Chapter 6 #2
Reo rolled his eyes.
“I just don’t want anyone getting their hopes up. That’s all.” Kaede shrugged. “Carry on.”
Daisuke said nothing, yet crossed his arms over his chest, telling me that he was already putting his outfit together in his head.
The twins spoke back and forth, finishing each other’s sentences.
"We’ll be wearing—”
“Black suits— "
" —with sharp lines."
"And clean hems."
"No loud stitching."
Then, they nodded in sync.
Hiro pulled the lollipop out of his mouth and leveled it at me across the table. "I still don’t think guests should come."
"My Tiger said guests can come." I set my hands on the table and folded them together. "So, guests can come."
Hiro pursed his lips and offered no further push back.
"We finish this meeting." I stared at all of them. "Then you can burn the rest of the afternoon on your outfits like fucking women heading to a gala."
A ripple of satisfaction moved around the table, and even Reo’s lips curved into a smile.
Fuck. What are you doing to my men, Tora?
An hour later, the meeting ended and I checked on my Tiger, needing her scent in my nose, her warmth surrounding my skin, her body pressed against mine.
Where are you, Tora?
I went to the kitchen.
That place was a war zone of its own—sous chefs shouting, trays being loaded, steam rising from pots the size of oil drums.
I stood in the doorway and scanned the chaos for my Tiger, craving just a few seconds to hold her in my arms and run my fingers through those silky braids.
She wasn’t there.
One of the sous chefs saw me, bowed, and nearly dropped a platter.
Tora, I want to see you.
Pissed, I left before I disrupted her whole operation and searched the rest of the house. I never found her.
Goddamn it.
It was lunchtime when I returned to my office. Men carried boxes into the space.
My mother’s belongings.
They moved carefully, wearing white gloves, and gripping each box with both hands.
To my utter annoyance, Reo had sent his right-hand man, Ali, to oversee the process.
“There we go.” Ali directed the operation with one gloved hand and held a massive donut with the other. “Come on. Make it quick.”
I frowned and went over to my desk.
Ali was 5’9 and built like a wire hanger someone had draped a cheap, gray shirt over. His glasses always sat on the tip of his nose in a way that made him look like a librarian who had accidentally been assigned to the yakuza.
Powdered sugar covered his chin.
"Careful with the frame. Hold it from the bottom, not the sides." Ali pointed a gloved finger at one of the men while taking an enormous bite of his donut. Powdered sugar drifted down like snow onto his shirt.
He turned to the next pair of men carrying a long crate. "That one goes near the wall. Gently. Reo will have my head if any of this is damaged."
Still frowning, I watched him work and eat. This man consumed food at a rate that should have made him enormous, and instead he remained built like a chopstick.
I didn't like Ali, and understood that the dislike was not rational.
Ali was competent, loyal to Reo, and highly effective at his job. He'd also never disrespected me or overstepped his position.
But he was close to Reo.
Too close.
Ali occupied a space in Reo's daily life that the beastly part of me couldn't accept quietly. Ali cooked for Reo, read beside him, and knew the way Reo liked his tea in the morning.
They’d met in Dubai years ago. Ali had been working for the wrong people. Reo had almost killed him. Whatever stilled my Roar’s trigger finger that night had turned into a partnership that outlasted most marriages.
Granted. . .Ali looked very similar to Reo's estranged little brother. Perhaps, my Roar used Ali as a stand-in to fill the emptiness in his heart.
A crumb fell from Ali's donut and landed on the hardwood floor. White powder on dark wood. Ali froze mid-chew, looked down at it, and then up at me.
I raised an eyebrow.
He stuffed the rest of the donut into his mouth, making both cheeks swell. Next, he dropped to one knee, picked up the crumb with his gloved fingers, and deposited it into his pocket. "My apologies, Dragon."
The men continued setting down boxes and crates.
I moved among the boxes and opened one. It held aged and brittle scrolls. I untied one and unrolled it to find a family tree rendered in ink so old it had turned from black to amber. My mother's maiden name sat near the center, connected by thin lines to branches that stretched back centuries.
Ali got to my side. “This stuff should be in a museum. The pigment preservation alone looks to be hundreds of years old and the red is still saturated to show. . .”
