"Huh," she says aloud.
Then, to Alice, Libby, Elena, and Mary, and Lazarus except he autoreplies with a busy message, [Hey folks, Moonstone Palace grew a bar that I don't remember putting in, come check it out.]
He cocks his head and grins.
"Actually, I robbed five, but who's counting? Anyway. It's the last one that counted. I walked out with a chunk of change belonging to several mob bosses, they got all riled up, I taunted 'em a little, and thennnn they hired me to kill 'er."
"She dresses up as a bat?" Bella says quizzically. "And mob bosses hired you to kill her? Okay... what're you planning to do with a job like that?"
He rubs his hands together and continues.
"So I was never gonna kill her, obviously, I like her too much. I got myself caught instead." He smiles wistfully. "You ever been in a police interrogation room? You should take your boyfriend to one sometime, they're fun. She cracked a safety glass window with my face."
"And then, y'know, I bombed the place and took a hike, and it was all very exciting for a while, and at the end..." he looks distracted for a moment, smirks secretively, then shakes his head and continues, "We fought it out in a half-built skyscraper and she threw me outta the top floor. And like I said, caught me halfway down." He shrugs. "Now I'm locked up, and she's out there somewhere hating my guts, and someday I'll get out and we'll do it all over again."
"And as long as you have access to some door you can sometimes pop into Milliways for a bit," Bella says. "Interesting. Is it satisfactory for her to hate your guts? Wouldn't you rather she liked you?"
"She's never gonna like me," he says. "She couldn't. I mean, even if I hadn't killed a girl I'm pretty sure she was fucking, she is ve-e-ery much about law and order and I... am very much not."
"Well, yes, killing someone she liked is not conducive to such a plan," Bella says. "Although I feel compelled to point out that a fondness for law and order isn't incompatible with whimsy. Even a very, very terrifying-expensive-nonfestive bat costume requires some whimsy somewhere."
"Yeah, I'm getting the impression that Alice-types who do not encounter Bella-types quick enough go from whimsical to something a little less socially acceptable."
"Tell me, smart cookie," he says, "say I kidnapped a lady you had the hots for, and you had me locked in a room and could do annnnything you wanted to make me talk. Well, anything you'd do with half a dozen cops watching you through one-way glass. How would you play it? No cheating."
"No cheating?" Bella says. "I've gotten very accustomed to cheating." She thinks. "Are the cops a threat to me, or just potentially embarrassing? My first idea isn't a problem either way, I'm just sussing out option-space."
"Batsy shoved a chair under the door before she started throwing me around. So no, not a threat."
"Wait, was that the first thing she did? She didn't expend twelve seconds on saying where is the lady I have the hots for first just in case that worked?"
"Hah! Actually, one'a the cops asked me a couple questions first. Great guy. I like him. He turned his back on me, and you gotta have some balls to do that, if you're a Gotham cop." He quirks a smile. "Bats, though, the first thing she did was slam my head into the table."
"No wonder you like her," Bella says dryly. "I take it you didn't answer the cop. Would you have answered... Bats? Is that what we're calling her?"
"Sure I did. I would have tried asking where she was first. You want to know what step two would be if all you did was stare at me with a smug look on your face? I'd ask you what you wanted."
He did tell her that, albeit on a slightly different prompt.