Edited 2-18-15

Chapter 12: The Night in Paris

"We'll always have Paris."

― Howard Koch

.

.

Sasori pulled off the silky wig once they entered the hotel room and motioned the bluette to follow suit. Hinata pulled her jacket closer to herself and joined him on the couch, watching him put take out a frilly, laced envelope.

Hinata backed away a little from him once she caught him staring at her, something akin to happiness in his eyes. "W-Why are you staring at me like that?"

The young man smiled and pointed at the fancy looking envelope on the table. Hinata once again glanced at the thing again before hesitantly picking it up and awkwardly holding it in her hands with hesitance.

Sasori's face etched towards that of sudden frustration when the bluette only picked at the lace. His patience with the dumbfounded girl ceased. "Open the fucking envelope, Hyuuga.", he whispered.

Hinata eyes widened at his unnecessary tone and then they narrowed. Just who did he think he was talking to her like that? Sure, Sasuke had disrespected her a lot, but that was the past. She wasn't going to let him get away with that one.

The bluette threw the envelope down on the table and turned away from the redhead. Sasori became annoyed with her childish actions and soon shoved the envelope into her hands once yanked off the stylish lace and opened the envelope, ignoring how Sasori glared holes in her wig.

"Read it aloud, Hyuuga."

This guy… Hinata turned her head towards him, a slightly annoyed expression on her face. "It's Hinata."

"Should I give a fuck?"

"Y-You should."

"And why should I?"

"Because like it or not, in October we'll be close co-workers.", Hinata spat, rolling her eyes. She normally wasn't like this, but when she only had three hours of sleep, she became grumpy. She watched as he once again, glared at her.

"Just read the letter, Hyuuga."

She sighed and looked down at the cursively fonted letters. "Dear Hitachiin Sasori, you have been cordially invited to attend the 75th anniversary of Mr. and Mrs. Elipope Roman on the 15th of July on Monday at 9:00 pm in the Hotel Ritz Paris ballroom." She looked at the smirking man and gave him a small smile.

Sasori leaned forward towards her. "I got this from the desk clerk in the lobby. So, what do you think?"

Hinata grabbed his hands in excitement. "I think that's great, Sasori-san!"

The redhead face-palmed himself again before shaking her shoulders a bit. "No, you stupid girl! Do you not get what this means?" Hinata shook her head and once again she started to be shook. "Mr. Elipope is a famous Investor - he has a part in some of the world's biggest companies. Of course MGC is going to be there!"

Recognition came into the girl's eyes and suddenly gripped the young man's wrists. "M-M-MGC's going to b-be there?!"

Sasori blankly stared at the startled girl and then sighed. He held her hands and gave them a squeeze, trying his best to keep the girl's eyes from drooping over from sudden exhaustion. "Here's the plan: you and I will go to the party as a couple and as soon as the Uchiha is in the ballroom, you'll sneak out and find a way into his room and retrieve some sort of info on Anne-Sophie. It might mean another day here, but it's going to be worth it if we pull some sort of info."

Hinata hung on to every word he said, until confusion crossed her face at the last word. "Who's Anne-Sophie? Is that your mother?"

Sasori sighed and pulled the drowsy girl to him, defeat on his face. She didn't protest as he wrapped his arms around her and started to pet her indigo locks. She snuggled into the warmth, forgetting that this was the sarcastic and (from what she had seen on the night of Sasuke's engagement party) slightly horny Sasori she had known for only a little while. Soon, she drifted off into dreamland, leaving the belligerent Sasori up and alert.

The redhead pulled out his phone and started to take pictures of he and the girl. Sasori smirked when he was finished "Let's see how many favorites this will get on Twitter."

The bluette snored quietly on the mischievous redhead.

He smiled as the tweets and favorites started to roll in.

Hinata jumped from her sleep when she felt something heavy hit her face.

She started to fumble with the material around her head that was nearly suffocating her in her sleep, until a sigh from across the room was heard and the clothing was gone from her red face, leaving her slightly panting and her heart beating fast. She looked around the room and saw the redhead, half-lidded gaze displaying his boredom.