I turned to him and scowled.
Ali cleared his throat and backed up. “Well. . .I’ll be leaving.”
I set the scroll down. "And what about the serial killer? Do we have more news?"
Ali turned around slowly. "Yes, sir. We do."
"Go ahead."
Ali blinked behind his glasses. "Oh. You want me to tell you?"
My scowl shifted to a glare.
"I-I usually give my reports to Reo."
"So you're saying Reo is more important than me?"
The color drained from his face. "Oh God. No. No. I'm just saying the protocol has typically been—"
"Don't waste my time today."
"Of course." He straightened his spine and pushed his glasses up with one finger. "We've finally discovered the name of the serial killer we've been calling the Footman.”
“What is it?”
“Archer Lee. He’s half Japanese, half American."
I crossed my arms over my chest. “Interesting.”
"His mother was a thief. She stole from the yakuza during your father's reign. The Fox ordered his men to bring her head and heart. To make an example. They broke into her home and chopped her up while her six-year-old son sat in the corner watching."
In my mind, I imagined a six-year-old boy in a corner watching his mother be reduced to pieces on the floor.
"When the killers finished, I guess they. . .felt remorse for the kid.”
“Why do you say that?”
“They left the boy, Archer, his mother's feet."
I tensed.
"They took the rest of her body to the Fox."
I considered all of this. My father had given a demented kill order, received the delivery, and moved on without thinking about the child he'd left behind.
And within the darkness that boy had grown into a serial killer.
"No one knows how long Archer held on to those feet," Ali continued. "But it was long enough to build an obsession. He grew up in an orphanage, and every year, a child was found dead with their feet removed. When Archer became an adult, he escalated to women."
"And delivers their feet to me.” I sighed.
Ali nodded. “The sins of the father and all that.”
“Where is Archer now?”
"We went to his home. He was gone. Cleared out within the last week. Our team is running down known associates, aliases, and financial records."
“Find and bring him to me immediately.”
“Of course." He bowed and then for some idiotic reason bowed two more times.
I sneered.
He quickly turned and hurried away.
I spent the next hour rummaging through my mother’s belongings—watercolor sketches, old portraits of ancestors, brilliant swords, an empty jewelry box.
And at the center. . .a thick book.
I picked it up and held it with both hands. Dust sat in the grooves of the cover. The leather had gone soft and pale.
I opened it.
The pages were painted in Japanese ink that had browned.
I turned the pages carefully, afraid that pressing too hard would turn history into dust.
The title sat alone on the first page.
The Rites of Burial and Becoming.
Below it, the first line.
To become something powerful, you must first be buried. And if done correctly, you will rise as something unrecognizable.
I read it twice and let the words settle into the space behind my ribs where fear lived. Where the knowledge that I was about to kill my father sat beside the knowledge that doing it would change the shape of me forever.
I turned the pages and found faded watercolor illustrations. A warrior kneeling in dirt. A woman beside him. Moonlight overhead. Flowers surrounding them in rings of red and white.
I kept reading.
We were not chosen for purity. We were chosen for endurance.
And the spirits did not ask if we were good men. They only asked if we could carry what they placed inside us.
More illustrations showed hunters moving through darkness with masks on their faces, animal-shaped shadows above them, and blades drawn.
The demons they pursued were rendered in red ink. And sometimes their bodies were contorted in agony and their mouths opened in screams.
To hunt demons, we wore their faces.
For some reason. . .that sat within my chest, and my mother’s presence rose within the room the way perfume filled a space.
I was finding her, reconnecting with her bloodline, and hoping to God that this could protect my men and me in the next battle.
I turned the page and saw a large sentence painted over several illustrations.
Once the Burial Ritual is complete, the hunter controls the beast.
I leaned my head to the side.
Controls the beast?
My pulse picked up.
I took in the first illustration and shivered.
A massive circular hole had been dug into the earth. Inside it, a warrior lay with a woman. They were naked and their bodies were intertwined together in the slow curve of lovemaking. Her hair spread beneath them in dark waves. His hand cradled the back of her skull.
Lotus blossoms covered them.
And above them, a massive shadowed spider watched.
The artist had rendered it in faded gray ink. Its mouth was open and its eyes were on the lovers.
