They were doing circuit training, although Mark was using weights that most men, well, I guess what you could call most normal men, would have considered heavy. He was practically jumping up and down with two hundred and twenty five pounds on his back, while Sophie was doing the same with a hundred and thirty five. They would go from there to swinging a kettle bell, to pushups, to pull-ups, and back to the squats with barely enough of a rest to move from one station to the next. I was tired just watching them.
Sophie noticed me first, dropping down from the pull-up bar and coming over. "I think I've hit my limit for today," she said, barely audible over the music. "After all, I'm in my second trimester. Mark's about halfway done."
I nodded and she left, patting me on the shoulder as she did. I found an empty box against the wall and sat down. My bullet wound ached, so I leaned back against the plaster behind me and watched as Mark finished his circuits. From there he moved on to rope climbing, which was pretty impressive considering they had set the gym up in the main sanctuary of what had been the church. The vaulted beam ceiling went all the way up to about twenty, maybe twenty-five feet, and Mark climbed it over and over again using just his arms.
As he climbed, I could sense that he noticed me, even though he never looked my way or said a word. As he finished up, he went over and grabbed his towel and bottle of water. Still facing away from me, he started speaking.
"You had guts, I'll give you that," Mark said, popping the top on his water and taking a deep pull, "but guts runs out very quickly. You damn near got yourself killed last time. And you almost got me killed in the process."
"I'm sorry about that," I said, humbled. "When you called me an amateur before, I thought you were just being an asshole. I didn't realize how right you were."
"Which is why I'm shocked at what I'm going to say," Mark replied, still facing away from me. As he talked he gestured with his free hand for emphasis, looking out the windows at times. "Out there, I need a partner. Someone I can depend on, someone I can work with. I'm limited in what I can do, mostly to small work, surveillance and information gathering, only doing direct action when I have to. The streets need more. I need a partner. But it has to be a partner I can trust, someone I know is going to have my back and I know can get the job done. If I can't have that, I'm better off working on my own. Before this, I had Sophie when I took down the Confederation and Lynch. Your guess earlier was right, she was the person who took down Petrokias. But she's pregnant, which means for at least a year, maybe a year and a half, maybe even forever, she's off the streets. If she comes back, it’ll be limited duty only because I will not have my daughter grow up with both her mother and father killed in this fool's crusade. So, despite what you've shown me, despite my better judgment, I'm going to extend you the offer. Before you answer, it’s going to be a lot of work before you step foot out there with me. Do you want to train, become my partner?"
"You mean your sidekick? The Robin to your Batman?" I asked. "And what about my day job?"
“That’s a big part of why I’m even considering this. It’ll be just as important as anything we do at night," Mark replied. "Just like what Tabby does with the money I make is just as important, if not more important, than every criminal I take out with my hands or my guns. And no, I'm not looking for a sidekick, although you'd start in a similar role. If you know your comics, you know what happened to the first Robin. He grew up, became Nightwing, and for a while, he was Batman himself."
I considered his offer. "What do I need to do?"
Mark chuckled. "First, you have to recover from that wound. Then you're going to have to survive something even more painful."
"What?" I asked, a bit worried. "Martial arts training with you? Knives? Guns?"
Mark finally turned to me and shook his head, a sardonic grin on his features. "You're going to have to survive my wife."
Chapter 3
Patrick
That night I slept fitfully in the entertainment room. I would’ve loved to have had Tabby with me, but I’d been honest when I told Sophie that having her with me would have been too difficult for me. Despite the nearly constant pain I was in, and the stiffness in my back, having her nearby was so distracting I barely felt it. I knew that if she was in the same room as me dressed for bed, I would never have gotten any sleep, not without sex. And sex was not what my body could tolerate.
As I tossed and turned, the pain in my back increased. Sophie had checked my sutures after dinner, declaring that they were looking good. She even showed me a photo taken with her cell phone, and I couldn't really tell. I mean, how good is crusty tied up skin supposed to look like, anyway? It was still stained with the topical antiseptic she’d used for the surgery even, I looked like a golden carrot surrounded by large purplish black rings of bruising or something. The thing hurt.