"Put that on.", he said , still burning his eyes into her lying form on the California king.

Hinata grabbed the clothing and noticed that it was black just like he what he wore. A black shirt too small and black pants too small.

She nervously looked up at the nonchalant man while he simultaneously averted his gaze towards the window that showed the nightly hour of Paris. "I-It's to small. I-I won't be able to breath in this."

"Stop eating so much then."

Hinata stayed silent at this and slowly got up from the bed, careful not to mistakenly roll her eyes at his statement. Sure she had been eating a lot, isn't that what a normal woman would do if they found out that their marriage was crumbling? She went into the bathroom and quickly changed into the dark attire. After literally squeezing in it, she looked at herself in the large, gold-trimmed mirror. Her curves showed more than usual and her hips were accented in the dark pants. Wasn't black supposed to slim you down a bit? Hinata turned to the side and saw that the myth was true.

Feeling relieved that she wasn't big yet, the girl bounded out of the bathroom to the impatient man. He looked her up and down, and feeling satisfied, nodded.

"Looks like you aren't gaining any weight at the moment." He came forth and slightly fluffed her hair a bit. "But your hair is a distraction. It'll have to do though" Sasori then sighed and moved his hands downward, letting his finger tips brushing her sides a little and a suggestive raise of his brow.

"Wanna do a quickie?" That was unexpected.

Hinata blushed and warily glared at him before slapping his lecherous hands away and waiting for the explanation on why she was woken up. Sasori sighed.

"I think that I know Deidara's exact location." Hinata's eyes widened and soon a grin came across her face. That could mean that the blonde was safe at the moment!

"W-What are we waiting for then? Let's go!" Before she could make it to the door, she was pulled back to the redhead's warm chest. She looked up and noticed that he was only slightly taller than her; a 5'7 to her 5'5.

"We need to be careful about going out though. MGC could be walking the hall this moment as we speak. We don't need to draw their attention now." Hinata nodded and went to grab her wig off the end table beside her, but her hand was slapped by Sasori. "And you can't use that."

"But the r-reason you got it was for a false identification, right?"

"Well I figure that since people already know that I was invited to the ball, that maybe I wouldn't have to cover up our identity." Hinata furrowed her brow.

"I-I need to cover up mine." Sasori shook his head at her defiant behavior. What had happened to the shy little girl he had known? She must have been hanging around Konan too long.

"No, Hyuuga. Listen.", he grabbed the confused girl's shoulders. "If Sasuke finds out you're here, my guess is that he'll try to track you down for your reasoning."

"How is that making my job any easier?" He smirked at her.

"You're going to let him 'find' you, making him slip up and extend his stay here, and possibly, extend the date in which Deidara's father can pay him the money before something bad happens to Anne-Sophie!" The bluette stayed silent, running over his rushed plan three times in her head. Would Sasuke want to track her down? So was she going to confront him about the drug dealing or not?

"I-I don't think that will w-work." Sasori patted her back and turned to get his wallet.

"It already has." Hinata cautiously walked behind him, fearing the smirk she heard in his voice.

"W-What do you mean by that?" He grabbed her hand and walked towards the door, that smirk still on his face.

"You'll see." Hinata looked at his face once more before letting him lead her to the long stairs going down instead of the elevator. She soon wanted to scream in agony over the on going steps of stairs. Aren't we on the fifth floor?!!

Sasuke was livid, and wanted blood.

This didn't go unnoticed by Shikamaru, who had situated his seat to be beside the window of the gold imperial suite of Hotel Ritz Paris, a far distance from brooding man.

Naruto, however, came from the kitchen and bounced beside the brooding Uchiha on the couch with a bowl of microwavable ramen in his hands, oblivious of the tensed atmosphere. "Aw cheer up, teme! You can't just sulk around all night! We're in Paris, lighten up a bit!"

Sasuke remained quiet, letting his glare bore onto the wide screen in front of him. Naruto slurped up his ramen and watched as the basketball player dunked.

