Getting to Florence (part 3 of 4)
Title: Getting to Florence (part 3 of 4)
Author:charlie_bz
Pairing/Characters: Bruce Wayne/Selina Kyle
Rating: For mature readers - nothing terribly explicit but there are a few F words in this part. Like 2.
Warnings: see above
Spoilers: Dark Knight Rises
Disclaimer: Dark Knight Rises does not belong to me.
Part 1
Part 2
“What time is it?” Selina mumbled sleepily against the back of Bruce’s neck. She knew he was awake; he was reading something on his IPhone. Stock prices, crime blotters, she could hardly guess what he read for fun.
“Almost 11,” he said absently.
She rolled over, her eyes blinking against the harsh sunlight as she tried to muster enough energy to get out of bed. It had been a vigorous night. And morning. Morning sex was not something Selina often indulged in. She usually wanted the other person gone before going to sleep or she left to avoid any intimacy that actually sleeping with someone entailed. With Bruce, it didn’t occur to her to sneak away and rush back to her own room and even if she tried, she’s sure he wouldn’t let her. And for that she was glad because she had thoroughly enjoyed him as they engaged in crack-of-dawn delightfully and surprisingly energetic sex that involved lots of rolling about the bed before falling back asleep.
“Ugh…I have to go. I have to check out of my room.” Selina scooted away from him toward the edge of the bed but he reached out, grasping her hand to pull her back to him.
“Why do you have to check out?” He pinned her beneath him. “Why now?”
“The convention is over,” she stated as if that fact should answer everything.
“So?”
“So…Attaching yourself to a business convention is the best way to score a free room” she explained. “The convention ends, the free room ends, too.”
He stared at her for a bit trying his best not to frown at her. She found him very cute.
“It’s not free,” he said. “Someone is paying for it.”
“Yes, but it’s some megacorporation that can afford it.” An innocently mischievous grin hovered about her mouth. “A big megacorporation like…say…Wayne Enterprises.”
“You didn’t.”
“I did.”
“How long do you intend to keep stealing from me?”
“I’m not stealing from you. Last I heard you don’t own Wayne Enterprises anymore. And, you’re dead.”
“That’ll be fixed.”
“The dead part?”
“The owning part.”
“But if you’re dead, who will own it then?”
“Alfred. You’re stealing from Alfred.”
“Who?”
“My heir.”
She sorted through the information she gleaned about him in her various searches. From what she could tell he had no family whatsoever then she remembered the Harvey Dent Day party. “That old guy at the party? He’s your heir? I thought he was your employee.”
Since he started nuzzling her neck, Selina surmised that he didn’t want to talk about Alfred. She noted that for further reference. But she couldn’t let him off the hook entirely.
“So, who’s his heir?”
“Me,” he said, trailing kisses over her jaw line.
“You rich have the most complicated legal issues.” She closed her eyes, relishing his distraction methods but knowing she really did have to get up. One more minute, she promised herself yet there he was, naked, making her too fuzzy. Making her weak. “I really do need to go. Wayne Enterprises is paying the convention rate and I’d hate for Alfred to have to pay the standard rate. I think it’s like double or something.”
He lifted his head to look at her. “Do you take anything seriously?”
“Depends on what it is. Corporate assets? Not so much. But this?” Her hand strayed from his chest to lower parts. “This I take very seriously.”
As they kissed, Selina pushed him onto his back then pulled away.
“But I have to check out now.” She hopped off the bed before he could grab her again. She looked for her clothes, walking naked around the room which didn’t cause her the slightest bit of self-consciousness. She liked feeling his eyes on her as she searched for her dress that had been thrown somewhere. She found it under some pillows then slid it on glad she had worn something so simple to put on. And take off.
Her underwear was nowhere to be found and she smiled at Bruce’s expression when he realized she was leaving as is. She looked around the room before sliding open the desk drawer. Holding up the cheap hotel ball point pen, she said: “I’m taking this, okay?”
He shook his head in bemusement. “For the pen, you ask permission.”
As she walked to the door, she wound her dark hair up on her head, sliding the pen into the mass of tangles to hold it up. Picking up her shoes, she blew him a kiss before closing the door behind her.
