Author's Note; Hey huns!! Thanks again to Andrew; he's a hunni!! So get your butt onto Genesis Awards and sign-up hun!! Sorry about the wait huns, and I;m still working out some kinks in the storyline with my hunni, so I'll try to be quicker, I promise!! This chaoter mainly focuses on the developing (or lack thereof) relationship between Jazira and Anto...tear...sniff... Thanks huns!!

"What's going on with you?"

"Lui…"

"What d'you mean him?"

Not bothered with giving an answer, Anto stood from the cluttered desk in the study and walked out of the refined room, pushing past the younger teenager as he did so. Jazira, albeit with a stunned air, was immediately hot on his heels as he made it to the foyer and began walking up the grand staircase, steadily becoming angrily frustrated that she was receiving no answer to her question.

Finally catching up to the French youth, half-way up the flight of stairs, the maddened heiress reached forward and grabbed her friend's wrist and yanked with intended force, causing him to spin around. Anto immediately snapped his wrist back, but what pierced Jazira was the anger that sharp in his eyes, with what looked to be betrayal shining like a beacon within his smouldering irises.

"Laissez-moi la paix et allez trouvent votre baby-sitter…"

Leave me alone and go find your babysitter…The seventeen-year blinked her sapphire eyes once or twice as her mind automatically translated his words in a mere split-second, along with the harsh whisper with which he had hissed them. Feeling almost bitten by his words, Jazira squinted slightly, inclining her head at an inquisitive incline to her right-hand side, displaying her confused curiosity.

"An…Anto-"

"He told me, Jazira! You had to tell him we kissed, didn't you? Is it because he already knew about your family? He's known you for a matter of weeks, I've known you for years and you still prefer him, why?!"

It was then that the nineteen-year-old averted his gaze, whilst clamping his mouth shut, then turned back around and began to climb the stairs again, this time at a half-jog, just wanting to make it to the top. Now feeling regret for his outburst, yet feeling an inextricable anger settling and making itself quite comfortable in his chest, feeding his hatred for the sandy-blond Egyptian who had seemingly intruded when everything was going right, and now this enthralling bodyguard was stealing away the very girl he had fallen in love with when he was a scrawny and gangly fifteen-year-old, her being an amusing, joyous and intangibly amiable thirteen-year-old those four years ago…and his feelings had only grown and grown in strength since those early stages of adolescence, but now Jazira was being taken from his grasp by this foreign heartthrob, and it burned in his heart.

She could feel the tears springing to life as her gaze bore witness to his back climbing further up the stairs, reaching the top step…it was only then that she returned o her senses and more or less took the last ten steps in no more than three leaps, tripping on the last one and almost receiving a face-full of the most expensive Japanese carpet to be had. Catching herself just before colliding, Jazira took the brunt of the not-so-graceful fall upon her right knee. As he heard her exclaim slightly, Anto looked back over his shoulder, his normally-clear grey irises appeared troubled and clouded, almost as though there was an intimidating storm brewing within them, like some class of confused and romantically-troubled maelstrom.

With a pang of guilt, Anto leaned downwards and locked gazes with the young woman even though it stabbed him sharply to do so, managing to mask his true feelings by incessantly blinking his eyes. After maybe thirty seconds, Anto spoke…in a quiet whisper that was laced with so much unspoken hatred, it both surprised and scared him.

"I was happy when I came here, but things have changed. Jase makes me act like some pig-headed asshole around you and I hate him for it…I hate being this jealous monster he's made me into…je suis écœuré avec moi…"

I'm disgusted with myself…the heir to Doujarent Inc. leaned back against the wall of the hallway that continued on from the staircase, and exhaled deeply, a long and surprisingly shaky sight that revealed his true emotions. Now feeling the pain throbbing in her knee, most likely the foretelling of an imminent bruise, compliments of the collision with the last step, Jazira heard her friend swallow a painful lump and what she saw next was a sight that truly frightened her…terrified her stupid with unbearable guilt.

