Aster's mine, but as much as I'd like to claim Ban, he and Ginji and anyone you recognize belong to another.

PROLOGUE

"What?" An outraged Ban glowered at the Honky Tonk's door, or rather, at the 'Closed' sign that hung just inside it. "Closed until further notice? What the hell?"

Ginji and his partner had responded to a frantic call from Natsumi to meet at the Honky Tonk, only to find the red and yellow sign hanging lopsidedly in the glass. Natsumi and Rena stood by, antsy and upset, as the two Get Backers peered into the darkened windows.

"Rena-chan and I got a call from the coffee shop down the street this morning. They said that Master was going away, but that he'd made a deal with them for us to work there until he got back. He didn't tell us anything," Natsumi fretted. "Why would Paul-san just disappear?

"And without calling to make us pay our tab." Ginji smiled abashedly, hoping to put the girls at ease. It was unusual, yes, but he wasn't especially worried. Paul could take care of himself. "Did you call his apartment?"

"We called his apartment, his cell, the Honky Tonk phone, and we e-mailed him." Rena ticked off the number of ways they had tried to reach their boss on the fingers of her left hand.

Natsumi's dark head bobbed up and down anxiously in agreement. "I'm worried, Ban-san." She bit her lip with small white teeth, and where the pressure met the pink mouth, the color fled, leaving the flesh pale and bloodless. Ginji had a sudden image of his own white teeth biting the pink mouth, and looked away with a blush.

"Don't be." Ban tapped a cigarette out of his carton of Marlboros, oblivious to Ginji's discomfiture, and fingered the white paper briefly before lighting up. "He was obviously prepared for something like this, or he wouldn't have made plans for you two to work at the coffee shop."

"But why wouldn't he tell us about it?"

Ban shrugged and leaned against the side of the building. "Could be dangerous," he offered around the cigarette gripped in his teeth.

"Ban-chan," Ginji chided him, as Rena crossed her arms tightly with worry. Ban had a lot of good qualities, he thought ruefully, but tact did not number among them.

"If he wanted us to know where he was, he'd have told us," Ban insisted logically, stubbornly. "So don't worry about him. If he said he'd be back, he'll be back. He's nothing if not dependable."

"But – "

"Quit fussing over it," Ban said with finality, looking up at the plumes of smoke that drifted away from the red embers of his cigarette.

"We could at least take a look around his apartment, just to make them feel better, couldn't we?" Rena and Natsumi were obviously upset, at it wasn't as if they had anything better to do.

Ban snorted, and the rising smoke puffed out weirdly around the exhaled breath. "You want to break and enter into Paul's apartment? I can tell you what you're going to find – a few pornos, a half-drunk case of beer in the fridge, a dozen messages on his machine – all from Natsumi and Rena – and a big computer system blinking halfway around the spare bedroom. Just like any bachelor pad. Except probably compulsively tidy." His mouth twisted peevishly, and the cigarette almost dropped from his lips. "There. Now you know, so we don't have to go, right?"

"Please, Ban-san?" Natsumi clasped her hands tightly together, and rested her chin on the knuckes, lips aquiver. Rena didn't say anything, but flashed her dark, earnest eyes at the Get Backer, a silent addendum to Natusumi's plea.

To Ginji's secret satisfaction, Ban proved no better at turning down pretty girls than he was, and so it wasn't long before all four piled into the 360 and headed out to the outskirts of Shinjuku where Paul lived, with the agreement that the girls would treat the Get Backers to dinner.

It wasn't a new complex, but had the comfortable feeling of a nice, older neighborhood, with red bricks and recently painted beige siding around the upper floor. A series of small, man-made lakes were nestled into the ring of apartment buildings, each neatly landscaped with a small gazebo in the center. Ginji had never been there before, and to the best of his knowledge, Ban and the girls hadn't either.

"This is nice," Rena noted, a slight smile softening her usual somber countenance.

"Just like Master," Natsumi agreed.

Now that the Get Backers had agreed to take a look, both girls had relaxed considerably. Ginji grinned at Ban, who rolled his eyes. It was nice to be appreciated.

"You remember the apartment number, Natsumi?" Ban asked, surreally calm as he careened into the parking lot.

"1218," she answered, clinging to the armrest. Rena hadn't budged, taking Ban's unorthodox driving habits in stride, but now she pointed.

"There's building twelve. And eighteen probably means second floor, right?"

Ginji had to think about that for a moment, but Ban cut off his chain of thought by throwing on the breaks. They were halfway between spaces.

"Um, Ban-chan – shouldn't you park in just one space?" he ventured. It wasn't as though he didn't know his suggestion would be rebuffed; it was just that he wanted to be able to say 'I told you so' later. Usually that was Ban's line, so he enjoyed the rare occasions when he could throw the words back in his contentious partner's teeth.

