by Kat Cotton
Getting these guys to help had seemed sane before we got here but actually confronting them made me see how stupid we were. They’d tried to steal the kami in the first place. They’d tricked me into thinking they were my friends and weren’t above any kind of rotten tricks but if Yamaguchi found out about the kami’s disappearance, it’d be much worse for us.
“We can’t just agree to a random favor that could be anything,” I said.
Shun nudged me. What? He wanted to agree to that?
“Before we agree, we need to know what you want” Mai said.
Shun quickly explained our plan. I wasn’t sure we should just blurt it out to them but then there was no way to inch around the subject. These guys knew about the kami’s disappearance.
“That sounds like the most half-baked plan ever,” Jin said. “Even if you fool Yamaguchi, you won’t have the kami.”
Like we didn’t know that. “We’ll get the kami and we’ll return him before Yamaguchi finds out.”
“You seem pretty sure about that, new girl,” Jin said. “But how can you guarantee it?”
I ignored him and looked to Hokuto.
“I’d love to help,” he said with that amazing smile. “But I have to look after my team. If we do this, you’ll owe us big time. And if Yamaguchi finds out, we’ll deny any involvement.”
I nodded. That sounded fair.
“I don’t think we should do it,” Mai said. “We owe these Crows nothing.” Then she focused on me. “Hey, did you get your SIM yet? We can still go shopping even if we have this whole enemies thing going on.”
That just confused me but she smiled and gave me a thumbs up. I got the feeling that this whole team rivalry was just a game to her.
“I don’t think we should do it,” Jin said. “They’ll get all the kudos for the kami and we’ll get nothing. There is literally nothing in it for us.”
Yuki punched him in the shoulder. “Shut up, jerk. You already owe me.”
Then she shoved him hard enough that he stumbled backward.
“I do not,” he said and jumped back to his feet. He lunged forward, looking like he intended to attack Yuki, but Shun stepped between them.
“Enough of this, already.” He sounded like he’d heard this argument a few times before. “You help us out and we owe you a favor. That’s the deal, take it or leave it.”
“No way,” Mai said.
“We need the kitsune to make the promise,” Jin said. “Everyone knows kitsune can’t break promises.”
I didn’t know that so obviously not everybody did.
“I’m not having sex with you,” Yuki said.
Well, her words said that. Her body said otherwise. Sexual tension rolled off the two of them so thick you could slice it up and serve it with jam.
“No one is trading in sex,” Hokuto said. “We’re not like that.”
I snorted. “You had no issue with kissing me to get information off me.”
“I didn’t kiss you to get the information. That was just a side benefit,” he said.
Then he smiled and that smile almost broke me inside. I wanted to believe him so bad.
“Agreed,” said Hokuto.
Yuki nodded. “We’ll do it.”
Man, she’d made the promise and she had to stick to it. If I was a kitsune, I’d be screwed. I promised people shit all the time without ever meaning to follow through. Like saying I’d pay them back if they got me a coffee.
Shun and Jin worked out the details. Jin had to come with us to work his magic. I wasn’t sure if more Yuki and Jin together time would end with them screwing or killing each other but if he worked with us, then I wasn’t too concerned about what happened to him afterwards.
As we were leaving, Hokuto called out to me.
“Mori, once this is done, do you want to have dinner with me?”
“Sure,” I said with a smile.
As we walked down the street, Yuki grabbed my arm.
“I can’t believe you agreed to date him. He’s evil.”
“He’s more morally ambiguous than evil,” Jin said.
“I can’t help it. He’s got those crazy, magical seductive powers. Even if I wanted to resist, I’d be powerless, right?”
The three of them laughed.
“He doesn’t have magical seductive powers,” Yuki said. “You just got sucked in because an ikemen paid you attention.”
“Ikemen?”
“That’s a hot guy.”
“It sure is,” I replied.
But, damn it, I’d kind of been banking on Hokuto having magic seductive powers. That’d mean I could have sex with him and be absolved of all responsibility.
