Chapter 30
A requested chapter. Enjoy!

Natsume appreciated Mikan's spirit and determination and understood her fear for her parents, but he wasn't going to drag her through the woods to look for a killer. They were almost to the Anju house. When they got there, they'd wait for the SWAT guys. FBI, Alice Agents, Special Operations, Secret Service, local guys – whoever Kokoro Yome managed to get in there could go find Reo Mouri. For all Natsume knew, they could be there by now.

In the meantime, it was his job to keep Mikan Sakura alive.

She didn't see it that way. She walked just ahead of him, her energy not flagging even slightly. "You're not responsible for me. It's my decision to go after Mouri."

"You have your own way of looking at things."

"That's right, I do."

The trail had descended toward the river – they were only fifteen feet above the water now – and cut steeply back up toward the Anju house. Reo Mouri had the skills to hide in Central town park in the middle of a rainy early May day and pick off two agents. He'd killed two presumably high trained bodyguards. He'd wormed his way into the Sakuras' live. Natsume had believed the guy was just another reporter looking for a story.

"Reo wants the pardon so he can get his money and his recognition," Mikan said. "He doesn't want to kill me. That's not what this is about."

"Let the SWAT negotiators talk to him. They're the experts. What if you find Mouri and end up screwing up?"

That caught her up short. She broke her stride. She was in the shade of a cedar tree growing precariously up out of the limestone, between the path and the river. For a split second, Natsume thought she was going to back off. He heard the rustling noise above them.

A huge balck snake dropped from the cedar and landed on Mikan, latching its fangs onto the right side of her neck, its thick body writhing and wriggling. It had to be five feet long.

Simuntaneously Reo Mouri leaped from the tree, its branches halfway out over the river, and made a sprawling dive into the water. Mikan screamed in schock and tried to pry the snake off. "Don't shoot it!"

The snake wrapped itself around her arms and was going for another bite. Reo had used it as a distraction. "I've got it.," she said. "Trust me. Please."

Natsume jumped to the edge of the path and pointed his gun at the water, saw Reo swimming toward a boat anchored in a small, shallow cove just downriver from the bluff below the Anju house.

Making his escape.

"Stop him," Mikan said. "Don't worry about me."

She staggered backward over the roos of the cedar tree and went feetfirst over the edge, wrestling with the damn snake all the way into the river.

Natsume ran past the cedar and tore his way down an erode section of the riverbank. Slipping on the wet rocks and dirt. He could see the snake scurrying away from Mikan and in to the water. She came up for air and waved Natsume on as she swam toward shore. Her strokes were strong determined.

She'd be all right.

Reo was twenty yards downriver, climbing into his boat.

Natsume had a shot. A difficult one, but he'd take it if he had to. He raised his weapon, felling a jolt of pain from his injured arm. "Freeze, Mouri."

Mouri flopped onto the pilot's seat. "You wouldn't shoot me." His voice was raspy, breathles, as he shouted across the water at Natsume. "I know where the Sakuras are."

The guy was in bad shape. But he was right. Natsume didn't want to shoot. Keeping his gun pointed in the general direction of the boat ignoring the pain in his arm, he ran up the short stretch of embankment to the shallow cove, positioning himself about Reo.

He had one chance.

Without hesitation, Natsume jumped, landing on Mouri, knocking him down and sticking the HK in his face. "Don't move."

"I should have killed you when I had the chance."

His words were slurred, his body fiery hot even after being in the icy river water. "Where are the Sakuras?" Natsume asked quietly.

"Fuck you."

"Was it a bluff? Do you have them?"

Mikan was on shore, scrambling along the eroded bank, blood from her snakebite dripping down her neck. "My parents -"

"Get the pardon," Reo screamed at her, trying to jerk his head up against Natsume's hold. "It's not too late. Call Prime Minister Anju. I'm his brother. He never knew his true family. I'll tell him everything about us. I'll share the money with you."

Natsume had heard enough. The guy's condition was worsening from the snakebite. "You need a doctor."

Mouri vomited, what looked like mostly river water spewing out over the boat. He was shivering violently, panting, sweating. Natsume got him to his feet.

"The parent's," he said. "Come on. It'll be a hell of a lot easier for you if you tell us where they are."

