HI! Of course, the minute I got done with the last chapter, my scanlation team finally got their butts in gear, so I was cleaning and proofing five manga chapters instead of finishing this chapter, and then I discovered Webtoons and fell off the wagon into pure reading addiction again...BUT here it is! One ridiculously long chapter made to order! And somehow, I still haven't managed to get to Christmas...I'm starting to think these characters don't want this story to end...or they're horny. Probably both.
FYI-I know that Kyoko would have to go through customs etc. when getting off the plane before she could get to an area to meet Kuon, but who wants to waste time reading that nonsense? So, forgive me for skipping the realism a little this round...lol.
Also...ahead there lies smut. Lots and lots of lemony smut. Read in a safe space away from people who pay you.
Enjoy! ;)
The wheels of the plane bounced onto the tarmac after a grueling eleven hours in flight and Kyoko let out a sigh of relief akin to a balloon slowly deflating.
Even though this was her third time traveling the distance between Japan and California, Kyoko still couldn't wrap her head around the fact that she had left Japan at 5:30am on the 23rd of December and the plane was touching down shortly after 12:00am...still on the 23rd of December.
However, while she'd gained five hours, she sure as hell didn't feel like it. Her original plan was to sleep most of the flight, but she had been recognized by a fan while boarding the plane and, despite the best efforts of the flight attendants, been awoken at least once an hour by someone new sneaking into first class to ask for an autograph.
It was flattering and humbling to be admired by so many people, but it made it nearly impossible to keep to a schedule or plan! Her appreciation for Yashiro's ability to keep Ren's title of the Never Late King had increased tenfold just since the flight had departed from Kyoto.
She also now knew why Ren went back to his natural color every time he traveled. Hats got hot and there were only so many hours you could wear sunglasses before the bridge of your nose was graced by a permanent, bruise-like indentation. And the fans were impossibly perceptive.
And EVERYWHERE. She swore they were following her to the bathroom just so they could catch her on the way out. And those were the first class passenger fans.
It had been an excruciatingly long flight.
With another sigh, she pulled the hair tie from the end of her braid and ran her fingers through her wavy golden locks, now falling well past her shoulders. The braid seemed to have done its work, keeping the frizz down to a minimum, but she nervously pulled a mirror from her bag to make sure she looked decently presentable.
The newest, blondest, Californified version of herself looked back, with eyes that looked brighter than they should have and a grin that wouldn't leave. She felt weird as a blonde, but not having to wear a wig every day as Violet would more than make up for the fact that sometimes she didn't even recognize herself anymore.
After a quick touch up of her eyeliner where it had smudged and a new coat of lipgloss, she decided to quit while she was ahead and lovingly stashed her luxury cosmetics back in the large tote bag sitting in her lap.
What a change her life had made in less than a year. Some days she was convinced it was all a dream.
Currently a nightmare of airplane taxiing limbo.
They'd been moving along pretty well for a while, but now it seemed they had been sitting for hours (waiting for God only knew what). Kyoko's adrenaline spiked and her knee began to bounce in place.
Looking out the window only yielded a black view of the night occasionally dotted with a cone of yellow light that lit up nothing but more blackened pavement.
"Is someone special coming to meet you?" asked Susan, the nice older woman who sat beside her in first class.
Kyoko couldn't look at the poor woman without feeling guilty. The number of times she had been disturbed by intrusive fans looking for Kyoko was completely unacceptable, but time after time, she had congenially waved off the interruptions as she typed merrily away on her laptop or let out a hearty laugh. In the hours after dinner, she had even helped get rid of them, pretending to be her manager and allowing Kyoko to at least close her eyes and pretend to rest. Basically, the woman was an unshakable goddamned hero and Kyoko would remember her fondly until the end of time.
"Yes, my boyfriend," Kyoko admitted blissfully, heart light and cheeks pink. "We haven't seen each other in five months. It's almost more than I can stand knowing he's so close, but I can't just jump off the plane and run to where he is."
Susan laughed. "I know the feeling. I travel a lot for business and the worst part after a long flight is sitting on the tarmac waiting to disembark. The key is to keep yourself distracted. Then before you know it, you're grabbing your luggage and hightailing it to your connecting flight! So, what's your young man look like?"
"He's so beautiful, it almost hurts to look at him for too long," Kyoko sighed, closing her eyes for a moment. "He dyes his hair this beautiful chocolate brown most of the time, but he's a natural blond with green eyes."
"Tall?"
"Almost two meters."
"Wow. That's pretty tall. Is he famous too?" Susan followed up, smiling apologetically when Kyoko's eyes popped open and slid sideways in panic. "Sorry, cat's outta the bag, what with everyone coming up to you all flight. You'll have to forgive me, I don't watch a lot of television or movies, so I don't really recognize you."
"Oh, no! Of course not! I'm not that famous of an actress yet. Especially outside of Japan. I just modeled for a somewhat famous ad in the States not too long ago, right after I dyed my hair, so there's a bigger number of people recognizing me than normal. Usually it's my boyfriend who has to fight off the hoards of fans. I'm still learning how to deal with it all."
"So he is famous. Anyone I might have heard of?"
"Maybe," Kyoko hedged with an apologetic smile, lowering her voice. "But it's sort of a secret that we're dating, so I can't tell you his name. Sorry."
"A secret?" Susan asked with a frown. "Why is that? Doesn't he want everyone to know he's seeing such a charming young woman?"
Kyoko chuckled awkwardly. "Oh, he definitely does. It's just that there are extenuating circumstances that make it better for both of us this way. He has some pretty zealous fans, who already weren't very happy that he's dating anyone at all, let alone someone like me." Plus I'm four years younger than him and still technically a minor...
"Well, I say that's poppycock. You're a beautiful, obviously talented, girl with fans of your own. You should tell your young man he's being a coward. Maybe if he puts a ring on that finger, his fans will figure out he's serious."
Kyoko squeaked. "I think it's probably a little early for that. I'm just turning 18 in a couple of days."
"Wow, I never would have guessed! You look a lot older than that."
"Thank you!" Kyoko couldn't help but smile at that. Maybe she'd finally matured enough that when she stood next to Ren, she would actually look like his girlfriend...instead of his little sister (one of Kyoko's more needless worries, since anyone who saw the looks Ren gave her knew he definitely wasn't thinking of her like a sister).
"You're welcome," the older woman replied with a knowing smile. Young people were always in such a hurry to grow up. She knew it would only be a few years before the glowing teen before her would be doing everything she could to look younger for just a little while longer.
"Excuse me, Miss Mogami," a flight attendant politely interrupted. "We're ready to begin disembarking and we would like to offer you the opportunity to disembark first so you won't get stopped by fans on your way out of the gate."
Kyoko looked up at her with eyes overflowing with gratitude. The flight attendant and Susan blinked in surprise as the mature woman holding her bag to her chest suddenly turned into a starry-eyed little girl who looked like she was on her way to meet a unicorn.
Maybe she won't be so worried about looking younger, Susan mused. And maybe I should look her up. She's really quite talented...
"Thank you so much. Would it be possible for my companion here to leave with me?" The young actress' lip came out in a slight pout, and her eyes grew round and glistening, with a pleading urgency.
"O-of course," the attendant responded, unable to look away. "Please gather up your carry-on baggage and follow me."
Kyoko winked at the woman beside her and scooped up the handle of the bag sitting in her lap, flipping back into mature traveler mode. While she appreciated Julie's instruction on how to overcome obstacles by flaunting her elite status, Kyoko still preferred to do it her own way if possible. Snooty just wasn't her style.
"Come on auntie. Let's get the heck off this plane!"
Susan cleared her throat to fight her sudden urge to giggle. "Whatever you say, dear."
The two of them shared a twinkle in their eye as they swiftly walked past the other first class passengers and kept their pace down the long carpeted gangway. But as soon as Kyoko stepped through the door at the other end, she stopped in her tracks, causing her companion to bump into her back.
"Is something wrong?" The woman peeked around her shoulder, trying to see what had halted their progress. Her eyes fell on a strikingly tall, broad-shouldered man. He had longish blond hair sticking out around the edges of a knitted hat and was just pulling sunglasses (at night?) off impossibly green eyes. "Holy crap. You weren't kidding. He's absolutely stunning."
Kyoko didn't even hear her because by then her feet had recovered from their shock and she was hurtling forward, at double speed.
"Kuon," she breathed as though it were a magic spell. He met her halfway, grabbing her tightly in a hug and lifting her off the ground.
Kyoko's arms squeezed around him just as tightly as relief flooded her, feeling like the last piece in a long unfinished puzzle had finally fallen into place.
"I missed you so much," he murmured into her hair, slowly lowering her back to her feet so he could pull back his head and look at her.
"I missed you too." The words felt woefully inadequate. "Let's never do that again. I know we'll have to be apart because of work sometimes, but five months is way too long."
"Five minutes is way too long."
"Seems like you've got a keeper there…" Susan murmured in her ear with a squeeze to her shoulder. "Thank you for a very amusing flight. I promise I'll watch some of your work next time I have a free minute."
Kyoko jumped and then smiled, waving as the woman walked away. There really were nice people anywhere if you were open to finding them.
"A new friend?" Kuon asked, his hands sliding up to support her head between his large palms.
"An unexpected comrade in the trenches." Kyoko's heart pounded in her chest and her cheeks went red. It wasn't fair how little it took for Kuon to affect her heart. "We should go. They're going to be letting everyone else off the plane in a minute."
"Yeah, you're right," he agreed, taking her bag so naturally from her that she didn't realize she wasn't carrying it anymore until they got to the baggage claim.
"You don't have to carry that," she said, reaching for the strap over his shoulder. He grabbed her hand instead, threading their fingers together.
"Either I carry your luggage, or I carry you while you're carrying it. Take your pick." He brought her hand to his lips and locked eyes with her as he lightly kissed her knuckles.
Kyoko didn't try to take her bag back again. Though when her checked bag finally came down the conveyor belt and he released her hand to grab it, she seriously considered it, just to see if he would touch her again. The thought made her cheeks flush with embarrassment.
As if he could read her mind, he took her hand again as they were leaving the airport, her carry-on slung over his shoulder and her rolling suitcase trailing behind him.
She squeezed his hand and felt her stomach flutter when he squeezed back.
"Did you get any sleep on the flight? Are you tired?"
"Not at all," she replied, answering both questions at once. "I'm wide awake."
With the adrenaline pumping through her system, it was about 80% true. Close enough.
His eyes slid over to her, just a hint of the Emperor peeking out as his hand tightened around hers again.
"Oh?"
And oh God, what a loaded 'oh' it was.
Her heart thundered in her ears as she nodded, pulling her lower lip between her teeth and glancing sidelong at him through her lashes. "One hundred percent not tired at all."
Did she say 80%? She meant 110. She was 110% awake now.
They seemed to reach the car in record time, her suitcases barely making it into the spacious trunk of the glistening blue Benz before it was slammed closed and she was unceremoniously deposited on top of it.
Then, time skidded to a stop, their faces a mere foot apart and Ren's hands solidly hot, still circling her waist.
As eager as Kuon clearly was, he also seemed to be held back by something. Kyoko felt it too.
It was like the months extending between the last time they had been intimate and the present moment had become a physical thing wedged between them, almost insurmountable in its sudden enormity. It resulted in a moment akin to the first heartstopping move made between a man and a woman attracted to one another: that charged, possibly awkward, but always hotter-than-hell moment of hesitancy before one of them rustled up enough courage to make the first move and took the chance that all the signals sent between them had been read correctly.
Lifting her up and holding her was as far as Ren's courage would let him go. While his mind knew beyond a doubt that she was attracted to him (proven by the naughty photo gallery on his phone that he had to daily make sure wasn't a perverted figment of his imagination), his body remembered what it felt like to scare her away with one wrong move.
Over, and over, and over again.
Because when it came to her, any perfectly innocent move could be a wrong one. And he was definitely not feeling remotely innocent now.
Kyoko, on the other hand, was undergoing an entirely different problem...the utterly confusing desire to seduce her boyfriend out of his pants.
As soon as fucking possible.
This was a first for her.
Sure, she'd grown used to having her sexual experience gradually expanded as Ren carefully explored how far she would let him go. And she had certainly enjoyed herself as he pushed her boundaries, but the growing desire to push his, that had snuck up on her over weeks of lonely nights, took her by surprise. Without realizing it, somewhere along the line, she'd completed her transformation into a sexually conscious woman, who now encountered the infamously powerful pheromones emitted by none other than Kuon Hizuri himself.
If she hadn't been sitting already, her knees would have given out trying to support the wave of lust sweeping through her body.
He wasn't Japan's Most Wanted bachelor for nothing. He was hotter than fuck, and he was all hers for the taking.
Her hands shook where they rested on his arms, tingling to squeeze the hard biceps under her fingers. Her eyes were glued to his neck, watching his Adam's apple bob as he swallowed, then tracing the flawless tan skin over his lean corded shoulder muscles as they disappeared under his shirt.
Fuck, his barely exposed collarbone, sticking out of his collar at that proximity, would have been enough to give her fantasies about locking herself in a closet with him somewhere.
With him so close she could feel the heat radiating off of his body and it had her hot, wet, and throbbing.
And he was just standing there, barely touching her at all!
So, Kyoko took matters into her own hands. She spread her knees, grabbed his biceps (which were even harder than she remembered...sploosh) and pulled, until his hips were settled between her thighs and his shocked gaping mouth was a breath from hers. Then she leaned forward and kissed him with everything she had.
