Bring forth the angry mob...I mean jury! *cough*
Title:Shards
Author/Penname: Kainasilversbane (me!)
Rating: PG-13
Chapters: Chapter 17 (WIP)
Pairings: Fujitaka/Kaho centered
Summary: AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!
Warning, Notes: Teeny weeny bit of lime
Link to previous chapter: http://community.livejournal.com/reviewers_inc/21398.html
Chapter 17
“…I love you…”
Kaho’s eyes snapped open at his words. At the same time, there was a different snapping, this time coming from the release of a Sakura Card. Dimly, between the life draining haze of the spell, and the drugging affect of being in Fujitaka’s arms, she wondered what the girl was trying to do.
Copper sparks filled her peripheral vision, and for a moment she couldn’t understand what they were. She knew of no Card that could produce copper sparks, let alone counter a life taking spell.
There was an odd pulling sensation within her, and it hurt, enough to where she cried out against Fujitaka’s shirt as the demon was ripped from her already savaged body.
Fujitaka watched as the black cloud, which was what was left of the demon, was pulled up above them, and then ripped into shreds, it’s own death screams harmonizing with Kaho’s as she was set free from her own spell.
The wind died away quickly, leaving the two adults still clinging to each other on the floor of the cave.
“Ho-ehhh…” came Sakura’s awed voice. “It worked!”
Kaho pushed herself away from Fujitaka to look over at her, “Good, now tell me what you did.” She looked tired, which wasn’t a surprise, and may have had a bit of a headache.
Sakura grinned with pride in herself as she held up a Card, “I used this one.”
The Hope
“Huh…” Kaho said in dazed bewilderment. But, as the woman had previously mentioned, the cavern began to tremble and crack, signaling it’s pending collapse.
“We have to get out of here!” Kerberos said as he urged Fujitaka onto his back, Kaho following suit. Sakura released The Fly and picked up Tomoyo, gambling on the need and the adrenaline to allow her to carry her friend through the tunnels and out again. They barely made it to the first tunnel before the cavern completely fell in on itself.
Sakura took the lead, flying as fast as she could through the equally crumbling tunnel.
“Do you think we’ll make it?” Fujitaka asked the woman who sat behind him, holding onto him by his waist.
“Not through the way we originally came in,” Kaho answered as they emerged into the cavern that had earlier been covered in brittle stone and sand spires. Boulders were falling from the ceiling and the people flying had to not only make their way towards the exit, but avoiding being smashed to the ground by the falling masses of death.
“Sakura can’t hold onto Tomoyo much more,” Kero called over his shoulder to his riders.
Fujitaka felt Kaho sit up a little and aim her gaze towards the two teenagers. She rested one hand on his shoulder as a large boulder made Sakura have to fall sharply to the left to avoid it, then lost her grip on her friend, Call Sakura to you! She instructed him. That said, she leapt off the guardian and disappeared.
She reappeared quickly, right in the path of Tomoyo’s fall. The minute the woman caught her, they both disappeared in a spray of dust, only to reappear again a few feet above Kerberos. Sakura had already made it back to her father, who looked up as Kaho and Tomoyo appeared.
In a controlled fall, Kaho dropped them both on top of the guardian, then phased them all out of the collapsing cavern as fast as her overly exerted mind could process her demands.
OOOO
They landed inside Fujitaka and Kaho’s room back at the hotel, and were mildly shocked by the sudden silence and stability.
“We’re…back…” Sakura looked around in disbelief. “We’re not dead, right?” She looked back at her father.
“I don’t think so,” Fujitaka answered as he rubbed his forehead. “You okay?”
“Sore, but nothing serious,” his daughter replied and looked over at Tomoyo, “Sorry I dropped you.”
“It’s okay, Kaho caught me,” Tomoyo smiled and looked around for the woman to thank her, then paused.
Kaho wasn’t there with them.
Or at least, not at that second. She appeared a foot over her bed about a minute later and landed with a thud and a grunt.
“And your need for a semi dramatic entrance was because?” Fujitaka asked as the woman rolled over onto her back and stared at the ceiling.
“I went back to the mansion to make sure the portal collapse didn’t cause any sort of implosion,” Kaho answered.
“Did it?” Fujitaka asked.
“We’d have all been sucked into a massive black hole by now if it had,” Kaho breathed.
