Hi, Guys :3 Did you miss me? I bet your answer is "Nope, Not at all."
But anyway let me present to you Chapter 7.
Hope you guys would enjoy this... :) (Sorry for the repetition v^.^)


Natsume lived on a side street several blocks from down town in an area known for its trendy shops and funk bars. The buildings lining his street were architecturally impressive; many converted into townhouses, bright with summer flowers potted on their stoops of fling in the tree-by-three foot plots behind black iron fences. Natsume's building was brick and black shuttered with few flowers out front. His apartment was a two-bedroom walk-up on the third floor. The ceilings were high, the windows are long. Furnishing were male necessities – couch, recliner, dinette set, everything utilitarian and inexpensive. There were no doilies, matted prints or refrigerator magnets. His kitchen window looked out on the high towers of the project six blocks away. The only exotic element was a huge fish tank against the living room wall and a black cat sleeping on the couch. Mikan walked over to check out the colorful fish. She glanced at Natsume over her shoulder.

He shrugged. "You don't need to walk them." He took out two beers from the refrigerator, a bag of chips from the cupboard. He was halfway to the living room when his cell phone rang.

Even with the buzz of the air conditioner Natsume had cranked up to high as soon as they'd walked in, there was really no place in the apartment where Mikan couldn't hear his voice. She stepped into the bathroom, ran the water in an attempt to give him privacy. Still she heard "Tch. Hn. Okay." Natsume was a man of action, not words.

She tried not to listen. She was tempted to explore his medicine cabinet but wasn't sure she was ready for what she would learn. Forgoing the spotted class on the counter, she cupped her hand and splashes some water on her face, her mouth as dry as the brown fields she'd passed this morning on the way to her mother's house. She wiped her face using the towel that flung over the top shower. Her nose and cheeks were slightly sunburned. Her hair was limp where sweat and fear had pasted it to her neck. She put the toilet seat and covers down and sat and waited for the call to be finished. She can't see dirt. For a boy I can say he's so clean. She thought. "What a man."

When she heard nothing but silence for several minutes, she got up and came out of the bathroom, her hands damp.

"As I thought, Reo was killed much earlier, before the body was dumped in your room. They're looking for Hajime now."

"They think he did it?"

"No evidence yet. They couldn't find any finger prints, but Hajime's too smart for that anyway. He probably used Reo's car and was returning from dropping off the body in the hotel room when he ran into you. Forensics is going over the car and Reo's house now hoping to find something. Reo wasn't killed with a .45 though."

"How did you know?"

"A .45 close range would have been messy. From the looks of Reo, it was a smaller caliber. A .22"

"But why was the body put in my room?"

"If Hajime did do it, he as told to by whoever he's working for. And whoever that is, they want you out of the way. They're being polite about it now, but patience isn't a virtue with these people. Who knew you were staying there beside me?"

"I called my mother's house again from the hotel, trying to find Persona, but all I got was the machine. I left my cell number again and hotel number."

Natsume moved toward the coffee table where he'd set down the beers and bag of chips. "If Persona's involved in anything, he's only a small fish. Hajime doesn't work for small fish. More likely Persona and Hajime are working for the same boos."

He popped open the beer, moved toward the recliner. Mikan saw her handbag, sitting where she'd dropped it in the chair's seat. She started toward the chair but not before Natsume pick up her purse. "Whoa." He levered the purse up and down. "You're going to get a hernia carrying this thing around."

"Look at me. Just making myself at home. Dropping crap all over the place. I'm sorry." She reached for the bag.

"What do you keep in her anyway?" Natsume still tested the bag's weight.

"Stack of cash." She told him the truth.

He smiled, handed her the purse. She sat on the couch, put the purse on the floor next to her feet, the cash that she thought was much more than "emergency money" resting on her ankle.

Natsume took a smooth sip. "Women and their purses."

"Men and their remote controls."

He smiled the smile that had defined her puberty.

"So nobody at the hotel saw anything?" She diverted his attention away from the subject of her purse, her own attention away from that smile.

"If they did, they're not coming forward. The place was only about a quarter full."

