Previously: The Joker and Crane have been working behind Harley's back to find the 'big boss' before the Batman catches on. Harley has made a friend in Hamilton Hill's campaign manager Arthur Reeves. When she finds out about Crane she is, predictably, pissed.
Theme: Donna Summer - 'I Feel Love' (12" Version)
The Pantomime
6.
"What the fuck is going on!" Harley raged, her heart pounding in her ears as she looked between the Joker and Crane and then around the room again, struggling to accept what she was seeing.
Behind the couch, were two tables covered in beakers, flasks, and rubber tubing, and beside the tables were a pair of gurneys currently without patients. On the floor beside the gurneys were two massive plastic tubs, surrounded by at least twenty empty ten-gallon jugs labeled HYDROFLUORIC ACID. Then, behind the couch was a barrel drum with MCU PROPERTY stenciled on the side. Harley was very familiar with that particular drum. It was what remained of Crane's fear toxin.
She put two and two together quickly—that Crane had been using drug addicts as test subjects and dumping the bodies, and the Joker had been helping him, which was entirely beyond her comprehension.
Thus far, the Joker remained silent, sprawled out in the corner of the couch, smoking lazily as he watched her react. Then Crane had the balls to scowl at him.
"What is she doing here?" he demanded, not looking at Harley, whose eyes widened indignantly.
"I dunno," the Joker shrugged, still watching her without a hint of an expression on his face. "You said it yourself, Jonny... she's relentless once she gets an idea in her head
It wasn't said spitefully, more of an observation, but Harley could only stare at him helplessly, bewildered, and once again, hurt.
She looked away, her jaw working as she tried to concentrate and compartmentalize.
"What are you doing here, Harleen?" Crane scowled. He got to his feet, setting an empty glass on the table beside a bottle of bourbon.
They had been drinking together, like friends.
Harley licked her lips, trying to understand, and failing. That wasn't good enough. She stepped into the loft and slammed the heavy steel door shut behind her, letting them know she wasn't going anywhere, and that they had some explaining to do.
"A friend of mine at the GCPD had some questions about hydrofluoric acid after he started finding body parts in the Narrows," she said coldly, moving further into the room. She noticed an air mattress and piles of clothes on the floor along with countless empty pizza boxes. They had been living there. Like roommates. "I had a look into who sells hydrofluoric acid, and shockingly enough, that led me here."
Crane scoffed. "You're here helping the GCPD?"
"I'm here because you two idiots didn't cover your tracks," Harley spat, more at the Joker to let him know she thought he was slipping. But he just gazed back at her impassively, as if her presence there meant nothing. "So?" she demanded, her voice cracking as she turned to Crane, her eyes sweeping over him quickly. He didn't look as sickly as she remembered him from Arkham. There was color in his cheeks, and his pale eyes were glinting dangerously, confidently. "What the hell are you doing here?"
Crane looked to the Joker for help, but he just shrugged, making Crane roll his eyes.
"In short, Blue Orchid is made from the same poppies as my fear toxin," he informed Harley hostily. "J helped me escape Arkham to find out where it came from before the Batman does."
Harley was so stunned by this quick succession of revelations—not in the least the familiar, almost privileged way Crane called the Joker 'J'—that she was momentarily speechless. She had never experienced the fear toxin first hand, but she had an academic understanding of its composition and effect on the brain. Suddenly, her experience at the Iceberg Lounge made all kinds of sense.
Also… of course this was about the Batman.
Of course it was. The Joker would never put this much effort into a project unless the flying rodent was involved.
As for Crane's break out... Harley did some quick mental math and judged it to have been a week after they got back to Gotham. That was the point when the Joker started pulling away from her. Apparently, because he'd been hiding this partnership with Crane, which was by far the most bewildering part of all of this.
"And did you find out who's made the drugs?" she demanded.
"We know he's a medical doctor, and well-funded," Crane said haughtily. "Perhaps a psychiatrist. But we don't have a name yet."
"What about the poppies?" She pressed them. "How are they getting into Gotham?"
"We're workin' on that too," the Joker drawled, his tongue sliding along his bottom lip. "We're looking for the big boss."
"The big boss?" Harley's eyes widened, remembering the man from the Iceberg Lounge the night before. The one whose face she couldn't remember because of the damn drugs. "Who is it?"
"Not Lucy, I'll tell ya that," the Joker growled, lighting a fresh cigarette.
Harley narrowed her eyes. "Is that why we went to the Iceberg Lounge? To check in on Lucy?"
He shrugged again, and Harley almost lost it. She braced both hands on her hips and turned away, breathing deeply to calm down. He was being an asshole on purpose, and that was fine. She was there for information, not consolation. She turned her head to the side, not looking at them.
"Why did you think it was Lucy?"
"We followed the money," Crane filled in smugly. "All roads lead to the Iceberg Lounge."
Harley thought about Fats and Alberto the night before, and Lucy's constant referrals to her 'boss.'
She turned around, shooting Crane a dirty look.
"Lucy has a very mysterious boss who she won't name," Harley announced, her voice sounding stronger than she felt. "He's the reason she was able to afford to turn the club around. Maybe a well-funded doctor with a penchant for psychopharmacology and access to the blue poppy is on his payroll too."
Crane slowly turned to look at the Joker, who once again shrugged, but this time he had a small smile on his mouth, silently taunting Crane about something.
Harley looked between them again, trying to understand why they would work together behind her back.
She caught the Joker's eye. "I need to talk to you."
His eyebrows rose, and he dropped the half-smoked cigarette in his glass, making it hiss and die in the dregs of liquor as he rose to his feet.
Harley shot Crane one last piercing glare that he returned venomously before she turned to leave, the Joker loping along behind her.
She hadn't seen Crane in almost two years, and if memory served, the last time she'd visited his cell at Arkham, he'd begged her to help him escape. She'd walked away, ignoring him as he screamed her name.
That pathetic show of desperation stuck with her, coloring her opinion of him along with the fact that he had been played a fool by a secret society of ninjas. Not to mention his rampant self-important arrogance. All of it screamed entitled ineptitude, something Harley didn't have the patience to entertain.
Despite all of that, she still respected his mind and his work. He'd inspired her when she was a student, his passion for the human mind mirroring her own, and she had genuinely enjoyed their conversations at Arkham. Crane always felt like a kindred spirit, before and after his incarceration. But then she met the Joker, which had been like having a spotlight shone on her painfully micro-managed life of pretending to be something she wasn't.
But now that she knew Crane was the reason for the Joker's absence, any fond feelings she might have had for him were out the window, leaving bitter disdain in their wake.
From Crane's sneering show of force, it was clear he still resented her for leaving him at Arkham. Perhaps dwelling on it, obsessing over it for years.