I mean, in nearly all situations, I was totally against sex where you had no agency or ability to give consent but if it meant getting it on with our very hot but potentially evil arch enemy then being absolved of responsibility had an upside. And a big part of me really wanted to enjoy that upside to full capacity.
Then Shun coughed. “I don’t want to be a killjoy but we have an hour before Yamaguchi shows up to collect the kami and we need to be prepared.”
Chapter 26
As we walked, I started doubting this plan. It’d seemed like a good idea at the time but the more I thought about it, the more I became sure Yamaguchi would know for sure that we were fooling him and he’d heap vengeance on us.
I’d pictured a thousand different scenarios, a few of them with me surviving intact. I didn’t want to mention my fears to the others because I’d been the one who got us into this so I just walked in silence, my nails digging into the palms of my hands.
This pick up needed to go perfectly. I needed to stop feeling so damn nervous. I went through things in my head and instantly came up with a huge issue.
“Won’t he think it strange we’re not in Yuki’s usual apartment?” I asked.
That would require some explaining.
“They fixed my windows while we were out,” Yuki said. “We can go back to my apartment.”
Personally, I wouldn’t have let the tradesmen have access to my apartment while I wasn’t home. But she was Yuki. She’d probably hunt them down and kill them if they did anything to her stuff.
“Yep. We need to move everything back or Yamaguchi questions us,” Shun said.
Exactly. And that box had taken us forever to move. My stomach gurgled. Nerves did that to me.
“Jin,” Yuki ordered.
Jin? Oh yeah, Jin could move the box. It’d take no time if he magically floated it.
“That wasn’t part of our deal,” he said. “We need to renegotiate. What are you offering?”
Yuki got up in his face. “You help us move this box and you live.” she sneered.
I’d have flinched at her tone of voice but Jin just grinned. I got the feeling that he liked Yuki getting all aggressive with him.
A crow cawed in the distance, making me realise I hadn’t seen any today. I took that as a sign this plan was doomed. Even the crows had deserted me. My stomach gurgled louder.
We got to the apartments and Yuki organised Jin to move the box while she put up an illusion so no passersby would see a gold box floating through the air. She gave him a lot of orders in Japanese.
He sighed each time but did what she told him.
While they did that, Shun and I hauled the rest of Yuki’s stuff back. She still had a heap of red beans left. Why didn’t she have the gurgling belly instead of me? Those beans had to be rough on your digestive tract.
The four of us stood around the near empty apartment. With the box back in place, it looked fine but maybe Yamaguchi would know. That crafty old man might see hints we hadn’t even thought about.
“What now?” I said. “We need a plan. A plan is good, right? Shun, you do the talking. I can’t talk.”
I knew I was rambling but I couldn’t help myself. Yamaguchi would be here any minute and I’d have to keep my mouth well and truly shut. And, hell, I still wore that little black dress. Would that
look strange? Yuki had her silver dress on too.
“We need to change. Why didn’t we think of that earlier? No one is going to believe Yuki’s been sitting around watching a box in that dress.”
Yuki screwed up her face then nodded.
I didn’t expect her to strip off the dress right in front of us right down to her tiny black underwear. I looked away. So did Shun. Jin, not so much.
When I looked back, she wore a mini skirt and baggy t-shirt. Not the kind of baggy t-shirt I’d have worn, all shapeless and food stained, but a really awesome one.
She threw me an oversized sweater.
“Put this on,” she said. “He won’t notice too much and you’ll look more casual.”
Great. Now on top of everything else, I had the stress of not doing any damage to Yuki’s clothing.
“You, get in the bathroom,” Yuki told Jin. “The old man can’t see you.”
Jin screwed up his face at her.
“What if he needs to pee and goes in there?” Jin asked. “He’ll have questions.”
He had a valid point. As my stomach gurgled again, an equally valid point was what if Molly needed to make an emergency run and Jin was in there. That bathroom was not roomy!
