Title: Dreams 2/3
Rating: T (language)
Fandom: Gotham
Pairing: Bruce/Selina
Warning/Disclaimer: I do NOT own Gotham and this is Unbetaed.
Selina
Selina stared across the chair at the top of Bruce's bent head, the moon having turned his dark locks black. They were each perched on an arm of the too deep chair now, having immediately recognized their need for space when Bruce had nearly elbowed her in the collarbone on his second attempt at recreating the knot she had shown him. Bruce had been hesitant at first, his blue-blood manners balking at the idea but she had easily convinced him of the merits so with their feet on the seat cushion and the knees of her grey sweatpants brushing his dark trousers, they faced each other.
The usually thick vines were too thin and too far to cast any significant shadows, but despite the fair skies the wind continued to howl every once and a while, shaking the panes of glass and making the house groan in return. The room felt like it had dropped several degrees since they had been sitting in the dark, and if it weren't for Bruce beside her she was sure she would have already been shivering. He was like a walking furnace, and his warmth just leaked into her.
Sitting here, his fingers looping a length of rope around her wrists should have frightened her, but that instinct that always steered her right was dormant drowned out by something else. Something she didn't think she was quite ready to understand.
She watched as he made another loop, his dark brows knit as he concentrated on the rope in his hand. It had been her idea to teach him, her idea to be his test dummy. He'd been reluctant at first, whether it was at the idea of binding her wrists or touching her at all she wasn't sure. Bruce was weird like that. She either new exactly what he was thinking or she didn't have the slightest clue. Frustratingly, the latter was become more and more frequent.
She watched his bottom lip as he became absorbed with his task; his movements were slow and gentle as his entire world minimized to her vein covered wrists and a bit of rope the width of her pinky.
The rope around her wrists was so loose she worried he wouldn't be able to tie it right and almost pulled her hands away ready to tell him to forget the whole thing when she felt his fingertips brush the tender skin along her wrist.
Unable to stop her reaction, she gasped but quickly cleared her throat to cover up the tiny but traitorous sound. She watched him but besides an almost imperceptible curl of his lip, if Bruce had noticed anything he didn't respond.
His eyes stayed on her wrists, his long lashes casting shadows against his pale cheeks. She hadn't been wrong about Bruce and moonlight. It cast off his hair and made his sharp angles sharper; made him a study in contrasts: black and white, light and shadow. It suited him well. Maybe too well.
For now he was stuck in that teenage purgatory, not a child, but not a man either. But she could see it, she had been gifted with a thief's eye for pretty things, and Bruce Wayne had the potential to be devastating.
His touch light and experimental, she felt his thumb trace over the faded remnants of the bruise on her wrist again. It looked like nothing but an old scratch now, but she could already tell where the chain had dug in that it was going to leave scar.
Damn, she was tired of scars.
"When you," he cleared his throat as if he wasn't exactly sure how to proceed. "Before Alfred got rid of your jacket I checked the pockets for you… I couldn't find your bracelet. Did you lose it?"
Selina felt something in her stomach drop at his words. Of course he would notice it was missing. He noticed everything.
"Nah, umm," "I prolly just left it somewhere. Why you asking?"
He shrugged a shoulder, his thumb resting lightly on her pulse point. "I thought you might like a new charm," he suggested.
"I have enough charms, B," she answered, "That thing weighs a ton as it is."
He shrugged his shoulders, his attention returning to the length of rope in his hands. It was obvious that the warm feel of his fingers brushing the soft skin on her wrist didn't seem to be having the same effect on him as it was having on her. Outside of that first tick in his cheek, he hadn't seemed to even notice their proximity.
She had been so absorbed, watching the angle of his cheek, the flutter of his long lashes against his brow bone. She hadn't noticed he was finished until he called her name.
Having been caught, she felt heat crawling up her neck as she looked down at her now falsely bound hands.
"What," she barked, her voice coming out much harsher than she'd meant.
He ignored the tone of her voice, gesturing to his finished work, "Is that right?"
Suddenly she could feel the tail of the rope sitting in the palm of her hand and she blinked at the discovery. Bruce had actually finished. While she'd been getting lost in useless observations, he'd been working.
"Let's see," she answered, and using her teeth she bit and pulled the small left over rope and almost like magic the rope unfurled. "Good job," she said wryly, and she watched as his mouth tilted up at his accomplishment.
"Okay, my turn," she declared.
