Chapter 35 Obsessed with the Dragon #2
"Mami only reads art books and poetry. She thinks genre fiction is beneath her. She's told me multiple times that dragons are 'aesthetically interesting but narratively juvenile.'"
"And Hina?"
"She thinks the book is ridiculous." His jaw tightened. "She once told me she couldn't understand why anyone would want to read about monsters pretending to be romantic. She said it glorifies captivity. She would rather read about architecture."
"So this room is themed in a book that they don’t even like." I gestured at the paintings, the color scheme, the carefully curated details. "Did they do it for Kenji?"
“They try to like what he likes.”
“Yikes.” I lowered my camera.
He moved closer to one of the paintings—the one with Sol sleeping in the dragon's hoard. "When we were children, they memorized passages and would repeat them in front of Kenji, just to make him smile.”
“Did it make him smile?”
“Always. In fact, he would say, ‘Again, do it again.’ And they would do it with not one complaint.”
My throat tightened as I tried to imagine three little girls acting out a story they didn't even like, just to see him happy.
I looked at the paintings again—each one a scene from a book none of these women chose to love. This wasn't their home. This was a stage. A performance space designed to prove their devotion to something they didn't even believe in.
I thought of the bookmarks. The figurines. The candle holder shaped like claws. Every detail chosen not because it brought them joy, but because it might bring him joy if he ever came in and noticed.
I didn’t know if I could live in a space like that, covered in stuff that I didn’t enjoy.
This is crazy and sad.
I took one last look at the painting of Sol sleeping against the dragon, safe and treasured in his possessive embrace.
And I understood.
These three women had spent their entire lives trying to become worthy of being held like that.
By decorating their world in his dreams.
By memorizing his favorite words.
By erasing every piece of themselves that didn't reflect him back.
Even down to pretending to love a story about a woman claimed by a dragon-king who saw her as his equal.
The irony was devastating.
And now I was here, searching their rooms for evidence that one of them betrayed him. The woman he'd already chosen. The one he saw clearly enough that he didn't need her to perform.
Guilt twisted in my stomach. Not because I doubted the mission—if one of them was a spy, she had to be found. But because I understood, suddenly and completely, why she might have done it.
When you've spent your whole life being invisible to the man you loved, sometimes even bad attention felt like being seen.
If it is only one spy out of the three women, it is the one that feels the most ignored.
I considered the three women.
Something is off.
I’d been so sure Hina was the spy due to that strange look on the other island. However, standing in this meticulously curated living room filled with scenes from a book none of them even liked. . .I was seeing a different pattern.
I’m so glad I came to see their living space. There’s a clear hierarchy here that I didn’t know existed, and that’s important.
I looked at Hiro. “Hina is the youngest, but then who is the oldest?”
“Yuki.”
“Interesting.” I put my view back on the painting.
Three bedrooms arranged by choice or more by age—Yuki first, Mami in the center, Hina protected at the end. Three childhood roles etched into adulthood. Three women living inside a performance space built to reflect Kenji back at himself.
And in the center of it all—Mami’s paintings.
Hmmm.
God, those paintings were impeccable and should have won her awards. So much devotion in every brushstroke and tenderness in every detail. This was a woman pouring herself into images of stories she called “juvenile.”
Some people didn’t commit betrayal because they hated someone. They did it because they were unseen.
And middle children were experts at being unseen.
Yuki was the oldest—trusted, responsible, the one who probably held everything together. Hina was the youngest—protected, indulged, and probably the emotional pulse everyone responded to.
But Mami?
The middle?
The one whose needs disappeared in the space between those two poles?
She blended in.
Soft.
Sweet.
Overlooked.
Still here, after years of devotion that rarely earned more than a gentle compliment.
If it is only one spy. . .it would be the one used to being invisible.
The one who learned to adapt so well she became part of the furniture.
The one with the quiet talent.
The one who lived behind her own paintings like a ghost.
My suspicion of Hina had been instinct.
But this—this was motive.
Mami made the most sense.
The overlooked always did.
Plus, I knew this pattern.
I'd watched my mother live it for years.
She'd pretend to enjoy the most boring court footage imaginable—hours of procedural testimony, legal arguments, dry case analysis—because my father loved it.
Would sit beside him on the couch, nodding at appropriate moments, asking questions she didn't care about, smiling so wide one could see all her teeth.
Performing interest like it was a second job.
My mother loved romance novels. The trashier, the better. Dukes, rakes, and women who talked back.
