So she caught him, and kissed him,
and with an impudent face said unto him,
I have peace offerings with me…
---
The fifth time he sees her, it costs him dearly.
Not money. Something else.
His principles.
The fifth time, he finds himself bending the rules that govern this part of his life, and it leaves him simultaneously frustrated and alarmed. Ra's al Ghul wanted to wipe the city clean. The Joker wanted to fill it with chaos. Catwoman…
He's not sure what her goal is.
She followed him for the better part of a week and saved his life against the LoBoys – he saw her disarming a shooter – but then staged a major heist and a wild escape, defiantly, mockingly, in his full view.
She knows about Jason White's connection to Superman – flaunted the knowledge – but hasn't used it.
He doesn't know what to do about her. He doesn't know her goal. He doesn't think it has anything to do with the city at large. He suspects that she's just toying with him, that she's going to make him pay for finding her out, for running off her accomplice, Holly Robinson.
He does know it's not a game he can afford to play. He tells himself that he needs to be careful; more careful than he has been, at any rate. She's not crazy, not obsessed - not any more than he is. She's smart. Calculating. Daring.
Dangerous.
He needs to take her off the streets. Take her out of the equation. He can't let her get the drop on him again.
There's a new exhibit of rare gems at the Museum of Natural History, including several spectacular examples of chatoyancy: Cat's-eye stones. After the theft a month earlier, and having a better feel for her winking sense of humor, he takes no chances and monitors the museum closely.
On the second night of the exhibit, he finds her perched on a rooftop across the street. He considers waiting for her to make a move on the museum so that he can catch her red-handed, but after a few minutes of observation it becomes clear that she's not going to do anything anytime soon.
He decides to confront her and lands silently on the roof, out of her field of vision.
She turns her head slightly, enough for him to see the curve of her jaw and neck, the small rounded ears on top of her mask, the deep purple sheen, almost black, to her leather suit. "You can't sneak up on a cat," she says in that low purring voice.
It's a false voice, as false as the one he puts on with his mask and cape. But his is designed to intimidate, and hers is... not.
He says nothing, but he moves closer.
She turns all the way around, leaning back against the decorative crenellation at the roof's edge. Lounging – or so it seems. "Relax. I'm not going to steal anything tonight, handsome."
"Then why are you here?"
"Mm... you're not in the phone book." She eases off the stonework and takes a few slow, sauntering steps towards him. He tenses and shifts, ready to fight if needed. But she only smiles and stops just out of arm's reach. "I'll be good," she says, teasing. "Honest."
He doesn't believe her. "What do you want?"
"To give you this," she says. She reaches up to the circular tab at her neck and unzips the front of her suit – slowly, eyes sparking with mischief behind the lenses of her goggles, watching for his reaction – showing a long blaze of pale skin against the dark leather.
She slides one hand inside, pulling out a dull green chunk of rock, then holds it up with three fingers. "Found it under the Little Blue Boy Scout's pillow. I was going to keep it, but…"
She shrugs, slipping the kryptonite back into her suit and zipping it closed again.
"That's not giving it to me," he says. It earns him a new smile, this one appreciative, and he makes a note to keep comments like those to himself.
"Two hundred grams," she says idly. "On the market, it's worth… what?"
Two hundred grams of kryptonite is a blank check. It's priceless. Individuals will pay millions. Organizations, including certain governments, will pay billions. She could sell the rock within hours and retire in fabulous wealth.
He says nothing.
She moves in closer. He holds still and ready and lets her. But she only lifts one hand and runs her fingers over the bat design on his chest, then digs the tips of those claws in. Stretches up and leans in and purrs, "So make me an offer."
He can't feel her hand through the layers of armor and Kevlar and fabric. He can, however, feel the warmth of her breath on the skin below the edge of his mask. And he can smell her perfume, the musky leather of her suit. See the way her lips part.
"I'm not playing games," he says, cold.
She tilts her head and her lips curve up in a faint smile. "Aw," she says. "Don't make this business. You can't afford it."
He says nothing.
"C'mon, Batman," she says, putting a little mocking twist on the name. She runs her free hand up his arm and curves it around his shoulder, pressing closer still. The claws digging into his suit pry clear and rake lightly downward, hooking onto the belt instead.
He should separate them. He can. One quick move will propel her away, out of striking distance.
So then – why hasn't he?
Because she has two hundred grams of kryptonite. Because she saved his life against the LoBoys. Because she plucked a stranger's son out of hell.
And because he can feel her warm breath on the skin of his face, and he can smell her perfume, and his hands are curling into fists at his side against the temptation to touch her.
"No," he says.
Her smile stretches out and she brings her face next to his again, brushing skin against skin. Her lips move on his jaw as she says, barely audible, a ghost of sound whispered across his mask, "Play with me."
He turns his head fractionally. Her breath hitches and the arm around his shoulders tightens, and he balances on the half-second impulse to move another centimeter and find out what she tastes like.
Play with me.
But it's not a game.
He should take advantage of the moment and remove the kryptonite by force. He should cuff her and leave her for the Major Crimes Unit. A housewarming gift for Montoya, the new detective there.
He can. He should.
She makes an impatient noise and shifts position. Presses her mouth against the edge of his – and then it's too much, he tips over that edge of self-control, and he kisses her.
He reaches between them to the circular tab of her zipper. Tugs it down. She leans back slightly with a laugh, giving him space, curving one strong leg around his to hold her balance, running her tongue along his jaw before capturing his mouth again.
He slides his hand inside her suit, feeling smooth skin and soft round curves even through the thick palms of his gloves, feeling the heat trapped between the two of them, and closes his fingers around the green rock.
Bending the rules. Doing something he shouldn't.
He knows better, especially after the Joker. He does not negotiate with criminals. He does not do as they ask. He does not play their games. There's no gray area here – only black and white – and she's proven, more than once, that she's on the wrong side of that dividing line.
Play with me.
But he thinks he knows this game: First the seduction, then the claws.
For a long perilous moment he stays where he is, kissing her, lost in the dark urgent thrill of it, the unreality of it.
Then he thinks, Rachel. And it becomes crashingly real.
He brings his arm up and shifts his weight on his feet and sends her staggering backwards. She catches her balance quickly and stands there, poised and elegant despite the deep V of skin exposed to the night.
The three-month-old scar on his jaw twinges.
He expects claws. He expects further seduction.
He gets neither.
"Better," she says, dark amusement dancing in her voice and across her face. She tugs the zipper closed again, almost primly. "Tell Big Blue I said 'you're welcome.' "
She blows him a kiss.
She turns.
She runs to the edge of the roof and jumps.
Batman stays where he is for a long moment, then puts the kryptonite away in his belt and leaves.
Catwoman is a problem – a larger one, in her way, than the Joker or Ra's al Ghul ever were. She's a gray area. She's… a distraction.
A temptation.
Play with me.
He doesn't know what he's going to do about her.
But he tells himself that next time will be different.
---end---