It quickly became very apparent to Selina that sailing knots and restraining knots were two very different things. She felt her cheeks beginning to burn as she made her fifth attempt at trying to tie it right. Bruce had explained to her the mechanics of the old sailing knot and whether it was due to his drawn-out explanation or her loss of dexterity she had still failed to loop the rope correctly.
As if he could sense her frustration Bruce's voice was unnaturally soft, "It's a really hard knot," he explained, giving her that patient little half-smile of his that never failed to either charm her or make her sneer. Fortunately, whatever disturbing feeling that sitting so close to B had unsettled inside her earlier that night had quickly disappeared as Selina began trying to tie the knot. Again.
She exhaled a little too sharply and felt her eyes narrow as she looked up at him. She wanted to throw the rope to the ground, to tell him to forget it. Really, when was she ever going to go sailing? She fucking hated the water.
"This is stupid," she groaned.
Slowly, as if not to scare her, he reached across the small space between them and she could feel the calluses on his fingertips as he adjusted her fingers along the loop she'd made. "Try again."
She ignored the patience in his voice and fought the urge to roll her eyes. She would try again, but only to humor him.
Even injured she knew she was quicker than Bruce and before he could draw back, Selina had dropped the rope and had both of his hands in hers.
When he looked at her, his confusion was apparent in his drawn eyebrows. But she ignored him using one hand to hold both of his against her thighs as she retrieved the rope and disentangled it. Comprehending her intention, his hands merely flinched in her lap but to his credit he didn't try and remove them.
"It's a hitch knot, Selina," he said, as she lifted his hands to wrap the rope around. "Don't you think that this is bit superfluous?"
"What like your vocabulary," she sniped back.
"I just don't understand why you can't just make the knot loosely like I showed you," he said, his shoulders rolling beneath his dark sweater.
"Like for like, B," she answered. "I let you practice on me. 's only fair."
She watched his knuckles go white as he folded his fingers together in her lap. "And since when do you concern yourself with what is and isn't fair?"
Selina clamped her jaw and resisted the need to tug the coughs of her sweater down as she concentrated on making the appropriate sized loop. The offhanded comment hit her harder than she liked. Bruce appreciated honesty no matter how horrible or even awkward it might be and because of that he could be careless with his observations. She tried not to take it too personally, she'd witnessed some of the harsh things he'd said to Alfred before and those weren't even comparable.
Refusing to look him in the eye, she focused on the rope in her fingers in the hands in her lap. Unlike her own scarred hands which had been made to thieve, to con, and to pick. Bruce's long fingers had been made for piano keys and white gloved balls. His square nails were always clean and clipped, blatant signs of his privileged upbringing. But studying them now, she could feel where he had started putting calluses on the tips from his training, could see the bruises on his knuckles where he'd forgotten to wrap his hands again before boxing, and could even see the little writing bump on his right ring finger probably put there from all those damn notes he was always taking. She inwardly sighed; if he wasn't more careful, soon his beautiful hands were gonna start looking a lot like her own.
"So where'd you learn to tie a knot like that?"
Bruce's voice almost startled her, but from the sound of it, she could tell that her silence had probably gone for too long and he was grasping at something to fill the space.
Swallowing, she breathed out a sigh as she wrapped the length of rope around both of his bony wrists. "This prozzie I used to know… Her and her sister, used to run this con on johns and she was always bragging about it."
"Used to know," he asked his voice soft and head tilting.
"Yeah, I'm not real sure what happened to them," she admitted, shrugging. "They just kinda… Disappeared ya know."
"That tends to happen a lot in the city," he murmured.
She could feel him studying her response and she was careful to keep her head still as she chanced a glance at him.
"Yeah, well," she added, her voice growing thick. "Last I heard they'd got stupid, and tried to screw over the wrong trick."
When he didn't respond, she looped the rope again and continued, "I heard it was one of Falcone's men, but coulda easily been one of Maroni's," she said unable to keep her voice as devoid as she wanted. "Doesn't really matter, they're all dicks."
"They just make people disappear," he said, his voice soft and edged at the same time.
"All the time," she said dryly.
"And the police-"
"Don't do shit," she snapped, bringing her head up to lock eyes with him.
"But Detective Gordon-"
"Bruce," she said, refusing to look away but softening her voice. "This whole city saw what happened last time he tried to take on a family. It didn't end well."
His eyebrows knit as he looked away and for one moment he looked despondent, before he looked back at her, "They really have that much power."
"You couldn't imagine B," she said, unable to keep the bitterness out of her voice.
