Chapter Three #4
His eyes darken, the curl of his mouth turning suggestive. “You know I have no qualms kneeling for you. Shall I remind you of my devotion tonight, my love?”
Heat rushes to her cheeks. “Yes,” she blurts, fingers twisting in her apron as she wills her blood to cool. Jiro looks at her as if he’s never seen her before. “I’m married. We’re married. Jiro, this is my husband, Khiran. Khiran, this is Jiro. He’s been helping me here around the cottage.”
“A pleasure,” Khiran says, warm enough to convince Anna that he means it. He takes a seat in his usual spot at the kitchen table, setting his attention to the parcel he’d brought with him. His long fingers work at the knot tied at the top, the fabric falling away to reveal lacquered boxes.
Anna already knows what it is. The little tradition they started centuries ago in the mountains of Genoa has continued.
Whenever he returns home, it is always with some sort of food for her to try.
Though sometimes he forgoes the guessing and brings her something she’s enjoyed in the past. His last trip, he had brought her feijoada—a Brazilian stew with black beans and different meats.
It made her think of the day trip they made to Salvador, the way the stew felt warm and comforting in her stomach after having made the journey with his magic.
She can tell by the lacquered boxes and the shade of indigo of the fabric that today’s dish has more than likely come from Japan.
He’s brought several meals from there over the last year as he carefully watched the aftermath of the nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Anna has seen the images of the distinctive mushroom cloud, read the articles that headlined every major newspaper across the county.
Khiran described the horror of it, pale-faced and ashen. Of civilians dying months after the bombs dropped, plagued with strange and horrible symptoms. How the bomb sites stopped any type of life from taking root for miles. Of all of man’s weapons, Anna knows this one scares him the most.
Jiro eyes the box, a strange look of recognition and suspicion pinching his face. “Where’d you get that?”
Khiran opens the lid, tactfully ignoring the question by offering one of his own. Lined neatly inside are some fish shaped pastries. “Would you care for some?”
“That’s taiyaki.”
“It is.” Khiran’s brow ticks upward, a subtle challenge.
“Do you like taiyaki, Jiro?,” she asks, deliberately ignoring the tension between them. “I’ve never had the opportunity to try it.”
“I haven’t had it since I was a kid.” The edge in his voice, the skepticism stubbornly heating his eyes, makes it clear that his questions won’t be cowed by Khiran or redirected by her. “Where did you get it?”
“I had some business in Monterey.”
Anna knows the moment he says it, that it’s a lie.
The answer is too fluid, too smooth, for it to be the truth.
Still, paired with his easy confidence and Monterey’s history, it’s believable.
Before the war, the canneries had been supplied fish and abalone from the Japanese divers and fisherman that had built their businesses there.
Some of the families returned after the war, but few of them had the means to rebuild the businesses the government stole from them.
The town and its fishing industry have been slowly dying ever since.
Jiro falters, grudgingly accepting Khiran’s answer. Unfortunately, he seems no closer to trusting it.
Anna closes her bedroom door, leaning back against the wood.
Dinner was an awkward affair. As was the time spent in the living room after.
Jiro had been a bit prickly with her in the beginning, but it pales in comparison to the outright needling remarks he shoots at her so-called husband.
Khiran takes it all in stride, but Anna catches the way his jaw flexes when Jiro finds a particularly sore spot to prod.
“So you just leave for weeks, come back for a few nights, before you leave her again?”
Anna flinches openly at the memory of it.
She had thought Jiro might retreat into his defenses, particularly once Khiran’s relationship to her was clear, but instead he seems more combative.
Unfortunate, since she can tell by the way Khiran sits at the edge of their bed, his hands folded between his knees and his attention solely on her, that the conversation they put off till later is now.
“He can’t stay,” he repeats, soft but firm. “You know he can’t.”
She studies his expression carefully. “This isn’t about what he said, right? Please don’t hold his actions tonight against him.”
Khiran frowns. “I like to believe I’m above begrudging a child for throwing a fit.” He scoffs, the sound soft in the dark. “Besides, it is apparent that he adores you. How he feels about me is irrelevant.”
Anna doesn’t deny it. “I care for him, too. In time, I’m certain he’ll—”
“That’s not the issue. He could worship the ground I walked on and it still wouldn’t sway my opinion on this. He shouldn’t be here, Anna.”
Her arms cross over her chest, a stubborn lift of her chin. “He was homeless, Khiran. And that town is so full of bigots, people would rather chase him away than help him.”
His stare doesn’t falter. Doesn’t flinch. “Then we will find him another town.”
“If that’s what he wants, then that’s fine. But I promised him a roof and a job for as long as he wants it.”
He shakes his head, the first traces of frustration sharpening the edge of his voice. “He’ll be caught in the middle, Anna. You can’t possibly wish that for him.”
“Of course I don’t, but we don’t know if that will happen months or decades from now! You’re asking me to turn him away on the chance that it comes sooner than later.”
The way he stares at her makes her skin flush. It’s the same look he’s given her in the past, the one where she feels exposed of secrets she never even knew she held. He still sees right through her. She suspects he always will.
“You were afraid,” Khiran says, the words soft. “When he shouted. Those moments before you saw it was only me.”
Anna flinches, unable to deny it. Discreetly, she thumbs at the ring on her right hand—the one that connects them. Her fear must have been strong enough, real enough, for him to feel it. “Yes,” she admits, “but that doesn’t mean I’ll cater to the fear of what could—”
“Will,” he corrects. “What will happen. It is inevitable. We need to treat it that way.”
She deflates, feeling chastised. “What will happen,” she echoes, voice soft, before adding, “Someday.”
“Anna—”
“Jiro needs help now,” she stresses. “You told me once that you gave me immortality because you saw the good that I could do. Please don’t ask me not to do it. Not now. Not after everything.”
He runs a hand over his face, fingers massaging his temple. “And if they come while he’s here?”
Her eyebrows rise in challenge. “Do you have any reason to believe they will?”
His mouth thins. “You are relentless.”
Anna’s lips curl, her smile triumphant as she pushes herself from the door. Her hands rise, reaching for him. “Maybe a little.”
He groans, falling back onto the mattress. His forearm rests over his eyes. “Absolutely insufferable.”
She joins him, straddling his hips and kissing the exposed skin under the line of his jaw. “Am I?”
“Without question.”
She grins against him, her hands lowering to his belt. “I don’t believe you.”
“Damn it, Anna,” he mutters, breath hitching. His fingertips trace a path up her arm before sliding into her hair. “You’re being terribly distracting.” He turns his head, catching her lips. “I’m trying to be angry with you.”
She hums against him, successfully undoing the catch of his belt. “Be angry tomorrow,” she sighs, eyes fluttering shut as his lips move over her jaw. Nipping at her pulse. “I missed you.”
His hands roam her back, settling on her hips as he rolls them over.
He hovers over her, a breath away. Anna can see every fleck of green swimming in the blue of his irises.
Can see every regret. He places a kiss at the corner of her mouth, the ridge of her cheek, her closed eyelid.
“I’m sorry,” he murmurs. “I would come more often if I could, but if they notice—”
She hushes him, her hands curling in the fabric of his shirt. “I know.”
Fingers trace her brow, sweeping a stray curl to the side. Another kiss, this one lingering longer, to her forehead. It feels like an apology.