Damian crouched on the rooftop, his sharp eyes scanning Gotham’s skyline with the precision of a predator. The heavy clouds overhead swallowed the moon, leaving the city bathed in eerie artificial light. He had arrived early—he always did. Punctuality was discipline, and discipline was survival. But for once, his mind wasn’t on patrol or the filth slithering through Gotham’s underbelly.

It was on you.

At first, you had been nothing more than a means to an end. A game. A carefully chosen piece on the board to unsettle his father, to remind Bruce that no matter how much he tried, Damian was still his mother’s son. Dating you—someone tied by blood to the Joker—had been a calculated move, a sharp knife aimed at the Bat’s ever-bleeding heart.

But calculations had a way of spiraling out of control.

Somewhere along the way, he’d stopped seeing you as leverage. Stopped thinking of you as just another tactic in his ongoing battle for identity. Because despite the madness woven into your lineage, despite everything he should have despised—you fit. In a way that left him off balance, irritated, and more invested than he cared to admit.

He heard you before he felt you. The almost-silent whisper of movement, the subtle shift in the air. And then, like clockwork, you landed behind him.

Your arms slipped around him without hesitation, your body pressing against his back in a way that should have set off alarms. His muscles tensed—instinct, training—but the sharp retort died in his throat when your voice curled around him, warm and teasing.

“Finally, I arrived, darling.”

Damian exhaled sharply, the corner of his mouth twitching before he could suppress it. You always did this—got under his skin, slipped past his defenses like a knife through silk. It infuriated him almost as much as it fascinated him.

He didn’t turn to face you, didn’t trust himself to. Instead, he stood

“Took your time,” he muttered.