DISCLAIMER: Don’t own anything associated with the show or DC Comics… I just like playing with the characters in it from time to time. Dance Monkeys! Dance!

RATING: T - Teen

PAIRINGS: Batman/Wonder Woman

SPOILERS: None

SUMMARY: Bruce is forced to deal with the confusing emotions surrounding another's surprise visist to Gotham. Sequel to my story "Vigil of the Dark Angel" and the one written by kreleia, "Diana's Letter" showing the other side of the story.

A/N: It started off as a little plot bunny for me, and my very first Batman fic, and now it has turned into a full-blown journey into insanity. And as with any great journey, it's never fun going it alone, so I have managed to get my longtime beta swept up into the hurricaine of plot bunnies spinning around my head. Be sure to check out kreleia’s fic "Diana's Letter" to have a little more understanding about what's going on. Also, there are at least 2 more stories springing forth in this story arch. kreleia is already working on the Diana version of that party as we speak (but she's not as cracked out about writing as I am, so it will take a little longer to finish). I hope you enjoy our combined madness.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: I have the two most amazing people for my regualr betas. One of which is specifically responsible for making me write this story. She's also directly responsible for making me addicted to CSI Smut Fics, Batman Begins, Wonder Woman Comics, Batman Comics, Justice League Cartoons, Clois Fics and Hanson's Diet Black Cherry Natural Soda... But I suppose some of it is payback for the hangovers I've given her, and the costumes I have aided in overtaking her brains, not to mention making her hoeplessly addicted to visiting me in Colorado (she's even toyed with the idea of moving here :D ), so I guess we're almost even. LOL

REVIEWS: Reviews are the way I know if people are enjoying the work or not. So, if you leave one, THANKS! And if not, I hope you found at least a little something to brighten your day, and thanks for taking the time to read.

The roar of the compressed cabin filled in all possible pockets of silence left by the solemn occupant of the Wayne Enterprises jet. Last minute business matters at a manufacturing plant in the province of Quebec served to occupy his mind for the better part of a day and a half, but the solitary flight back from Montreal left him to his idle thoughts once more. Idle thoughts about vague notes from visiting diplomats to be exact.

His fingers nimbly flipped the unpretentious notecard over and over in his hand, occasionally stopping to glance at the handwritten words it held upon its surface. The handwriting was succinct and clean, without a single smudge, though he was quite certain it had been written with fountain ink. The salutation left him wondering how it was intended; familiar, business-like, vague, informal, or it could have been something more (something personal). But it was the closing which had him searching the banks of his reasoning skills to decipher its true meaning.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

B-

In Gotham on personal business to assist another prodigal daughter of Themyscira. I’ll be in town for two more days, but my nights are free.

In case you were wondering…I’m still waiting for that dance.

-D

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Deftly tossing the card onto the side table to leave it spinning in the center, he cursed his over analytical mind beneath his breath. “It doesn’t mean anything… Just a little snipe to throw me off guard.” As he brought his glass of water to his lips he disgustedly uttered, “Which is working a little too well for my tastes.” However, his train of thought was interrupted by the voice of the captain informing him that they were making their final approach to the Gotham City Municipal Airfield.

Looking out the window, he marveled at the diminutive size of the landing strip, in comparison to the hulking beast of a craft they were about to land upon it. Thankfully for him, Wayne Enterprises bought up the patents to the Harrier Jet technology when they became available. The corner of his mouth turned up into a carefully controlled smirk as he silently congratulated himself for putting together the R&D team that managed to apply that technology to his private, commercial jet. “Comes in handy to have a corporate jet that can land on a dime.”

The words had barely left his mouth when he felt the wheels of the Wayne Enterprises jet touch down upon the concrete runway. Within the next thirty minutes, he would be safely inside Wayne Manor, and preparing for a crash course in the events transpiring in his brief absence.

While he knew that Barbara had been sending him streaming data for the duration of his business trip, he still liked being able to check things out for himself.

He listened for the whine of the engines to reach the proper pitch before he stood up and retrieved his bags just as a hiss of crisp fall air leaked in from the door as the ground crew opened the once compressed cabin.