THUMP

Naruto started to choke when the remote was thrown in Shikamaru's direction with the intention to crack open his skull.

Shikamaru barely dodged the thing, and was then staring at the Uchiha in disbelief of his actions. "What the hell Sasuke?!"

Said man glared.

Naruto, after getting his noodles down, looked at the scene before him. Why was Sasuke throwing inanimate objects in Nara's direction, and why was Shikamaru ignoring Sasuke this whole time?

"What's going on?"Naruto asked.

Sasuke ignored Naruto and continued to glare at Nara.

Shikamaru sighed. "Father Uchiha is pissed that Sasuke's pushing drugs and is threatening to take Uchiha CEO position and give it to me." The Nara dodged yet another inanimate object from the Uchiha, this time a vase. "I didn't protest against the idea, which leads us to this situation."

Naruto dropped his bowl at that and started to yell at Sasuke , who simply put his ear plugs in his ear and turned up his Ipod. He didn't want to deal with them today.

Naruto continued to bellow at the brooding male. "I told you this was a bad idea, teme! Now look at the position you've put us in! Fugaku's gonna squeal this to my dad! If my dad finds out, it's goodbye to Namikaze and my career forever! Are you listening TEME!-"

A knock on the door sounded and Naruto went towards it, but not before poking Sasuke in the nose, which earned him a seething glare.

When the Uzumaki threw open the door, a woman bowed before giving them a lacy letter and leaving them; Naruto wasted no time in tearing off the lace His eyes lightened when he saw that it was the anniversary of one of his father's close friends, Elipope.

Naruto turned towards the men. "I think I know what will keep old man Fugaku from shitting on our boy!" Shikamaru sighed and rubbed the back of his neck; hearing the energetic boy's loud voice made his head hurt.

"What could possibly stop Fugaku from stomping down to Paris and wringing his neck?"

"Making connections with one of Europe's most finest business men, Elipope Roman!"

Shikamaru sighed once again when Sasuke pulled his earplugs from his ear and looked toward the grinning blonde, a infamous twinkle in his inky eyes. Here we go again..

Naruto sheepishly rubbed the back of his head. "There's only one problem though." All eyes turned towards him and he let out the bad news. "Dad and Uncle Mada are going to be there."

Sasuke and Shikamaru groaned simultaneously in defeat. Namikaze and Uchiha going to the same place. Sasuke slumped down in his seat, a deadly aura coming from him. Madara and him never got along. One of the reasons was because his uncle was only five years older than him and that Madara had always pestered and teased him about his failures when he was little. He had always thought that if he met that sneaky Madara again, that it would be too soon. He didn't even want to think about Minato..

"Trouble is always around the corner it seems. So troublesome..", muttered Shikamaru. He looked out towards the front of the window and saw that the crowd of women were still in front of the hotel, hoping to sneak a peek at one of the MGC. "Still a full crowd out there.

Maybe you should go on the balcony and wave to the nice women." Sasuke snorted and made a face at the wet ramen on the floor.

Shikamaru persuaded him some more. "It would help with the media's view of you. Most think you're just a handsome emo guy who's dating the precious Sakura Haruno." Sasuke shivered at the name of the woman, but sat still for a minute before glaring at the lazy male and storming out onto the balcony in his pajamas, making the noise already outside go ballistic as he closed the clear doors behind him.

Shikamaru chuckled at the scene before him, some were literally crying with tears at seeing their dream man.

Shikamaru's eyes softened when he averted his sight at the Eiffel Tower standing tall and proud in the night sky, lights making it shine like a star.

They were too young to be out in the business world like this. They had grown up too fast, too fast to enjoy life right now. Shikamaru's eyes hardened all of a sudden and he clenched his fists. But why had they tried so hard? To become responsible? To make their parents proud? Or just to be powerful? He didn't know why he tried so hard, all he had wanted was a normal family and a normal job with normal co-workers and friends. Now he finds himself at every launch party, every college party (even though he was too smart to be in college), every single MGC board meeting, and every thing that has to do with business. But he's a lawyer. A very successful lawyer with a 90% win rate on all of his past clients.

