In the days following their conversation on the porch, Kagome took Bankotsu's advice and didn't worry about the check from Toga, and instead, threw herself into the design plans for the house, with Jakotsu's help, but under the watchful eye of Bankotsu. No, he wasn't micromanaging the remodel, but what he was doing was making sure Jakotsu didn't keep trying to steamroll Kagome and take over like he had the first day.

Jakotsu and Kagome were sitting at the dining table, all matter of fabrics, paint swatches, tile samples, flooring samples, and anything else one could think of spread all over the surface. To someone that didn't know Jakotsu, it would look like he was doing exactly what he said, he was there to help, but since Bankotsu knew his brother, when he walked in the room and saw an almost helpless look on his wife's face, he was quick to realize that what was happening was Jakotsu had taken some over-stepping liberties, and Kagome didn't know how to tell him no.

So he did.

Leaning over his brother's shoulder, he spoke in Jakotsu's ear. "I will have primary colored circles painted on every last wall and black and white checkered tiles put on the floors throughout the entire house if you don't back off." Jakotsu looked at him with wide eyed horror and stammered out a 'you wouldn't', to which Bankotsu smirked. "Try me." Then, with a wink at his wife, he went into the kitchen to get some coffee like that didn't happen.

Deciding it was time to take a break and let Jakotsu sit with the very real threat of his worst nightmare, Kagome excused herself from the table and followed Bankotsu into the kitchen. Taking up a space at the island, she laced her fingers together and leaned on the counter, watching Bankotsu move about the room to gather what he was after, nodding at to him when he asked her if she wanted a cup herself. She remained silent as she took in his appearance, brows drawing down when she didn't recognize his clothes. Then again, he had more clothes than she did, and she wasn't stupid enough to think she had seen his entire wardrobe. "You look nice. I don't think I've seen that suit yet."

Bankotsu just shrugged a shoulder as he finished getting the coffee going before turning around and leaning back against the counter, crossing his arms and ankles. "You haven't. It's my father's."

Blinking at the answer, Kagome made an uncomfortable noise in her throat. "And are you okay wearing it?"

Once, again, Bankotsu popped a shoulder. "I'm fine with it. Besides, I have a meeting in an hour, so I don't have time to stop by the house for something of mine that's clean. It was either this or go dressed like a bum."

Unable to help it, Kagome snorted and rolled her eyes. "Right, like that's possible. Even your laying around the house clothes are date night acceptable for normal people."

A brow slowly slid up to meet his bangs as Bankotsu's head tilted to the side. "Normal people, huh? Are you saying I'm not normal?"

Grinning at the playful tone of his voice, Kagome shrugged slightly. "I'm saying you don't even own a pair of sweatpants, Bankotsu, so it's impossible for you to look like a bum." When his response was a snort, Kagome bent her arms and propped her chin on her knuckles. "So, what's this meeting for? Another grand business venture?"

Uncrossing his arms, Bankotsu wrapped his fingers around the edge of the counter, his lips pursing for a moment in thought. "It is according to the guy that asked for the meeting, but it almost sounded like he was looking for a partner, and I don't usually involve myself like that. Even still, either way, if he expects to use my wallet as his own personal piggy bank, he better fucking have an ironclad business model full of damn good reasons."

A look of understanding settled on Kagome's face as she picked her head up. "He couldn't get an actual loan, so he's hoping to get one from you."

Rolling his head on his shoulders, Bankotsu hummed. "I don't know, but it's probably something like that since it usually is. However, I very much doubt he realizes how much harder it is to convince me that some random, half-assed cooked up business plan is a good idea, or how many more strings come attached to my involvement. Honestly, the only reason I'm even going is because I'm more curious about the man that has the balls to ask for millions of dollars than I am the reason behind it."

One thing Kagome wasn't sure she would ever get used to was just how easily Bankotsu talked about money. He threw around amounts in the millions like she referred to amounts in the hundreds, and even now, it was still mind boggling. Biting into the corner of her lip as she lowered her arms back to the counter, she drummed her nails against it and, though thought her tone was unsure, she still asked. "How much money is he asking for?"

A smirk pulled at Bankotsu's lips, his tongue gliding along his top lip as he looked at his wife. "Do you really wanna know?" He waited, and answered her after she flicked her eyes to his. "A hundred and twenty million."