"What'll happen when you find Hajime?"

Natsume leaned all the way back in the recliner. "We'll bring him in, try to scare him if we don't have any proof, and he's not biting, we'll only be able to hold him until his lawyer shows up and lets the courts know we've got nothing."

Mikan slumped back into the couch.

Tomorrow I'll find Persona and have a little talk with him. I'll also talk to Reo's neighbors and co-workers try to find a connection. A lead. Forget about it, Yukihara."

Her face must have beamed interest.

"You will stay here."

The man would never learn. "And do what?"

"Feed my fish and cat."

At least he didn't threaten her with handcuffs again. They were making progress.

Natsume sat up in the recliner, set his beer can on the coffee table, glanced at the other unopened can. "Can I get you something else? There's some iced tea in there, and water."

"No, I'm fine. I don't want anything right now, thanks."

Natsume picked up his own can. "Is there anyone your mother was close to at the bar, outside the bar? Any other relatives?"

"Like I said, I haven't been around much. My mother had one sister but she died about ten years ago. Cancer. My aunt had two sons. One lives in California, the other North Carolina. As far as I know she hasn't heard from them expect for Christmas cards."

"It couldn't hurt to give them a call," Natsume suggested.

"She did mention one woman now and then. She worked at the bar for time but I don't think she's there anymore. Mama hadn't mentioned her in a while. They used to go shopping, took a bus trip once down to Yokohama."

"Remember her name?" He was all cop now and sexy as hell.

Mikan closed her eyes to concentrate and block out the appealing image of Natsume. "I think it was something like Gina or Tina. Maybe Nina." She opened her eyes. "If I heard it again, it would ring a bell."

"I'll ask at the bar tomorrow. See if anyone know anything." He set down his beer and stretched. Mikan watched the ripple of muscle, added it to her list of worries.

"You better get some sleep," Natsume advised. "I'll take the couch. You can have the bed."

"I don't want to kick you out of your bed. I'll take the couch."

"I'll take the couch," he said again as if the matter were settled.

"You're bossy, Hyuuga."

"Comes with the territory." He picked up her small suitcase which he'd carried up from his car and walked into the bedroom door. "You'll have to leave the door open for the air-conditioning."

Somehow the idea of an opened bedroom door in Natsume's apartment was unsettling. But it was either that or heat stroke. She wasn't sure which was the most dangerous.

He brought out bedding for the couch. She took her suitcase and purse into his bedroom. From the suitcase, she got her toothbrush, dental floss, facial cleanser, toner, night cream, eye cream, and lip balm and body lotion out of her suitcase. Gathering the various bottles and tubes in her arms, she went into the bathroom. She wasn't sure if all these creams did diddly, but she was in her mid-twenties now and like most things in her life, she couldn't afford to take any chances.

She brushed and cleansed and flossed and creamed, the routine providing a small measure of normalcy in a day that was anything but, and from the looks of it was only the beginning of a strange trip down memory and murder lane. She scooped up her toiletries, almost dropping them when she came out to find Natsume in only his gym shorts and body built by God and Nautilus. Natsume's left brow lifted as he looked at the variety of cream and lotions in her arms. She let pass his smile that said, "Sucker," as he slowly lifted his gaze to hers. Nor did she argue. He was more right than he probably realized. For all her cynical, streetwise pose, she fell too easily for false promises, a weakness that in the past had only led to disaster and sometimes, a black eye. She had to learn to become more careful. No matter the buzzing inside her and the man before her only gym shorts away from naked. Didn't matter what side of the law he was on, Natsume Hyuuga was trouble. And at the moment, her problem box was overflowing.

She dumped the bottles back into the suitcase.

"Will the television bother you?" Natsume called from the other room. "They repeat the late night news after Letterman."

"No." She doubted she would get much sleep tonight anyway. "In fact, I'll watch it with you." Insomnia. The curse of a conscience.

She went back into the living room, sat on the couch, fully dressed. Something about being in Natsume's apartment, never mind his bed, in nothing more than pajamas – granted, perfectly respectable cotton pj's that covered all necessary areas – seemed wrong. Her Catholic nature was rising again.