When she reached her room, she checked out via the TV dismissing a twinge of guilt at all the charges she had accrued during her stay. Sorry about the mini-bar, Alfred. She took a hot shower then stuffed her very few belongings in her worn leather satchel. In Miami, she had shipped her winter clothes, boots, and beloved leather jacket back home knowing they were wholly unnecessary in the sunny Caribbean. The only items she kept were her toothbrush, her running shoes, and the necklace that was still safely nestled in the expensive velvet case.
Her phone pinged indicating a text message.
Leaving soon. Coming to say goodbye? Nicholas texted.
Meet you in 5 at your room. Selina responded then slid the phone in the back pocket of her extra short jean cut-offs.
She put on her big, floppy beach hat then picked up her satchel and beach bag. With a quick last look at her room, she thanked Wayne Enterprises for the pleasant stay and left. On the walk to Tony and Nicholas’ room, her phone pinged again with a text from Unknown Caller.
Breakfast?
She grinned. Who is this?
Someone who’s hungry.
‘Hungry’ invited so many different innuendos, she debated how to reply. Opting to play it safe, she responded: Restaurant?
Room service.
Pancakes, lots of maple syrup. Milk. Sausages. Then, after thinking it over, she sent him one more text: Not vegan! Saying goodbye to T & N. Be there soon.
She knocked on Nicholas’ door wearing a pleased grin.
“You look like the cat that ate the canary,” Nicholas said, standing aside to let her in.
“The bat.”
“Huh?”
“Nothing, I’m being stupid.”
“Nice night?”
Yeah, I just fucked Batman. Like three times and it was better than awesome.
“It was okay,” she told him in a way that clearly implied it was much more than okay.
She sat on their bed and chatted with them as they finished packing. While she was sorry to see them go, she was not nearly as sorry as she would have been had Bruce not showed up and that realization was sobering. That won’t do, she told herself and decided to walk Tony and Nicholas to their cab instead of immediately returning to his room. After promises of keeping in touch and hugs goodbye she waved as their taxi pulled away. Once it was out of sight, she turned and leisurely strolled back to Bruce’s room.
He answered the door looking irritatingly attractive wearing t-shirt and shorts with his hair damp from a shower. She kissed his cheek chastely then tossed her bags on the floor and her beach hat on the couch. The room had already been cleaned and tidied, all evidence of their passionate night eradicated.
“Did you find…?” She looked around the room for her underwear that she lost earlier.
He gave her a guarded look before nodding yes.
She grinned at his almost bashful expression. “Am I getting them back or do you have something else in mind?”
At that he smiled and she couldn’t resist going to him for a kiss which ending up being more involved than she intended.
They were soon interrupted by a knock on the door signaling the arrival of their breakfast. With a nod to the two of them, the hotel employee wheeled the room service cart out onto the balcony. He then proceeded to set the table in a style that seemed way too fancy for breakfast. When he uncovered the cart to reveal two gas stoves, Selina realized the guy was actually going to prepare their food here and now.
“Wow,” she said. “You know, for me, at my room, they just drop off a tray and leave.”
“Ordered a lot of room service, did you?” He asked, and Selina got the feeling that he knew about all her room charges.
She didn’t answer him but walked to the glass sliding doors that opened onto the spacious balcony to watch the chef work. The guy wasn’t just some omelet maker you found at a buffet but a bona fide chef. He prepared their food with a skill and panache that she only saw on cooking shows.
Bruce touched her bare back, just below where her bikini top was tied, nudging her to step out onto the balcony. He held out a chair for her and as she sat down, the chef placed a napkin on her lap with more flourish than Selina felt was necessary. This level of service was mystifying but she suspected Bruce wasn’t doing all this to impress her. She guessed that some habits of the wealthy were probably difficult to shed. She also guessed that if this man was really broke, then she was the Flying Nun.
The chef completed the food preparation and, as unobtrusively as possible, packed up his gear and quietly left.
Bruce’s breakfast was appallingly healthy. An egg white omelet with lots of vegetables, fruit on the side, no bread, no butter, no oil, no meat: it was the opposite of hers. She slathered a generous amount of butter on every pancake then drenched her plate in hot maple syrup.