The loft's heavy door slammed closed with a metallic rattle and Harley turned to face the Joker. He stared back at her impassively, his jaw twitching. Harley chose to look at the door behind him, finding looking directly at him too upsetting.
"I spoke to Sly," she said, her mouth suddenly dry. "Someone was asking around about us after we left."
There was a long pause before he spoke. "That's not so strange."
"They know about Marty's house," Harley continued stiffly. "And they know about Lonnie."
The Joker took a sudden step toward her, but Harley refused to look at him, keeping her eyes trained on the steel door.
"Know what about Lonnie?" he demanded, his voice a low growl, but Harley shook her head.
"I don't know. Sly said he didn't tell them his name," she swallowed thickly. "But it sounds like they shook down everyone else. Dough Boy and Ralphie are dead because they didn't talk, so... don't trust anyone."
The Joker took another cautious step toward Harley, but she still refused to look at him. "What else?" he growled, correctly reading her apprehension.
"They asked about our..." Harley rolled her eyes toward him reluctantly, feeling dread pool in her stomach now that she was repeating this to him. "Relationship."
"Our... relationship?" his eyebrows rose as he turned his head to the side like he hadn't heard her right. The evasive shrugging performance he'd given in front of Crane was gone now.
Harley held his gaze, her throat feeling thick. "They asked him what it would take to get me to kill you."
The Joker laughed shortly, a sharp, incredulous bark that seemed to hang in the air between them. Then he ran a hand over his jaw and turned around to stare at the wall, his mind obviously working fast.
"I think I saw the big boss at the Iceberg Lounge last night," Harley continued, her voice strained. "In that fucking birdcage."
The Joker whirled around to face her. "You saw the big boss?"
"I was high, so I didn't see his face right," Harley explained weakly. "But I'm sure it was him. Lucy kept talking about him like he was... her savior or something. Whoever her boss is, I'm betting it's the same person paying your doctor with the blue poppies. The same person asking questions about us. Maybe they're the one who had Holiday kill Marty too."
The Joker hummed thoughtfully, his eyes narrowing as he nodded once.
"Alright," he met her eyes. "What're you gonna do?"
"I'll go back to the Iceberg Lounge," Harley sighed, feeling exhausted. "Dig around. See what I can find."
"Alright," he said again like he was giving her his blessing.
Harley took this as her cue to leave. She shot the Joker one last lingering look, needing to see him again. He was standing completely still, staring at her blankly, looking almost forlorn.
Almost.
When Harley got back to Samantha's apartment, she was wet, cold, tired, and depressed. She shed her clothes and took a quick shower, the storm outside still raging. Then she hid under Samantha's duvet, willing herself to sleep instead of obsessing over why the Joker would hide his project with Crane from her.
She slept fitfully, slipping in and out of sleep with strange dreams about the Joker and the Riddler and the big boss with no face, all of them dancing on the fringes of her brain like firebugs she would never be able to pin down. She stayed in bed well into the afternoon, wrestling with her declaration to go back to the Iceberg Lounge and dig around, an idea that made her feel vaguely sick compared to the much more desirable idea of kidnapping Lucy and torturing information out of her.
But Lucy was just a cog in the wheel. There was clearly much more at play, and taking her out of the game early could make things worse, not better.
Eventually, Harley got hungry enough to get out of bed and heat up another one of Samantha's batch-cooked meals from the freezer—tofu Thai green curry. She tried calling Pam, but her phone was off, so she settled for standing in front of Samantha's closet, numbly staring at the colorful frocks there and trying to make a plan. Any plan.
If she was going to socialize at the Iceberg Lounge for the sake of digging up information, she would need to look the part. Harley fingered her butchered hair, remembering a contemporary proverb about a hair cut making you feel like a new woman. A fresh start. It was wishy-washy thinking, but Harley was in the middle of the first break up she actually cared about, and she was willing to take some pedestrian advice on how to deal with it like a 'normal' woman.
The Flatiron Building in Midtown was built in the 80s at the tail end of the depression. It was a skyscraper designed to rival Wayne Tower, dominating Gotham's skyline with plate-glass chevrons and golden pyramids, a gaudy imitation of the art-deco style that characterized much of the city's architecture.
Vicki remembered reading that office space in the Flatiron was the most expensive in the city, outstripping all the other glass and chrome structures on Wall Street by a few hundred per square foot. Hill Consulting operated on the building's top floors, the most expensive of all.
She also remembered hearing that Carmine Falcone and his family used to live in the Flatiron's penthouse.
Walking into the lobby, with its pink marble floors, golden columns, and elaborate water features, Vicki felt like she'd been transported to another plane of existence. She rode a private elevator up to the fifty-third floor, watching the floors tick by as she reexamined her reasons for being there.
Harley Quinn had been speaking to Hamilton Hill's campaign manager. Vicki didn't know what that said about Hill or his campaign, and she didn't know what Harley wanted from them. Even if Vicki did know the answers to any of those questions, she didn't know what she could do about it. But her father used to say she was relentless once she got an idea in her head, and Vicki had not been able to stop thinking that maybe she could learn something from Hill. Something that could point to what Harley had planned for the city.
Arthur Reeves was waiting for her in reception, tall and blonde, clean-cut and all-American, and grinning like he'd won the lottery.
"Vicki Vale," he greeted her cheerfully, his eyebrows rising when he saw she was wearing white sneakers instead of heels with her tailored slacks.
"Mr Reeves," Vicki plastered on a fake smile as she offered him her hand.
She would have preferred to shove a microphone in his face and demand some answers.
"Hamilton's really looking forward to getting a chance to connect with your readers," Reeves smirked, gesturing for her to follow him down a carpeted hallway, past another gurgling water feature. "And thanks so much for signing that NDA we sent over. Standard procedure, I'm sure you understand," he shot her a brilliant white grin.
"Of course," Vicki agreed politely, remembering what Thomas Elliot said about Hill's iron-clad NDAs. She'd signed the NDA without showing it to the Globe's lawyers, judging its very existence to be enough reason not to write or publish the interview she was about to conduct.
"Can I get you some coffee, tea, water? Hey Karen," Reeves continued, as they passed a receptionist, Karen, looking eager to please.
"No, thank you," Vicki gave him another tight smile.
"Well, alright," Reeves beamed, knocking twice on an office door that read HAMILTON HILL, C.E.O. "Let's get right down to it!"
Hill's office was predictably extravagant, featuring more of the pink marble columns from the lobby, floor-to-ceiling views of the city. There was a fireplace flanked by overstuffed chairs, a small bar in the corner, and a massive mahogany desk that looked like it was trying to compensate for something. On the wall behind the desk was a golden mural, and after a few seconds of squinting at it, Vicki realized it depicted the tale of King Midas, a greek myth about a man who turned everything he touched to gold.