"If you're hungry or thirsty, there's stuff in the refrigerator and cupboards," Natsume offered as he clicked the remote.

She shook her head, too keyed to eat or drink. The watched a commercial for dog food in silence. A blond – bobbed anchorwoman with an earnest expression came on the screen. "Top stories tonight. Body found in barge." The screen shot was away to the port. As Natsume collapsed the recliner again, Mikan wished she'd chosen the end of the sofa closer to him. With a promise "We'll be back with the full details along with the day's other top stories after this word from our sponsor," The screen cut to a woman shaking clothes into a washing machine. A swear word involuntarily came out of Mikan's mouth. Natsume didn't say a word. He got up, stood behind the sofa. She picked up a throw pillow propped against the couch's arm and hugged it against her chest.

The news returned. "The lady of Louisiana was docked yesterday morning in the city's port on its way to Canada when workers started complaining of an odor aboard the ship. Local authorities were called in when further investigation revealed the source of the foul odor was a locked cargo trunk hidden in a section of the ship's ceiling."

The screen showed a trunk being pried open with crowbars. Mikan squeezed the pillow tighter.

"When authorities opened the trunk, they found the body of a dead man."

Mikan let out a breath.

"Authorities have not released the victim's name yet, but they did report the victim was a white male, late twenties, approximately medium height, 145.29 pounds with blond hair. The victim had shot in the forehead."

Mikan went cold all over.

"Agents estimate the body had been dead for about twenty four hours. Based on a tip from an informant, Federal agents raided a sister ship of the Lady Louisiana last month in New Orleans but no illegal contraband was found aboard the ships used to transport cargo into Japan and into international water."

Mikan turned and looked at Natsume. He was dialing the phone. "Got any identification on that body found in the port tonight?" he asked whoever picked up on the other end. "How 'bout the weapon?"

She got up, walked over to him. He started toward the bedroom, a closed door, a lowered voice. She clutched his arm, shook her head "no." He stared straight at her as if sending her strength. "tell them to check out a man named Kokoro Yome."

She stared at Natsume for several motionless seconds. He stared back, not letting her go. She walked to the couch, bent to pick the pillow that had fallen from her lap when she stood, but as she leaned over, the dread claimed her completely she feared she would keep going, sink into a boneless heap on the floor. She clutched the pillow, straightened with the will that had taken her far from her beginnings and brought her back again.

Natsume sat down, fingers loosely laced, hands hanging between the spread knees in an almost Father Knows best Pose. "It's a long shot, Mikan."

Neither believed it. She looked into her ex-lover's eyes, seeing the steely determination she wished for herself. "They're dead, aren't they?" she asked in a tinny tone."My mother and sister. They're dead."

"We don't know that. We've got no evidence. This could be something totally unrelated. The docks aren't a playground. Right now we have an unidentified body on a barge. Nothing else."

"What about the weapon?"

"They're investigating."

"My mother and sister are missing. Meanwhile corpses are coming out of the woodwork."

"Your mother and Luna could be hiding. Maybe they're involved somehow in whatever is going on. Maybe they know something, saw something. Maybe somebody warned them to lie low for a while because things were heating up."

She wanted to believe him. "There was that one call from Luna."

"What about that phone call you got today?"

"Go home," Mikan remembered.

"You said the voice was disguised. Whoever it was didn't want to be identified. Maybe your sister and mother can't reach you. It's too risky, so they had someone else contact you, warn you."

"Scare me is more like it."

"Maybe your mother and Luna are trying to get out of town. Afraid you might get hurt."

"Well, somebody sure as hell doesn't want me around. The corpse-a-gram in my hotel room made that clear."

"Maybe whoever it is decided you needed something a little more effective than a phone call."

"At least Reo Mouri won't be waving a gun at me in noontime traffic anymore, will he?"

Natsume didn't answer. She studied his face.

"You don't think it wasn't Reo on that bike today, do you?"

"My hunch is Reo was dead by that time." A shiver went through her. Natsume stood. "You need some sleep."

