InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Purity 4: Justification ❯ No One Quite Like Her ( Chapter 45 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

Gin scooped up the collected sketches and tapped the stack against the table to straighten it.  "L'amont-san called me earlier," she said casually as she set the stack on Cain's desk.

Cain dropped the pencil he had been tapping against his chin and very slowly swung his head around to stare at Gin.  "Oh, did he?"

She nodded as she hopped up onto the edge of his desk, crossing her legs and nodding.  "Yes, when I went home to change for class.  Anyway, he invited me to lunch."

"And?" Cain prompted.

"And I said I'd meet him after class, so I won't be able to help you Friday afternoon."

He choked out an incredulous laugh.  "That's funny, Gin.  It almost sounded like you thought you'd meet him alone."

Gin licked her lips and scrunched up her shoulders, ears flattening for a moment as she scratched the side of her head.  "I am."

"Uh huh . . . Yeah, you're not."

She scowled as he snatched up the pencil, drumming the eraser against the desk as he reached for the stack of sketches.  "I want to go, Cain, and it's just lunch.  It's not like I'm going to run away with him or anything stupid like that."

"Damn right, you're not, because you're not going at all."

"Do you have a good reason for saying that?"

He snorted.  "Yeah—because I said so."

Gin made a face.  "Can we discuss this?" she asked reasonably.

"Not really."

"Cain—"

"Absolutely not."

"Cain . . ."

"Don't make me call your father, baby girl."

Gin's mouth dropped open.  "You wouldn't!"

"If it'd keep you away from that pervert?  Just try me."

"Well . . . It's not like it's a date.  Papa . . . wouldn't care . . ."

"You believe that?"

Her expression must have told him that she didn't really believe it at all.  Cain looked almost exultant.  Gin rolled her eyes and hopped off the desk.  "I can take care of myself, you know," she pointed out.

"I know you can," he told her.  "That's not the point."

"Then what is?" she challenged.

Cain sighed.  "Look, Gin, I know you can take care of yourself.  Thing is, you shouldn't have to.  I know Pierre, and I know you're the kind of girl he loves to get his hands on.  Just trust me on this, will you?"

She shook her head.  "But I really want to go.  Maybe it isn't a big deal to you.  You talk to people like this all the time.  I have so many questions I'd like to ask him.  It's just lunch, Cain, in a public place, and if it would make you feel better, you could walk me there and meet me right afterward."

He didn't look like he wanted to agree.  "All right," he finally said with a shake of his head and a long-suffering expression.  "But if he so much as touches you in any way that could be considered indecent . . ."

Gin rolled her eyes but smiled.  "I won't let him; I promise."

"I know you won't.  I trust you.  I just don't trust him.  Be careful, okay?"

"Okay."

Gin shuffled idly through the stack of sketches with a critical scowl.   They were all sketches of the nude woman who had modeled for the class.  "It's funny," she mused.  "Everyone drew the same woman, but all the sketches look completely different."

"Of course they do," Cain replied.  "It's a matter of perception.  No two people are going to draw things exactly alike, even if they are looking at the same thing."

She smiled.  "I suppose you're right."

Cain stood up and came around the desk to peer over her shoulder at the sketch in her hands.  "That one's interesting," he remarked, trailing his claw over the image and studying the artist's signature.  "Ah, well, there you have it.  Drawn by a guy.  That figures."

"What do you mean?"

Cain chuckled.  "Look at her unrealistic proportions: tiny waist, overly large breasts . . . It looks cartoon-ish.  Not a bad thing, just interesting."

Gin stared at the picture and shrugged.  "You think so?"

"Where's your sketch?"

She shuffled through the stack to find hers and handed it to him.  He nodded slowly as he examined the image.  "You know . . . your style . . ."

"What?" she asked reluctantly, twisting her fingers together in a fleshy knot.  "Is it bad?"

He shook his head.  "No, not at all . . . You just . . . You interpret things the way they should be seen.   Idealism at its best, but . . . Well, maybe that's not such a bad thing."

"I prefer to think of it as being optimistic," she replied, thinking of his commentary on her fruit sketch.

"You look at things and see what they could be.  There's beauty in that."

"Really?"

He nodded slowly.  "Absolutely."

A trace of sadness flashed through his gaze.  Gin grimaced and scrambled for another topic; one that might make him smile as she braced her hands on the desk and hoisted herself back onto the top.  She didn't like it when he was sad.  She considered her personal mission to be making him laugh.

"None of these sketches are very similar," she remarked, lifting the stack to shift through them again, "but they're all really good."

