InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Purity Redux: Vivication ❯ Tempest ( Chapter 53 )

“What do you think?”

Rinji raised an eyebrow and slowly shook his head as he peered over the top of the magazine he’d found, lying on the table beside the comfortable chair in the small and quiet dress shop.  “Don’t you think that you should be picking out a wedding dress with kaa-san and obaa-san?” he asked dryly.

“Maybe,” Saori allowed with an offhanded shrug.  “But you’re here, and they’re not, so . . .”

He sighed.  “That one makes your butt look big,” he said, disappearing into the pages of Newsweek once more.

Saori snorted.  “Baka,” she grumbled, spinning around on her heel to stomp off to change.  He chuckled behind her.  She made a face.

She hadn’t thought that it would be that difficult to find an appropriate dress for the very casual, very cozy wedding.  Nothing too fancy, nothing with the frills or ridiculously long skirts—none of that.  All of them that she’d found so far, however, were more like simple summer dresses or just a little too business-like to suit.

It didn’t take long for her to change back into her regular clothes and carefully arrange the dress on a hanger.  When she opened the door, she handed the dress to the nearby attendant before heading back over to her brother and slapping him indelicately on the arm.  “All right, nii-chan,” she told him, intercepting the very appreciative looks that the couple of salesgirls over by the counter were casting in Rinji’s direction.  “You know, you’re being shamelessly ogled,” she pointed out with a very bright smile.

He blinked and paused for a moment before bending down the top corner of the magazine.  Amber eyes taking on a rather suspect kind of lilt, he managed a very good affectation of their grandfather’s infamous blank stare.  “Do I want to know what you’re talking about?”

Just to twist that knife a little more, Saori turned at the waist and smiled brightly as she wiggled her fingers very pleasantly in the salesgirls’ direction.  The two girls held a very quick conversation before one of them hurried over, her own smile flashing as she stopped before them.  “May I help you?”

Saori slid her gaze to the side, long enough to intercept the ever-so-slight narrowing of Rinji’s gaze.  “Oh, I was just wondering if you’re seeing anyone?  Nii-chan, here, was saying that he wouldn’t mind getting your phone number—if that’s not too forward . . .”

The girl looked like she was caught somewhere between disbelief and sheer euphoria as Rinji slowly stood up.  “Nii-chan?” the girl echoed, shaking her head since she didn’t understand that at all.

Saori giggled.  “I’m Japanese,” she explained.  “Nii-chan means my big brother.”

“Oh, your brother!” the girl blurted, seeming a little more relieved than she probably should have.  “Umm, no, I’m . . . I’m not at the moment,” she replied, pulling a small white card from her pocket and extending it to her.

Saori accepted it, sparing a minute to look it over, holding it reverently in her pinched fingers.  She didn’t dare look at him since she figured that he wasn’t going to be at all impressed—if she told him, anyway—since the entire conversation was going on in Russian . . .

“Thank you so much,” Saori replied.

Rinji leaned down to whisper in her ear.  “What are you doing, Saori-chan?”

She ignored him.  “I’m sure he’ll call you!” she hurried on to say.  “It was very nice to meet you!”

He must have gotten an idea of what was going on, and he quickly bowed slightly before herding Saori out of the shop and onto the street once more.  She turned to hand him the girl’s card, but he grunted, refusing to take it.  “Saori . . .”

“Yes, nii-chan?”

He was walking so fast that she had to hurry to keep up with him.  “Did you just try to find me a date?”

Pressing her lips together to keep from laughing outright at the absolute menace in his tone, she shrugged instead.  “She was very pretty—Ingrid-san . . .”

Uttering a very terse grunt, he yanked open the car door and waited for her to slip inside.  Then he slammed it closed and stomped around to the driver’s side, but it wasn’t until he’d negotiated the vehicle into the lane of traffic that he finally deigned to speak to her.  “I can’t believe you did that,” he complained, pulling to a stop, waiting for the traffic light.

She snorted.  “That dress did not make my butt look big,” she challenged haughtily.

Suddenly, he chuckled.  “So, you thought to find me a date to get back at me for teasing you?”

“I’ll bet she thought that your blushing was even cuter,” she assured him.

He rolled his eyes, and it wasn’t surprising at all to find him blushing again.  “You’re a menace,” he grumbled at her.

She giggled, but her amusement died away as she turned her attention out the window.  Getting away for the day was a decent distraction, she figured, but it really didn’t do anything to make her feel any better about what might well be going on back at the castle.

“You should have told Fai-sama,” Rinji remarked, keeping his eyes trained carefully on the road.  “He’s your mate.  That means he’d want to know what Feodosiv-san said to you.”

She sighed, making a face, propping her chin on her fist, elbow resting on the door armrest.  “How could I do that?” she challenged quietly.  “Evgeni-san’s the closest that Fai has to family, other than Yerik-kun . . .” She frowned, bit her lip.  “As mean as he was, he was just trying to protect Fai, and . . . and really, I can’t fault him for that . . .”