Like finely retuned clockwork, their bodies remembered each other with a vengeance. Ren's arms coiled around her, pressing her body tight against his as their tongues joyfully got reacquainted. Kyoko's hands divulged him of his hat and she groaned as her fingers laced happily into his silky blonde hair.
It was even softer than she remembered it.
He hummed back at her and slid a hand down to her butt, almost pulling her off the car in his urgency to press against her and make her feel what she was doing to him. She broke their kiss with a gasp and he faltered, preparing to get slapped, only to flush hot from one head to another as she instead widened her legs and pressed her core against him, pulling open the top of his button-down to suck on his collarbone.
"Fuuuuuuck, Kyoko."
His whispered crudity sounded more like a reverent prayer. And her hands were the answer she granted him, tugging his shirt out of his belted designer jeans and diving under it so they could feel his unimpeded skin.
They slid up the hard planes of his back and raked back down, scoring his skin red with her nails, which joined the hickey materializing under her tongue as the second of the many ways she planned to mark him as hers, once and forever.
Kyoko had dreamed of doing this with him so many times, it almost felt like it had already happened. As though it was inevitable that the moment they saw each other again they wouldn't be able to hold back. But she still wasn't prepared for how violently she wanted him.
It was more intense than missing his smile, and eyes, and soul had been for the past five months, but not an entirely dissimilar feeling either. She'd lain awake many nights, wanting him lying beside her more than she'd ever wanted anything in her life, but now she wanted him much closer than just beside her (like inside her), with the soft parts of her body fitted snugly into the hardened planes of his. She wanted him to ease the ache between her legs that just looking at him made her feel, by filling her up and making her whole. She wanted to be so close to him that not even air could come between them.
No, she didn't just want it...
"Kuon," she murmured against his skin, unable to force her lips away even long enough to tell him what she'd decided. "I need you...right now..."
A deep sound that was almost a growl rumbled out of Kuon's throat as he pulled her butt off the car and bent the small of her back over it instead, supporting her hips with one arm as her legs clenched around his waist.
The Emperor of the Night pulled back to survey his soon to be conquered domain with eyes ablaze. It wasn't the simmering gaze he'd condescended to grace her with when he teased her, or the flickering longing he'd let loose while finding his Katsuki. No, what was behind those seductive eyes was nothing less than a poorly restrained wildfire, mere moments from burning her to a crisp.
Oh boy, did she want to burn.
"Do you know what you're asking?" he baited her, licking his lips and advancing his free hand under the hem of her slinky silk top, the confidence that came with experience finally taking over.
His previous romantic encounters had all unfolded in the same fashion: with his presence and not inconsiderable skill reducing even the fiercest of women to putty in his hands. He'd liked it that way. He took pride in his ability to seduce a woman so utterly and completely with very little effort. And he was dying to conquer Kyoko. Kuon could already imagine her timid nod, or gasping assent as he finally availed himself of every precious privilege she was offering him. But, as his hand closed over her lace-restrained breast, she purred out a completely unexpected reply in anything but a submissive tone.
"I'm not fucking asking."
He blinked, momentarily overwhelmed by the influx of blood that headed downward in response to the tigerlike power in her voice. His first thought was that she was assuming some sort of character, but as he looked down at her and tried his damndest not to tear off all her clothes, he couldn't find a trace of Setsu, or Natsu, or even Mio. The woman looking up at him was the same one who always insisted he eat just one more bite of the bento she'd made him. She was the woman who had demanded he compliment her Halloween costume or suffer the consequences. She was the woman who had looked up out of his phone dripping wet and begging with her eyes to be thoroughly fucked from thousands of miles away. And she was the woman who had confessed to him in the course of a yelling match, barraging him for all the mistakes he'd made over the years while failing to convey his own feelings to her...in a hot pink string bikini.
She was 100% his Kyoko. His always-wiser-than-her-years, fully-grown, sexy-as-hell Kyoko, who knew exactly what she was doing to him.
Which simultaneously turned him on more than anything in his life ever had, and made him abruptly reaware of their surroundings. He closed his eyes for a moment and opened them with a renewed sense of purpose.
"In that case, we need to get in the car."
Kyoko furrowed her brow for a moment in confusion, then her face was set ablaze as she also remembered they were making out mostly exposed in the dark corner of a public parking garage. She loosened her legs' grip around him and rested her weight entirely in his arms until her legs slid down his body and found solid concrete again. "Yeah. Inside the car would probably be better."
His hands, clasped around her impossibly tiny shoulders by the time she was standing under her own power again, tightened. He frowned. "We're not doing it in the backseat of the car either."
Sure, he'd thought about fooling around with her exactly there when he'd picked the Benz, but making out a little and her first fucking time were two very different things.
She went an even darker red, but didn't drop her head, meeting his heated gaze with her stubborn one. "Then take me somewhere we can. I don't want to wait anymore."
Kuon's heart skipped a beat. Hell, it fucking tripped over a beat and fell down several flights of stairs landing on its face. Then started an improvised drum solo. "Yes, ma'am"
He couldn't resist leaning down and kissing her one more time before pulling away and digging for the keys in his pocket. He had her door open and waiting before she'd even opened her eyes, but once they were open, she lost no time catching up, squeezing his arm as she raced past him and took her place in the passenger seat. Kuon securely closed the door behind her and practically sprinted around the car, the luxury vehicle purring to life and pulling out of its parking space before his door had fully closed.
"Buckle your seatbelt," she murmured quietly into the leather- and lust-scented silence.
He immediately complied with her wishes, then took her hand, resting their interwoven fingers on her thigh.
They'd barely hit the road when he was pulling up to the valet of the Hyatt Regency, not even a block away. He exited the car and rounded the vehicle before tossing his keys to the valet, opening Kyoko's door, and offering her a hand out. Then he smoothly slipped the valet a fifty dollar bill.
"Take good care of her, won't you?"
For one embarrassing and thrilling moment, the valet thought the driver had been referring to the stunning blonde girl who magically appeared out of the passenger side door one long, lean leg at a time. Then he realized the guy was obviously talking about the car.
A car even his lawyer parents would have trouble affording.
The star-struck college freshman swallowed the saliva flooding his mouth and nodded, red-faced, but still couldn't tear his eyes away from the girl. She was like the embodiment of every girl-next-door/supermodel/japanese-school-girl fantasy he'd ever had. Just being near her made his knees feel weak.
"Of course. Right away, sir."
Kuon and Kyoko didn't even hear him, their broad matched strides already having taken them halfway to the front desk.
"We need a room please. We don't have a reservation," Kuon said with a brilliant smile, practically blinding the receptionist.
"O-o-of course. How many nights?" she finally managed, smiling warmly back at him and seductively lowering her eyelashes. She had never been so glad to have pulled the night shift.
"Just the one," he replied.
"Very well sir. I just need to see your ID and a credit card to put on file for incidentals."
Kuon pulled out his wallet and handed her the credit card and driver's license with another smile. The woman looked at his name and felt like the room was spinning, her mind instantly recalling the numerous posters of the very man standing before her she'd had as a teenager. "...Kuon Hizuri? You're the Ku-"
"Sssshhh," Kuon cut her off with a wink. "I don't want anyone to know I'm in town. Do you think you can keep this our little secret?"
The woman leaned over the desk towards him, her eyes locked onto his, rendered completely incapable of looking away by the sexual energy rolling off of him in waves. God Kuon Hizuri had grown up well. Maybe all her middle school fantasies were about to come true!
"O-of course. What kind of woman could possibly say no to you? Is there anything else I can supply during your stay...sir?"
The receptionist was snapped abruptly out of her dirty daydreams as a delicate hand slid up Kuon's cheek, physically turning his head slightly away from the woman, and forcing her to notice the woman beside her thirteen-year-old-self's dream husband for the first time.
"Kuoooon," Kyoko crooned, using her hand to coax his head lower so she could whisper in his ear while locking flashing eyes with the front desk hussy. "If we're not alone in the next fifteen minutes, I'm taking the car and leaving you here."
To pile a layer of icing on the cake of her threat, she bit lightly into his earlobe, then pulled, dragging her teeth lightly across his skin with a smile before releasing it.
The receptionist blushed as Kuon's pupils almost completely pushed the green from his suddenly dazed irises. He swiftly reclaimed the card and ID she held limply out to him.
"Do you have our room key ready?" Kyoko prompted with a catlike smile. "It's been a long day and we're anxious to go to bed."
Kuon nearly choked on his tongue hearing the innuendo exit his innocent (or lately not so innocent) little girlfriend's mouth. The receptionist stared at Kyoko with her mouth hanging open.
"Well? The key?"
The woman snapped out of it, her mouth curling into a dissatisfied sneer. "Of course. Just one moment."
"Thank you," Kyoko simpered as Kuon wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her snugly against him. The receptionist typed intentionally slowly in petty revenge, and picked a room on the top floor as far from the elevator as possible. But eventually she had nothing left to stall them with.
"Here are your room keys, sir," she purred in one last attempt to regain his attention. Kuon didn't even hear her, too busy looking down at his girlfriend's cleavage, where three buttons of her blouse had mysteriously come undone since they'd left the car.
Instead, Kyoko reached out to grab the cards, looking at them just long enough to see the room number written on the tiny paper envelope before grabbing Kuon's hand and striding away with him in tow.
"Thanks!" she tossed over her shoulder brightly. She didn't let go of his hand again until the elevator doors closed, shutting out the world.
"Jealousy suits you," Kuon growled into her ear, pulling her back against his chest and kissing her neck from behind.
Kyoko smirked. "You know, that's the first time I've been able to do that."
"What?"
Stake my claim on you…or anyone. "...nothing."
Kuon's hand ghosted down the side of her body, settling at her hip. Then two of his fingers slipped just inside the elastic waistband of her skirt, coaxing it downward an inch, then following it around her abdomen to bring the other side down to match it. "Nothing?"
Kyoko swallowed hard, all of her attention pinpointed on his wayward fingertips. "It's not important."
"I don't know...it sounded pretty important to you…" His fingers repeated the cycle, as they slid the garment down another inch. "You sure you don't want to tell me?"
It was suddenly hard to take a breath. "No…"
His hand took another lap, this time pausing as the ends of his fingertips brushed the top of her low-riding panties. Kyoko shivered involuntarily as a jolt of pleasure shot the short distance between his fingers and the drenched chasm between her legs. She didn't notice Kuon had also stopped breathing.
His fingers back-tracked slightly and he suppressed a groan at the smooth, hairless expanse beneath his fingers.
Fuck. Did she fucking prepare for this?! Just...fuuuuuuck. Please let the room be right next to the elevator!
Kuon frantically watched the numbers ascend above the door agonizingly slowly.
"Hang in there," Katsuki muttered sympathetically into his head. "You're almost to the room."
"Fuck the room. There's no one else in this elevator. Just finger fuck her right here," Cain offered. "Setsu would totally go for it."
"In the elevator?! How could you even consider doing that?!" Ren raged. "She's far too precious! Get your head on straight, you idiot! Treat her like the treasure she is!"
Kuon bit his tongue, hoping the pain would bring him back to his senses.
It did not.
His fingers moved all on their own, curling a bit to flit under the edge of the last silky barrier in his way.
"Stop it! Pull yourself together! There are probably cameras in here, dumbass!" Ren snapped.
Kuon blinked, his eyes too dilated to focus on the upper corner of the tiny room and see where the camera actually was. His fingers twitched a millimeter lower.
Kyoko closed her mouth around a moan and it came out as a whining hum that resonated through his chest.
Unable to think rationally if she was going to make noises like that, Kuon spun them around, pressing Kyoko against the mirrored wall of the elevator and nuzzling his way past her hair to kiss her neck as his hand dove right past the point of no return and into no man's land.
That is, where no man had gone before.
She was so wet his finger slipped right over her swollen clit and partially entered her in one motion.
Hand to God, he almost came right then and there.
His head reeled and he forgot to kiss her, his mouth just resting against her sweet skin as he concentrated on crooking his finger back to sweep over her slick bud again.
"Oh God…" she breathed, panting slightly. "Kuon…?"
He didn't have the chance to answer as the elevator dinged impossibly loudly and the bubble around them popped. They both stiffened.
Kuon's head whipped around to watch the door open and breathed a sigh of relief as he saw the empty hallway. With one last curl of his fingers, he removed his hand, his fingers leaving behind a damp trail across her skin that made Kyoko shiver. Then he stepped back, allowing her to step away from the wall and adjust her clothing.
Kyoko felt like she had Bambi's legs, taking several shaky steps out of the elevator and down the hall before feeling steady on her heeled boots again.
"What's the room number?"
She was pretty sure Kuon's voice had dropped at least an octave.
And she couldn't have told him the room number from memory at that moment to save her life. Her left hand, still holding the now crumpled little envelope numbly moved where she could see it.
"...790."
They both stared at the sign showing which numbers were down which hallway and frowned. Their room was the very last one to the right, apparently. Literally, the farthest from where they currently were.
"What a jealous bitch!" Natsu snapped in her head.
Kyoko couldn't help but agree.
"Well, that's gonna take way too fucking long. Guess there's no helping it."
Kyoko didn't have time to process what Kuon had said before he'd thrown her over his shoulder and taken off down the hall.
"Kuoooooon! Puuuut meee doooooown!" Kyoko whisper-yelled, hyper-aware of the fact it was almost one in the morning and they were thundering past door-after-door of guests who were probably already asleep.
Kuon laughed at full volume, not giving the other guests a second thought, and picked up speed, dashing at an all out sprint until he made it through all the twists and turns to the farthest corner of the hotel. Only then did he set her down and meet her embarrassed face with his grinning one.