"You're right." She rose, although she knew she would be awake for many hours. She had to brush by him in the narrow gap between the couch and the chair to get into the bedroom. That awkward moment came when they were chest to chest, the pose that preludes a kiss. He looked into her eyes, his expression never giving an inch but his voice tame when he said, and "If you need anything, I'll be right here. Just yell."

He wasn't being suggestive. That scared her even more. Kindness could do things like that to her.

"Thanks, but I think I'm all set. I'll see you in the morning." She walked into the bedroom, leaving the door open as instructed, the light from the other room sufficient enough to see. The bed was unmade. This man needed a mother or a wife or a maid. She smoothed out the bottom sheet's wrinkles and crawled under the top sheet. She wiggled out her shorts, drop them on the floor. She unclasped her bra, stretched her arms through the sleeves of her T-shirt to slide her bra off her arms. She lay in her ex-lover's bed in her shirt and underwear and a blanket of fear.

She was awake when she heard him get up. The sounds in the kitchen signaled he was preparing coffee. It wasn't the first time he'd gotten up. Nor was it the first time she had awakened. He was a restless sleeper, getting up several times during the long night. She had seen him in the refrigerators light. He would open and close the refrigerator door without removing anything. He'd cross to the window, the towers of the projects forming grids of light and dark across the glass. He'd move back to the recliner, click on the television, mute the sound, and watch the silent pictures. He switched the channels frequently, old black-and-white movies, reruns of the nineties sitcom, infomercials. A visual lullaby until she herself had fallen into a fitful sleep, her dream images as hectic and disjointed as the changing pictures on the television screen. The nest time she woke, the television was still on and Natsume was stretched out in the recliner, but his snores joined the other night noises. She'd listen to the wheeze and wind of his breath telling her she wasn't alone.

She smelled coffee. Her eyes opened a slit. Natsume passed the doorway in shorts and t-shirt and sneakers. The front door opened, closed. She grope for her shorts on the floor and wriggled into them under the sheet. By the time Natsume returned from his run, his body shined with sweat and smelling of hard exercise, she was on her third cup of black coffee.

He went to the fridge, pulled out a bottle of water, and drank half of it before setting it on the counter. He wiped his mouth with the back of his bare arm. Mikan purposefully concentrated on stirring her coffee and feeling like a slug.

"Sorry if I woke you up." He said.

"It wouldn't have taken much. How far do you run?"

"Until the demons stop chasing me." He didn't smile when he said it. Neither did she.

"How far today?"

He looked at her long and too intently for morning and only caffeine. "Not far enough," he said and walked to the bathroom.

She made the bed while he showered. She went into the living room, folded the sheet thrown in a heap on the couch, laid it on the pillow and carried them into the bedroom, placed them at the foot of the bed. Her stomach rumbling, she went into the kitchen and opened the fridge, forced to test out her theory of personality on Natsume. What she saw inside wasn't encouraging – beer, a take-out fast food bag, ketchup, and a half-eaten jar of homemade marinated peppers someone must have given him and a pizza box that took up the whole second shelf. The water bottles, several of which were standing on the shelf on the inside of the door were the only thing that gave her hope.

"I would have shopped groceries if I'd known I was having a guest," Natsume said as he came into the kitchen poured a cup of coffee.

She hadn't heard the shower stop. She shut the refrigerator. "You would have?" she said, always the skeptic.

He smiled. He had dressed for work. His hair was dump. His gun, blackberry, pager, handcuffs and badge waited on the table. "Nah."

She smiled back, grateful for his ability to make her smile at a time when it seemed a sacrilege.

"I'll buy you breakfast if you want to get dressed and go out."

She sat, unable not to look at the gun on the table. "I thought I was under house arrest."

"We've got two bodies now. No need to make it three."

Not your usual morning conversation. Then again not your usual morning.

"I'm a big girl Natsume, I can handle myself."

He got up, dumped the rest of his cup of coffee down the sink. He opened a drawer, put a key on the table. "Here's an extra key to the apartment."

"What about the rental car at Reo's?"

"I'll pick you up after work and take you to get it."

"And here I thought I was a free woman."