“Good,” Fujitaka sat down on his own bed and flopped backwards with a groan, “Everything hurts.”
“Sorry…” Kaho croaked out.
Sakura remembered something, “What about all those souls we saw? What happened to them?”
Kaho smiled, “Go to the window and look outside, in the direction of the mansion.”
Three humans and one Guardian rolled to their feet and stumbled over to the window, and, after a minute’s struggle on how to get it open, peered outside into the night sky. The hill top shone and glittered as souls made their way out of the collapsed tunnel and into freedom. Most shot for the sky, while others scattered out into the wind, all of them on their own journeys, back to where they belonged.
“It’s beautiful!” Tomoyo said as she filmed.
“Kaho you should really get up and see this,” Fujitaka said over his shoulder.
“I would if I could,” she murmured.
There was a silent pause, then Fujitaka toddled backwards for a second, then gave let out a giggle, “It’s over!” The two teenagers and guardian whooped for joy at the realization, and a calm chuckle of satisfaction came from Kaho.
“Should we go and check on Eriol?” Sakura asked. “Make sure that he’s okay?”
“That really isn’t a good idea,” Kaho said with her eyes closed.
“Why not?” Sakura asked, feeling a significant amount of joy vanish from the moment.
“Think about it, if you had been responsible for a tremendous amount of pain and destruction, to people you knew, even if it wasn’t done by your will, would you be ready to face the people you hurt straight after the problem had been solved?” Kaho asked, her eyes remaining closed. “I’m not telling you this to be mean. Had I the energy, I’d also be contemplating the idea myself, but would you be mentally and emotionally stable enough to look at those people and…be able to stand yourself?” Traces of disgust and sorrow flashed across her own feature for just a second.
Sakura was silent for a moment, thinking it over, “No, I guess you’re right.”
“Call him in a week,” Kaho said. “By then he’ll have recovered a little and most likely be craving human contact, but not have the courage or will to leave his home.”
“Should he really be left alone?” Tomoyo asked, worried for her old friend.
“He’s not completely alone,” Kaho said. “Spinel is with him, as he always has been. He’ll keep Eriol from doing anything drastic if it comes down to that. You have no need to worry about him, he’ll be all right.” Her eyes finally fluttered open as she brushed her bangs away from her face, then paused in mid move. She sat up quickly, staring at her arm where part of her sleeve had been torn and slipped down. Pulling it down completely, Kaho studied her left arm in amazement, “It’s…gone…”
“What’s gone?” Fujitaka asked as walked over.
Kaho pulled down her other sleeve and checked her other arm, “They’re both gone.”
Fujitaka crouched down next to her, taking one of her arms in his hand.
The slash wounds were indeed gone, replaced with silvery scar tissue that swirled at the ends, making the scars look almost decorative.
“They really are…” Fujitaka murmured as he traced his fingers over one of the wispy ends.
Lightning bolts of feeling shot through her at his touch, and Kaho jerked her arm away quickly, “They still hurt a little.” That was a lie, what she had felt definitely hadn’t been pain, far from it. It had felt…sinfully good, and it startled her, even scared her in some sense.
“That’s no surprise,” said Kero, who’d changed back into his disguise. “Major injuries like that will hurt for a while after they heal, but it will dissipate over time.”
“That’s good to know,” Kaho said as Fujitaka sat next to her on her bed, her eyes still on the man.
By the looks that were passing between the two adults, the three other occupants made the wise decision of returning to the other room. They did so quietly through the adjoining door, and it swung silently closed behind them, but didn’t latch.
“There was something…that I said to you before Sakura released The Hope,” Fujitaka said as he stared at his hands, “And I’m not sure if…”
“I heard you,” Kaho said as she placed one of her hands on his.
“I see,” he murmured.
Neither spoke a for a while, both fighting with the voices in their heads.
“Did you…mean it?” Kaho asked lowly.
“Yes…” Fujitaka answered as he finally dragged his gaze over to look at her. What he saw in her eyes made a smile tug at the corner of his mouth. Pain and fear, the two most prevalent things he’d seen in her eyes since the day she had come to live with them, were gone. What shone through her eyes now was an unmeasured amount of hope, hope and something he’d only gotten a quick glimpse of the night before.