The lazy man looked back towards the screaming women.

That's when he saw indigo and red down the street. He looked closely and saw, with surprise, that it was Sasuke's wife being dragged by a red-haired gentleman. Shikamaru sighed and leaned back in his chair, too lazy to comprehend what was happening at the moment. His stomach growled.

Where the hell is Neji with the pizza?

Naruto clumsily hurried out the bathroom, pajama pants bottoms on and a toothbrush in his mouth, waving a phone around in the air like a fly was in the room.

"One of the Akatsuki members just tweeted a photo of Hinata! She's here at the same hotel as teme!" Shikamaru got up and took the phone from the panicking man and sighed when he looked at the picture.

The indigo beauty lay smiling on the red-haired man's chest as he smirked towards the camera, the caption on the picture labeled BLACKMAIL.

Shikamaru then went to the window to see that the couple was gone, whisked away in the night of Paris.

"Shit."

Hinata tiredly panted as she was dragged down the many streets by the fast male. He seemed to know all the streets of Paris, for he only stopped when the cars were passing in the streets. Her legs were burning and her throat was getting dry. She didn't know if she could keep up with him this long.

"S-Sasori-san, c-can we rest for a minute." He only looked back at her before dragging her into an alleyway nearby.

She leaned against the wall and tried to catch her breath while Sasori looked around the corner to see if anyone was coming. Hinata, while her mind was spinning, decided to question him on his suspicious behaviour.

"Why are w-we running? I thought you said that you wanted your identity to be known?"

He folded his arms and turned away from her, a slight frown on his face.

"I do want my identity to be revealed, but not when there are french kissers littering the streets tonight. Did you not see that huge crowd that we passed by? They were literally going wild over the celebrity in the window." Hinata blankly stared at the man as he started to brag about how 'sexy' and important he was and how him being here in Paris is a threat to his life.

Hinata sighed and leaned against the wall. She really wanted to see Deidara now.

Her eyes became hard as she thought of the blonde. What would she say to him once she saw him? Should she apologize upfront, or let him talk first? She rubbed her bare arms and suddenly wished she had her jacket. Would he even want her here in Paris, meddling in his family affairs?

"-and now more and more hearts are going to be broken now that probably half of the world knows that we're dating-" Hinata snapped her gaze to the blabbering man.

"W-WHAT?!" Sasori stopped and shushed the wide-eyed girl before looking around the corner to see if any commotion was stirred.

Hinata backed away from him, thinking that he had gone off the edge and that he was a crazy person, like Uncle Madara.

"W-We're not dating, Sasori-san! Why would anyone would think that?!" Sasori glared at her, offended that she had seemed to object to 'courting' him and to the plan he had.

"You're not a little precious jem yourself, girl. Do you know how many women would kill and die for your position? Consider yourself blessed that you even have my conversation." Hinata pulled on her hair.

"Sasori-san, what have you done!" He snorted and glared at her rising voice.

"I might have posted a picture of you and me in the hotel room, but it's not as bad as it looks." He took out his phone and handed it to the frazzled girl.

Hinata's jaw dropped as she stared in horror at herself and the smirking Sasori on twitter. He looked at it from behind, a small smirk on his face. He pointed to the number of tweets it received.

"See? It's not as bad as it looks. It was supposed to be a friendly friend-friend gesture, but you know how the media takes things these days." 900,000 tweets on Sasori-Hina

Hinata couldn't come up with any words. Sasori and her were on Twitter TOGETHER in a very suggesting position. If you looked at the photo, you would think that she was smiling on him rather than sleeping. Oh God, WHY did you bless me with the ability to smile when I sleep?!

The bluette suddenly became upset. She was a married woman on twitter with another man! That screamed cheater. She gripped the phone in her hands. And if Sasuke sees it…

She stopped the thought when Sasori took it from her hands and gave her a comforting smile.

"I only did it so that it would attract the Uchiha to finding you. That was part of the plan." She pouted at him.

"B-But why didn't you tell me you were planning on doing t-that sort of thing."