He strapped on his gun. He didn't smile. Neither did she. "You have my cell number?"

"And a key." She picked it up, waved it at him.

"Do me a favor."

She waited.

"Trust me."

She hadn't trusted anyone but herself since she was seventeen. Natsume had been even younger. "You know better, Hyuuga."

He smiled. The attraction that was always there gained muscle.

"It was worth a shot." He gestured toward the bathroom. "There's towels and stuff. Help yourself."

"Thanks."

He walked to the fish tank, sprinkled some food into the tank, leaned down and patted the black cat. "Watch her. She's a slippery one."

He straightened and faced her. "I need to get to work." He didn't move, looked awkward for the first time Mikan could remember. She didn't know what the matter was, but she tried to help him out. "Have a good day," she said. Only after the words left her mouth did she realized how ludicrous they sounded.

"I've seen too many die, Mikan."

"And if it happens to me, you'll kill me?"

"Exactly." He moved towards the door, dropped a kiss on her crown as he passed, causing her to go very still. He was gone several minutes before she moved again. She got up, washed out her cup and the one Natsume left in the sink, emptied the coffeepot, rinsed it and set it in the drainer. She walked around the apartment, went to the fish tank and tapped on the glass. Several pairs of protruding eyes blinked back at her.

"I know. He's right, isn't he, guys? I should lie low." That fact only made her more restless. She did some deep knee bends, jogged in place, trying to channel her nervous energy into something safe. She'd already seen one death. She didn't want to see another – especially her own. But at the same time, sitting around, waiting, seemed just as a big crime.

No reason she couldn't take a walk. A short one. She'd see if Claire's Bakery was still open, stop in for a pastry.

As she walked into the bedroom, she saw her purse on the floor, remembered the money. She couldn't be walking around with that kind of cash. She didn't know who it belonged to or why it was under her mother's front car seat, but she wanted it safe until she did. After going to the bakery, she'd find a bank nearby, rent a safety deposit box and put the money in there until she knew more about it.

She showered, was forced to dress in the same pair of shorts she'd worn yesterday, but took the tags off the other T-shirt she bought. She considered skipping makeup. After yesterday, issues such as long, lustrous lashes suddenly seemed insane. But, as she'd learned last night, if anything was going to keep her from going over the edge, it was her little daily routines. She tied her hair into a messy bun, look waning in popularity now but not long ago was actually in vogue across the country. At least some reality could still make her smile. She borrowed a baseball cap for protection against the sum, threw it into her purse. She saw the fat block of cash. She stopped smiling.

The morning heat was young enough to feel only mildly oppressive .she started out at a brisk pace, arms swinging. Until the demons are gone.

She turned at the corner and cut through the park, quiet now except for the footballs of joggers and the too easy, deep snores of the camped out homeless. She came out on the other side of the park and walked two blocks east to Central Town. At the next corner, she saw Claire's Bakery still thriving, the smell of their freshly baked pastries one of her sweeter childhood memories.

She went in to the tinkle of a bell above the door and the warmth of yeast and coffee. She circles round the bakery counter and the line of workers waiting for take-out to the main room with its curved counter and booths that looked out onto the busy avenue. Most of the customers were busy reading the daily edition. She sat down at the counter ordered coffee and a nut horn in keeping with another of her life's philosophies that a person can never have too much black coffee and white sugar. She picked up a paper abandoned on the empty stool next to her and spread it on the counter.

Body Found on Barge was on the front page of the local section.

She looked up as her coffee and pastry came, hot and sweet as life should always be. "Thank you," she told the waitress. She took a bite and came back home to a memory of herself and her sister sent to get Sunday's rolls, sneaking one warm on the way home after finishing the Spanish cookies Claire Riego always gave the children for free after telling them to be good girls. Her sister had been no more than six then, fresh-faced and fragile and full of life's possibilities. Mikan had been twelve. Luna had idolized her. "Big sister" stuff. Mikan had left five years later. She swallowed hard, took a sip of coffee, didn't flinch when it burned her mouth. Luna had picked the wrong hero that time, too. Mikan turned away from her memories to the paper.

Kokoro Yome.

