Chapter 2

Don't own Rorouni Kenshin

Kaoru was surprised. She couldn't remember the last time she was able to just say 'no' to anyone. She looked at him in complete defiance. "If you think that by kidnapping me you'll get a lot of money from my father then think again. He doesn't care about me. All he will do is use this little incident for publicity."

Battousai watched her with more than just a little amount of curiosity though he allowed none of it to show on his face. She sounded so sad and forlorn. "I'm sorry, but you must come with me." Now she looked surprised. He started to slowly stalk toward her. She looked scared.

"Wait! I don't want to go. I mean I don't want to go with you." She decided to run. She ran past him into the ally. She turned through different streets all the while trying to loose him in the maze. Kaoru ran until she thought her lungs would burst from lack of air and then she ran some more, desperation giving her strength. She ran so fast that she ran herself straight into a dead end. She turned around to go the other way. However, when she turned around instead of running back into an open street she ran into Battousai and would have fallen over if it weren't for his steady hands supporting her.

He grabbed her around the waist, surprised when she winced. He hadn't thought he had grabbed her that hard. When she looked up she saw only his beautiful amber eyes shining at her like the most rare of jewels. And he looked at her ocean blue eyes. They stared and thought. There was a spell that was cast upon them at that moment. Realizing it was futile to run she made a decision. "I'll go with you under three conditions. One: you tell me your name. Two: you don't hand me over to someone else. And three: you keep me safe."

He listened to these conditions and made some of his own. "I will try to uphold my end of the bargain if you give me a condition of my own. I have only one but it will do for me." He paused and watched the confusion pass in her expressive eyes. "You have to let me kiss you."

She thought for a moment while looking at the handsome man before her and then nodded. "Okay." She said softly. As he leaned down to kiss her their eyes met and she knew she was lost. In that one small moment she felt more emotion for this man she didn't even know than for anyone else in her life. Then she closed her eyes and focused only on the feel of his kiss. It was a slow kiss that was meant to sooth and calm. She soon surrendered to the feel of the kiss, which soon after turned to a kiss with easy tongue. Once that was started it turned into a passionate kiss. Even though Kaoru knew this was wrong and had been told all her life about things like this being wrong she couldn't force herself to pull away.

"What have you done to me?" He said panting when the kiss had ended. When he pulled away she winced. He noticed how one hand shot to her stomach. When he lifted her shirt he immediately saw why. There was a very ugly bruise on her stomach. As he looked at it he thought of all the bruises he had given to others. All the bruises he could give to her.

Then he remembered what he was supposed to do and dropped her shirt before looking at her in horror. With this girl it was as if he had found the one person he could trust with anything. And he had to give her up. It almost made him want to cry.

"Kao, I don't think I will be able to keep my side of the bargain. However, I will tell you my name. After which I will tell you why I am not able to keep it." He paused and took a deep breath, dreading her reaction. "My name is Kenshin Himura. Most people know me by Battousai." Her heart stopped beating before returning in a much more frantic rhythm. The man, who stood before her, the man she had just kissed, was the famous assassin. He was the Battousai. He then continued. "The reason I am not able to hold my side of the deal is because I was assigned to kill you. If I fail to do my duty then I, in turn, will be hunted down and killed."

He backed away a few steps before looking down. She paused, hesitating, then she stepped up to him and cupped his face in her hands. "I don't care. I'm not sure what's happening to me but I do know that my life is worthless and that I care more about you in the first minutes I've known you than anyone else in my entire life and if killing me will keep you safe then so be it." After that was said she kissed him gently. He started to kiss her back when they heard shouts of "Kaoru Kamaya has been kidnapped" and "The presidents daughter was kidnapped."

As they both pulled away in shock the last thing Kenshin saw on Kao's face was first surprise and then pain as she fell into a heap in his arms. He had knocked her out.