Removed – Chapter 18

At seven o’clock, I have another grand entrance at Izakaya Tanaka and turn to the booths to find Jiro laughing and shaking his head. That will never get old. Yoichi is at the bar with Miko sitting next to him. She’s examining something on her tablet when she waves me over.

“Miko, how are you?” I lean in, and we give each other a kiss on the cheek.

“I’m great! Happy. You look hot, Sanaa.” She pulls back so she can scan me from top to bottom. I’m wearing my black and green haori coat with a large orange koi fish along the bottom back, a tank top, and black pants. I twisted my hair up and even put on makeup.

“Thanks. Hi, Yoichi. It’s good to see you again.”

“Sanaa,” he says with a smile and a nod, but nothing more. I need to get to know him better soon.

“Yoichi is quickly helping me with some financial stuff, but we’ll come over and sit down with you two for dinner in about fifteen minutes. I ordered up food for us already.”

“What’s good tonight?” I ask with a smile.

“Sushi. Kagetora is on duty tonight.”

“Fantastic.” I squeeze her arm, nod and smile at Yoichi, and walk to Jiro’s table.

I should not be this happy. I just spent the afternoon watching video of Matsuda who has been following me, but I can’t wipe the smile off my face. Jiro is gorgeous again in black. He’s formidable in a way that makes all the blood pool right between my legs. He stands up when I reach the table.

“Good evening, Sanaa.” He asks me to sit and gestures to the seat on the inside of the booth between him and the wall, so I move past him and sit down.

“How are you? It was strange not having our usual practice session this afternoon.” I actually missed it despite asking for the day off. I would’ve much rather have been with him than spending the afternoon in Ku 1 unexpectedly.

“It was strange. I didn’t know what to do with myself. And I’m fine… happy,” he says, smiling at me.

I remember how we left things two nights ago after the okiya and how determined I am to grab him for myself. Being forward with him is the only way to do this.

I reach over and slide my hand easily into his. “Me too.”

There are those first few seconds when you’re staring at someone you want to kiss and think it’s going to happen, and you lean in a little and smile… But then a waiter comes by with a bottle of saké and ruins it. The carafe hits the table with a thump and knocks me straight out of the moment.

Seriously, that was uncalled for.

Jiro clears his throat, and I blush so badly I think my face will melt off.

“Saké, Sanaa?” He doesn’t even wait for my response, just pours.

“Yes, absolutely.” I squeeze his hand. “That waiter has the worst timing ever.”

Jiro laughs, leans in, and kisses me on the neck again, right below my ear, and his head and mine are so close together I close my eyes and rest my cheek on his. It causes a long sigh to exit my body. My shoulders drop and my cheek sinks deeper against his.

Jiro pulls back and says, “Mmmm.”

I take a sip of saké before I say anything in response. I don’t know what it is about Jiro, but I’m not the least bit shy with him. It was awkward in the beginning with the dōjō and the cameras, but our carefulness has disappeared. I’ve never been a shy girl. I was the one who asked Joshua out, and when I dumped him and was depressed, I started hitting on Chad. I don’t like to wait for things I want.

“I hope you haven’t eaten. We ordered a lot of food.” His thumb strokes my hand a few times before he lets go.

“Nope. I had ramen with Helena in Ku 5, and then I…” Maybe it’s time I confided more in Jiro? He knows what I do each day, I’m sure.

“What?” he asks while loading up his plate with dumplings.

I cringe. I didn’t want to talk about my problems when happy feelings are bouncing between us.

“Well…”

He sets down his plate and turns to me. “Spit it out. What’s going on?”

“So, we talked about Tadao Matsuda last time we were here.” He nods his head, his eyes intense. “I do know him. I watch all these people for Mark, and he’s one of them. A few days ago I watched him beat a man to death in front of the cameras.”

Jiro stiffens. His muscles are tense, and he’s barely breathing. His reaction is so severe a vein in his temple starts to throb. I’m not afraid of Matsuda, but instead I’m afraid of what Jiro will do when I tell him the rest of this story.

“And today I found him watching me at the ramen shop,” I say carefully.

He sets his chopsticks down forcefully on the plate, and they roll in different directions. “You what? What happened?”

“You’re gonna laugh,” I say with a chuckle, but he’s not laughing. “I thought about what you were teaching me about offensive sword fighting, and I basically stared him down until he went back to his noodles.”

A hint of a smile graces Jiro’s face. Just a hint.

“And then I gave up any idea of having a day without work, went to Ku 1, and watched Matsuda on video. Turns out he’s been following me for about a week now.”

Jiro is stone cold silent and staring straight into my eyes. My heart is picking up pace in my chest.

“Jiro, say something before I faint.”

“Matsuda is… following you.” It’s not even a question. He’s clutching the edge of the table with such force his fingertips are turning white. “He’s a killer.”