“I didn’t notice your fine ocean view earlier,” she said as she dipped her sausage in the syrup. The balcony was no more than fifty feet from the edge of the sea and was constructed in a manner that felt private, as if there were no other guest rooms in the vicinity. “If I wanted to see the ocean from my room, I had to stand on a little table on the furthest corner and crane my neck just to get a glimpse. I almost killed myself, you know. Thank God I didn’t. That would have been so embarrassing.”
“Yeah…embarrassing,” Bruce said, amused.
“So…” Selina said. “What do you want to do today?”
He gazed at her for a moment before answering and, not for the first time, she wished she could read his mind. “The beach is there…” he said gesturing in the direction of the ocean as his gaze flicked from her chest to her face. “And you’re already dressed for it.”
“Yeah, I wasn’t really expecting all this. Just pancakes. And I don’t usually dress up for pancakes.”
“I’m not complaining.”
“I didn’t think you were,” she said as they held a long look.
“What is your plan?” Bruce asked, his neutral tone indicated he wasn’t talking about her plan for the day.
“My plan?”
“What are you going to do after…this?”
The ‘this’ he avoided finding a name for was as perplexing for her as it was for him. For her, the plan was to engage in a little harmless fuckery, amiably go their separate ways then continue her journey in figuring out what she wants to do with the rest of her life.
“My ‘plan’ if you can call it that is to go where the winds blow me.”
“Really?” He looked skeptical.
“Yes. You should try it sometime.”
“What, roam the earth with no purpose?”
“Why not?” She leaned forward, her elbow resting on the glass topped table, her chin on her palm. “But to give you a specific answer to your question, I considered hopping on a bus and seeing the country. Go to the mountains. Or to Kingston. After that…” She shrugged.
“What about you?” She asked the question in the most off hand way possible.
“I have no idea,” he said with a rueful smile before meeting her steady gaze.
Selina would have been very surprised if he had presented a well thought out plan of his life post recluse, post Batman. What did one do after such an existence? She was having enough trouble figuring out her own life she could hardly imagine what he was going through.
She tossed her napkin on her mostly empty plate then rose and walked to him. “Well,” she said, leaning on the table, her hip next to his glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. “I hear the Blue Mountains are nice. Rainforests, waterfalls, nature stuff.”
“Are you a fan of nature?” He asked, taking her hand, his thumb lightly rubbing her palm.
“I’m a city girl. Nature mystifies me. Naturally, I want to go look at it.”
“Makes sense.”
“So, you wanna come?” She rolled her eyes at her the unintentional suggestiveness of her question. “With me?”
“Maybe,” he said, but she knew he did.
“How could you not want to? I’m the most fun you’ve had in…ever.”
He nodded in agreement, his eyes not leaving hers.
She dismissed the pang of lust his hot look elicited. Maintain control, she reminded herself. “C’mon,” she said, pulling him to his feet. “Let’s go to the beach and be lazy all day.”
After the day lazing on the beach and the night spent being definitely not lazy, they left late the next morning. Instead of depending on the unreliable Jamaican bus system, Bruce had arranged for a Jeep. Selina suggested that they should just guess their way around the country saying “how hard could it be to find mountains?” and was impressed that he made it a whole twenty miles before pulling over to access detailed maps on his IPhone.
For the next few days, they travelled around Jamaica’s inland region. Selina liked seeing the Jamaica that wasn’t popular with tourists, making Bruce stop at markets, shacks that sold food, or whatever else caught her interest. Her fondness for meandering aimlessly through a foreign country was not rubbing off on him so every morning while still in bed he presented options giving her final say about where they would end up the next night. He, in turn, compromised by not meticulously planning their hotel visits by calling ahead for reservations at the closest thing he could find to a luxurious hotel. She didn’t think he minded the modest accommodations they stumbled on, all were clean with small but sturdy beds. “What more do we need?” She asked him the first night as he kissed her neck while hurriedly ridding her of her clothes.