I looked at the illustration on the other page.
The hunter was now in full battle with a mask over his face and his blade raised in mid-strike against an enemy twice his size.
And his shadowed spider had its fangs in the enemy’s throat. It looked to be weakening the man.
I widened my eyes and looked at the sentence again.
Once the Burial Ritual is complete, the hunter controls the beast.
Then, I stared at the illustrations side by side.
Burial Ritual? Sex in the earth. . .lotus blossoms. . .what else?
A slow shiver hit me.
I need to know more.
My hand tightened on the edge of the book.
I closed my eyes and let the image of the spider-shadow settle behind my lids. Its fangs in the enemy's throat.
Nyomi sees my dragon-shadow. The hairstylist can see Rin’s serpent-shadow. Then. . .it’s all real. . .
I opened my eyes.
And if this is real. . .is there a possibility that Rin and I could use the shadows?
This could all be old mythical bullshit or it could change everything in this war.
Please, God. . .Mom. . .show me. . .I don’t want to bury any more men. . .
I spent the rest of the day reading the book, but nothing touched back on that Burial Ritual. I ended up calling Reo, letting him know about the page, and having him put a team into researching it.
Surely, my Roar thought I was crazy, but he would never question me.
When the light outside my window had begun to turn gold, signifying the beginning of sunset, I stopped reading and searched for my Tiger again, taking the book with me.
She wasn’t in the kitchen.
I checked with my Roar, and he said she was in her office. I headed that way and bumped into a long line of women outside the private theater.
What is happening here?
It must have been at least twenty women walking in the same direction. Their heels clicked. They giggled and chatted with each other as they entered the theater. Behind them, several servants pushed long garment racks draped in black sequined gowns. The fabric shimmered.
I gestured to one of the maids. “What is going on?”
One slowed just enough to meet my eyes. Her smile was small and apologetic. “The Tiger asked us not to respond if anyone asks what is going on.”
I frowned. “I am not just anyone.”
“Yes, sir. You are correct.” She bowed and then continued walking.
I watched her go in shock.
Did she just put the Tiger’s loyalty over mine?
A quiet laugh almost broke from my chest before I caught it.
Naughty Tiger. What are you plotting? Issuing orders in my house that even my staff followed over me.
I should have corrected it, but I let it pass. I wanted them to respect her, and she’d clearly gained their loyalty all on her own.
I went to her office and looked inside. She was not there. Yet, a massive cage sat inside.
What the fuck is this?
I went up to it. The cage’s door was open.
Who had been inside it?
Her amber-plum scent hung in the air. I went to her desk and touched the back of her chair. It was still warm.
Where the fuck is she?
Her guard answered when I called and said she was in our bedroom waiting for me.
I went there immediately and saw that yet again she was not there either. I sneered and fisted my free hand.
What the fuck?!
Rage blazed through me.
Why would they say that she’s here, if. . .
Then I noticed something on the bed. Laid out across the black cover was a dazzling tuxedo done in this luxurious black.
Tora. . .did you tell your guards to get me here?
I walked over and set my mother’s book down. That was when I spotted the large note next to the tuxedo.
It was thick card stock and cream-colored. The handwriting was unhurried.
I could see her writing this—bent over her desk, her breasts hanging forward, and her throat exposed.
I wanted my mouth on that throat.
Biting it.
Tasting her blood.
I wanted to feel her pulse jump under my tongue.
My teeth.
I wanted my cock so deep inside her that she couldn't remember the shape of a world without me in it.
She must have known that if I caught her today. . .she’d be bouncing on my cock instead of finishing plans for this party.
I looked at the card again.
To the Dragon.
Grinning, I picked the card up and turned it over.
I dressed you tonight because I wanted my hands on you before anyone else got the chance.
Consider it foreplay.
Every button you close.
Every cuff you fasten.
Every inch of fabric touching your skin. . .that's me.
Touching you.
Yearning for you.
Get dressed.
Now.
Love, your Heart
I brought the card to my nose and inhaled black amber and ripe plum.
My cock stiffened so fast it ached, just from her scent on paper.
Naughty Tiger.
I inhaled it again and then prepared to get ready.
What do you have in store for us tonight?