Pet Shop Of Horrors Fan Fiction ❯ Conversations of the Heart ❯ One-Shot

Disclaimer: Blah blah, not mine, blah blah, no money, blah blah, don't sue.

WARNING: This story contains a loving relationship between our darling Count D and Detective Leon Orcot. Technically, all androgynous aspects aside, that's a relationship between two men. If this offends you, you shouldn't be reading PSoH fanfiction. More specifically, this fanfiction. I am not responsible for your stupidity if you choose to continue reading. You have been warned. Flames will be used to lower my heating bill.

Conversations of the Heart

By: PawsCat

Jill was having a really good dream. You know, one of those 'somewhere exotic getting a full body massage from a random drop dead gorgeous native who doesn't speak a word of English' dreams. Yes, it was a very good dream.

Hans, or maybe it was Julio in this particular dream, had just spent an hour working away the tension that her job, and more specifically her boneheaded, stubborn as a mule partner, caused her. They were just about to start in on the strawberries and champagne when a loud banging noise intruded itself upon the lilting mood music that floated through her lavish resort suite.

"Damn it, Jill! I know you're in there… Let me in!"

"Leon??"

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Leon Orcot raised his fist for the umpteenth time to pound on his partner's apartment door. He never finished the motion, however, as the door was jerked open. A disheveled, still mostly asleep blonde woman glared at him, tangling her fingers in her robe as if to restrain herself from strangling the man before her.

"Leon, what are you doing here?" her voice was hoarse from sleep, but that still didn't quite mask her annoyance.

He blinked down at her, "Er… Were you asleep?"

If she'd been more awake, Jill would have rolled her eyes. As it was, she closed her eyes and took a deep, calming breath, "It is three fifteen… What else would I be doing?"

He glanced at his watch in shock, "It is no… Oh. It is." At least Leon had the decency (or good sense) to look sheepish. "Sorry, I guess I forgot how late it was. Can I come in?"

Cursing her inability to stay angry at tall, gorgeous blondes, she grudgingly moved aside and let him pass.

Fifteen minutes later, a cup of coffee in her hand and her glasses retrieved from the nightstand, Jill was feeling almost human. "Okay, Leon… You still haven't answered my question."

He glanced at her distractedly, his coffee mug sitting, ignored, where she'd placed it. "Which question was that?"

"'What are you doing here?' I've got a dozen more, ranging from 'What were you thinking, pounding on my door like that?' to 'What color underwear did the Count have on tonight?' but we'll start with the simple ones." Her jesting mood turned to concern when he didn't seem to hear a word she'd said. "Leon? Hey, Earth to Detective Orcot! What's up with you? You're worse than a zombie today."

A harsh sigh was all that answered her, but at least that confirmed that he was indeed listening. If patience be a virtue, then Jill resided on par with the Saints, and she was fully prepared to wait all night if she had to.

Fortunately, Leon seemed to reach a decision fairly quickly, "I need your help, Jill…"

"Tell me something I don't know, Sport." His expression darkened, "Sorry. Habit. Go ahead."

"I… I messed up with the Count. Big time. Bigger than big time. Even I can't believe that I was that stupid…" He ran a rough hand over his face, and for a moment, it looked like he'd break down.

Alarmed, Jill got up and went to sit next to him, wrapping her arms around him, "It's alright. It'll all be okay." she sighed. If he knows it was stupid, this is going to be bad… "Why don't you tell me what happened?"

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

"D. Hey D?" Leon peered around the shop's dark interior cautiously. He knew what kind of pets there were in this place, and he really didn't want to run into any of them. It'll be just my luck that he's not here… Leon thought to himself, In fact, I'll bet he's not. This is all some prank or something. After all, why would the Count call him this late at night and ask him to come over to the shop immediately?

Stepping a bit further into the shop, Leon felt something crunch underneath his sneaker. "What the…?" It was a candy conversation heart. Blinking down at it, he noticed another one a little ways away. The one that he'd stepped on had been broken into several small pieces, so he picked up the second one and examined it. Both sides were blank. "Uh… D?" Glancing around, he found a trail of hearts leading around behind the couch, where they disappeared underneath a curtain.

Feeling a little guilty, he followed the trail, picking up the candies as he went. They were all completely blank. With one more suspicious look around, Leon brushed aside the curtain and peered down the hallway that it revealed. The trail continued along the exact center of the hallway until it was almost invisible, then took a sharp right and ended abruptly at one of the ornate doors.

This worried Leon. The pets lived back here; how did he know that this wasn't some weird trap? For long minutes, he debated with himself, but eventually curiosity won out. Proceeding down the hall with a caution bordering on paranoia, he collected the remainder of the hearts and pressed his ear to the door. Not that I'd be able to hear much through this thing. My apartment has walls thinner than this door.

It took him four tries to make his hand grip the door knob and a minute worth of prompting to get it to turn. A gentle glow spilled out as the door slipped open, dozens of candles coating every available surface in the room being slowly revealed. It was a bedroom; the thought flickered at the back of his mind. Despite the ample lighting, the only feature of the room that was at all distinguishable was the bed. As Leon drew closer, he could see an arrangement of more little hearts nestled among the rose petals scattered on the silk comforter. The scent of the candles, an odd mix of vanilla and musk, was almost smothering in the still room as he leaned over the bed.

I… L… O… V… He didn't have a chance to finish as slender arms wound around his middle, soft lips brushing his ear and warm breath stirring the hair on the back of his neck.

"Hello, Detective."

