Fruits Basket Fan Fiction ❯ Cursed Words, Cursed Lives ❯ The hand that feeds ( Chapter 5 )

But the next, something changed.

It was Shigure who answered the door that night, leaving Tohru in a state of total shock. Judging by the way he stammered her name, he was equally surprised, but she left too quickly to ask. She ran across the grounds at top speed, collapsing behind a row of bushes and covering her mouth as she gasped for air, muffling any sound in case the Dog had followed her.

It was less his presence and more his appearance that had startled the girl, and she ran over it again in her head. His hair had been disheveled, his yukata rumpled and half-open, his face somewhere between distracted and annoyed. She hadn’t seen him since she’d moved out after graduation, but in three years living in his house, she had never seen her caretaker in such a state.

Tonight, for the first time in nearly two weeks, Tohru went home early.

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Chapter 5: The hand that feeds

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Shigure stood just outside the door, looking around for the girl who’d just run off. He considered calling after her, but decided it wouldn’t be worth his effort, instead turning and returning inside, slipping the door shut behind him.

He wasn’t sure which surprised him more; Tohru’s presence or how quickly she’d run away. It was clear she hadn’t expected him to be there, but why would she have been at Akito’s house to begin with? It seemed almost entirely illogical, and the only plausible explanation seemed unlikely. On the off chance the ever-persistent duo had decided to come ask the Goddess herself about the curse, it was Rin he expected to show up at the door.

The Dog was pulled back from his thoughts by a call from Akito. “Who was at the door?” she asked, her tone indicating she was asking purely out of formality.

“Tohru, strangely enough. She took off the instant she saw me.” Shigeru glanced at the Goddess, watching her carefully for any twinge of emotion. He got what he wanted as a snarl flashed over the girl’s face at the mention of Tohru’s name. “Has she been here before?”

Akito hesitated, then scoffed dramatically, stepping lightly across the tatami floor toward Shigure. “No,” she lied, then set her lips to his before he had a chance to disbelieve her, one hand fastening tightly to the wrinkled edge of his yukata. In turn, he wrapped his arms around her, holding her tight for a passionate moment, the smirk growing on his face hidden by the kiss. “She has no reason to be here... this place is just for you and me,” she added between shallow breaths, hands digging into his hair.

He chuckled, his ego growing from her words. There were no more questions from the Dog, only actions as he began to strip the girl before him, goading her with kisses and nips which she gladly returned.

They were on the floor before long, bodies intertwined even before the last of their clothing was removed. He knew just where to kiss her to make her desperate, a talent produced by experience and research for his writing. As she writhed beneath him, his pleased sneer only grew, a subtle disgust with her building within him as it always did. He made no effort to be romantic about the act, only to drive her insane in it. To make her call his name and surrender to him.

Her skin was soft beneath him - a rare treat he could get only from her and from no other woman, the other, even younger, Juunishi women aside. Her face was softer still, tears forming as he whispered his love to her. He loved how she believed him time after time, no matter how often he lied. How it was she who was blindly loyal to him.

There had been a time when he’d truly loved Akito, but that time was long gone. It was the power he got from her that he craved and loved now; the sensation of total control he got from seeing a God laid bare before him, quivering under his touch. Her surrender was his temporary salvation, his driving force. He could reduce the great Goddess, the head of the family, to nothing more than another human girl from one of his cheesy novels. Every time, she accepted him willingly, even took him herself, and every time she only inflated him more, until by now he considered himself above even her.

He was certainly above the other Juunishi, for it was he, the Dog, who was shown love by his master time after time.