But was unconscious, slumped against Natsume.

Mikan splashed out into the river, water up to her waist. "Narumi, don't die."

Hotaru was behind her, looking as if the current would sweep her wat. But her voice was steady, firm. "Ouch. God, you're a mess. Look at that neck. What happened to the snake?"

"He's okay. It was just scared." Mikan was hardly aware of what she was saying. She squinted at Hotaru. "Tsubasa?"

"He's greeting the SWAT guys."

Mikan shook her head. "Shiki Masachika had Tsubasa's wife killed. Tsubasa will go after him." She reached into the boat and touched Reo's hand.

"Please, don't die."

Natsume wasn't optimistic. He looked at Hotaru. "You've got him?"

"No problem. I'm in rough shape, but I can handle someone uncounsious."

He helped her into the boat and turned his weapon over to her, then climbed out. Blood flowed freely from Mikan's snakebite. He had no idea if that was good news or bad news. Above them on the, he saw the first of the black-clad SWAT guys.

"Shit's hitting the fan," Hotaru said unnecessarily.

Mikan clawed at him. "My parents. It's been an hour."

But one of the first wave of SWAT guys to reach them told her that they'd just got a word from Kokoro Yome. The Sakuras were safe. French authorities had them in Paris. One of Masachika's bodyguard had grabbed them at Roissy Airport – Reo must have offered him part of the five million to work on his behalf.

No Shiki. He'd apparently slipped out of the country.

As Mikan had predicted, Tsubasa Ando hadn't stuck around to greet the SWAT guys.

He'd disappeared.

Mikan sat in Oba-chan's rocker on the front porch of the log house that had always been home, a safe haven, and tried to drink some of her sweet tea punch. Her snake, though angry and frightened, hadn't released any venom, just left a single nasty bite on the side of her neck. She had it cleaned and bandaged in the E.R.

Reo Mouri – Narumi Anju – wasn't so lucky. By the time they reached the hospital, there was nothing doctors could do for him. He died fifteen minutes later.

He'd lied about so much, but not that Narumi Anju was his real name.

When she was a teenager, his mother had heard about the Anju sisters and the baby they'd found on the doorstep. Pregnant, unmarried and broke, she created the fantasy that her baby and Himemiya and Shizune Anju's baby had the same father. She named her Narumi – why she'd given her child the same name as the man she would later tell him was his half-brother remained a mystery – and changed her name legally to Anju.

Agents searching out Reo Mouri's background in the publishing house had dug up that story with little effort. Yura Anju was long dead. After the real Narumi Anju was elected governor and then prime minister, everyone who'd known her and her little baby boy remembered her crazy tale.

Natsume came out onto the front porch and sat on another rocker next to Mikan. His arm was freshly bandaged, and she'd overhead an E.R. doctor giving him a stern lecture about taking it easy for a few days. You've been shot, do I need to remind you?

Mikan sipped more of the tea punch, her snakebite aching, her mind fighting off the memory of going into the river with the fat, wriggling water snake. Once it realized it was in the water, it released its grip on her neck and tore off to safety. "Reo – it's hard to think of him as Narumi – would have had a better upbringing if his mother had left him on Himemiya and Shizune's doorstep too."

"They were up there in age when he was born, weren't they?"

"They'd have seen to it he got to a good home."

"Why didn't they do that with the prime minister? Not that there was anything wrong with their home, but two maiden sisters living alone out here on the river, World War Two ranging –" He shrugged. "It can't have been an easy decision to keep him."

"They believed he belong here." And Mikan left it at that, angled a quick smile at him. "You'll have to watch my documentary."

He smiled back at her. "Mikan Sakura, Ph.D." But he tilted back in his chair and hoisted his feet up onto the porch rail, a warm breeze bringing with it the smells of grass, flowers, river. Natsume, who'd been in agent mood for hours, glanced at her with those incisive, impatient crimson eyes. "Why would our young Narumi Anju think the prime minister would grant Shiki Masachika a pardon if you asked him? It's got to be more than your pretty hazel eyes."

Mikan looked straight ahead, across the shaded lawn to the river and didn't answer.

"What do you have on the prime minister?" Natsume asked quietly.

