Disclaimer: don't own….

Chloe arrived back at the office late. It was relatively empty. Most people avoided Gotham streets after dark. She unfortunately had no choice because she'd left her keys on her desk. She was mildly shocked however, to find Bruce Wayne sitting at her desk looking at her pictures. Judging by the frame in his hand, the picture was of Clark.

"Mr. Wayne, snooping around my desk?" Chloe said flirtatiously.

He looked at her with a grin, and then placed the picture back on her desk. "Boyfriend?" He asked.

"No. Just an old friend." Chloe told him as she walked closer to her desk.

"I'm glad to hear that, but it seems to me that you claim to have a lot of "old friends". Besides, I don't do well with competition. I have this thing about always getting what I want." Bruce told her easily. She smiled, not knowing what to think about that.

"Competition over me?" Chloe asked incredulously.

"Indeed." He inclined his head toward her.

"That's a first." Chloe said honestly.

"I refuse to believe that you haven't ever been the desire of two men at the same time. A beautiful, talented woman like you?" He stood up and walked over to her. Chloe had to look up at him, he was a tall man. "Impossible." He said with a smile. This one reached his eyes; a real smile. She couldn't help but grin back. She had guessed right; he was even hotter when his smile was genuine.

"Still too busy to have dinner with me?" He asked. Chloe was tempted to accept too, if not to just feel wanted again. It had been a tiring day. Oliver had thrown her and she needed a little distraction. She would not, however, sleep with him tonight she told herself.

"No. I think I can pencil you in." She said with a flirty smile.

Dinner with Bruce had been wonderful. He was a gentleman, but, at the same time not entirely. It was a look, or a smirk, or even the occasional innuendo that would let Chloe know that his intentions with her weren't entirely gentlemanly. It was refreshing to meet a man that was interested in her and not afraid to show it. Of course, this was Bruce Wayne, a well known playboy, that was pursuing her. She decided to proceed with utmost caution.

"Chloe, you said that you grew up with Lex Luthor. He's not exactly an ideal playmate, not to mention that he is considerably older than you." Bruce was fishing for information and not being shy about it.

"You know, I am a reporter. Therefore, I'm a firm believer in asking questions outright instead of dancing around them." Chloe told him.

"Fair enough," Bruce said with a smirk. "How well do you know him?"

"Well enough. I'm not sure that anyone really knows him, though. He hides too many secrets, even from people he claims to care about." Chloe was thinking of Lana. "I have to admire your tenacity in keeping him out of Gotham. His business ventures aren't usually entirely on the up and up."

"I'm particular about who does business in this city. My parents loved Gotham; it's my duty to save it." He confided and had no idea why, except that Chloe was easy to talk to.

"You're doing great things for the city: revitalizing and rebuilding, creating jobs. That's saving Gotham." Chloe reached over the table and grabbed his hand to give it a comforting squeeze. He turned his hand over and held onto hers when she would have tried to pull away. She looked up at him through her lashes and blushed a little.

"Thanks, Chloe," Bruce ran his thumb over her knuckles. "What made you leave Metropolis? I would've thought a job at the Daily Planet would have been ideal, and yet here you are."

Chloe looked down. Managing to get one of her hands out of Bruce's, she took a sip of her wine. "I outgrew it. You can only be in one place for so long before it becomes too easy to settle. I just knew, felt, that there was more to life than Metropolis."

"That's a very vague answer," Bruce saw through her attempt at dodging the question. The corner of his mouth quirked in amusement.

"You caught me. It was over a man. There it is: the ugly truth." Chloe told him with a smile.

Bruce pulled his hand away, finally freeing her. He leaned back in his chair. "There is more to that story, but it would be rude of me to ask."

"Thanks," Chloe took a bite of the cake she'd ordered for dessert. After Oliver's comments about her being too skinny, she figured she should at least attempt to eat more. "What about you? There was a period of your life when you just dropped off the face of the planet."

"Is this the reporter asking or a woman asking a man she is interested in?" Bruce leaned back toward the table and looked down at Chloe's lips. She automatically licked them. Then realized she'd done it, she smiled a little.

"The last one."

"You are interested in me, then?" He gave her a satisfied smile. "I was all over the place. Working here and there."

"Now, that's even more vague than my answer was!" Chloe accused.

"Hey, this is only the first date. If you want answers, then it will have to be on another date," Bruce told her. Chloe pushed the somewhat eaten dessert away from her and looked at him.

"Again, you should just ask."

"I was flirting, Chloe." Bruce corrected.

"No. Really?" She grinned widely at him. She was having fun.

"Is that a yes?"

"Well, I do want all the dirty details."

"Who said anything about dirty?" Bruce asked as he paid the bill.

"I'm just saying. You're a man; therefore, there is dirt somewhere."

"I hadn't pegged you as a sexist, Chloe." Bruce helped her into her jacket. She turned around to face him to correct that idea. In doing this, she found herself standing very close to him. He brought his hand up and gently stroked her cheek.

"I'm not a sexist, Bruce, just a realist." Impulsively, she stepped on her tiptoes and gave him a kiss. It was a quick kiss, but it earned her one of the treasured genuine smiles from Bruce.