Hill stood up behind his desk, beaming as he opened his arms wide in a charismatic welcome, the golden mural glowing behind him. He was probably sixty, with a bushy gray mustache and leathery brown skin from too much time spent in tanning beds. It was immediately clear to Vicki that he was a bullshit artist of the highest caliber, with something wolfishly keen glinting in his watery eyes.
"Vicki Vale!" he greeted her boorishly, shaking Vicki's hand. "Welcome, welcome, take a seat! This is Circe," he gestured to a willowy blonde sitting in one of the two chairs facing his desk. "She's my publicist, but she won't let me get away with anything!"
"Hello," Vicki offered Circe her hand, taking note of her salmon-pink shift dress and the matching pillbox hat perched jauntily on her sleek blonde bob.
Circe beamed warmly at Vicki, squeezing her hand but not saying anything, making Vicki falter. Usually, this was the part where the publicist gave a spiel about what was and was not on the table for discussion, but Circe just continued to smile silently and serenely.
"Well, I'll let you guys get on with it," Reeves grinned, looking pleased with himself as he backed out of the office.
"Oh, Reeves, have Roman call me later so we can go over the, uh," Hill snapped his fingers twice. "Details of the fundraiser."
"You got it, boss," Reeves winked boyishly before making his escape.
Hill turned back to Vicki, who was watching everything unfold with a smile, though she wasn't sure how natural it looked when she was inwardly cringing.
"Ah, this is for you," Hill continued, selecting a sheet of paper and pushing it across his massive desk. "My donor list. Reeves thinks you'd be interested in finding out who's supporting us!"
Vicki stood up to pick up the list of names printed on expensively watermarked Hill Consulting paper, and saw that each name listed had a dollar sign with at least three zeros attached to it. She read over the list twice, picking out the names she recognized as those of Gotham's wealthiest citizens and business moguls. But there was one name that stood out, the sheer size of their donation far outstripping the generosity of the other donors: John Daggett, CEO of Daggett Industries.
"Thank you," Vicki said, folding the list in half and tucking it in her handbag before she placed a tape recorder on Hill's desk. "Do you mind if we jump right in?"
"Of course, of course!" Hill boomed, waving his arms for her to continue. "I'm an open book, Ms Vale."
"Why don't you tell me about your vision for Making Gotham Great Again," Vicki opened, watching Hill's eyes light up as he launched into his list of campaign promises. Vicki estimated most of them would benefit the people who lived and worked in that very building more than the average Gotham citizen, but she didn't derail him. She lobbed softball questions that were easy for him to spin, and she didn't raise any of the many obvious problems his prescriptions for the city presented. She let him have his moment.
"You've spoken a lot about your platform, and I understand that's your primary motivation for running," Vicki continued, her eyes drifting to Circe, who was staring dreamily at Hill, not blinking. "But aside from policy, what else inspired you to run for Mayor?"
"Aside from policy! Ah, you want the personal angle, don't you, Ms Vale," Hill huffed good-naturedly, and when Vicki only offered him a pinched smile, he sighed leisurely. "In the consulting business, you're only as good as the advice you give or the advice you take, and I get some excellent advice, Ms Vale."
"One of your consultants advised you to run?" Vicki's eyebrows raised.
"Oh, nothing like that," Hill waved her off, looking thoughtful before he laughed boorishly. "Aw, hell, let's get a little personal—it makes for some good color, don't you think?"
"Sure," Vicki agreed, offering him another pinched smile.
"I don't mind telling you I have some very fine people working for me, Ms Vale. Some of them are no doubt the brightest minds of their generation," he pitched forward, a performance of being candid. "And one of my top earners, he's someone I trust implicitly. In fact, in many ways, he's like a son to me— no offense to my actual son, of course!" he laughed heartily at his own joke. "I mean, this man is a real problem solver, a philosopher, a wise man. He's the real reason I'm running, Ms Vale. That man has the Midas touch, and when he advises me, I listen."
"Wow," Vicki's eyes widened, her interest immediately piqued. "What's this wise man's name?"
"Oh, I don't think so, Ms Vale," Hill wagged a finger at her like she was cheeky. "We keep things under wraps here. Our consultants don't like their names being flashed around in the press."
"Okay, how about for context," Vicki said slowly, trying to spin him. "You tell me one of his other achievements."
"Well, let's just say..." Hill rolled his eyes out to the side, a sneaky grin sliding onto his papery lips. "John Daggett would still be a millionaire and not a billionaire if it weren't for my boy."
Circe made an angry screeching sound that made Vicki jump as she swung around to stare at her, bewildered.
"Uh oh, Circe didn't like that!" Hill chuckled, while Circe smiled bashfully but still didn't say anything. "Uh, Ms Vale, you wouldn't mind striking what I just said about John from the record, would you?"
"Of course not," Vicki replied quickly. She glanced at Circe, feeling there was something very, very wrong with her. "You have editorial approval, after all," she lied.
The girl who cut Harley's hair had long, lilac waves falling half-way down her back like a mermaid, the salon's specialty, apparently. Harley immediately passed on the blue and red dip dye the stylist offered, but agreed to a let her bleach her hair a platinum blonde that was almost silver, and cut it 'mermaid style.' Whatever the fuck that was supposed to mean. It was an upgrade from the machete-hack job she was currently sporting.
"Your hair has such a great natural wave," the stylist gushed, making Harley roll her eyes impatiently.
Back at the safe house, she stood in front of Samantha's closet, feeling uninspired as she tried to decide what to wear. According to the Iceberg Lounge's website, it was 'disco night', so Harley settled on a strappy red silk dress with a low-cut top and a fluttery not-too-short skirt that seemed close enough. She applied shiny bronzer and red lip gloss, and with some dangly gold jewelry and clunky silver heels, Harley declared it good enough.
Thank God, Samantha left a full closet behind when she disappeared.
Harley called a taxi to pick her up and spent the short drive mulling over how to play Lucy. If her boss was interested in Harley and the Joker, the whole Janice Porter job—an absurd job to offer them—was likely just a ploy to get them in the club. If Lucy was under instructions to get close to Harley, then Harley would make it that much easier for her. That meant girl talk.
It was nearly midnight when the taxi arrived at the Iceberg Lounge, the line outside looping around the block twice. Harley told the bouncers she was Peaches Kane, correctly suspecting Lucy and her boss would put her on the guest list if they wanted her to come back.