More or less positive she just choked on her heart, Kagome's jaw hit the counter as her eyes bugged out of her skull. "What kind of brass balls does someone have to grow to ask a perfect fucking stranger for that kind of money?"

With a snap of his fingers, Bankotsu pointed at his wife. "And now we're on the same page as to why I agreed to this meeting." Crossing his arms and settling against the counter, he then crossed his ankles. "The answer is I honestly have no idea. You learn, rather quickly, these kind of people are out there, the ones that want some astronomical, unrealistic amount of money while doing the most minimal amount of work for it. My brother is one of those, so I've learned the signs."

Her voice was breathless and strained. "And you have that to just... give away like that? Even with the pending purchase of this place?"

Smirk growing, Bankotsu slowly nodded his head. "In spades. Besides, the money for the two completely different things come from two completely different accounts. I keep my business account separate from our personal accounts. I don't spend a penny from my business account for personal luxuries, and I certainly don't flip it. Twice a year a percentage of profits go from business to personal, but other than that, I reinvest everything I make."

With a clog in her throat, Kagome watched Bankotsu turn his back to her and pull two cups from the hooks under the counter. As he poured their coffee, the tips of her fingers pressed against her lips, her mind flying and she asked before she took the time to talk herself out of it. "So... how much money do you have?"

Pausing as he replaced the decanter back on the hotplate, Bankotsu bit into his bottom lip as he thought about the question. He had actually never thought about it, and though he was more than proficient at math and could answer if he had his financial paperwork, off the top of his head, he didn't know. So, that's what he told her as he picked up their coffee and turned, taking the two steps between the back counter to the island. "I have no idea, but you're welcome to call Ginkotsu if you really want to know. I'm sure he could tell you; or at least he better be."

Blinking at the answer, Kagome just stared at him as he set her coffee cup in front of her and brought his own to his lips. She tripped over her tongue, but she did get the question out. "What do you mean you have no idea?

Propping himself up on one hand on the island counter, still holding his coffee cup, Bankotsu could only shrug. "I mean exactly what I said; I have no idea. I know what I have access to on any given day, but overall? I don't know."

No less able to understand the words coming out of her husband's mouth, Kagome shook her head. "I don't understand how someone could possibly not know something like that."

Leaning forward on his forearms, Bankotsu cocked his head. "Well, not everything is in just one or two places. I own stocks and a handful of bonds. I have business investments all over the place. I have several CDs that are several years old that I took out before I made my first business investment, in case shit didn't pan out and I lost it all, that I just keep rolling over instead of closing when their terms expire as something of an insurance policy. I earn interests on almost everything, and I get involved in all kinds of shit. I do actually pay Ginkotsu, and I help fund Mukotsu's research. I have money coming in and money going out and moving from one place to another all the damn time, so personally keeping track of every single penny is fucking impossible."

Rolling her cup between her palms, Kagome attempted to digest what she was told, but after a moment or two, she just shook her head. "Okay, then." Bringing her cup to her lips, she took a large drink, and licked her lips clean before clicking her tongue and locking her eyes on his. "You're not going to this meeting alone, are you?"

Snorting with a grin, Bankotsu chuckled. "Hell no. I don't ever go to meetings like this by myself. As a matter of fact, when I leave here, I'm picking up Ren, Ky, and Ginko. I can't actually make the deal, even if I wanted to, without Ginkotsu because the amount far exceeds the limitations without his sign off, and people are less likely to do really stupid shit when I tell them to fuck off when there is an entourage present."

Brows drawing, Kagome's lip curled. "Ginkotsu has to approve your business ventures?"

Bankotsu shook his head. "Not the way it sounds, no. I can do whatever the fuck I want, but after what happened when I was arrested, I made him the legal Executor of my estate. When we did that, we put checks and balances in place to prevent theft because I had no idea if Kagura had one of my checkbooks or not. We agreed that account transfers, any singular transaction over a certain amount, too many smaller transactions in too short of a time frame, or if money was spent on things or in places I wouldn't normally spend money, he has to sign off on it."

"Why didn't you just close that account?"

Bankotsu's face leveled out. "I did, but just because you close an account doesn't mean someone that had free reign of my apartment didn't discover what was needed to gain access to the new one. All Kagura would have needed was my name, birth date, and my social, all of which was in my apartment she invited herself to live in, and bam... she has what she needs to wreak havoc with my account online."

