WARNING: Too hot for TV.

Disclaimer: Yadda yadda Batman yadda not mine bleh.

---

Crane briefly forgot about the storm, his rush, his plan, and his pride. Every improper thought or daydream he had about Katie cut off precisely before just this sort of moment. Though he would never admit it, even to himself, the sneak attack kiss was sweet relief after so many unfinished fantasies.

He let Katie slide her tongue slowly against his, and without realizing he began kissing back. Katie's fingers left his cheeks and tangled into his drenched hair. She suddenly pulled her lips away, leaving him open mouthed with eyes closed.

"Is there anywhere around here where we can find some shelter?"

Crane blinked lazily as he thought. "Yes, but it's a barn."

"This will do then." She pulled his face to hers. Another bolt of lightening illuminated the woods. Thunder cracked immediately, vibrating the forest floor. "On second thought…"

Katie reluctantly let go of Crane, picked up the duffle bad, and followed him to the waiting horse. He climbed on and hoisted her up. Katie found her place against his back again and whispered, "Hurry!"

Crane was thankful the lightening held out just long enough for them to reach the nearby destination. He didn't know this horse, nor what it could do when spooked. This was partly why he didn't reprimand himself too harshly for giving in to his primal urges. After all, riding the rest of the way in lightening would be extremely dangerous, he thought.

He stopped in front of a large, two story barn and jumped to the ground. Katie stayed on and stared at the building. Crane put his hands up to her. "Let's go!" Katie frowned and allowed him help her off again, letting her hands linger in his as she reached the ground.

Crane led Katie and the horse into the unoccupied barn. She jumped when Crane closed the doors behind them.

Crane walked over to her slowly and licked his lips. "Remind me where we left off."

Katie looked at the barn's darkened corners. What light they had came only from a few cracks between planks in the ceiling and walls, and six small, soiled windows. "I don't know about this." She noticed his look of concern. "Oh, not about you. About this…place."

"Don't fret. There's no one here but you, me, and him," he pointed to the horse. "Maybe some mice."

"Not funny."

Crane examined Katie's face as she observed the barn again. "Why are you so bothered?"

"It's stupid. And nothing. But you could make me feel better."

"And how might I do that?"

"Ask me to kiss you."

Crane raised an eyebrow. "What if I just kissed you without asking?"

"I don't know. Try and find out." Katie bit the side of her bottom lip and looked up at him.

"Is that your come hither look?"

"Is it working?"

Crane's face suddenly became serious. "Katie, you'd better not be doing all this as some stall tactic…"

"Crane, of course I'm not."

"And don't call me 'Crane'."

"What am I supposed to call you?"

Crane put his left middle finger through the belt loop on Katie's left hip, and his right finger through the other. He drew her towards him so that they were hip to hip. He looked into her eyes and slid his hands up to her waist. "I don't know, but I don't want you calling me by my last name right now."

"What about your first name?"

Crane made a face as if she had said something repulsive. "What do you usually call someone in this type of situation?"

Katie wondered if his question was supposed to sound so naïve. "Uhm…maybe 'oh god, oh god' or 'Yes! Yes! Yes!'"

Crane left one hand on Katie's waist and ran the fingertips of the other across the wide neck of her shirt. His eyes followed his fingers. "A shirt this soaking wet can't be very comfortable."

"There's a way to fix that."

Crane smiled and ran his fingers back in the other direction. "By all means, make yourself comfortable then."

Katie took Crane's hand and placed it back on her side. "Do it for me."

Crane willed his fingers not to tremble, and they were relatively compliant. He tugged from the bottom of Katie's shirt, and by the time it was above her shoulders there wasn't so much as a tremor in his hands. He tossed it over his shoulder and it landed with a quiet splat on the floor. He reached for her belt.

"Hang on there, cowboy. We're taking turns."

"Right," Crane said, unbuckling the leather belt. "You take all of your clothes off, then I'll remove mine."

"No way!" Katie wriggled out of Crane's grasp and reached for his shirt. Crane attempted to get a grip on her belt again, but she pulled away and jumped into the dark.

"Of all times for games, Katie, this is not one of them."

"Sure it is!" she shouted. He was surprised by how far away she was so quickly, and with so little sound. "I can see you but you can't see me. If you take your shirt off, I'll come out with my pants off. Promise."

Crane yanked his shirt over his head and threw it into the dark. His hair was wild and his face flushed, his skin almost glowing in the diffused moonlight. "Your turn."

