I don't know what makes me ask him, or what makes him accept, but after an awkward and silent car ride through the city I invite Richard Grayson up to my penthouse.

So that is how I end up with my hot fiancé in my home on a Friday night, petting my cat on the sofa whilst I make coffee.

What am I doing?

"What are their names?" He suddenly asks. He's facing away from me, which is the first good thing. The second is that because of the size of my apartment he's miles away.

Which means I can sigh as many times as I want, because honestly, what am I doing? 

"The light coloured one is Cookie and the grey one is Luscious," I answer, tapping the chocolate powder over the milk froth. 

The cats were emotional support. Mom had hopes I would enter them in shows, because Cookie is a Scottish Fold and Luscious is a Burly British Shorthair. 

I'd rather neck myself though.

"Interesting names," he comments as I lift both mugs up.

"They're from a show I watch, called Empire," I tell him, taking a deep breath before I walk over to the open living room. I place the mugs on the coffee table in front of him.

"Oh yeah, what's that about?"

Awkwardly I sit on the opposite end of the sofa. I'm so busy continuously questioning myself that I hardly hear what he asks.

I'm me. I'm Cleopatra Perich. Who am I named after? Where have I been in the past few years? Who have I defeated? What have I lost?

This is nothing. This is easy. 

I slip into a more confident mood after that, leaning forward to grasp onto the handle of my mug. As I sit back, I flash my fiancé a small smile.

"Actually, it's about running a company that's entangled in crime. Empire, a media company primarily in music. It was started by one of the main characters, Luscious Lyon. He was a rapper from Philadelphia and with his wife, Cookie, built Empire. They did it illegally and Cookie took the fall and ended up in jail for seventeen years. It's about her re-entering the world, reconnecting with her three sons and fighting Luscious for the company," I explain, honestly the bare minimum of the show.

Up until now all that Nightwing without a mask must have seen of me is bitchiness and fakery. I suppose letting him know that I'm not all entirely-robot might make the next few months easier.

"Would you say you're learning from it?" He jokes, because we both know that in leading a company lessons come from anywhere.

But the question seems misplaced. He's looking at me with amused suspicion and I realise it's both a joke and a question.

"And why would I need to know how to fight someone for a company?"

From those words the atmosphere seems to sink, becoming heavy. The brief elevation that existed has faded now with the reminder that we're both part of a scam.

"I don't know, why would you?" He asks with a charming grin that really is the money maker. It doesn't do much to diffuse anything like he might hope.

Despite that I keep up the amused and interested glint I must have in my eye. I am amused and I am interested, but only because of what he is implying.

"What did you think of me exactly?" I ask, glancing away just to place my coffee down. "That I was the type of girl to trick my father by convincing him to marry me into one of the richest companies in the world? Because I have literally no interest in Perich Inc., or Wayne Enterprises for that matter."

The charming smile is gone now, replaced by genuine confusion.

"Then...why go along with your father's plan? Accept the proposal? If you really didn't care, you'd just disregard it, right?"

I nod, "Yes, I could have. But there is one thing that would have jeopardised; my family. Losing the company would destroy us. Rejecting the marriage means he'll place it on Fantasia or any of my other siblings. I can't have that. So I'll take it."

There are of course, other reasons. Like the fact that if I don't marry you according to Rip Hunter the universe will fall to shreds. 

"But your brothers are having arranged marriages too, aren't they?" He frowns.

I smirk, "Oh, are they?"

There is an intrigued, almost mystical look in his crystalline eyes. It's as if he had a complete image of me and it's now flipping like mosaic tiles. I'm not that girl.

He jumps, when something in his pocket beeps. It sure as hell doesn't sound like a normal phone. I take another sip out of my mug.

"I uh, have to go," he says, already standing up. I look up at him, my fiancé, with an extra large build and pretty eyes, wearing smart-casual street clothes with hair sticking in all the right directions.

Honestly, I could have done worse.

"Thank you for driving me home," I reply, standing up as well.

"Thanks for the coffee."

We stare at each other awkwardly for a few seconds, before I swivel around and head towards the kitchen. I hear his footsteps retreating.

That's it? That was the point in this?

"Hey." 

The simple word is out of my mouth without permission. It stops Grayson before he can start down the hallway. Hands in his pockets he quickly turns towards me.

"I'm not a nice person," I start with, brilliantly, "so I don't care about anything you want to do, now or when we're married. Don't come home to me if you don't want to, seperate rooms every night, no talking, flash cards for the media. I don't care. I want this to be a contract, not a prison. Even if you're only doing it to catch my dad out. But I want to make three things very clear; if you take this company from my dad, you give it to me, or Ethan, or my mom. I want you and your family to be happy, so you should want the same for mine in return."