Love
Kaho leaned forward and hugged him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and let her lips brush against his ear, “I love you too.” The minute she felt the words pass her lips she realized she’d finally admitted it to herself as well as to him. But, where one weight was lifted from her shoulders, another replaced it.
Was this right?
She pulled away slowly, her hands staying on his shoulders, “But…”
“What?” He watched fear and doubt glint into his eyes.
“Is this right?” Kaho asked as she stared down at the mattress. “I mean…what about Nadeshiko?”
Fujitaka gave her a smile that eased her a bit. “I’ve asked myself the same question dozens of times throughout this whole…adventure. Do you remember when Nadeshiko visited us on Christmas?” He received a nod. “She asked me if I was planning on being alone like this for the rest of my life. I had no answer for her, only telling her that I still loved her and that I didn’t want anything to destroy it.” He chuckled, “She put me in my place pretty quickly, telling me that living alone, because Sakura and Toya aren’t going to be in the house forever, wasn’t going to be the way I would keep my love for her alive. She told me that loving someone else wouldn’t destroy our relationship, but proved that I had accepted it and understood that I wouldn’t be able to survive being alone.”
He paused for a moment, collecting the rest of his thoughts, knowing they were coming a little garbled, “She knew I was attracted to you, and at the same time resisting any idea of getting any closer. After she cleared up my doubts about me falling in love again, that it wouldn’t upset her, I began to wonder if it was right too, but I think it was for a few other reasons.”
“You mean about me and Toya?” Kaho asked.
“Yes…”
Kaho smiled a little, “I don’t know how incredibly happy he is about our relationship, but I think he’s more afraid of what I might do to you, more than us being together itself.”
“You mean, how you left him?” Fujitaka asked.
Kaho visibly flinch, “I felt bad for having to do what I did, but there was no way around it. I had to leave, and I knew there was going to be someone for Toya in the near future anyways. I think he’s got a bit of a love/hate relationship with me. Nothing that would ever cause either of us harm, we’re still friends, but I don’t think we’ll ever be able to get very close to each other again.” Sadness entered her eyes at the thought, and she knew later on she’d have to try and confront Toya and settle their relationship with each other.
Fujitaka was silent, his gaze turned inwards, “You still hurt him.”
She felt like she’d been stabbed in the chest and she turned to look him straight in the eyes, “Fujitaka, I loved your son, and I had no intention of ever hurting him. When I saw I had to, I waited as long as I could, put it off, looking for a way out of it. But there wasn’t any. I can’t tell you, or him, how sorry I am for having to have done it, but it’s just how it had to be.”
His inward gaze disappeared, replaced with a small, mischievous smile, “I know, I just wanted to make sure you saw it the same way.”
Her jaw dropped and she grabbed for a pillow to smack him with. He caught her arm in mid swing and they both sat there struggling against each other for a moment, childish giggling filling the room as the woman tried to bat his brains out with the cushy object.
“You cheeky bastard,” she cursed at him good naturedly as she tried to wrestle her arm out of his grip, her other arm having been captured at the wrist and held immobile in her lap.
“You love it,” Fujitaka snickered and slowly brushed his thumb over the scar on right arm.
Kaho froze and dropped the pillow, which satisfyingly plopped onto the man’s head before falling onto the floor. His kiss followed half a second later, turning Kaho’s face a few different shades of pink.
Hah! I knew it, they don’t hurt! Fujitaka chuckled in her mind.
You’re mean! Kaho whined, but physically made a noise of surprise as his other hand mirrored was doing to her opposite arm, sending twice as many shockwaves through her body. Before you have too much fun with your new toy, I think you should know we have an audience.
I know, I figured we did when I didn’t hear the door latch shut, Fujitaka said.
Kaho ended the kiss and rested her forehead against his with closed eyes, out loud she spoke, “All right, you got what you wanted to see, now leave us alone you three.” They heard two feminine giggles from the adjoining door plus a deeper one, signaling Kerberos was watching as well. The door closed a few seconds later, but Kaho lifted a trembling hand and flicked it, the sound of the lock latching told them they finally had their privacy.
Fujitaka took her still raised, trembling hand and asked, “Why are you shaking?”
“It’s just burn out,” Kaho replied, “that, and I’m exhausted.” She gave him a challenging looking, “Not to mention what you’d just been doing to me.”