The mere mention of Kagura's name turned Kagome's mood completely south. She was already slightly stressed out due to Jakotsu's 'help' when it came to remodeling parts of the first floor, so when Bankotsu seemed to speak so easily about the woman who damn near ruined her life, Kagome's lips pressed together in a hard line, her arms crossed, and she dropped back in her stool, her eyes narrowed on the coffee cup sitting in front of her. She didn't say a single word for nearly a minute, and when she did, her voice was hard. "I fucking hate that woman." Flicking her eyes to Bankotsu's understanding ones, she let out a hard breath from her nose. "Don't... don't ever say her name around me again. I'm going to have everyone and their brother talking to me about her, and have to see her in person soon enough. I don't need her brought up by you, too."

It really came down to being indulgent when Bankotsu nodded to the request. He understood Kagome's position, and he didn't want to make things worse for her than they already were. So, with a quiet sigh through his nose, he clicked his tongue. "Alright. I won't."

Even though she did feel a little patronized by his agreement, as long he didn't actually do it, she didn't care. She really did know she wasn't being completely fair to him, and she did realize she just snapped at him, but what it came down to for her was that she wanted just one place she could go that wasn't tainted, that wasn't shrouded with the shadows of what happened, and if that was going to be anywhere, she felt she was perfectly within her lane to want that to be her home.

Which was where the recognized unfairness came in.

She knew the whole reason Bankotsu was jumping through the hoops he was jumping through for his brothers was because of what happened and he wanted her to have a home she felt safe staying in after what happened at the house they already had. No, she was still not overly happy about how he went about trying to buy it in the first place. She did think she deserved at least a little bit of a heads up after the conversation in their kitchen before Jakotsu and Ginkotsu left, but she had been told not to worry about it until there was something to worry about. She had pushed for something, but he told her she knew it wasn't in his hands, so there was nothing to tell her until he talked to his brothers. After he did, she figured out a lot of shit he could have told her, making the bomb at that dining room table much less of a direct hit, but as it stood, she had to agree his defense of her trying to talk him out of buying his childhood home was exactly what she would have done.

He was buying her a palace, and letting her do almost whatever she wanted with it, while he turned it into a fortress. Their first morning there, he was up before she was, making calls and checking out the state of the pool house and staff house. He agreed not to do anything to the place, but he was never told he couldn't make it safer until he was allowed to update the security system. By lunch, there were two more people shaking up with the three live in staff members, only they were there purely for Kagome. They weren't bodyguards persey, but they were trained in private security, so if Bankotsu wasn't home, she wasn't alone. They turned out to actually be very nice and so unobtrusive Kagome actually forgot they were there once or twice, which made for a spectacular show she was sure when she walked around the corner the next afternoon and they were playing cards at the dining room table. They were also there to take her wherever she wanted to go so she wasn't stuck in the house all the time.

While she appreciated sentiment, it was things like hiring Muso and Jinenji that kept events she would rather not think about in the forefront. On the other hand, they were only around if Bankotsu or someone else wasn't. Otherwise, they made themselves scarce while still making sure no one was coming around that shouldn't be.

It wasn't much longer after she snapped at him about saying his ex's name around her Bankotsu left, and things went much smoother for Kagome when it came to Jakotsu after that. She and Jakotsu had started with reimagining the kitchen, and through Jakotsu's input, they were able to figure out a way to almost replicate the wall of glass doors Kagome loved about Bankotsu's house. It wouldn't be able to be exactly the same because there were sections of wall that were loadbaring, but with the images Jakotsu painted for her, she didn't care.

The sink was currently on the back wall with a pass through window, but by moving the sink to the island and taking out the cabinets and counters, they could remove the wall and put in doors, leaving a three foot corner to house the glass when they were open, which was where Kagome decided the refrigerator was going to go instead of where it was across the room, making it much more functional layout.

The two of them worked out together the plan to expand the kitchen out onto the porch, giving Bankotsu the outdoor kitchen he wanted. It would be made with all the same counters, and the cabinets would be the same color as the ones inside, but made with more amicable materials.