Heckings. The whole apartment wasn’t roomy. If I had an emergency, everyone would know. Maybe I should just go back to my own place. Did I need to be here?
Yuki glared at Jin.
“Yamaguchi will have questions if he sees you in my apartment. Do you want to keep your name out of this or not?”
“Won’t Jin need to be here, though? Isn’t that the whole point of this deal?”
“The priest won’t come with Yamaguchi,” Shun said. “We have to go to the matsuri for that.”
“Huh? We’re going to the matsuri? I’ll definitely need to change.” I moved towards the door. “I’ll go now.”
Yuki grabbed my wrist and pulled me back. Damn it. I thought I could escape.
“Nice try but you have to face the old man with us.” Then she turned back to Jin. “I told you to get in the bathroom.”
“He can wait in my apartment,” Shun said.
That seemed logical but Yuki frowned. I think she just wanted to make Jin stand around in the bathroom for the LOLZ.
I sat down while Shun rushed Jin up to his apartment. Hell. My palms sweated and my stomach got no quieter.
“Sit still,” Yuki said to me, slapping my leg. “He’ll know something’s up if you jiggle like that.”
“I get nervous around Yamaguchi anyway,” I said.
Not that Yuki wasn’t nervous. The more nervous she got, the bitchier she became. I’d noticed that about her.
Someone knocked on the door. Shun? Yuki answered it. It wasn’t Shun but Yamaguchi and his goon. That screwed up the plan. Shun needed to do the talking. Yuki was too aggressive and I couldn’t talk.
“No problems?” Yamaguchi asked, walking into the apartment.
“No problems at all,” Yuki said.
I couldn’t stop myself from looking at that box. He’d know. He’d look at the box and realise there was no kami inside.
But Yamaguchi just stood in the middle of the room, talking to Yuki. I wrapped my arms around myself, hoping I could disappear into a little ball.
He used a completely different tone with Yuki than he did with Shun. I didn’t know much about cultural clues but it seemed to me like he purposely tried to rile her up, and Yuki wasn’t the type to not get riled.
Luckily, Shun returned.
Not being able to speak Japanese came in handy sometimes. Shun looked so in control. He didn’t sweat, he didn’t mumble. He acted all business as usual.
Yamaguchi walked over and inspected the box. He pointed at the torn sides of the carton and Shun said something to him about it.
My stomach gurgled so loud that Yamaguchi glared at me. He asked me something. I had no idea what he said. I struggled to my feet. I’d need to rush to that bathroom any minute now.
If Yamaguchi straight out asked about the kami, I’d have to lie and when I lied, my face went bright red and my nostrils twitched. I was the worst liar ever.
“Your stomach is weak with Japanese food, right, Molly?” Shun said.
I nodded. Yep. That was it. No nerves here. No lying. No major meltdown.
“Too many red beans,” I said with a laugh that was way too loud and way too shrill, but Yamaguchi ignored me.
He ran his finger over the gold top of the box. I held my breath. Would he notice anything untoward?
Then he nodded for the goon to take the box. Even if that guy struggled under the weight, he could lift it. A guy like that could kill you, no issues.
Before Yamaguchi left, I remembered the whole reason for me being here and ran after him.
“The job’s done, right? When do I get my information?”
He gave a wave of his hand and said something to Shun.
“He’ll contact you after the matsuri,” Shun said.
The matsuri. Damn. I’d been so relieved that Yamaguchi had taken the box, I’d forgotten we had all that to get through, too.
But that old man had better not stiff me on the information. If he did, I might not have goons and I might not have powers but I had a whole flock of crows I could set on him.
My stomach gurgles turned to earthquakes and I dashed to the bathroom.
Chapter 27
“Okay,” Shun said when I came out of the bathroom. “We need to get to this matsuri.”
He handed me a light cotton jacket with a crest on the back.
“What’s this for?”
