Disclaimer: No, I don't.


Smooth Criminal
Chapter 3: End It with a Gunshot

Dedicated to jAyesque

To tell you the truth, I was surprised that the Chief entrusted the case to me. Before this, I'd only gotten minor cases that no one usually paid attention to; tracking lost children in particular. After all, I am not talented at anything more than my accurate portrait sketching. Unfortunately, although that's a great asset to my usual work, it's also a great loss to my current case. If we only knew how Natsume Hyuuga looked like, it would be more possible to catch him. And our golden key to Hyuuga's face was—

"Hotaru Imai," Koko spoke all of the sudden as he stopped abruptly at the sight of the red light. I felt like I would have been thrown out of the car if it weren't for my seatbelt. He looked rather perplexed; his right hand was cautiously playing with the wheel.

"What about her?"

"If Hyuuga wanted her dead in the first place," he started. "Why doesn't he come after her?"

"Imai's a big personality. It would be really hard to get past her security," I answered. His eyes were now fixed on the road again as the lights turned to yellow then to green. He stepped on the gas and sped off. I swallowed, "Which is why they need us, because access to her would be easier for us."

Sometimes – wait, scratch that. I meant, always – I hated riding the car with Koko. He was the most reckless driver I knew, which was totally ironic, because he was a police officer and he's supposed to set an example. But he would always use his own car anyway whether on or off duty, because "the police car smelt like sweat and rotten fast food".

"This is stupid," he shook his head and spun the wheel, swerving round the curve. I didn't say anything and allowed the moment of silence to sink in. I didn't like it more than he did. I just looked at him and he sighed, "Hey."

"Yeah?"

"We're getting LOLphones while we're at it, right?"

I laughed, "Sure."

He slowed down at the sight of the shop and halted altogether in front of it. Good thing Koko insisted on taking his own car instead of the police car. Otherwise, we would have garnered such unwarranted attention, which could very much ruin our mission. Well, we were on day-off anyway, so we didn't have much of a choice. He unbuckled his seatbelt and stepped out of the car, then walked around the hood and opened the door on my side. I slipped out, shielding my eyes from the glaring sun. Koko, putting on a pair of Aviators, leaned on the car hood and looked at me, saying, "So this is it."


"What's the difference between a LOLphone2 and a LOLphone2i?" Koko was asking the saleslady while he weighed both in his hands. Before the saleslady could even explain, I pulled Koko away from the counter and started walking. I stopped at the elevator and pressed the button, but I didn't let go of his wrist.

"I thought we were going to buy a LOLphone!"

"Sir, we don't have much time," I sighed. "The phone can wait."

"Excuse me," a small, pitchy voice came out of nowhere. We turned around and found a slim girl with permed hair, which was significantly seaweed green, standing behind us. She was pretty. She must work in the place, too. Although she wasn't wearing the same uniform as those perky salesladies, she was wearing a much more class office clothing. She put her hand on her waist and said, "Sir, Ma'am, where do you think you're going?"

"Lady," Koko stepped in front of me and crossed his arms, "what's with that tone?"

"Excuse me?" The lady was obviously pissed already.

I slapped Koko's side with the back of my hand and gave him a look. Then I turned to the lady with a smile, "We're looking for, um, Miss Hotaru Imai."

"Well she's not entertaining walk-in guests," the girl said flatly. "Now if you please—"

"You don't understand," I brought out my ID and showed her. "It's for investigation purposes."

"Do you have an appointment?" She said, raising a brow, hugging her clipboard tighter with her other arm. Apparently, it didn't intimidate her at all.

"Hello? Didn't you see? I'm Officer Mikan Sakura; that's Officer Kokoroyome. We're police, in case you're oblivious to that. We're trying to do our jobs here," I said, already gritting my teeth in annoyance.

"And I'm Miss Imai's personal assistant, Sumire Shouda. I'm trying to do my job as well. Now, please leave if you don't want me to call the security."

"Didn't you hear, woman?" Koko hissed. "We're police."

"And you're not in uniform, which means you're not in duty."

"Can I please shoot this bitch now?" I whispered to Koko.

"No, no," Koko said, raking his hair with his fingers. "Let me handle this."

He cleared his throat and winked at Shouda. She raised a brow at him. "Hey," he said smoothly. Oh God, Koko. I wanted to bury myself in a cave. I slapped my forehead and tried my best to not witness what was going to happen next. He moved closer to her and she stepped backwards. But he caught her chin. "What a pretty face."