“Oh? You mean this?” He spitefully rubbed his palm over one of the scars this time and the woman gasped, then leaned down and rested her forehead against his shoulder, trying keep control over herself. Part of her wanted get back at him for what he was doing, but another, stronger part of her mind, haunted with dark memories, wanted to run from the room, away from the sensations that had before come from nothing but force, pain, and control.
“You’re mean,” she growled against his throat, her mind finally settling on just holding still, and staying as rational as possible.
He chuckled, having no notion of the turmoil that had run through her mind, and brought her face back up so he could kiss her. No I’m not, I’d be mean if I did this. He broke the kiss and brought her left arm up, kissing the scar and raking his teeth gently over the silvery skin.
Kaho saw stars before wriggling away and dashing under her blankets to hide from further intimate affection. “You’re mean…” She continued to say, wanting for the life of her to sit down and tell him her story, but didn’t have the heart or the will power to possibly destroy what she had just gained. She heard him chuckle and felt the blanket being pulled away from her and she held it in place.
“I won’t touch them…for now,” Fujitaka promised.
She allowed him to pull the blanket away and scowled at him once the cover was gone.
“What?” Fujitaka asked innocently, giving her a cute, boyish grin.
Dark memories couldn’t stand a chance against the man’s smile, and it wiped her scowl away instantaneously and she smiled back, a pure, unhindered smile that could have easily sent the man to his knees had he not already been sitting. All he could do was pull her into an embrace and hold her tightly.
“Is this a dream?” The woman asked after a few moments. “Is it really over? Or am I still on the road, trying to get to you and I’ve fallen asleep somewhere, and my mind has allowed me this escape.” She’d done it before, fallen asleep while hiding and had had pleasant dreams of finally getting home, only too be scared awake by something, terror erasing any of the warmth she had felt in her dreams.
“It’s no dream,” Fujitaka said hooked his finger under chin and tilted her head up so he could look at her. He could see sleep invading her eyes as she fought to keep them open. “I’ll be here when you wake up, I promise.” He kissed her one final time before the woman settled her head against his chest and finally allowed sleep to take her.
For the first time in a long time, Kaho slept feeling warm, safe, and accepted, and no longer cold, alone, and afraid.
OOOO
What? Two more chapters left. I want this back in pieces
Author/Penname: Kainasilversbane (me!)
Rating: PG-13
Chapters: Chapter 17 (WIP)
Pairings: Fujitaka/Kaho centered
Summary: AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!
Warning, Notes: Teeny weeny bit of lime
Link to previous chapter: http://community.livejournal.com/reviewers_inc/21398.html
Chapter 17
“…I love you…”
Kaho’s eyes snapped open at his words. At the same time, there was a different snapping, this time coming from the release of a Sakura Card. Dimly, between the life draining haze of the spell, and the drugging affect of being in Fujitaka’s arms, she wondered what the girl was trying to do.
Copper sparks filled her peripheral vision, and for a moment she couldn’t understand what they were. She knew of no Card that could produce copper sparks, let alone counter a life taking spell.
There was an odd pulling sensation within her, and it hurt, enough to where she cried out against Fujitaka’s shirt as the demon was ripped from her already savaged body.
Fujitaka watched as the black cloud, which was what was left of the demon, was pulled up above them, and then ripped into shreds, it’s own death screams harmonizing with Kaho’s as she was set free from her own spell.
The wind died away quickly, leaving the two adults still clinging to each other on the floor of the cave.
“Ho-ehhh…” came Sakura’s awed voice. “It worked!”
Kaho pushed herself away from Fujitaka to look over at her, “Good, now tell me what you did.” She looked tired, which wasn’t a surprise, and may have had a bit of a headache.
Sakura grinned with pride in herself as she held up a Card, “I used this one.”
The Hope
“Huh…” Kaho said in dazed bewilderment. But, as the woman had previously mentioned, the cavern began to tremble and crack, signaling it’s pending collapse.
“We have to get out of here!” Kerberos said as he urged Fujitaka onto his back, Kaho following suit. Sakura released The Fly and picked up Tomoyo, gambling on the need and the adrenaline to allow her to carry her friend through the tunnels and out again. They barely made it to the first tunnel before the cavern completely fell in on itself.
Sakura took the lead, flying as fast as she could through the equally crumbling tunnel.
“Do you think we’ll make it?” Fujitaka asked the woman who sat behind him, holding onto him by his waist.