I reach out and lightly touch the tops of his hands and slide my fingers under his, prying them from the table top. “I know. And I don’t know what’s going on, but I’m not going to find out until I talk to Mark tomorrow.”

“Let’s talk to him tonight. Right now.”

He wants to protect me, and it’s really turning me on. Stop, Sanaa. Not right this moment.

I close my eyes. Focus.

His right hand is cold in both of mine, and I take my thumbs and massage some life back into it.

“No. Not right now. Not tonight.”

I flip his hand over and press my palm down directly on top of his, making a sandwich of his hand in mine, my heart beating way up in my throat.

“Please.” It comes out more desperate than I want it to, but dammit, I’m so tired of waiting for one crisis after another to end before I can make a meaningful connection with Jiro. Matsuda is not going to take it away from me now.

“Sanaa, I want…”

I shake my head at him because Miko and Yoichi are heading our way. “We’re about to have company. Let’s eat. We’ll work this out later.”

I fear the mood between us has cooled way too much to get anything more out of this evening, but when Miko and Yoichi sit down, and we start to eat and drink together, Jiro relaxes a little. He puts his hand on my knee while talking, and I let my fingers play over his until he’s so relaxed he even smiles. That’s better.

As we talk, we steadily clear out the appetizers, sushi, and saké, and every little bit is delicious. I want to stay here all night and not have my day off ever end, but the saké is creeping its way through me. I need to use the bathroom, but when I get back to the table, I’ll pull Jiro away and have him sit with me alone at the bar for a while.

“The food was delicious, Miko. Kagetora is amazing as always.” I place my napkin next to me and turn to Jiro. “Would you let me out? I’ll be back in a minute.”

When I’m done in the bathroom, I stare at my reflection in the mirror for quite some time. The freckles on my nose, the ones Jiro called kawaii, are standing out again, and it makes me wonder if I resemble my mother when she was twenty. I’ve seen some photos of her a few years older but none from when she was my age. If we look as alike as my aunts, Sakai, Koichi, and Mariko say we do, perhaps Matsuda sees it too? That’s a thought. He was so surprised to see me that maybe he thought, for a moment, I was my mother. Why he cares is another question entirely.

I wash and dry my hands and leave the bathroom before Jiro sends out a search party. As I’m heading back, I pass by a man using the public terminal.

It’s Matsuda. Twice in one day is not a coincidence.

I turn my head to him as I walk by, he looks up from what he’s doing, and we stop, but he takes a breath before I can and approaches me. I’m too terrified to move.

“So, Sanaa Griffin, are you following me now? Or should I call you Hanako?”

“Uh…” I stammer. Hanako? What the hell is that? What should I say? Yes, I’m following you? No, I’m here with friends? I opt for, “I think you’re the one following me, actually.” And it was the right response because he immediately backs off, a smile playing about his lips.

“How was your ramen today?” he asks.

“Excellent. Yours?”

“Their noodles are getting a little soft for my taste.”

“Back off, Matsuda.”

I turn around, and Jiro is standing behind me. I didn’t even hear him approach. I’m glad he was the search party and not Miko.

“You wouldn’t want to cause a scene, now, would you?” Matsuda asks.

Jiro’s hand is on my arm as he pulls me to the side.

“If you don’t want a scene then you should be on your way.” Jiro has stepped in front of me, and I take the opportunity to smile and raise my eyebrows at Matsuda. It’s not the most prudent thing to do, taunting a killer like him, but damned if I’m going to play the scared victim.

He grins back in that strangely detached way he has, his dirty brown locks fallen over his face.

“Don’t forget to ask Sakai about your aunts, Sanaa,” he says.

Jiro takes several steps backwards, slowly pushing me towards the door to the back alley. Matsuda walks to the last of the private rooms, opens the door, and glances at us as he enters, closing the door behind him.

Jiro turns and pushes me out the door. “Let’s go. Hurry!”

“Jiro, I can’t leave Miko back at the table… and my bag!” What the hell is he doing?

“We’re not leaving for good.” He surveys the back of the restaurant and pulls me toward the side alley between the two buildings. Near the end of the alley is a pile of delivery crates, and he runs to them. “Here, help me with this.” Jiro starts grabbing and stacking crates against the building.

“What are you doing?” I’m exasperated and, well, the outside air has only reinforced how much I’ve had to drink tonight. If Jiro thinks I’m going to stack crates in a back alley, he is mistaken.

“Look.” And he points upward. About two and a half meters above us is a long line of windows along the length of the building, and now I remember each of the private rooms has a window. I jump right next to Jiro and stack two crates up. He climbs on his and holds out his hand to grab mine and pull me up. Despite the drink, we are both light on our feet and nimble. The crates barely creak as we straighten up to peer over the edge.

“You think she followed you here?” says a female voice out of visibility. It sounds familiar, though.

