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Going into the crumbling building, which clearly was suffering from a landlord deficiency, Peter entertained the possibility that this would be a weird one. Ever since he’d been bitten by that spider, he’d seemed to be a magnet for weirdness, even in run-of-the-mill situations like taking a photography assignment off Craigslist. Hell, even before that, his parents had been spies.

But he needed the money and, heck, Peter supposed that if this were a set-up, better that he fall into it than someone who couldn’t handle themselves. As directed by the e-mail he’d gotten, he took the stairs. This place was on the verge of being condemned, but until then, he supposed it was open for business. Hopefully, his spider-sense would warn him about any tetanus before he poked himself full of it.

***

Harley paced around the darkened studio. She knew the photographer wasn’t going to arrive for another quarter of an hour, but she was just too excited to wait any longer. She’d dreamed about this all her life! A photo shoot! A chance to be a star!

Sure, she was technically paying for it herself and they were dirty pictures to be uploaded to a dirty picture website, but those were just niggles. She was going to break into the bigtime and with her legions of loyal fans, she’d be a bigger celeb than the Joker ever was!

There was a knock at the door. Harley squealed with excitement and ran to answer it. He was early! Thank the New Gods, she’d finally found an artistic type who was punctual!

She swept open the door to find a man standing before her. He was young, slim, and good-looking.

“Hiya there, pal!” she cheered in a charm offensive, with a jubilant shake of her head to let him know that she was no threat—she was happy with him! “Got here bright and early, did ya? I gotcha! Probably you can really use the money! Well, me too!

Maybe it was just that he’d gotten there fast enough to count as instant gratification, which was Harley’s favorite love language, but she felt a flush of desire for the guy. Wished all photographers looked like him. She certainly wouldn’t mind taking naughty pictures if that were the case!

“Sorry about the state of this place—I know you’d think a girl that hangs out with Red and the Cat much as I do would know a lot of internal decorators, but nope! Can’t even pay for a can of spray-paint, I saved it all up to get you paid! But ya gotta spend money t’ make money, right? Right! Come in, come in, unless ya wanna take some pictures of me here!”

Harley struck a pose, sprawling across the doorway.

“Waddya think? Am I a natural or what?”

***

Peter didn’t know what to think. He’d been expecting weird and gotten mentally ill! Not only that, but Harley Quinn—Joker’s gal pal Harley Quinn—Poison Ivy’s gay pal Harley Quinn—had seized onto him like a terrier with a turkey bone.

She noticed how stunned he was, if not the reason. “Whassa matter? Lighting no good? Oh! Is it you need to be behind closed doors to work your magic? I gotcha! Come on in!”

Seizing him by the lapels, Harley pulled him inside. At the last possible second, Peter rolled with her momentum, refusing to give away his secret by marshalling his strength and resisting her. Instead, he was dragged into Harley’s apartment, seemingly just in time for the door to slam shut behind him.

It looked like the last tenant had been evicted—or died—and the only furnishings were what the estate sale wouldn’t touch. Not that any furniture could compete with Harley. Petite but stacked, she wore a tight white T-shirt showing off the lack of a bra underneath, adhering so tight to her chest that it was all but translucent. A grinning face had been spray-painted on the front of the shirt. That layer of paint seemed like the only thing really covering Harley’s pert, well-sized breasts.

Her bottoms were equally skimpy, a pair of shorts that seemed more like a stretched out thong than anything else. They only barely covered her small, sculpted ass and the tight little groin that rested on top of her svelte thighs. Despite her tiny stature, Harley had plenty of leg. Stockings—one red, one black—accentuated her near-nudity like the bolt of pink and blue in her pigtails flashed with sexuality.

Peter thought fast, wondering if it were really her. This was a whole lot of make-up, after all. It could be anyone under all that look. Mary Jane had some Halloween costumes that had made her damn near unrecognizable. Maybe this was a cosplayer who was really in-character. Mary Jane had done that too, trying out method acting.

“You’re real quiet,” Harley said suspiciously. “Is that part of ya method? Because it can’t be, ya gotta tell me what to do. I don’t know a thing about modeling. I’ve got what ya’d call a natural sexuality. People just wanna eff me and I let ‘em. Or violence. Mostly the violence. It’s real hard to meet a nice guy, ya know? Not that you’d know. Oh! Is it that you’re worried I won’t be able to pay? I gotcha! Cash on the barrelhead!”

Prancing away from him, Harley picked up a satchel and ran it back to Peter like a child eager to show something off. She opened it up for him. Inside, bills were stacked to the zipper: scattered, folded, spindled, and mutilated like there’d been an explosion at the US Mint.

“Will that be enough? Spider-Man can’t pay ya more than that to take pictures of him. I mean, I heard he’s black. I’m Jewish. Who do you think can pay more in this competitive marketplace?”

Whether this was her or not: the real Harley Quinn, he knew, had been released from Arkham on sane behavior. (Yeah, inside-voice Peter scoffed, by GOTHAM standards…) He hadn’t heard of her pulling any jobs since then. And hiring a photographer didn’t seem like part of any masterplan.