"Anto…"

The young man, now in the closing stages of his adolescence, raised his forearm and hastily wiped away the single tear whilst exhaling another, less-shaky sigh, removing all evidence of that single moment of weakness; the "perfect man", as voted by the women of the world, suddenly didn't seem so intangible and dreamy; he was just a normal youth who was tired with the trials and tribulations of one's heart. Anto shook his head and stood, leaving Jazira sitting on the final few steps, having not moved an inch since falling and forcefully banging her knee on the edge of the godforsaken step…just like her life; falling at the last hurdle yet again.

"Our branch is fully constructed and all the staff began work last week…the mansion is ready aswell; I meant to tell you earlier, but…I and my father are moving out- tonight."

With that, he left her there on that top step and walked down the short distance to the room that had sufficed as his home for the past number of months, closing the door behind his handsome frame and not once looking back as Jazira let loose a few deep-throated sobs, her hands holding onto the banister of the stairs and, for once in her life- she let her tears have reign…all her life, the young woman had trained herself that crying was display of weakness and only tolerated it in extreme circumstances…but something Denian had once told her came flooding back; strength is not measured in the amount of tears unshed, but more so in those chosen to be shed.

It was only when a kitchen-maid heard the noises that Jazira found herself not alone on the stairs. The maid had worked in the Kaiba household since the days of pre-Kisara…having watched Seto Kaiba change from a cold-hearted young man, to a loving father and brother and she had also seen that loveable little baby grow into the admirable young woman that now sat on the stairs of her home, crying pitifully, though unwilling to diverge the cause of her upset.

At eight o'clock that night, a hired cab, or the most expensive sort pulled into the Kaiba family grounds and parked at the base of the cement steps leading up to the magnificent mansion door, awaiting the duo of French men who bid their farewells inside.

"Au revoir Jazira, faites attention mon chéri."

Goodbye Jazira, take care my darling. A kindly smile and a warm hug from the tall, middle-aged man. Then Jerohn pulled away and winked at his friend's daughter, a wink that managed to pull a hint of a smile from within her as she remembered seeing the same man do the exact same action four years ago.

Next came Anto…Seto and Jerohn stood to one side of the foyer, speaking business as they believed the duo to need some privacy- if only the fathers had known the true extent of the youths' mangled relationship.

"Goodbye Anto…"

"Au revoir…"

The young man then walked out the front door, stopping as he glanced up at the sky and ordered his thoughts, deciding to let loose the secret he'd managed to keep for four years and yet, as he looked back at the swimming eyes of his once-friend, Anto swallowed hard and felt his familiar hatred blowing back into life as he realized just what a truly perfect vision of beauty Jase had stolen from him.

" I hate myself...I hate Jase, and I hate what he's transformed me into; I just can't be around him anymore or I'll draw blood, I swear I will, Jazira…"

A few more tears fell from her flooding eyes as she saw the pain evident on his handsome, chiselled face, but Anto hadn't finished saying his piece just yet, and continued on in a low, sincere voice, whose tone softened to that of tender caring, his eyes softening to pools of malleable silver tenderness.

"Mais il me tue…parce que je vous ai aimés quand je vous ai d'abord vus il y a quatre ans et je sais dans mon coeur je vous aime toujours, Jazira Kaiba…et je sais aussi que je ne peux jamais vous avoir."

His soft lips brushed again the skin on the back of her hand, as did a few strands of his dark hazel hair whilst the young man completed the most loveable of French traditions. He leaned up from kissing the back of her hand and walked to the cab, not once looking back to see the fresh tears as Jazira realized what a fool she'd been, her mind once again translating his breathtaking words, resulting in the young heiress feeling the air winded form her lungs. She continuously heard his words reverberating round and round in her head as another of her friendships seemingly snapped in front of her eyes, the bonds of trust and truth finally broken. And yet those words just kept spinning around her brain, punishing her for may hours after their speaker had left…

But it's killing me...because I loved you when I first saw you four years ago and I know in my heart I still love you, Jazira Kaiba...and I also know I can never have you.

A/n- Thanks huns!! And please let me know what you thought!! Kas, :-) XxxxxxxxxxxxxxX