"How are you not even breathing hard?!" she whined, one hand rubbing the section of her stomach where all her weight had been resting on his rather hard shoulder. "Have you taken up running since I last saw you or something?"
To her utter surprise, a blush sprang to life on his cheeks. Instantly, she was fascinated.
He never blushed.
Like ever.
"What?" she pressed.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Oh yes you do. Why are you embarrassed?!"
He snatched the envelope with the keycards from her hand and turned toward the door before hesitantly answering.
"Every time you send me one of those pictures it makes me...hungry. And with all I've been eating lately, I've had to start running every morning to stay in shape." The door popped open and he stepped inside, holding it open for her behind him, but still not turning back to face her. "So a jog like that, even carrying you, is nothing."
Kyoko followed him automatically, sure that she'd heard him wrong. "They make you...hungry? Seriously? You? Hungry?!"
"Yeah."
The door clicked quietly closed behind her.
Kuon still stood with his back to her, a few feet inside the door, kicking off his shoes. She took off her boots neatly too before she walked around him, staring up into his endearingly sheepish face.
"Really?"
He focused on her again, his tongue slipping out to lick his lips as the Emperor took over his features once again.
"Ravenous."
Kyoko gasped as he kissed her, making room for his tongue, as his hands made short work of the buttons of her blouse. His shirt swiftly followed, his eyes devouring her when he pulled away to yank it over his head.
"Is that one of the sets that I got you?" he asked, reaching out to tap the tiny pink bow nestled between her breasts. He could just barely make out the slight color difference of her areolas through the deep purple lace push-up bra it was attached to.
He'd taken particular note of it while staring down her shirt at the reception desk (and previously in a few of Setsu's more daring outfits), but her cleavage looked absolutely phenomenal in a push-up.
Mouth-wateringly so.
She blushed, the dusting of red spreading down to the top of her chest.
How could a blush of all things be so fucking sexy?!
"Can't you tell? Aren't you the one who picked it out…" Suddenly a horrifying thought occurred to her. "Don't tell me you made Yashiro buy me underwear?! I swear to fucking God, Kuo-"
"Of course not! Jesus!" Kuon reared back in surprise. "I've just bought you so much lingerie lately, it's kind of hard to remember it all!"
Kyoko looked confused. "...You're not capable of remembering six bras? We need to get your memory checked."
A wicked, yet endearingly boyish grin grew on Kuon's face as he drew their hips together with one hand and traced the scalloped edge of her bra with the other.
"Oh, I've bought you waaaay more than that. Those are just the ones I sent you."
Kyoko's eyes went wide. "What?! Kuon!"
Kuon ignored her entirely predictable outburst and bent down until he could grasp one of her straps in his teeth, tugging it off her shoulder.
Kyoko forgot what she was going to say as his mouth descended on her breast and the embers of desire that had been banked by their embarrassing run down the hall came blazing back to life. Her hands greedily raced up the hard muscles of his arms, over his wide shoulders and down his chest, taking particular delight in his sculpted abdomen before finding his belt.
However, about the time her hands hit the cold metal buckle, Kuon's lips, which had been taking a very thorough survey of her boob and the surrounding area, got just a little too close to her armpit, which sent a chilling thought racing through her body like an ice cube down her spine.
OHMYGOD I WAS ON THE PLANE ALL DAY! HOW LONG HAS IT BEEN SINCE I'VE SHOWERED?!
Her body stiffened and jumped away, leaving Kuon blinking in surprise at his suddenly empty arms.
"Kyoko?" he murmured, trying to get his eyes to focus on her face when they seemed magnetically drawn to the sight of her pale, perfectly curved chest. Her skin looked like carved alabaster against the purple paisley lace so dark it was almost black.
"Um, I need to...um...well, don't you think I should probably take a shower before we...you know...right?" Kyoko babbled as she absentmindedly pulled her strap back up and crossed her arms over her chest. "I mean, I was on a plane for eleven hours. I probably smell...and we've waited this long, right? What's another fifteen minutes? So...I'm just, uh, gonna go...do that...then…"
Kyoko was looking at anything but Kuon, so she didn't see the annoyed look on his face until he stopped her from scurrying past him to the bathroom.
"Are you kidding me right now? Miss 'I can't stand to wait, so let's lose my virginity in the back of a car' is worried about this now? I thought you 'weren't fucking asking'? What happened to that? Do you seriously think I care if you haven't bathed yet today?"
With every question, he forced her back a step until her legs hit the bed closest to them and she tumbled onto the fluffy white comforter.
A flash of deja vu hit her, his annoyed expression morphing into Cane's enraged one as he placed a knee between her legs and towered over her. Kuon seemed to be thinking along the same lines, since his hand traced the same path it had that fateful night when he'd flung her phone across the room and completely lost Cain's character to what she now knew were his personal feelings of jealousy.
"I haven't seen you in four months! I haven't gotten to touch you in four fucking months! And I had to leave you thousands of miles away, in a veritable war zone of good-looking carnivores, for four fucking months! And now, after seducing the fuck out of me in a parking garage and telling me you need me as soon as fucking possible, now, you want me to WAIT?!" Two of Kuon's fingers hooked over the tiny scrap of fabric that served as a bridge between the wires supporting her boobs. "I'm gonna go with...hell no."
If Kyoko had been any less turned on, she probably would have been figuring out what to name the expression on his face (a strange combination of the Emperor and the Demon Lord...the Demon Emperor maybe?), but instead, she was trying to decide the best way to shut him up and get off his pants at the same time.
"Oh come the fuck on," Setsu-chibi needled her. "You know exactly what to do. We've been here before."
Kyoko set her jaw stubbornly, looped her knee up over his hip and shoved her body upward, flipping Kuon over onto his back, with one of her knees braced between his legs. Wasting no time, she straddled his hips and sat up, a smirk fighting to get loose on her face as she rested a hand on his defined six-pack and reached out to trace his lips with the other. "Well, excuse me for worrying about it. I am a girl, you know."
The Emperor quirked an eyebrow as his fingers went to work finding her legs beneath the pooled fabric of her skirt.
"Trust me, I am acutely aware that you are a girl." He grasped her knees and tugged them outward, snugly settling the bulge under his jeans against her. They inhaled sharply together.
"Hmmm, that's twice I've gotten the better of you," Kyoko breathed out, leaning forward and softly kissing his lips, her hair falling in a curtain around them. "Is it possible," she murmured as she flipped her hair over one shoulder and shifted lower until her lips rested over the side of his neck where she had first marked him, "that you're just the tiniest bit weak when it comes to me?"
She sucked hard on the spot for several moments, enjoying the way the heartbeat under her lips quickened and his fingers tightened on her thighs. Finally, she gave him a gentle bite, and pulled away to admire her work.
"I feel like I've turned a tiger into a kitten with just a little bite on the neck."
Kuon's eyes sharpened at her bravado.
"Oh? You're gonna have to do better than that if you want to tame me." His broad hands slid up her thighs, encircling more than half of them, until his thumbs met the damp satin of her underwear again. Applying just the right amount of pressure, he caressed her covered bud, causing her thighs to clench around him.
Kyoko narrowed her eyes at his challenge and let her head tilt to the side in speculation. Then she lifted herself up on her knees and started backing off of him.
Kuon panicked for a second, his head rising off the bed as his body reflexively sought to follow hers. He tightened his solid grip on her legs, making it impossible for her to move any further back, his eyebrows furrowed. But Kyoko leaned forward again and pecked him on the forehead before pointedly prying off his hands.
"Down kitty. I'm not really going anywhere."
Kuon raised an eyebrow, but let her go, sitting up on his elbows to watch her hand trail down toward his belly button, her lips following with soft kisses.
The anticipation was scrambling his rational mind as he watched her blond head get closer and closer to where he hadn't even dreamt it would go.
When she hit the waistband of his jeans Kyoko trailed her tongue over the skin just above it until she found a spot she liked and went to work giving him another hickey.
Kuon didn't realize her hands were undoing his belt and unbuttoning his jeans as her tongue's ministrations to such sensitive skin just north of where he wanted her sent shivers through his body. He fell back onto the bed, eyes closing as all his focus centered on that torturous, tantalizing feeling. It was only when she removed her lips that he noticed her tugging off one of his last two remaining garments.
His eyes popped open and he sat slightly up again, just in time to see Kyoko push her skirt off her hips and send it cascading to the floor. He could barely swallow as she leaned over and plucked off her socks, her boobs trembling on the verge of escaping their lace prison until she straightened again.
In a sudden bout of embarrassment at his intense scrutiny, she grabbed her elbow with her other hand and her hips twisted a bit to hide her suddenly exposed lingerie. But even in her embarrassment, she didn't look away from him.
The twist of her hips had the opposite effect as she intended, as Kuon suddenly recalled just what the matching panties for that bra looked like, the thin string extending around her hip a dead giveaway that he correctly remembered a thong.
He swallowed a groan, but his throat still made just enough noise to divert Kyoko's gaze (from her fascinated perusal of the rather impressive tent his boxer briefs made) back to his eyes. Tentatively, she approached him again, crawling carefully on her hands and knees, intentionally avoiding the part of him that most demanded her attention, until she sat on his stomach.
Kuon gritted his teeth. "Woman, are you trying to kill me?"
Kyoko swallowed and licked her lips. Then she held her breath and shifted backward until her ass was pressed fully against his erection. Kuon groaned and grabbed her hips pushing her more firmly against him, closing his eyes at the pleasure of finally being touched.
"You talk a big game, but you look pretty tame to me right now..." she whispered cheekily.
His eyes snapped open only a moment before he sat up in one smooth motion, flipping them over and caging her in with his arms. "Not even close. You've got promise, but you're still just a novice, my little kouhai. Shall I show you how to do it properly?"
Her eyes flashed, recalling the last time he had said that to her, and she pushed on his chest.
Only, this time, he didn't budge, a wicked smile taking over his face. "Oh no, I'm not letting you get away this time."
Kuon kissed her deeply, sliding a hand under her and lifting her just enough to reach around and pop open her bra. He broke the kiss, moving to her neck as one of his large hands found and massaged her newly bared breast. He slid his body lower to take a pert nipple into his mouth and her legs clamped onto his ribs, prompting his hips to press reflexively into the sheets.
He pushed his own needs to the back of his mind and set to work marking Kyoko on each of her breasts...and on her shoulder...and in the space just behind her ear. Relentlessly he sucked on her flesh, burning the full measure of his devotion through her skin to the blood vessels underneath for every hotblooded male in a fifty mile radius to see. And hell, the lesbians too. When it came to Kyoko, he could never be too careful.
"Kuon…?" she gasped as he pried one of her legs off his hip and rolled onto that side, taking her with him without breaking his mouth away from her skin so they lay side-by-side together.
"Hmmm?" His fingers lightly pinched her nipple before slithering down her side, catching her thong along the way and beginning to tug it off. She helpfully lifted her hips off the bed enough to let it loose and his long arm finished the job like a champ.
Lying completely naked before him for the first time, Kyoko felt exposed in a way she hadn't before.
Exposed...but also kind of...free. Her body shivered involuntarily as Kuon's hand slowly inched its way back up her leg, guiding her knee to rest on his hip. She blushed at how wanton the position was, but soon forgot her shame as his fingers ghosted up her inner thigh until they met her slick warmth.
She didn't even realize how much she'd been aching for him to touch her there again. A deeply satisfied sigh escaped her as he traced her slit a few times, her body tensing each time he circled her clit and relaxing again as he veered away from it. Kuon waited until her hips had begun shifting to his rhythm before he slipped a finger into her impossibly tight opening, only going a knuckle deep before pulling back out again and returning to his pattern.
Kyoko gasped and opened eyes she didn't remember closing to find Kuon watching her face closely, his jaw tight. Their gazes met and he slid his finger into her again, further this time, breathing harder as he watched her mouth drop open and her eyes widen. He carefully inserted a second digit into her and felt his cock twitch in response as she pushed her hips into his hand, moaning softly.
He leaned forward and kissed her, coaxing her tongue to play with his as he put more strength into what his hand was doing. She responded in kind, pushing against him harder, and letting out a lewd moan against his lips as he crooked his fingers on the way out, hitting a spot that made her body clench around him.
"Kuooon," she groaned, her hand grasping at his bicep, her eyes hooded. "I want to…"
"What?" he murmured back, admiring the flush in her cheeks and the cry released from her lips as he stretched her with a third finger, lost to imagining what her tight muscles would feel like squeezing the part of him that really belonged inside her.
Kyoko's hand moved to his chest and drifted downward, causing his fingers to pause in their quest.
"I want to touch you too."
Her hand tentatively brushed his still covered erection.
His hips jumped, pushing himself more securely into her palm.
"Then…"
Kyoko swallowed a whine as his fingers pulled out of her, feeling deeply empty, but also a little relieved that the fog in her brain lifted a bit as well.
At least until she saw her boyfriend sliding off his boxer briefs. Then she felt even more dizzy.
That's supposed to fit inside me?! There's no way! No fucking way!
Right?
He grabbed her hand and guided it down until she grasped him, wrapping his much larger hand around her own to show her how to move. Kyoko, even in her sexed-up, dizzy state caught on quickly.
"Like this?" she whispered into his neck, licking a drop of the sweat that had started to make his skin dewy from her ministrations. She experimentally ran her thumb over his tip, surprised to feel the slick liquid beading there.
"Fuuuuuck…" Kuon groaned before he could stop himself. He didn't even care anymore if she knew how easily her tiger had been defanged. He would do anything she told him to as long as she kept touching him like that. For the rest of their fucking lives if possible.