"Some of them are better than others," he commented.  "Some of them have more feeling behind them."

Gin laughed.  "You think any of your students will ever be famous like you?"

He made a face and dropped the sketches onto the desk as he shook his head.  "Fame is overrated, Gin."

"Maybe," she agreed, "but if you weren't famous, you wouldn't have been asked to lecture.  If you weren't famous, I wouldn't have gotten to meet you."

That gave him pause, and he thought it over.  "You don't know . . . I might have met you anyway.  I do know your uncle.  Who's to say it wouldn't have happened?"

"Why did you stay here?" she asked quietly.  "I'd read all about you.  They said you were reclusive.  Why would you decide to teach?"

"I . . . don't know," he answered as he gazed at the windows and the overcast gray sky.  "It seemed like a good idea at the time, maybe?"

Brushing aside the feeling that there was more to his decision that he wasn't telling her, Gin kicked her legs, crossed at the ankles, and smiled.  "I'm glad you did," she assured him.

"Yeah . . . I am, too."  Cain shrugged offhandedly and shuffled his feet.  "You ready to go?  I think I'm done here."

Gin waited till Cain finished stuffing the sketches into his attaché case before sliding off the desk and grabbing her backpack.  "Can we stop and get some lunch?  I'm starving."

Cain rolled his eyes but chuckled.  "All right, all right . . . Can't have you starving, now can we?"

She giggled and followed him to the door, waiting outside in the hallway as he flicked off the light and pulled it closed.


"Here," Kichiro said with a hefty grunt as he plopped the huge box onto the bed and stepped back.  "Don't ask me what's in it; Belle didn't say."

Kelly dropped the magazine she had been reading onto the stand beside the hospital bed and eyed the box rather dubiously.  "Where is Belle?"

He shrugged.  "She said she had other things to do."

"Oh?"

He ignored the stab of his conscience and shrugged again.  "Yep."

Okay, so that wasn't exactly the truth.  Bellaniece had wanted to accompany him and made no bones about it—until he had insisted that she admit to being jealous of his three phone numbers or she couldn't come along.  She'd stared at him in disbelief before throwing her hands up at her sides, grumbling under her breath about idiot hanyou with over-inflated egos and stomping off toward the staircase.  She had stopped long enough to tell him to drop off the box beside the door, and he'd glowered at the gift, festively wrapped in hideous green gift paper.

"Ah, well, never look a gift horse in the mouth . . . or a gift half-dog," Kelly quipped as she pulled the box closer and tore into the paper.

Kichiro glanced over the clipboard with Kelly's latest stats and slowly nodded.  "Good . . . Everything looks good here . . . As long as your tests come back okay today, we'll schedule your first skin graft for Monday morning . . . Tuesday at the latest, if I can't reserve an O. R. for Monday."

"Wow," Kelly breathed, ignoring Kichiro's assessment.  "Oh, this is awesome!  Give Belle-y a huge hug for me, will you?"

Kichiro snorted and looked up from the clipboard as Kelly pulled a huge stack of CDs and a brand new Discman out of the box—the stuff he'd bought for Bellaniece just yesterday—or so he had thought.  "Wait . . . that stuff wasn't for Belle?"

Kelly made a face and giggled.  "Belle, listen to current stuff?  You've got to be kidding, right?  She listens to ancient stuff: jazz and show tunes and . . . opera . . ."

"Does she," he mused, ear twitching as he scowled at the CDs Kelly was shuffling through.  "You don't say . . ."

"You think she'd listen to a band called the Funk Monkeys?" Kelly countered, waving a shrink-wrapped CD in Kichiro's direction.

"Kami, I hope not," he grumbled.

Kelly laughed and unwrapped the CD.  "Oh, she even bought me batteries!  I love Belle . . . just love her . . ."

'Why would she do that?'

'Do what?'

Kichiro shook his head.  'Why would she make me buy all that crap if it wasn't for her?'

'Because, baka . . . you offered.  You said you'd buy her whatever she wanted if she agreed to buy the panties.'

'I didn't mean she was supposed to buy something for Kelly . . .'

'Maybe that's what she really wanted.  Anyway, I think it was pretty sweet of her.'

'Keh.'

"Are you okay?  You look a little ticked off."

Kichiro blinked and schooled his features but couldn't quite keep his right ear from twitching.  "Never better . . . why?"

Kelly shrugged, her expression darkening with unvoiced apprehension.  "Tell me, Dr. Izayoi . . . What do you really think of Belle?"

"She's . . . all right . . ."

"Just 'all right'?"

