Title: I Love You…I'll Kill You

Fandom: The Dark Knight

Rating: M

Pairing: Joker/OC

Genre: Drama/Angst

Disclaimer: Unfortunately I don't own the Joker or Batman.

A/N: I really appreciate knowing that there are people enjoying this story! Also, please don't hesitate to review this story, even if you just want to criticize it. I welcome all opinions/comments. Enjoy!!

Chapter Twenty-One

Chip and Dale sat in a little café close to Wayne Enterprises. They had been watching Lacy all day and now were in the café getting something to eat, but they made sure to sit by the window so that they could see if she left. They were the only customers in the place and the employees were all in the kitchen, laughing and joking with each other.

Chip put a packet of sugar into his coffee and stirred it with his spoon. "She's been at work for a long time. It makes me wonder if she's ever going to go home."

"I know." Dale agreed. "She really likes to work late."

"You know, Bruce Wayne is still up there too." Chip pointed out.

Dale laughed. "What are you implying?"

"Nothing." Chip explained. "I'm just saying that they have been spending a lot of time together lately and now they are both working late." He made sure to make air quotation marks with his hands when he said 'working late'.

"Maybe they are just friends." Dale suggested.

"Perhaps." Chip laughed. "But I don't think the Joker's happy about the amount of time his girlfriend spends with Bruce Wayne."

"Oh man, not this again!" Dale threw his napkin onto the table. "Do I really have to hear your theory about how the Joker and this girl are involved in some kind of forbidden love affair?"

"Look at the facts." Chip commanded. "He is almost obsessed about us giving him updates on what she's doing, where she's going, and who she's with. He's put cameras up in her apartment, and he's visited her apartment too many times for me to even count. What other conclusion should I draw from it?"

"I don't want to hear it anymore." Dale told his friend. "Until you can get solid proof about them having a relationship, I don't want to hear your theories anymore. Understand?"

"Fine." Chip sulked.

"Thank you!" Dale exclaimed.

"No problem." Chip rolled his eyes. He looked out the window and saw that there was a dark green car parked down the street. He vaguely remembered seeing a car similar to that hanging around earlier. "Hey, have you noticed a dark green car hanging around all day today?"

"A dark green car?" Dale asked. "No, don't think so."

"Really?" Chip asked. "I might be paranoid, but I could have sworn that I saw that dark green car over at Acer Consulting and then again here at Wayne Enterprises."

Dale laughed. "You think someone else is tailing her?"

"Well, yeah." Chip replied. "You don't think the Joker sent other guys to do this job, do you?"

"Why would he?" Dale asked. "We've done a good job."

"Yeah but he isn't exactly the most rational person in the world." Chip reminded his friend. "He's been known to kill his employees for no reason at all except his own personal enjoyment."

"That's true." Dale sighed. "I just don't see why he would assign other guys to follow her. He seems to trust us."

"Maybe we should ask him the next time we check in." Chip suggested.

"I'll leave that up to you my friend." Dale laughed. There was no way he was going to bring that up to the Joker. "But we should get back to the parking garage in case Lacy decides to leave."

"Yeah." Chip agreed, taking another sip of his coffee before following Dale out of the diner. He couldn't shake the feeling that the dark green car was also trailing Lacy. But if it wasn't another group of the Joker's men, who could it be?

Lacy took another long drink of what she figured must have been her fifth or sixth beer. It might have been her seventh though, she could have lost count. When they started drinking she vowed to only have a couple beers because she didn't want to get drunk. But then Bruce started talking about his past and when she realized that he had loved Rachel she felt so guilty. The only way she could deal with the guilt without confessing was to drink.

She suddenly realized that she never gave Bruce an answer about what they should talk about. "Why don't we talk about the kiss we almost shared this weekend?"

"Ok." He replied. While he did want to talk about it, he also wanted to talk about her company. "What about it?"

"What was up with that? I mean, honestly." She asked, aware that she was beginning to lose the inner filter she normally had which kept her from saying whatever popped into her mind. The alcohol must be doing that.

She laughed. "I mean, one minute we're talking and then we almost kiss. If the Joker hadn't blown up those buildings, who knows what we would have done."

"I don't know what happened." Bruce told her. "But I do know that I didn't invite you to lunch in order to make a move on you."

"And I certainly didn't go to lunch with you to have the moves put on me." She laughed again. "So are we friends or something else? What's going on with us?"

"Honestly, I don't know." He replied. Maybe this wasn't the best conversation to have while she was drunk. She probably wasn't going to remember most of it in the morning.

"Cause I can tell that you still love Rachel and, god only knows why but, I still love Jack. And you know what?" She laughed yet again. "I wake up everyday praying that I will stop loving him, but it never happens. I am in love with a man that doesn't exist anymore, and might never have really ever existed."

She leaned in closer to him. "As much as I love him though, I'm not in love with him anymore. I hate him. I hate him so much that I can't even see straight sometimes. You wanna know why I have a love/hate relationship with him?"

"That's not really any of my business." He replied. He figured that she said she hates her deceased husband because he chose to kill himself instead of trying to get help. That's the only reason he could think of for her to hate him. It seemed like a fairly normal reaction to the situation in his opinion.

"Have you ever had someone torment you to the point where you feel like you've lost your mind?" She took another sip of beer. "I mean, really have someone mentally and emotionally just beat you down until you just want to scream? But then you realize you can't scream because there's no one around to understand or help you."

He was beginning to think that she had drunk enough beer for the evening and that he should but off her alcohol intake. They had been drinking for about three hours now and thankfully she ate a lot of pizza. A full stomach would help her stomach absorb some of the alcohol faster. He reached for her beer. "I think you've had enough for tonight."