The body found on the ship last night had been identified. It was her sister's boyfriend.

Mikan read no further. Her mouth opened but she couldn't breathe. She leaned her chest against the counter, unable to look away from that name. She had known it could be him, but seeing it in black and white made it all too real. She bent closer to study the grainy picture of the port beside the article as if she looked hard enough, she would find them – her mother, her sister – peeking out from behind a corner, smiling, giving a little wave as if this were no more than the games of hide and seek she and Luna used to play with the neighborhood children.

She dialed Natsume's number.

"Hyuuga."

"It's him. Luna's boyfriend. The guy. The body, the one they found." She was babbling. Not a good sign.

The waitress came to the counter. "Anything else, miss?"

"Where are you?" Natsume demanded.

"I walked over to Claire's" she shook her head at the waitress. "I wanted a nut horn."

She listed to Natsume's response. "Very colorful, officer."

The waitress tallied her bill, ripped it of her pad, laid it face-down the counter and move on.

"Did you get the robbery report Persona filed on the gun?"

"Yeah."

"And?"

"You listen to me for the first time in your life, Yukihara. Your mother is missing, your sister can't be found. Her boyfriend ends up junk in a trunk. Another body with a plug between the eyes ends up in your hotel room –"

"Don't forget the attempt on my life yesterday."

The silence at the other end of the line told her she'd gone too far. "Don't you understand, Natsume? If I hole up in your apartment, if I let them, whoever they may be, scare me, then I might as well put a bullet to my own brain right now, because they've already won. They'll have taken something from me, but I let them take it. And if I let them take it, I might never get it back."

She heard a long breath on the other end. "Cut the crap, and get back to the apartment before you get your brain blown out."

It'd been a regular phone, Natsume would have slammed it. Instead there was only a thin click. Mikan muttered a word that had once gotten her mouth washed out with soap by Sister Amanatsu. She finished her coffee, forced herself to eat the pastry as one defiant act against death. She left a tip, walked to the register to pay.

"How was everything?"

Mikan didn't recognize the woman ringing her up behind the register. The Riegos, like most Spanish families, were large and varied. Many of the older ones brought their brothers, sisters, cousins over to live in Japan or somewhere in the United States, help run the family business.

"Fine, fine," Mikan replied as if she hadn't just read her sister's boyfriend's body had been found stuffed in a trunk on a barge. The woman saw her glance at the platter of Spanish cookies beside the register.

"For all our customers. Take some. Take some."

The woman picked up two napkins from the pile beside the platter, set them in Mikan's palm, patted her hand. "You enjoy them."

"Thank you." Mikan looked at the platter of cookies, some pink, others dipped in thin chocolate, and many covered with sprinkles that change an ordinary day into celebration. She chose two.

"Oh no, more, more. You're too skinny." The old woman dropped four cookies onto the napkin, folded Mikan's fingers around them, and gave her hand a final pat. "You come see us again. You're a good girl, I can tell."

Mikan turned away. Six and twelve they'd been, her and her sister. It could have been yesterday.

She walked toward the door. I won't leave you this time, she promised her sister, her mother. I won't let you down again.


What do you think?
Good? or Lousy? Do you Love it? or Hate it? Any comments? or Violent reaction? (Just in-case you have...)
Please don't forget to leave your reviews for this week's chapter. All of your opinion(s) are welcome :) Also I would like to Thank those who people who welcomed me back. I also missed you guys. To those who still read (that includes my ghost/silent readers), reviewed on last week's chapter, followed, and added Hide and Seek in their favorites list... A massive thank you to all of you and to everyone who patiently waited for the update and for those who are still reading/supporting this fanfic.


Sneak Peak:

Suddenly, in the storefront's reflection, she thought she saw a man across the street, watching her. She moved slowly to the next storefront.

"Mikan? Are you there?"

She feigned interest in the shoes displayed in the store's window. The man was medium height, wore his dark hair in a crew cut and was still watching her.

"Yes. Natsume, I think someone is watching me. A man across the street."

"What does he looks like?"

"He's –"


Till the next chapter ;)
XOXO
~Claire-chan143