Bruce flipped open his phone and activated the device as he stepped down from the plane and automatically walked to the place he was certain his car would be waiting. And true to form, he only needed to duck in as the driver held open the back door of his limousine. Upon finding himself securely seated on the plush leather bench, his phone chirped with an incoming call.

Looking at the display screen, he chuffed in disgust. “That didn’t take long.” He had been dodging the current grande dame of Gotham, Kitty Vandeveere, for the last two weeks. He supposed it was as long as he could go without making an appearance at one of the beautiful people functions Gotham was so well known for, and he pressed the answer key.

“Kitty, my dear… To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Bruce! I was absolutely certain I would be speaking with your voicemail, once again, so this is quite a surprise.” The sarcasm and annoyance practically poured from her voice as she spoke.

“Well, unlike yourself…I do have to keep Wayne Enterprises in the black, if I’m to continue being invited to the best parties.” He affected the elitist tone so well that it almost made him sick when he could hear himself.

“Very true, Bruce… And those baubles you toss around have to be paid for in someway, now don’t they?” The attack was unwarranted and Bruce made a mental note not to keep this society matron waiting quite so long anymore. “But that’s not why I was calling you, Bruce. I am throwing a little soiree this evening to celebrate my newest acquisition. I didn’t want to wait to celebrate this one, seeing as the ultimate expert in authenticating this piece is only in Gotham for one more night.”

As the woman rattled on and on about her art collection, Bruce found himself equating her voice to that of a droning swarm of insects. That was…until she mentioned the name of the expert.

“Princess Diana of Themyscira is the foremost authority on Amazonian artifacts and I couldn’t believe my luck when the broker promised me she would authenticate the piece herself…in person, no less.” He could practically hear the girlish giggles in her tone, but the only thing on his mind was that Diana was going to be at that party tonight.

Not wanting to tip his hand to the society dame, Bruce coolly mentioned, “Well, I have been in the market for a new piece to decorate my office… Perhaps you could introduce me to your broker, Kitty?”

“If you’ll promise to be on your best behavior…” He was certain she was completely unaware of his ulterior motives, but her next statement forced him to regard the woman as a far more formidable adversary than previously acknowledged. “I’ll even introduce you to the Princess.”

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

It was not until he stood in his closet that Bruce Wayne realized just how many tuxedos he owned. It had been one of the most agonizing hours of his entire life, but finally Alfred entered the room and reminded him that, given the circumstances, a dinner jacket was the most appropriate choice in attire for the evening.

Of course, that led to the discovery they perhaps someone should be monitoring his clothing expenditures a little more closely, as he flipped through the half dozen expensive dinner jackets. Eventually settling on the most sedate looking, and comfortable feeling ensemble for the evening, he called down to make sure that the car was ready.

Stepping into the cool night air, Bruce was struck with a sudden chill as it crept its way up along his spine, and settled into a faint buzzing at the back of his consciousness. Normally such feelings told him that things were about to get interesting, and rarely in a good way. It most often occurred immediately preceding a fight for his life with one of his many nemeses. So why is a simple cocktail the same as a knockdown drag out with the Joker?

That question remained in his thoughts as the driver carried him to his destination.

When the car stopped at the luxury high-rise tower of overpriced, exclusive condominiums in the current incarnation of The Place to live in the heart of Gotham City’s richest neighborhood, Bruce shook his head in disgust. It never ceased to amaze him the lengths people in that community would go to try and impress one another with how much they could throw away in the name of appearances. In a perfect world, he would live in the cave full-time and donate the manor to some deserving group to use, but in a perfect world…there would be no use for the Batman.

Riding up to the penthouse suite in the elaborate elevator, Bruce pondered over the concept of a perfect world. The thought initially gave him a twinge of melancholy, but he quickly pushed it aside in favor of analyzing what a perfect world would be for him. In a perfect world, his parents would have lived until a ripe old age, living full and rewarding lives so that they could one day work together to spoil the hell out of their grandchildren.