"You have a suspicious mind, Deputy." She laid on the sexy southern accent but still didn't look at him. "The Sakuras and Anjus have been neighbors for a lot of years. I'm sure we can tell many tales about each other."

"Whatever it is, it's going to come out now. The media's descending. You've got the Secret Service crawling all over this place. The FBI, the marshals, Alice, your local sheriff – they're all going to want to know why Reo Mouri/Narumi Anju thought Prime minister Anju would grant a fugitive a pardon if only he could manipulate you into asking him."

"And I could tell them I have no idea," she said. "I could tell them that Reo never discussed his reasoning with me in the cave." She glanced sideways at him. "Here's a question for you. Should I have tried to scream when her grabbed me in the cottage kitchen and put the gun to my head?"

"You should have trusted your instincts, which is what you did."

"How long before you and Tsubasa realized he had me?"

"Seconds. We didn't want to get you killed." His eyes narrowed, darkened. "It was not a good moment."

She felt a rush of warmth, but warned herself against reading too much into it, too much into the sparks that had flown between the two of them for days. They both had so much to process. And yet, she didn't want him to go back to Tokyo. She wanted to keep him right here, sitting with her on the front porch.

"I trusted you to deal with your snake," he said.

Back to what she had on the prime minister of Japan. She was smart to remain on her guard. "I left you no other choice."

"I could have kept you from doing that kamikaze, feetfirst dive into the water, or I could have gone in with the two of you."

"And got bit, too."

"The point is that I trusted you to handle yourself."

"Thank you, and I trust you to do your job as an Alice Agent and therefore tell your superiors if I tell you something about the prime minister, who is, after all, your ultimate boss."

"So you're saying you do have something on the prime minister."

She groaned.

"Alright. Don't tell me. I'll read about it in the papers."

He didn't seem irritated or even that curious, just satisfied that he was right and she did have a secret on the prime minister.

He tilted back in his chair. "I'll bet t has something to do with snakes."

"You're like the water snake that had hold of my neck. You won't let go, will you?"

"Ah, Mikan." He grinned at her, his tiredness evident underneath, but a light of humor and pure, deliberate sexiness shone in his eyes. "I'd love to latch onto you in a dozen different ways right now. But don't compare me to a snake, okay?"

"You've seen more water snake since being here than I've seen in the last ten years –" But she sighed, and set her glass down, gazing again at the river. "Narumi was a self-made businessman when I was in high school, a millionaire with political ambitions and a desire to serve the public. Himemiya and Shizune were still alive. He'd drive out here to see them. Luna, his wife, often didn't come."

"Mikan…"

She pretended not to hear him. "It was a hot day. Muggy. Ruka and I were home from school. I didn't know Narumi was here. As I told you, I'd been visiting Himemiya and Shizune – they didn't know, either. He and Kuna had just lost their fourth child. Luna was very depressed. There were rumors she was suicidal." Mikan shut her eyes and rocked back into the chair, feeling herself at almost seventeen, practically skipping back from the Anju house. "Narumi believed it was his fault, that his ambition, the pressure of his work, had hurt their chances of having a child. He came out to the river to pull himself together. It was the low point in his life, his marriage."

"He told you all this?"

She nodded, opening her eyes, wishing she could slow her mind, stop the pace of the images repeating themselves. "He was standing on the narrow ledge in front of the cave where Reo had taken Hotaru. I heard him from the path. He was sobbing. I don't think -" She broke off a moment, searching for the right words. "He's not one to cry in front of other people."

Natsume picked up her iced-tea glass and took a sip. "Think he was going to jump?"

"I don't know. I'll never know." She rocked back in her chair. "I don't think he intentionally went out to the ledge to jump. I think he found himself there. It's not that much of a jump – there's no guarantee he'd have died even if he had planned to commit suicide."

"Water's deep there, current's strong."

"He's an excellent swimmer. Not that it matters if he'd wanted to die."

"Was he drunk?"

"Who's telling this story?" But he'd brought her back to the present, and that was where she needed to be to continue. "He surprised a water moccasin on the ledge. I saw it. It came after him – they can be very aggressive when they're startled. Narumi panicked."

"And you?"

"I grabbed the snake and threw it in the water."