"S-sir," Shouda said, trying to hide her blush, and removed Koko's hand, "Stop."

"Won't you let me talk to your boss for a while, ne? And we'll date later. Is that alright, darling?" Koko was saying, caressing the poor girl's face. I tried to stifle my laughter but it was harder than expected.

"Alright, alright! Go already. I'll brief Miss Imai," she said and took big steps backward, away from Koko. Her face was pale crimson already. Koko gave me a thumbs-up. Then he winked again at her.

Ding!

We all turned to the door. My eyes widened when I recognized who it was. She smiled and said, "Sumire, isn't it a bit early to be flirting?"

"I'm sorry, ma'am! But they couldn't be stopped," Shouda said while doing a proper 90° bow to her boss. Hotaru Imai. I felt like blood had been drained out of me. I couldn't explain why, but I didn't have a good feeling about her.

"No, no. It's alright," Imai said, waving off. Then she turned to us. My heart leapt in anxiety. She then said, "Why don't you come with me and we'll have a chat."

I looked at Koko and he nodded. We stepped inside the elevator and she pushed a button. Shouda just stood outside and watched the doors closed.

It was an awkward silence. All the while, all I could do was try and figure out what was so intimidating about her. Was it her economic status at such a young age? Or was it the fact that she's connected to Hyuuga and Nogi? Or was it both perhaps? I glanced at her.

What could she be hiding?

"Hey," Koko whispered while grinning.

"What?"

"Don't you want to thank me?"

Ding! The doors parted and Hotaru Imai walked out. We followed her.

"Why?" I asked Koko.

"If it wasn't for my charms, we wouldn't be here. She was totally swooned."

"More like, totally scared of you," I grumbled. "She only let us, because she wanted you to stop harassing her."

"I wasn't harassing her!" Koko protested.

We already reached Hotaru Imai's office. It was big, but it was clean cut, a monotone of black and white. Koko checked the outside first and then locked the door. Then he squeezed my shoulder and whispered, "No hidden cameras." I nodded.

Imai shuffled to the chair behind her desk and sat, like the boss she was, and then gestured to the guest seats in front. Reluctantly, we both accepted.

"To whom do I owe the pleasure of having two police officers in my office today?" She began, leaning back and crossing her legs.

I swallowed, mentally trying to come up with how to make it sound as mild as possible. Then I said, "Ruka Nogi. He wants you dead."

Well, that wasn't very mild at all.

She gave it a thought for a while and then only said, "Really."

"Would you have an idea why he would want that?" Koko asked this time.

"Let's just say I have something that they want," she said nonchalantly. Then she smirked, "He's got some kind of nerve, doesn't he?"

"He wants me to kill you," I decided to say when I noticed she didn't appear to be shaken or aware of the danger she was in at all.

"Very well then." She wasn't scared. Rather, she was amused. Ultimately, Hotaru Imai said, as if it was the most normal thing in the world, "Kill me."

"But Ma'am, we couldn't possibly—"

"You need this to get information out of Nogi, right? So do it," she said. I gulped and then shook my head. I couldn't possibly. We couldn't. I looked at Koko and he had this sparkle in his eye. I already knew what that meant. We only had this one opportunity. It's now or never.

"If there's nothing else, Officers," Imai said and came to her feet. "You may leave."

I sighed, stood up and headed for the door with my partner behind me. But something was tugging at my chest. Something felt wrong. So I stopped midway, pulled out my gun, and aimed at her.

"No hard feelings, Miss Imai."


"Clear?" I asked, wiping off the gun with a piece of cloth, when he finally entered the car and started the engine.

"Clear," he answered and then drove off.


A/N: I'm sorry for the delayed update. I have three valid reasons, though. (1) Writer's block. Yes, it's valid. (2) I lost all my notes on my phone, so I didn't have any materials to construct this with. Luckily, I remembered some. (3) Exams. We all know how it is. I'm also sorry if my writing's a bit rusty. (Also unbeta-ed). Haven't written for a long while.

Anywhohow, thank you for waiting and for reading! I hope I didn't disappoint. Again, I really do apologize for the delay. But for that, I will update again next week. (No exams, yaaaay!) Thank you also for supporting the story! –insert heart here-

Oh and what do you guys think of the current cover?

All my best,
Scherzkeks