Bruce was suddenly struck with the notion that it was probably the first time in his adult life that he had ever even considered a world where he would have found himself as a father. Although he had encountered numerous pupils in his quest to rid Gotham of the darkness that dwelled within it, he never really considered himself a father figure to anyone. Well, maybe Tim.

Pondering the nature of his theoretical future, Bruce quickly came to the conclusion that it was a waste of time to think about such things. His life was already promised to his quest, to his city. His contribution to the continuation of the species was to provide a better Gotham in which others might thrive. That would be his legacy.

Exiting the elevator, Bruce could hear the delicate tinkling of cocktail glasses and the tittering laughter of society dames. He checked his watch to make certain he managed to achieve the proper arrival time to demonstrate his characteristic aloofness.

Much of that work was destroyed the moment he walked into the penthouse.

The great room was abuzz with the conversations and whispers of the attendees, but there was no denying that his attention was instantaneously drawn to the tall, statuesque, raven-haired beauty standing at the back of the room. His eyes were riveted to her sumptuous form as her blood red dress clung to all the right places.

When the hostess sidled up to him and chuffed, Bruce knew that he had been caught. “I see you’ve already found my guest of honor, Bruce.”

His back instantly stiffened as he fought to keep from letting even a hint of color find his face. “Hard not to notice a woman that beautiful, my dear Kitty.”

“Very true, but I did hold out hope that you would be the one man not drowning in his own puddle of drool at the very sight of the Princess.” His brow creased into a scowl in an autonomic response to her condescending remark.

“I’m fairly certain drool never entered into the equation, Kitty.” Dropping back into the playboy Bruce Wayne, he made the effort to throw off her suspicions with a devilishly salacious comment. “After all, she’s just another beautiful woman, with two legs and two-”

“Thank you… I am quite sure I can follow your train of thought, and you really should be ashamed of yourself.” Kitty berated him for the attempt at low humor, and went on to explain, “The Princess is a selfless servant for her people, and a fierce protector of all human-kind. You should do well to remember that when you greet her…and not stare at her cleavage the whole time.”

Silently, Bruce cursed the woman for even mentioning Diana’s cleavage, because it quickly became something he could not help but think about, in great detail, and in full disclosure. His mind was instantly filled with the images he had been fighting so hard to banish since his slightly obsessive perch beside her bedroom window just two nights before.

Either to take pity on him, or to further add insult to injury, Kitty announced, “You need a drink before I’ll introduce you…” She regarded him with a cynical eye and then added, “Or maybe a few. When you find Bruce Wayne again, come see me and I’ll make the introductions.”

At the bar, Bruce sulked as he waited for his usual; a single glass of champagne. He never actually indulged at these parties, but he made sure to always appear as the slightly out of control playboy by never being without a drink. At some point in the evening, he would stake out the bar and slip in when the bartender was otherwise engaged to pour himself a completely innocuous beverage to pass as his advertised drink of choice. He used to try and nurse the single malt scotch all night, but that grew dangerous when he was party hopping, and so the subterfuge quickly became a necessity.

In light of his stellar entrance to the party, Bruce actually toyed with the idea of ordering a scotch, but decided that if he was going to make it through the night with even a modicum of his dignity, he needed to be sober. And as he turned from the bar to look out on the crowd, he was once again reminded why.

He had been having dreams about that dress ever since Paris. The deep red color, the rich curves it caressed, the way it practically set her hair on fire and-… His heart was beginning to pound within his chest in a way no regular nemesis could incite, but thinking about her in that dress was certainly giving his vigilantly manicured self-control a serious workout. Fortunately, one of the other members of Kitty’s court came to distract him from his predicament.

Tyler Cassidy was a man of industry, even if his industry was manufacturing bathroom porcelain. Cassidy was also a frequent bystander at these parties, because his wife Tiffany was doing her level best to insert herself in the good graces of the older money of Gotham City.

“A slow night, Wayne?” Cassidy gestured at his glass of champagne and smirked.