But she only read my father’s favorite sci-fi books. The hard, technical ones with more equations than emotions.
Because my father didn't respect romance. Said it made women weak. Made them stupid. Made them believe in fantasies that would ruin them.
So she read what he read.
Watched what he watched.
Became a mirror of his interests until I couldn't remember what she actually liked anymore.
And even now—even with him in prison, even with her free to be whoever the hell she wanted—she still wouldn't touch a romance novel.
Every Christmas, I buy her the latest romance hardcover anyway. Wrap it in pretty paper. Write the same message inside the front cover: Mommy, be you. Live your life. Read this. Learn something cool in here. Look at the possibilities of love.
She'd smile.
Thank me.
Set it on a shelf.
I doubted she ever read them.
Because even after the man who'd controlled her was gone, the performance had become her. She didn't know how to stop pretending. Didn't know who she was without the mirror.
Yeah. I’m raising Mami to the top of the list now. Although I’m looking at all three.
Hiro grabbed my attention. "We should check the bedrooms."
I nodded, but couldn't stop looking at that final painting—Sol entangled with both twins, worshipped, claimed, and seen.
One woman.
Two dragon-kings who would burn the world for her.
And here, three women burned themselves trying to be chosen by one man who couldn't even see them clearly enough to notice they were performing.
I looked at him. "Do you like the book?"
Something shifted in Hiro's expression—not quite a smile, but close. "I like the parts with the twin dragons and their. . .entanglements with Sol."
Heat crept up my neck at the way he said that word.
He moved closer to the final painting—the one with Sol between both twins, their bodies curved around hers in obvious intimacy.
"When we were children, Kenji snuck this book out of our father's library.
It obviously wasn't meant for children. In fact, the edition Kenji stole should have been locked away. "
"Why?"
"It had illustrations." Hiro's mouth curved. "Very explicit ones. As a kid reading that story and seeing the images, it felt deliciously naughty to me. Forbidden. Those images were. . ."
Lust crossed his face. "They were the first time I'd ever seen such things. The first time I understood what. . .sex could look like."
My pulse kicked up.
"Kenji and I would read it together, hidden in his room. Poring over those illustrations. And we decided—right there, as boys—that we'd be like the twin dragons. That we'd share everything. Including women."
I snapped a photo of the painting, buying myself time to process that. "Intriguing."
"Is it?"
"That you two made that decision so young." I moved to photograph another angle of the room. "Based on a fantasy novel."
"No. Based on what felt right, the story just gave us language for it."
I took another photo—the dragon in flight, the woman with ice powers. "And now you no longer will share.”
“Wrong again.”
“I’m not wrong.”
Hiro chuckled—low and dark. "We'll still share you. . .Tora."
My head snapped toward him. "What?"
He shrugged, utterly casual about the bomb he'd just dropped. "We will just share you differently from how we have shared before. Probably not sexual, but like with sharing your food and time."
Probably not sexual. I caught that, Hiro.
I stared at him. "Kenji sharing my food and time with you? That’s what you see?"
"We’ll figure it out."
"And has Kenji gotten that memo about you two sharing my food and time?"
"He will." The certainty in his voice—the absolute confidence—made something flip in my stomach.
I laughed, slightly unhinged, and turned back to my phone. "Right. Okay. Sure."
"You don't believe me."
"I believe you think that's what's going to happen." I snapped another photo, focusing on the bookmarks, the figurines, anything but his face. "But Kenji doesn't strike me as the sharing type. Not anymore. Not with me."
"You'd be surprised what my brother will do when properly motivated."
"Uh-huh."
"You think I'm joking."
"I think you're testing me. Seeing how I will react to what you’re saying.”
“I am.”
Those two words held heat, more heat than I wanted to consider. So I kept my expression neutral and forced myself to focus. Hiro's ideas about dynamics and sharing could wait. Right now, I needed to figure out which of these three women had weaponized their access to Kenji's world.
I checked the time and sighed. "Alright, let’s go to the rooms.”
“Good idea.”
I moved past him, very aware of how close he stood, how his scent—different from Kenji's but equally dangerous—wrapped around me.
And I absolutely did not think about that painting. The one with Sol between two identical men. Both of them looking at her like she was the only thing worth worshipping.
Nope. Not thinking about it at all.
I adjusted my grip on my phone and headed for Yuki's door, determined to focus on literally anything else.
Behind me, Hiro followed, still radiating that smug amusement.