Bruce's first instinct, wild and revelatory and thoroughly humiliating: to shield Clark from his own partner. He resisted it, barely, one boot twitching a few inches in the wrong direction. Clark, of course, noticed.

Lois might have noticed too, but Bruce didn't know her well enough to make such a determination. Certainly he shouldn't have counted on her not noticing other things.

"Conference room?"

"Lead the way," Lois said, as cold as Alfred when Bruce decided to patrol with a knee injury, and significantly less readable.

Bruce, out of options, obeyed. Lois strode past him without bothering to check the room, sitting down at the head of the table. Bruce closed the door behind Clark, engaged the security system, performed a mostly-prefunctory sweep of the room, and settled down at Lois's right hand, across the table from Clark.

Clark, unable to be anyone but himself, broke their uneasy silence immediately. "Lois, you have to understand, I didn't want to --"

"No." Lois held up a hand. "This isn't about you, Clark. And it's not about you either." Bright green eyes turned towards him, giving the uncanny impression of a gaze met despite his mask. "Bruce."

In for a penny. He took his cowl off and chuckled ruefully. "I don't suppose 'no comment' would suffice, would it, Ms. Lane?"

"This isn't an interview." An amusing comment, he thought, from a woman with a legal pad and brutally efficient shorthand. "Nor is it a request for comment from Bruce Wayne."

He tried a smile. "Then may I ask what it is? A proposal that we alter our...arrangement?"

"Bruce," Clark said quietly, at the same time Lois snapped, "Cut the shit, Bruce. You look ridiculous, you know. The useless-idiot tabloid routine doesn't work in that."

He couldn't ignore the solid thwack of her hand against his armor. He caught her wrist, meeting her gaze again, feeling the sweat at the base of his neck with unwelcome acuity.

"Lois," Clark said, still quiet but distinctly unhappy.

Bruce had taken off his gloves. He could feel her pulse, predictably steady, not elevated at all. Well, she had been here first. Bruce would feel confident as well, if he had such power to dictate the terms of his partner's life.

"Cards on the table," she said, not looking away from Bruce. "Clark. Obviously I'm not going to tell everyone, so stop looking like I stole your gingerbread house."

"I never made one of those. Ma said they're wasteful."

"Bruce. Quit acting. I can't talk to you like this."

Unfortunately, he couldn't. Literally. He tried, releasing her wrist and taking a deep breath, letting it out slowly, centering himself beneath Clark's gaze. But then he opened his mouth and said, "You look remarkably well-rested for someone who's uncovered the scoop of the century. Unless you already filed with the Planet? Are we in final legal review?"

"Bruce," Clark said again, unhappiness shading into the kind of upset Bruce had never heard from him before. Because Bruce held this part of himself back in front of Clark, of course, as much as possible. When he'd let it slip last time, also with Lois, Clark's expression had been flat and tense as he fucked Bruce into the mattress. An unusual dynamic between them, though not unprecedented. Bruce hadn't taken it as a chastisement because Clark hadn't meant it that way. It was only Clark resisting an accurate understanding of Bruce's mindset, his character.

Not so with Lois. Her eyes flickered between Clark and Bruce, and then she pressed her lips together and set her notepad down on the (cheap; Bruce had been overruled during office requisitions) table. "You're fucking it up with Clark right now," she said, and she had the nerve to make her tone kind. The generous, understanding wife, throwing her husband's lover a bone, since she got to have the whole meal.

Never mind that Clark and Lois weren't married, that Clark was painstaking in his division of time, that Bruce would have turned Clark down if he'd suggested they marry. None of that mattered; he didn't think of any of it. He only looked at Lois, too-sharp green eyes with a killer's mindset, and felt his body do its best to burn from the inside.

"He's not," Clark said, too late for it to be true. Bruce snorted and found himself finally -- thank God -- able to break Lois's gaze. She didn't seem to mind, or more accurately, she minded too much to give him even a hint of her true state of mind. She was a statue, a beautiful heterosexual Ma-Kent-appropriate statue, and Bruce -- Bruce felt like he rarely had since Dick had come back to Gotham. Helpless, furious, scattered. Emotional.

"Clark," he said. "I --"

"I don't think you need to apologize." Clark's tone was sharp, his expression mulish. Not accusatory: he understood what he was asking Lois to accept. But still, he asked. "I think we did our best, I did my best to be honest, and there's no need to reconsider. Anything. Nothing has to change."

"Some things have to change," Lois said. "Perry'll notice if I recuse myself on Batman stories, you know."

It was, unfortunately, an eminently fair point. Lois had run interference for Clark, even though she hadn't known why Clark didn't want to cover Batman, beyond the obvious conflict of interest presented by their alter egos. Clark had told Bruce about her efforts during one of the many phases of discomfort he'd gone through, desperately wanting to continue their arrangement and also feeling "like the kid with his hand in the cookie jar, Bruce, and Ma hated that." Even filtered through Clark's pep-rally-booster cheer, it had sounded like a good thing to do. A nice thing. The kind of thing you did for your partner when you were in love, even if you had to share him with someone you'd happily feed to the wolves.

"...reassign. Bruce?"

He closed his eyes in frustration, then remembered his cowl was off and opened them with a jolt of panic at his own pathetic lack of situational awareness. Clark's expression just sort of collapsed at that; he'd have heard the kick of Bruce's heartbeat, his adrenal system never quite accepting its master. "I. My apologies, reassign how?"

It was Lois who jumped in, Clark who snapped his jaw shut with a goofily grateful expression. She explained their discussion, that Bruce Wayne acting hostile towards Lois Lane would be more than enough reason to put another journalist on the Gotham beat. It was a thin plan, of course, lacking contingencies and competent threat analysis, brimming with assumptions about others' behavior that may not pan out, utterly absent any sense of urgency about what they might do if it didn't work. But Bruce wasn't shy with his guesses about others' behavior. The grimace on Lois's face indicated that she agreed with him: there wasn't a better plan. They would have to be optimists, and if Bruce had to get into print media to ensure Lois didn't lose her platform -- well, it wasn't a profitable vertical, to hear Lucius speak of it, but Bruce Wayne was permitted his little distractions.

All of this he decided without Lois or Clark's input. He only said, "I agree. I'll escalate open of business Wednesday."

"Gee, thanks," Lois said, dry as a bad sauvignon blanc.

Bruce kind of spasmed, a little. Repressed, barely, the urge to smile. Not a provoking smirk, no, but rather the grim half-smile of a co-conspirator. A 'we're in this shit together' smile. Absolutely inappropriate. He tried and failed to think of something to say; at the ten-second mark of his silence, Clark's big, warm hand landed on his thigh. "Bruce?"

"It's your night," Bruce said. "It's Tuesday. Barely even cocktail hour, in fact, so given we've agreed upon next steps, I see no reason to keep you." He stood up fluidly, smoothly, his heart rate under control, his breathing perfectly normal. "Clark, debrief is tomorrow, nine PM."

"I'll be there."

