Catwoman: Soulstealer (DC Icons #3)(42)

Not who he was looking for, but…Luke smiled.



* * *



—

“Dumping a body in the river. Real original.”

The three men whirled as Luke sauntered up behind them, the body landing with a splash off the rotting docks.

His suit had a video camera, and he made sure it was recording, marking their faces, the van that they had just driven up, even the body now bobbing in the river.

“Should have weighed that package down,” Luke supplied, stalking closer.

Two of the men pulled guns and fired.

The sound ripped at him, trying to haul him back into his memories, but Luke focused on his breathing, the shift of his body as he rolled to the side, the docks groaning beneath him.

Clumsy, panicked shots. They fired and fired, and Luke’s suit whirred and then pulsed. A wave of ear-ringing sound rippled out.

The sonic pulse stopped the bullets dead. The men fired again, though their bullets fell to the wood, pinging and thudding against the force of the sonic waves. They emptied their clips within seconds.

Then silence.

The third man—the one who hadn’t fired—leapt into the river. Trying to swim away.

Luke smirked as he got to his feet. Surveyed the two men now clicking away on the triggers of their Glocks. The bat-symbol on his suit flared, primed and ready to unleash more surprises.

“This really isn’t going to be your night” was all Luke told them.



* * *



—

Twenty minutes later, Luke lurked at the edge of the pedestrian overpass, watching as Gordon and his men hauled away the three low-level cronies, including the soaked one.

He’d had them tied up in five minutes.

Less than five minutes. He’d waited longer than that for GCPD to arrive, making sure the murderers didn’t escape their bonds.

As soon as Gordon shoved the last of them into the police van, slamming shut the door, Luke loosed a long sigh and turned.

And found the so-called Catwoman leaning against the opposite railing of the bridge.





Her figure cut a dark shadow against the railroad tracks illuminated below.

His helmet’s night vision told a different story. A cracked lens now marred the left side of her helmet. And blood. Even with her suit’s stealth keeping him from any further readouts, there was no mistaking the organic material splattered over her helmet, her chest and shoulders.

Yet she appeared steady. Unfazed.

“Are you responsible for the body they were dumping?” His words were low—rough. He sized up the weapons on her: two blades sheathed down her back, built right into her suit. That bullwhip at her left hip. Nothing else.

She let out a quiet laugh. “No. Whose men are those?”

None of her business. “Why are you here?”

“I thought you might be bored, so I came to say hello.”

Luke couldn’t help but make the analogy: a cat playing with its dinner.

“Why is there blood on your suit?”

“Want a DNA sample?”

Yes. He hadn’t gotten a call from GCPD that anything was amiss, that anyone was down. “You came to brag about it?”

“I came to give you a little warning.”

Luke kept his arms at his sides, in easy reach of his weapons, even though he had the urge to cross them. “About what?” he ground out.

She was so still. It was an animal’s stillness. Even Bruce, trained and lethal, never stood with that sort of stillness. Like she might blend into a shadow and never emerge.

“Far bigger players are coming to Gotham.”

A chill skittered down his spine. “Is that who landed a punch tonight?” As he said it, his suit zoomed in on the damaged helmet, lighting it up. A long, wicked-looking scratch sliced down one side of it, straight through the cracked glass. That had to have been made by one hell of a blade. And a shallow wound sliced across her thigh, the blood caked on too thick to get a glimpse at the skin color beneath.

She gave a little nod. “More are coming.”

“At your invitation?”

A pause. “More are coming,” she repeated. “Worse than any of the criminal factions here. More powerful—and with a deadlier agenda. Keep your eyes open.”

“Why warn me?” he demanded.

That stillness settled over her again. “Because this city won’t survive them.”

“And that’s not what you want?”

She looked him over. Or he thought she did. “There are good people in Gotham. Protect them.”

It surprised him enough that Luke couldn’t think of a reply. Didn’t need to.

Because one of the cop cars still parked at the docks below exploded, the boom and fire and shouting filling the world.

And then he wasn’t in his body, wasn’t on that footbridge anymore.

He was in sand and sun and blood; he was on the side of a road. He was cut up, body screaming, but not as loud as his men, his friends—

He had the dim sense of slamming to the ground. Of being unable to breathe, of his suit going haywire and sending a frantic feed of internal assessments: heart rate too fast, breathing rapid, blood pressure spiking—

Not here. Not here and now.

“That asshole,” he heard someone—heard her—hiss. In another world, in another life.