“I have two words for you, Cassidy… Kitty. Vanderveere.” He shivered with the thought of incurring that woman’s wrath. There was a reason the men of Gotham society called her the Broad of the Boulevard.

Cassidy appeared to feel the same chill in the air as he too shivered and titled his scotch and soda at Bruce with a toast. “Don’t I know it.” The two men shared the quiet laughter of comrades under the same firing line. “I’m still trying to recover from my last lashing at the hands of that broad. Who knew discussing toilet fixture models at a fashion show was grounds for total bombardment. The wife didn’t even look at me for a solid week after that one.”

Bruce was used to the comfortable banter the men at these parties exchanged, and though they all knew him to be the confirmed bachelor and playboy, they all seemed to delight in showing him exactly why he should stay that way. He quirked an eyebrow, and just before he took a sip from his glass, he nonchalantly asked, “How’d you survive?”

“The dog doesn’t care what the hell I say… And his feet aren’t cold, either.”

After his brief encounter with Cassidy, Bruce was able to comfortably slip back into his normal persona, and was careful to stay back in the dark corners, occasionally flirting with this woman or that, but never drawing attention to himself. From those corners, he could watch the whole play as it was performed before his very eyes. The play and the players were usually the same, and it took little of his focus to know what was happening, but tonight was different. Tonight, there was a new player, and the play had changed entirely.

Tonight, his focus was never far removed from the toned figure of a very familiar Amazon. He casually watched as she explained the origins of the obje d’art currently on center display. He observed the way she deftly tucked an escaping lock of hair back into place behind her ear. He noticed the way she would clasp her hands together in front of her whenever the questions began to take on a personal nature. But more than any other thing, he noticed the way Kitty’s prodigal son Simon would lead her from one conversation to another with a hand placed strategically at the back of her arm, and just above the elbow.

As he watched the shameless cad once again take her bare arm into his clammy grip, he was reminded of his last encounter with Diana aboard the Watchtower. That time it was his hand on her arm, gliding down from its beginning upon her shoulder, along the length of her well-defined arm to rest at the elbow. He was suddenly filled with an unreasonable feeling of rancor towards the man who was able to touch her with his bare hand, while he was relegated to a gloved touch in the name of friendship.

Behind a blank and unaffected façade, he seethed with anger while observing the brazen reprobate guiding her around the room as though she was some new toy to show off to his friends. His anger grew as he wondered what in the world would have prompted Diana to allow such a vulgar display to continue in her presence.

His thoughts drifted back to their brief conversation in the halls of the Watchtower a few days earlier, and he was forced to question if her dilemma had anything to do with the infamous Simon Vanderveere. He could not fathom why Diana would have gotten herself mixed up with such a philandering slime like Simon, but it quickly became obvious to him that this was what she had been struggling with in regards to her ambassadorial responsibilities mixing in with her personal life.

As Simon brought her out to the dance floor, Bruce sensed the bitter taste of bile rising up in his throat. The rakish heathen actually had the gall to attempt to paw at Diana in full view of the partygoers. It was more than obvious to him that she was immensely uncomfortable with the situation, but he was shocked to find her merely shifting the man’s hands into the proper and more polite positions reserved for public dancing. His anger grew to a boil with every attempt to grope at her curves by the repulsive toady on the dance floor.

Without any prompting, a sneer began to turn the corner of his mouth. It would have gone unnoticed had not a woman come to stand beside him at the bar. “She has far more patience than I,” the disgust was plainly evident in the woman’s voice, and Bruce turned to learn the identity of the voice. When he turned, he found himself standing face to face with the woman he had seen outside of the Astor Hotel two nights before.

For the average Gotham male, she would have appeared as the most beautiful woman to ever grace their city streets, but he knew better. Her bronzed, porcelain smooth skin radiated; even in the dim light of the cocktail party setting. As she brushed a lock of hair behind her ear, he caught sight of the tell-tale bracelet. “The Princess has always possessed an astounding capacity for patience when it comes to the unpleasantness of man’s world, but it still amazes me the way she can affect such a calm composure when surrounded by scoundrels such as that.”