Kyoko smirked and did it again, squeezing a bit as she did, finding the lubricant made it easier to slide her hand down his not inconsiderable length. "I'm assuming that means you like it when I do that..."
"Yeah," he gasped. "I would say...I like that…a lot."
Kuon found her face with his hands and angled it upward for a harsh, forceful kiss as his hips thrust into her hand, rushing her languid pace. His fingers followed her leg back to her core and thrust his fingers into her again, confirming that she was still dripping for him before removing his hand again with a final curl of his fingers.
Kyoko whined at the loss, her hips eagerly following his hand until their sexes collided.
Both of them froze, as they literally bumped uglies.
So to speak.
They looked down, then quickly back at each other, their eyes each searching for something.
And Kuon must have found what he was looking for, because in the span of a moment, he had her on her back and was hovering over her.
Then his eyes widened and he abruptly hung his head, letting out a string of curse words toward the general area of her chest.
"What!?" Kyoko implored, reaching out to push his hair aside so she could see his face.
"I don't have a fucking condom with me! Godfuckingdammit!" Kuon dropped his head down until it rested on her bare chest. For a moment, Kyoko would have sworn it sounded like he was going to cry. "I did not think we'd be doing this tonight. Fuck. I'm sorry."
"Oh. Well, um, I'm on the pill, so…"
Kuon's head shot up. "What? Really?"
"Yeah. It seemed like it might be a good idea, so..."
He didn't need to hear more. Ecstatically, he kissed her, swallowing the squeak she made when he grabbed her knees and spread her legs wider. Then he pulled back enough to look her seriously in the eyes.
"I love you so goddamned much. This will probably hurt at first...just tell me if it does and I'll stop, okay?"
Kyoko just nodded, fear and excitement choking her ability to form words.
"Okay." Kuon took a deep breath in an attempt to slow his racing heart and softly kissed her forehead.
Kyoko didn't have time to reply before he was entering her, inch-by-slow-tantalizing-inch. Her muscles tensed as she waited for the inevitable pain, her eyes scrunched closed and her nails digging into his arms…
But...
It never came.
Her eyes fluttered open, to meet his own confused ones. He was more than halfway to home, and while she felt stretched, and a little uncomfortable, and an itchy sort of ache inside that she desperately wanted scratched, there was nothing even resembling pain.
Kuon pulled back a bit and pushed forward a bit more, making both of them groan before locking eyes again. He searched her face for even a trace of anguish. "You doing okay over there?"
"Um...yeah," Kyoko breathed, then twitched her hips, unable to stay still anymore. She bucked her hips and pushed against him.
Kuon cursed and lost his careful control, pushing fully into her with a little more strength than intended. Kyoko cried out at the feeling, her toes curling as her knees squeezed his ribs. He froze, eyes closed as he tried not to focus on the heaven he'd entered, sure that he was, in turn, making her feel more like hell. It wasn't until Kyoko's fingers let go of his arms and laced into his hair that he opened his eyes.
"I'm fine. It didn't hurt at all...so..um...please…" her eyes pleaded what she didn't know the words for as her hips shifted restlessly against him again. "Keep going."
So, he did. He held back as much as he could, but let his body fall into the rhythm it so desperately wanted to follow, basking in the lewd noises unabashedly gasping out of Kyoko. He didn't know if it was because it had been so fucking long, or because he was finally burying himself in Kyoko, but being with her was better than anything he'd ever experienced. She was impossibly tight, really responsive, and making faces that men all over Japan would have paid millions just to watch on screen. The thought made him thrust a little harder, ecstatic as Kyoko's reaction was to push back against him, clumsily trying to match his rhythm.
Kyoko wanted...more. Every touch, every motion, every gasp of air between them stoked the heat coiling in her. Every time Kuon pulled away, she felt his loss. Every time he seated himself deep inside her again, she rejoiced at his return, but the itch inside her still wasn't satisfied. It just seemed to get worse, her hands desperately holding on for dear life to his solid arms planted on either side of her head and her toes curled up tight. He pushed into her quicker and harder than he had been and for a moment everything felt perfect, her frustration momentarily abated. She reacted immediately, pushing again his next stroke with everything she had, trying to recreate the moment.
She mewled softly when he slowed down again.
"What?" he asked,
"Faster," she gasped. "And...harder...please."
Kuon obliged for several strokes, pounding into her without holding back.
"AH! Yes! Like that! Pleeeease!"
Kuon smiled. She was taking this better than he ever would have expected. So, he sat back on his heels and lifted her hips, thrusting into her from a new angle.
Behind her scrunched eyelids, Kyoko's world burst into color as a wild sound she didn't know she could make was torn from her lungs. It would have been embarrassing how her hoarse wails seemed driven out of her with every thrust if she weren't so lost in ecstasy. If this was what sex always felt like, she understood why everyone was so obsessed with it. Everything tingled from her fingertips to her toes and even when she opened her eyes all she could see were sparkling afterimages. Pleasure rolled through her body in waves, and never seemed to leave, filling her up and wringing her out with no end in sight. Her fingers gripped blindly at his skin, trying to find something to ground her, but still unable to ease the growing pressure under her skin.
It felt like Kuon was working magic, continually filling her up with warmth and love and pleasure until she was sure she couldn't take any more.
That was Kyoko's last lucid thought before Kuon looped one of her legs over his elbow, pulled it out to the side, and then sent her into orbit. Her world exploded in bright light, as though all the fireworks at a summer festival were set off in the same place, at the same time, right above her. She vaguely heard Kuon groan as he dropped her legs and pushed deeply into her one last time before he was gone, leaving her feeling warm, and limp, and comparatively numb. It was like he'd sapped every ounce of her energy from her body, down to the last drop, leaving her feeling helpless and vulnerable, but somehow at the same time...safe.
She turned her head to see Kuon panting beside her, fascinated by the beads of sweat resting like morning dew on his forehead and across the noble bridge of his nose. She instructed her hand to reach out and touch them to confirm they were real, but it couldn't be bothered to raise even a half-an-inch off the fluffy white comforter sticking to her back.
But honestly, she couldn't blame her wayward limb. This was probably the most comfortable she'd ever been in her entire life. Every cell in her body was screaming at her to never move again. She would just have to adjust to spending the rest of her life on a hotel bed stark naked.
After all, becoming a nudist seemed like a perfectly reasonable concession in return for a full life of boneless bliss.
So she drew in a breath instead of trying to get her arm to move again, wincing at how it stung her throat and how her resulting words came out raspy.
"Your face is all sweaty."
Kuon cracked the eyelid closest to her. "So is yours."
Kyoko noted he was right, but couldn't be bothered to wipe it away. Apparently she was just gonna have to be a sweaty nudist...
Whatever. Worth it.
"Well, yeah. But I thought you didn't sweat from the neck up...Tsuruga-senpai."
He let out a chuckle of disbelief as he gasped in air. "Are you seriously...taking advantage...of this situation...to draw out my acting secrets? You're...something else."
Kyoko huffed out an airy laugh. "No. Just something I noticed. You're also more out of breath than I am for once."
Her eyes shifted to his chest, mesmerized by its rapid rate of rise and fall.
"Well, I was doing all the work," he teased with a huge smile, turning his head to fully look at her.
"My bad," Kyoko replied dreamily, deciding she must be floating on a cloud. "I guess I'll have to work on that."
Kuon's eyes sparkled and he rolled onto his side, propping up his head on one elbow while his other hand reached out to trace swirls onto her taut tummy.
"How can you possibly move right now?" she demanded, somewhat distressed that he wasn't also joining her sweaty nudist comfort cult. Life would be lonely without him. She hoped he would visit her often.
"Very well," he sighed, in a voice filled with mock-resignation as he waved off her question. "Knowing you, you'll want to start working on it right away, so give me five minutes to recover and you can get started. I'll be happy to monitor your progress, kouhai."
"Five minutes!?" Worse than not joining her, he wanted her to abandon her new boneless way of life too?!
"Actually, make that three. Just picturing you bouncing away on top of me is making me hard again..."
"Kuon!"
"What? You said you wanted to do the work, right? That clearly means you'd be on top. And I must say, it being you, I'm expecting great things. If I was forced to give you a ranking for your first time-"
"Don't you dare!" She blanched. Surely he wasn't serious. There was no way he would really do something that callous...
"-I'd say you're at like an...eighty percent?" Kuon teased.
"I can't believe you just said that…"
"Well, okay, eighty-five. But I'm sure I've still got that 'infinite potential' stamp around here somewhere if you need a little extra motivation…"
Kyoko mustered all her energy and punched him in the stomach. Some things were worth abandoning a life of endless perfect comfort as a sweaty nudist for. And punching his uppity candy ass for being rude about losing her virginity was apparently one of them.
Goodbye perfect life of boneless bliss!
"Okay, okay." He grabbed her waist and pulled her effortlessly across the space between them, until he could bury his head in the crook of her neck. "As your senpai, I think you're capable of at least 120% so it's important to keep at it until I can see a marked improvement."
Kyoko shivered, the warmth of his breath making her realize that the sweat drying on her skin was actually quite chilly. "What I'd really love to work on right now is getting clean."
Kuon shrugged, smiling brightly, but genuinely. "Sure. Just get on up and take a shower then."
He gestured to her unmoving body and waited, his smile growing larger as her muscles once again refused to move.
"Ooooor, we could just get dirtier…" he purred into her ear, grinning as his fingers found the goosebumps his breath incited up and down her exposed skin.
Kyoko blushed and shivered. "You're way too happy right now."
It was actually starting to freak her out. For once, Kuon actually felt younger than he was, his almost childlike exuberance a side of him she'd only seen in brief glimpses before now. Maybe sex was the only thing that could bring out this side of him...
"I prefer to think I'm just happy enough," he replied with a sniff, peppering her shoulder with kisses.
Then his face suddenly went serious, the green pools of his eyes threatening to drown her.
"Well, actually, there is one thing that could make me even happier."
Kyoko swore she used to know how to breathe.
Without even thinking about it.
What came after inhaling again?
"A-and what's that?"
The twinkle returned to his eye and he rolled over her, ignoring her squeak and taking her along as both of them tumbled off the bed. She closed her eyes expecting the impact of the floor, but was surprised to see he'd somehow landed on his feet and lifted her off the bed at the same time.
His natural athleticism was almost sickeningly sexy. And as soon as her body had the energy to move again, she fully intended to show him just what shit like that did to her. But for now, she just wanted to know why he had kidnapped her from her white sweaty haven.
"Kuon! What are you doing?"
He crooked an eyebrow down at her. "Taking you to the shower. Why? Did you change your mind?"
He turned back toward the bed looking like the Emperor's wicked little brother.
"No! Shower! I choose shower!"
Kuon pouted but spun back around and gently deposited her on the cool tile floor of the bathroom.
Kyoko kissed him quickly on the cheek and turned away to start the shower before she jumped his extremely built naked body. Again.
"Hey, did you by any chance, remember to grab my bag from the car?"
Kuon blinked in surprise at her question before grimacing. "Nope. Totally forgot."
"Can you go get it while I shower?" Kyoko asked, grabbing a towel from the shelf.
"What for? It's not like you need to get dressed again," he argued stubbornly.
"Yes, I do actually."
"I mean, yeah, you could, but I'll just take them off again."
Apparently Kuon was fully on board with her new life as a nudist after all. Kyoko shook off the stray thought.
"But, I will need to get dressed eventually, and if the second time is anything like the first, I'm not gonna want to get up again until I absolutely have to. If ever."
Kuon's eyes widened. "Are you really up for that? I don't expect you to push yourself, you know. Don't get me wrong, I would happily fuck you again on that counter, right here right now, but you did just lose your virginity…"
"Yeah...but it didn't hurt at all. And I didn't...um...bleed, right?" she blushed as she realized she was talking to him of all people about such a private thing. But, maybe he thought she wasn't a virgin after all! Maybe he was joking around to cover up how hurt he was because he thought she'd been screwing around on him! Kyoko went pale.
"BUT I SWEAR TO GOD THAT WAS REALLY MY FIRST TIME! I HAVE ONLY EVER BEEN WITH YOU! I HAVE NO IDEA WHY I DIDN'T BLEED!"
Kuon looked like a deer in headlights. It had been a while since he'd been witness to one of her completely non sequitur outbursts. Heaven help him, he'd even missed those. "Uh, yeah. I didn't think you had. Calm down."
Kyoko's body slumped as she relaxed. "Okay. Great. Just...making sure. I mean I'm glad I got to skip the painful bit, but I wonder why…"
Kuon furrowed his brows and turned to leave the bathroom, returning shortly with his phone in his hand. "I don't know, but I'll look it up…"
Kyoko snatched the phone out of his hand, clutching it to her chest to keep it away from him as she blushed fiercely.
Which just gave him more incentive to steal it back, honestly. He suddenly envied his phone, nestled securely in her cleavage. On second thought, she could keep it. It clearly had a better life now.
"No! I'll look it up! You go get my bag!"
Kuon opened his mouth to argue, so she pulled out her recently acquired Hizuri puppy dog eyes and turned them on him without mercy. To her utter astonishment and growing excitement, he melted immediately. He turned away so quickly she didn't know if she'd really seen a blush on his face or not.
"Okay. I'll go get your bag. And then we'll figure it out together when I get back."
Kyoko nodded and he left the bathroom. Before she'd even had time to set his phone somewhere safe and close the door, he was dressed and striding out of the hotel room.
She watched him go with a little envy.
"I wonder if he'd teach me how to change clothes that quickly if I asked him…" she mused to the now empty room.
Kuon bounced on the balls of his feet in the elevator, cursing himself that he hadn't called down to the front desk ahead so they could bring his car around before he got there.
