Feel like I'm circling the ending of this "supposed to be a oneshot". Thanks for all the good encouragement!

Disclaimer: see part 1

Kaoru was trying to calm her breathing and stop her leg from twitching as she was waiting for Enishi to make his appearance at their study session. She had been rehearsing her words to herself under her breath ever since she had gotten the package in the mail with the expensive (!) new (!) laptop (!) that shipped with the full invoice showing her Yukishiro had spared absolutely no expense and found the top of the line solid state tech monstrosity to apparently gift to her. When she saw how much he had paid through what she assumed was some sort of shell company, she had sucked in air so fast that she had swallowed her own spit the wrong way and sat there hacking in her living room and cursing him in her mind.

Kaoru Kamiya was not a charity case! She was marshalling herself through life dammit all, and giving him a place to crash for a couple hours one morning was not something that required thousands of dollars of compensation. A thank you, surely, maybe even a meal or a bottle of wine or something… Enishi's thought patterns were so beyond Kaoru that she wasn't even sure he'd understand why she was mad. This wasn't normal and it smacked of pity.

By the time Enishi made his eminently punctual appearance at the bookstore to commence with their second to last statistics homework session, Kaoru was exactly the mess of nerves she had told herself she would not be. He still sported a fading black eye, but the fussy glasses were intact now, and he was in his normal high fashion athleisure so surely whatever difficulties he had been facing in his organization were largely resolved.

"I take it you were able to go back home safely." Kaoru greeted him curtly, forcing herself not to cross her arms defensively from the start. She had coached herself on this, she could be polite, curse it all.

"I dealt with my security flaws. There are loose ends, but they will be seen to before the end of the month." Oh lord, did he mean killing people? She wasn't so sure. But if he meant killing people he wouldn't mention it casually, right?

There was more to bristle about than expensive tech purchased with blood money, however. "And I suppose one of those flaws you were addressing included posting some creepy old man outside my house at night?!" The pile of cigarette butts had been noticeable by day two, and while she had considered calling the police there had a been a certain surly reluctance to the man bundled in a black coat two sizes too large. He didn't give off a vibe like he was doing anything other than freezing his butt off just far away enough from her property line that even if she did call the cops they would have assumed she was an anxious single female reading too much into an old homeless man's smoke breaks.

"Gein was ordered to observe not interact. The directives were clear so if he failed then I can always—"

"He didn't talk to me, but it was pretty obvious he was there to watch me when he was waiting for me at all my jobs, just across the street. I mean…" Kaoru flicked her chin out, indicating the storefront across the street where at one time a badly disguised Misao had thought to hide. "He's pretty much the worst at subtlety. He's been using the same newspaper for days to pretend like he's doing something every time I try to make eye contact."

Enishi had enough grace to cringe a little. "He was the only man I could spare. The others are occupied with slightly more arduous tasks. Gein's arthritis makes him an unreliable shot in cold weather."

Straight up pretending as if he had not just said that, Kaoru decided to fall back to the safer and easily as annoying topic. "Well, you can tell him I'm fine and I don't need a babysitter. And while you're at it you can take this back." Kaoru slid the laptop, in its now retaped box, back towards her visibly stiffening companion.

"No." Enishi strode the rest of the distance that separated them and stood nearly toe to toe with Kaoru, daring her to explode in the face of his calm command.

"No? No to what?!"

"Both. You providing me with aide for as long as you did, against my instructions, probably attracted some unneeded attention to our association. While Gein has been posted near your house, he's also observing a blind corner and can be explained away as a scout if no one outside of my inner circle has made the explicit connection." Kaoru didn't know what to say to that, so she flattened her mouth out into a slim bloodless line. "And as for the computer, it looks like it came from a Six Comrades, Inc. Take it up with them."

The way his mouth turned up at the corners he knew exactly what he was saying and how it would wind her up because Kaoru felt her lungs swell from the indrawn breath of pure indignation. The words were ill conceived as they passed her lips, arms flailing at her sides. "I'm not here to squeeze money or favors out of being a decent person! I don't need some—some—" She struggled to come up with a word for what Enishi kept doing to her and picked the exact wrong thing out of a corner of her mind, "Kind of sugar daddy to keep me in stupid gadgets!"