Katie could tell, even from a distance, that his expression was changing. He looked more possessed than playful.

"You said turns. It's not nice to tease," he reminded her, wherever she was.

Katie's pants landed at Crane's feet, but Katie didn't join them. He looked in the direction they came from. "I'm not taking another turn until I see you."

He heard nothing but the storm outside. He ran his hands through his hair as his eyes wandered through the dark.

"Tag," Katie said, touching his shoulder from behind. "You're it."

Crane spun around and met Katie nose to nose. He grabbed her and pulled her to him, jamming his tongue into her mouth before she could take a breath. She let out muffled protest, but caught her breath through her nose and kissed him back. She realized giddily, holy crap, this is actually happening.

Crane's hands traveled down Katie's back and up again. He tugged on the clasp of her bra.

Katie broke his kiss, but his lips attached like magnets to her neck. She laughed and tried to remember what she was going to say. "Take your pants off first."

Crane looked her in the eye briefly before going for the other side of her neck. "No."

Katie made a vain attempt to get away from his lips. "N-nothing else until we're…we're, uhh…uhm, equally disrobed."

Crane looked her in the eye again and gritted his teeth. "No."

"Yes," she said firmly, pulling hard on the top of the fly of his pants. The button popped off and bounced into the dark.

Crane grabbed Katie's shoulders and pushed her against a stall that once housed an animal, but now stored a forgotten, overturned claw foot tub. He jerked his head back and looked down his nose at her. His face was in shadow, other than the light that reflected off his eyes and teeth.

The light came from behind him, and he could see Katie much better than she could see him. He drank it in – her tussled hair, lips swollen from fervent kisses, and bare feet on the dusty barn floor. He loved that he still had everything on but his shirt, and there she was in royal blue boy cut underwear and strapless bra.

Crane rubbed his lips together and smiled. "That was cute. But I'm not in the mood for cute."

"What are you in the mood for?"

Crane tilted his face down slowly, a few wet hairs falling in front of his eyes. "I would rather show than tell."

Katie didn't appreciate being pushed against the stall, and the tone of his voice and gleam in his eye did nothing to make her feel better. This wasn't the man she had imagined herself in this scenario with (over and over for years), this was the man that greeted her from inside his Arkham cell.

"When you've thought of me," Katie said, trying to suppress this Crane, "is this how you pictured it? I'm all for rough housing, but it almost seems like you might actually try and force me to do something."

Crane put his forehead against Katie's and shook his head. "Oh Katie, Katie. You're such a silly thing." He rubbed his cheek against hers as he continued. "I do not turn you on in spite of my wickedness. On the contrary," he ran a hand from her shoulder to her chest, "it's the devil in me that gets your blood flowing."

Katie leaned her head against the stall and enjoyed his roving hand. "What is it about me that gets your blood flowing?"

Crane looked up from her body to her eyes. "You're very curious about that, aren't you?"

"I want to know what you think of me. I want to know what it is about me that makes you want my bra off so badly."

"Those are two very different questions, and it's not fair to lump them together like that," Crane began, pulling Katie against him to unhook her bra. "The first question has to do with what I think of you as a person," he finally got the clasp undone and slid the garment out between their bodies. He pressed himself against her and kissed her face and neck while he spoke. "The second question is about why I'm physically drawn to you. They're completely independent of one another."

"No they aren't," Katie said softly, unzipping his pants. "I'm a body and a brain, and you're attracted to the whole package."

Crane's pants fell to the ground, and he stepped out of them, along with his shoes. Katie rubbed a bare leg against his. "Well I suppose you're right," Crane said, shuddering as Katie ran her nails down his back. "I could answer both questions."

"Don't keep me in suspense."

Crane stopped kissing her momentarily to give his answer. "I think you're an extremely bright woman, and you're wasting your potential. The world is a dirty place, and no matter how hard you try, you'll never clean it up. People are bad by nature. That's why you can't rehabilitate them, Katie, because rehabilitation suggests they were good to start with. Everyone is inherently corrupt. You should learn not only to accept this, but," he kissed her lips for emphasis, "to exploit it."

"Huh?"

"Think about it," he said excitedly. "You're smarter than 99 percent of the population, you're charming, you're gorgeous. You could have all of Gotham eating out of the palm of your hand if you took the talent and effort you pour into a hopeless cause and turned it towards something actually attainable."

"I still don't understand where you're going with this." She reveled in the fact that he called her smart and beautiful, not truly hearing the rest of his words.