"We won't be here long," Ban answered confidently.

Ginji sighed. "Looks like we'll be hitting you up for ticket money, too, Natsumi-chan," he said.

She laughed, and Ginji blushed again. "Okay, but you owe me."

Ban bristled with aggravation, but, true to form, he didn't back out to park again. The two Get Backers got out and pulled their seats forward so that Rena and Natsumi could get out.

Strolling off toward building twelve, Ban turned back to them, a haughty mien wrenching his mouth. "Come on. We don't have all day to do this, you know."

"What else are you going to be doing, Ban-san?" Rena laughed, leaning on the 360. "Your hangout's closed, and if you had a job, you wouldn't be here."

Ginji snickered a little at that. It didn't bother him, but their current, assignment-less state had Ban irritable and on edge.

"It'll come," Ban insisted with a growl. "No thanks to punk kids like you."

In their neat little work uniforms, Rena and Natsumi were the furthest thing from punk kids that there could be, and the accusation inspired a fit of giggles.

Ban threw his hands up in disgust as they approached the building, muttering to himself, until they came to Paul's door, and found that there was already someone standing there.

"Oh, good," the delivery girl said with relief. She wasn't very old, maybe a year or two younger than Ban and Ginji, and she was quite pretty, with a pert, bobbed haircut and grey eyes. "I was hoping someone might know what I should do with these." Behind her on the landing was a big flower arrangement of pale pink peonies, white roses, and tiny white star-shaped flowers.

"Are these for this apartment?" Ban asked, dark brows lowered in confusion.

Her face fell. "Damn – excuse me!" Her cheeks flushed as the invective slipped out. "It's just that nobody at work really knows this guy's story, and I was hoping you might." Sitting down by the flowers, she said, "He seems like a really nice man, but he doesn't say much, you know? He won't even tell us who the flowers are for, like a girlfriend or a wife or anything. Just smiles. Gives us a last name to put on the package, but only because he has to."

Ginji cut off the question Ban was trying to ask and sat beside her. "Does he order flowers often?"

"Only every Monday for the past five years." The girl grinned. "Awesome, isn't it? I wish someone would send me flowers every week."

Ginji didn't notice when Ban blinked in astonishment and tried to speak again, but this time, Rena cut him off. "You're kidding."

"No, I'm serious! Every week, he orders another arrangement. We've shipped them all over the world, too, Sydney, Vienna, Madrid, Los Angeles, you name it." She rested her chin on her knees pensively. "Every once in a while, he'll ask for them to be brought here, just for a few weeks or months at a time, but mostly they get shipped out. We all fight over who gets to deliver them when he wants them brought here, but so far nobody's seen the lucky lady." She sighed. "It's such a mystery. So romantic."

Ginji glanced at the now glowering Ban as he opened his mouth a third time, but like Natsumi and Rena, he was far more interested in the girl and her flowers.

"Are they always like this? These roses are gorgeous – and these, what are these? They're beautiful!" Natsumi gushed.

"Peonies – one of my all-time favorites!" The girl smiled happily, tapping one of the pink blooms lightly with a perfectly manicured nail. "And no, he never orders the same thing twice. All different colors, all different shapes, rare flowers, common flowers. Except these." She fingered the tiny white blossoms daintily. "Everything he asks for has stephanotis in it. In the language of flowers, it means happiness in marriage."

"Marriage?" Ginji stared at the girl in disbelief, and Natsumi and Rena shared a wide-eyed look. The moment was broken by a string of curse words from Ban.

"Shit, you guys made me forget what I wanted to ask!" Ban complained, but they ignored him.

The delivery girl nodded. "We always figured that there was a wife out there somewhere. But he never gives us a full name, and it isn't the same as his. Always the same person, though. Whoever she is, she gets around."

Ginji felt Ban jump beside him, and figured he'd remembered what he'd wanted to ask. "What's the name?"

"It's a funny foreign name, but I remember it because it's English for a type of flower. It's 'Aster.'"

Then she sighed again. "I guess if you don't know what I should do with these, I don't know either. I'll have to take them back and hold them until he wants them." She gathered the big arrangement in her arms and started to make her way carefully down the stairs.

They watched her leave, and every eye followed the pink-and-white flowers to her van.

"Aster," Ban mused, half to himself.

"Let's go inside, Ban-chan!" Ginji got to his feet and stood by the beige door. It wasn't like Paul to ask to have something delivered, and then not be there to pick it up, and he said as much, adding, "You said it yourself, Ban-chan – he's nothing if not dependable.

Ban nodded, finally intrigued. Pulling his trusty skeleton key from his pocket, he fiddled with Paul's lock, and let himself in.

Rena and Natsumi gasped.

Ban caught Ginji's eyes, and both Get Backers spoke at the same time.

"Shit."