He soon became comfortable with not hiding his lust for her. That look in his eyes, his desire for her, was more intoxicating than she ever would have imagined. They quickly learned all the things they liked, didn’t like and the things that drove each other blissfully crazy. What Selina found most surprising, and alarming, was how well they got along outside of bed. She surmised that their easy geniality was largely due to the unspoken agreement that barred them from venturing into sensitive topics. Which wasn’t terribly difficult as very little about this beautiful, sunny, vivid, wild country invited exploration into dark pasts. But sometimes it was tricky navigating around the unarticulated things; the more she learned about him the more she wanted to know everything.
“You know,” he said to her one evening as they ate their dinner at a small restaurant way off the beaten path. “You’re very nosy.”
She’d been peppering him with Batman questions wanting to know every detail of the suit. Why the ears? How bullet proof was it? How did he get it on and off? How hot was it? Was it terribly uncomfortable?
“I am not,” she replied with a little indignant huff. If she wanted to be nosy, she could think of far more invasive questions that could be asked.
“If you hadn’t been snooping around my drawing room I never would have found you.” Bruce looked like he had been dying to impart that little bit of information for quite a while. “You could’ve got my prints, left, and no one would have been the wiser. But, no, you just had to look in the safe, which I imagine was not part of your job, then you just had to poke around-”
“I was curious what a person does all day, every day, when they refuse to leave their house for years and years. That’s being curious.”
“I call it nosy.” He grinned, enjoying teasing her. “And there’s plenty to do at my house.”
“Like shooting arrows.”
“That and there’s a pool and a library and, well, it’s a big house.”
“So’s prison,” Selina said, wincing a little when she realized she’d spoken before thinking. Her guard was lowering.
“I read a lot,” Bruce responded, steering the conversation back into safer territory.
“Read what?” She asked as she peeled her shrimp.
“Books. Newspapers. Periodicals. Scientific journals”
“What kind of periodicals? Like porn?”
“See…that’s a nosy question!”
“Curiosity.”
“No porn,” he stated firmly.
“Hmmmm…and yet you have such an imagination about things,” she said giving him a look.
He tossed some cash on the table and took her hand, unmindful of the food not eaten. The modest guesthouse they were staying in was across the small street and they barely made it to the room where he put his imagination to very good use.
Part 4
Author:charlie_bz
Pairing/Characters: Bruce Wayne/Selina Kyle
Rating: For mature readers - nothing terribly explicit but there are a few F words in this part. Like 2.
Warnings: see above
Spoilers: Dark Knight Rises
Disclaimer: Dark Knight Rises does not belong to me.
Part 1
Part 2
“What time is it?” Selina mumbled sleepily against the back of Bruce’s neck. She knew he was awake; he was reading something on his IPhone. Stock prices, crime blotters, she could hardly guess what he read for fun.
“Almost 11,” he said absently.
She rolled over, her eyes blinking against the harsh sunlight as she tried to muster enough energy to get out of bed. It had been a vigorous night. And morning. Morning sex was not something Selina often indulged in. She usually wanted the other person gone before going to sleep or she left to avoid any intimacy that actually sleeping with someone entailed. With Bruce, it didn’t occur to her to sneak away and rush back to her own room and even if she tried, she’s sure he wouldn’t let her. And for that she was glad because she had thoroughly enjoyed him as they engaged in crack-of-dawn delightfully and surprisingly energetic sex that involved lots of rolling about the bed before falling back asleep.
“Ugh…I have to go. I have to check out of my room.” Selina scooted away from him toward the edge of the bed but he reached out, grasping her hand to pull her back to him.
“Why do you have to check out?” He pinned her beneath him. “Why now?”
“The convention is over,” she stated as if that fact should answer everything.
“So?”
“So…Attaching yourself to a business convention is the best way to score a free room” she explained. “The convention ends, the free room ends, too.”
He stared at her for a bit trying his best not to frown at her. She found him very cute.
“It’s not free,” he said. “Someone is paying for it.”
“Yes, but it’s some megacorporation that can afford it.” An innocently mischievous grin hovered about her mouth. “A big megacorporation like…say…Wayne Enterprises.”
“You didn’t.”
“I did.”
“How long do you intend to keep stealing from me?”
“I’m not stealing from you. Last I heard you don’t own Wayne Enterprises anymore. And, you’re dead.”
