Sugita
I slumped against the wall, rubbing my forehead.
If a human kidnapped Kishi, she might still be alive—I had to act quickly. If she was dead, I had to find that out before the trail went cold. If she’d fallen prey to a yokai, someone had to hunt it down and finish it off before it got the chance to kill again.
Right now, all I had was my sickening hunch and Naito-kun’s confirmation that it was possible I was right. I didn’t know enough to transfer my case.
I didn’t want to risk making more waves with Handa. When he’d confessed his feelings at my bachelor party back in February, I’d woken up to an alarming reality that there was a serious problem with an old and solid friendship I’d come to rely on. A lopsidedness that put him at risk.
I’d thought I could fix it by being honest and upfront with my feelings, not thinking even once about how hard it was for Handa himself to be honest or direct. Needless to say, I hadn’t fixed anything—not even close—Handa kept those feelings in the closet, insisting he’d been so drunk at my bachelor party, he didn’t even remember what he’d said to me. I’d had to tell myself that he was on his own. I couldn’t do anything about a problem he refused to address.
From there, we’d drifted apart. And after the incident on the Rainbow Bridge, things had gotten that much harder for me to understand. I didn’t know how to fix his screwed up way of thinking. I didn’t know if choosing to stay close to him was helping or hurting.
All I knew was that if I told him we had to stop being partners, our friendship might buckle under and collapse.
Meanwhile, I still had a duty to this city.
I drew out Kishi’s picture again to study the brightness in her eyes. She looked as warm as a summer’s day, and her mother had talked like she used to make the sun rise every morning. A truly beautiful and enlightening woman.
The woman I loved was home even now, sitting alone in our new house, waiting for me. She’d turned twenty-one in April, and she was gorgeous. I could almost believe she woke the sun up every morning with her vibrant spirit and zest for life.
Walking away from this case without even trying to comprehend the truth wasn’t an option. Not when I had something so precious I wanted to protect.
With my mind made up, I put the photo back into my pocket and went to look for Handa.
It wasn’t hard to find him. He’d planted himself at the center of a group of the younger guys, where he was making jokes and laughing through a cloud of cigarette smoke.
I hung back a moment to watch him.
He hadn’t changed much from the skinny nineteen-year-old I’d met in the academy. Comprised of an average height and so thin I sometimes wondered where he was keeping his organs, he wasn’t a big guy, and the tailored suit he wore accented his leanness. Something about the way his hair shadowed his forehead lent him a troubled look no matter how he was feeling, but tonight, even at the center of attention, his smile didn’t touch his gray eyes, and I knew he was going through the motions, trying to convince me, and everyone else, that he was the same old Handa Hideki he’d always been.
The guy I’d met in the academy would have understood the situation I was in without me having to explain it. He would have encouraged me to do the right thing, do what I thought was best, and not worry about him. He would have wanted to be right by my side, no matter what we were facing.
This Handa Hideki seemed so jaded and angry to me, it was hard to guess what he was thinking, let alone what he might want, but I knew now that he loved me in a way he loved no one else. When things got bad, at least I knew I had someone watching my back who would fight hard, and I just couldn’t believe I wasn’t able to rely on that anymore.
His chi felt the same as it always had—a light zephyr of energy, gusting around me. I’d gotten so used to that presence, I honestly didn’t want to go crawling into the shadows without it. For better or for worse, he was my best friend.
Amidst the laughing kouhai, I stepped up to put a hand on Handa’s shoulder. “Ready when you are, Aibou.”
He smirked up at me, perfectly concealing how angry he’d been when I’d walked away from him. “I was just inviting these guys to my birthday next week. Think they can keep up?”
“It sounds too wild for me,” Nagamine-kun admitted, grinning.
“It’s definitely something,” I grunted.
“Don’t come if you can’t hold your liquor,” Handa warned, getting lightly to his feet. “Or if you’re broke.”
“I always pay for everything anyway.” I headed for the door. I was glad he was thinking about the future, even if it was only something as mindless as going to concerts and getting drunk next week. I wanted to believe that if he could keep holding onto one little thing at a time—promotions and birthdays and financing a motorcycle—we could sort through things over time.
Until then, I had to keep him close.
In the elevator, Handa’s cheer dissipated back into an unnerving and unfamiliar silence. I was so used to him filling every free moment he found with casual chatter, nothing illustrated to me that he’d gone somewhere dark like his sudden inability to just slouch there and talk about something dumb.
I drew a quiet breath. “Say something, Ki-kun.”
“I hope Naito, boy wonder, had the answers you were looking for.”
“Not exactly.” Naito-kun had said exactly the opposite of what I’d wanted to hear.
“Well, what can you do? He’s a summer out of high school, like I said. Anyway, what’s it matter what I have to say? Isn’t that why you went to Naito in the first place? He’s obviously got something I don’t.”
I glanced down at him, dismayed by the cold look on his face. “I get why you’d think that, but if you’re pissed off, I wish you’d say so.”
“I’m not pissed off,” he lied. “I’m just saying you guys obviously had something to talk about that didn’t include me, and if that’s how it is, maybe this isn’t working.”
