InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Purity 2: Defiance ❯ Guilt ( Chapter 32 )

~~Chapter 32~~

~Guilt~

 

The knock on the door rattled Toga out of an exhausted sleep. With a wince as he realized he'd fallen asleep on the sofa, sitting up with his head tilted back, he rubbed his neck as the lingering waves of sleepiness dulled his senses.

 

Another round of knocking forced a few muttered curses as Toga stood up and shook his head before striding over to the door and jerking it open.

 

“Damn, pup, you look like hell.”

 

Toga blinked in surprise as Kagome stepped forward to hug him tight. InuYasha stood with his arms folded over his chest as he watched Kagome greet her nephew. “Bad night, Toga?”

 

He shrugged and stepped back to admit his aunt and uncle. He didn't miss the nervous twitching of his uncle's hanyou ears, the guarded expression in his golden eyes. “You look like you're waiting for someone to jump out at you,” Toga remarked mildly. “Any reason for that?

 

InuYasha snorted. “Keh! There's a reason I hate planes.”

 

“His ears kept popping the entire flight,” Kagome supplied, casting her mate a concerned glance.

 

Toga nodded. He could commiserate. He wasn't overly fond of flying, either.

 

“The stewardess kept staring at him, too,” Kagome mused with a little smile.

 

InuYasha blushed. “The concealment kept slipping. It was all I could do to keep my ears from exploding,” he grouched.

 

“It was really because he's so cute,” Kagome told Toga.

 

“Oi!”

 

Toga chuckled. “Why are you two here?”

 

Kagome shrugged, trying for nonchalance as she hugged Toga again. “We were in the neighborhood?”

 

“Right.”

 

InuYasha strode toward the kitchen for a glass of water. “Truth, wench. She was worried about you.”

 

Toga grimaced. “You were, huh?”

 

Kagome leveled a no-nonsense look at her nephew. “Yes, I was. What would make me feel like there's something wrong?”

 

Toga faked a smile at his far-too-perceptive aunt as he headed down the hallway toward his bedroom. “Not a thing. I hate to do this, but I've got to go to work, so I'd better get changed.”

 

“So . . . wanna tell me why Kagome is having such strong feelings?”

 

Toga winced. He hadn't really thought that his uncle would leave it alone, but he had hoped . . . “It's fine.”

 

InuYasha snorted indelicately as he leaned back against the wall. “Fine, huh? Want to tell me why I don't believe you?”

 

Toga discarded his tee-shirt on the bed and strode over to retrieve a crisp white cotton dress shirt. “I have no idea, Uncle Yasha.”

 

“Keh. And I don't breathe.”

 

Deliberately taking his time with the buttons of his shirt, Toga shrugged off-handedly and grabbed a pair of black slacks. “It doesn't matter. Nothing can be done.”

 

InuYasha's eyebrows shot up. “What happened?”

 

“Sierra and I . . . we aren't together anymore, that's all.”

 

InuYasha glowered at the floor as he digested that. Toga could feel his uncle's gaze on him moments later even though he didn't look to confirm it. “Toga, let me ask you something, and you damn well better give me a straight answer.”

 

Wincing inwardly as Toga carefully tied his necktie, he nodded once as he stared into the mirror on the back of his door. “All right.”

 

“Did your youkai blood choose her?”

 

He had never lied to Uncle Yasha before. He didn't want to do it now. Trouble was, he couldn't tell him the truth, either. No, Uncle Yasha would tell Aunt Gome, and Aunt Gome would run over to Sierra's apartment to try to make everything all right. It was her nature to do that. Remembering the sadness, the stricken, broken look on Sierra's face, though . . . He couldn't hurt her more. Forcing a smile, he shrugged as he sat on the edge of the bed and pulled on his socks and dress shoes. “Of course not. Father would blow an ass gasket, wouldn't he?”

 

InuYasha shook his head slowly. “This ain't about that bastard of a father of yours. It's about you. You're not lying to me, are you?”

 

“Keh. As if I ever could,” Toga remarked dryly.

 

“I'll believe you, pup, because you ain't never lied to me before,” InuYasha stated mildly, “but if I find out you're lying, I swear I'll fucking kick your scrawny ass. You got that?”

 

Toga shrugged. “Of course, Uncle Yasha. Loud and clear.”

 

InuYasha watched as Toga brushed past him into the hallway. He heard Kagome tell him to have a good day before the door closed softly in his wake. Moments later, Kagome touched InuYasha's arm and smiled hesitantly. “Did he tell you anything?”

 

He shifted his gaze to the side, regarding Kagome with his knowing stare. “Keh. Like you weren't listening.”