Then again, where had the money come from, Bruce Wayne? Peter’d heard the guy had a soft spot for charity cases. Or maybe it was loot from an old heist the cops had never found. If it was, Peter wondered if he was obliged to return it.

He would if he found a bag of money on the street. But then, this wasn’t on the street. This was being given to him. Fair pay for work performed.

Had Harley found it on the street? After… blasting the shit out of whatever building it’d been sitting inside? If Harley paid for a hamburger with stolen money and ate it, would he go to the restaurant and force them to return the money, even though they had given her a burger?

And what if Harley was rehabilitated? It might set her off if he accused her of stealing with no proof—besides the fact that she had a bag of money and she was a woman who’d stolen crap a million times…

“Not a big talker, are ya?” Harley jiggled the bag, sending a few stray bills spilling out of the top. “Well, if it’s not enough, there’s more where this came from! Once we start posting my pics to the Internet, we’ll be raking in dough! I’m talking mucho dinero! Trust me, I get enough fan mail to know that my nudes are worth top dollar.”

“Nudes?” Peter had finally been shocked out of his moral dilemma. “You want me to take nudes?”

“You don’t wanna?” Harley asked, head cocked to the side now, sounding offended. “I’ll have you know that Mistah Jay paid for the best boobs that money can buy! These are by the guy who keeps fixing the Riddler’s nose after Bats smashes his face in! Wait—that’s not it, is it?”

Closing the bag, Harley tossed it aside. Peter winced at that much cash impacting the ground like a… box of old shoes…

“You think we shouldn’t go full Basic Instinct? Maybe start off more… Disney movie that gave you ya first boner, then move onto the real saucy stuff? Jessica Rabbit, then porn parody of Jessica Rabbit? Cuz that’s brilliant! You’re real good at this! No wonder Felicia can’t stop talking about you!”

Peter had never felt something so close to his spider-sense going off without his spider-sense actually going off. Felicia knew her? How? Were she and Catwoman in the same union or had she once dated Poison Ivy? Gadzooks, was this what artists went through when they accepted furry commissions?

“Okay, Petey, I’m placing all’a my hot little body in your hands! Waddya wanna do with me? And should we start off with feet or play coy with that for now? I can paint my nails a lot of ways, let me tell you…”

***

As they talked, Harley could feel their working relationship falling into place. What a collaboration! What an artist she’d picked out! Gawd, she sure knew how to pick ‘em! There was a lot that Harley didn’t know about photography, but she was going to know it all before she was through and Peter was going to teach her.

“Should I stand?” she asked. “Or do you not want me to stand? I can not stand if ya don’t want me to!”

Like a puppet with its strings cut, Harley dropped herself down to the floor.

“Here! Is this good? This feels great! I feel like we’ve struck gold!”

“Just go over there,” Peter said, indicating the north wall, where the sunlight from an open window hit the wall like a spotlight. “I want you to walk and bend and do a few exercises, just so I can catch you in motion.”

“Alrighty!”

Harley marched away from Peter, throwing her legs high and far so she could show him a lot of thigh. When she looked back at him, there was a red flush across his face.

“Now whaddaya want me t’ do?” she asked him.

“Just walk around,” he said. “Back and forth. Maybe do a few somersaults if you feel like it. Yeah, do whatever you feel like.”

Harley smiled. She’d always been good at walking around. She had a strut that put every ripple of motion into her curves, where they would do the most good. Harley strode around, glad she wasn’t wearing a bra under her shirt. She knew that the camera could see every jiggle her perky breasts showcased.

Peter’s camera snapped and flashed, capturing bounce after bounce of her supple tits. She heard the camera shudder like she was feeling a hand warmly touching her chest.

“Okay, that’s good,” Peter said.

“Is that all?” Harley asked innocent. “I thought for sure you’d want me in less clothes…”

“I don’t think you could be wearing less clothes,” Peter replied, flustered.

“Maybe one of those pictures where I’m topless, but I’m holding my boobs in my hands? Whaddya think? I know I’ve got pretty small hands, but all I really have to cover are my nips, right? Maybe I could just use my fingers. Okay, two fingers, I got pretty big nipples and I’m a little excited right now…”

Peter blushed. “I don’t think that’ll be necessary.”

“Are ya sure? What if there are some of those big spenders, y’know, whales—I can say that word, I’m friends with Orca—and they wanna spend on me naked? Won’t those guys want something ready to go? I mean, we can’t just take people’s money and promise we’ll give them what they paid for some time far off in the future! These Internet types are smart! They won’t go for that!”

Peter’s mouth was going dry. He was barely a photographer; most of his income came from taking pictures of himself with an automatic timer. On the few jobs Mary Jane had got him in modeling, the girls were pros, knowing exactly what to do. All Peter had to do was keep his finger on the shutter button for a few minutes and they were done.