Natsume smiled. "You and these snakes."

"The story got told differently than how it was,"

"That's one way of putting it. He said he saved you from the snake. That he saw you on the ledge and you were the one who panicked."

"Ah. You've done your research. No, he said none of that. It was how the story got told. It was how people wanted it to be. A high school girl and a man who would be president – wouldn't you want him to be the one to save her from the snake?" She looked out at the river, smelled it on the breeze. "He simply never corrected it."

"Did he ever ask you to not to correct it?"

"Never. Not once. I think if I hadn't been there, he'd have crawled into the cave and died. He wouldn't jumped in the river and committed suicide, but he would have seen the snake as confirmation of all he'd thought and doubted about himself that day. I don't mind how the story's been told. Narumi understands what it's like to be rock bottom. He's brought that into his public service. His political enemies would say he was a grown man saved by a seventeen year old girl, but the truth is far more complicated."

"He'd never have granted Shiki a pardon on your say-so."

It was a statement, but Mikan shook her head.

"Never. He took an oath. He just wouldn't – no, never. That Reo – Narumi – believed he would was a fantasy on his part."

Natsume took another swallow of tea. "This tea punch is growing on me. I still think it could use a pound less of sugar."

"Are you drinking out of my glass?"

He leaned toward her, skimmed his knuckles across her cheek. "If this place wasn't crawling with feds and you hadn't just been bitten by a snake, I'd be carrying you upstairs right now and drinking -"

"You're determined to embarrass me, aren't you?"

"Uh-uh." He kissed her on her forehead. "Just to make you smile."

The French authorities released the Sakuras into the protective custody of a deputy marshal sent in specifically for the task, who in turn not only put them on a plane but sat next to them for the duration of their flight to Tokyo.

Hotaru figured it was the only way to get them to their kids without another damn drama.

She inched her way out to the porch after she'd talked her E.R. doctors out of sticking her in a hospital and got a ride back to Northern Woods from a very cute FBI agent with a southern accent.

She hurt all over. She figured she'd hurt until she was a hundred.

Mikan was still in her rocking chair. Natsume had joined a million other feds down at Tsubasa's cottage. They'd already gone through the fishing cabin that Reo Mouri had rented. Apparently, he'd left behind a considerable amount of damaging information on Shiki Masachika, who was, allegedly, involved in illegal arms trading, extortion, murder, fraud – tax evasion was the least of his misdeeds.

"I thought you were being admitted to the hospital," Mikan said.

Hotaru gave her a crooked smile. "I had to threaten to shoot my doctor to keep hi, from strapping me to a stretcher. I hate hospitals."

"More than most people?"

"Yeah. Probably." She changed the subject. "Did I see you and agent Hyuuga smooching out here?"

Mikan sighed, looking smart and pretty and blushing a little bit. "Maybe it's the snakebite, but I think I'm falling for him."

Hotaru smirked. "It's the snakebite." She glanced out at the cottage and wondered where Tsubasa Ando was now. "I knew he'd take off."

"Tsubasa? Why didn't you stop him?"

"He was the one with the nine-millimeter."

Mikan put her feet up on the porch rail. "I hope someone gets to him before he does something he regrets."

"Like kill Shiki Masachika? I'm not sure he'd regret it." Hotaru eased herself slowly, painfully, onto a cushioned chair. "Kokoro Yome read me the riot act for not stopping him. Like I didn't have enough to do with two dead bodies, the snakes, you in the river, Natsume going Tarzan on us, this Reo Mouri foaming at the mouth."

"Yome is hard on you because he respects you."

"He's hard on me because he's a prick."

Mikan smiled. "And supposed you told him that?"

Hotaru realized that she'd come to like Dr. Sakura. "Yeah, as a matter of fact."

"Tsubasa's going after Shiki," Mikan said.

Hotaru nodded. "That must have been some woman he lost."

Well, that was anti-climactic don't you agree? What do you think of this chapter? Lousy, good enough, love it or hate it? Please leave any comments, opinions, suggestions or violent reaction. Write it in the review section below, and let me know.

Here's a Sneak Peek:

He had become one of the most wanted criminals in the world.

But he was prepared. He had a plan for just such a worst-case scenario.

He would survive. He'd always survived.

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