He looked back down at his hands, his thumbs overlapping, one pushing against the other until the knuckle turned white and she felt a moment of regret for being so harsh with him. She wasn't sure why she'd just said that, or why she'd just offered him that information. There was just something about Bruce's innocence, his naivety that somehow both pushed and pulled her. There was a part of her that wanted to preserve him and a slim perverse part of her that, if only a little, wanted to corrupt him.
When he looked back up at her, his skin looked almost translucent in the pale light making his grey-eyes look almost black and he looked so young she knew the part of her that wanted to keep him safe would always win.
"Sorry," she sighed. "Sometimes I forget who I'm talking too."
He looked at her, determination in his eyes. "No," he said firmly. "I've been coddled long enough."
"B," she laughed, breaking the tension that had collected between them. "What's your definition of coddled 'cause I seen Alfred lay your skinny ass out like a carpet."
He looked moderately offended. "I'm getting better," he argued.
"Yeah," she agreed, her voice playfully patronizing. "You've gone almost a week without a new bruise," she said, reaching out and thumbing the ridge of his cheek. "You gotta learn to protect your left side better and stop letting the old man mess up this pretty face."
At her words, something in him quickly drew closed as his gaze lowered to his hands and she couldn't help but feel disappointment pooling in her chest. She wondered if it was the criticism on his technique or the fact that she'd had the audacity to call him pretty.
She watched his head tilt in confusion as he looked at his now bound hands, "This isn't a hitch knot," he scoffed.
Selina felt herself smiling at his tone. "I know," she drawled. "And I gotta say I'm a little disappointed it took you this long to notice."
Ignoring her words, he lifted his bound hands in her direction. "Untie me."
"You gotta learn to lighten up, B," she answered, making no move to unbind him. "Don't you know stress kills?"
He let out a breath through his nose. "Untie me," he ordered, through gritted teeth.
"Nah," she answered, "I don't think so."
He titled his head asking for an explanation.
"What?" she asked, reaching up to flick at his too perfect hair. "I kinda like ya this way. I could do whatever I want to you," she purred, resisting the urge to run her fingers through the surprisingly soft lock, "and you couldn't do a damn thing to stop me," she finished grazing his cheek with her short nails before playfully patting his cheek. He didn't flinch from her touch, but blinked as if he was trying to stop himself from falling asleep. He swallowed, but this close she could see his eyes darken.
She watched his bottom lip disappear behind his teeth and it was as if someone had dragged a finger down her spine. Taking a deep calming breath, she quickly determined that that was a very dangerous sensation. A little too dangerous. And with nothing but a smile or a glance, this twig of a boy had certainly not earned the right to be dangerous.
Especially, not to her.
She pulled her hand away, and tilted her head in a completely playful gesture, as she leaned forward, "Do you like being tied up?"
He stared back at her that line between his brows pronounced in his confusion. She saw the exact moment his brain had sussed out her meaning. His hooded eyes widened so quickly she thought he might try to jump away from her. "What?!" he exclaimed, with shock and a little disgust. "No!"
The absolute look of sheer terror and humiliation on his face made her laugh before she could stop herself. His head drawn back, his normally hooded eyes were so wide she could see the whites in them.
She clasped her stomach as she tilted her head back and the full moon was so bright overheard she could see the light behind her closed lids. Her amusement having eventually boiled down to a soundless chuckle she opened her eyes to find Bruce was glaring at her, the shock of her suggestion having warn off. She felt her cheeks begin to heat as he continued to study her thoughtfully. Barefoot, wild hair, and an oversized sweatshirt, she could only imagine the picture she made for him. Not that she cared how Bruce saw her that is.
For just a moment he was cast in shadow as a cloud moved quickly over the moon and when she could see him once more his gaze had slipped away moving past her shoulder to their only source of light. Suddenly, as if someone had snapped their fingers, he got 'that look' on his face, the one that told her something had just clicked on in his brain.
"The moon…" he said absently.
"Yeah, what about the moon?" she asked, glancing up hoping to see whatever it was that had made Bruce suddenly so thoughtful. "It's full, so what?"
"No," he answered, "It's waning tonight. It was full yesterday."
Selina felt her self snort. "Why in the hell do you know that?"
"Unimportant," he answered, stepping down from the chair. He walked the length of four tiles before he stopped. When he turned back toward her she could see he had the tip of his thumb wedged between his teeth. It wasn't such a nervous tell as a thoughtful one.
"Of course when I want you to talk I get one word sentences," she griped.
