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“You remember the rules, right?” Alya asked for what had to be the fifth time that night. She set down the lip gloss she was supposed to be applying for Marinette to level a pointed look at her.
Marinette rolled her eyes and grabbed the lip gloss to apply herself. She was not going to let any doubts get to her. She was far too excited about this date. She hadn’t been this excited about a date since… well, honestly, she couldn’t remember when. But Jason was absolutely amazing. He was everything she never even let herself dream about because it was too unlikely.
When he’d approached her in the café to ask her about her book while she waited for her coffee, she almost tripped. And she hadn’t even been moving. He was funny, charming, smart, quick witted, spoke fluent French, and it didn’t hurt that he was ruggedly handsome, looking every bit the bad boy his personality didn’t seem to be.
They’d spoken for well over an hour that first day and it would have been longer if Juleka hadn’t interrupted to remind her they were supposed to be meeting for her dress fitting. Thankfully, he was far more confident than her because while she was too scared to ask him for his number, he had no such compunctions., asking for her number and a date.
So, yeah, she was excited for this date. But she wasn’t stupid. They barely knew each other. She didn’t even know his last name, let alone what he was capable of. And she could protect herself and Tikki could assist, but Jason was easily three times as big as her. His thighs were beautifully the size of her head. If he wanted to hurt her, he might only get one hit in, but with his chest and biceps as beautifully sculpted and bulging as they were, it would only take one hit to do serious damage.
But that didn’t mean she wasn’t going to give Alya attitude for being even more paranoid than she was. “Yes, maman,” she snarked.
Alya grabbed the lip gloss back aggressively and tossed it in Marinette’s purse. “Hey! Check the attitude. You know I just do it because I love you.” She gave Marinette a pointed look but was only able to hold it for a few moments before both of them broke into giggles and playful shoves that didn’t stop until the buzzer sounded.
Their heads whipped toward the door and Marinette let out an excited squeal while Alya let out a long breath to psych herself up. “Okay, game time. Let’s meet Prince Charming,” she cheered and passed Marinette’s purse to her.
Marinette grinned at her and barely grabbed the bag before she rushed out the door. “Bonne soirée, Jason!” She lifted up on her toes to kiss his cheek.
He took a moment to respond, just staring at her dazedly for a few seconds. “Bonne soirée, Marinette. You look beautiful.”
“Thank you. You look amazing too.” She grinned brightly up at him, getting lost momentarily in his eyes until Alya cleared her throat behind her. “Oh, right. Sorry. Jason, this is my friend Alya. Alya, this is Jason.”
Jason stepped forward, hand extended. “Nice to meet you, Alya. Marinette speaks highly of you.”
She shook his hand with a polite smile. “And you. Nice to meet you, too, Jason.” She looked quickly between the two before widening her smile. “You two look so cute!” Alya cooed loudly. “Can I get a picture of you by the motorcycle?” She motioned toward the bike, herding them into position near the back of the bike.
Jason raised an eyebrow and glanced around them quickly as he took a step towards the bike, noting the way the light darkened the closer they got to the light. He took a few more steps before freezing suddenly and turning around. “Oh! This is the background or Proof of Life pic,” he exclaimed loudly. “Oh, got it.”
Marinette and Alya looked at each other anxiously, but he nodded excitedly like he was proud of himself for putting the pieces together and started reaching into his pocket. “Yeah, why don't you go ahead and take a picture of my license plate. Here's my ID. Go ahead and take a picture of that.” He handed the ID over to Alya, who took it tentatively, but did exactly as he suggested and handed it back to him, sending furtive, confused glances over to Marinette the entire time.
“But, you know, those records can all be faked pretty easily,” he noted casually while he tucked his ID back into his wallet. “They’re pretty easy to manipulate. It’s better to look up my name. It’s harder to fake a bunch of news articles.”
Marinette blinked at him. He wasn’t wrong, but she hadn’t been expecting him to know that. Most people didn’t. But that wasn’t the part that concerned her the most. “Bunch of news articles?”
He shrugged and let out a helpless noise, almost too nonchalantly. “When you do the background check you're probably going to find out have a charge for manslaughter.”
Alya chuckled at his joke but was already looking up his full name, now that she finally had it, before he finished his sentence. Her fingers were moving like lightning as she pulled up any and all mentions of ‘Jason Todd’ in the French or American news (just to start, she would widen her search later if she didn’t find anything there), her paper’s backlogs, and police records.
Marinette gave him an exasperated look. He clearly didn’t know who he was dealing with. He was playing with fire. “Don’t say things like that to her, it’ll just set her o…”
A screech interrupted her sentence and Marinette and Jason whipped around to look at her; Marinette with an expression of shock and Jason one of resignation. “You’re Bruce Wayne’s son?” she shrieked.
“You are?” Marinette asked, turning to Jason, eyes wide in surprise. In all their conversations, he had never mentioned his family, almost like he was intentionally avoiding the subject. She guessed that must be why.
“What is it with you and rich men’s sons?” she snickered without looking up from her phone.
“Oh?” Jason asked, fixing her with a teasing gaze.
“What the… You were serious!” Alya screeched before Marinette could respond.
Marinette turned back to her again, trying to construct what was going on through eye contact with Alya, but her eyes were trained incredulously on Jason. “What?” Marinette asked. Alya angled the phone toward her without taking her eyes off Jason.
Marinette only read the headline and the first few sentences before turning her uncertain, hurt gaze to Jason. He held his hands up. “In my defense, that guy had been and currently was trafficking little kids into the sex trade. He had seven little girls in his warehouse when I stopped him.”
Alya and Marinette slowly looked back down to Alya’s phone and scrolled further down on the article. “Yeah. Yep. That's what it says,” Alya nodded, still reeling from the revelation.
“And he attacked me. I tried to deescalate. The charges were dropped, thank you. And made sure the girls didn’t see anything,” he insisted earnestly.
Alya scrolled down further. “Uh huh. Okay. Yeah. Says that too.”
Marinette blinked a few times at the article before she was able to find her words. “You warned us about the manslaughter but were hoping we wouldn’t find out about the Bruce Wayne thing?”
He scoffed and leaned back on the seat of the motorcycle; legs stretched languidly in front of him. “I’m not embarrassed about the manslaughter charge.” He paused and bobbed his head to the side in consideration. “Well, no, I’m a bit embarrassed I got caught, but I stand behind what I did. Being associated with Bruce though…” he shuddered violently. “If there was one thing I could scrub from my record…”
Alya looked over to Marinette, having a silent conversation with her. Marinette looked between her and Jason a few times then shot her a determined nod and sent Jason a brilliant smile. “Right, well, we're going to be late if we don't go and I was really excited to try this restaurant. See you later Al,” she chirped and slung her leg over the seat behind Jason who returned her smile, just as brightly and handed her a helmet.
Alya nodded and waved her off. “Have a good time! Don't do anything I wouldn't do.” She paused for a moment to consider her words before continuing louder. “Actually, do far less than I would do. And Jason?” She waited until he looked at her before continuing, pointing a warning finger at him. “If you feel the need to do something like that again, give me a call. I'm a reporter. I can use the story. Have fun kids!”
The roar from the engine of Jason’s motorcycle filled the street, only drowned out by the delighted laughter from the passengers.