"Because you would have flaked out." True, she would have, but him putting her on Twitter without permission was a violation in her right to privacy. Did the blunt man even know what privacy meant?

She heard him sigh. "It's no big deal Hyuuga. It's not like you actually cheated on Sasuke. You know, the man that actually cheated on you and basically confessed it to the public.", his voice held sarcasm, much like Deidara's had held the night he straightened her out. Hinata nodded in understanding.

She wasn't going to stand up for Sasuke anymore. That was her promise to Deidara.

When she thought about it, she shouldn't care what he thought. He wasn't thinking of how he felt when he left her for Sakura, so should she care if he saw her in a picture with a guy, who might have been her friend and not her lover? The weight lifted off Hinata as she convinced herself not to worry.

This was the only way that seemed to by Deidara's father time to pay Sasuke, or time for Deidara and Sasori to locate Anne-Sophie.

Sasori gestured her to follow him around the corner. She noticed that he had stopped but kept walking. If they wanted to find Deidara, they needed to hurry before he relocated.

"Hyuuga, over here." She turned and saw him enter into the building next to the alley-way and a sweat-drop appeared on her face.

So they were here this whole time? So they had wasted time. Hinata shrugged and entered the building, a nervous look on her face, but determination in her eyes.

She prayed that he would at least be happy to see her.

Sasuke winked at the screaming women before waving them goodbye and closing the double doors. His small smile was replaced with a smirk when he saw Neji come through the door, pizza in one hand and his phone to his ear.

Naruto 'yelled' before diving for the pizza, in which Neji swiftly dodged the hungry man, never missing a beat in his talk with their agent. Sasuke fell on the bed and stared at the ceiling, peering at the gold border it had.

He has been ignoring his finance's call since he had arrived and he had been bailing out on the gathering parties and conferences in Paris, leaving Neji to mingle with the estranged CEOs and executives. He didn't want to think about work right now, he had only came to Paris to collect money from one of his underground drug dealers, one of which was named Tshikyo Mondine. Instead of sealing, he was using, and had soon grown into a $400,000 debt. Sasuke had given him time to collect the money, but he was ignoring him and signing off his threats as one of a child.

Sasuke smirked. He surely didn't think that now. The Uchiha turned towards the crying blonde.

"Make sure that Sai is watching her closely. One slip up of his can mess up the whole thing." Naruto stopped his pouting on the floor and watched Sasuke.

"I did my part by tracking her down! Why can't Shika do it?!"

Shikamaru glared, not wanting to be in the hot seat. "I made an oath not to be in criminal statuses when I became a lawyer, knucklehead." Naruto pointed to the busy Hyuuga on the phone.

"Why can't Neji do it?" Sasuke glared at Naruto.

"Because he's has been traveling throughout Europe all night and is persuading our agent to talk to the editors of Vogue about pushing back our photo shoot that was supposed to be tomorrow."

"Why can't you check on the woman?" Sasuke smirked and lied back down on the bed.

"Because I'm sleepy."

"I'm sleepy too, teme!" Naruto waved his hands in the air. "Can't the photo be enough for right now? You saw with your own two eyes that she's not escaping anytime soon!" Sasuke shrugged and ran his fingers through his hair.

Shikamaru butted in, a reprimanding look in his brown eyes. "Remember the plan. After the gathering of Elipope, if that Mondine guy doesn't have the money, we'll ship the woman to Russia and let them deal with her. No shooting of any kind, am I clear?"

"Yeah yeah, I hear ya."

"Whatever.", said the Uchiha. Shikamaru looked at him warily.

"I mean it, Uchiha. No gun violence of any kind." Sasuke nodded his head and went into the kitchen, wanting to get away from the fatherly Shikamaru.

There was a reason why Shikamaru and his father got along so well; their mindset was the same way. It's just that Fugaku was more scolding that Shikamaru.

When the Uchiha went into the kitchen, he grabbed a slice of pizza and leaned in one of the chairs. Neji ended his talk on the phone and looked at Sasuke, pure exhaustion in his eyes. Who wouldn't be exhausted after traveling all over Europe most of the day? Sasuke worried a little about his best friend, but didn't let it show.