He would be. Bruce knew better than to count on Clark's selfishness or carelessness. But someone who knew him less well might be tempted to repeat himself. Clark and Lois had started staring at each other with warm, eager affection, wrapped up in a two-person world that could have shut out a tornado. It twisted the pit of his stomach, pointlessly, absurdly. There was nothing remarkable about the melting adoration of Clark's gaze. Bruce would feel that way too, if he'd left a beautiful woman planet-side for over a week. It wouldn't matter if Clark had been with him, kissing him, loving him. He still would miss what he lacked.

They said no further goodbyes. He left the Tower directly, bypassing the residential quarters.

Long ago, before Bruce had ever heard of the Flying Graysons, before Jason and Barbara and Cassandra and the rest of it, Bruce had decided it was best to live with the dreams.

He'd done his research back then and he'd kept himself updated in the intervening years. Nothing in the fields of neuroscience or psychiatry indicated he was incorrect in believing that his dreams were a useful valve from which to vent the pressure of his necessarily stressful life. If he dreamed about his leg being slowly sawed off, he wouldn't freeze the next time someone got a lucky hit in. If he relived Barbara's hollow-eyed rejection when he offered his condolences, he couldn't be duped by Scarecrow's attempt at replicating the same. The dreams were unimportant except in the sense that they served a specific and invaluable role in his day-to-day maintenance routine.

Waking up from this particular dream sorely tested his hypothesis.

In the dream, Lois had loomed over him. She wasn't holding anything so cliché as a riding crop; no, it was worse, personalized and in-character. Intimate. She had a single issue of the Daily Planet lying on Bruce's chest; she sat in one of Bruce's sitting room chairs, holding her notepad and gazing at him keenly.

"How long have you been jealous of Clark?" she asked, tapping her pen on paper. When Bruce clenched his jaw shut and refused to respond, she sighed, rubbing the crease between her eyes. "Clark. Again."

Clark's mouth, Clark's hands, bringing Bruce right to the edge and holding him in implacable too-gentle hands when he tried to fling himself over. When he tried to come, when he was desperate for it, hard and aching, thighs burning from how long he'd been desperately holding them open, keeping himself on offer.

"You can tell her, I promise. She won't do whatever you're afraid of," Clark said quietly, like he thought his love and trust was somehow communicable.

Bruce clenched his jaw and shook his head. His whole body jerked, his back arching, muscles painfully clenched against the agony of frustrated need.

"All right," Lois said. "Five minutes, Clark."

Silence, silence, silence. Dread. The deadly curl of Lois's hand on a nondescript blue Bic pen.

"How long have you been jealous of Clark," Lois said again, but this time she was naked, they both were, her tits smooth and perky and inches from him, somehow -- and horror shot through him, commingled with his orgasm. Too soon, he'd come too soon. He'd let them down.

He woke up right then, of course, not coming but right on the edge of it, grinding down into the mattress. He had exactly as long as it took to grip his cock and then it was all over, squeezing his eyes shut and doing his level best not to humiliate himself further by making any noise.

Not that anyone was around to hear. But sometimes he thought -- maybe Clark indulged, maybe Clark kept an ear out.

Pathetic. And an echo of the dream, these fleeting little longing thoughts, the baggage they brought with them. Avoidable, for months, when Lois only knew the half of it. Glaringly obvious now.

He'd have to do something about it. He stayed awake the rest of the morning trying to figure out what.

"So," Dick said, "we noticed you've been in Metropolis a lot lately."

Bruce drank another glass of champagne. The full glass. "We?"

"You know, me and the kids. Barbara. The usual." Dick sipped his own champagne, eyes scanning the crowd idly. The perfect picture of a bored spoiled son at a charity event, because Dick had always known how to play this role with precision and grace. "Clark and Lois break up?"

"No."

"Ah." Now it was Dick's turn to drain his glass. "Very, uh, modern?"

"Is that a question about my love life, or a statement?"

"A ha," Dick said. "Look, I wouldn't be bringing it up, except. You haven't quite been the same since your last League trip."

Well, fuck. "Did you and the others also discuss this?"

"No. This is a Dick Grayson original." He snagged two more flutes of champagne from a passing server, thanking her and then turning to hand one glass to Bruce, gaze fixed on him. "But I'm not wrong, am I?"

The hell of it was that he wasn't, and Bruce had always been very bad at prevaricating in front of Dick, much less to him. He said, "Later. This can't go past me and you."

"Aw, come on, you think people would eavesdrop on us here, at a cancer benefit? A cancer benefit for children?"

Bruce gave Dick an unamused look.

"All right, fine, I know the rules."

And so, on the ride back to the Manor a few hours later, Bruce said, "Lois knows about Batman."

"Well shit."

"And, to confirm your significantly more intrusive assumption: yes, I'm seeing Clark, and he's still seeing Lois."

Dick was silent for just long enough for Bruce's shoulders to marginally relax, hopeful that they could drop the subject altogether. They hadn't even left the highway before Dick proved optimism was an operational security risk. "So, Lois figured it out? Are you and she...I mean, is that a thing, then?"

"No," Bruce said, too sharply and too bluntly. Humiliatingly revelatory.

"Oh wow." Dick patted his knee. "Sorry, B."

"It is what it is," Bruce said, and endured Dick pulling all the usual faces in response to Bruce deploying cliché.

Dick didn't keep prying, a small mercy Bruce was embarrassingly grateful for. He told himself the truth couldn't possibly be so obvious to people who weren't his son. No one who didn't know him so well would realize what was happening when he skirted around the topic of Clark and Lois; hardly anyone knew of his dual identities, and even most people in that tiny group wouldn't know how little distance there was between 'she figured it out' and 'I'm desperate for her'.

And even Dick might not fully grasp that part. How bad it was, how deeply Bruce had managed to fall. A suspicious-minded person would reach the correct conclusion: he had been falling long before, and Lois' discovery only cemented his fate.

He hated introspection. In this case it was the only appropriate course of action. He applied himself to the task upon returning to the Cave, sitting at his desk and taking notes as he stepped through it.

How long had he been fixed on Lois? As long as he'd understood how Clark loved her, not just the fact of his love but its depth and endurance. Clark loved everyone, worthy and unworthy. Bruce was too selfish to hope he'd ever learn to be more discerning. He had dealt with Lois Lane, Daily Planet reporter, only a few times; he was familiar with her bylines, but he was also familiar with the ways careerists inflated their credentials. He thought Clark might be being lied to or taken advantage of. Then he thought Clark might be honestly in love with someone who would still abandon him in the end. Then he'd realized the first two were merely wishful thinking; on paper Lois was an accomplished and brilliant journalist with unimpeachable ethics and a strikingly powerful deductive mind, and in person she was all of those things and also completely, obviously, undeniably head-over-heels for Clark.

And Superman, of course. Bruce had been nothing to either of them when Lois had known Clark was also Superman. He should never have deceived himself regarding her character, knowing that, but the power of jealous hope had again outstripped common sense.

He thought, looking back, that he'd started falling before Clark had proposed this arrangement. Clark had coaxed them both out to dinner, he remembered, a quiet night at Clark's favorite Greek spot in Metropolis, the three of them crammed into a booth that hadn't been built for someone of Clark's height, Bruce's muscle mass. Lois had taken the aisle seat next to Clark, leaving Bruce alone on the other side of the booth, holding his head a little oddly so he didn't collide with a hanging pothos. Lois's eyes had flicked up to the pot two or three times, a tiny smirk lurking at the corner of her mouth; Bruce had thought, she notices everything. And that had been the point at which his preoccupation began, he thought, if not his fixation.