“Not through the way we originally came in,” Kaho answered as they emerged into the cavern that had earlier been covered in brittle stone and sand spires. Boulders were falling from the ceiling and the people flying had to not only make their way towards the exit, but avoiding being smashed to the ground by the falling masses of death.
“Sakura can’t hold onto Tomoyo much more,” Kero called over his shoulder to his riders.
Fujitaka felt Kaho sit up a little and aim her gaze towards the two teenagers. She rested one hand on his shoulder as a large boulder made Sakura have to fall sharply to the left to avoid it, then lost her grip on her friend, Call Sakura to you! She instructed him. That said, she leapt off the guardian and disappeared.
She reappeared quickly, right in the path of Tomoyo’s fall. The minute the woman caught her, they both disappeared in a spray of dust, only to reappear again a few feet above Kerberos. Sakura had already made it back to her father, who looked up as Kaho and Tomoyo appeared.
In a controlled fall, Kaho dropped them both on top of the guardian, then phased them all out of the collapsing cavern as fast as her overly exerted mind could process her demands.
OOOO
They landed inside Fujitaka and Kaho’s room back at the hotel, and were mildly shocked by the sudden silence and stability.
“We’re…back…” Sakura looked around in disbelief. “We’re not dead, right?” She looked back at her father.
“I don’t think so,” Fujitaka answered as he rubbed his forehead. “You okay?”
“Sore, but nothing serious,” his daughter replied and looked over at Tomoyo, “Sorry I dropped you.”
“It’s okay, Kaho caught me,” Tomoyo smiled and looked around for the woman to thank her, then paused.
Kaho wasn’t there with them.
Or at least, not at that second. She appeared a foot over her bed about a minute later and landed with a thud and a grunt.
“And your need for a semi dramatic entrance was because?” Fujitaka asked as the woman rolled over onto her back and stared at the ceiling.
“I went back to the mansion to make sure the portal collapse didn’t cause any sort of implosion,” Kaho answered.
“Did it?” Fujitaka asked.
“We’d have all been sucked into a massive black hole by now if it had,” Kaho breathed.
“Good,” Fujitaka sat down on his own bed and flopped backwards with a groan, “Everything hurts.”
“Sorry…” Kaho croaked out.
Sakura remembered something, “What about all those souls we saw? What happened to them?”
Kaho smiled, “Go to the window and look outside, in the direction of the mansion.”
Three humans and one Guardian rolled to their feet and stumbled over to the window, and, after a minute’s struggle on how to get it open, peered outside into the night sky. The hill top shone and glittered as souls made their way out of the collapsed tunnel and into freedom. Most shot for the sky, while others scattered out into the wind, all of them on their own journeys, back to where they belonged.
“It’s beautiful!” Tomoyo said as she filmed.
“Kaho you should really get up and see this,” Fujitaka said over his shoulder.
“I would if I could,” she murmured.
There was a silent pause, then Fujitaka toddled backwards for a second, then gave let out a giggle, “It’s over!” The two teenagers and guardian whooped for joy at the realization, and a calm chuckle of satisfaction came from Kaho.
“Should we go and check on Eriol?” Sakura asked. “Make sure that he’s okay?”
“That really isn’t a good idea,” Kaho said with her eyes closed.
“Why not?” Sakura asked, feeling a significant amount of joy vanish from the moment.
“Think about it, if you had been responsible for a tremendous amount of pain and destruction, to people you knew, even if it wasn’t done by your will, would you be ready to face the people you hurt straight after the problem had been solved?” Kaho asked, her eyes remaining closed. “I’m not telling you this to be mean. Had I the energy, I’d also be contemplating the idea myself, but would you be mentally and emotionally stable enough to look at those people and…be able to stand yourself?” Traces of disgust and sorrow flashed across her own feature for just a second.
Sakura was silent for a moment, thinking it over, “No, I guess you’re right.”
“Call him in a week,” Kaho said. “By then he’ll have recovered a little and most likely be craving human contact, but not have the courage or will to leave his home.”
“Should he really be left alone?” Tomoyo asked, worried for her old friend.
