandered his family's money. They thought he ruined his father's legacy. How could he expect them to be loyal? Now was his chance to show them that he'd changed.

And if they didn't believe him, they would believe a vendetta against Luthor. Everyone knew they'd been friends a long time ago and there had been a falling out. It wasn't going to be nearly as difficult as jumping off of a building without a parachute.

If none of that worked, well, he could have Lucius fire all of them. Although, he'd much prefer to go the non-drama route.

He climbed into the shower and the water blasted onto his body. He winced in pain as it hit his back. The water wasn't that hot, so he stepped out of the shower and looked at his back in the mirror.

There were eight nearly identical scratches running parallel down the length of his back.

He grinned and shook his head. He should have known it was caused by Selina. They'd had a lot of fun last night.

Once he was dressed and ready to go, he realized he still hadn't seen or heard from Selina.

Bruce found Alfred in the kitchen.

"Good morning, Alfred," Bruce said.

"Good morning, Master Bruce," Alfred replied. "Selina elected to sleep late this morning?" he asked, noting it was now nine AM. It was late for her.

"I was hoping you'd know where she was," Bruce said. "She wasn't in bed when I got up."

Alfred shook his head. "I haven't seen or heard her this morning."

"Well, that doesn't make me feel good," Bruce said.

He pulled out his cell phone and called his wife's phone. Bruce heard the ringing and found it in his purse in the hallway.

"She has to still be here," Bruce told Alfred. "She never leaves without this thing," he said as he smiled at the background picture of them at the house in Italy.

Systematically, the two men started to search the penthouse. And in the last room left, Bruce found Selina curled up asleep on the couch in his office.

Bruce crouched down and stroked his wife's cheek. She gently stirred, but made no real move to wake up.

"Selina?" he said softly.

She opened an eye and immediately panicked. Where was she?

"Calm down, calm down," Bruce told her. "Why are you sleeping in here?" he asked.

Selina couldn't remember. She'd remembered waking up from a nasty dream in the middle of the night, but until now, everything was a blur.

"I have no idea," She said honestly. "I must have gone in here after I woke up from the dream I'd been having. But I don't really remember."

"You don't look like you're feeling so well. You're kind of pale. Maybe I should stay home and take you to the doctor. I can miss the board…"

"No, Bruce. I'm fine and you absolutely have to go to the board meeting," she told him. "I'm fine. I just didn't sleep well. Your couch is lumpy. Who picked this out?" she said, trying to detract from her.

"What if I told you my mom picked it out?"

"I'd call you a liar," Selina said.

"There's my girl," Bruce said. But while she sounded a lot like Selina, there was something very obviously bothering her. And Bruce felt guilty because he didn't have the time to stay home and take care of her.

"Go, you're going to be late, Bruce," Selina said.

He nodded and kissed her on the cheek.

"Shall I drive you, sir?" Alfred asked.

"No, no. I think you'd better stay here with Selina. Let Alfred take care of you."

Selina shot him a dirty look as he and Alfred walked out of the room.

"She listens to you better than me, would you try to get her to see a doctor?" Bruce asked. "Something isn't right."

"I shall ask her, but I'm not promising you anything," Alfred told Bruce. "Go to your meeting and impress them with how smart you are instead of how loudly you can snore."

Alfred ushered the man out the door and closed it behind Bruce and looked at Selina from the doorway. She looked lost in thought as if trying to remember a long-forgotten piece of information.

"Selina?" he asked, attempting to bring her back to the present.

Selina came out of her trance and looked at Alfred.

"Are you going to tell me what's wrong or are you going to force me to guess?"

"I don't know that you'd be able to guess this," Selina said.

"Are you…pregnant?" he asked tentatively.

"No," Selina gulped. "Life would be a hell of a lot easier if I was."

"Well, what else would it be?" Alfred said.

"I made the mistake of googling my symptoms?" he asked. "It could be any number of things…"

"And what are your symptoms?" he asked. "And don't ever look things like that up on the internet."

"I'm missing huge chunks of my memory. I can remember my childhood. Its recent things, like last night. I can't remember anything aside from looking stuff up on the computer. I remember seeing the clock at three-o-three and then again at three-fifty-three. And I don't remember getting to the office during that time. It's been happening for the last week and a half. You can't tell Bruce. I need to figure everything out. He's got other things to worry about. He doesn't need this too."

…

"I know Luthor is offering a hell of a lot of money to buy you all out; to effectively purchase Wayne Enterprises. But he's not going to do anything with the company, he wants to destroy it. Because it's my family's name," Bruce explained.

"I think you have to put aside your past with Mr. Luthor. He saw Wayne Enterprises as floundering…when you abandoned it. Not that you were too terribly involved when you were here anyway. But Mr. Luthor does want to do something with this company, you should have taken the time to read the proposal provided…" a grey-haired man said.

"Besides, you faked your death. The will was read. And…you lost all that money…"

"You know as well as I do that my fingerprints were stolen and the funds were released without my permission. I may be a lot of things, but I would never do that to the company my father built," he said sincerely. "The final vote is in three weeks. Please at least consider my option."

"And what's that, Mr. Wayne?" a blue-haired lady asked haughtily.

Bruce resisted the urge to bang his fist on the table. He'd played the part of the playboy too well. No one wanted to believe him.

But he wasn't going to let something small like this stop him.

…

"Mrs. Wayne, I don't know what to tell you," the doctor told her as he sat down on the stool opposite her.

She's been so scared at the prospect of losing her mind that she let Alfred take her to a doctor.

"What is it?" Selina said, trying to read the man's face.

"There is nothing wrong with you. We did a full work up. We did the brain scan at your insistence. And we can't find a cause."

"Nothing?" she asked.

"Well, it might be…psychological," he told her softly.

"You are telling me that I'm crazy?" she asked. "Like, actually crazy?"

"Not crazy. But your problems might be stress-induced. You're married to a notorious…" he trailed off. "Well, let's say he comes with a reputation…"

"He's not like that."

"Well, regardless, you were living a fairly anonymous lifestyle, based on what you described to me, Mrs. Wayne. And now you've come back to Gotham City and have become the center of attention and scrutiny. Moving in and of itself is stressful enough. Having photographers follow you everywhere would be enough to be a stressor," the doctor explained.

"And what would be your suggestion to lower my stress?" Selina asked in annoyed tone.

"Well," the doctor began. "Is divorce an option?" he smirked, attempting to make a joke.

"I don't find that funny."

What was she going to do?

…

To Be Continued…