The club still had its prohibition-era entrance, but instead of nostalgic ragtime tunes bellowing from behind the circular oak door, it was hyperactive synthesizers and tipsy high hats that evening.
Harley pushed open the circular door and looked around the club, her eyebrows rising at the swelling dance floor. It was packed with young bodies dressed in 70s-era glamour, dancing woozily to Donna Summer while a giant disco ball sparkled overhead.
Her eyes swept the room as she entered the crowd and elbowed her way through to the bar, where Ed was pouring out frothy pink drinks from a cocktail shaker, his shoulders rolling to the music, his silver eyeshadow glinting beneath the disco ball.
"Hi," she greeted Ed with a sly smile, leaning over the bar.
"Peaches! You're back!" Ed gasped, his eyes lighting up. "Oh my god, I love your hair," he gushed, throwing a hand over his heart.
"I needed a change," Harley shrugged, brushing her hair over her shoulder.
"Dry gin martini?" Ed offered smugly, already reaching for the gin and a fresh cocktail shaker.
"Do you remember everyone's drink?" Harley asked, making Ed giggle as he bent over the bar toward her, staring into her eyes.
"Only the ones that look like you," he admitted, a complacent smirk slipping onto his lips. "Ms Quinn," he added slyly, pushing her drink toward her.
Harley felt a smirk creep onto her lips too, enjoying Ed's gumption.
"Are you going to blow my cover?" she asked, sipping her martini.
"Now, where would the fun in that be?" Ed shot back coyly.
"Harley?"
Harley turned around to see Lucy standing behind her, dressed in an outrageously glamourous floor-length gown made of silver foil, her dark hair feathered around her face with a generous shellacking of hairspray.
"Hi Lucy," Harley smiled.
"I didn't think you'd come back," Lucy admitted, leaning close to shout in Harley's ear.
"I needed a night out," Harley explained, making Lucy's eyes widen.
"Oh, uh, great!" she faltered, forcing a grin. "Hey, lemme just grab these drinks and we can go talk."
"Great," Harley simpered, fighting back a smirk as she watched Lucy pretend she wasn't shocked to see her.
It wasn't that Lucy was a bad actress. Harley was just a better one, and she could see right through the attempt at friendliness. It made her wonder what else the big boss had instructed Lucy to do.
"Miss Lucy!" Ed chirped, pushing the fizzy pink drink toward her. "What belongs to you, but other people use it more than you?" He widened his eyes meaningfully at Harley before delivering the punchline with a flourish of his arm. "Your name!"
"Ed, your jokes are terrible!" Lucy crowed.
"I don't think that counts as a joke," Harley observed, allowing Lucy to take her hand and drag her over to the ridiculous birdcage.
Victor was once again standing guard, looking both bored and content as he bobbed his head along to the tisking high-hats. Harley met his eye briefly, remembering what Lucy had said about her boss having a talk with him.
That required closer inspection too.
Lucy flopped down on her preferred magenta couch, beaming as she reached for her cigarettes when Victor cleared his throat. They had some kind of silent argument before Lucy set her cigarettes aside in favor of a vape pen, which she sucked on happily as she watched Harley lower herself onto the couch beside her.
"You look amazing," Lucy informed her, exhaling a cloud of water vapor that smelled of blueberries.
"Thanks, I needed a change," Harley said again. She sighed sadly and sipped her martini, bracing herself for the girl talk.
Lucy frowned, looking concerned. "Everything okay?"
"Oh, you know how it is," Harley replied miserably. "My boyfriend's a terrorist and an asshole."
"Oh, right," Lucy faltered, bemused and maybe a little suspicious. "So you two are still having... problems?"
"I'm not the type to talk about my feelings, Lucy," Harley said drily, backing up a step so she wasn't laying it on too thick. "I just had to get out of the house."
"D'you mind if I ask what he did? I mean, I don't really expect an answer, but if you want to tell me, you can," Lucy plastered on an empathetic just-between-us-girls smile, one Harley had used to manipulate people before.
Touché, Lucy, she thought.
Harley chewed her bottom lip and stared down at her clunky silver shoes, the anger she felt earlier bubbling to the surface. Use it, she told herself.
"He lied to me," she said bitterly, the DJ changing the track in quite a timely fashion to Gloria Gaynor's 'I Will Survive'. And when she looked up at Lucy, she could see she was listening intently so she could faithfully report back to her boss later.
"You don't have to answer this," Lucy said apprehensively. "But he doesn't like... hurt you, does he?"
Harley's mouth twitched up on one side. "Do you think he'd still have his balls if he did?"
Lucy threw her head back and laughed. Then she grinned, shaking her head. "It's crazy thinkin' about the Joker this way."
"What way?" Harley asked, curious.
"You know... human," Lucy shrugged, taking a thoughtful drag off her Juul. "Like, how does that even work between you two? How do you guys have a relationship when you're both so... ya know, you."
There it was again—that interest in their relationship and how it worked. Harley decided to give Lucy an honest answer. A peek behind the curtain as she and her boss would see it.
"We're just like anyone else. We trust each other, we want the same things, we fight sometimes and then we have great makeup sex," Harley explained, feeling a pang of genuine sadness.
She must not have hidden it very well because Lucy made a compassionate sound and put a hand on Harley's arm.
"Hey, let's go dance!" she suggested, opening her clutch and pulling out her little vial of Blue Orchid. She scooped a small bump up and offered it to Harley, who shook her head.
"I didn't like the way it made me feel," she said frankly. "Like I wasn't myself."
"A lotta people like it for that reason," Lucy admitted, sniffing up the bump and closing her eyes as the high washed over her. When she opened her eyes, her pupils were dilated, and she offered Harley a dreamy smile. "I've always been jealous of how you you are, ya know? You never question yourself. You're totally comfortable being who you are, even if you are a horrible bitch."
Harley chuckled affectionately, appreciating the sentiment. She stood and grabbed Lucy's hand, pulling her to her feet and walking her out to the dance floor. They joined a group of socialites and stockbrokers there, all of them high as kites and swooning along to the music.
At some point, Mario joined them, offering Lucy bumps of BO off the back of his hand and watching over her lovingly. By all appearances, Lucy was in charge, but there was no doubt having a boyfriend with the last name Falcone gave her legitimacy.
Ed arrived at intervals with more drinks and 'jokes' that made Lucy and Mario howl with laughter while Harley squinted at him, trying to figure out his angle. The drinks kept flowing, but Harley slopped most of hers out of the glass and onto the floor, wanting to be sober as she spoke to VIPs, searching for information. None of it was especially revealing, and Lucy was rapidly getting too fucked to carry on a conversation.