 

Kagome didn't deny it. “He was lying to you.”

 

InuYasha nodded slowly. “He was.”

 

“And?” she asked when InuYasha remained quiet.

 

“And,” InuYasha went on as he straightened up and faced his mate, “there ain't a damn thing I can do to get the truth out of him.”

 

Kagome made a face as she whirled on her heel to stomp out of the room. InuYasha gently caught her arm. “Let go, InuYasha. Whatever is bothering him can't be good, and I'm going to find out what it is.”

 

“Forget it, wench. You can't just pester the truth out of him.”

 

Kagome snorted. “And who says I was going to ask him?”

 

InuYasha's golden gaze narrowed. “Oh, no, you're not.”

 

“Maybe I can fix it,” Kagome explained. “Maybe they just had a disagreement.”

 

InuYasha shook his head. “Or maybe you'll just make it worse. Let the pup deal with it.”

 

“If he was one of our own and not Toga, you'd—”

 

“Say the same damn thing, wench. You can't spend your life trying to fix everyone else's problems.”

 

Kagome opened her mouth to argue but stopped with a concerned frown as InuYasha winced and rubbed his forehead with a discernibly shaky hand. “That plane really got to you, didn't it?” she asked softly.

 

InuYasha snorted but his tone was missing much of its caustic bite. “Keh. I'll live.”

 

She shook her head and tugged on his arm. “Toga's got a guest room. I want you to lie down awhile.”

 

“Are you going to lie down with me?”

 

He didn't miss her slight grimace.

 

“Kagome, you're not sneaking out to find her, got that?”

 

Kagome heaved a sigh and nodded slowly, giving in with all the ill-grace she could muster. InuYasha finally let her lead him across the hall to the spare room.

 

 

-=-0-=-0-=-0-=-0-=-0-=-

 

 

“Well?”

 

Toga glanced up from his computer monitor at Kari and shook his head. “Nothing.”

 

She sighed and shook her head as she leaned in the doorway. “Nuts.”

 

Leaning back in his chair as he idly tapped his pen on the desk calendar, Toga shook his head. “You don't think they know the office is being monitored, do you?”

 

Kari shrugged. “How could they?” She sighed. “Maybe they won't try it this time.”

 

“Maybe,” he agreed though his tone said otherwise. He glanced over at her and shrugged. “Something doesn't feel right . . . The signing is tomorrow, isn't it?”

 

She rubbed her temple. “Yep.”

 

“You've got the spare, right?”

 

“Guarding that contract with my life,” she remarked with a rueful smile.

 

Kari checked her watch as she nodded. “I'm going to head down to the deli to get a sandwich. You want anything?”

 

Toga shook his head slowly, waving her off as he turned his attention back to the computer monitor. “No, thanks.”

 

“You sure? I feel kind of bad, leaving you here, watching my office.”

 

He snorted as his phone rang. Kari waved as she strode out of Toga's office. “Inutaisho.”

 

The smooth alto of the receptionist on the first floor greeted him. “Mr. Inutaisho, you've got visitors—Mr. and Mrs. Izayoi.”

 

He kept his gaze on the computer monitor as he grinned slightly. “Ah, can you send them up?”

 

“Absolutely. They're on their way.”

 

“Thanks.”

 

He dropped the phone into the cradle and resumed the cadence of his pen tapping against the desk calendar. Uncle Yasha and Aunt Gome had probably figured out that Toga didn't have any food in his apartment, to speak of. He braced himself for `The Lecture' that Kagome would undoubtedly blister his ears with.

 

`This is about as exciting as watching paint dry,' Toga mused with an inward grimace. Still he watched the monitor, unable to shake the feeling that something was about to happen.

 

“Oi, pup . . . what's with the serious lack of ramen in your apartment?”

 

Toga grinned as he glanced over at InuYasha. Kagome followed him into the office and sat down, smoothing her brown tweed skirt before she folded her hands together in her lap. “Yeah . . . I forgot about that . . . if someone had told me they were coming, I'd have stocked up. I promise you, though, most of the ramen around here is shameful unless you sniff out a Japanese grocer.”

 

InuYasha wrinkled his nose. “Keh. I knew we should have tried to sneak some through customs.”

 

Kagome rolled her eyes and shook her head but smiled at InuYasha's commentary. “If you're busy, Toga, we can leave.”

 

“No, we can't,” InuYasha insisted, shooting Kagome a pointed look.

 

Toga frowned. “You can't?”

 

“Nope,” InuYasha answered as he leaned back against the wall beside the door.

 

“I need to be watched at work now?”

 

InuYasha shrugged. “Nope. Kagome's just trying to stick her nose where it don't need to be.”