After Clark had suggested he date them both, after they'd worked out a schedule and basic ground rules, after Clark had spent the night with Lois and the afternoon with Bruce: that was the start of the full-on fixation. He'd smelled Lois's perfume on Clark's shirt and wondered if it was a deliberate rebuke, then gone into Clark's bedroom to find space cleared for him: half a nightstand, most of a dresser. Clark had said he'd told Lois he could share, too, wanted to share, but Lois had insisted upon subdividing the remaining space, operating on the logic that she and Bruce both had separate homes. It was sound reasoning. Bruce would have done the same, for the same reasons.

Bruce would have done the same: there. That was the source of the problem, the fixation, the fall. It wasn't narcissism, exactly. Or entirely. His preoccupation with Clark stemmed from delight in their differences, admiration at all the ways Clark understood, loved, and surpassed humanity. He was funny, smart, and always understood what Bruce was driving at and why. Of course Bruce loved him. But Lois...with Lois, it felt like she was the flint and he the tinder. When they butted heads, he felt lit from within. When he watched her dig into someone, even a suspect he'd have preferred to interrogate, he was suffused with an odd, wild joy, the same joy he'd felt watching a storm roll in over the Great Steppe. A challenge he wanted to meet.

A ridiculous way to feel about his boyfriend's partner. It had to be acknowledged. Clark was too nice to laugh at him, but Bruce could only hope Lois would see the truth and put him out of his misery, should they ever have to confront it. He couldn't bear to think about it too much.

So: the incident report. His feelings had germinated very early in his relationship with both of them. He had failed to curtail his obsession, or even adequately acknowledge it; consequently, it had grown and deepened, entrenching itself in his emotional landscape. And now Lois knew his identity, and would consequently be more involved in both their lives, uncowed by any distancing lies Bruce might try to tell. When Clark had to meet Batman on one of his and Lois's nights, Lois could come. When Bruce needed Clark for one of Batman's investigations, Clark could tell Lois as much. Lois might even volunteer to help.

He considered that prospect. It evoked a feeling similar to claustrophobia. Could he prevent it? Not without revealing significantly more about his emotional state than he was comfortable with.

Contingency plans, then. Exposure therapy; compartmentalization; induced inhibition. He was an old hand at all of them. This preoccupation would not threaten his day-to-day work.

"Are you serious," Bruce couldn't stop himself from saying.

"Do I look like I'm joking?"

"You look like you always do."

"Wow, looks like I'm not joking." Lois clicked her pen. Ballpoint, this time. Still Bic, though this -- unfortunately -- wasn't a dream. "So: what do you know about Wayne Enterprise's antiquities purchases?"

There was no real danger inherent in this line of questioning. Sure, they were in public; undeniably, the 'public' in question was an alley frequented by Falcone's accounts receivables thugs. But Batman had spoken to reporters about this sort of thing before, including Wayne Enterprises business. It was more or less fair to corner him here and ask the same question she'd been asking anyone, cape or otherwise, who seemed like they might have a clue.

No, it was making Bruce's spine itch for the obvious reason: Lois's too-knowing gaze really was too fucking knowing, and Bruce, hatefully, didn't want to lie to her.

"Bruce Wayne might have a better answer for you," he managed to say, "though I've heard he rarely shows his face to reporters before cocktail hour. Excuse me."

A jump, a grapple, and he was free. For now.

Lois showed up at the Manor at eleven sharp. Bruce had been awake for fifteen minutes and was only just pouring coffee in the kitchen when Alfred appeared, said, "Miss Lane to see you, sir," and allowed Lois fucking Lane to stroll into his sanctum and hop onto one of the breakfast bar stools.

"Make yourself at home," Bruce said, sipping his coffee and glaring at Alfred.

Alfred, of course, didn't make any pretense of backing down. "Quite."

"We've had tea in here before," Lois said. Not an apology, but half an explanation, delivered with a very direct look.

She was always looking at him. It made him itch. Clark would never stop laughing if he admitted as much. "Let me finish my coffee. Then we can talk."

If she picked up on how grudging he felt -- and really, how could she not -- she didn't let on. Alfred went about his day-to-day duties and Lois typed energetically on a slim laptop. One mug, then two; his brain, reluctantly, came online. "All right. Follow me."

With the decision made, he saw no reason to postpone its consequences. He led Lois directly to the Cave, not bothering to obscure the security system or hidden entrance. She had no recording devices running, or his systems would have caught them, but he doubted that mattered with her. She surveyed the Cave once, twice, three times, gaze pausing on Jason's case each time. After this, he was certain she'd be able to recount the whole thing from memory with great accuracy. He'd already accepted the risk.

"This is where I do my work. Where we do our work."

"Clark?"

"Has his own access code."

Lois didn't do anything so gauche as ask for one of her own. She smiled a little, walking over to his computer and setting two fingers lightly on its chassis. "Old-school."

"Several orders of magnitude more powerful than it was when first installed," Bruce allowed.

"Very impressive." She nodded towards the far end of the Cave. "Holographic training rooms?"

"Similar to the ones the Justice League uses, yes."

"Nice. And a full gym, of course. Climbing, tumbling. Vehicles." She quirked an eyebrow. "Closets -- disguises, I assume?"

Bruce nodded.

"Wow. Gotta say, this is about as comprehensive as I'd expect from Batman." She turned in a slow circle, tilting her head up towards the endless dark of the caves. She looked beautiful like this; Bruce didn't want to notice, but once he had, he couldn't stop. Her elegant hands turned, palms upward, like she was absorbing the slightly humid air through her palms. Her thick, soft-looking hair escaping its ponytail around her temples. Her jaw, sharp and uncompromising, slackened slightly in awe as she took in the scope of Bruce's excavation.

"Seventy thousand tons of concrete," Lois said, tapping the floor with one well-worn leather pump. And Bruce understood the trap closing around him.

Too late to do anything about it, though. He only shrugged. "A bit more." Several times more. "But yes, this is where it ended up."

"Amazing. I really mean that, Bruce. What an accomplishment."

Those eyes, fixed on him again. He fought the urge to say something, do something, to keep them there. Not now. Not ever, really, for the two of them, but especially not now. "Thank you."

"You're welcome. But there's something I don't see anywhere. Not even in the closet, I'd bet, though that's just my gut speaking. You understand."

That a three-time Pulitzer winner's gut was worth its weight in gold? Bruce did.

"What I don't see anywhere...are antiquities. Of any kind. Nor is there any record of them in your office, or on display, or donated to local museums. Or national museums, for that matter." Lois clicked her nails on Bruce's keyboard. "I have absolutely no doubt that neither you nor Batman nor Bruce Wayne nor any of your associates are donating money to All of Metropolis. They don't share your political leanings, but even if they did, you wouldn't move money for them like that. But that raises another question. Why antiquities, Bruce? If you can't answer, it'll become a story I chase down. I need you to understand that."