"Dish it." Neji sighed and shook his head, letting his long brown hair bend over his shoulders.

"There's no way we can miss that photo shoot tomorrow. Kakashi says that they've been planning it for months now and that we've been pushing it off for too long. A crowd of fans are supposed to show up. This will mess up the media's thoughts of us." Shit. Sasuke sighed.

"Looks like we won't be able to visit Mondine in the morning." The Uchiha shook his head and grabbed Neji's phone off the table. That's when Naruto bounded in and grabbed three slices of pizza, momentarily sticking his tongue out at the annoyed Neji and finding a seat at the large table. Shikamaru then came in, his eyes tiredly gracing the food before also grabbing himself some.

Most of the time they ate at restaurants, but now in Paris, you couldn't walk in at night without being seen by lifetime fans.

Naruto looked around at his friends, a little put-down by their tired gazes.

"Come guys! Cheer up!" Neji looked his way and sent him a meaningful look. "After all this business jazz is gone, the real fun can begin!" Sasuke nodded and look on his twitter page.

Shikamaru smirked. "I wouldn't say that, Naruto. We have two married men holding us back from partying." Naruto grinned and patted Sasuke's back hard. Neji smiled lightly at the two.

Sasuke brushed his bangs from his eyes and looked at Shikamaru.

"Has that ever stopped me before?" He started to ignore the chatter between his colleagues and turned his full attention on the phone.

There was a lot of talk about Sasori, a member of Akatsuki, and on the end of every tweet they hooked 'Hina' at the end. Sasuke became curious of the certain tweet line and soon clicked on a link.

"-And I was like 'don't put too much sauce on the noodles' and she went 'fof so nee' or something like that! I was so mad because the ramen was being abused and not loved like old man Ichiraku had does it! But you know not all noodle shops are good li-"

CRACK!

"-ke...old man...Ichiraku?" The three surprised men stared at the cracked phone in the Uchiha's hands. Shikamaru sighed and shook his head.

Sasuke calmly set the phone down, so carefully that the men didn't hear it sound on the table, and walked into the bedroom before closing the door and locking it.

Neji looked towards the two men, obliviousness in his eyes and walked towards the phone. "What's his problem?" No one answered as the Hyuuga-heir picked up his cracked screen Iphone and looked at what it held.

Neji just stared at the picture before looking at the two men. And then looking back at the photo. Then back at the two men, who were staring him down.

"Hinata-sama has found a new man?"

Shikamaru nodded and Naruto nervously looked the other way. Neji looked back at the phone, a sudden protectiveness coming over him. Even though he didn't favor the bluette, she was still his cousin, someone who he had known most of his life. So why did he do that to her?

He peered closely and saw that the background of the picture held a big window that showed the Eiffel Tower as clear as day.

Neji calmly looked back at the men. "And she is in Paris?" It sounded more like a statement than a question, but Naruto nodded nonetheless. Neji made sure to put the phone down before letting the information settle in. A small smirk came to his face, which shocked Shikamaru and Naruto.

"It's good to see that Hinata-sama has moved on. I'm happy for her in a way." He looked back down at the phone and stared at her face a little more, a sudden hit of guilt hitting him before he pushed it back. "Uchiha should have known not to try and play a Hyuuga. That is what you'll gain in the end: nothing."

The three men just sat silently and listened to the smashing of furniture and glass from the young man. That's when the blunt truth was known by the men sitting at the table.

Their best friend, Sasuke Uchiha, was in/still in love with his wife, Hinata Hyuuga.

Is he really in love, or is he just jealous of her moving on? They all knew that if Sasuke was jealous, he would make a sarcastic comment and move on. But this was a different side they had seen. He was cracking and showing how he really felt about the ex-Hyuuga. But they all figured that it was too late for him. The picture was proof enough.

That night in the imperial suite of Hotel Ritz Paris, at exactly 11:23 pm, Sasuke experienced his first real heartache. And he wasn't happy about it.