Then finally, something interesting happened. Harley was getting Mario's sob story about how his father never believed in him like he did his sister —a wise judgment, in Harley's view. Then the crystal curtains covering the old kitchen doors parted, and Alberto jumped to his feet to greet a small contingent of men.
Harley's eyebrows rose as she watched Hamilton Hill arrive through the back entrance with an entourage in tow, including Arthur Reeves and Thomas Elliot.
Alberto and Hill immediately started talking with their heads together, Hill gesturing wildly and looking pleased with himself while Alberto nodded along. Reeves and Elliot were both visibly drunk despite Elliot supposedly being in recovery for alcoholism. It seemed he'd fallen off that particular wagon. When Ed put a tumbler of scotch in his hand, Eliott immediately downed it, rocking back on his heels as he spoke to Reeves, his face slack with booze.
Harley rose to her feet, leaving Mario and Lucy to coo at one another lovingly as she strode up to Reeves and tapped him on the shoulder. He turned around to face her, smirking as his eyes rolled over her. Not because he recognized her, but because a pretty woman had approached him. Poor Mrs Reeves, Harley thought, cocking her head to the side and staring at him, waiting for the pieces to click into place for him.
And when they finally did…
"Oh… my God," Reeves laughed incredulously, looking her over again. "God, you look amazing."
"Thanks," Harley said dismissively, her eyes darting to Elliot. "Hey, Tommy," she greeted him, receiving a sloppy wave in return.
Behind Elliot, Harley saw Lucy trying to sober up as she offered Hill a big beaming smile. She let him kiss her on both cheeks, then he laughed boorishly, wagging a finger in her face. They were obviously very familiar with each other.
"What are you doing here?" Reeves asked Harley, wide-eyed and drunk. "Did I say you look fucking amazing?"
"You mentioned it," Harley said drily, then let a nice, pretty smile slide onto her face as she sidled up to him, getting closer than she usually would. "What are you doing here?" she asked coyly.
Reeves stared down at her, transfixed like an animal trapped beneath a cobra's stare.
"Tommy donated to Hill's campaign," he explained distractedly, still staring at Harley as he gestured to Elliot, who was sniffing BO off the back of his phone before grabbing another drink off the tray Ed was offering around.
Ed caught Harley's eye, and they shared a look she wasn't sure how to quantify aside from... understanding.
"Hill looks friendly with Miss Lucy," Harley observed, nodding in Lucy's direction. She ran her hand down Reeves' arm, giving him her full attention. "Do you guys come here often?"
Reeves' mouth twitched into a crooked grin, taking the flirting in stride and letting it puff up his ego.
"You know, I was gonna ask you out again," he said smugly. "I've got a friend who's dying to meet you."
"Oh, really?" Harley raised an eyebrow, realizing this meant Reeves had been chatting about her. That wasn't good. Not at all. "Where's your friend tonight?"
"He's a busy guy," Reeves replied, his eyes following the low neckline of her dress to where it dipped between her small breasts.
Harley imagined snapping the stem off her martini glass and gouging out his eyes.
Once you realized how easy it was to pop an eyeball out, it was something you thought about—a lot.
She smiled softly instead. "And why does your friend want to meet me?"
"Because you're amazing," Reeves laughed, making a face like it was obvious.
"So you're pimping me out for autographs now, is that it?" Harley asked, narrowing her eyes.
Reeves licked his lips, getting nervous as he glanced back at Elliot to make sure he wasn't listening.
"It's not just you," he leaned toward her, his breath stinking of whiskey. "He wants to meet Mr J too."
Harley ground her teeth, suspicion roiling inside her like a cyclone.
"Why?" she demanded.
"He has a job for you," Reeves replied obediently, his eyes wide.
"What kind of job would a friend of yours have for us?" Harley scoffed.
"He's one of the top consultants at Hill's firm," Reeves scrambled to explain. "Sometimes the top tier stuff needs a um... out of house touch if you know what I mean."
"Are you serious?" Harley laughed at the sheer stupidity of what he was suggesting. "You have a friend who wants us to 'freelance' for a Wall Street consulting firm? Does your friend have a death wish, Reeves? Do you?"
"Listen, if the money's good enough, they'll take on any client," Reeves rushed to explain. He glanced at Hill, who was still talking animatedly with Alberto and Lucy. "Authoritarian regimes, warlords, terrorist states, anything so long as the money's right. Roman spent most of last year in China and Saudi Arabia."
Harley frowned, turning this information over in her head. She took a quick look at Hill and remembered his espousing of capitalism at the Tobacconist's Club. There was something disgustingly dishonest about packaging villainous work in a suit and tie and giving it an office on Wall Street when it was no less bloody than the work of mercenaries.
It was exactly like the mysterious boss who'd managed to make the city look clean even though organized crime was running as fluidly as ever.
It seemed Hamilton Hill, prospective Mayor of Gotham, deserved more of Harley's attention than she'd realized. And with Reeves as his loyal lapdog, that meant there was reason to be suspicious about him too.
Harley ground her teeth as she eyeballed Reeves, wondering if this slimy country club fucker had managed to mislead her…
Perhaps his Wall Street friend would be able to offer some insight.
"Roman?" Harley asked warily.
"Roman Sionis," Reeves confirmed. "I went to prep school with him. Just meet him, see what he has to say, okay?"
Harley narrowed her eyes, thinking back over her short friendship with Reeves and the many ways it could be a setup. Even if it wasn't and Hill was clean, it was clear he hadn't taken her threat of a painful death seriously, a very silly mistake on his part.
"Set it up," she agreed coldly, deciding she needed more information before she could make a call.
"Have I said how fucking beautiful you are?" Reeves grinned, but Harley just made a face and walked away, not bothering to say goodbye to Lucy or anyone else.
She ran into Ed on her way out the front door.
"Leaving so soon?" he pouted, popping his hip as he balanced a tray of drinks. "We didn't even get a chance to practice our dance moves!"
"See you later, Ed," Harley replied drily.
"Bye, Harley," he smirked after her. "Stay sassy."
Harley hailed a cab, which dropped her off outside Samantha's apartment building, and as she climbed the stairs, she turned over the idea that Hamilton Hill could be the big boss. Was it possible that by running for Mayor, he was tying it all up with a nice little bow? Putting himself in charge of Gotham legitimately, democratically, when he already ran things from behind the scenes?
When she reached the safe house's front door, she stopped short, her face darkening as she realized the television and a light were on inside.
But she could do with a fight.
Harley unlocked the front door with her key, bracing herself before she kicked it open, almost praying someone would attack her.
But there were no gunshots, just the sound of Hamilton Hill's voice campaigning from the television in the living room and cigarette smoke hanging heavy in the air.