“We’re going to help carry the mikoshi. It’s the best way to get close to the action. We need to be there when the priest takes that kami out of the box.”
Huh? “We can just gatecrash the matsuri?”
Shun nodded. “Yamaguchi’s teams often join in and the more the merrier when it comes to helping carry that thing.”
“I’ll just run upstairs,” I said. “I can’t go out like this.”
“No time. Throw the jacket over your dress.”
“I’m not doing it,” Yuki said, crossing her arms. “I’ll go to the matsuri but I’m not a mikoshi bearer. You know my thoughts on that.”
Shun gave her a look, the one I’d learned to identify as his “be patient with Yuki look”.
I took off Yuki’s sweater then put on the jacket, crossing it over my body and tying the belt.
While I sorted that out, Shun went through the usual arguments with Yuki. How we couldn’t let Yamaguchi find out what we’d done and how we needed her there to deal with Jin. She still didn’t look convinced.
Surely it wouldn’t kill her to help us with this. She was part of the team, after all.
I opened my mouth to argue with her then I remembered what she’d told me earlier, about the different types of kitsune. Being a trickster rather than a kitsune who worked for the shrine seemed to be a point of pride with her, and Yuki had more pride than anyone I’d ever met. For her to take part in this festival would be a major deal for her.
I wasn’t even sure if we needed her. Shun and I could handle it. But could we handle Jin? Even though he’d given his word, I had a feeling the two of us would have a lot harder time controlling him than Yuki had.
Instead of arguing, I softened my stance.
“Please, Yuki,” I added. “We really need you there.”
“Phhht, Jin,” she said, and shook her head.
I thought she’d scoff at my pleading but she almost smiled. Her mouth definitely twitched.
“Wrong way,” Yuki said, looking at the jacket I’d put on. She untied the belt and fixed my outfit.
Did that mean she agreed? I wasn’t sure but I didn’t want to push her any further.
Once she’d finished adjusting my clothes, she sighed and picked up the jacket Shun had given her. He looked at me but didn’t say anything.
After she put her jacket on, she twisted her hair up in a bun and tied a strip of fabri
c around her head as a head band. She gave me one to put on too.
“We have to fit in as best we can,” she said.
I wasn’t sure that’d be possible for me but I tied my hair back and put the headband on.
“Cab’s here,” Shun said.
“So far, so good,” I said.
“Yeah, but that was the easy part,” Shun said. “We’ve got to make it convincing for the priest.”
With so many cars around the shrine, the driver pulled up as close as he could. Shun grabbed my hand and made me run with him.
I tried to take it all in. The teenage couples shyly holding hands, the families all dressed up for a day out, the old people. Bells rang out and a steady drum beat filled the air.
“It will only get busier,” Shun said. “The festival hasn’t even started.”
I just hoped we’d be around later to enjoy it and not being disembodied by Yamaguchi’s henchmen.
We dodged through groups of people, while smells of delicious food wafted around me. We ran down a row of food vendors and the tinny pop music from their stalls drowned out the drum beats.
Damn, I could eat some of that corn.
As we swung a sharp left, a row of game tents stretched out before us. Kids hung around tanks of goldfish, trying to catch them with nets.
“Too busy,” Shun said and slipped through a gap between the tents.
We cut across a grassy area and Jin and Yuki caught up with us.
When we got back on the path, the number of people around us increased. I could see the shrine building up ahead. The bright orange gates already towered above us.
Suddenly, voices clamored in my head. I raised my hands to my ears which didn’t help at all.
“I can hear kami,” I said. “Not our kami but the voices of hundreds of them.”
“There are many kami at the festival,” Shun said. “Not just ours. Each has their own mikoshi.”
I hadn’t considered that there’d be other kami. I thought if our kami was here, I’d hear his voice clearly but that might not be so. He’d blend in with all the others. There’d be only one kami here obsessed with chocolate, though.
“They’re excited,” I said. “They won’t shut up.”