For a horrible, frozen moment, Bruce wanted very badly to laugh. How many times had he delivered precisely this warning? How often had he urged people -- millionaires, petty thieves, billionaires, mobsters -- to tell him what he needed to know and let him focus on someone else? Lois's delivery came with a pen to paper rather than a batarang to the throat, but that was a distinction without a difference.

He managed, barely, to contain his laugh. He cleared his throat and said, "I understand." About this, certainly. About Clark, more and more. He wondered, very briefly, what she'd do if he said that. Slap him, ideally.

"Then if you understand, hopefully you'll also tell me what I need to know."

He'd already decided. "It's nothing. I mean that literally. The antiquities themselves follow a restoration and repatriation process, or they're donated to an unrelated party. The latter is significantly rarer, which is why you haven't found any yet. The acquisition is practical: several of Batman and Superman's enemies are very interested in antiquities, for magical or scientific purposes. If we, Wayne Enterprises, acquire them first, we can confirm they're unlikely to be exploited for sinister means."

"So it's catch-and-release for potential magical objects?"

"Yes."

Lois sighed. "Well, that's not something Perry'll want, at least."

"You're not eager to unmask The Batman for your boss?"

"I'm not eager to embroil myself in an ethical quagmire, no."

Dry as dust, eyeing him up like she was reconsidering something, and maybe it was this juxtaposition in tone and content that made him want to just -- push. Pull. Unravel the odd thread between them. "Biggest story of your career and you're going to bury it. Speaking of ethical quagmires."

"That's the second time you've said that." Tap-tap-tap went Lois's pen against Bruce's desk. "But it's not true."

"What scoop could you possibly get that's bigger than Batman's identity?"

If Clark were here, he'd make that little hangdog face he was so good at. But Clark wasn't here, and Lois only laughed, bitter and sharp. "Celebrity gossip will never be one of the biggest scoops of my career, Bruce, thank you so much. I think we're done here." She brushed past him, thwacking his chest with her hand as she did. "Thanks again."

And then -- it was over. Lois left; Bruce had nothing else to do but get to work. He had no reason to keep thinking about it, about her. Wondering, worrying. Turning her over in his mind like enough tumbles might turn craggy rock into smooth gem. Absolutely no reason.

"Does it bother you that Lois is sitting on this story?" he asked that night, within five minutes of kissing Clark hello. Christ.

"Ummmmmmm." Clark paused midway through unbuttoning his shirt, blinking at Bruce with confusion, a painfully attractive picture that would have amounted to coy artifice if Clark were anyone else on the planet. "No? I mean, why would it?"

"I won't claim to be particularly educated on journalistic ethics, but Lois is now sitting on an absolutely enormous story with far-reaching implications in Metropolis and Gotham; in fact, she's made herself part of this story, and could change her mind regarding disclosure at any time. Seems like an ethical quagmire."

"Ha. Well, maybe." Clark finished unbuttoning his shirt, hanging it carefully over the chair. Just in case he wanted to be company-ready later. Bruce hated the way it made his chest feel a little tight, endearment worming its way into his rib cage. "If I were reading about it in the Planet, I mean if I didn't know her or you or myself at all, I guess I'd think it was wrong. But you know Lois."

"Do I?"

Clark made a face at him. "She'd throw her credentials into the Atlantic before she let her feelings overrule her ethics. She's keeping my secret and she always will, and when there's a real conflict of interest, she figures out a different way to disentangle herself. She'll do the same for you. So no, it doesn't bother me."

For a moment, Bruce wondered if Clark understood the false equivalency he'd drawn via casual assumption that Lois had the same drive to protect Bruce as she did Clark. But Clark wasn't stupid and rarely spoke without thinking. If Bruce interrogated the premise, he was sure Clark would dig into Lois's care for him, Clark, how it affected her attitude towards Clark's close associates, and why that meant Bruce was safe. Bruce wasn't even sure he disagreed, but he wanted to pick at the assumption anyway, which meant he absolutely shouldn't.

"All right," he forced himself to say. "Have I mentioned you look good like this?" Clark's undershirt was worn and stained; his jeans had seen better days. He'd been out and about today, Bruce surmised, chasing a story or a lead, for himself or for Lois. He saw her every day, worked with her, fucked her. Loved her. Bruce was lucky to have made it this far.

Clark quirked an eyebrow. "Once or twice. Want to show me you mean it?"

"Sure. Come here."

Clark kissed generously, an open-mouthed slide of lips and tongue. On the nights when Bruce's sins had caught up with him, Clark let Bruce bend him over and fuck him, make him beg for it, until Bruce thought he might be able to sleep. Most of the time, it was Clark who bent Bruce over, Clark who gently bullied Bruce onto the bed and climbed between his legs. It was Clark, now, who rolled Bruce onto his hands and knees, sliding two lubed fingers over Bruce's ass and then pressing, almost too gently, inside.

Bruce loved it. Savored it, even on the days when he felt more or less certain he'd get to have this again. Clark acted like sex was brand new every single time, and Bruce had gone from being warily charmed to finding it hopelessly hot: the little gasp Clark let out when Bruce spread his legs and arched his back, the way he whispered, "Oh my God, Bruce," when Bruce fucked himself back onto Clark's hand. He'd done this before, God willing he'd do it again, and every single time Clark would act like Bruce's body was some kind of revelation.

"You're so perfect," Clark whispered, fucking inside him. Big and broad, heavy and hot, need lighting up Bruce's spine. He grunted in response, moving his head back until Clark could capture his lips for a kiss. And --

And he wondered, in the part of his mind he didn't have enough self-control to silence, if Clark was like this with Lois, too.

Even now, with Clark thick and hot inside him, with his own breath ragged and noisy, he could squash that thought. Box it away, at least, so it didn't grow. He focused on Clark's hands on his hips, Clark kissing the back of his neck. Clark, whispering Bruce's name as he came deep inside, cupping one huge hand around Bruce's cock to bring him along for the ride.

"Fuck, that was really good," Clark said into Bruce's back. They'd lain together awhile, Clark pulling out and then plastering himself against Bruce like he thought Bruce might run away. Which Bruce had, once, out of panicked self-hatred. Clark clung to the idea that he could physically prevent a relapse.

"Yes. It usually is." Bruce kissed Clark's hand, played with his fingers.

"Do you think we should all go to dinner? The three of us?"

It felt like missing a stair while carrying a heavy load, or like when Dick had moved out. A sudden absence of anything making sense, followed by throttled panic. "The three of us? You mean us, with Lois?"

"Mm-hm."

Bruce was not at his most eloquent post-orgasm. All he could think to say was absolutely not, are you insane.

"You think it's a bad idea."

"I think." He forced himself to breathe. To think. Rolling over helped, being able to see Clark's bright eyes and utterly guileless expression. "I think it's...nice...that you want to. Take advantage of Lois's newfound knowledge, to bring us closer. But."

Clark screwed up his face in a rueful grimace. He was so stupidly beautiful, Bruce thought, never more than after he'd come, flushed and joyful with it. "I know. It would be weird! I swear, Bruce, I really do know that. I know it's not how it is for me, with you guys. I just thought it might be good to, I don't know, clear the air. Somewhere nicer than the Watchtower."