But even that thought couldn't keep the blindingly happy grin off his face for more than a few seconds.
Because he'd just had sex.
With Kyoko.
He'd just had sex with Kyoko.
Who was naked and waiting for him upstairs.
Because they just had sex. With each other.
And were probably definitely going to do it again when he got back.
Because now their relationship included seeeeeeeex.
Yep. That was never going to get old.
Ever.
Life was finally going right for him. The world was golden and bright. His relationship was perfect. Kyoko was 100% going to say yes when he proposed to her, and they were going to make Hollywood their eternal bitch and live happily ever after.
And fuck like animals on every surface of their home. If everything went as planned.
Or his parents' house in the meantime. He felt fairly confident in his ability to get Kyoko on board with that...
After all, he had a list of positions longer than his resume that he wanted to try with her and time was a-wasting!
Kuon strode out of the elevator on a Kyoko-scented cloud.
He didn't notice that his shirt was mis-buttoned and open enough to reveal three of the five hickeys decorating his neck and shoulders, but the bitchy receptionist and the newly arrived night concierge waiting in the otherwise empty lobby noticed immediately.
"Hi. I'm sorry, but we forgot to grab something out of the car. Can you have the valet bring it around for a minute?" he asked brightly.
They both stared silently back at him, entranced by his euphoric, disheveled state.
Kuon stared back in silence for a hot second, but didn't have the patience to wait the requisite amount of time it usually took women (or in cases like this, one woman and one pristinely-groomed man) to recover from the effect of his presence. He had to get back to the room. Where the sex happened.
"Nevermind. I'll just go ask him myself."
The two starstruck hotel employees helplessly watched him go. The concierge regained use of his vocal cords first.
"I'm assuming that walking peach emoji was him, right?"
The receptionist nodded. "Yeah. That's Kuu Hizuri's seriously fuckable progeny."
"And how long has it been since they went up?"
"Maybe an hour, if that?"
"Hot damn. Now I really wish I could see the girl who's drinking him up! She must be hella great in bed to make someone working with a face and body like his, act like that."
The receptionist agreed, but couldn't bring herself to say it aloud.
The two of them watched him through the windows until his car arrived and started drooling when he leaned over to get the bags out of the trunk, his beltless jeans slipping down his hips just enough to show that there was a very high chance he wasn't wearing anything under them.
"I don't know if I'm more jealous of her man or her luggage! Who the hell is the lucky bitch?" The concierge asked as Kuon took long-legged strides across the lobby, carrying the matching Louis Vuitton tote bag and suitcase in one arm, like they weighed nothing. His audience leaned over the desk to keep him in view, just in time to catch a last glimpse of his tight denim-clad ass before he disappeared through a door next to the elevators. "Did he just take the freaking stairs!? What floor are they on?"
The receptionist's mouth fell open. "They're in room 790."
The concierge's eyes narrowed. "Fuck. There's no way one little girl can keep up with that kind of stamina. I wonder if he swings both ways...maybe he's got a waiting list where I can sign up to ride..."
"I doubt it. He could barely keep his eyes off her. And she didn't seem like the sharing type."
"Okay, now I have got to see this bitch. I'll stick around after my shift. In this town, there's no way a Hizuri is fucking below his weightclass."
The receptionist nodded. "Yeah, maybe you'll recognize her. I couldn't place her, but there's no way a normal girl has an A-lister like him wrapped so securely around her finger, even if she's got a magical wish-granting vagina. Which I seriously doubt."
The concierge gave her a knowing look. "Girl, you want me to get you some jars for all that jelly?"
"Bite me, Alejandro."
"No thank you. If I wanted to taste salty bitches like you, I'd still be straight."
Kuon raced up the last flight of stairs, relishing the burn in his legs. Running up seven flights of stairs with Kyoko's bags was nothing if it got him back in time to see her in the shower. If their interlude in the elevator earlier had taught him nothing else, it was that the elevators in this hotel were slow as fuck.
He'd spent weeks in the back of Cain's mind being tortured as he listened to the water running over her naked body, and now he was finally in a position to act on the many fantasies he'd suppressed from that time.
The sound of the still running shower when he walked into the room was music to his ears. Dropping her bigger bag off next to the bed, he whisked the other bag straight into the tiny room without knocking, dropping it on the counter. Then he quietly pulled back the shower curtain to take in the view
Kyoko had her eyes closed and was rinsing her hair, her back arched gracefully as her hands combed through her golden locks. He loved her with any hair color, but a little part of him kind of liked it that they matched. Drops of water raced each other down her skin, catching the light and making her sparkle with every movement.
"Thank God for stairs," Ren intoned reverently in his head.
"Ditto," Katsuki added.
"What he said," Cain agreed.
"What? You wanna join me?" Kyoko asked, eyes still closed as she washed the hotel provided conditioner out of her hair. He'd been careful to be quiet, but somehow, she still knew he was standing there.
He grinned, already shucking his clothes. "Well, if I wasn't cooking, I'd love to."
Kyoko's head snapped up and her eyes popped open to glare at him just as he kicked off his jeans and stepped in to join her, sporting a perfect impression of her maid-spirit face.
"Shut up! I still can't believe I did that!" Kyoko exclaimed, slapping his arm, but letting him under the spray with her. He was so tall that he had to bend his head to get it under the water, and then when he had, he managed to block almost all of it from getting to her. She pouted.
"Well you're no fun to shower with. Luckily I'm almost done, so I'll just get out and you can have it to yourself."
Kuon swiftly encircled her waist with his arms and locked her into place against his chest.
"Oh no you don't. I've waited way too long for this to have you run away."
Kyoko tilted her head back until she could see him, hoping he would believe the red of her skin was from the hot water and not the fact she could feel every hard, muscular inch of him pressed up against her back. When he was sure she wasn't going anywhere, he grabbed the hotel provided bath pouf and lathered it up with a bar of soap so small it disappeared when he held it.
"Aren't you going to wash your hair?" Kyoko asked, looking at the dulled, wet strands sticking to his neck.
Kuon shrugged, drawing the soapy pouf over her shoulders and squeezing so suds were released to drip down her body. He'd never seen anything quite so captivating as the little soap bubbles sliding down her skin.
"Maybe after I finish washing you…"
Kyoko turned around to face him, noticing his whole abdomen go tense when her soap-slicked chest slid over it.
"I'm already clean though...so can I wash your hair for you?"
His eyebrows went up. "Sure, if you really want to."
Kyoko beamed up at him and immediately went into bossy mode, grabbing the tiny bottle of shampoo and spinning them around so she could properly get his hair wet.
"Close your eyes or I'm going to get shampoo in them," she scolded, pouring viscous shimmering liquid into her palm.
"But then I'd have to stop looking at you. What if you run away while my eyes are closed?"
Kyoko snorted and dragged him toward her out of the water, reaching up to massage his locks and scalp with strong, sudsy fingers. "I'm not going anywhere. I've...kind of wanted to do this for a long time too..."
He obediently closed his eyes and focused on the soothing feeling of her fingers. "Washing my hair? Seriously?"
"And your back…" Kyoko added quietly, easing him back under the water, pleased that his body moved with her hands at the slightest suggestion of pressure. It showed how much he really trusted her. She washed out the shampoo and slicked back his hair, pulling him out of the water. "You can open your eyes again."
Kuon brought a hand up to wipe away the water before opening his eyes, which quickly found her face again as he held out the soapy pouf he still held. "Well, might as well do my back then too."
She waited for him to turn around, but he refused to budge, his grin getting wider every second. She flushed as she wondered if he knew this was something Japanese women did for their husbands… She sort of hoped he did.
"I can't wash your back like this."
"Sure you can, just reach around me and wash it. Nothing to it. I've got scratches back there as proof that you can reach it just fine from the front."
Kyoko bit her lip to combat the weakness his playful smirk sent right to her knees. Well, two could play at that game.
"Fine."
She started at his belly button, running the pouf in a downward arc before heading straight up his chest, thoroughly spreading the foamy bubbles across his broad shoulders before reaching under his arms to start the task of soaping up his back.
Kuon swallowed as she pressed her body into his abdomen, the feeling of her slick chest smooshed up against him making his cock, erect and blissfully trapped between them, even harder. She raised herself up on her toes to reach the back of his neck and his hands immediately settled on either side of her waist, in case she slipped. They tightened as she slid slowly back down, making him feel every inch of her along the way as she serpentined the soap onto his back.
Kuon bent his head until his lips brushed her ear, the water spraying across his back, quickly ridding his skin of suds.
"All done?"
"Yes," she replied happily, dropping the pouf onto the little shelf where she'd found it.
Kuon reached behind him and shut off the water as he licked up the tiny droplets of water that were clinging to her ear.
"Mmmmm, delicious."
Kyoko laughed. "It's just tap water."
"No. Now it tastes like you. They could bottle this and make millions," he insisted, kissing off more of the liquid clinging to her neck.
"I seriously doubt that."
"They could call it Kyoko Juice...wait, no, actually they definitely shouldn't call it that…"
Kyoko steeled herself against the butterflies he was rousing in her stomach and shoved back the curtain, stepping out of the shower and grabbing a towel for herself before tossing one to Kuon. She wrinkled her nose as she replied.
"Because it's a really stupid name?"
Kuon scrubbed the towel over his hair and quickly over his body, without looking away from Kyoko as she carefully dried herself off and twisted her towel efficiently around her head. He was amazed how flawless her skin was. With how often he knew she went charging through bushes or throwing herself into a dogeza, he would have expected something to scar.
"Yeah. That and because it would make it even harder to keep men off you."
"Why? Kyaaaaah!" Kyoko squealed as he lifted her up and set her on the bathroom counter. "Kuon! What-"
"Because every time they drank it, men would be thinking about," he continued, his hands sliding from her waist to her thighs as he sank to his knees. "Doing this to you."
He gently pried her knees apart and pulled her to the edge of the counter, maintaining eye contact as he kissed her inner thigh.
"Th-this?" she whispered, her heart doing its best to find a way out of her chest.
Kuon lifted her legs over his shoulders, forcing her body to lean back slightly against the foggy mirror behind her, because even kneeling, his shoulders were well above the height of the counter.
"This," he confirmed, gently spreading her folds with his fingers and leaning forward to swirl his tongue where Kyoko thought no tongue would ever swirl.
So it really can't be helped that she reacted by inhaling half the air in the room.
Which Kuon took as positive reinforcement, so he proceeded accordingly.
Not that he had any intention of stopping. He was eager to tick #14 off his list. Granted, he'd always imagined it on his apartment kitchen counter...with Kyoko in nothing but an apron…
But naked was always good too. When it came to Kyoko, he wasn't picky. She looked fantastic in anything.
Or nothing...
...
Oral sex was like nothing Kyoko had ever felt before.
On the one hand, it was really, REALLY embarrassing, because she was practically spread-eagled in a hotel bathroom with Tsuruga Ren's face all up in her cooch.
On the other hand, she was practically spread-eagled in a hotel bathroom with Tsuruga Ren's face all up in her cooch.
Which had her mentally drafting the doctrine of a new religion worshipping his tongue, mouth, lips...hell, really everything in that general region. Because the heavenly workings of his mouth could only be described as a profoundly religious experience.
Sure, it would be a niche faith with only one accepted follower (despite extensive, almost insurmountable competition), but she would more than make up for its lack of members with her devotion, worshipping daily (or even hourly if necessary) at the altar of his godly lips.
It was somewhat ironic that he was the one on his knees when it was her crying out in gratitude for his divine blessings, but she was more than willing to overlook it in favor of…
JESUS FUCKING CHRIST THAT FEELS AMAZING!
...
Wait...What was she thinking about again?
Her legs strained against his broad shoulders as he used them to wedge her legs wider. Her fingers clung to his damp locks as her last anchor to the temporal realm and she was vaguely aware she should feel ashamed that her hips were rocking against his perfect face all on their own.
Because she was practically riding the face of Japan's Prince-fucking-Charming! There was just something so right...wait, no! WRONG. There was something so wrong about that...
Or not...because nothing that felt so miraculous could be wrong...right?
In her giddy, lightheaded state, she wondered if Cinderella ever got this kind of treatment from her Prince Charming.
Maybe the storybooks stopped after the wedding because what came after that was too graphic for little ears.
Maybe 'happily ever after' was just code for 'and then they fucked like bunnies and the prince ate her out until she turned into a royal puddle of goo, every day, until the day that they died...from too many consecutive orgasms'.
Maybe princes were just inherently better at stuff like this... Like, it came with the package: royal title, gorgeous castle, noble steed, a battalion of servants, and a magical tongue that could elicit multiple orgasms a night.
Suddenly the desperate hoards of single women who showed up at the ball looked a lot less pathetic. If she knew this kind of service was on the line, she would have been willing to do a whole lot more than just put on a fancy dress and beg for a chance to dance with him.
Maybe Cinderella's step sisters hadn't been evil...just thirsty for a royal tonguing.
Kyoko immediately regretted what her imagination had conjured. Now she would never be able to see a picture of a prince kneeling in front of a princess again without thinking of Kuon's head between her legs, humming happily into her nether regions like he was in a freaking Campbell's soup commercial.
Mmm. Mmmm. Good.
If I told him that, he would tease me for...the rest...of...our...HOLY-
And that was the point at which Kyoko's brain short-circuited and the extent of her mental vocabulary narrowed down to combinations of 'Oh God!', 'Kuon!','Yes!', and 'Fuck, do that again' (in multiple languages...it being Kyoko).
