"You can't stand in his doorway all day, Car." Bruce found his wife in the center of the fifth floor corridor, frowning through their son's doorframe the next morning. "I'm sure Clyde can't wait to see you."

"Yeah." Carly chuckled as she thought of her secretary. "No doubt he spent all of yesterday at my desk, making phone calls and riffling through my things." She looked away from Bruce and watched Dick sleeping in his Justice League sheets. "I want to wake him to say good-bye, but at the same time I want him stay sleeping. He deserves the peace."

"He's going to be perfectly safe here with Alfred." Bruce assured her.

"I have no doubt that Alfred can keep him safe, Bruce." Carly shut the door quietly. She decided not to wake Dick after all. "But he shouldn't have to." She shook her head and began walking down the hall. "I know I've said this before, but I can't believe this is all happening again. To Dick, to Alfred, to you…"

"It's happening to you too Carly." He said, taking her hand when they rounded the corner. "It's natural to be afraid, but things are different now. We're not children anymore, Jim Gordon's not a bright-eyed detective. We've all seen what lies in the underbelly of this city. We can learn from the past and we can keep Dick safe. I have a plan, but for now we need to keep up appearances. Things will feel more normal once we're at work."

Carly and Bruce drove to work together that morning. She would have preferred to take her own car, just incase one of them did need to leave work early, but Bruce was right. They needed to keep up appearances and it would look strange to the rest of Gotham if the newlyweds continued to arrive at work in separate vehicles.

"I can't believe you're here!" Clyde gasped when Carly walked into her office that day.

"Well, as far as I know, I still work here." Carly mumbled. She walked past Clyde's desk knowing that he would absolutely get up and follow her to her own. "Being married to the CEO, I hope that I'd at least get a decent warning if they decided to fire me."

"Fired? What no!" Clyde shook his head as his boss sat down in her cushiony leather chair. A chair that he had very much enjoyed sitting in yesterday. "I meant I can't believe you came into work today after what happened to you! Everyone's been talking about it! I mean what were those men thinking? Trying to mug you of all people! You're basically Gotham royalty!"

"They weren't really after me." Carly told him hoping that would be enough to satisfy Clyde. She tried to take Bruce's advice and just dive right into her work for the day, but that was proving difficult with her secretary nearly interrogating her. She answered all of Clyde's excitable questions about her and Dick's mugging in a very bored tone. She didn't want him to know just how badly the entire event had shaken her up.

"So, how is Richard settling in?" Clyde asked when he'd run out of other questions to ask.

"Don't you have work that you could be doing?" His boss sighed.

"No." He shook his head before sitting in one of the chairs opposite her. "Since you weren't here I was able to catch up on all the filing, ingoing mail's been sorted, and outgoing mail's been forwarded to the mail department. I even had your door and desk plaque changed, you're welcome." Clyde reached over and turned the name plate on the desk so that Carly could read it. It now read Mrs. Cary Amelia Wayne in large letters on one line and Attorney at Law in smaller letters below her name.

"Well it's good to know that at least I pay you for something." She joked.

"Will you please tell me about your son?" Clyde whined. "I've been your secretary for what; two, almost three, years? You never tell me about your personal life. Up until a few weeks ago anyway. And now that I've been let in, I'm not letting you shut me out again! The only pictures I've seen of Richard are from the paper, I bet you Cecilia's seen real pictures!"

"You think I don't tell you about my personal life?" Carly couldn't help but snort at his assumption. "Cecilia's not even allowed to interrupt Bruce whenever he's in a meeting, and she's definitely not allowed to sit in his chairs and press him for questions like you've been doing all morning. You wouldn't last two days in Cecilia's position."

"Probably not." Clyde frowned. "But I'm not Mr. Wayne's secretary, I'm yours!" He smirked. "So please, tell me about your son!"

"If I do, will you leave me alone so I can actually get things done?" She asked, already reading for her cellphone. Carly showed Clyde a picture she'd taken of Dick while they were at the movie theater. She'd taken him to the concession stand and told him he could have anything he liked. He made a wide smile as his eyes scanned the shelves of candy. She couldn't help but snap a quick picture.

"Knock, knock." Carly and Clyde were taken by surprise when Bruce let himself into the office.

"I-I just remembered, I have those expense reports that need to go to HR, excuse me!" Clyde jumped up from his seat and practically ran from the room.

"I see Clyde's still terrified of me." The corners of Bruce's mouth turned upwards in a mischievous grin. He walked to his wife's side ad gave her kiss.

"Yes you've still got it, even without the terrifying cape." She giggled and he leaned against the desk. "Is it lunch time already?" She glanced at the clock on her computer.

"It's a little early." Bruce confessed. "But I thought you might not be taking my advice and that maybe you were still worried about Dick."

"I'm never going to not be worried about him." She decided. "If it weren't this, I'm sure I'd be worked up over something else. Besides," She rolled her eyes. "It's not like Clyde's helping very much. He's been talking my ear off all morning."