“That’ll be fixed.”
“The dead part?”
“The owning part.”
“But if you’re dead, who will own it then?”
“Alfred. You’re stealing from Alfred.”
“Who?”
“My heir.”
She sorted through the information she gleaned about him in her various searches. From what she could tell he had no family whatsoever then she remembered the Harvey Dent Day party. “That old guy at the party? He’s your heir? I thought he was your employee.”
Since he started nuzzling her neck, Selina surmised that he didn’t want to talk about Alfred. She noted that for further reference. But she couldn’t let him off the hook entirely.
“So, who’s his heir?”
“Me,” he said, trailing kisses over her jaw line.
“You rich have the most complicated legal issues.” She closed her eyes, relishing his distraction methods but knowing she really did have to get up. One more minute, she promised herself yet there he was, naked, making her too fuzzy. Making her weak. “I really do need to go. Wayne Enterprises is paying the convention rate and I’d hate for Alfred to have to pay the standard rate. I think it’s like double or something.”
He lifted his head to look at her. “Do you take anything seriously?”
“Depends on what it is. Corporate assets? Not so much. But this?” Her hand strayed from his chest to lower parts. “This I take very seriously.”
As they kissed, Selina pushed him onto his back then pulled away.
“But I have to check out now.” She hopped off the bed before he could grab her again. She looked for her clothes, walking naked around the room which didn’t cause her the slightest bit of self-consciousness. She liked feeling his eyes on her as she searched for her dress that had been thrown somewhere. She found it under some pillows then slid it on glad she had worn something so simple to put on. And take off.
Her underwear was nowhere to be found and she smiled at Bruce’s expression when he realized she was leaving as is. She looked around the room before sliding open the desk drawer. Holding up the cheap hotel ball point pen, she said: “I’m taking this, okay?”
He shook his head in bemusement. “For the pen, you ask permission.”
As she walked to the door, she wound her dark hair up on her head, sliding the pen into the mass of tangles to hold it up. Picking up her shoes, she blew him a kiss before closing the door behind her.
When she reached her room, she checked out via the TV dismissing a twinge of guilt at all the charges she had accrued during her stay. Sorry about the mini-bar, Alfred. She took a hot shower then stuffed her very few belongings in her worn leather satchel. In Miami, she had shipped her winter clothes, boots, and beloved leather jacket back home knowing they were wholly unnecessary in the sunny Caribbean. The only items she kept were her toothbrush, her running shoes, and the necklace that was still safely nestled in the expensive velvet case.
Her phone pinged indicating a text message.
Leaving soon. Coming to say goodbye? Nicholas texted.
Meet you in 5 at your room. Selina responded then slid the phone in the back pocket of her extra short jean cut-offs.
She put on her big, floppy beach hat then picked up her satchel and beach bag. With a quick last look at her room, she thanked Wayne Enterprises for the pleasant stay and left. On the walk to Tony and Nicholas’ room, her phone pinged again with a text from Unknown Caller.
Breakfast?
She grinned. Who is this?
Someone who’s hungry.
‘Hungry’ invited so many different innuendos, she debated how to reply. Opting to play it safe, she responded: Restaurant?
Room service.
Pancakes, lots of maple syrup. Milk. Sausages. Then, after thinking it over, she sent him one more text: Not vegan! Saying goodbye to T & N. Be there soon.
She knocked on Nicholas’ door wearing a pleased grin.
“You look like the cat that ate the canary,” Nicholas said, standing aside to let her in.
“The bat.”
“Huh?”
“Nothing, I’m being stupid.”
“Nice night?”
Yeah, I just fucked Batman. Like three times and it was better than awesome.
“It was okay,” she told him in a way that clearly implied it was much more than okay.
She sat on their bed and chatted with them as they finished packing. While she was sorry to see them go, she was not nearly as sorry as she would have been had Bruce not showed up and that realization was sobering. That won’t do, she told herself and decided to walk Tony and Nicholas to their cab instead of immediately returning to his room. After promises of keeping in touch and hugs goodbye she waved as their taxi pulled away. Once it was out of sight, she turned and leisurely strolled back to Bruce’s room.