Kuon felt Kyoko's fingers tighten almost painfully in his hair and sucked hard on her clit, making her muscles clamp down on the fingers he had curled inside of her. He knew she was so close now.
Just a little more… and...
Her climax hit her swift and strong and then words ceased to have meaning, her orgasm temporarily erasing all memory of all alphabets. Among other things.
Like her name.
And why the hell she hadn't begged him to do this to her a year ago.
When she became aware of her surroundings again, she was back in bed, beginning anew to mentally catalog the pros and cons of a boneless, nudist life. She was starting to think heaven was probably just a sexed up nudist colony at this point.
"Am I dead?"
She heard muffled laughter from the direction of the bathroom and turned her head just enough to see Kuon poke his head out, a toothbrush sticking out of his mouth.
"I'm not a doctor, but I don't think dead people can scream quite that loudly," he answered drily after spitting in the sink. "However, if you're still not sure, I would be happy to conduct a more thorough examination."
"Is it even possible to be more thorough than you just were?" she inquired with a deep blush.
Kuon narrowed his eyes like he was thinking about it, then smiled cheekily, and headed back into the bathroom. "I don't think so, but there's always room for improvement."
Kyoko sighed blissfully. "Amen, kamisama."
"What now?" He leaned out again.
"Nothing." Kyoko eyed his toothbrush. "Did it...taste that bad?"
Kuon cocked an eyebrow, glanced down at his toothbrush, and then shook his head with a smirk. "I assure you, it did not. I just usually brush my teeth before I go to bed."
"Oh...right." Kyoko closed her eyes, suddenly feeling just how long her day had been. She had decided turning her head to check the clock was against her new way of life. But if she had to guess, it was probably close to three o'clock in the morning…
"Well, and I wanted to try something."
Which meant she'd been awake for...more than 32 hours straight now...they should really go to sle-
Kyoko's eyes popped open as something warm and cold at the same time enveloped her nipple.
"Kyaaah! What the hell?!"
Kuon gave her breast another pepperminty lick before darting away to avoid being hit as she sat up and took a swing at his head. "Well, that reaction was even better than I thought it would be…"
Kyoko just stared at him, dumbfounded at how different Kuon was from the always mature and polite Ren. The Never Late King would never run around a hotel room pulling pranks in his boxer briefs. He had way too much pride and dignity for something like that.
"How have you acted as Ren all these years? The real you is so different."
Kuon's smile fell a little. "We're not that different…I mean, you understand, don't you? Every successful character comes from a part of who you already are. He's just...the more mature side of me."
"OH! I didn't mean that in a bad way! You're different, but I like this version of you better...because you seem so much happier."
Kuon's face softened as he carefully sat on the bed beside her and gently brushed her hair out of her face. "I think Ren's just a little out of his depth. He didn't have much to be happy about until he met you, so he's not too great at showing it."
"You know...you don't have to put on that act all the time anymore. Your fans would love the real you too."
"I'm not so sure about that…they sure didn't before."
"I'm positive you had plenty of fans as Kuon Hizuri too. But that doesn't matter. That was then, this is now. You won't know until you try."
"True." Kuon bit his tongue not to say too much. Because if he told her the plans he had concerning his identity reveal, it would ruin everything he had planned for the next few days.
Kyoko got the impression she'd pushed the topic as far as she could, so she kissed him on the cheek and smiled softly at him. "Now get out of my way please, so I can go get dressed."
"Nope. Didn't I tell you? This is a no clothes allowed hotel room."
"Come on, at least underwear! You get to wear yours!" Kyoko pouted.
Kuon made a show of thinking about it. "Fine, but I get to pick."
Kyoko blushed with a pout. "Fine."
His happy smile back in place, Kuon moved to help her up and Kyoko, with one arm modestly covering her chest, opened up her suitcase and threw what was left of her clean underwear onto the bed.
"Make it quick. We should really get to sleep soon if we're going to wake up in time for checkout tomorrow."
Kuon obliged, plucking a pair of Setsu's black ero-kawaii panties from the bottom of the pile and holding them out to her on the end of a long finger she was pretty sure had been inside of her multiple times in the last hour.
God, was this what she was going to think about every time she saw his hands now?
Kyoko turned even redder and took them from him, turning her back as she slid the strappy black mesh cheekies up her legs. When she was done, she crossed her arms over her chest but didn't turn around, for some reason feeling more embarrassed in just her panties than when she was naked.
"When did you buy those?"
"About two weeks into playing Setsu."
Kuon swallowed hard. "You were wearing stuff like that...the whole time?"
"Most of the time. Some days I was already wearing my Natsu underwear, so I just left that on."
Kuon wondered if she had different underwear for every one of her characters...and was really looking forward to a life of seeing them all...if she said yes that is.
Kyoko could feel his body heat radiating off him as he came up behind her and ghosted his fingers down her sides until they hit black spandex. Then they traced the lower edge of the garment in a curve over her butt and back again to the front following the crease of her thighs.
All of her exhaustion disappeared as his body leaned closer, their bodies pressed together in a way that made it obvious just how much he liked Setsu's taste in lingerie.
"You up for one more round?" he whispered in her ear, his fingers already seeking out the slick heat between her legs.
"...oh, what the hell. Who needs sleep anyway?"
Alejandro looked at the clock and then back over at the receptionist beside him.
"Dammit, are they even gonna make check out time? My skin is losing its glow by the minute. This perfection doesn't happen without at least six solid hours of sleep a day!"
"And a fortune in cosmetics."
"Don't I know it."
The receptionist brought up her call log and frowned at the screen.
"They ordered breakfast three hours ago, the guy came by with his clothes more than an hour ago, they called down for the valet to get their car twenty minutes ago, and it's only three minutes until checkout, so they should be here any minute."
The elevator dinged and their heads snapped sideways, their jaws slowly dropping as a young blonde woman with her hair in a french braid, wearing a well-fitted tea-length sundress (sporting an explosion of colorful full-ground crewel embroidery that screamed 'branded merch') skipped out of the elevator on stiletto heels to get away from the hand that had clearly just been grabbing her butt.
"Kuon!" she squealed quietly as she spun around and held out her hands to ward off further attacks. "Stop it! We're in public now!"
Kuon Hizuri, looking like he'd stepped right out of a magazine in dark slim fit jeans, a white linen button-down with navy gingham lining the collar and cuffs, and a pair of Italian loafers, chased after her and looped the arm not holding her luggage around her waist, snugly tucking her into his side before turning them towards the front desk and exit.
"Please, this is barely public." His fingers played with the stitching on a red poppy covering her hip, seeing if he could figure out what kind of underwear she was wearing that day by feel or not. Despite all logical, and what he considered very compelling, arguments, she had insisted on getting dressed in the bathroom. Which might have had something to do with him reversing her attempts the first three times she tried to get dressed...
"It's public enough! Do you have the room keys?"
"I told you we could just leave them in the room." He took his arm reluctantly off her to pull the cards out of his pocket, handing them to her.
"But this is more polite," she replied stubbornly. Kuon just sighed and smiled smittenly at her as she hurried away.
The hotel employees had just enough time to adopt polite smiles and pretend to be busy as the blonde woman they'd been speculating about all night stepped over to them and snapped the cards down onto the counter.
"Room 790 checking out," she said crisply with a professional smile, her eyes flashing for a moment with surprise and pleasure as she felt Kuon's lips brush her neck. Alejandro's eyes widened as he immediately recognized her, while the receptionist glared openly.
Kyoko didn't notice, too busy fake pouting up at Kuon.
"Really?" she sighed dramatically. "Can't you even wait until we get to the car?"
"I told you, five minutes is too long."
"It hasn't even been five minutes since…" Kyoko was suddenly very aware of their rapt audience, turning a charming shade of pink that matched a satin-stitched carnation on her shoulder. "...the elevator."
Kuon grinned and kissed her neck again before straightening. "That doesn't count…"
"Maybe you should have given them the honeymoon suite…" Alejandro muttered under his breath to his companion a little too loud.
Kuon's eyes snapped back over to them and the receptionist felt like a deer in headlights. Bright green, incredibly sexy headlights.
He'd volunteer as roadkill for high beams like that.
"Thanks for the suggestion. We'll be sure to request that room if we ever come back."
Then he put on the Versace sunglasses hanging from his collar and flashed one last panty-dropping smile their way before escorting Kyoko out to their waiting car.
"Do you think anyone would notice if I kidnapped her and took her place?" the receptionist asked hopelessly.
"Not likely sweetheart. Aside from what Mr. Horny as Fuck over there would think, I'm pretty sure Valentino would have something to say about that. Maybelline too."
"...what? Why?"
"Because that was Kyoko Mogami. She's in that new edgy ad for Valentino's perfume that went viral, and Maybelline just signed her as the new face of their Fresh Faces line. How the hell did you not realize it was her?! She's like the hottest new girl in town!"
"She looked different yesterday! She didn't have hardly any makeup on and she was wearing normal clothes!"
"Well, I guess I can't blame you. She is a chameleon actress. My Tuesday hookup is super into Japanese cinema and he can't shut up about her work there too, so I've seen most of her stuff. It's almost creepy how different she looks in every role."
"Well...fuck."
Alejandro gingerly patted her shoulder. "Oh honey, you never had a chance to begin with. The real travesty is that I didn't think to ask for her autograph. Lee's gonna beat my ass when he finds out...and not in the good way."
"...What do you think they did in the elevator?"
"Oh, Babygirl, don't even go there. That's a one-way road to the Emerald City."
"...what?"
"Jealousy! Green with envy? Emerald City? Ug, is there no one who can keep up with my voracious wit?"
"Nope. Now go the fuck home. Your gorgeous unattainable face is just making me more depressed."
Kuu Hizuri put up a cool and collected facade as he scanned the restaurant for the 80th time and turned back to his wife.
"But they didn't come home at all last night, and now they're late for lunch! What if something happened to them? What if they were kidnapped and smuggled out of the country? What do we do then?!"
"Pfft. Call down, sweetheart," Julie laughed, picking up her phone from beside her crystal water glass. "See? Kyoko messaged me this morning! They're fine. They just needed some alone time."
Kuu's brain went from one panic mode into another. "Alone time? I know what that's code for! She's seventeen years old! What is Kuon thinking? She's not ready for that!"
"Darling, Sweetie Pie, Honey-Bunches-of-Oats...they're both adults, and fairly responsible ones at that. Not only are they older than when we started fooling around, but I happen to know they're being a hell of a lot safer about it than we were, so maybe you should put your big boy pants on and suck it up that our kiddos are all grown up and can take care of themselves. After all, if everything goes well, they'll be engaged by the end of the week."
"But how?! How did they grow up so fast?! It was only yesterday, they were this big!" Kuu held his hands about a foot apart.
"Honey, we didn't even know Kyoko when she was that tiny, and I'm pretty sure Kuon popped out of me at least two inches taller than that."
"Well, fine, but we haven't gotten to spend even a year with Kyoko, and we just got Kuon back, and now he's gonna go out and leave us again!"
"You think I don't know that?!" Julie exclaimed, her own helicopter parent instincts cracking through her thinly veiled facade of calm. "They're my babies and for all we know they're going to think we're too clingy and decide to live in Japan instead of here with us! We've gotta stay cool, okay? Just, stay...cool. You're a goddamned award winning actor with millions of fans in multiple countries! It should be cake to keep your son from hating you!"
Julie let out a frustrated sigh and pushed the fear grudge that had popped out of her shoulder in response to her husband's tiny mental breakdown back into her body. The last thing they needed was Kyoko seeing that from across the restaurant and asking her about it. She was having a harder and harder time when she tried to lie to that child's pure golden eyes.
"Okay. We need to pull ourselves together. They're just a little late for lunch and that's no reason for us to freak out. Kuon has never been good at showing up on time."
"I know! Did I tell you they call Tsuruga the 'Never Late King'? If I hadn't have witnessed it myself, I'd never believe Kuon could manage it! But then, our boy is capable of anything if he puts his mind to it!"
"Damn straight he is. Which is why I'm sure they're fine...but why don't you give them a call and see what's keeping them and I'll order an appetizer?" Julie suggested, picking up the menu with one hand and flagging down one of the servers standing in a gaggle across the room and trying to look casual as they stared at their table.
"Good plan," Kuu agreed, digging his phone out of his pocket.
But just before he connected the call, they heard a commotion at the front of the restaurant and Kyoko was skipping over to their table, waving brightly.
"Hi guys! Sorry we're late. We overslept a bit and then there was a huge pileup on the interstate, so we had to take the long way around. I hope you haven't been waiting long!"
As it always did, Kyoko's sunny smile had the Hizuris relaxed and smiling in a matter of moments.
"Not at all, kiddo," Kuu said, getting up to wrap Kyoko in a huge bear hug that she enthusiastically returned. "Where did you lose that wayward son of mine? Is he still parking?"
Kyoko shook her head. "No. The hostess fainted when he smiled at her, which caused a bit of a commotion, so he sent me ahead while he's handling that."
Julie sighed wistfully as she claimed Kyoko for her own, more gentle hug. "Ah, I miss those days. You know I'm not allowed to attend the Olympics anymore after the time the Korean relay team had to forfeit due to all the concussions…"
"What?" Kyoko asked Kuu around her shoulder, having found very early on in their relationship that it was quicker to have Kuu paraphrase than let Julie go off on a tangent.
"The team was warming up on a raised platform, and your mother here was visiting the friend of a friend on the next track over wearing a mini skirt. Her bare legs alone are enough to cause general rioting, but then a gust of wind blew just as she passed them and they fell head first off of the platform trying to catch a glimpse."
"Ah, but you forgot the best part about the story, Dad," Kuon chimed in as he came up beside Kyoko and rested a hand on her back.
