You get hit on. But your husband is watching.

The Gotham skyline looms gray and indifferent in the rearview mirror as the car idles at the curb of a quiet side street. You and Damian have been married for just over a year now—a fact that still surprises the tabloids, though it surprises no one who has watched the way the youngest Wayne heir looks at you.

Damian's presence lingers in the car even while he's gone,t. He told you he'd be five minutes, maybe ten*, and in the meantime, you're content to watch the foot traffic through the smudged glass of the windshield. A street performer plays a melancholy saxophone half a block down. A woman with a stroller chases after a runaway dog.

And then there's him—the man who's been circling the block for the past quarter hour in a rented sedan he clearly can't afford. He's got the polished exterior of someone who's spent too much time on dating apps angling for a sugar mama: a suit that's a half-size too tight at the shoulders, a jawline sharpened by intent rather than genetics, and eyes that keep calculating the value of your car—a matte black Aston Martin, a wedding gift from Bruce that Damian had hated accepting almost as much as he'd loved watching you behind the wheel. The man has been doing this calculating* long enough now that he finally seems to have decided something. You watch him smooth his hair, square his shoulders, and start walking toward the car with the particular gait of someone about to deliver a sales pitch.*

He knocks on the driver's side window. He actually knocks*. With a grin. And then he gestures for you to roll it down.*

The knock echoes through the cabin like an unwelcome doorbell. You glance toward the coffee shop, but Damian has vanished into the depths behind its steamed-up windows. Outside, the man in the too-tight suit is grinning now, wide and performed, and he taps the glass again with an insistent knuckle.

He is still mid-gesture when it occurs to you that you could simply ignore him. But he's already mouthing something through the glass—something that looks suspiciously like "Please, just a moment of your time"—with all the desperate sincerity of a man who has done this before and usually meets with success. You sigh, the sound small inside the car. Fine. Some people need to learn things the hard way.

You press the window button. The glass slides down with an expensive purr, and the man's smile widens.

"Now, don't take this the wrong way, but I've been watching you, and—" He holds up both hands, palms out, as though he's already anticipating a protest. "—I know what you're thinking. 'Another stranger coming up to a beautiful woman alone in her car.' But I'm not like other men, I promise. Look at you—clearly successful, clearly independent, probably not even looking for anyone, and honestly, that's exactly what I'm drawn to. A woman who doesn't need a man. A woman who knows what she wants."

He glances at the car's interior, at the diamond stud earrings that Damian had given you for your anniversary—ones he'd spent three months designing with a jeweler in Switzerland—and his grin becomes something approaching audacious.

"The name's Marcus. I'm an entrepreneur, entrepreneur of the mind, if you will. I see potential in people, and here's the thing—I see potential in you. Whatever it is you're building, whatever it is you're looking for, I'd be an asset. I mean it, I'm low-maintenance. I'm charming. I'm available on short notice—naturally, I have some standards, but for a woman like you? I'm flexible. In fact—"

That's when the shadow falls across the sidewalk behind him.

You don't have to look to know who it is. Your eyes are already on Marcus's face, watching his expression shift in real-time as he registers the sudden darkness that has descended over his shoulder, the way the temperature seems to drop by several degrees, the unmistakable energy of a predator who has stopped moving and chosen instead to simply... observe.

Marcus keeps talking anyway. God bless the delusion of the mediocre.

"—I'm the kind of man who actually listens, which is rare nowadays, and I'll bet you're looking for someone who can keep up with you intellectually... and otherwise—"

Behind him, Damian shifts his weight. He's holding a paper coffee cup in one gloved hand, and he takes a slow, deliberate sip as he watches the back of Marcus's head. His eyes meet yours over the rim of the cup. There's no fury there. There isn't even surprise. There's just that particular stillness Damian has, the one that precedes either a dismemberment or a particularly cutting remark, and for a heartbeat, you see the corner of his mouth twitch.

Here it comes.