The island, which was pretty pathetic for the size of the kitchen, was nearly tripled in size to accommodate the loss of counter and storage space, and would now house the sink, dishwasher, and microwave. Given the choice between a counter between the kitchen and dining room or a double wall oven, Kagome picked the double oven, and decided the range would go on the back wall with prep space to either side.

Once she settled on tile flooring that looks like wood, the kitchen design was finished and they moved on to the Tea room, which came with the issue of Kagome not having a single idea what to do with it. It had taken about an hour of back and forth between her and Jakotsu, and it was actually him that cracked the code. He had made the suggestion that, since Bankotsu was adamant about the game room upstairs staying put, she could turn that room into her own little space, which Kagome loved the idea of. Since she didn't know exactly what she wanted to do with it, she said she would think about it for a couple of days.

The next thing they tackled was that ridiculous staircase, and that was easy. The whole damn thing was coming out, and was going to be replaced with a much less gaudy looking staircase off to the side and along the wall on the living room side. As far as that massive room went, Kagome found out it was actually at one time two rooms, but when they were younger, Ginkotsu and Kyokotsu were rough housing and broke the wall, so it was taken out because their parents figured it would just happen again. When Bankotsu found that out, he told her to wait until after the appraisal to make any decisions on the first floor outside the kitchen, because 'load bearing' was a guideline that came with walls, and he didn't want any. While Kagome had no idea what the fuck he planned to do with so much open square footage, she just shrugged it off as mostly unimportant when he told her to just trust him.

While Kagome kept herself busy with the plans for the kitchen remodel, Bankotsu had been in touch with some appraisers he had worked with in the past, knowing they would do a very thorough job, and after discussing it with his brothers, decided to have three separate appraisals done on the property, find the average, and use that as the sale price. Once those times were set up, he also went ahead and brought in the contractor he used for his own house, and did a walkthrough with him and Kagome. While at first the man had taken notes, when Bankotsu got to the part of not needing two master suites and wanting to vault the ceiling in the living room by moving the attic access to the other end of the hall, the poor guy went white before reminding Bankotsu of the conversation they had about overall integrity of a house's structure, to which Bankotsu shrugged, making the man sigh. However, Bankotsu knew for a fact there was absolutely no way the bedrooms and bathroom on the third floor were going to fly past code enforcement because there were no fire escapes, so those walls were going to have to come down. Because of that, he saw no reason that moving attic access from one side of the hall to the other to accommodate how he wanted the first floor to look should be out of the realm of possibility.

Besides, the master suite that he wanted taken out was his parent's room, and there was absolutely no way he would ever be able to see it as anything else.

The contractor, exasperated, questioned Bankotsu on pipes and wires, which led to him rolling his eyes and say that something needed to hold up the second floor, and pillars would work just fine to hide plumbing and electrical, so unless Scott wanted to move the second floor from the back of the house to the front of the house, he needed to use a little imagination.

At which point, Kagome chimed in, asking if he could really do that. If given the option, she would rather have the entire back of the house opened than the front, and was willing to sacrifice the natural light from the front windows to do it. Finding herself under the weight of a look of pure betrayal by the contractor, Kagome happily pointed out he was the one that didn't like the idea of using pillars to hold up the second floor, and since there were going to have to be rooms on the first floor, this was the way to give him his precious walls to hide the wiring and pipes while still giving Bankotsu the openness he wants.

It was always entertaining to Bankotsu when he could actually watch someone's eyes spark with the realization they were fighting a losing battle, and with a grin on his lips, he handed over the blueprints to the house when he was asked for them, and showed Scott to the door when he relented and said he would make some calls and see what he could do about accommodating their ridiculous requests and get back to them in a couple of weeks for approval when he had the new plans done.

Once that was done, all that was left was for the appraisals to be completed and they actually bought the property. When those took place, each one ended up looking at different things, and though not a single one said a word to either Bankotsu or Kagome as they did their walks, there were a handful of looks cast toward the couple when they uncovered some of the more outdated aspects. Whether they were looks of mild irritation or disappointment over letting what was once a magnificent home fall into such a state was really anyone's guess, but Bankotus just shrugged them off. The house itself was almost seventy years old, and though it had been modernized within the last thirty years, if they expected pristine condition after basically being ignored for close to a decade, that was their problem.

As it stood, however, now there was nothing left for the couple to do as far as the house went until the reports were turned over and the as-is value was figured out.