Book Two - Part One: Spectre

A/N - BEST TO READ BOOK ONE: THE DARK KNIGHT RISES BEFORE THIS AS IT CONTAINS ELENA WAYNE, IF YOU'VE NOT READ BOOK ONE YOU WON'T UNDERSTAND WHO SHE IS. JUST POINTING THAT OUT. 

Laurie Juspeczyk has been around enough to never take anything at face value, she's seen the best and worst of humanity to know that it is never as it seems. So when a billionaire heiress calls her for a meeting, the same heiress that may or may not be sleeping with her brother, Laurie knows not to dig too deep for an explanation, she doesn't jump to conclusions. She looks up at Wayne Manor as she stands outside, hands in the pockets of her trench coat, letting her eyes wander the height of the building, it reminds her of Xavier's School actually. The big, grand, old looking house. Filled to the brim of history probably. She loves houses like this. She steps up to the front door and knocks on the huge wooden door. Shrugs her coat closer to herself as she waits. As the door opens Laurie is greeted by an older man, he smiles in greeting at her but his eyes remain guarded.

"Good afternoon" he greets. "May I help you?"

"I'm here to see Elena" She tells the older gentleman. "I'm Laurie Juspeczyk"

"Of course, Miss Wayne is expecting you" He lets her into the house, Laurie smiles stepping in, he closes the door behind her and then leads her through the house.

"This place is beautiful" Laurie comments.

"It's been in the Wayne family for six generations now" he informs her. "And one day, Miss Wayne will take it over" he knocks on the study door as he reaches it before opening the door and letting himself in.

"Mrs Juspeczyk is here" he informs Elena before nodding for Laurie to enter, Laurie takes a breath and enters the room, ornate in design and lined floor to ceiling in books. Laurie smiles at the older man and thanks him before he leaves, closing the door behind her.

"He reminds me of Jarvis" Laurie admits softly and turns to Elena.

"We haven't officially met" Elena tells Laurie who shakes her head but smiles. "Elena Wayne" Laurie takes her hand when offered.

"Laurie, which you know" Laurie counters taking a seat with Elena. "You're the girl my brother has the hots for" Laurie teases, even she's seen the way Tony is around Elena, or talking about her, or thinking about her, and she doesn't need to be Charles for that. Elena smirks and nods. "Nice to finally meet you face to face" Laurie offers warmly.

"And you, Tony spoke about you a lot" Elena admits.

"Is there a reason for the meeting?" Laurie asks genuinely surprised but happy about it too. "I'll admit I'm surprised"

"I thought you might be interested in something I found" Elena grabs a file from the side and sets it in front of Laurie who raises an eyebrow. "I looked into Tony after we returned from Afghanistan" she admits. "And by default you...." Laurie opens the file to find a photo of her and her husband Lawrence, a liar, a man with a second life, a man that lead her to believe he was one person, when he was another. Dead. She brushes over it slightly, moving past those emotions and looks to the photo beneath it, of her and Bruce Banner. A man she had fallen hopelessly in love with whilst working with him, despite the fact she was married at the time. A man she would have left her husband for. Her heart aches staring at his face, those brown curls, the lines of his jaw. He was and will always be the most beautiful man she has and will ever meet.

"Bruce" Laurie whispers sadly. Her heart broke the day he disappeared, the day he ran. The day that changed everything.

"He's in Rio" Elena offers her, Laurie looks to her.

"You managed to find him when the government couldn't?" Laurie asks touching the photo of Bruce, unable to stop herself.

"I'm Elena Wayne" Elena offers holding out her hands, they share a look. "And Wayne Enterprise's is working a facial recognition software is about 10 times more powerful then anything currently out there. When the software picked up Dr. Banner I made a note of his location and then removed the data from the computer, just in case someone else was to see it" Laurie looks to her.

"Why did you do this?" Laurie asks her.

"We both know that Tony isn't very open with his feelings" Laurie nods in agreement. "But he spoke about you, often....and I will admit that Tony has come to mean...." Elena shakes her head and clears her throat.

"Yet Tony is the one that isn't open with his feelings" Laurie teases, Elena looks to her. "Thank you, Elena" Laurie touches the file.

"Do what you want with the data, Laurie" Elena tells her. "I just thought you would want to know that he's alive and well" Laurie smiles and nods.

"How did you even...." Laurie struggles a little.

"Tony" Elena admits. "Back in Afghanistan when he thought I was asleep he'd ramble to me, he talked about your mother, he talked about you and he talked about this one time you seemed more then happy" Laurie smiles. "He said that he was pretty sure that it wasn't because of your husband"

"Things were complicated" Laurie admits.

"I'm not after an explanation" Elena assures her. "I just listened to Tony when he talked about your work with Dr Banner, said how much you loved it, how upset you were when it ended and I kind of put two and two together" Elena stands a little. "Not sure Tony completely understood why you were so upset but..."

"Tony's always been a little dense to other people and their feelings" Laurie adds standing too. "But you'll learn that soon enough" she teases, Elena smirks and looks down. "He does have a good heart though" she assures the heiress. "Just takes some people a while to see that side of him" Laurie smirks. "But I think you already have" Elena nods and looks to her.

"We'll have to have dinner one time" Elena offers.

"Sounds great" Laurie offers picking up the file to take with her. "Thank you for this" they share a look before Laurie inclines her head and leaves.