“No. I get the impression she was here with Jiro Itō or maybe someone else. He came out and confronted us.”

“Did you see Mark Sakai?” A female hand reaches out of the corner of the room and slides the rice paper door open. “I don’t see any of them in the restaurant. Maybe you scared them off.”

“So, you’re certain, Tadao? Absolutely certain?” This is not the female nor Matsuda. Another man is present, but I don’t recognize his voice.

“She is the spitting image of her mother. All the way down to her voice. I’m certain,” Tadao says.

“Then the kiku line was not destroyed as we thought it was.”

“Kiku? What’s that?” I whisper at Jiro. He shakes his head.

“Perhaps even she doesn’t know.”

My heart has stopped. They’re talking about me!

“Mark Sakai is behind this somehow. We’ll have to do some more digging and figure it out.” Matsuda does not sound happy.

“But it’s been over fifteen years. How were we to know she was still alive?”

“We should go before they come back or anyone else sees us,” says the female voice. She gets up from the table, and it’s Emiko Matsuda, the new head of the Colonization Committee, and Tadao Matsuda’s wife. I sink down so I won’t be seen, but before they leave, I peek up again and the third man is none other than the head of Minamoto clan, Yoshinori Minamoto. Huh. In all of my research of the Minamotos and Tairas, I have never heard any of their voices. All of the surveillance footage is silent.

We jump down from our crates, and I stumble a little. Jiro reaches out and grabs me before I fall over. Yep, still tipsy. Hurriedly, we make our way to the back of the building again.

“Kiku? Have you ever heard that before?” Jiro asks. I shake my head. Never.

“Jiro. Jiro, they were talking about me. What in the hell is going on?”

My thoughts race, and I’m not making any sense out of them. Kiku line? My mother?

Jiro grabs my hand. “I…” He falters and just looks at me.

I don’t know what he wants to say, and I don’t care. I only see his concerned and handsome face and want to kiss him so badly it hurts. So I lean in and stop him before he can get any further. It’s a split-second decision I’m sure I won’t regret because he immediately brings his hands to my face and is kissing me back.

Ah. I finally got the kiss I’ve been obsessing over, and it’s exactly what I was hoping for and more because it’s slow, steady, and passionate. It’s the kind of kiss I’ve longed for, the kind neither Chad nor Joshua could give me because they just couldn’t love me. His lips are sweet, and he’s much better at this than I am, so I relax against him, and it only causes him to kiss me harder. I wrap my arms around his waist and feel, not just know, how strong he is. Through his shirt, my hands play over the muscles in his lower back that tighten as I press my body into his. It makes my knees weak.

And then, it’s over so quick. We break apart and stare at each other.

I ask because I need to be sure. “We’re not going to regret this, are we?”

He smiles and pushes his hair back from his face, the lock of bright white hair shining in the light from the alley door. I can’t resist reaching out and touching it. He sighs, turning his cheek into my hand, and shakes his head.

“No. This is something I won’t ever regret.”

I knew right from the beginning, from the first moment we ever saw each other, we would be good for each other. He is exactly what I need. He’s what’s been missing from my life and my relationships, a well of strength and love, not a psychotic burst of mayhem or an emotionless shell. I hope I can hold on to him.

We’re so wrapped up in each other now, kissing like we’ve been held back from it for years, my hands in his hair, his hands around my waist. Jiro pulls my head back and kisses my neck. Oh gods, that’s amazing.

I don’t want to let him go so we stay out back together until it gets so late I hear Miko inside talking to the staff about the next day’s schedule. She usually waits till midnight to do that.

“It’s getting late, and you have to meet Sakai in the morning. I think tonight, I should go home and talk to him about Matsuda.” He seems disappointed to be ending this, and it pleases me.

“I should come.” Maybe I can get some answers.

“No,” he says, shaking his head. “It’s already late, and I’ll have to wake Sakai.”

Right. It’ll be easier for them both if I go home, I’m sure, but I want to be there, and it makes me pout.

“I’ll walk you to the transitway after we go inside. Yoichi and Miko are going to wonder where we are if we don’t go back eventually.” He puts his forehead against mine.

“Sanaa, listen. You and I still have to work together every day.”

“You mean, you have to put me through intense training every day until I fall over. You’ve been awfully hard on me lately.” I smile at him though I poke him in the chest with my index finger.

He smiles back and tucks my hair behind my ears. “I’ve been frustrated by our lack of… private time.”

I nod. I know this feeling well.

“We can still work together. It’ll be fine.” I rest my head on his shoulder, burrowing my face on his neck. I breathe deep and remember his smell again. “We should be reserved and professional in front of others.”

He laughs knowing this statement coming from my mouth is ridiculous. “All right, but we don’t have to hide it, especially not in front of our friends and family. For everyone else, we’ll have to be business-like.”

Jiro smiles and pulls me back for another kiss.

I don’t object.