There was a deadly silence between them as Kaoru wished she could snatch words out of the air with suitably fast hands while her face slowly burned. Turns out in her awkwardness, she had no other recourse than digging her own grave deeper.

"Not that you're my—I mean not that we are like, um, that." Kaoru took one large step back in retreat, fight fading with embarrassment. She closed her eyes a moment with force, opening them to see that the object of her discomfort was still only an arm's length away. It took all of her pride, but she took another step back for safety.

Up until this moment Enishi Yukishiro was like a beautifully packaged, yet larcenous, brain floating around her and causing turmoil. Kaoru was not an unattractive woman, and she had worked in the service industry long enough to know when the male gaze was resting on her with intent. Eyes that had never bothered to consider her as a woman before, to her knowledge, suddenly swept over her with calculated interest. What had she wrought with her poor word choice?

A little bit more breathless than she expected to be, Kaoru saw Enishi gesture towards the table. "We have work to do. And unless you plan on going to the library, you'll need to get out that laptop you pointedly refuse to accept. Mine, as it so happens, has disappeared from my condo along with a number of other possessions that I have yet to retrieve."

"If you hadn't showed up to my house bleeding this week, I would think you were lying about the laptop to trap me into using this thing."

The chair Enishi pulled out for himself made a sudden squeak as it scraped the floor, and Kaoru felt herself start at the noise. In comparison, Yukishiro was a mask of calm indifference, deigning not to respond as he pulled her open textbook over and began to work through the problem set with his usual efficiency. She started to think his earlier appraisal of her had been in her imagination. Slowly, Kaoru eased herself into the chair opposite and pulled out her keys to saw at the many passes of tape she had used to reseal the box.

Quicker than a blink, a knife materialized in front of Enishi. He held it out to her with his left hand, still writing something down with his right. She had barely seen him move and now a wicked looking blade was poised next to her. Taking a deep breath, not wanting him to see how his slight of hand had shaken her, Kaoru plucked the knife slowly from his grasp. Her fingers brushed over his knuckles as she extracted the handle he loosely gripped and as she concentrated on cutting through the thick tape without damaging the laptop she felt his burning eyes on her again.

Had Kaoru planted a seed of awareness in his brain with her careless words? Or merely encouraged something that already lurked in his psyche? It was a good thing they only had one more session after this or she might end up doing something stupid like asking him on a date. Kaoru didn't need any more of Enishi Yukishiro in her life than was strictly necessary, but as his pencil flew over the college ruled notebook she had to acknowledge that she very much needed him for math. All other purposes weren't going to bring her anything other than heartache and complications.

Maybe now was the time to start planting different sorts of seeds in the minds of her friends that this relationship was starting to crack. It had only been a little less than two months, it didn't need to be an elaborate breakup.

Cheating on her? No, he didn't seem like the type. He barely seemed like he was interested in people.

Job too busy? No, then she'd have to make up some reason why it was busy. Worse, she'd probably have to know something about what he did for the sake of realism and she couldn't very well say his profession was 'mobster.' Even she thought that sounded silly.

Ah, personalities weren't compatible! That was the truth, wasn't it? Enishi was hot and cold in turns, arrogant, suspicious, history of violence…not exactly boyfriend material.

As he pushed glasses up the bridge of his nose absently and scratched out answers to math problems in those sharp, precise numbers that flowed from his pen it was hard to remember the details of their most unfortunate encounter. Time and casual association had retconned it into something more like a hilarious misunderstanding and not the police actionable assault it had been. Kaoru had to actively remind herself that she despised this man. But then she didn't really think of him as her enemy, either.

"You shouldn't need me to explain much about this set. They are insultingly easy, even you can't find much to stumble on." He pushed the notebook across the table and instead pulled the computer over and started it up, the bright light from the monitor obscuring his eyes behind reflective lenses.

Kaoru swallowed an angry response to his left-handed compliment and picked apart his answers to fill in the work that needed to be shown. No, not an enemy but certainly not a friend either.

Kaoru hadn't worked a Thanksgiving in years, but then she had previously spent Thursdays at the fencing studio until her recent schedule change and they always closed for the holiday weekend. A shocking number of people ordered food for takeout she realized, and there were even several small groups of people having their 'friendsgiving' celebrations at the restaurant itself. Tae and Sae were with their family, and Kaoru was on her own juggling small groups and phone orders. It was busy, but maybe busy was what she needed. It was helpful to have a good excuse not to go to Thanksgiving at Misao's house this year. It would have been too hard making up excuses for why Enishi was not with her at a major holiday event, and with one more study session to go (summary review problem set before the final exam) Kaoru wasn't ready to stage her breakup yet. She wasn't that good of an actress.