“He’s not completely alone,” Kaho said. “Spinel is with him, as he always has been. He’ll keep Eriol from doing anything drastic if it comes down to that. You have no need to worry about him, he’ll be all right.” Her eyes finally fluttered open as she brushed her bangs away from her face, then paused in mid move. She sat up quickly, staring at her arm where part of her sleeve had been torn and slipped down. Pulling it down completely, Kaho studied her left arm in amazement, “It’s…gone…”
“What’s gone?” Fujitaka asked as walked over.
Kaho pulled down her other sleeve and checked her other arm, “They’re both gone.”
Fujitaka crouched down next to her, taking one of her arms in his hand.
The slash wounds were indeed gone, replaced with silvery scar tissue that swirled at the ends, making the scars look almost decorative.
“They really are…” Fujitaka murmured as he traced his fingers over one of the wispy ends.
Lightning bolts of feeling shot through her at his touch, and Kaho jerked her arm away quickly, “They still hurt a little.” That was a lie, what she had felt definitely hadn’t been pain, far from it. It had felt…sinfully good, and it startled her, even scared her in some sense.
“That’s no surprise,” said Kero, who’d changed back into his disguise. “Major injuries like that will hurt for a while after they heal, but it will dissipate over time.”
“That’s good to know,” Kaho said as Fujitaka sat next to her on her bed, her eyes still on the man.
By the looks that were passing between the two adults, the three other occupants made the wise decision of returning to the other room. They did so quietly through the adjoining door, and it swung silently closed behind them, but didn’t latch.
“There was something…that I said to you before Sakura released The Hope,” Fujitaka said as he stared at his hands, “And I’m not sure if…”
“I heard you,” Kaho said as she placed one of her hands on his.
“I see,” he murmured.
Neither spoke a for a while, both fighting with the voices in their heads.
“Did you…mean it?” Kaho asked lowly.
“Yes…” Fujitaka answered as he finally dragged his gaze over to look at her. What he saw in her eyes made a smile tug at the corner of his mouth. Pain and fear, the two most prevalent things he’d seen in her eyes since the day she had come to live with them, were gone. What shone through her eyes now was an unmeasured amount of hope, hope and something he’d only gotten a quick glimpse of the night before.
Love
Kaho leaned forward and hugged him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and let her lips brush against his ear, “I love you too.” The minute she felt the words pass her lips she realized she’d finally admitted it to herself as well as to him. But, where one weight was lifted from her shoulders, another replaced it.
Was this right?
She pulled away slowly, her hands staying on his shoulders, “But…”
“What?” He watched fear and doubt glint into his eyes.
“Is this right?” Kaho asked as she stared down at the mattress. “I mean…what about Nadeshiko?”
Fujitaka gave her a smile that eased her a bit. “I’ve asked myself the same question dozens of times throughout this whole…adventure. Do you remember when Nadeshiko visited us on Christmas?” He received a nod. “She asked me if I was planning on being alone like this for the rest of my life. I had no answer for her, only telling her that I still loved her and that I didn’t want anything to destroy it.” He chuckled, “She put me in my place pretty quickly, telling me that living alone, because Sakura and Toya aren’t going to be in the house forever, wasn’t going to be the way I would keep my love for her alive. She told me that loving someone else wouldn’t destroy our relationship, but proved that I had accepted it and understood that I wouldn’t be able to survive being alone.”
He paused for a moment, collecting the rest of his thoughts, knowing they were coming a little garbled, “She knew I was attracted to you, and at the same time resisting any idea of getting any closer. After she cleared up my doubts about me falling in love again, that it wouldn’t upset her, I began to wonder if it was right too, but I think it was for a few other reasons.”
“You mean about me and Toya?” Kaho asked.
“Yes…”
Kaho smiled a little, “I don’t know how incredibly happy he is about our relationship, but I think he’s more afraid of what I might do to you, more than us being together itself.”
“You mean, how you left him?” Fujitaka asked.
Kaho visibly flinch, “I felt bad for having to do what I did, but there was no way around it. I had to leave, and I knew there was going to be someone for Toya in the near future anyways. I think he’s got a bit of a love/hate relationship with me. Nothing that would ever cause either of us harm, we’re still friends, but I don’t think we’ll ever be able to get very close to each other again.” Sadness entered her eyes at the thought, and she knew later on she’d have to try and confront Toya and settle their relationship with each other.
Fujitaka was silent, his gaze turned inwards, “You still hurt him.”