Three weeks later, and she'd been out with Bruce too many times to count. He was good company, always said the right thing and was very gentlemanly, but he was holding back and Chloe could tell. There was definitely something that he was hiding. It was taking her right back to every past horrible man issue in her life. They always held something back and she refused to do it again. She told Bruce this at dinner the other night.

"Bruce, I've really enjoyed our time together." They were sitting on a couch in his mansion. They just gotten back from a date and she'd asked to come in.

"I have too, Chloe." He told her and reached over to take her hand in his.

"I'm just not sure that we can continue." Chloe told him and looked at him, pleading for understanding.

"What's the problem?" Bruce asked, gently rubbing his fingers over her knuckles.

"I just…" Chloe stopped, she didn't want to sound accusatory, but it had to be said. "I feel like you're hiding something from me." She said and Bruce just looked at her.

"We all have secrets, Chloe." He told her quietly.

"Yes, true. But I've been burned one too many times by secrets." Chloe told him. She was surprised to actually find herself fighting tears a bit. She'd grown to care about him a lot in a short amount of time.

"Chloe, I care about you." He told her and pulled her into his body and wrapped his arms around her. "I care for you a great deal. But I have some secrets that I can't share. You - knowing the truth would put you in too much danger and if anything happened to you, I'm not sure what I would do." Bruce was telling the truth. Somehow, this spunky blonde had wormed her way into his heart. He cared about her and that was dangerous. He was solitary. He had to be, it was his nature.

"I understand." She said and hugged him back tightly. She then pulled back a little and kissed him. He kissed her back gladly. He pushed her down onto the cushions of the sofa. He brushed a strand of hair back from her face, and stared at her beauty.

"I'm sorry, Chloe." Bruce said sadly. She smiled a little.

"At least you're being honest about it." Chloe said and meant it.

"I hope that we can still be friends." Bruce said it more as a question than a statement.

"Of course, you're not gonna get rid of me that easily." She said with a laugh and then kissed him soundly.

"That was a goodbye kiss." She told him when he looked at her questioningly.

"If you say so. We may not be a couple, but I wouldn't be able to resist if you ever threw yourself at me." Bruce told her flirting, but Chloe could tell that he meant it too.

"Good thing I'm not that easy then." She smiled back at him. "Today anyway, check with me next week." She said as he was helping her into her coat. He laughed and kissed her cheek.

Even though the lines of their relationship were supposed to be established, they were in reality, extremely fuzzy. They still went out together but under a friends tag, with nothing implied. Sometimes, though she would still catch Bruce looking at her lips and it would make her pause. Then there were times when she was the guilty one. She'd watch him shrug into a jacket and notice his broad shoulders and wonder what he looked like with nothing on.

When Bruce dropped his mask, she'd find a lonely man with painfilled eyes. That was something she'd rarely see and something he never meant to be revealed, so she would just pretend not to have noticed. However, it made her extremely curious to know what his secrets were.

At least her work life wasn't so murky. Increasingly, she was getting better stories. They were better in her mind, although no other reporters wanted them. She was assigned to cover Batman. He was a vigilante superhero, whose own behavior sometime bordered on criminal. It was hard to argue, however, when the city was experiencing its safest levels in decades. Crime was down and if that took a man in a bat suit, then so be it, she thought. Not everyone agreed with her though…

"Kelly Matthews." Alli said as she plopped into her chair at the desk across from Chloe. Alli Saunders was a good reporter and had turned out to be a good friend too.

"Kelly wha?" Chloe asked with a smile.

"Kelly Matthews is the name of Katrina Matthews and Oliver Queen's baby." Alli told her. That secret was one thing Chloe hadn't shared with anyone, so she hid the pain that news brought her.

"When's the wedding, again?" Chloe asked, even though she knew.

"In six months. Queen is saying that they need enough time to prepare. It's strange though that they didn't give the baby his last name. I thought that was the usual thing to do; to take the father's name." Alli said, suddenly distracted by this new thought.

"I'm sure he has a reason. He always does." Chloe said under her breath. She had to admit that she was mildly curious, but had no interest in breaking her own heart again by finding out any details of their relationship. Besides that, she chased serious news, not the celebrity gossip. Chloe's phone rang, pulling her out of that conversation at a good time. She looked at called ID and smiled.

"Chloe Sullivan." She answered, imitating his way of answering the phone.

"Chloe, it's Bruce." She could hear the smile in his voice. "I have a proposition."

"Ohh. I like the sound of that. I'm always up for a little dirty innuendo." She always flirted with Bruce like this. It was fun and gave her a little thrill.

"There's a charity benefit in a few weeks. Be my date?" He asked.

"A date?" Chloe said, pretending to need to think about it. "I dunno. I'm getting a little tired of all this dating. I'm ready for some action."

Bruce laughed at that. "I'm always ready for you, Chloe." Bruce told her and meant it. He'd been ready to have her since he met her.

"That's what they all say." Chloe say in mock seriousness.

"I mean it, though." Bruce said back.

"Ok. A date it is then." Chloe told him. "So, does this mean I have to get all decked out and fancy?"

"Yes, you need to wear a ball gown and all that, Chloe." Bruce answered and she could hear his amusement.

Reviews are Loved!!!!