 

Toga blinked as he stared at his aunt. “I wish you wouldn't,” he finally said, dropping any pretense that he didn't know what Uncle Yasha meant.

 

Kagome sighed. “Have you tried to fix it?”

 

Toga forced a small smile. “It's beyond fixing, I think.”

 

“It's never beyond fixing,” she chided gently.

 

Toga started to answer when movement on the computer screen caught his attention. He sat up straighter as his gaze narrowed as Mike Sampson slipped into view of the camera. Glancing around quickly to make sure he was alone, he opened Kari's attaché case and rifled through it for the contract. “That bastard!” Toga cut in as he shot out of his chair and strode around his desk toward the door, interrupting Kagome's gentle insistence that he talk to Sierra. “Something's happening.”

 

InuYasha was right behind him as Toga slammed open Kari's office door. Mike whirled around, red-faced, with the contract still in his hands. “T-Toga . . . something wrong?”

 

Toga nodded toward the contact in his employer's hands. “So you have been trying to make Kari look incompetent. Why don't you just fire her, if you don't want her working here?”

 

Mike's face reddened a little more as he puffed his chest out, rife with indignant anger. “Just what are you accusing me of, Inutaisho? I didn't do a damn thing.”

 

“Did you take the other contracts, too?” Toga countered.

 

“What's going on?” InuYasha demanded.

 

“Listen, I have every right to check over this contract!” Mike sneered, his scalp reddening under his thinning hairline.

 

“Of course you do,” Toga agreed evenly. “Just as Kari has every right to work here since you did hire her.”

 

“Just what are you insinuating?”

 

“Not a damn thing,” Toga retorted.

 

“What the hell is going on here?” InuYasha demanded again.

 

Toga didn't take his eyes off his boss. “He's been taking a co-worker's contracts to make her look incompetent so he can fire her.”

 

InuYasha shook his head slowly. “Then why the hell did you hire her?”

 

Mike bristled under the double scrutiny of the youkai and hanyou. “I've never wanted her here! It doesn't matter, anyway. Don't be stupid, Inutaisho. I hired you. I can fire you, too. You'll never work in this line again.”

 

Irritated with the man's threats, Toga shot forward, grabbed the man by the throat. Mike's face deepened in color as Toga restricted his air flow. “You can keep your fucking job, Sampson. I don't need it anymore, but you will promise that you're done trying to set Kari up. If you want to get rid of her then I suggest you suck it up and do it the right way. What you've been doing is pitiful.”

 

“That's enough, pup,” InuYasha said.

 

Toga held on for a moment longer before shoving Mike away. The man stumbled into the desk behind him, gripping his neck and rubbing as he wheezed to catch his breath. “I ought to have you arrested,” he mumbled though his tone lacked any real conviction.

 

Toga snorted as he headed toward the door. He stopped on the threshold and peered back over his shoulder at his ex-employer. “By the way, it doesn't matter if you destroy that contract or not. Kari's got another one already drawn up.”

 

He didn't bother stopping in his office. With every step he took, his anger grew hotter and fiercer. Slamming open the stairwell door, Toga was vaguely aware of Kagome and InuYasha's voices behind him. The feeling that he'd just severed his last tie to Sierra was enough to further his irritation as he ran down the stairs toward the parking garage below.

 

He felt as though he was coming apart at the seams, as though his last vestiges of sanity were rapidly slipping away from him. Realization hit him hard as he shoved the door to the parking garage open with a resounding thump. He really didn't have anything left here, at all.

 

`I . . . I can't leave her . . .'

 

He winced as Sierra's eyes flashed through his head.

 

`Sierra . . .'

 

“Toga? You okay?”

 

Shaking his head as he blinked to clear his mind, Toga stared at Kari. Eyebrows drawn down in a marked frown, she tilted her head to the side as. “I caught Mike in your office with the contract. He's been trying to find a reason to fire you.”

 

She looked stunned as she slowly shook her head. “Oh, my God . . . I thought . . . I mean, I suspected . . .”

 

Toga shrugged. “Yeah, well, he won't do it anymore.”

 

“Thanks, Toga . . . you have no idea how much this means to me!”

 

He shook his head and strode toward his vehicle, needing to distance himself from this place. “Don't worry about it.”

 

She caught his hand as he started to walk away. He stopped and turned back to face her. “No, I mean it . . . I've never had a friend like you. Thanks.”

 

“I gotta go.”

 

“Toga?” A fleeting glimpse of emotion filtered over her features; a frightening glimpse into something he didn't want to understand. Toga tried to pull away. Before he could figure out what she was about to do, she wrapped her arms around his neck, pressing her body against his as she pulled his face down into a kiss.