His eyes met hers. "Sorry, I just- I thought of something," he said, his voice slightly distant but apologetic as his eyes and his thoughts drifted away. His thumb was between his teeth again, a hard gesture to make when your hands were bound.
Sighing, she waved him over. "C'mere and gimme your hands before you hurt yourself," she ordered.
Absently, he held up his wrists to her, his gaze moving up to the ceiling, his skin almost glowing in the moonlight. "It's been almost a month," he said, as if he was thinking out-loud. "Since Alfred found you."
"Not quite," she corrected as she worked the knot free, "Way I remember it, I found you."
He looked back down at her, the side of his mouth tilted up. "Doubtful Alfred would see it that way," he said.
"You're prolly right," she said, watching him step away as she finished untying him. "Why you asking? Why's that important?"
"It's not," he said too quickly. "I was just thinking about something."
"You already said that," she said, not even trying to hide the suspicion in her voice.
"So I did," he admitted. "It's probably my brain working on too little sleep."
Selina felt her eyes narrow as she watched him. As long as she'd known Bruce, he had always been stubborn and unflinchingly proud and that statement, that statement was a very un-Bruce like thing to say.
"It's late," he observed. "We should probably go upstairs…"
"Yeah, I'm pretty tired too," she lied, pulling the cuffs of her sweatshirt over the tips of her fingers. She watched him, waiting to see that lip of his disappear, because she had a feeling that Bruce had no intention of going to bed.
His eyes moved from her now covered hands, to her bare feet, and back up to meet her gaze. "Do you need help getting to your room?" he asked.
"I got down here on my own didn't I," she replied.
Play nice, a tiny voice reminded her.
"Besides, what would Alfred say you bringing an un-chaperoned girl up to her room," she asked.
"I'm not sure either of us wants to imagine the things that Alfred might conjure up," he replied, offering her an uncharacteristic grin.
She ignored the things that that crooked grin did to her insides. "You coulda just said, 'I don't' know.'"
Despite common sense, she hopped up, pain instantly shooting up from her bad ankle. She tried to disguise the sudden ache, but from Bruce's expression she knew she had done a shit job.
"Still sore," he asked, his grin having disappeared.
"A little," she admitted.
The main house was warm, a lot warmer than the either the solarium or the kitchen had been and she guessed that Bruce had only the parts of the Manor that needed it heated, not because he couldn't afford it, but probably for some do-gooder reason. The two of them had been cast in and out of shadow as they had made their way through the big house, the halls were windowless and dark, only the random dimmed lamp giving off traces of light like ensconced torches in a creepy old castle.
Quickly, she sneaked a peek at the boy beside her. He hadn't offered her his arm, like he had that day in his study, but they had walked so close together that she could feel the brush of his elbow against her shoulder, the slight graze of his knuckles against her thick sweatshirt. The entire walk back to her room they talked about all the exercises Alfred had put her, and when he had broken his ankle Bruce, through from writing the alphabet with their toes to standing on one foot as they brushed their teeth. Even as he smiled at her less than generous observations on Alfred's training techniques, she got the distinct impression that his mind was elsewhere.
When they turned the corner into her hallway, for less than a heartbeat, she felt his fingers low on her back as if she hadn't walked that hall a hundred times. She couldn't tell if it was merely an absent or calculated gesture but either way for someone like Bruce it was pretty bold move.
It wasn't until she had actually reached her room, her hand on the door knob that Selina had started to feel some of that rolling in her belly again, the feeling that an elephant had taken up residence on her chest. She knew her fireplace would be lit, her day old sheets clean and the scene should be inviting, but she knew with a horrible certainty that it wouldn't. It was such a stupid feeling, but she still found herself lingering in the hall, reluctant to release him from his responsibilities of being a good host.
"Is everything okay?" he asked, when she still had failed to open the door.
His voice was so soft, so filled with concern her back immediately straightened, her head taking on a decidedly arrogant tilt. Taking an inaudible breath, she flung the door open, "Five by five," she answered.
"Okay, then," he replied, as if he could see past her posturing, but accepted that there was nothing he could do about it. He was still wearing that far-off look, certainly not dazed, but like his mind was putting things together, snapping jig-saw puzzles into place.
Whatever Bruce was thinking of it certainly had nothing to do with the present and the idea left her feeling weirdly frustrated. It was obvious he was keeping something from her, and she didn't mind, she couldn't fault him for his secrets. Hell, she had more than her fair share, but this seemed different.
