Chapter Two

Sneering, Mello eyed the woman. "Of course I'm fucking capable. Genius, remember?"

"So you claim," she said, raising a delicate eyebrow. "I admit, your counterfeiting operation has gone surprisingly smoothly... Nevertheless, identity theft is a whole different animal. And this time, you won't have James to show you the ropes."

"It's all the same. I'll learn it, just like I learn and master everything else. Got it, Natasha?"

She continued to give him a skeptical, mocking smile, but replied, "Got it, Mello. I'll see you in a week, you know where."

Mello didn't even bother to say goodbye. Reining his temper in with effort, he swept out of the building onto a shady London street.

It was November now, one of the city's rainiest months. Sure enough, the sky was a drab gray and a light drizzle was steadily coming down. Sourly, Mello jogged to his motorcycle and put on his helmet, annoyed that he was going to have to deal with rain on his visor on the way home.

Despite the weather, however, he was actually quite pleased with how things were going. This wasn't the life he imagined he'd have after leaving Wammy's House, but it was the life he had, and he was... happy. Happier than he'd been in a long time, anyway.

Before long he arrived home. His and James's place didn't look like much from the outside—they had to lie low, seeing as most of their earnings weren't quite legal—but on the inside it was finely furnished. And their pantry was well-stocked with chocolate, which was Mello's main concern.

"What's the deal with that bitch, anyway?" said Mello by way of greeting as he hung up his coat. Irritably, he wrung some water from the ends of his shoulder-length blond hair so that it landed outside on the front step, closing the door once he was done.

"Hmm?" came a distracted murmur from the other room.

"Natasha," said Mello. "Does she always have that stuck-up, holier-than-thou attitude, or am I just a special case?"

He walked into the living room, where James was watching some inane show on the telly. A half-empty glass of red wine stood on the end-table beside him.

James had messy black hair that stuck up in all directions, aided by moderate amounts of hair gel. The first time Mello caught sight of him, he'd thought that somehow he'd run into L; the resemblance, at least from the back, was quite striking. However, he'd quickly realized that the man couldn't be his former mentor-slash-idol because the guy actually had some fashion sense. Not to mention a more muscular body—not that it was hard to be thicker than L's anorexic-looking frame.

"Eh," replied James, turning to look at Mello with his hazel eyes. "She gets like that sometimes."

"Annoying as hell, it is," muttered Mello.

"Did it go all right, though?"

"Yeah."

"What did she want?" asked James casually. His voice had a strange lilt to it, but Mello couldn't place it, so he brushed the feeling off.

"Said she wants to get us into identity theft. Apparently that's the way to go now, and even though nothing's gone wrong, it's—and I quote—not safe to run our counterfeiting operation for too long."

James's eyes narrowed. "We haven't gotten caught yet, and I don't plan to."

"That's what I told her," said Mello in frustration. "Still, she's the boss... I don't know why we don't just drop her and do what we want, without her damn input. We haven't even been counterfeiting that long. Definitely not long enough to justify stopping 'just to be safe.'"

"I've told you before, Mello. I worked with her for years. She's also got more connections than I could ever handle, and she's dead smart. She has the business sense to know what to get into, and when. Come on, trust her a little."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, she's so great, so smart. Why don't you just go fuck her, then?"

"Mello," said James flatly. "You know I don't swing that way. I'm one-hundred percent gay, thank you very much."

"Sometimes I wonder," said Mello, unable to resist grinning. "I saw you eying Gina's backside the other day, and you can't convince me otherwise."

"Only because her arse reminded me of yours, babe."

"A likely story."

"A true story," corrected James. "Now sit down with me and relax. I'm watching through the second season of Torchwood—it's almost done."

"I don't like TV," complained Mello, although he sat down next to his boyfriend after moving in for a quick kiss. "It's boring." They'd never watched TV at Wammy's House, and Mello had never really gotten what all the fuss was about it. Maybe it was the kind of thing people had to grow up watching to properly enjoy.

"C'mon, do it for me. With a minimum of snide comments, if you can at all manage to hold back. Here, have some wine," he added, pushing the glass into Mello's hand.

"Don't you think it's a little early to be drinking?"

"It's half-three on a Saturday. Do you have anything better to be doing?"

"I guess not," relented Mello, swishing the liquid and smelling its fruity aroma before taking a sip.

He wasn't too much of a drinker, but he did enjoy a good pinot noir. James knew him well.

"I hope you know that I'm expecting compensation after watching this shit for however many hours," Mello said warningly.

"Like what?"

"Like I want top, tonight."

James regarded him calculatedly. "Hm..." he said. "How about I order some imported chocolate instead?"

"Oh no, no," said Mello, laughing. "You are not trying to buy me off with chocolate. Not today."

"But it usually works so well," James grinned with a caught-out expression.

"Come on. It's been months since you've let me top, you selfish bastard."

"I got the impression you liked to bottom."

"You know I don't have a problem bottoming. I enjoy it, of course," said Mello in exasperation. "But that doesn't mean I don't like to top, too."

"Fine," said James after a minute. Mello blinked in surprise.

"Wow, that was surprisingly easy," he commented. "You normally put up way more of a fight."

"Don't push your luck, Mels."

James returned to watching his show. Mello gave in and forced himself to follow the storyline for his boyfriend's sake. The two of them went through a bottle of wine in no time, and even though there was something that felt off about James tonight, Mello couldn't help but smile.

Things were good.