The Joker was hovering near the window, smoking as he always was while Crane sat in an armchair in front of the TV, glaring at her as he always was.
"By all means," Harley sneered, throwing the door shut behind her. "Make yourselves at home."
Crane was left to his own devices at the warehouse all day, most of which was spent sulking over his lack of independence while he stared at a whiteboard covered in formulas written in his untidy scrawl. There was only one conclusion to be drawn from his recent work—it was impossible to synthesize a new fear compound from Blue Orchid. He needed the big boss's poppy supplier, and he needed them soon.
The Joker returned sometime after midnight, stinking of cigarettes after another day attempting to bleed information out of his traitorous henchmen. This strategy had officially reached its limit if the foul mood he was in was any indication.
It wasn't just the 'sniffing around' Gotham's underbelly that had reached a dead-end—their search for the big boss via Blue Orchid had hit a wall too, and Crane wasn't sure where that left him.
"Saddle up, Jonny," the Joker announced gruffly. He snatched a pack of Marlboro Reds from a carton on the makeshift coffee table, then turned and loped back out into the hall, Crane reluctantly following with his teeth gritted.
"Where are we going?" Crane demanded once they were in the station wagon. He was behind the wheel and the Joker was slumped in the passenger seat, a long flame leaping from a silver-plated zippo. It looked like he'd recently topped up with lighter fluid. Finally. Watching him fight with the stupid thing had been driving Crane mad all week.
"Otisberg," the Joker muttered, raking his hair off his face as he exhaled a stream of acrid-smelling smoke.
"What's in Otisburg?" Crane asked warily.
"Harley is," the Joker shot back without hesitating.
"You agreed to leave her out of this," Crane spat, to which the Joker just scoffed impatiently.
"Harley is at the Iceberg Lounge tonight," he explained in a sinister sing-song. "Ya think maybe she might hear something helpful there? Huh?"
Crane's shoulders tensed, his mouth hardening into a thin line as he reluctantly accepted that the Joker was right again.
He'd already accepted he wouldn't be able to avoid Harleen anymore, and he'd decided it would be poetic to use her to track down the big boss and his poppy supplier. Then when she was no longer useful to him, Crane would make sure she was locked up in Arkham, forced to engage in socialization at her old mentor Joan Leland's behest.
But first, he needed to find the big boss.
The Joker seemed to take Crane's silence as acquiescence. He slouched down in his seat, turning his attention to the glovebox, which he stared at like he was trying to see through it. The silence stretched on for the entirety of the drive, right up until they reached the exit for Otsiberg.
"I've been thinking," Crane mused as he pulled off the freeway. "All of this secrecy is odd for Gotham. This city traditionally takes pride in how out in the open its corruption is."
The Joker didn't say anything.
"Why does the big boss hide behind a veneer of legality?" Crane continued, mostly talking to himself. "He's well-funded, so why go to the trouble to hide when he could simply pay off the people who get in his way."
Again, the Joker didn't respond.
"Perhaps there's a phobia or some other pathology," Crane frowned at the dark road ahead. "Something that could be used against them."
The Joker snorted derisively. "You ever heard of projection, Jonny?"
Crane bristled, indignant that the Joker would use the language of psychology to insult him.
"I'm willin' to bet you got teased as a kid, didn't ya, Jonny," the Joker spat, still staring at the dashboard. "Bet they called ya scarecrow for being such a scrawny little pipsqueak, huh? So you reclaimed it. You turned it around."
Crane ground his teeth, knowing if he reacted, it would only get worse.
"I'm thinkin' it was rough at school, maybe it was rough at home too, huh? Mean daddy get his belt out? Was he like, a macho man disappointed in his skinny dandy boy kid? Or was it mommy, needing you to be the big man when you couldn't even look after yourself?"
Crane's hands tightened on the steering wheel, clenching his jaw until it began to ache. Ignore him, he told himself. Just like you used to ignore them.
"See, that's the difference between you and Harley, Crane," the Joker sneered, switching from condescending to outright hostile, almost angry. "She didn't have parents to treat her like shit. She grew up on her own, lookin' out for herself. Came home to find daddy dead on the couch with a needle in his arm when she was a sweet little six-year-old. But she didn't let that turn her into a nervous wreck. Oh no, she picked herself right up and went back to school the next day."
"Because she's a psychopath who doesn't feel empathy or love," Crane bit back, but the Joker just chuckled indulgently.
"Labels, Crane. Who needs em'," he drawled, a nasty smile sneaking onto his lips. "And that's the real difference between you. Harley is strong, and you... you're fuckin' weak, Crane."
The accusation hung in the air, belittling and cruel. But the Joker wasn't done.
"And that's why you hate her," he continued blithely. "Because she made you think you were worth her time when you never were. That's why she left you in Arkham, cause she didn't give a shit about you, and it eats you up that you thought someone like her looked up to someone like you, only for her to drop ya like a hot potato when she got what she wanted, making you realize just how weak you are."
"Stop it," Crane snapped roughly.
"I won't even get into the fact that Harley could kick your ass til' there's nothin' left of you," the Joker added hotly. "Cause you're still just a scrawny little pipsqueak under all that brainy bullshit. If I were you, Crane, I wouldn't get on her bad side. You got no idea what she's capable of. Turn left here."
Shaken and blinking rapidly, Crane followed the Joker's grunted directions until they arrived at an apartment complex in the nice, middle-class part of Otisberg. He parked on the street, reluctant to get out on this well-manicured street looking scruffy and unwashed, his hair too long and beard growing back, his clothes too big. But his only other option was sitting in the car, waiting impotently. So Crane got out and followed the Joker into the building, glowering at his back in silence.
They stopped outside a unit on the second floor, and the Joker produced a set of keys from his pocket. Crane watched warily as he let them into the apartment and flicked on the lights, both of them standing out starkly against the pretty decor. The apartment had a distinctly lived-in feel, and it even smelled feminine, like hairspray or shampoo. Crane realized it must have been one of their safe houses, an idea that inspired an awful flare of jealousy in him. That these two psychopaths had a nice apartment to call home while he'd been sleeping on the floor of an old warehouse he was too scared to leave alone.
Acting as if he was utterly indifferent to Crane's presence, the Joker kicked off his shoes and strode into the living room, grabbing the remote off the couch and turning on the television. He flipped through channels until he found GCN where Hamilton Hill, the candidate for Mayor, was being interviewed by Mike Engel, enthusiastically describing his plans for the city.
The Joker fell on the couch, his eyes trained on Hill's interview as he ran his tongue along the seams of the scars inside his mouth, ignoring Crane.