The air felt heavy and despite what he wanted her to believe she knew Bruce was far from tired. She and Bruce had been so close this afternoon, closer than they had been in what seemed like forever and he didn't seem to have noticed at all, his overworked mind simply wandering off. She could feel it in the air around him; he'd carried it from downstairs, a nervous kind of energy. He seemed so distracted, she'd bet she could stand nose-to-nose with him and he wouldn't even notice. She wondered what he would do if she approached him. How he would react? Before she could think about her actions, Selina was already taking a half-step toward him.
To her utter shock, he didn't step away. He just looked down at her, his eyes lazily roaming her face. She didn't really mind looking up at Bruce. Despite his training he was still a long way from being physically intimidating and from this angle she could see the different shades of grey in his already complicated eyes.
She watched him take a deep and solid breath as if he was smelling a feast after having been starved for years. He had that same look the one he'd been wearing when he was sitting on the armchair in the solarium, like he'd been drugged.
His stubborn mouth parted as if something had just occurred to him and she felt like someone was squeezing something inside her chest, making the delicious flutter in her belly turn warm. It was supposed to be just a test, a way to see how he would react, so why was her stomach turning over itself. Why did she have the overwhelming urge to touch him? Really touch him.
She watched his Adam's apple bob as if he was being jostled out of a day dream and he nearly shook his head as he stepped away from her something oddly unreadable in his eyes.
"What?" she accused.
He blinked at her as if he was still in a daze. "Nothing," he said his voice hoarse. He cleared his throat. "Nothing," he repeated, but she could see his cheeks turning the most charming shade of red.
"Good night Selina," he said, his demeanor suddenly so foreign and formal that she was scared he might try to bow or something. The image made her stifle the sudden need to guffaw.
"Night, B," she said, trying to hide her grin as she watched him turn to leave.
It was only after she was in her pajamas, a throw blanket thrown over her shoulders and that old book open in her lap as she settled into the captain's chair by the fire, that Selina realized that for just a few hours she had completely forgotten about that night in the forest and the things she had done.
To be continued…
Author's Notes: Constructive Criticism always welcome. If you need someone to blame these 3 pieces on it was a definitely a combination of "I See the Light" and "Satisfied." I'm sorry for not having updated sooner. Honestly, the holidays got a little crazier than I thought. And I know that I had said that this chapter was going to be wrapped up in 2 parts but after some consideration I decided to give Barty his own third. Hope you guys don't mind.
I wanted to say thank you to Complicatedfanficbuisiness, sabsfan2, Adromedastrain, ByzinhaLestrange, Jethro25, Judy Snape, krsa, Fanwriter83, Claire-loves-music, Jinnx21, .3 I hope you guys got my answering PM. : )
Guest 10/6, Guest 10/6, Guest 10/6: thank you, I'm glad you're enjoying it and I will be revisiting Bruce's POV very soon. :D Guest 10/8: Awww, thank you so much. I hope you're still reading. : ) Guest 10/9: Thank you, and not to give too much away but Bruce will definitely be discovering all kinds of things very soon. AnnieC: 10/16: Thank you so much! Great call on catching the Falcone reference, I have some head cannons involved and depending on how well this story is received may explore them in-depth in the future. It's been a while since I read House of Leaves (I think my freshmen year) but yes that book is insane. Really trippy. And I had no idea that the author's sister was: Poe. I have them on multiple playlists.
Karina: hahaha I agree. Thanks for reading. : ) Guest 10/13: Wow, thank you so much. I completely understand quitting the show it definitely has its flaws, but I'm so glad you're enjoying my little tale for Bruce and Selina, I really hope these last two chapters didn't disappoint. Guest 11/15: Thank you so much! I'm working on it every chance I get. : ) Annie C: 12/24: Gosh, I know that was a long time between updates, thank you for hanging in there. : ) Thank you for all your kind words, dialogue is definitely one of the things that I worry about when writing (who am I kidding it's basically the entire text) so to know that someone is enjoying it really makes me smile. I'm so glad you're still enjoying it. Thank you for taking the time to read and review. Merry Christmas! yes, I know its about two weeks late. Guest 12/24: Thanks, I'm glad you like it. : ) Guest 12/25: I'm working on it and thank you so much, I love your enthusiasm. 3 Guest 12/26: Wow, seriously, thank you. I hope this new chapter didn't disappoint. Guest 12/30: Thanks, I hope you like this new one. : )
I'm sorry I know this is almost a page of Author's Notes but I wanted to make sure to reply to every review and answer every question. You guys deserve it! 3