Tapping his claws on the steering wheel—something he always did when he was thinking—he shook his head.  “Are you sure about that?  I mean, it’s really none of his business.  It’s not like he can do anything, and even if he could, it’d be reckless.  You can’t separate mates . . .”

“I know,” she replied.  “I just . . . I’m sure that he’ll . . . He’ll be fine with it.  You’ll see.  Once he realizes that I’m not trying to do any of those things . . .”

“You’re missing the point,” he told her, turning the car onto the highway that would take them back to the castle.

“What point?”

He reached over, tweaked her ear.  “Fai-sama would want to know.  Even if Feodosiv-san is just concerned, it’s not your job to defend him.  The ones you should be protecting are Fai-sama—and yourself.  Don’t let that old bastard knock you down, especially when you don’t deserve it.”

Using his thumb to swipe over the phone screen to end the call, Sesshoumaru let the device fall from his hand onto the table with a dull clatter as he scowled out of the window of the guest bedroom.

“Did you verify whatever it was you were checking into?”

He turned his head slightly—just far enough to regard his mate.  “I did,” he replied, letting his amber eyes flick back out the window once more.  “It’s as I thought.”  Letting out a deep breath that wasn’t quite a sigh, his gaze narrowed as he watched the empty driveway.  “Damn . . .”

A gentle hand rubbed his back as Kagura stopped behind him.  “Would you care to tell me what’s going on?  It concerns my granddaughter, too, after all . . .”

“I spoke with Gostoyev Vladimir at the bank, who is the officer in charge of all of Faine’s accounts.  He seemed to be a little reluctant to answer my questions, but he finally acknowledged that Feodosiv . . . volunteered to deliver all of the account information to Faine—two large envelopes.  Faine only received the one.  The fact that Gostoyev was so . . . unenthusiastic about talking to me makes me suspicious . . . If he’d told Feodosiv about the second account . . .”

“Then he could have easily just . . . chosen not to give it to him . . .” Kagura nodded.  “But why?  What would the point of that even be?”

Sesshoumaru shrugged.  “Simple enough.  If Faine didn’t have the money to pay for the official services, would that not make him look rather inept?  And if the youkai got wind of his financial difficulties . . .”

She sighed, rubbing her forehead as she leaned against the window frame beside him.  “They could easily choose to challenge him—or worse . . . If they banded together, brokered some kind of revolution . . .?”

Nodding slowly, Sesshoumaru met her concerned gaze.

Kagura considered what he’d said for several minutes, idly fussing with the top button of her green silk blouse.  It was a fidgety kind of habit, one that usually amused him.  Just now, however, he was too busy, trying to figure out just what was going on, though his understanding was very nearly complete . . . “And you said that you think Alexei complained about him before?  Do you remember what he said?”

Eyes narrowing as he concentrated on that half-forgotten conversation, Sesshoumaru tapped his index finger claw against the window frame.  It wasn’t too long before Faina had died, if he recalled correctly.  He’d called to give Sesshoumaru his yearly briefing—something that many of the tai-youkai didn’t bother doing, but Alexei had always been very proactive in keeping Sesshoumaru informed . . .

“Everything seems to be in order—at least, as much as it ever is here . . .”

“Nothing you cannot handle, Alexei?”

The Red Dog—a nickname given to Alexei back when he was little more than a pup—grunted.  “Nothing that I’m unfamiliar with, in any case.”

“Oh?”

Alexei sighed—an odd sort of sound from the proud Russian.  “Just rumors.  An old griffon-vulture’s been heard to be whispering in some of my regents’ ears—talk of revolution . . . They don’t like that I don’t lean upon them—that I don’t need them.  It seems they wish I was a little more . . . compliant with the things that they want, even if those things would prove to be useless in the end . . . Damn that Feodosiv . . .”

“Feodosiv?”

Uttering a terse grunt, he swallowed loudly, the clink of ice, rattling in a glass echoing through the connection.  “Evgeni Feodosiv,” Alexei replied.  “Too smart to challenge me—too stupid to keep his venom in check . . .”

Blinking away the memory, Sesshoumaru slowly shook his head.  “He seemed to believe that Feodosiv was trying to incite the youkai . . . He believed that he was trying to turn the regents against him, which is entirely possible.  Faine has had some trouble with a number of them, too.  Alexei believed that they didn’t like the idea that he chose not to lean upon them when forming his own policies . . . If Feodosiv had an occasion to try to . . . ingratiate himself to Faine . . .”

Kagura’s youki flared, spiked.  “Then he would view Saori’s relationship with Faine-sama as an impediment—an obstacle to get rid of?  Is that what you’re telling me?”

Sesshoumaru shook his head again.  “At this point, it’s all speculation,” he said.  “Albeit, damning speculation.”

Snapping open her fan with a sharp flick of her wrist, Kagura pinned her mate with a fierce glare.  “He won’t be touching her,” she said, her voice, dropping to a low, silky tone.  “He will not touch my granddaughter . . .”