She moved her beer out of his grasp. "No. I haven't had too much because I still remember him."

He decided to let her finish the beer that was in her hand but then he was going to keep her from drinking any more.

She took another long drink of her beer. "You though, I must say you have been amazing."

He laughed. "Amazing? Really?"

"Yeah. I mean, you have been so incredibly nice to me even though I totally don't deserve it. But you have just been great. In fact, you kind of remind me of Jack in a few ways—at least the Jack that I fell in love with, not the Jack that Jack actually was or turned into." She stopped for a moment. "Does that even make sense?"

"I understand it." He assured her, even though he really didn't. "You know, you remind me of Rachel in a few ways." He couldn't understand why she would think that she didn't deserve his kindness. He thought that she was a good person. "Maybe that's why we almost kissed. Maybe we see the past in each other and that's what the almost kiss was about."

"Maybe." She shrugged her shoulders, not sure she wanted to talk about it anymore. "You know, you really picked the wrong consulting firm for this job."

Her sudden change of conversation confused him for a second but he quickly recovered. He was glad they were finally talking about what he wanted to talk about all night. "Really? Why would you say that?"

She laughed and took another drink of her beer. "Well I don't know if you realize it, but all of the victims of the Joker's home invasions have been former clients of ours." She looked all around before leaning in even closer and whispering, "I wouldn't be surprised if you're next."

He did know that all of the victims were former clients of her company. "Why would you say I could be next?" He whispered, deciding to play dumb to try and get more information from her.

"Well you're rich, you're in charge of a large company in Gotham, and you're one of our clients. That means you fit the profile of people the Joker is targeting." She explained. "So I would be careful if I were you. I don't want to see you end up dead."

"I'll be careful." He promised her.

"I don't know if the police know about the connection between all the victims. They aren't exactly the smartest."

"The commissioner seems intelligent." Bruce pointed out.

"Gordon?" She asked, thinking back to her meeting with him. She didn't have anything against him; she just didn't like that he was asking her so many questions. "He's ok I guess. Anyways, if they do about the connection, then they sure aren't doing anything about it. You would think that they would be interrogating people at the office but they aren't. They probably should though."

"Who should they interrogate?" He asked, hoping for any kind of lead.

"Do you ever think about redecorating this office?" She asked out of the blue.

He could tell that she was definitely drunk now because she was having problems keeping up a conversation with him. "No. I like this room the way it is. Now who would…"

"I think it would look good if you painted the walls a different color. Maybe put some bright colors." She suggested.

"I'll keep that in mind." He told her. "Now Lacy, who should the police interrogate?"

"Huh?" She asked. Then she remembered what they had been talking about. "Oh. How about the guys in charge? They are the ones who would know what's going on, if anything is going on."

She tried to take another drink of her beer but was saddened to find that there was none left. "It's all gone." She pouted.

"Yes, it's all gone." He consoled her as he took the empty bottle away from her. "You know, I should get you home."

He was starting to realize that it wasn't right to help her get this drunk. Maybe he should let her crash in the guest room at his penthouse so that he can keep an eye on her and make sure that she is alright in the morning instead of leaving her alone in her apartment. He would hate for anything to happen to her.

He picked up the phone and called Alfred to come and pick them up because neither of them should be driving right now. Although Bruce didn't feel drunk, he had several beers and it wouldn't be responsible for him to drive like that.

"Why do I have to go home?" She asked. "I'm not tired yet."

"No," he laughed. "I bet you're not. But you will be very soon once the effects of the alcohol wear off."

She stood up, only to stumble. She would have fallen if Bruce hadn't caught her before she hit the ground. "Whoa. The floor isn't very stable."

He had to laugh. "Yeah. It's the floor that isn't stable. Do you think you will be able to walk?"

"Sure!" She exclaimed. She took a few steps and almost fell down again. But Bruce caught her again. "Ok, maybe not. You really should have this floor checked out. It's dangerous."

"I will." He assured her. He picked up her purse and handed it to her before he picked her up and carried her. He figured it would just be easier to carry her down to the car instead of having to help her walk.

"You smell good," she told him as her nose inhaled his scent, "and you're really strong."

"Thank you." He laughed, reminding himself that she was drunk and would probably be embarrassed by the things she said tonight—if she remembered them.

Alfred was already in the parking garage when Bruce came out with Lacy in his arms.

"Hello Alfred!" Lacy smiled widely and waved.

"Hello Miss Williams." Alfred replied as he opened up the door to the backseat. "What happened to her?"

"I took your advice to be charming." Bruce replied. Lacy was slipping in and out of sleep. He gently placed her in the back seat.

"I told you to get her drunk?" Alfred laughed. "I think not. I don't remember advising that."

Bruce had to laugh too. "Ok, so maybe I went about it a different way than you suggested, but it worked."

"Well I'm glad to hear that." Alfred replied, going back to the driver's seat. "Am I taking her back to her place?"

"No." Bruce said as he got into the back seat with Lacy and propped her up against his shoulder. "We're taking her home with us." He saw Alfred raise his eyebrow in a disapproving manner. "She'll be sleeping this off in a guest room."

"I would hope so." Alfred said as he started to drive.

Chip and Dale had followed Bruce's car once it left the parking garage and were surprised to see that it didn't take Lacy back to her apartment. "Oh the boss isn't going to like this." Chip said as he saw Bruce Wayne and another man help Lacy in to Bruce's building.

"I don't envy you." Dale laughed.

"Why?" Chip asked, confused.

"Because it's your turn to call the Joker and check in." Dale continued to laugh. "So you're gonna have to be the one to tell him about this."

"Great." Chip rolled his eyes. He had also noticed that the dark green car had followed them to Bruce's penthouse. This next call to the Joker wasn't going to be fun.