#14

"I didn't say you could smoke on my balcony."

Reno lowered the cigarette and the hand holding it to rest on the railing. "Because I didn't bother asking. Needed the nicotine, and I'm not about to leave you alone. Your father would have a fit."

The blond head belonging to the younger Shinra appeared in the corner of Reno's eye as the boy joined him at the railing. This was, probably, the closest he had gotten to the 'golden boy'--as several of the Turks 'affectionately' called him--in a long time. He wasn't exactly thrilled by that fact, either. Whatever attachment Veld had seen when the child and the Turk first met, it didn't seem to be there now. "And he'll have a fit when he finds out that you didn't listen to me. As I said, I didn't say that you could smoke on my balcony."

Reno raised his hand back to his lips. "Maybe you didn't hear me the first time. I didn't ask if I could." He drew in a long breath, holding it as he lowered the cigarette again and flicked the ashes down on the cliff below them. "You want something other than to bitch at me for smoking?"

Rufus turned a bit to look at him, and he could see the surprise in the boy's face. "I wanted to know why you were out here smoking when I hadn't given you permission!"

Reno grinned and inhaled one last time from the cigarette in his hand before stabbing it out on the concrete railing. "Because his majesty was busy harassing one of the maids for not having his favorite suit ready last night when he hadn't bothered to tell them that he wanted it," the red-head snapped back, turning partially to face the thirteen year old standing beside him.

He figured that he was going to regret his words when he saw the way Rufus' eyes narrowed at him. "Not that I need to justify myself to a street rat like you, but they knew which suit would have been most appropriate at last night's function. A fact which you would know if you had been allowed to attend it with Tseng. It was my father's decision, however, that you would have done nothing but..."

Rufus stopped in the midst of his tirade when Reno's hand grabbed his chin and tilted his head to the side. "Who hit you?"

The Shinra boy squirmed, trying to pull away from his bodyguard's touch. "No one. I tripped in the dark and hit something after I got back here last..."

"Look, you little brat, I know you don't think much of me, but I know the difference between a bruise from hitting a wall and an obvious hand print. Tseng'll have my skin if I let..."

This time Rufus succeeded in pulling away from Reno's grip. "Tseng won't question it," the boy growled as he stepped back. "He knows his place. Now leave me alone!"

Reno figured that it was to his credit that he did manage to bite back the comment on his tongue about the fact that Rufus was the one that interrupted his privacy, and a muttered "I'll be inside if you need me" was the only thing he said to acknowledge the order as he started to the open door back into what was Rufus' private section of the vacation home.

He turned briefly to look back at the boy now slouched against the railing when he thought he heard a sob. It wasn't possible, of course. Rufus Shinra didn't cry. Screamed at you for being incompetent when he didn't get his way, possibly, but he didn't cry...