Calling her makes no sense.
Yet before I can talk myself out of it, my thumb presses the call button.
The phone rings.
Once. Twice. Three times.
I almost hang up. Then?—
“Hello?” Her voice is cautious, a little breathless like I caught her off guard.
Fuck.I stay quiet for a second, suddenly realizing she has no idea who this is.
“…Hello?” she says again.
“It’s me,” I say finally.
There’s a beat of silence.
Then recognition settles in her tone. “…Mr. Vasiliev?”
I lean back in the seat, eyes on the empty road ahead of me. “You’re home,” I say. It comes out more like a statement than a question.
“Yes,” she says slowly. “Why?”
Relief slips into my chest before I can stop it.Good. She’s home.
“You called me,” she adds carefully.
“I need you to do something.”
There’s a quiet laugh on the other end of the line. “Of course you do.”
“I want my first date scheduled within the next twenty-four hours.”
Silence.
Then she says, very calmly, “You’re joking.”
“I’m not.”
“Mr. Vasiliev,” she says, “its past my shift time.”
“I don’t care.”
“That’s not how scheduling works.”
“It is tonight.”
I hear movement on her end, like she’s pacing around her apartment now.
“You kissed me in an elevator two hours ago,” she says carefully, “and now you’re calling me to arrange a date with another woman.”
For a moment I’m genuinely caught off guard. I hadn’t expected her to bring that up so directly. Most people would pretend it never happened.
Zatanna, apparently, is not most people.
My grip tightens slightly on the phone. “Correct.”