"She's fine."

"Ouch."

"What?"

Kelly rolled her eyes.  "Pretty harsh assessment.  Most guys trip all over themselves around her."

Kichiro snorted.  "Do they?"

She sighed, sitting back and crossing her arms over her chest.  "Hello?  Have you seen Belle?"

"Pardon?"

"She's gorgeous, you know.  Hell, if I were a lesbian, I'd be all about her . . ."

Kichiro snapped his mouth closed as his ear twitched faster.  "I told you, she's fine."

"Okay, I hear you," she remarked as she pulled the plastic wrap off another CD.  "It's probably for the better, anyway.  Belle doesn't seem to like you at all, anyway . . ."

"Why . . . What'd . . . What'd she say . . .?"

Kelly's fingers stilled momentarily, and she glanced up at him before turning her attention back to her presents.  "Well, she did call you Dr. Gaylord . . ."

He couldn't quite repress the growl that escaped at the reminder.  "Yeah, let's not yank at that string."

"And I think she used the words 'insufferable', 'anal', 'narcissistic' . . . Oh, and don't forget, 'asinine' . . . I like that one: 'asinine' . . ."

"Listen—"

Kelly's gaze turned speculative as she set the stack of CDs on the nightstand and folded her legs.  "I can't imagine why that'd be . . . You look like the kind of guy she'd go for."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Kelly shrugged.  "The brooding sort, you know?  Like you're closet basket case with a sordid past veiled in mystery . . ." She wiggled her eyebrows then grinned.  "Or a basket closet case, in which case you would be offended in her insistence that you're gay . . ."

"All right, that's so wrong, I can't even begin to explain the levels of wrong-ness . . ."

"Fine, fine, then tell me the truth: what do you really think of Belle-y Button?"

Kichiro started to shake his head then stopped, his gaze turning speculative as he scratched his chin thoughtfully.  "Okay, then you tell me the names of Belle's three . . . guys."

"Why would you want to know their names?"

He shrugged.  "Curiosity."

"Uh huh . . . If you want an honest answer, you could at least supply an honest reason."

He laughed.  "You're all right, Kelly.  I rather like you.  How about we just say it's morbid curiosity and leave it at that?"

"Fine, so tell me what you think of her?"

"She's . . . all right, for a little girl."

Kelly rolled her eyes.  "Yeah, okay . . . D, R, and C."

"D, R, and C?"

"Sure . . . If you're going to give me a half-assed answer, then that's what you're getting in return."

He sighed.  "She's . . . nice looking."

"All right . . ." Kelly agreed slowly.  "That's not really going to get you much more of an answer."

"What do you want me to say?"

"The truth."

He drew a deep breath and leaned against the window sill, crossing his ankles as he glowered at the floor.  "The truth, huh?  Okay . . . The first time I saw her, I thought she was . . . the most gorgeous girl I'd ever seen."

"Nice . . ." Kelly approved with an amused nod.

"So?"

She giggled, hooking a strand of mousy brown hair behind her ear.  "Diddy, Rachet, and Corn."

"What?"

"The names you wanted . . . their nicknames, anyway."

"Oh, that's low," he argued.

"You didn't specify . . ."

"You've been taking sneaky lessons off Belle-chan, haven't you?"

"Where do you think she learned it?"

Kichiro heaved a contentious sigh.

"You like her?  Really like her?"

He didn't answer, and he tried to keep his expression blank.  Kelly laughed, and he grimaced inwardly at his obvious failure.

"I could . . . tell you some of the things that Belle's told me . . . Things she'd like . . . If you want."

"What makes you think I need your help?"

Kelly shrugged.  "Well, for starters, you're asking me for names that you should be getting from Belle . . ."

"Like she'd tell me."

"Maybe.  Maybe not.  For God's sake, you didn't even know that the CDs were for me . . . Do you know anything about her at all?"

Kichiro snorted.  "Keh!  I know she likes . . . junk food . . . and haunted houses . . ."

"What was that?" she asked since the last part of his statement had been significantly muffled.

"Nothing.  So, uh . . . What do you want in exchange for your advice?"

"I want a straight answer about something,"

"Okay.  What is it you want to know?"

Kelly sighed.  "Belle's paying you to do this, isn't she?  The surgeries . . . I told her not to.  I told her I didn't want her to pay for it."

Kichiro considered her question and shrugged.  "Sort of . . . Not really.  She's working for me, in my office back in Tokyo, if you call that payment."

Kelly shook her head.  "I thought as much.  That's Belle for you.  She thinks she's to blame whenever something goes wrong.  She thinks she can fix everything, even when it wasn't her fault."