"The Watchtower's pretty nice," Bruce said mildly.

"For dinner, I meant."

"When you say 'how it is for me': you mean that you're in love with both of us. Correct?"

Clark nodded, looking like he wanted very badly to hide his face. Bruce leaned in and kissed him, coaxing, reassuring. More reassuring than he actually felt, but that couldn't be helped. He made himself say it: "It's okay, Clark. I understand what you mean. If you want to get dinner, just let me know. I'll set it up."

"Lois might not want to let either of us pick the restaurant."

"I'm the one with the least reasonable security requirements. I can give Lois a list of restaurants that meet those requirements, and you two can make the final choice."

"She'll make the final choice. I have bad taste."

"Well, I didn't say it," Bruce demurred, and allowed Clark to tackle him down, laughing, for round two.

So he was going on a date with his partner and his partner's partner. Fine.

He and Alfred had a shortlist of restaurants for engagements like these (well, no; fake dates for Bruce Wayne, but they had identical security requirements), but they were all in Gotham. Bruce created his own Metropolis list, three restaurants with good sightlines, clean owners, and feasible points of exit for Batman and Superman. He sent it over to Clark with a note about each option: ramen, Italian, Oaxacan. Clark replied: funny - that's me and Lois's favorite ramen place. Let's go there. :)))

It would be humiliatingly revealing to revise the list. Bruce squashed the urge, and their reservation went forward.

Logistics dictated timing; they met at Metropolis Mega Ramen that Friday night. Clark and Bruce were dressed similarly, slacks and button-downs as work dictated, but Lois...

Lois, Bruce noticed too quickly and thoroughly, must have changed or structured her professional attire very cleverly. She wore pumps and slim-fit slacks, a plunging v-neck blouse that was almost certainly silk, and a single pendant necklace. Her hair was still pulled back, but she'd styled the ponytail into a sleek curl. She looked good; she looked a little mean. She looked like most of the women Bruce had ever wanted, and very few of the women Bruce Wayne had ever slept with.

"I didn't actually think this place took reservations," Clark said.

"They don't." But they met every other requirement, including being a place he'd thought Clark would want to step foot in, and any restaurant became the sort that took reservations when Bruce Wayne's assistant called.

Still, some creeping sense of not-quite-rightness made him ask, "Is there an issue with our seat? The service?"

"Well, we've only just sat down," Lois said. "At least let them screw up my order first."

For a moment Bruce wasn't sure if he was meant to be chastised. Then Clark laughed and Lois's lips curved in one of those almost-mean little smiles of hers, and he was able to relax.

No one's order got screwed up. Lois carried them through the main course on the strength of a rousing story about legal review of her last published piece, and Clark happily chattered about the farm through dessert. Then two sets of bright eyes turned towards Bruce as he handed the waitress his card.

Bruce tried for a smile. "Second location for drinks, or are we too old for that?"

"You look like you might just go puke in the bar bathroom." Only from Clark would such a statement sound gentle. "What if we went back to my apartment? Or -- " His eyes flickered towards Lois.

Never let it be said Bruce would miss a cue. "No need. I'm in Metropolis for the week; we can go back to my penthouse. Alfred's got a better mind for cocktails than whatever mixologist is working the Flowerhouse tonight."

Lois snorted and slapped his arm. "Nice one. Yeah, I'm down. Smallville?"

Clark answered. Bruce was sure of it: Clark had impeccable manners and wouldn't have just grunted or even nodded. But Bruce didn't hear his response, or Lois's flirty rejoinder, because it was only early autumn: Bruce wore a linen button-down. All of his attention was focused on the burning memory of Lois's hand on his arm, the way his skin screamed to be touched again.

Thank God, this wasn't the sort of restaurant where settling a check was such a delicate process that he'd be left alone for his horrible, horny reverie. The waitress all but shoved the card tray in his face, and within five minutes they were back in the car, Bruce behind the wheel, Clark --

"Absolutely not," Bruce said when he tried to slide in the front. "Don't leave Lois alone back there."

"I'm fine," Lois said, over Clark's, "But I don't want to leave you alone!"

Bruce put the car back in park. Pointedly. "The backseat, Clark."

He wasn't sure why that, of all things, made Clark flush, bright red from nose to -- well, navel at least; Kryptonian circulation was a marvel. Before he had a chance to ask, Clark was sitting in the backseat, pressed against the door, looking as awkward as a teenager on his first date. Bruce watched in the rear view mirror as Lois rolled her eyes and tugged Clark close, long fingers tangling in his hair.

She met his gaze in the mirror. "I think we're good."

He looked away. He turned the car on. He drove at precisely the speed limit until they reached the penthouse.

Alfred had been alerted by the penthouse's central computer, so by the time they made it to the door, he was already setting a glass of water on the counter. Bruce doubted his pause and recalibration was visible to anyone but him, but pause Alfred did, his eyes flicking between Lois and Clark before finally landing, judgmentally, on Bruce.

"You've fraternized one too many times, Alfred," Bruce said. "Clark angled for an invitation back here. He wants a drink."

"I did not!" Clark protested, but he was laughing, and then Lois was laughing at him: the icebreaker had done its job. Alfred was happy to prepare drinks, and happier to leave them to it, making noises about needing to do something upstairs.

("Your penthouse is two floors," Lois said. When Bruce shrugged, she poured herself another shot of whiskey.)

The penthouse's kitchen had never seen such a party. Bruce leaned against the interior of the breakfast bar, a careless elbow away from the sink. Lois and Clark sat across from him, their knees very obviously pressed together under the counter. Lois's cheeks were lightly flushed, and her blouse - well, it was a v-neck. She kept leaning over, her pendant flashing in the light.

Bruce felt dizzy. Hungry. Despite the fact that Clark and Lois were arguing about wheat yields, of all things.

"It just doesn't make sense," Lois said. She gestured with her drink, nodding thanks to Clark when he super-sped his hand over to keep it from spilling. "I get that the whole regenerative soil thing is so they use less fertilizer, but why are yields a third lower?"

"It's the herbicide," Clark said. "Or lack thereof. I mean, if you kill everything but the corn, the corn's gonna do better."

"But the soil's supposed to be so much better!"

"Have you ever milked a cow?" Bruce asked Lois.

Silence. Bruce was also tipsy, also flushed. Clark, of course, wasn't. Well, he wasn't tipsy. He was flushed, biting his lip like he was trying not to laugh.

"That's the main thing I know about farming," Bruce said. "Cows."

He just wasn't expecting to get kissed over that. But Clark was apparently endeared by ignorance, a fascinating quality in a journalist. Bruce let himself get lost for a moment, warm skin and slick spit. But even tipsy, he felt Lois's gaze on his neck like a brand; even with Clark's hand on his jaw, he was acutely aware of the distance between himself and the two of them.

When they pulled away, Clark licked his lips and said, "I, um. We should...it's late? Probably get going?"

Bruce opened his mouth to gently mock Clark for his garbled phrasing. What came out was, "This apartment has four bedrooms. Take one."

Clark made an odd wheezing noise. Lois's eyes widened, just barely, still more expressive than Bruce would have expected. They looked at each other, a brief glance that nonetheless seemed to function as a full conversation; it was Lois who turned to Bruce and said, "You sure?"