He answered the door looking irritatingly attractive wearing t-shirt and shorts with his hair damp from a shower. She kissed his cheek chastely then tossed her bags on the floor and her beach hat on the couch. The room had already been cleaned and tidied, all evidence of their passionate night eradicated.
“Did you find…?” She looked around the room for her underwear that she lost earlier.
He gave her a guarded look before nodding yes.
She grinned at his almost bashful expression. “Am I getting them back or do you have something else in mind?”
At that he smiled and she couldn’t resist going to him for a kiss which ending up being more involved than she intended.
They were soon interrupted by a knock on the door signaling the arrival of their breakfast. With a nod to the two of them, the hotel employee wheeled the room service cart out onto the balcony. He then proceeded to set the table in a style that seemed way too fancy for breakfast. When he uncovered the cart to reveal two gas stoves, Selina realized the guy was actually going to prepare their food here and now.
“Wow,” she said. “You know, for me, at my room, they just drop off a tray and leave.”
“Ordered a lot of room service, did you?” He asked, and Selina got the feeling that he knew about all her room charges.
She didn’t answer him but walked to the glass sliding doors that opened onto the spacious balcony to watch the chef work. The guy wasn’t just some omelet maker you found at a buffet but a bona fide chef. He prepared their food with a skill and panache that she only saw on cooking shows.
Bruce touched her bare back, just below where her bikini top was tied, nudging her to step out onto the balcony. He held out a chair for her and as she sat down, the chef placed a napkin on her lap with more flourish than Selina felt was necessary. This level of service was mystifying but she suspected Bruce wasn’t doing all this to impress her. She guessed that some habits of the wealthy were probably difficult to shed. She also guessed that if this man was really broke, then she was the Flying Nun.
The chef completed the food preparation and, as unobtrusively as possible, packed up his gear and quietly left.
Bruce’s breakfast was appallingly healthy. An egg white omelet with lots of vegetables, fruit on the side, no bread, no butter, no oil, no meat: it was the opposite of hers. She slathered a generous amount of butter on every pancake then drenched her plate in hot maple syrup.
“I didn’t notice your fine ocean view earlier,” she said as she dipped her sausage in the syrup. The balcony was no more than fifty feet from the edge of the sea and was constructed in a manner that felt private, as if there were no other guest rooms in the vicinity. “If I wanted to see the ocean from my room, I had to stand on a little table on the furthest corner and crane my neck just to get a glimpse. I almost killed myself, you know. Thank God I didn’t. That would have been so embarrassing.”
“Yeah…embarrassing,” Bruce said, amused.
“So…” Selina said. “What do you want to do today?”
He gazed at her for a moment before answering and, not for the first time, she wished she could read his mind. “The beach is there…” he said gesturing in the direction of the ocean as his gaze flicked from her chest to her face. “And you’re already dressed for it.”
“Yeah, I wasn’t really expecting all this. Just pancakes. And I don’t usually dress up for pancakes.”
“I’m not complaining.”
“I didn’t think you were,” she said as they held a long look.
“What is your plan?” Bruce asked, his neutral tone indicated he wasn’t talking about her plan for the day.
“My plan?”
“What are you going to do after…this?”
The ‘this’ he avoided finding a name for was as perplexing for her as it was for him. For her, the plan was to engage in a little harmless fuckery, amiably go their separate ways then continue her journey in figuring out what she wants to do with the rest of her life.
“My ‘plan’ if you can call it that is to go where the winds blow me.”
“Really?” He looked skeptical.
“Yes. You should try it sometime.”
“What, roam the earth with no purpose?”
“Why not?” She leaned forward, her elbow resting on the glass topped table, her chin on her palm. “But to give you a specific answer to your question, I considered hopping on a bus and seeing the country. Go to the mountains. Or to Kingston. After that…” She shrugged.
“What about you?” She asked the question in the most off hand way possible.
“I have no idea,” he said with a rueful smile before meeting her steady gaze.
Selina would have been very surprised if he had presented a well thought out plan of his life post recluse, post Batman. What did one do after such an existence? She was having enough trouble figuring out her own life she could hardly imagine what he was going through.