“Not much for men, I take it?” He turned back to the bar and nodded at the bartender to produce a drink for the lady.

“I have nothing but admiration for men; real and true men… It’s a large part of why I am no longer welcome in Themyscira. But that…” She gestured at Simon Vanderveere with great contempt. Turning back, she found the champagne flute he had ordered for her waiting politely for her to take it.

When she was about to refuse the offering, his face split with a faint grin and he confessed, “Ginger ale… Looks the same, but lets you stay in control.”

She nearly blushed at the gesture, but quickly recovered her composure. “Thank you. As I was saying…that is not a man. That is a snake in an overpriced Italian suit. I believe my mate would call him a slimeball, or a weasel… I can never keep them straight.”

Bruce actually chuckled at the woman’s analysis of the situation. “In this case, I would have to say both are fairly accurate.”

The woman turned again to him and awkwardly held out her hand to greet him properly. “I’m sorry… I always forget to introduce myself. I am Areta of Themysciria- Well, Areta Trumbull now. I am most pleased to finally meet you Mr. Wayne.”

He softly took her hand, and respectfully brought it to his lips for the more formal greeting. “And I you, Ms. Trumbull. He looked around the room momentarily to see if he could spot the mate in question watching over their conversation. “I would also enjoy meeting the man with such keen insight.”

“Alas, he’s away on business at the moment. With my background in art and the antiquities, I assist him in his family’s import business.” She regarded him with a suspicious glance, and then she explained, “It’s my friendship with Diana that enabled me to convince the Princess to authenticate the piece for Mrs. Vanderveere. Otherwise, I never would have gotten her to come to Gotham City. She claims it is not a place she is normally welcome.”

He tried to hide the surprise from his face, but the quirk of her lips told him that he had failed miserably. She was not in town for any purpose of her own, and was in fact doing a favor for a friend. She was not in Gotham to make time with that slimy worm ridden piece of filth currently oozing her across the dance floor. Bruce suddenly felt about three inches tall, and hoped no one would notice when he tried to slip from the room.

Thanking her for the conversation, Bruce excused himself from Areta. When he made for the door, he was stopped by the plain speaking Cassidy once again, only this time he had company.

After a few minutes discussing the current market situation in the Pan-Asian economy, Bruce once again hoped to make his escape with as little notice as possible. Just as he was about to find the door, Kitty had found him.

“Now, Bruce, you wouldn’t possibly be trying to escape my party, would you?” Her sarcasm positively oozed from her lips, and he instantly knew the oozing must be a genetic thing.

“Sorry to drink and run…” He dropped his champagne flute onto a passing waiter’s tray. “But I’ve got other obliga-…”

The woman promptly interrupted him, “I won’t hear a word of it… At least not until you’ve been introduced to the Princess. It simply wouldn’t do for you not to meet the woman, Bruce. I’ll just be a moment.” His pulse was throbbing in his temples as she quickly pushed her way through the crowd.

Swallowing back the nervous bile which began to rise in his throat during his conversation with Areta, he took a deep breath and bolted for the door. He would much rather deal with the vindictive wrath of the Broad of the Boulevard than to face Diana like that. His carefully contained control was completely eradicated, and he desperately needed to get his grip once again.

His only true salvation came when he saw Dick Grayson in the hall outside of the penthouse. Obviously picking up on the older man’s unease, he questioned Bruce’s hasty exit. Unwilling to explain exactly how and why his equilibrium had become unbalanced, Bruce shrugged off the question and instead asked for a favor.

Dick was caught completely off-guard by the uncharacteristic request for help, and instantly agreed. Searching for a logical solution, the only thing that came to Bruce’s mind was to scribble a brief note on a calling card and to have Dick deliver it to the Princess.

To his credit, Dick asked no other questions, and bid his former mentor a gracious good night.

There were still a great many questions left to be answered, however, those would need to be handled in his own mind. After he finished the self-emolliating he was about to administer for his ridiculous behavior, of course.

Return to Main Page

Return to Batman Wonder Woman LJ