“You’re projecting,” I huffed. “I never said this wasn’t working. You’re the one who acts like it can’t, and that has nothing to do with Naito-kun.”
“Whatever, Ken.” The elevator doors dinged open, and he sauntered out. “Just tell me what you want to do.”
“I want to sit down and talk our shit out. I want to tell you what I’m thinking, and I’d love to know what the hell is on your mind these days. I’d take any of that over a transfer.”
He refused to look at me, puffing his cigarette as he clipped toward the door, like he wanted to get away from me. “I never said anything about a transfer. I was talking about the case. What the hell do you want to do about the case? Even with advice from the prodigy, we’ve got nothing, right? Or was his advice too classified for me to know about?”
“I hate it when you get like this,” I snarled, unable to help it. “Look. Do me a favor.” I grabbed his shoulder, pulling him to a stop.
Reluctantly, he faced me. “What favor?”
“Have a little patience. I know that pissed you off back there, and I’d be pissed too, if I were you, but there’s something going on here you don’t understand.”
“I can definitely see that.” His eyes narrowed. “What is it?”
I had to tell him something. Anything. If I was going to investigate this, I couldn’t do it without telling him anything.
I wasn’t allowed to explain about yokai, but even if I did, he wouldn’t believe me. Why should he? It would sound as ridiculous to him as if I said Santa-san was our prime suspect.
“I need your advice now, Aibou,” I told him, seriously. We’d reached our favorite smoking spot in the parking garage.
Some of the shadows lifted from his eyes, and he studied me with interest. “All right. I’ll do my best.”
That gave me some hope, but I took my time deciding what to say, lighting a cigarette, carefully choosing my words. “What if I knew something you didn’t? Something classified I wasn’t allowed to talk about.”
“Such as what?”
He was so thorough, and I wasn’t good with hypotheticals.
“I don’t know. Aliens.”
“Aliens,” he repeated, skeptically.
“It doesn’t matter what it is. The point is, if I had information that could put you at risk, what would you say I should do?”
His brow slanted back into annoyance. “First of all, I’m your partner. I don’t need you to protect me.”
“You and I are supposed to protect each other.”
“We’re supposed to watch each other’s backs, but I’m not your shounen manga girlfriend, and if you expect me to sit on the sidelines, wringing my hands and praying for you to come back safe from fighting aliens, that’s bullshit.”
He really was touchy about his sexuality. When I read between the lines, so much of what he had to say hinted at that deep-seated insecurity, that concern that I might view him as being weaker, all because he liked men.
I had to admit, it did trigger a protective side of me I didn’t expect, but only in that I wanted him to know I accepted him and that I’d stand up for him against the kinds of people who might try to treat him unfairly.
“Nobody thinks that about you,” I told him, delicately. “Definitely not me. I’m talking about when my professional obligation intersects with my personal concern for your well-being.”
“You’d better not start talking about the fucking Rainbow Bridge again. I swear—I am fine. And that was months ago. If you can’t see that I’m fine, I don’t know what to tell you, but I’m definitely not backing off a case over it.”
It was the first time he’d mentioned the Rainbow Bridge since that night, and it stalled me. Maybe he meant for it to. Either way, as much as I’d love to, this wasn’t the time to address that.
“I’m not talking about that, Hideki. I’m asking you what you think I should do.”
He shrugged. “I think you should do your job, Ken. I have no idea what the hypothetical is about, but if there’s something classified you really can’t tell me, I still expect you to do your job. And you can still count on me to watch your back. I trust you to watch mine.”
I gazed out at the rain, thinking.
That was exactly what he would have told me in the academy also, even if he had a more jaded way of expressing it now. so I saw no sense in second guessing his answer. He couldn’t make an informed decision, but his desire to work with me and keep me safe was indisputable. Loyalty was one of his most admirable qualities.
I might be able to pull this off. If I could triangulate a point between the park where Kishi had disappeared, her university, and the spot where Arai’s body had been dumped, I had a good chance of locating the yokai’s hunting ground. Naito must be closing in on it already, but I had an advantage over him in my ability to detect chi. Using that tool, it was completely possible for me to at least figure out where the yokai was and whether or not it might have been responsible for whatever had happened to Kishi Tomiju. After that, I could report to the lieutenant and get us reassigned to a new case.
I didn’t like the idea of abandoning my victim, and I knew Handa wasn’t going to understand my method, but I needed to know, as soon as possible, what I was up against, so that I could make the best decision for myself and all the people I cared about.
Heavily, I clapped a hand on his shoulder again. “Okay, Aibou. I’m counting on you.”
Shaking off his funk like magic, Handa grinned at me. “So, overtime, right?”
“I need to call my wife first,” I grunted.
“Sure, take your time. What’re we doing, taking down some corrupt politician?”
“If you’re lucky, you’ll never find out what we’re doing. Let’s leave it at that.”
“Right, aliens. I won’t let them probe you.”
“Classy, Hideki.” Still, I smirked at him a little. He wasn’t completely beyond my reach, and that meant I still had an opportunity to salvage our friendship. All I had to do was close this case, and then I could focus on fixing things with him.
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