Still feeling sick with contempt, Crane lowered himself into an armchair and pushed his hair off his clammy forehead. He tried to focus on the news, staring at the screen without blinking as Hill discussed the economy and his plans to increase building permits and subsidies. That meant decreasing funding for programs like soup kitchens and free clinics and shelters for homeless youths, but with a paycheck in their pockets, the people who needed those programs would be free to work and run their own lives. All of this, Hill said, would Make Gotham Great Again.
Engel didn't look overly impressed, but when Hill offered him a red cap with his slogan abbreviated on it—MGGA—he wore it anyway, looking uneasy.
The Joker got up abruptly and walked to the window adjacent to the front door, which looked out on the street where they'd parked. He lit a cigarette but didn't open the window, instead opting to turn off the hallway light as he smoked and peered out at the street from behind the curtain.
Crane slumped down in the armchair, using the opportunity of the Joker not looking to scrub his hands over his face.
A key scratched in the lock, and Crane looked up in time to see the door fly open as Harleen stepped over the threshold, her eyes blazing.
"By all means," she sneered, throwing the door shut behind her. "Make yourselves at home."
One of Crane's eyebrows arched at the sight of her. She looked nothing like the ambitious, professional academic who kept her hair pulled back in a tight bun, and nothing like the drowned rat who'd shown up at the warehouse only the night before. Her hair was now a glamorous silvery blonde, falling in soft waves around her shoulders, and she wore a red silk dress that showed off long legs and a slender, gracefully curved physique. After years of only seeing her in baggy slacks and shirts buttoned up to her throat, it was bizarre to discover that she was so… female beneath it.
"What the hell are you doing here?" Harleen demanded, striding into the kitchen and throwing her bag on the counter. She grabbed a bottle of red wine and stepped out of her silver heels, kicking them away.
The Joker rolled his shoulders back and took a deep breath like he was preparing himself for something stressful. He dropped the butt of his cigarette on the hardwood floor and crushed it with his socked heel, then strolled into the kitchen, leaning against the fridge to watch Harleen pour a glass of wine and take a few indulgent swallows before she turned her ferocious glare on him.
Crane watched them interact, finding the tension between them immensely compelling.
"Well?" she spat impatiently, bracing her hip against the counter.
"Calm down, cupcake," the Joker sneered, his tongue snaking out to swipe over his bottom lip. "We're just checking in."
"Just checking in?" Harleen seethed.
"It seems your drug-addled minions don't have any further information to be useful to us," Crane drawled, shooting the Joker a withering look.
"Minions?" Harleen's eyes widened as understanding crept into her expression. "That's why you were with those idiots at Marty's?" Her cheeks turned pink, and she looked on the verge of launching into a tirade.
"Harleen," Crane interjected flatly, drawing her irate stare. "I believe it is time for us to set our differences aside and collaborate."
"Collaborate?" Harleen swiveled around to face Crane squarely. "Are you fucking kidding me, Jonathan?"
"I take it you didn't learn anything at the Iceberg Lounge tonight?" he shot back coldly.
"No," she snapped, glancing at the TV where Hill was still making his pitch to Mike Engal. "But he was there." Her eyes darted to the Joker. "And he was awfully cozy with Lucy and Alberto."
The Joker looked between Harleen and the television a few times, his brow furrowing.
"That guy?" he grunted, unconvinced.
"He's a Wall Street prick," Harleen explained, suddenly sounding uneasy instead of angry. "I've been meeting with his campaign manager, Arthur Reeves."
"I wasn't aware you had political aspirations, Harleen," Crane observed drily, his lips twitching into a small, mean smile. "Then again… I didn't see clown terrorist on the cards either."
"Go fuck yourself, Jonathan," Harleen snapped brusquely, turning back to the Joker. "Reeves says Hill's consulting firm works with terrorists and dictators, but they do it all legally. So they make it look clean even though it's as dirty as you can get." She raised her eyebrows knowingly. "Who does that sound like?"
The Joker narrowed his eyes to squint at her. "You think… Hill's the big boss?"
"Maybe," Harleen sighed, exasperated. "I don't know. When I met him, I just thought he was a rich asshole, but… maybe."
"Maybe, huh?" the Joker scoffed, looking unimpressed.
"There's more," Harleen glared at him. "Reeves says one of the consultants at Hill's firm wants to meet with us about a job."
"Fascinating how in demand you both are at the moment," Crane pointed out drolly.
"Reeves," the Joker sneered, ignoring Crane. "That'd be the fellah you were out with the other night?"
"Yes," Harleen's eyes narrowed like she thought he was accusing her of something.
"Mm-hm," the Joker ran his tongue over his teeth, glowering at her. "But you didn't suspect his boss till' tonight, right?"
"What are you getting at, J?" Harleen snapped, looking flustered.
"How about while you've been sippin' cocktails with your good pal Reeves, he's been keeping tabs on you for the big boss," the Joker growled quietly. "Ya think about that?"
Harleen's lips parted in surprise. She looked hurt—as if the accusation that she'd been outmaneuvered was the worst the Joker could lob at her. She swallowed thickly and squared her shoulders, recalibrating.
"If Hill is the big boss and Reeves is a plant, we need to meet this Sionis guy and figure out his angle," she said hotly. "Now get the fuck out, I need to sleep."
"No can do," the Joker shot back snidely, waving an arm at the front door. "You've got a tail. They're followin' you, and they're gonna be out there waiting to see what kinda move you make. Including who comes in and out of this place."
Harleen groaned miserably and threw her arms up over her head, her hands sinking into her platinum hair as she buried her face in her arms.
"Fine," she said raggedly, her arms falling by her sides.
She shot the Joker another withering look before she stomped out of the kitchen, heading for a door down the hall.
To Crane's surprise, the Joker loped after her, grabbing her wrist just as she threw her bedroom door open. She turned around to glare up at him and tried to wrench her arm away, but he didn't let her go. Then the Joker said something quietly, something Crane couldn't hear across the room.
"Improvise!" she snapped, shaking him off before she slammed the door in his face.
The Joker stood there, staring at the closed door while Crane watched, fascinated. Then he spun around and stomped down the hallway to the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind him, the shower squealing on a few moments later.
Crane sighed happily, relishing the Joker being taken down a few pegs by Harleen. Relishing the fact that the only person the Joker seemed to care about was rejecting him. Crane turned off the television and laid down on the couch with a pillow embroidered with 'Its Happy Hour Somewhere' under his head, smiling as he drifted off to sleep.
Vicki spent the evening researching until long after her colleagues had gone home and the cleaners came to vacuum. Sequestered in her office, she listened back to her interview with Hill and went over his donor list with a fine-tooth comb, searching for clues as to explain his connection to Harley Quinn.