The only concession to the holiday was early closing hours tonight, so Kaoru eyed the clock warily as the door opened with not only a blast of cold air but a slight dusting of snow and a familiar frame divested a suit jacket as he entered. Enishi was already loosening his tie when Kaoru nodded towards his usual table, her arms loaded down with a huge tray of dirty dishes.

"I'll bring the tea in a minute." He nodded in passing at her comment, glasses fogged from the transition from outside to inside.

Gathering hot tea and a nice cup on a clean tray, Kaoru wondered why he had seemed surprised to see her. Surely he knew what days she worked, because he was very careful not to show up during them for the most part. There had been a few times, but he always acted like they didn't know one another and Kaoru always ended up giving herself a pep talk at the end of his meal about how that's exactly what she wanted. It never really worked, she always felt a little bit hurt at the snub.

"Happy Thanksgiving." Kaoru said with a smile, dropping off his tea and pulling her order pad from her apron and pen from behind her ear.

Enishi had been pinching the bridge of his nose, eyes closed, glasses on the table in front of him. He looked tired, but not the bone deep about to drop kind he had projected that day he had come to her house. This was more the normal 'had a bad day at work' look she had seen on enough business types who stopped by at the end of the day and before she could even think about it the words that were on her mind instead made it to her lips.

"Hard day?"

Enishi cracked open those angel eyes of his and gave Kaoru a withering look. He slid his glasses back on his face and worked at rolling up his sleeves before he poured himself his first cup of tea. "Soup dumplings, two orders. Peking duck. Rice. Bring a second pot of tea with the food."

"I'll put the order in and be back with your water in a moment." She knew disappointment was writ large on her face but she couldn't even pretend she was unaffected tonight, she was so wrung out from work already. Maybe he didn't want to talk about his troubles, and Kaoru didn't want to know any more about his work than she already did, but would it kill him to make small talk?

Instead of worrying about the man in the corner table who quickly whipped out a familiar phone and began texting with a stormy look while he waiting for his food, Kaoru simply fetched his water. She may have slammed it on the table with more force than intended, but it didn't seem as if he noticed over whatever conversation he was having online. It was mostly easy to forget about him as she cleaned up the tables and saw guests out. There were two more take out orders for pick up that she dutifully reported, but her eyes kept wandering over to Enishi who was methodically working through his meal.

Mechanically, he ate. Once the food had arrived his phone had disappeared from sight. He might have been the kind of person who was perfectly happy eating alone, but even so he gave the food itself his full attention when it came out. That was one of the first things that had made Kaoru notice him when she had come to work here what felt like eons ago. She kept tabs on him, making sure his water was full while cleaning off tables and sweeping the floor. As soon as Yukishiro was done she would put up chairs and finish closing up the front of the house. In a way, she was in no rush because in the darkening outdoors it seemed like a dusting of early snow was coating everything with a slippery sheen. Bussing it tonight was going to be extra cold, but she always liked it when it first started to snow because she enjoyed the way it caught the light in the streetlamps while she waited.

Kaoru printed out his check and was piling his dirty dishes onto a tray when he caught her attention. His wallet was thick with cash and he peeled off bills as he asked her a question. "So what next?"

"Pardon?" She wiped her hands down her apron as she stacked the last dish, and turned towards Enishi who was rolling down his sleeves having already stuffed cash in with the check.

"So you finish your class, what next? An economics class? Lectures where business majors try to outdo one another for status points that won't matter in the real world?"

Crossing her arms defensively, Kaoru tried not to snap at him. "I was thinking about advanced accounting classes. Maybe tax law."

"It will be a waste of money and time, just like your statistics class." He sneered. What had crawled in his craw?! Sure he'd clearly been having a bad day but coming here to stress eat and then take out his irritation on her was really childish. Unfortunately, she was already riled and not about to walk away.

"That's for me to decide. You don't get to be one that ranks the worthiness of my education!"

Enishi choked out something like a laugh, but his expression was cruel as he tore her down. "I know you don't make decisions in your own best interest. From what I've seen you never do what you want, you don't follow your instincts."