I speak bluntly, with no expression on my face. That in particular doesn't seem to phase him. Instead he turns fully to listen to me.

"Of course. What else?"

I didn't expect him to be so agreeable, at least without a lawyer present and a couple of contracts laid out.

"During that time...during all times, you will never ask about my time in the Elites. Understood?"

There's something there in those shining eyes when I say that, but instead of arguing he just nods.

My eyes set from expressionless to glare, when I remember the third rule.

"And most of all; if anything you do goes public, concerning that redhead, or anything that might ruin my reputation or my integrity, I will slice off your balls with a precision fillet and deliver them to her in a jar."

Instead of waiting for his response I turn back around and continue my way through the kitchen. After a few seconds I hear the elevator opening and closing.

He might have expected someone who is fake and conforming. Someone easily manipulated by their own family, instead of desiring to protect them.

But I'm not that girl.

◊

◊

When Mai shows up the next morning she lobs my car keys across the living-room in a fit of rage. Seeing an object of that size, flying through the air towards me, becomes a trigger. 

The word Grenade! on the tip of my tongue makes me choke, so I fight it down.

Immediately Mai is on the floor with me, panicking. Her fake bodyguard exterior is gone and Doctor Shinshou appears.

After a few attempts at pushing her away I give up and just lay there, letting her check vitals and whatnot, which is a complete overkill.

It was just a flashback and a hard dive, that's all.

In an hour everything dissolves to me sitting on the sofa watching TV and her in the kitchen, cooking, seeing as I can't.

There is a tension there. Not the usual frenemy one we have but an awkward one. Likely, it will disappear in a few days, but until now she'll feel guilty and I'll feel stupid.

"Do you think Grayson will figure it out?" She asks, at the end of my short telling on last night's Richard interaction.

"About you? I doubt it. Just keeps ignoring Todd's advances and act all stoic and serious. More than usual, anyway. They won't figure out you're actually my doctor," I tell her.

A lie.

She can't know the truth about the Waynes and, as an extension, the truth that they probably know every little detail about Mai's life from the moment she was born until now. 

"Right, right... Wait, 'Todd's advances'?"

I scoff, "You didn't notice his weird stares or half-assed bedroom eyes and the weird way he sniffs you when you pass by?"

Turning away from the documentary I'm watching, I find Mai to be as red as her dyed hair. Her eyes are boring into the pot on the stove and it makes me laugh. 

"Are you telling me you haven't noticed?"

"Of course not, idiot! I'm too busy watching you!"

"Hey hey, don't let me get in they way of your love life. We're going to be living close to them now. Have at it man," I joke. She doesn't realise I'm teasing her. I swear steam is pouring from her ears.

"A-As if! He looks like the kind of guy who was supposed to be the quarterback or something but ended up getting kicked off the team for hard drugs and sleeping with the entire cheerleading team only to get a concussion during a bar fight on crime alley while he's drinking away his woes and one day wake up in hospital after yet another fight and decides to turn his life around!" She suddenly blurts out in one go.

I spend a few seconds staring at her blankly. If it weren't for my practice in keeping up with hundreds of different Netflix shows, as well as a team of rowdy Elites, I might have missed all of that entirely.

Still, "What?"

My response annoys her.

"That's just...how I've imagined him," she argues, then turns back to the pot in an attempt to end the conversation.

"Wait wait wait, are you telling me you have some fantasy about Jason Todd being a low-life, ex-quarterback, drugged-up alcoholic who meets a doctor such as yourself who turns his life around?" I try to clear up.

The reaction is instantaneous, "Shut up! No! H-How...I said he decides he wants to change."

"In a hospital," I say back plainly, "like the one you used to work at."

Seemingly defeated in that area, she decides to turn the tables.

"I bet you have fantasies about your future husband!"

I make a vomiting motion paired with a strangled noise, "Absolutely not. About killing him, maybe, but no thank you."

She gives me a look of doubt, "He's hot."

"Yeah he's hot, and he's nice, but-"

Ah, shit. I can't think of anything negative about him. Not at this moment anyway. When Mai goes to respond with some bitey remark, her phone rings and she stops to answer it. I turn back to the documentary and watch the killer whales in their Dining With Shamu show, not bothering to listen to her.

Just as I reach out to pet Cookie beside me on the sofa, I feel Mai tap my shoulder. She shoves her iPad into my chest and I take it. When I face the screen towards me I understand the silence.

My name.

His name.

The two of us walking through the city with his arm around my waist.

Me getting into his car.

Us walking into my apartment.

There is none of him leaving, which I suppose is a good thing for the ultimate goal but that also means that the media have declined to represent the truth and are instead presenting falsities to form their story.

Oh well, it works to our favour, I suppose.

Guess it's time for that engagement ring.