But Vicki's questions about Harley were bleeding into new questions her interview with Hill raised. Circe the publicist, who didn't speak and hardly blinked. Who was she, and more importantly, what was wrong with her? Then there was Hill's 'top earner', the one he thought of as a son who advised him to run for Mayor and turned John Daggett into a billionaire. Who was this influential and mysterious person? And why was John Daggett so invested in getting Hill elected Mayor?
All of it set off Vicki's sense for a story like a goddamn fire alarm before you even added Harley Quinn to the pot.
There was a notable lack of information about Hill Consulting available online—an intentional lack of information, no doubt—. Luckily, the Globe kept sixty-plus years of print clippings on file.
It was well past midnight when Vicki let herself into the archives, even though technically she wasn't supposed to be there without an archivist present. After trolling through three years of "Hill Consulting" mentions in the business pages, she came across a syndicated article by Lois Lane from the Metropolis Daily Planet. It was an expose alleging Hill's firm encouraged authoritarianism in their work with dictators across the planet. Vicki's mouth nearly fell open as she read Lane's reporting, which was full of anonymous sourcing, but so detailed, any sane person could see it was true. But for some reason, the Daily Planet had been forced to retract the article and take it down, and it only existed in print clippings now.
Vicki hunted down Lois Lane's contact information and tapped out a quick email on her phone. Then she sat back in her chair, her eyebrows knitting together as she considered the possibility that Harley was going to expose Hill Consulting as the evil, cozy-with-dictators monsters they were. Just like the Joker had exposed Crowne and Kane and Dumas for their misdeeds during the Thanksgiving Riots.
But it didn't feel like the right answer.
So she turned to Daggett Industries, finding plenty of information to suggest Daggett was no more or less transparent than any other major corporation. Five years earlier, the company went public after a period of booming growth, turning John Daggett into a billionaire overnight and making Daggett Industries one of the most powerful corporations in the world. An interview with Forbes—in which the writer described Daggett as "unpretentious and aggressively frank"—suggested their profit margins were a result of more lucrative defense contracts with the military, which itself suggested some kind of external consulting was at play.
Vicki inferred this meant Hill's wunderkind consultant was behind all of it.
Her eyes started to sting as the hours dragged on, her belief that there was a story begging to be told helping her push through. Then she found it—a black and white photo from five years earlier. Daggett was shaking hands with a striking-looking man with high cheekbones and large, deep-set eyes. They were surrounded by clapping shareholders, celebrating Daggett Industries going public with luminously-valued shares, turning Daggett personally into a billionaire.
Vicki squinted at the photo on the archive screen, zooming in on the caption beneath it, which read: John Daggett, CEO, Daggett Industries. Roman Sionis, Senior Manager, Hill Consulting.
Roman. Vicki sat back and chewed on her bottom lip. She was sure she'd heard that unusual name before. Had Hill said it? Had Arthur Reeves? Had Bruce?
Then her phone started to ring, making Vicki jump after sitting in silence for so long. She frowned at the screen, seeing it was an out of state number.
"Hello?" she answered warily.
"Hi, is that Vicki Vale?" A warm but authoritative voice asked. "At the Gotham Globe?"
"Yes," Vicki confirmed, sitting up straight.
"This is Lois Lane from the Metropolis Daily Planet. I hope I'm not waking you up…"
"Oh, that's okay, I'm working," Vicki scrabbled for a pen and paper to make notes.
"I figured if you're anything like me, you might be up," Lane said drily. "I know this story kept me awake at night."
"It's pretty shocking," Vicki agreed eagerly. "But what happened? Why was it retracted?"
"That's why I'm calling, Ms Vale," Lane sighed, sounding frustrated. "To advise that you be very careful with this story."
"Be careful?" Vicki's eyes widened.
"Hill sued me for libel as soon as we went to print," Lane explained bitterly. "I had shittons of deep background, and thirty anonymous sources, all of whom were too terrified to come forward even without those iron-clad NDAs they make everyone sign. My editor stood by me, but we went through six months of litigation, during which I wasn't even allowed to write. In the end, we settled, but it got nasty and personal, Ms Vale."
"Shit," Vicki ran a hand over her hair. "That sounds incredibly aggressive."
"Oh, it was," Lane agreed. "They wanted to make an example out of me. I know Hill's running for Mayor down in Gotham, and people deserve to know the truth about him but… you need to watch your back on this one, Ms Vale. I've met other reporters who've investigated Hill and ended up in worse positions than I did."
"I'm not actually investigating him," Vicki admitted. "I'm interviewing him for the Globe Magazine."
"He's a dick," Lane scoffed. "But he's nothing compared to some of the men who work for him."
Vicki eyed the picture of Daggett and Sionis shaking hands, her mind racing.
"Ms Lane... did you ever come across Roman Sionis when you were investigating Hill?"
"Oh, yes," Lane replied darkly. "He's one of the worst ones there. He has a lot of friends in Riyadh and Beijing if you know what I mean. One of my sources described him as Hill's golden boy, and in my book that puts him in American Psycho territory."
"Do you know if he was the consultant for Daggett Industries on those defense contracts?" Vicki asked, zooming in on Roman Sionis's face.
"I don't know anything about Daggett," Lane admitted. "I just know these assholes need to go down, but it won't be easy."
"Thank you for letting me know, Lois," Vicki sighed. "But I don't think I can ignore this."
"Be careful, Vicki," Lois warned her. "These people are capable of anything."
A/N: A little Lois Lane cameo there ;)
So now we've reached this divergent place as we begin the second act where Vicki knows more than Harley— you guys know WAY more than Harley and there are like a million threads to pull together.
Hill's firm is inspired by the McKinsey Institute but obviously dramatized. FFN won't let me link to the NY Times article about them but it's worth a read.
PSA 1 - I gave the Harlequin a minor faced lift for adverbs, run-on sentences, and I gave the smut a little more pizzazz too. Nothing's fundamentally changed except for the hotel scene in Chapter 31 when they're waiting for Vicki. I expanded it and added some character development. It's about three-quarters of the way down the page and starts with "is this the uh, making it up to me?" Lol.
PSA 2 - Somehow, i've ended up writing a smutty one-shot AU in which Harley & J have a one night stand when she's a student, LOL. You can thank those of you on Tumblr for that- and PS: I encourage any of you to join us over there, it's been fun lately. Anyway, I'm aiming to post this one shot, "The Devil in Miss Quinzel" Wednesday or Thursday. Unless it sucks, obviously. You can read the original drabble on my tumblr (knit-wear-it) but because FFN is lame I can't link to it.
Next: Harley and the Joker meet Roman about a job, and Vicki continues to investigate Hamilton Hill. and Daggett Industries.
Please please review! xo