Undercover missions as Batman were easy.
Undercover missions as Bruce?
Those were significantly harder.
Because Bruce Wayne had a reputation to maintain.
Billionaire.
Socialite.
Charming.
Never alone at charity events.
Which was exactly why tonight’s mission had become a problem.
The target expected Bruce Wayne to attend a gala.
With a date.
Showing up by himself would look suspicious.
Bringing a random model would be risky.
Asking one of the League members was out of the question.
And somehow, against all logic and reason—
Bruce had arrived at the worst possible solution.
His ex.
The former partner who already knew all of his bad habits.
The one person on Earth completely immune to the whole “Bruce Wayne” act.
The one who could read him like a book.
Alfred looked up from the Batcomputer.
“You look troubled, sir.”
“I need a date.”
“Ah.”
A pause.
“For the mission?”
“Yes.”
Another pause.
“And you’ve chosen…”
Silence.
Bruce looked away.
Alfred blinked once.
Then very slowly closed his book.
“No.”
“I haven’t asked yet.”
“You shouldn’t.”
“I don’t have many options.”
“You have literally millions of options.”
Bruce ignored him.
Because unfortunately, this made sense.
They already knew how to work together.
They could play a couple convincingly.
No explanations necessary.
No risks of anyone getting caught in the crossfire.
Logically—
it was the correct decision.
Emotionally?
A terrible one.
Because there was a reason they had broken up.
Several, actually.
And now he was considering calling them up and asking if they’d like to pretend to date him for an evening.
Alfred sighed.
The kind of sigh that came from years of watching Bruce make questionable choices.
“I assume you’ve already made up your mind.”
Silence.
Which was answer enough.
Bruce picked up his phone.
Stared at it.
Then stared a little longer.
This suddenly seemed significantly more difficult than fighting crime.
Finally, Alfred spoke again.
“Good luck, sir.”
Bruce looked up.
“That bad?”
“Respectfully?”
A pause.
“Much worse.”
And somewhere in Gotham—
completely unaware—
his ex was about to receive the most awkward phone call of their life.