 

Shock made him stand still for a moment. His brain seemed to slow then stop as a loud bang and a sharp gasp permeated his foggy mind. “What the—?” InuYasha's voice registered in his head but sounded so far away.

 

Sierra's face shot through his mind, and Toga reacted. A sickened feeling, the shame of betrayal rifled through him; the bitter tinge of bile rose in his throat to choke him, and Toga shoved Kari away from him as he uttered a low but fierce growl.

 

She stumbled. InuYasha caught her, letting go as soon as Kari regained her balance. Her face was bright red, and she cleared her throat nervously. “Sorry,” she murmured.

 

Toga shook his head, unable to meet his uncle's questioning stare. Kagome touched his arm. He jerked away, casting Kagome a wild-eyed glance before he turned and strode toward his SUV.

 

`Kami, what have I done . . .? Sierra . . . damn it all . . . I didn't mean . . .'

 

He flinched. In the end, all the excuses in the world wouldn't make him feel any less like a bastard. It was the ultimate betrayal, wasn't it? To kiss another . . .

 

A painful burning erupted in his stomach; a vicious nausea that he couldn't swallow or repress. It didn't matter at all, not in his mind, that he hadn't wanted Kari to kiss him. It didn't matter when the pain of his unwitting betrayal scalded him; branded him with the invisible surge of disgust, the intangible mark of one who had committed the ultimate treason. Whether she was with him or not, she had become a part of him as singularly as his own flesh and blood. Treason against himself? Yes, that was exactly what it was . . .

 

He didn't see the man standing beside his car nearby. The man's expression shifted from shock to surprise and lastly to disgusted anger. Getting back into his car, he watched Toga's escape in his rear view mirror, drumming his fingers against the steering wheel as rage twisted his guts, brought a sneer to his lips.

 

He sat there for a long time as he tried to reign in his temper. Starting his car as he mumbled curses under his breath, he slammed the vehicle into reverse and backed out of the parking space then jerked the car into gear. With a roar of the engine and the squeal of rubber on asphalt, he gunned the engine and sped out of the garage.

 

 

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A/N:

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Reviewers

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obsesed_wit_fluffy (AScom) :

I KNEW IT!!!!! I totaly gessed this right away. I feel super smart know, but it is an easy conection, but i still feel cool. well i am totally sure that i can gess the rest of this. Sierria one way or another goes to see Toga and in that time kari makes a move on Toga. Sierria gets all P.O.ed and they makeup somewhere. Uncle Inu comes in and thye find out about Sierra's ancestry. but i don't know. I like the fact that this is somewhat perdictable. You still surprize me in some way with your writting. when i think i got it all figgered out, u surprize me and it is even better! great chap, don't leave me hangin,

 

Your guesses are interesting but inaccurate… I actually try not to be too predictable, but the rest of this fic is already planned out, and no … uhh… none of that happens … Yasha will eventually find out about Sierra's heritage, but … Toga doesn't know it, himself …

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MMorg

Notzathros ------ D.V. (Not youkai… lol) ------ DarklessVasion ------ cjflutterbye (he did, but she doesn't really know what the problem is, either … just that Kagome senses that he is unhappy … ) ------ chichiwvu (Muahahaha, too bad he's not crushing back!) ------ Kyonarai ------ Iggy Lovechild ------ angelica incarnate ------ kolohe ------ Kadaede (Could be… ) ------ futekioosha

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FFnet

Drake Clawfang ------ Rinicat ------ kestrel ------ Lady Yukiko ------ WiccanMethuselah ------ Flames101 ------ Ryguy5387 (MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!) ------ xSilverShadowsx ------ SilverStarWing ------ ILOVEINUS ------ almostwhole ------ btrains126 ------ Proforce ------ myeerah ------ Luke (I just checked them, they're fine …)

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AFFnet ------ AScom ------ ATnet

deep serenity ------ wlfhund ------ Wing_Goddess ------ deep serenity ------ Never AFK ------ thoughts ------ Mel ------ fruitcake ------ inugrl15 ------ GgBg4u ------ Jasmine Fields ------ jragoneyes (He's losing his will, yes… if that makes sense… lol) ------ Shiga (LoL!) ------ Sess_2005 (Muahahahahahahahahaa!) ------ rachainu ------ moon_girl

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Final Thought fromToga:

… What the hell … ?

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Blanket disclaimer for this fanfic (will apply to this and all other chapters in Defiance): I do not claim any rights to InuYasha or the characters associated with the anime/manga. Those rights belong to Rumiko Takahashi, et al. I do offer my thanks to her for creating such vivid characters for me to terrorize.

 

~Sue~