"That's a lucky thing for you because my instincts are telling me to slam this tray full of dirty dishes over your head!" Kaoru snatched up the check. "Wait right there, Mr. Yukishiro." She said his name with as much venom as she could muster, practically spit it out between clenched teeth.

How dare he! Finance topics might be dry as unbuttered toast and boring to boot, but they were her key to a more secure future for her and her brother. At least she thought it was. Now a tiny voice wondered if she was consigning her soul to a slow death in a corporate machine somewhere. Had she really chosen this because she liked it, or because she had some history in it and it was easy? It wasn't as if she could say it was her passion…

Doubting herself? That was all that white-haired bastard's fault!

"Here. I even broke a one for you, like usual. Even though you didn't ask for it. Because I'm nice like that." Kaoru plopped the receipt in front of him with a clatter of change in the plastic tray.

"You think you know better than me, but I promise you the average businessman is just as crooked as my colleagues. You don't belong in that world."

"Oh? And do I belong in yours then?"

"They would swallow you whole and shit you out." It was matter of fact, without a trace of the rancor his earlier words held. Kaoru's answering shiver had nothing to do with cold.

Enishi looked hollowed out, but Kaoru couldn't prevent herself from saying more partially because she didn't want him to have the last word and partially because she knew she didn't deserve whatever it was that was happening in this moment.

"Just because you had a bad day doesn't mean you get to come to my workplace and punch holes in my dreams. What gives you that right?!"

"Bad day?" There was a frantic edge to his rising voice. "Bad day! You don't know anything. You've never devoted your life to something, sweat for it, bled for it, and then when its finally in your grasp to have it yanked away from you because of the clumsy scheming of a subordinate that couldn't wait six more fucking months for his due." Enishi was clutching his hands into tight fists on top of the table, knuckles that had apparently only healed recently splitting open with red fissures. Who or what had he punch so hard and so frequently to cause those injuries in the first place? Kaoru wanted to run, but instead stood transfixed by his sudden break. "I had a name, and I would have had the address given a few more negotiations, but Heishin's enthusiasm exposed my mole and now witness protection moved him again. He was a fucking butcher! And now the Manslayer is gone again, escaping my justice…"

Kaoru wasn't quite following his words, but she knew he wasn't exactly sane in this moment. It had happened again—he had reached a point of crisis and instead of suffering through it alone he had come to find her. Sure he was trying to drag her down into his own personal hell with him, but on top of her very justified anger at him for being a selfish bastard there were pinpricks of pity as well. Wallowing in a problem wasn't her style, life couldn't move forward like that. Then again, she didn't think that Enishi was really in a frame of mind to hear that message and it wasn't her responsibility to snap him out of his madness. She wasn't his family. She wasn't his friend, probably. But somehow she had been cast in this role as his sin eater and she didn't know where to go with it.

"I don't know what you want me to say right now," Kaoru cautiously began.

"Don't say anything." Enishi hissed, interrupting her. "I just need you to sit down and shut up. Don't even breathe."

Kaoru sat down at the table next to his, wondering if she should signal for help. He wasn't in his right mind. He was dangerous. He seemed to both need something from her and want nothing from her. Minutes ticked by as Enishi stared down at his clenched fists.

The door opened with a clang and someone called out, wanting to pay for their order for pick up. Kaoru slowly slid out of her seat eyeing Enishi who was as still as if he had been sculpted that way. She engaged in what seemed very much like a normal yet dissonant conversation with the lady picking up the food about Thanksgiving and family and the stressors of the holidays. While she was laughing with the woman about how much butter was too much in stuffing and making sure all the containers were properly secured in the bag, Enishi slipped out without so much as making eye contact. Kaoru felt a breath she had been holding ease out of her lungs that spelled pure relief.

It wasn't until after she had rung up the last take out order and locked the front door of the restaurant that she came back to Enishi's table and saw in addition to his precisely calculated meal there were a few more bills with the receipt wrapped around them. Take a cab, he had written on the back of the flimsy paper.

That night as she worked on the review statistics problems with the focus of a person who simply can't bring themselves to think about other things, she contemplated what kind of illness she should fake so that she could call out sick on Sunday.

Maybe it was better not to get too specific with the symptoms. After all, she would be 'better' by the following weekend.