Freedom

Part 31: The Artist

Harvey moaned, dizzy and disheveled, and he woke, strapped to his chair with ratchet straps from a truck; his hands were bound by zip ties. He sustained a blood cut on his forehead, blood drizzling down the side of his face. He sustained several bruises on his neck, strangulation marks.

He looked up to see Danica with her back faced to him; in front of her, there was an easel and a pallet in her hands. Danica hummed a song that he couldn't identify, but it was classical opera-like something out of Hannibal Lecter movie. Danica's fingers were stained with red paint...Or...

"Red is such a beautiful color, isn't it?" Danica mused with artistic flair. "So bright and dazzling in the light, but turns black when it touches just a *little* darkness." She sighed, reminiscing. "Remind you of anyone, Harvey, Darling?"

"Oh, God, is that blood? That's blood, isn't it?" Harvey said, annoyed.

Danica sighed irritably. "I might just have to take this art back with me. Jerome appreciates things like this."

"Sounds like a good man," Harvey groaned, still reeling from her blows on her face.

"Always a joker, huh?" Danica muttered. "Even in bad situations, you find a way to mock me, don't you?"

"That's not what I meant to do," Harvey said gently.

Danica turned to him from her easel. She gestured toward with a hand,
"Looks just like you, yes?"

It was an impressive caricature of Harvey, indeed. Even if it was smeared with blood. Harvey Bullock wrestled against his ropes as she turned full-bodily to face him.

"Don't struggle, Harvey. These days, it's enough to put me on a rocky edge," she uttered with a rise of her shoulders, as if recalling her moments with a certain ginger snap. "You didn't want to do this the easy way, so now we're doing it the...uh...hard way."

"Danica, honey, whatever you've got in mind, it won't change anything. It won't make the past go away."

Danica took a seat on his lap.

"Daddy always told me that I could attract the best clientele with my looks. But you never took an interest in me."

"You were twelve!" Harvey yelled angrily.

"Yeah, but you can't deny that even when I turned 16, developed early, that you didn't feel any sort of attraction, Darling." Danica's voice then went dark. "I felt it. And you know what, if Daddy had decided to turn me out for you, I think I wouldn't have had a problem with it."

Harvey's face twisted into disgusted repulsion.

Danica jumped from his lap, gave a long breath, and turned to him with a knife in her hand.

"Look," she reasoned, "just simply having you strapped to a chair, immobile-doesn't spell a lot of fun for me; and let's face it, you don't have enough blood in you for me to cover your base wall with a beautiful mural."

She tapped the tip of the blade on her fingers.

"So, I think I'm running out of things to do." She shrugged. "Fun while it lasted. By the way, in case you were curious, wondering about why you, it's your partner, James Gordon."

Harvey stared at her. "Goddamn it, I'm not even on the force anymore!"

Danica set a cell phone on the table in front of him.

"I'll let you call your buddy."

"Danica."

"No need to thank me."

"Danica."

She turned to him.

"I'm really sorry that I didn't take you out of that house while you still had a chance."

Danica smiled, sincerely appreciative.
"It's Gotham, babe. Shit happens to shitty people. No love lost, eh?"

She kissed him gently on the lips.
"See you later, Harvey. It's been fun. For what it's worth, I was happy to be sent to you. Gordon's such a stick in the mud. You're more much fun."