"Count!" Leon jumped about four feet, but when he tried to turn to face the Chinese man, he found himself held fast.

"Did you like my surprise?" the Count practically purred in his ear.

"S… surprise…" the blonde's eyes drifted back to the bed, and suddenly it all clicked. The Count… Me?! No! He pulled his elbow back as hard as he could, scattering the handful of candy he'd collected. When D cried out in shock and pain, Leon spun on his heel and glared at him, breathing heavy. D was wearing a pair of loose silk pants and an open silk robe, and he clutched at his stomach, eyes wide. The Detective growled, "You… you… freak!" Not trusting himself to say anything more, Leon Orcot fled the scene.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Jill just gaped at the shaking blonde, incredulous. "You did what??"

He just laughed bitterly, "I screwed up. Isn't that what I always do?"

She looked at him closely, "Did you mean it?"

His head whipped around so quickly that his neck clicked, "What the hell do you take me for, Jill?! Of course I didn't mean it! I was surprised, that's all." After a second he sighed, "No, that's not all. I was terrified. I never wanted to admit that I was attracted to the Count. He was business. Even after I admitted it to myself, I always thought of it as something I couldn't have. To have it offered to me on a silver platter... It was too good to be true, and it scared the hell out of me."

She nodded, "Then there's only one thing left to do…" She smiled reassuringly at his hopeful look, "You, Leon Orcot, have to fix this mess."

That startled a laugh out of him, "Couldn't you just ask me to keep the sun from rising or something easy?"

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

The Count was not coping with rejection well. That was the first thing that Jill noticed when she slipped into the shop. His beautiful eyes were as red as if he'd gone on a three day binge, and his cheeks were still streaked with tears.

Focus, girl, she berated herself, Leonwill kiss it and make it better in a bit. Just do this right.

She smiled at D and waved a red and white heart covered gift bag in his face, "Happy Valentine's Day!" She almost lost her nerve when a single tear slipped down the delicate man's cheek, but set the bag on the coffee table and rattled off the excuse that she and Leon had come up with, beating a hasty retreat.

Stepping into the brilliant sunlight outside the shop, she flashed Leon a thumbs up where he waited across the street. Phase One, complete.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

D blinked as the blonde woman left, rather disappointed in her for not noticing his pain. The gift bag she'd brought seemed to laugh at him, its little hearts insultingly whole when his own was fragmented into a dozen sharp pieces. Determined to ignore the offensive object, he picked it up to throw it away, but a gentle wafting scent caught his attention. Of course, a Valentine's gift would have chocolate in it. He held out against the temptation for all of a minute then, with a resigned sigh, dug through the bag.

Drowning in tissue paper, he found a small, gold foil box, and inside the box was a single chocolate truffle with a tiny candy heart set on top. Eyes wide, D let the box tumble to the floor, tears slipping free from his lashes. How did she…? Did he tell her? His mind grasped at straws, No, he wouldn't have. It's just a coincidence. Everyone gives candy hearts on Valentine's Day. He made no move to pick up the box, however.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

"I'm going insane, Q-chan." D growled, waving the mail at his little pet. "Those stupid candies are everywhere." Four of his former customers had come to visit and had brought him the same gold foil boxes as Jill. Must be the 'in' thing this year… Someone had dropped a candy heart that had tumbled down the stairs when he had opened the door to say goodbye to a guest. And then there had been the little boy outside the pet shop when he'd gone to check the mail. He'd run up to him and handed him a candy and then run off before he could say anything. It was beginning to border on the ludicrous.

He flipped through the mail angrily, stopping on a small hand address envelope. It bore no stamp or return address, but he recognized the handwriting as that of a friend who lived above the café across the street. Tearing into it, he yanked the folded up note out and stared in horror as another tiny candy tumbled out with the paper. It took him forty deep, calming breaths and counting to two hundred for him to overcome the urge to scream. He glanced over the note, staring intensely at the candy heart. It, like all the others he'd gotten that day, was blank. Just like… He brutally cut that thought off.

The note was a request, or more accurately, a politely worded order that he stop by for a few moments and receive the gift that the little boy and his mother had put together for him.

Deciding that it might do him good to get out of the shop for a few minutes, D put up a note saying that he'd be right back and hurried across the street. He never noticed the tall blonde man leaning against the wall outside the shop reading a newspaper.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

By the time the Count had eaten his way through a batch of delicious and thankfully not heart-shaped, chocolate chip cookies his mood was much improved. He even managed to smile a little as he walked back across the street to the shop. That is, he was smiling until he saw it. A conversation heart. Precisely placed on the top step.

Suddenly shaking, he stepped closer and peered down into the shadows of the entry. As expected, there was a heart on each of the steps, and a line of them led from the bottom step through the open pet shop door.

Heart in his throat, D stumbled down the steps and into the shop, spinning around looking for his Leon. There was no one there, and he almost collapsed at the realization. The hearts were there, though, and he collected himself enough to follow their path to the couch. There, on the center cushion rested a tiny jeweler's box. His hands were shaking so badly that it took him two tries to get the stupid thing to stay open.

Resting on the bed of velvet was a single candy heart. This one was not blank, however. It had two words on it: Forgive me.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Leon stepped out from behind the curtain, breath caught somewhere in his throat. "Forgive me?"

His heart stopped when D raised tear filled eyes to his. "Anything for you, my heart," the kami choked out.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Jill smiled as the couple kissed, then quietly closed the door to the pet shop and headed home feeling quite pleased with herself.