Asprin, Robert Lynn – Catwoman – Tiger Hunt (With Lynn Abbey)

Bruce shook his head. He’d destroyed the crude diagram he’d made of the icon security. Force of habit, he explained with a shrug. Tiger became agitated, demanding that he make another diagram quickly.

“It’s your bona fides. The boss sees you know what you’re talkin’ about and that you can get him that friggin’ icon, he takes you into the organization.”

“Are we going to see the boss?” Bruce paused with the diagram half-drawn.

“Yeah. Sort of.”

Batman completed the diagram with care and accuracy. He had to assume that the Connection was smarter than his lieutenants. He had to assume that a man who’d survived outside the law for a half-century could spot a ringer. At the moment the icon belonged to no one. If it had to be given up like a pawn in a chess game to get Batman into the Connection’s organization, that was something Bruce Wayne could live with. Folding the napkin in neat quarters, he tucked it in his wallet and followed Tiger out of the bar.

They walked several avenue blocks side by side. Bruce began to wonder if the Connection had written Tiger off. The possibility had to be considered. The Gagauzi debacle in front of 208 Broad Street was enough to cashier a lieutenant in any man’s army, but, even more, Tiger’s constant talk about fate and transformation marked him as a man about to walk off the edge. Then Bruce saw an antenna-sprouting package-service van turn out of a side street onto the avenue ahead of them. It cruised to the curb and waited with its lights on and its engine idling. No one got out; no one got on. Through the layers of latex and disguise, Batman’s senses came alive with anticipation.