We're going to fuck, she meant. You'll be alone and pathetic, she meant. But it wasn't like Bruce could back down now. "I wouldn't have offered if I wasn't. Alfred makes breakfast in the morning, it's a short commute. Why not?"

It was the wrong question to ask, Lois's wry expression informed him, the wrong question on top of a bunch of wrong statements, offers, and decisions. Too late. Clark said, "We'll take it, Bruce, thanks," and kissed him again.

And then they left him alone. Horribly turned on, feeling like he was burning from the inside out, completely alone in his enormous kitchen while Clark led Lois upstairs, their fingers tangled together.

Lois hesitated on the landing, turning to catch Bruce's gaze one last time. Bruce forced himself to look back, as placid as he'd been the first time a reporter asked him about The Bat-Man.

"Sleep well," Lois said. A taunt? A peace offering? He had no way of knowing, and Clark was too busy tugging Lois's hand to be of much help.

He waited, of course. Prepared some herbal tea and meditated in the living room, staring out over the twinkling lights of the city. He wasn't due to patrol tonight, but if he checked in, even Oracle wouldn't tell him to fuck off. But she would notice, and draw likely-correct conclusions about why his night off had become a night out. Whether she told Stephanie or not, the news would leak, and once Stephanie found out it would be a bona fide bat-mystery, and thus, soon solved. No, he couldn't show his face tonight, even if the flight wouldn't be a pain.

When an hour and fifteen minutes had passed, he rinsed his mug, turned on the dishwasher, and made his way upstairs. He expected to hear very little noise, maybe some music if they'd found the sound system, so the gasp and throaty Clark that greeted him made his breath thick in his throat.

He hurried down the hallway without waiting to see if Clark responded. He had to know, had to have heard Bruce coming, but there was no movement in the hallway; they'd chosen to mutually ignore one another, apparently.

That was good. It meant Bruce didn't have to feel guilty about what happened next.

He'd never felt more relieved to get a hand on his cock, more humiliated to know Clark could hear his bitten-off gasps and moans. It was normal, damn it, he had a completely average sex drive, but he felt ridiculous: guilty, illicit, his mind racing to remind him of the last time he and Clark had done this. Clark with his heels up by his ears, holding himself open for Bruce, bright red and clearly uncertain of himself yet determined to give Bruce what he'd said he wanted. Beautiful, trusting. All Bruce's, if only for that night.

He spread his own legs, fucking into his hand. His thoughts shifted, without his consent, to Lois. He didn't want to imagine how she might be in bed. Couldn't, if he wanted to stay sane; but maybe he'd already crossed that rubicon, because all he had to do was think of Lois's judgemental gaze on him, and he was coming.

He bit back any vocalization, stilled his shaking limbs as soon as he could. It was no use, of course. Clark had undoubtedly heard him.

"You're troubled."

"I'm busy," Bruce corrected, throwing another batarang.

The radar gun screen showed 120mph. Cassandra knocked the batarang away like he'd gently lobbed it. "Distracted." A kick that he parried, a strike that he didn't. "Sloppy."

"I apologize."

"That won't help." Another strike, then a kick, and this one landed. Bruce hid the practice mat with a subvocal oof.

He accepted her hand up. "What do you think will help?"

Cassandra cocked her head, making a face like she'd smelled something off, then shrugged. "Talking, maybe? An arrest? Depends on the problem."

He had to bite back the urge to congratulate her on her elocution. It wasn't something she needed anymore and it had never been something she wanted. But still, he felt pride warm him, even as he said, "What if I said it was relationship problems?"

"It's good to share. Emotional isolation is mentally and physically unhealthy and leads to compromised outcomes across a broad range of health concerns, including the ones that impact our work." She pointed a batarang at him. "Oracle."

That did, indeed, sound like something Barbara would say, in a strident tone, after having read multiple books on the topic. Bruce sighed, turning to begin a timed rope climb.

"Me too."

He managed not to fall, barely. Braced himself and climbed back down the ten feed he'd managed. "You too? You mean -- romantic problems?"

She nodded.

He had...no idea how to handle this. No clue of what to say. Cassandra looked at him, still so startlingly young, hands that had saved and ended lives hanging lax against her body. Five, even three years ago, he'd have cut this conversation short and gotten them back on track with training. Now, he couldn't imagine doing so; he saw the wrinkle in Cassandra's brow, the concern in her eyes, and knew that he couldn't coach her to forget about it. Compromised outcomes, indeed.

"We've been at this for three hours. What if I treat you to lunch?"

She lit up, nodding eagerly. Only after their burgers and fries had come and been demolished did she say, "It's Steph."

"...ah."

"You're not angry...?"

"Of course not."

"Surprised?"

Of course not, he didn't say again, wanting to spare her pride even though she'd read the lie on him. "Only a bit."

Sure enough, she kicked him lightly under the table. "She's beautiful. Smart. She is." As if he'd argue when he was trying to have a nice lunch. "And she's funny, makes me laugh...I like her. But I can't tell her."

"Tale as old as time," Bruce said. "If you're telling me this so I can provide advice, please know that it's not my strength."

"Ha ha ha ha ha," Cassandra said. "No. That's what Oracle is for."

It manifestly was not what Oracle was for, but if Barbara hadn't disclosed her own disastrous romantic history then Bruce wasn't going to do it for her. He could, however, offer his own vulnerability in return. "You know I've been seeing Clark."

Cassandra nodded.

"I find myself interested in Lois. His partner."

"Other partner?"

"They've been together for longer." And Bruce had no idea how Clark saw him, really, except of course that Clark loved him. But he loved everyone he bothered to spend time with, because his heart was too soft and open by half. "She's beautiful. Smart. Three Pulitzers and a fourth on the way, in all likelihood, and she, ah, knows. As well."

Cassandra's eyes widened slightly. "She knows? How?"

"Figured it out during my last business trip."

Cassandra thumped back against the booth. "Wow. The perfect woman."

"Indeed."

"Will you join them? All three?"

This was why he'd waited to finish eating before allowing discussion. "Unlikely."

"Thanksgiving?"

"They'll receive an invite." And hopefully wouldn't come; Bruce imagined they'd be too busy having their happy little nuclear family holiday at the Kent farm.

"Wow."

"Indeed." Bruce took a long sip of his water.

"Steph asked me to practice kissing and when I asked if she and Tim had never kissed despite their history, she invented a 'potato emergency' and left me alone on the roof."

Bruce didn't spit out his water because he was a vigilante and had also survived ten years of old-money etiquette lessons, but it was a near thing. He set his glass down very carefully. "You should talk to her."

Cassandra bit her lip. "But --"

The restaurant was empty and obscure enough that Bruce felt reasonably confident speaking bluntly, if not explicitly, of their shared life. "Cassandra. Talk to her. Clear the air. This sort of issue impacts mission readiness, it damages rapport in the field. You need to deal with it."

It was funny, he thought as he watched Cassandra muddle through the order. She and Dick shared no genetic material and had very little in common with regards to background, upbringing, culture, or personality. But for a moment, watching her face firm into a mask of nervous resolve, he saw Dick, right before his first date with Barbara. Pretending at a level of confidence he didn't feel, yes, but also biting back criticism of Bruce himself. A teenage rebellion, not quite finished curing.