"You're making me appreciate Cecilia." Bruce sighed. "The most I usually get from her is an inquiring look."

"Ha, if that was all I got from Clyde, I'd assume he was sick or a clone." She laughed. "I don't suppose you want to trade?"

"Not a chance, Car." Bruce leaned over and dialed the number for the mansion. He made sure it was set to speaker phone so they could both talk and be heard.

"Wayne residence, this is Alfred Pennyworth speaking." The stoic butler's voice answered on the second ring.

"Alfred, it's Bruce…"

"And Carly!" His wife chimed in.

"Lunch time already, is it?" Alfred paused, most likely to check his watch. "The young master is watching television. I'll fetch him, just one moment."

"Carly? Bruce?" It didn't take very long for Dick's small voice to chirp through the speaker.

"We're here!" Carly rushed to assure him. "How are you doing?"

"Good." Dick answered. "This house is so big, I might get lost! Bruce, do you think you could make me a map sometime?"

"I might be able to do that." Bruce nodded even though Dick couldn't see him. "Maybe you can help?"

"That'd be cool!" The boy sounded excited. "Carly, do you think you could take me swimming when you get home from work? Alfred says I'm not allowed to go by myself."

"Absolutely, Dick." Carly promised.

"Awesome!" He exclaimed. "What time do you come home? I miss you guys." Carly couldn't help but bring a hand to her chest and frown sympathetically.

"That's so cute!" She whispered to Bruce. "We miss you too, Dick!" She added louder. "We usually leave around 5:30, and depending on traffic we'll be home between 6 and 7 tonight."

"Oh…okay. It's already dark out then." He sighed.

"Yeah. That's right." Bruce said. "So, you'll know it's almost time for us to come home when the sun goes down. Dick, Carly and I have to go back to work now. We'll see you when we get home."

"Okay." Dick sighed again. Carly could picture the disappointed frown looking so out of place on his usually cheerful face.

"The day's almost done Dick." She promised him. "We'll be home before you know it. In the meantime, why don't you ask Alfred if he can find some of my old crayons? You're going to need them if you're going to start making a map."

"Yeah, okay! I'll ask him." Now Dick sounded excited again. "Have fun at work being important and cool. I can't wait till you get home!" A quick round of good-byes were exchanged and their phone call ended.

"You going to be alright going back to work?" Bruce studied his wife's face carefully. "You look upset."

"I don't want to be here, B." She confessed. "I want to be at home with him."

"Every parent in the world would rather be at home with their kids than at work." Bruce nodded. "But the best thing we can do for him is keep the company running, do our jobs. Make sure we are there for him when it counts. It's only his second day with us. He'll start school tomorrow. Soon he'll have a routine, friends his age. He won't miss us so much."

"How can you be sure?" Carly asked.

"Because, at one point all I had was Alfred. Then I met a girl. She became my best friend, and I didn't miss him so much when I was away from home." Bruce reached out and gave Carly's hand a comforting squeeze. "But, you know, you are married to a billionaire. You could become a stay at home mom."

"I couldn't do that!" Carly insisted. "Who would employ Clyde? And even if he could find someone else who'd take him there's no way they'd give him all the leeway that I do."

"That part is probably true. I'd better get back upstairs. I want to catch Gordon before he goes home for the day. He leaves early on Tuesdays to bring Barbara to gymnastics. Why don't you surprise our boy?" Bruce produced the car keys from his pocket and placed them on his wife's desk. "Work from home for the rest of the day. Boss' orders. I'll take a cab home."

"Thank you, for being so understanding." Carly planted a firm loving kiss on her husband's lips.

"Is this going to be a regular thing?" Clyde asked, sneaking back into his boss' office. "Because I don't know how many surprise visits from him my heart can handle."

"You're so dramatic." Carly rolled her eyes. She started unplugging her laptop and packing up any paperwork she could read over at home. "If and when my husband wants to come visit me, he is allowed, and that would be the case even if he didn't own the company. But he came down so that we could call Dick together."

"You called him together? That's adorable!" Clyde approved. "Wait, are you packing up to go home? It's barely noon time!"

"I'm just going to work from home for the rest of the day." Carly shrugged it off like it was no big deal.

"Two months ago you told me that people who work from home lack ambition and are statistically less likely to actually do their job. Don't you have the big case up against Lex Corp for that paten?"

"Clyde, you're my secretary and I'm the boss, not the other way around." She reminded him firmly. "I will be fine. This is the reason I don't tell you about my personal life. I will see you tomorrow. In the meantime, prep anything you have on this Lex Corp case and email it to me."


A/N: TBH I don't know if this story is going anywhere or If what I'm doing is any good anymore but I love working on it, and I'm going to keep working on it until the end. Whatever that may be.

Thank you Dream Lighting for reading and reviewing Chapter 33! Its always nice to know that your story has support. 3 I'll be back with another chapter soon! :)