She felt like she’d been stabbed in the chest and she turned to look him straight in the eyes, “Fujitaka, I loved your son, and I had no intention of ever hurting him. When I saw I had to, I waited as long as I could, put it off, looking for a way out of it. But there wasn’t any. I can’t tell you, or him, how sorry I am for having to have done it, but it’s just how it had to be.”
His inward gaze disappeared, replaced with a small, mischievous smile, “I know, I just wanted to make sure you saw it the same way.”
Her jaw dropped and she grabbed for a pillow to smack him with. He caught her arm in mid swing and they both sat there struggling against each other for a moment, childish giggling filling the room as the woman tried to bat his brains out with the cushy object.
“You cheeky bastard,” she cursed at him good naturedly as she tried to wrestle her arm out of his grip, her other arm having been captured at the wrist and held immobile in her lap.
“You love it,” Fujitaka snickered and slowly brushed his thumb over the scar on right arm.
Kaho froze and dropped the pillow, which satisfyingly plopped onto the man’s head before falling onto the floor. His kiss followed half a second later, turning Kaho’s face a few different shades of pink.
Hah! I knew it, they don’t hurt! Fujitaka chuckled in her mind.
You’re mean! Kaho whined, but physically made a noise of surprise as his other hand mirrored was doing to her opposite arm, sending twice as many shockwaves through her body. Before you have too much fun with your new toy, I think you should know we have an audience.
I know, I figured we did when I didn’t hear the door latch shut, Fujitaka said.
Kaho ended the kiss and rested her forehead against his with closed eyes, out loud she spoke, “All right, you got what you wanted to see, now leave us alone you three.” They heard two feminine giggles from the adjoining door plus a deeper one, signaling Kerberos was watching as well. The door closed a few seconds later, but Kaho lifted a trembling hand and flicked it, the sound of the lock latching told them they finally had their privacy.
Fujitaka took her still raised, trembling hand and asked, “Why are you shaking?”
“It’s just burn out,” Kaho replied, “that, and I’m exhausted.” She gave him a challenging looking, “Not to mention what you’d just been doing to me.”
“Oh? You mean this?” He spitefully rubbed his palm over one of the scars this time and the woman gasped, then leaned down and rested her forehead against his shoulder, trying keep control over herself. Part of her wanted get back at him for what he was doing, but another, stronger part of her mind, haunted with dark memories, wanted to run from the room, away from the sensations that had before come from nothing but force, pain, and control.
“You’re mean,” she growled against his throat, her mind finally settling on just holding still, and staying as rational as possible.
He chuckled, having no notion of the turmoil that had run through her mind, and brought her face back up so he could kiss her. No I’m not, I’d be mean if I did this. He broke the kiss and brought her left arm up, kissing the scar and raking his teeth gently over the silvery skin.
Kaho saw stars before wriggling away and dashing under her blankets to hide from further intimate affection. “You’re mean…” She continued to say, wanting for the life of her to sit down and tell him her story, but didn’t have the heart or the will power to possibly destroy what she had just gained. She heard him chuckle and felt the blanket being pulled away from her and she held it in place.
“I won’t touch them…for now,” Fujitaka promised.
She allowed him to pull the blanket away and scowled at him once the cover was gone.
“What?” Fujitaka asked innocently, giving her a cute, boyish grin.
Dark memories couldn’t stand a chance against the man’s smile, and it wiped her scowl away instantaneously and she smiled back, a pure, unhindered smile that could have easily sent the man to his knees had he not already been sitting. All he could do was pull her into an embrace and hold her tightly.
“Is this a dream?” The woman asked after a few moments. “Is it really over? Or am I still on the road, trying to get to you and I’ve fallen asleep somewhere, and my mind has allowed me this escape.” She’d done it before, fallen asleep while hiding and had had pleasant dreams of finally getting home, only too be scared awake by something, terror erasing any of the warmth she had felt in her dreams.
“It’s no dream,” Fujitaka said hooked his finger under chin and tilted her head up so he could look at her. He could see sleep invading her eyes as she fought to keep them open. “I’ll be here when you wake up, I promise.” He kissed her one final time before the woman settled her head against his chest and finally allowed sleep to take her.
For the first time in a long time, Kaho slept feeling warm, safe, and accepted, and no longer cold, alone, and afraid.
OOOO
What? Two more chapters left. I want this back in pieces