"All right," Cassandra finally said. "I'll...talk to her."

She'd have sounded happier if Bruce ordered her to run a marathon. "Thank you."

"You'll talk to her too."

"To Steph?"

Cassandra raised her eyebrows and waited.

Bruce did not like being outmaneuvered by a teenager. "All right. I can commit to clearing the air with Lois."

"Timeline?" said his too-smart daughter.

"...end of year. It doesn't impact my combat readiness."

"Mmph." But that was good enough, apparently; they changed the subject to Tim's mycology research, and Bruce was free to put Lois-and-Clark back in the little box he reserved for feelings he didn't want to examine too closely.

Lois suggested the next dinner but Clark delivered the invitation, a breezy little aside dropped in among updates about the Planet and strikingly verbose musings on the relative value of getting a dog.

Bruce, of course, accepted, at which point Clark informed him that Lois had picked the restaurant, a Gotham hole-in-the-wall with the best Mediterranean food she'd ever eaten. It was consistent, Clark said, with what Lois had deduced to be his criteria for a secure location; maddeningly, when Bruce conducted his own analysis, he had to concur.

So: Mediterranean. Pointedly casual; jeans were practically dressing up. A waiter and front-of-house staff that didn't seem to know or care that they had Bruce Wayne in a south-facing booth. A cacophony of multilingual discussion behind the counter, betraying a need for a more modern ordering system. And, yes, the best ful Bruce had tasted in years.

"I used to take sources here all the time, they'd do an $8 lunch deal," Lois said. "Out of this world bang for your buck. A full platter of food and tea."

Bruce sipped his wine. "Used to?"

"Rent went up, I guess. Now it's $12 and Perry says take 'em to Starbucks, you know." Lois winked at Clark, who laughed. Journalist inside joke? Lois-and-Clark inside joke? Bruce declined to ask and tried not to wonder. He failed at the latter as they ordered their main courses and Clark engaged them in a discussion about Martha Kent's adventures with animal husbandry.

"So I told her, well, maybe renting out the goats is a good idea -- it's trendy! And Smallville has the revitalized downtown now, so there's lots of younger people with big houses and lawns they don't want to use gas mowers for, but -- "

"Hold that thought, Smallville." Lois answered her cell. "Hey, John, what's up? Oh, wow, already? No, no, I get it, you don't want...yeah, I can do that. I'm actually in Gotham right now." She met Bruce's gaze, for some reason, in order to mouth sorry. "Sure, of course. That works for me. See you in a bit. Thanks." She slipped her phone back in her bag before Bruce could even catch the make, much less her notifications. "So, this is so awkward -- I'm sorry, but -- "

"Source?" Clark said. "Lois, it's okay. I get it."

"I know you get it." She rolled her eyes, tone achingly fond. "Bruce, I promise this isn't a regular occurrence. But I need to go."

It was interesting, academically, being on this end of it. When Bruce had to leave dinner with Clark, Batman and Superman were usually both needed. "Of course. We'll catch up later."

No fond kiss for him, only a relieved smile and awkward wave. She was gone in moments, walking briskly north. No cab, Bruce noted. The source was close, or she intended to take the subway. "This doesn't happen often?"

"Well." Clark pushed his glasses up his nose, making an apologetic face. "Usually if a source calls, I just ride along."

"Like us."

"Like us," Clark said, seemingly without a hint of irony, envy, or nerves. Must be nice.

Well, nothing good was likely to come from that train of thought. "You're right, by the way, about the goats. Martha should consider it."

Clark looked as grateful as if he'd handed over a five-figure check. "You should tell her, she'll listen to you."

"I doubt she'd respect my domain knowledge as far as goats are concerned."

"Market trends, though." Clark kicked his ankle lightly under the table, smiling when Bruce met his gaze. "You're good at that stuff."

It was oddly tender, stupidly knowing. Bruce spared a moment's frustration with himself for failing to conceal his anxieties, then he pivoted, putting his hand over Clark's. Lifting it, kissing the knuckles. "Thank you."

By mutual agreement, they parted ways after dessert. Bruce hadn't arranged for anyone to cover his territory that night. A few hours after kissing Clark goodbye, he found himself on the edge of Gotham's Greektown, crouched on a fire escape, listening to a hushed conversation about a weapons transfer. It was roughly what he expected: multiple stakeholders, six figures' worth of illegal weaponry, and a guy ignominiously named 'Ugly Fredrico' who was brokering the whole deal. He got the recordings, tied up the culprits, called the police. Standard procedure.

Then, right before he fired the grapple gun, he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. Ronda's Diner, open and bustling despite the later hour, but that wasn't what had caught his eye. No: it was the people in the window. A nondescript man in a disheveled off-the-rack suit, nursing a coffee and one of Ronda's obscenely big slices of pie, talking to Lois Lane, her coat from dinner easily recognizable despite her beanie and tied-back hair, her plate of eggs and toast barely touched. Her nods sympathetic, her hand busy with her notepad.

Whatever their topic of conversation, it was unlikely to be Bat business. Bruce involved himself in all forms of injustice, certainly, but the Planet's best reporter on an issue meant the Bat almost certainly didn't need to help. There was no reason to hang around; plenty of other emergencies in the city, trouble he could find or that Oracle would send him to.

He tapped his communicator and made his way to the diner roof.

"Oracle. Ears, please."

"Seriously, B?"

"The sooner the better."

Barbara had a talent for judgemental silences, but she nonetheless obtained audio from the diner, piping it into Bruce's ear. He crouched on the roof as Lois said, "RICO's a pretty heavy set of charges. I'm sure you know that; they always give campaign finance types that training, right?"

"Not me. Not this campaign. I mean, they had us click through an online training. But it was fast, and then it was all, oh, Ted, take this bank slip, transfer this money. Hey, don't worry about the cash. You know? A lot of little moving pieces."

"Pieces you moved?"

"Well, I didn't know I could say no!"

He couldn't see Lois from this angle, and he didn't need to; asking for video feed would test Barbara's patience beyond the breaking point. He thus couldn't be sure if Lois understood the extent to which her source was lying. Her voice was warm and sympathetic, not a hint of judgment as she said, "Right, I get it. I mean, your job was on the line."

"Exactly. Look, if I give you this, you swear you won't say who you got it from? Promise me."

"Of course. On background, John, that means I don't attribute the information you give me." A pause. "It also means I publish the information, as much or as little as I need to support the story."

"I got that. I'm fine with that. They'll get the realtor for RICO maybe, not me."

"All right."

"He's handing her a USB drive," Barbara said.

"Understood," Bruce murmured. "And is she as sympathetic as she sounds?"

Barbara snorted. "Is Lois Lane sympathetic to a low-level employee of a PAC her story's going to nail on campaign finance fraud allegations? What do you think?"

"A simple 'no' would have sufficed."

"Well, we don't always get what we want in this life. Speaking of which, you're needed over by the docks. There's heat on N."

He'd already shot a grapple. "Understood."