He reached out, gently pushing against the fan, closing it under his fingers, his palm, he nodded.  “No,” he surmised as the white car pulled into the long driveway.  “No . . . he won’t.”

Fai lounged in the bathroom doorway, frowning thoughtfully as he watched Saori, who had her nose buried behind the screen of her computer.  She’d mentioned something about looking up a few more things for the wedding, so she’d brought the device to bed.

“But you should know, he makes Saori uncomfortable . . .”

That statement had been spinning around his head ever since Sesshoumaru had said them, along with a guilty sort of pang that he hadn’t realized it already.  That strange sort of expression he’d seen on her face when he’d mentioned that Evgeni was stopping by . . . He’d seen it, and he’d discounted it when she’d covered it up a moment later . . .

‘Uncomfortable?  Exactly what does that mean?’ his youkai countered.

Fai’s frown deepened.  He didn’t know, but he was going to find out . . .

“Saori . . .” he trailed off, shouldering himself away from the doorway.

“Hmm?”  She didn’t look up from her computer.

Fai made a face that she missed completely.  “Could you put that away?  We need to talk . . .”

He didn’t miss the way she bristled for a moment.  Then, she snapped the computer closed and leaned over to set it on the nightstand before drawing up her legs, resting back on her pillows, her hands on her raised knees.

“Tell me what it is about Evgeni that makes you uneasy,” he said, stretching out on his side, propping his head on his hand.

She started to open her mouth, but he shushed her with his fingertips before she could speak.  “Don’t lie to me, okay?”

She winced as he let his hand drop away.  “It’s okay,” she told him, managing a very weak and thin smile that was far more uncertain than it really ought to have been.  “He . . . He was just protecting you, and that’s what a good friend does.”

“Why don’t you let me be the judge of that?”

She sighed.  “Does it really matter, what he said?” she countered.  “It doesn’t; not really.  All it would do is cause trouble . . . I don’t want to come between you and Evgeni-san . . .”

“You know, don’t you?  You’re the most important person in my life—more important than anyone, including Evgeni.  Do you think that I want you to feel uncomfortable in your own home?  Because I don’t, and if Evgeni’s presence here makes you feel that way, then I want—I need—to know why.”

She frowned at him, her brows drawing together in a consternated kind of stubbornness.  “Is he just a friend?” she asked, ignoring his request, altogether.  “Is he only your friend?  Your advisor and confidant?  Or is he more like family to you—maybe not as close to you as Yerik, but family, just the same?”

“I . . . I don’t know,” he growled, feeling the edges of his patience rapidly fraying.  Heaving a huge sigh, he flopped over onto his back, scowling up at the ceiling.  Had he realized that she could be that stubborn?  No, somehow, he’d missed that part of it, hadn’t he?  Then again, maybe he hadn’t.  She’d been adamant enough that he needed to meet the orphans in the beginning that she’ managed to appropriate him, after all, so yes, maybe he ought to have known . . .

“You don’t have many people in your life that you trust, Fai,” she said quietly, softly.  “Please don’t ask me to take that away from you . . . It’s . . . Well, it’s not fair . . .”

He reached over, tugged her down next to him, wrapped his arms around her and held her close.  Her caring was evident, even if it did frustrate him.  Sure, he could appreciate what she was telling him, and yet, she just didn’t seem to comprehend it, either.

“I don’t want to trust someone who isn’t worth trusting,” he told her, the memory of Evgeni’s thinly veiled accusations, flicking through his head.  “No matter who it is . . . Even if he was, as you say, trying to protect me, there’s nothing about you that I need protected from . . . And it’s my job to protect you, but I can’t if you won’t tell me what he said.”

She sighed.  “He just . . . He thought that maybe I was after your money or . . . or your title.  But . . . But he’ll see, won’t he?  When we’re mates for real, then . . . Then he’ll know.”

“That’s what he said to you?” Fai reiterated.

She shrugged and snuggled closer to his side.  “It wasn’t so much what he said as it was the way he’d said it,” she admitted.  “He was . . . Well, he was really . . . angry . . .”

He kissed her forehead, held her just a little tighter.  To be entirely honest, he was even more confused than he was before.  It simply didn’t make sense.  Of course, he believed her, but if she was telling the truth, then just what was Evgeni up to?  Concerned, maybe . . . Even so . . .

“May I ask you . . .?  What does he know of your finances?  Personal and otherwise?”

His eyes widened.  Sesshoumaru . . . He thought that Evgeni had something to do with that missing account, didn’t he?

Of course, he did.  Why else would he have asked?  But if Evgeni did have something to do with that . . . Was there a point?  Was there something else that Fai wasn’t seeing?  

Unfortunately, there were no real answers, no explanations that made a damn bit of sense.  There was nothing at all as the minutes ticked away, as he lay awake, staring at the ceiling, struggling for an understanding that simply wasn’t there . . . Just his thoughts and his growing pile of questions . . . and the welcome warmth and comfort of the woman sleeping next to him . . .