"That's right! Hello, my dearest darlingest son!" Julie declared, leaning forward to kiss her son on the cheek before picking up the narrative. "The best part of the story was how the team coach, who hadn't been there with them, got steaming mad about it and tracked me down to our hotel room to rail at me about what I'd done, but ending up proposing instead!"
"There's no way that's true!" Kyoko exclaimed, looking to Kuon and Kuu for backup. Both shook their heads.
"100% true kiddo. He's still officially the shortest grown man to ever propose to my beautiful wife, and Julie is officially banned from attending all Olympic events now and in the future. For the safety of the athletes," Kuu confirmed.
"But," Kuon added, naturally falling into the Hizuri rhythm of group storytelling he'd grown up with. "The Olympic Commission sends a huge gift basket to her to apologize every year."
"Even though I don't follow sports at all! I was only there in the first place doing a favor for my friend, so I always feel bad that they go to so much trouble. At least until I get the basket. They send the best wine..." Julie finished, sitting back down and dropping her napkin into her lap with a flourish.
By now, the lucky server who had responded to her hail (before being ignored when Kyoko and Kuon showed up and standing dumbfounded as he shamelessly listened to their conversation), didn't know how to get their attention. Fortunately, Kyoko noticed his predicament.
"Excuse me, can you please tell me what the soup of the day is?" she asked politely with a warm, sympathetic smile, doing her best to exude calm and friendliness.
The server opened his mouth to answer her, got lost in her eyes, and forgot to breathe. The next thing she knew he had passed out, taking down a busser's tray of dishes along the way.
Kyoko was so shocked she couldn't rehinge her jaw, let alone help the poor boy up until there were other employees swarming over to clean up the mess.
Across the table, Kuu burst out into a hearty belly laugh. "Guess that makes it official, kiddo. You're definitely Hizuri material."
Kyoko blushed and immediately started apologizing to the other servers who were helping up their friend, and if it hadn't been for the bright, yet menacing, smile Kuon was leveling at them from behind her back, they probably would have ended up as smitten as the poor sod on the floor.
In the end, the manager had to take their orders, and they had to make a point to avoid eye contact with the servers who carried out their food, but Kyoko loved every minute of it.
It felt like they really were a family...like she was part of something really special that only this special family could ever experience. And she fit right into the space they'd made for her like she'd been there her whole life. The feeling gave her a glow that lit her up from the inside out.
As a result, every man within eyesight seemed unable to choose who to look at more, Julie, or the girl they mistook for her daughter.
All except Kuon, who could barely stand to look away from Kyoko at all. A highlight reel of the best moments from the last twelve hours was running on repeat through his head, and instead of curbing the craving he'd been trying to kick for the last few months, it just made him want more. If the men watching her had bothered to look at him, the expression on his face as he mechanically ate every last bite of food on his plate would have been more than enough to confirm that she was definitely not his sister.
After lunch, they thanked the owner (who insisted on seeing how their meal was personally), took a quick picture with all the employees as an apology for bewildering their staff, and, since Julie and Kuu had sent their driver home so the four of them could spend the drive back together, piled into the Benz..
"Finally some peace and quiet," Kuon sighed,closing his eyes and rubbing the bridge of his nose. "American fans are so much more invasive than the Japanese ones. Thank god it's been long enough that most of them don't remember 'Kuon Hizuri'."
"Are we heading home now?" Kyoko asked, taking his hand, but directing her question to Kuu in the driver's seat.
Kuon stared down at their intertwined fingers, noticing just how tiny her fingers were compared to his. She was so small and delicate, yet never wanted anyone's help or protection. She never wanted to owe anything to anyone or depend on something that would disappear when she needed it most. It drove him crazy as the one struggling to work his way inside the solid bubble of protection she'd built around her heart after that musician jackass had stomped all over it. He wanted so badly to be the one thing in her life that would never let her down, and here she was naturally comforting him yet again.
"That's the plan, unless there's somewhere else you kids would like to go first."
"That sounds good to me," Kyoko replied, glancing at Kuon for affirmation. However, he stayed silent, unusually removed from his surroundings. She wondered what he was thinking about so intently, but didn't want to tip off his parents and spur what would sure to be an invasive round of endless questions. Maybe he was just tired.
Kyoko blushed. She knew firsthand just how little sleep he had gotten the night before...and why.
Kuon remained distant most of the drive, while Kyoko entertained Kuu and Julie with anecdotes of her short visit to Japan, including Sho's father's attempts to give Sho a rematch in Ryokan Stadium to regain his honor, and the ruckus greeting she'd received when she showed up for finals, her classmates inexplicably having transformed into ravenous fans. It was only right before the turn just past the little park where Kuon had learned to drive when he spoke up, his deep voice easily cutting through their happy chatter.
"Hey, Dad, can you drop us off at the house?"
They all stopped talking for a beat, Kyoko due to the slightly confusing question (weren't they all going to the house already?), and the Hizuris because they knew what he was actually saying.
"Right now? You sure?" Kuu asked casually, meeting his son's eye in the rear view mirror with a raised brow.
"Yeah. Right now."
"Okay then."
In the passenger seat, Julie's hands clenched around her purse like she was wringing out a wet rag as she traded an excited look with her husband.
Kuu drove past the turn off that would lead to the Hizuri estate and a little further down the road before turning down a different winding road, surrounded by even more dense vegetation than the entrance to the Hizuri driveway.
"Um, sorry, but...where are we going?" Kyoko asked, feeling like she missed something important.
Kuon squeezed her hand. "You'll see. Just wait for a bit, okay?"
She looked up at him and slowly nodded. "Okay..."
She didn't have to wait for too long. The heavy foliage gave way much sooner than she expected to an ornate metal gate much older than the Hizuris'. Kuon rolled down his window and leaned out, able to enter the code even from the backseat with his long arms. The gates swung open and they drove through, entering a small courtyard just big enough to swing the car around in front of a beautiful old limestone manor house.
"Wow," Kyoko breathed, her mind already picturing fairies fluttering around the vines artfully growing up the side of the house or lounging in the small pond supplied by a tiny waterfall to the right of the main entrance. It was a large house, almost as big as the Hizuris' home, but it didn't share the feeling of chic grandiosity that theirs did. Every detail, down to the large wooden door painted a deep green, felt warm and earthy and inviting.
"What a beautiful house!"
Kuon got out of the car and walked around to help her out of the car, gently urging her forward ahead of him. Behind her back, Kuon held out his hand through his mother's open window until she pulled a keyring out of her purse and dropped it into his hand.
"And the backup copies," he murmured quietly.
Julie narrowed her eyes and pulled another keyring out with six more copies of the key dangling from the first one. "Spoil sport."
"Thank you. We'll be back in time for dinner," Kuon said firmly, his fist clenching around the keys in his hand.
Julie teared up and Kuu nodded proudly. "Good luck."
Kuon leaned over so he could look both of his parents in the eye, the smile lighting up his face reminding them of a side of him they hadn't seen in a very long time. "Thanks. See you later."
Kuu and Julie stayed just long enough to watch Kuon coax Kyoko away from her thorough exploration of the pond and into the house before slowly circling around and out of the courtyard.
"I thought he wasn't doing it until tomorrow…" Julie finally said.
Kuu shrugged. "Me too. I guess something changed."
"I wish we could be there," Julie whined, turning in her seat to watch the retreating house as though she could see through the walls.
"You know that's not his style. He's always been a more private sort of person than you or I. Besides, she'll tell us all about it later, even if he won't, so let's give them some space." Kuu turned out of the driveway and down the road that led to their own sprawling estate. "Well as much space as we can living right next door."
"He's grown up so much in the last five years. It's like we hardly know him anymore."
"Speaking of which…" Kuu pulled to a stop at a stop sign before turning to his wife with bewildered eyes. "DID YOU SEE HOW MUCH HE ATE AT LUNCH?! SHOULD WE BE CONCERNED?!"
"OH MY GOD I KNOW!" Julie replied immediately with equal hysteria. "I THOUGHT I WAS GOING TO DIE OF SHOCK RIGHT THEN AND THERE!"
Meanwhile, as the Hizuris lost their shit, Kyoko stepped onto an intricately designed wooden parquet floor shining with fresh wax, her heels making a satisfyingly resounding click with each step. In front of her, a sweeping staircase spiraled around the wall of the large round-walled entry, a metal railing formed into swirling vines seeming to grow naturally from each smooth stone stair. There were large arching doorways to the right and left, revealing rooms full of windows and intricate moulding, but little-to-no furniture.
It was like she'd entered into a fairytale. She could practically see Cinderella rushing down the stairs after her sisters as they demanded she make their dresses for the ball, or Belle lounging in the window seat, just there to the right, with a book in her hand. Abruptly, Kyoko's fairytale magic switch got flipped and all pretense of maturity disappeared as her eyes grew dewy and round.
"It's so beautiful!" she squealed, dropping her purse on the ground and kicking off her shoes so she could run up the stairs. She made it halfway up before Kuon flipped on the lights and she was captivated by the chandelier made of crystal roses and tiny golden hummingbirds that dominated the air enclosed by the massive spiraling stairs. "Oh my GOD, LOOK AT THIS CHANDELIER!"
She raced back down the stairs to look at it from below, not even noticing her boyfriend leaning against the front door and watching her run around like a kid at Disneyland. But her own curiosity and excitement made it so she couldn't tarry there for long though, and soon he was pushing off the door to follow her. She went through the room with the window seat first, which led to a grand dining room with an antique mirrored ceiling, which led to a butler's pantry, and then the hugest kitchen she'd ever seen.
It was even bigger than the Hizuris'. Unlike the rest of what she'd seen, the kitchen had been renovated very recently, brand new state of the art appliances fitted snugly between smooth, spotless yellow cabinets. She stood in awe, reaching out to barely touch the six-burner gas range covering part of a huge center island, as her eyes gobbled up the mouthwatering view of not two, but three separate convection ovens built into the wall. Right next to what she was pretty sure was a professional brick pizza oven taking up almost half of one wall.
"What do you think?" Kuon asked quietly, coming to stand beside her with his hands tucked in his pockets.
She turned her face up to look at him and he could see that the excitement he associated with six-year-old Kyoko had taken a backseat to something more grounded.
"It's an amazing house, Kuon." Kyoko fought to keep her voice level and calm. Inside, her stomach was churning with butterflies. Kuon hadn't just brought her to visit a beautiful place. This house...there was a purpose behind their visit.
And she could only think of a handful of reasons.
All of which made her heart beat quicker.
"Do you know why we're here?" he asked quietly.
"This is the house Julie bought, isn't it?" Kyoko asked, avoiding his question and his sharp gaze as she started walking around the kitchen again, internally squealing over professional equipment that had no right to be in any reasonable home kitchen.
Despite many proposed outings to explore it over the summer, she had always stubbornly refused to set foot on the property Julie spontaneously bought for her. It was the only thing she could think of at the time to convey to Julie the inappropriateness of giving someone a whole freaking house. But now her heart ached, thinking of what the back garden she could see through the window over the sink must have looked like in the heat of summer. To think that this fairy land had been right next door the whole time.
"It's so different from your parents' house. I thought the houses around here would all look the same."
One corner of Kuon's mouth curled up as he leaned against a section of shiny marble counter and crossed his arms across his chest.
"It's one of the only original houses in the area. At one point, about half of this neighborhood was all part of this estate. It was eventually sold off piecemeal to wealthy celebrities looking to build. A lot of those other houses they first built have even been torn down and remade again, but this one still has the original floor plan and walls, even though a lot of the inside has been updated for convenience and comfort."
"You sound like a tour guide. Or a realtor."
Kuon laughed. "My mom said the same thing. I just like beautiful things with a good story behind them. It was fun researching the history of this place."
"Then I'm glad your mother owns it instead of someone who would tear it down," she replied wistfully, leaving the kitchen to enter a wide room with walls and a ceiling made of glass. There were sheer swags of voile draped across the ceiling panes to temper the brilliant sunlight coming through, but otherwise the room was empty, planes of light and filtered shadow layering over the floor like petals of a wispy flower. "This place deserves to be loved."
She continued on to the next room, with Kuon following silently behind her, glancing around a huge laundry/utility room briefly before continuing through (what she now realized was a large ring of rooms surrounding the entry) into what had to be the library. Here the walls weren't empty, the shelves lining the room packed with books, from paperbacks to old leatherbound volumes. It even had a rolling ladder. She couldn't resist hopping on it and lightly shoving off.
"Actually, my mother doesn't own it anymore," Kuon commented lightly. Kyoko spun to look at him in alarm, almost falling off the ladder, but before she could say anything, he spoke again.
"I do."
Kyoko blinked repeatedly as she looked over at him, eye-level thanks to the rungs beneath her feet. "You do?"
"Yeah. We signed the official papers about a week ago. It was one of the reasons I had to come back early and we missed seeing each other in Japan."
"Oh." Kyoko's head spun with the implications of what he was saying. A part of her stirred in annoyance that he hadn't even discussed it with her. Not that she had any right. It wasn't like they were engaged or anything. And his family all lived in California...maybe he never planned to go back to living in Japan full time. "Kuon, why did you..."
Kuon held out his hand to her, the look in his eyes keeping her from finishing her question. "Can I show you something?
Without hesitation, she placed her hand in his and let him help her down and through the library, then a high-ceiling room with a huge stone fireplace, and finally back to the main staircase. Together they ascended hand in hand. The second floor blossomed out from around the stairs into a series of doors, most of them open (to reveal bedrooms, bathrooms, and a study at first glance), but Kuon didn't stop, going up past them.