It was only later, after some punching and kicking and debriefing, that he let himself think of Barbara's answer. What do you think, indeed.

Bruce thought he'd have done exactly what Lois had, at dinner. Bruce thought the Planet was wasting their best reporter by not giving her a publication of her own. Bruce thought he could probably buy the Planet or a similar newspaper and install Lois as editor-in-chief, and she'd spit in his face for it. Bruce thought that if this emotional state persisted, he'd be finding out soon whether or not embarrassment could kill.

It was date night and Clark had been different from the moment he greeted Bruce in the lobby of the bowling alley.

He didn't seem upset or concerned. He was attentive as they spoke, laughed at Bruce's jokes, argued with him about his favorite Metropolis pizza (potatoes, corn, and squash? No, Clark). But despite his seeming normalcy, despite his not mentioning any problem to Bruce, something was off, and Bruce couldn't ask about it. He'd have to admit what he'd noticed: that Clark was being too damn sweet.

He just kept -- looking at Bruce. Smiling softly at him. When they'd waited for mediocre torte, he'd played with Bruce's fingers on their table, stroking his thumb over Bruce's knuckles. He'd kissed Bruce on the cheek, so lightly, while they waited for the car. And now he moaned as he pressed inside Bruce, stroking a hand down Bruce's spine and then slowly, so carefully, pressing Bruce's face into the pillow, one enormous hand flat against Bruce's ribs as he snapped his hips exactly the way Bruce liked it.

"Harder," Bruce said, needy and unthinking in the way he could only be with Clark. Clark dropped a kiss on his shoulder and obliged, making Bruce feel pinned, hollowed out, full and needy and hungry.

He braced himself a little, knees to the bed, getting enough space to let his hips fuck into the sheets. Clark loved this, making Bruce so desperate that he could come just from a little friction against his cock. He rocked against the bed, hands sliding up towards the headboard, knocking into a pair of sunglasses under the pillow --

He didn't want to notice, was the thing. He was close to coming, he was desperate for more, he loved Clark with an intensity that felt all-consuming, and he wanted to ignore that the sunglasses were the wrong style, shape, and size to be Clark's. But he couldn't. He pulled them out from under the pillow, moving to set them on the nightstand.

"Bruce, what -- oh."

He returned his hand to the bed, gripped the sheets. Set his mind against the question of whether he could smell her shampoo, whether Clark had been so desperate for her that they hadn't even finished undressing before going to bed. "Can't let them get crushed."

"Oh my God," Clark said, a distant and lost noise. He collapsed forward, hauling Bruce up with one arm like he weighed nothing at all, setting his teeth to the meat of Bruce's neck. "Bruce, Bruce, I -- she -- Bruce."

"Yes," Bruce said, and Clark began to move again.

He lost track of time after that. Clark fucked him like he might never stop, drawing wrenching moans and gasps from Bruce, needy little noises he tried and failed to swallow. It was only after Clark had come inside him, only when Clark had him on his back with his legs splayed as wide as they could go, playing with his fucked-out hole, that Clark said, "We couldn't wait. It was after we got lunch with you on Tuesday, we came back here and she -- I was naked, she still had her coat on, she fingered me and made me come, she asked me what you'd think of what I looked like."

The only consolation was that it was Bruce's own hand on his cock when he came, so hard he nearly blacked out, thinking of Lois's slim, strong fingers wrenching moans from Clark. Clark wouldn't be able to feel the way Bruce's dick kicked when he said she asked me about you.

Slim consolation, given that Clark's fingers were hooked inside him, rubbing his prostate as his orgasm crested, holding politely still as Bruce clenched around him and then, slowly, shivering, came back down to Earth.

"Hi," Clark said, kissing him.

Through the strength of his desire not to make a fool of himself, Bruce managed not to demand to know if Clark's story was true. It was a near thing. Bitten lip, lack of coherent speech. Fortunately, Clark seemed to interpret his reticence as a sign that he'd come too hard to think straight, which had the benefit of being almost true.

Clark spooned him that night, a warm heavy weight making insomnia nearly impossible. But only nearly. Bruce spent a number of hours with his eyes open, staring at the sunglasses neatly folded only a few feet away.

Catastrophic collapse typically occurred immediately upon completion of an inherently flawed project or after a long period of insufficient inspection and repair. This was true of modern software, mainframe systems, bridges, tunnels, and, apparently, Bruce's psyche.

He had spent a year and a half more or less happy with his and Clark's arrangement. The parts that he disliked, he still found bearable, because the payoff was Clark's time and attention. His affection, his love. He'd thought he could continue indefinitely. He hadn't counted on finding himself exactly where he'd been the spring before last, messily desperate for something he couldn't have.

He'd never disliked Lois, but he'd also never particularly liked her, and he'd thought that was a shield: wanting her, being obsessed with her, respecting her, but not really liking her. It was disorienting and deeply unpleasant to find his own affections so rapidly altered. She was utterly absent from his life yet also somehow omnipresent: he saw the Planet being sold in Gotham newsstands, her favorite brand of sparkling water advertised in a bus shelter he passed on patrol, her byline on PBS Gotham's scrolling chyron.

And he thought of her. Often. Constantly. Not just in lecherous contexts, either. They'd turned dinner into a recurring, not quite weekly appointment, and he'd learned about Lois's favorite music, her love of animal husbandry, her dislike of blueberries, her unbelievable commitment to the Planet. She had a texture and depth that shouldn't have surprised Bruce, but continually did. She was something of a puzzle, and Bruce loved puzzles.

All of that, he could have dealt with, compartmentalized as unusual but welcome friendship. Pure sexual attraction, he also could have compartmentalized, a natural side effect of sharing Clark with her. But the two together were unbearable. Urgent. He felt affection, genuine and deep, and the worst part was he couldn't even fool himself into thinking he was betraying Clark. Clark bloomed during their dinners together. He actively sought to extend their evenings with drinks or coffee, sitting around a too-small cafe table or taking their now-usual stools at Bruce's penthouse. Bruce couldn't make himself take the sensible steps back that he knew he desperately needed, not when faced with Clark's bright eyes, flushed cheeks, and unvarnished, unashamed happiness.

"And this attachment is why Lois and Clark are now regular guests at the penthouse?"

Bruce eyed Alfred over his tea. He felt bone-tired, weary in a way he hadn't in years. He'd been out all night with most of the Bats, tracking down mob activity that seemed to have materialized out of nowhere. He'd come home only to find Lois had left a few messages for him, asking to meet regarding her story; the subsequent emotional response, thirty seconds of staring into space while accidentally shattering the screen on his phone, prompted Alfred to bully him into the kitchen. And now here Bruce was, drinking tea and being coaxed into talking like he was thirteen again.

"They're guests because it's easier for them to stay than try to make it back to Clark's. It's two trains or the slowest bus in the city."

"Clark could get them both back in moments, surely."

Bruce closed his eyes. "Alfred."

Whatever Alfred saw in his expression, it must have been humiliatingly revelatory. He changed the subject to Damian's grades, of all things.

There was no need to overreact. This was a temporary fixation, nothing more. Bruce would deal with his feelings because he had to, and soon enough he'd be back to normal. All he had to do was survive until then.