She tossed her napkin on her mostly empty plate then rose and walked to him. “Well,” she said, leaning on the table, her hip next to his glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. “I hear the Blue Mountains are nice. Rainforests, waterfalls, nature stuff.”
“Are you a fan of nature?” He asked, taking her hand, his thumb lightly rubbing her palm.
“I’m a city girl. Nature mystifies me. Naturally, I want to go look at it.”
“Makes sense.”
“So, you wanna come?” She rolled her eyes at her the unintentional suggestiveness of her question. “With me?”
“Maybe,” he said, but she knew he did.
“How could you not want to? I’m the most fun you’ve had in…ever.”
He nodded in agreement, his eyes not leaving hers.
She dismissed the pang of lust his hot look elicited. Maintain control, she reminded herself. “C’mon,” she said, pulling him to his feet. “Let’s go to the beach and be lazy all day.”
After the day lazing on the beach and the night spent being definitely not lazy, they left late the next morning. Instead of depending on the unreliable Jamaican bus system, Bruce had arranged for a Jeep. Selina suggested that they should just guess their way around the country saying “how hard could it be to find mountains?” and was impressed that he made it a whole twenty miles before pulling over to access detailed maps on his IPhone.
For the next few days, they travelled around Jamaica’s inland region. Selina liked seeing the Jamaica that wasn’t popular with tourists, making Bruce stop at markets, shacks that sold food, or whatever else caught her interest. Her fondness for meandering aimlessly through a foreign country was not rubbing off on him so every morning while still in bed he presented options giving her final say about where they would end up the next night. He, in turn, compromised by not meticulously planning their hotel visits by calling ahead for reservations at the closest thing he could find to a luxurious hotel. She didn’t think he minded the modest accommodations they stumbled on, all were clean with small but sturdy beds. “What more do we need?” She asked him the first night as he kissed her neck while hurriedly ridding her of her clothes.
He soon became comfortable with not hiding his lust for her. That look in his eyes, his desire for her, was more intoxicating than she ever would have imagined. They quickly learned all the things they liked, didn’t like and the things that drove each other blissfully crazy. What Selina found most surprising, and alarming, was how well they got along outside of bed. She surmised that their easy geniality was largely due to the unspoken agreement that barred them from venturing into sensitive topics. Which wasn’t terribly difficult as very little about this beautiful, sunny, vivid, wild country invited exploration into dark pasts. But sometimes it was tricky navigating around the unarticulated things; the more she learned about him the more she wanted to know everything.
“You know,” he said to her one evening as they ate their dinner at a small restaurant way off the beaten path. “You’re very nosy.”
She’d been peppering him with Batman questions wanting to know every detail of the suit. Why the ears? How bullet proof was it? How did he get it on and off? How hot was it? Was it terribly uncomfortable?
“I am not,” she replied with a little indignant huff. If she wanted to be nosy, she could think of far more invasive questions that could be asked.
“If you hadn’t been snooping around my drawing room I never would have found you.” Bruce looked like he had been dying to impart that little bit of information for quite a while. “You could’ve got my prints, left, and no one would have been the wiser. But, no, you just had to look in the safe, which I imagine was not part of your job, then you just had to poke around-”
“I was curious what a person does all day, every day, when they refuse to leave their house for years and years. That’s being curious.”
“I call it nosy.” He grinned, enjoying teasing her. “And there’s plenty to do at my house.”
“Like shooting arrows.”
“That and there’s a pool and a library and, well, it’s a big house.”
“So’s prison,” Selina said, wincing a little when she realized she’d spoken before thinking. Her guard was lowering.
“I read a lot,” Bruce responded, steering the conversation back into safer territory.
“Read what?” She asked as she peeled her shrimp.
“Books. Newspapers. Periodicals. Scientific journals”
“What kind of periodicals? Like porn?”
“See…that’s a nosy question!”
“Curiosity.”
“No porn,” he stated firmly.
“Hmmmm…and yet you have such an imagination about things,” she said giving him a look.
He tossed some cash on the table and took her hand, unmindful of the food not eaten. The modest guesthouse they were staying in was across the small street and they barely made it to the room where he put his imagination to very good use.
Part 4