Crane brought both hands to Katie's face and kissed her deeply, breathing in as he explored her mouth. Her moan made his lips tingle. He pulled back and put the tip of his nose on hers. "Forget about Arkham. The men in those cells aren't the real problem with society."

Katie didn't want to have this discussion. She wanted to melt with him into a puddle on the floor. "It's not like that, Cr…uhm…whatever I'm supposed to call you. There are plenty of good people and good causes."

"What is 'good' anyway, Katie?"

"Come on," she said, snapping the elastic of his boxer briefs. "We can talk about this later."

"You opened Pandora's box."

"And I'm sorry I did. Forget it for now, Cr…ugh, please tell me something to call you."

Crane knelt and pulled Katie's underwear down, helping her step out of them. He simultaneously removed his own while kissing his way back up her body. "Call me… 'oh god, oh god'."

---

(Author's note: The part missing between these breaks is the part that would make this an MA story. It's not at all necessary to the plot; it's just me indulging my perviness. If you would like not to leave it up to your own imagination, ask nicely and I might just share  .)

---

Katie lay on the barn floor and wrestled with her damp jeans to get them back on her body. Finally succeeding, she hopped to her feet.

"Did you hear that?" Crane whispered from the ground, still partaking in his own struggle.

Katie shook her head and looked around. "What?"

"Shh," Crane ordered, putting his finger to his lips. "Listen."

Katie cocked her head and listened. She looked down at Crane. "I don't hear anything."

Crane looked at the ceiling and rose slowly, zipping his buttonless pants. "You don't hear that?" Crane spun around as if the sound had moved across the barn.

"Maybe mice," Katie said apathetically. Please don't act crazy right now, she thought.

"Don't get sarcastic!" Crane hissed over his shoulder.

"Don't get weird!"

"There!" Crane said, rushing over to her. He pointed to the ceiling. "You don't hear it now?"

Katie looked into his anxious eyes. "I think maybe you should take your meds," she said carefully.

Crane ignored her, too fixated on the ceiling. "Let's go."

"It's still storming."

"You don't seem to have much of a problem with getting wet."

Katie looked at Crane with shock.

"What?"

"What was that supposed to mean," she said, laughing.

"Only the lightening put you off earlier. The rain didn't seem to bother you."

Katie mouthed the word "oh" and closed her eyes.

"What did you think I meant?"

"Uhm, nothing. Let's go, then."

Crane followed her out of the barn, taking hold of the horse's reigns on the way.

Katie was several yards from the barn when she realized Crane was no longer behind her.

"Hey!" she called to the gaping barn doors. The horse trotted out of the barn, alone.

Katie's heart skipped. She took a few steps towards the barn.

"Crane?"

She heard a thump on the roof. She froze just outside of the barn. Another thump.

She shouted his name into the dark building, loud and crisp. "Crane!"

Crane lunged out of the barn at her, covering her mouth with his hand as they tumbled to the ground. "Shut up!" he whispered harshly.

Katie coughed into his hand, trying to capture the wind he knocked out of her body.

The thump was louder, and they both looked up in its direction.

"Who did you call?" Crane asked bitterly.

Katie pulled his hand off of her mouth. "How could I call anyone, you idiot?"

Crane licked his lips and looked up again.

Katie pushed him off of her and sat up. The thump was quieter again.

"So you hear it now, don't you," Crane said, sitting up as well.

"Maybe I'm having sexually transmitted delusions."

Crane was reminded of what they had done. It seemed like another daydream already.

"Let's get out of here. Quietly." He helped Katie to her feet.

"The bag!" she said as they mounted the horse.

Crane growled.

"I'll get it," Katie said, swinging both legs to the same side of the horse.

"No," Crane said, suspicious. "I'll do it."

Katie remembered how she felt standing at the barn doors, calling his name. "How about we go together?"

They stepped gingerly into the barn, searching the area where the horse had been.

"I don't see it." Katie said. She searched a moment longer, then turned around. "Crane?"

Not again, she thought.

"Crane," she whispered slightly louder. Dumb ass, she thought.

She walked to the center of the building slowly, the rubber soles of her boots padding against the floor.

"Crane," she whispered.

A hand suddenly clamped over her mouth, but it wasn't one of Crane's.

TBC

Author's note: Things have been cah-rae-zee and I didn't get this chapter out as quickly as the others. Sorry, babes! I'll be better this time.