"I've gotten the feeling that Belle thinks she could have prevented the fire."

Kelly tugged at her robe, picking off tiny balls of fuzz and dropping them back onto the material once more.  "It was my fault, you know?  I was stupid and careless, and Belle . . . If she'd have been there, maybe she could have put out the fire . . . or maybe she'd have been burned, too."  She hesitantly met his gaze, wincing as she tried to shrug in a careless show of nonchalance.  "If she'd been hurt . . . Well, anyway, things happen for a reason, right?  Even bad things . . ."

Kichiro nodded slowly.  Kelly had a good grasp on reality—a better one than Belle did sometimes . . . "So tell me: what sort of things does Belle like?" he asked, changing the subject for Kelly's sake.  It wouldn't do, to let her get upset.  She needed to be strong and healthy for the surgery.  Dwelling on the past . . . It wouldn't change a thing.

"Things Belle likes . . ." Kelly frowned at the ceiling and pondered the topic.  "She likes . . . shopping."

Kichiro rolled his hand as he nodded impatiently.  "Yeah, I got that one.  What else?"

"She's not all that picky, you know?  She's said before, she just wants to feel loved; nothing fancy . . . Just a note or a flower . . . Stuff that lets her know that someone's thinking of her."  Kelly laughed suddenly, shaking her head as she grabbed a pillow and hugged it against her chest.  "We were watching a movie once—I don't remember what it was or anything . . . The guy took his girl for a carriage ride through Central Park, and Belle . . . She said that was what she wanted, something like that."  

"That seems a little . . . cliché . . ."

She shrugged.  "What do you expect?  Her daddy's always been her hero, and her daddy would have done something like that, if she'd asked him."

"Yeah . . . I don't think anyone will ever compare to him."

Kelly laughed a little sadly.  "Of course not . . . I used to think that she was the luckiest girl, ever.  Cain's the kind of father the rest of us only wished we'd had.  I mean, he was always there, whenever Belle needed him, no matter what, and he never, ever got mad at her.  It was like his world revolved around her, and, well, I guess it does.  You know, right?  About her mom?"

He shook his head.  "Just that she died when Belle was an infant."

Kelly nodded.  "There was gossip . . . I heard my parents talking about it once when they thought I couldn't hear them.  I never believed the stories, and I figure Belle's never heard them, but maybe . . . Isn't there normally some bit of truth behind rumors, no matter how small?"

"What did they say?" he asked, unsure if he really wanted to hear it or not.  Something about Kelly's demeanor . . . Whatever it was she'd heard . . . Kichiro knew it wasn't good.

"I've never told Belle," Kelly said.  "I . . . can't . . . even if it's not true . . . It's not something I'd want to know; not about my daddy."

"You think I'd tell her something that would hurt her?"

Kelly grimaced.  "No, I don't.  That's why I've told you what I have so far.  You . . . You care about her, I can tell, and I'm glad because Belle . . . She doesn't let many guys get near her."

He wasn't sure what to say to that.  He nodded slowly.  "I see."

"The rumors . . . They said that Cain . . . They said he killed her—Belle's mom.  That's . . . That's what they said."

"What?"

"I don't believe it.  Cain . . . Well, he's not perfect, but who is?  It's just that he's not a killer, either.  Anyone can see that.  All they have to do is see Cain and Belle together.  Anyway, my parents were trying to decide whether or not I should be allowed to hang around a girl with such a 'dangerous' father.  It was . . . stupid."

Kichiro shook his head in disbelief.  Even if he didn't particularly like Cain Zelig, he also couldn't believe that Cain had killed Belle's mother, either . . . It wasn't possible, was it?  "How could he have . . .? That's got to be a mistake . . ."

"If you tell Belle, I'll hunt you down and chop off your balls . . . Got that?"

Kichiro snorted.  "Like I'd tell her something like that."  Pushing himself back to his feet, he paced around the foot of the bed with his hands on his hips and a glower on his face.  "And no one knows exactly what happened to her mother?"

Kelly shrugged.  "Nope.  Well, Cain does, but I doubt he'll ever tell anyone.  To my knowledge, he's never told anyone, ever.  Even then, if I had been accused of murdering my mate, I think I'd at least speak up . . . let everyone know that I didn't do it."

"Are you saying you think he did it?"

Kelly sighed.  "I think that it doesn't matter what really happened.  I think . . . I think that he blames himself, even if it isn't true."

"And Belle's never been told any of this, right?"

Kelly shook her head.

"Good."