"The bedrooms are on that level, but we can explore those a little later. And there's a home theater and gym in the other wings of the house."
"Wings? There's even more?"
"Of course. You've only seen maybe a third of it so far."
Kyoko followed him, picking up her pace as he did, the butterflies under her ribs threatening to break out at any moment. By the time they reached the end of the stairs she was breathing a little hard, but she forgot her discomfort as Kuon flipped on the light. The third floor was one sprawling room dotted by carved wooden columns that melted into intricate ceiling arches over a dark-stained wood floor. Which would have been impressive all on its own if it hadn't been for the murals.
Because she would have sworn she was standing in a magical forest. Paintings covered the walls from the baseboards, not stopping as the canopy extended over the ceiling, some parts of the room with sunshine and clouds behind the branches, and some showing stars.
But what absolutely took her breath away were the fairies. There had to be hundreds of them! They peeked out from between branches, and lounged in clouds. They ran along the baseboards and dove into pools of glistening dew. Her head spun as she tried to see it all at once, but every time she thought she had found them all, another cheeky little imp flitted into her sight.
"It's like a fairy woodland!" she declared, her feet carrying her around the room on the tips of her bare toes so she could take it all in.
"This is why I bought the house. I knew you would absolutely love it."
"I do," she breathed, still lost in the fairy magic. They looked just as she had always imagined. If she didn't know any better, she would swear the artist had been sharing her daydreams.
"Mom thinks it was probably a nursery at one time. It's the only thing that really makes any sense."
After several minutes of straining her neck and making herself dizzy as she tried to follow the artwork on the ceiling, she laid down on the floor, looking upward. She didn't notice Kuon pick up something off the floor by the stairs before he stretched out his long limbs beside her.
"Those kids must have grown up really happy with parents who loved them so much they made this place for them," she whispered, reaching out to take his hand.
"Kyoko." Kuon turned his head so he could see her face.
"Yeah?" She answered, still staring at the world floating above her.
"Will you marry me?"
She turned her head swiftly to look at him with a sharp intake of breath. "What?"
"HE SAID THE MAGIC WORDS!" Six-Year-Old Chibi Kyoko wailed as she ran circles around Kyoko's inner sanctum, hugging every character she met along the way. "WE'RE GONNA MARRY PRINCE CORN!"
"It's happening! It's really happening!" Kuon's Kyoko-chibi hugged Setsu-chibi as the moody brit rolled her eyes.
Kyoko couldn't look away from Kuon's eyes as he rolled to his side and propped himself up on one elbow to look down at her, but she could see fairies popping out of her in all directions from the corner of her eyes and flying around the woodland room made just for them.
"I love you. I want to spend my life running lines with you, and eating your cooking, and listening to you laugh, and watching you freak out over the things that you love. I want to create characters together, and buy you things that make you smile, and hear your voice every night before I go to sleep. I want to support you as you continue to become an even more incredible actress, and stand proudly beside you when you conquer every obstacle in your way. So I don't care where we live, or if we have kids, or how many men I have to physically beat off of you with a stick on a daily basis, I just need you in my life. So, please, grant me this one selfish request and I will do everything I can to make you happy...for as long as we both shall live."
Then, before she could reply, he smiled nervously and held out a small blue leather box.
"But I have to warn you, if you do say yes, you're agreeing to being showered with expensive gifts for the rest of your life. Starting with this...if you'll take it."
With shaking fingers, Kyoko took the box and carefully opened it, revealing a familiar ring with diamonds radiating out like petals nestled in blue velvet. She instantly recognized it.
"Oh my god, it's the ring!" she cried, tears pricking the sides of her eyes as she sat up to look at it more closely, definitively confirming it was, in fact, the ring that had lured her into Harry Winston that day shopping with Kanae. "How did you know?"
"Magic," he said with a twinkle in his eye. "I didn't think you'd accept a dandelion ring this time."
"Well, you're wrong. Because I would have," she said stubbornly, a tear rolling down her cheek. He wiped it away with a trembling finger.
"Please tell me that's a yes."
Kyoko finally tore her eyes away from the ring, meeting his eyes with a watery smile.
"Of course it is, you idiot. I can't imagine my life without you. Why would I ever say no?"
"Oh, thank God!" Kuon collapsed back onto the floor, one hand covering his eyes.
Kyoko gaped at him.
"You didn't really think I would say no, did you?!"
"Kyoko, when it comes to you, anything is possible."
"But I already straight out told you I would say yes if you asked me!"
"Hypothetically! Four months ago! A lot can happen in four months!"
"Wow, you have surprisingly little confidence for the top actor in Japan."
"How are you only now noticing this?" he laughed somewhat hysterically. "You know the distance between my eyebrows by heart, but it somehow slipped your attention that I'm always scared shitless you're going to reject me?"
"That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. You're you and I'm me."
Kuon knew she meant it in a different way, probably yet another way for her to build him up on a pedestal so she could grovel at his feet, but for some reason, those words seemed perfectly...right. He would always just be who he was, and she would be herself. The events of his life had all been leading to this moment, just as hers had led her here. Their future life together just seemed inevitable when he looked at everything they'd gone through.
He moved his hand off his face to find her leaning over him with the cutest little wrinkle in between her brows. He sat up slowly, cradling her cheek and gently kissing her before resting his forehead on hers. He took the ring out of the box and held out his other hand to her.
Holding her breath, Kyoko gave him her left hand and watched as he slid the tiny flower made of diamonds effortlessly into place on her finger.
"Thank you for finding me again and pulling me out of the dark," he said with a glowing smile, kissing her again.
"Thank you for wanting me," she whispered back, looking down at the ring on her hand.
They were silent for a few minutes, taking in the moment, before Kuon sighed.
"We should probably go tell my parents the good news. They were almost more nervous than I was."
Kyoko laughed. "Of course they were."
He got up and helped her to her feet. "We can come back later and explore the house as much as you want. We're gonna have our work cut out for us getting this place furnished before we have to go back to work."
"Wait, we're moving in now?!"
Kuon looked at her in surprise. "Well, yeah. We start filming Violet in less than a week and then we won't have time. Or did you want to live with my parents for another three to six months? "
"But what about after that? What about Japan?"
Kuon smiled softly down at her. "We'll go back whenever we want. Or have work there. Personally, I think my apartment is more than big enough for both of us, but we can look for a better place there too if you want."
That meant he didn't mind if they lived part time in Japan, right?! Kyoko dove forward in a hug, nearly knocking him over. "No, I love your apartment."
"Our apartment," he corrected gleefully. "Like I said, I don't care where we live, as long as it's not with my parents."
"Hey, I like your parents!" She pulled away so she could look him in the eyes to scold him.
"So do I, but I like them much better when our bedrooms don't share walls."
Kyoko opened her mouth to argue, but blushed as she thought of what they had done only that morning...and just how loud she had been.
"You might have a valid point there."
"And it's not like we'll never see them when we're living here..."
"They are right next door."
"Exactly." Kuon took her hands in his.
Kyoko laced their fingers together and looked around with awe again. "Oh my God, I can't believe we're actually going to live here. In this gorgeous fairytale castle."
"It's not a castle, but otherwise, yes."
"I'm going to be cooking in that wonderful kitchen!"
"I sure hope so. It was a fortune to renovate," Ren muttered under his breath. Unfortunately, the room was silent enough that she heard him clearly anyway.
"WHAT?"
"What? I told you that was part of the deal. Nothing but over-the-top, ridiculously expensive gifts from now on."
"But, you remodelled a kitchen for me without even asking me!"
"It has everything Kitchen Stadium does," Kuon cajoled, leaning forward to whisper enticingly in her ear. "Plus a pizza oven, a marble block for rolling out pastry dough and tempering chocolate, and two dishwashers."
Kyoko's eyes shone, totally forgetting to be annoyed. "It does?!"
"Mm-hmm. I also had a room in the east wing redone in traditional Japanese style in case you get homesick or have someone important over for tea."
Happy tears filled her eyes. "Really?"
"Yep. Picked out the tatami mats myself. I also filled the gym with equipment, but that's about as far as my decorating skills extend. I figured I'd let you pick out all of the other furniture and stuff, or it would all end up looking as lifeless as my apartment."
Kyoko pulled her head back to look at him again. "I like your apartment. It just needs…"
"Anything that shows a human being actually lives there?"
"...well, yeah."
"Great, you can redecorate there too." Kuon started walking forward, forcing Kyoko to back up in pace with him.
"Hey, one house at a time mister. Just furnishing this place is going to be a full-time job."
"And you've already got one of those," Kuon reminded her as her back hit the wall and he leaned over her.
"That I do. We'll have to go shopping right away before filming starts."
He leaned down further until he could speak next to her ear, his hands leaving hers to trace up her arms. "That might be the sexiest thing I've ever heard you say."
Kyoko laughed. "That we have to go shopping?"
"Yeah," Kuon purred playfully, dipping his head to kiss her neck. "I especially like the 'we' part. I haven't gotten to take you shopping since we were Cain and Setsu."
"Well," Kyoko hummed back, playing along. "We have a lot to buy after all...tables, chairs, towels...a bed…"
"Are you trying to make me rip your clothes off?" He pressed his hips into hers and Kyoko hitched up her right leg over his hip.
Or rather, tried to, wincing halfway there.
Kuon immediately backed off. "You okay?"
Kyoko nodded, but dropped her leg back down to the floor, avoiding his eyes with a sheepish smile.
"I'm just sore. And this wall is rather hard."
Kuon looked thoughtful, then nodded in determination. "Then, bed shopping the day after tomorrow."
"Why not tomorrow?" Kyoko asked, head tilted sideways in cute confusion.
Kuon laughed and gave her a peck on the now exposed side of her neck. "Because, my darling, tomorrow is Christmas and everywhere is closed."
Kyoko's eyes went wide. "I totally forgot!"
"You forgot that the party you spent months helping my mother plan and you flew the red eye to get here for is tomorrow night?"
"Hey, I'm seriously sleep deprived over here!" She playfully kicked at his shin with her barefoot, but ended up caressing it instead. God, she loved his calves. "Or have you forgotten whose fault that is?"
Kuon wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close as he assaulted her mouth with his tongue. A few minutes later, he pulled away, both of them breathing a little hard. "I assure you. I will never forget that for the rest of my life."
Kyoko blushed, her eyes cutely looking away from him in a fake pout. "Good."
"But, speaking of which...did you ever figure out why you didn't…" Kuon let his sentence dangle, relieved when Kyoko caught on quickly.
"Oh! Yeah, I looked it up earlier. I'm almost positive it was due to how much I ride my bike. I guess that kind of thing happens a lot...and there was this one time…" Her face went super red. "Ahem, uh, yeah, anyway, mystery solved! Perfectly normal!"
"Well, that does make a certain amount of sense I guess. You're like a demon on that thing. Don't you get sore riding it that hard? "
Kyoko averted her eyes, fighting a smirk with her cheeks still ablaze. "Not as much as I do riding you hard."
Kuon's eyes widened, not believing the dirty joke that just came out of his girlfr-wait, no, fiancé's mouth.
"Dammit, I should have at least bought a mattress. Or a couch. Or a chair. Or a fucking yoga mat."
Kyoko bit her lip, letting her eyes slip back to him sidelong through her lashes. "Well...you did mention a home theater, which I assume has some sort of built in seating…right? I'm sure my muscles will feel better if we just warm them up a little first..."
"Who are you, and what have you done with Kyoko? Between the pictures you sent me and your potty mouth, I hardly recognize you!" he joked, playfully biting her neck. "Where did this horny side of you come from?"
"Well, if someone would have sent me any decent pictures back, maybe I wouldn't need to work out quite so much frustration," she rebutted, sliding her hands under his shirt.
"...my apologies. Please accept this body as a means to work out any frustrations I may have caused…" He found the zipper of her dress and dragged the pull down her spine.
"If you insist on repaying me...then I have been wondering what library ladder sex is like ever since I saw Atonement…"
"Sold. " Kuon had her in his arms and across the room before she had time to squeal, taking the stairs two at a time.
Needless to say, they were late to supper.
Aaaaand another 23k over and done in this crazy story...which I thought was going to be a one-shot…
Longwindedness FTW!
Fun fact, girls bust through their hymens all the time before actually having sex. And bike riding is a common cause. As is fingering. As someone who experienced absolutely no pain losing their virginity for that reason, I thought it might be fun to write a first time without the painful bit. Plus, the way Kyoko rides her bike, there's no fucking way she'd still be 'intact', so yay for realism!
Anyway, I'm hard at work on the last chapter already, so as long as Kuon and Kyoko can keep their hands off each other and I don't end up writing another 10k lemon, it should be out soon!
Hope that was enjoyable! Now, go to bed (since I assume it's 1am and you have work/school in the morning) and dream of happily ever afters...or a royal tonguing. Whatever works for you. I won't judge.
Don't forget to drop me a review with any last requests before I wrap this up! I'll do my best to incorporate what I can! And, as some of you have asked/mentioned, there will be an epilogue with a time skip. I'm not sure exactly what direction it will take yet, but you'll definitely get to peek into their later lives.
To those wonderful readers asking me to keep going on this, I'm sorry but I need to bring it to an end! I want to get this one done so I can finish up PAPI...BUT, I may or may not have four chapters already written of another Skip Beat fic ready to go when PAPI's done...because honestly, I'd rather write Kyoko and Ren overcoming their sexual tension a bunch of times instead of writing their continued fluffiness for years into their future. I'm just selfish that way.
Anyway, love you all. You're the best readers ever and I don't deserve you.
Riot out.
