Well. Rating went up.

Disclaimer: See part 1

"You look, uh…"

"Gaunt?" Enishi supplied with a twist to his chapped lips that mimicked the way Kaoru's heart clenched in her chest.

"I was going to say 'better than the last time I saw you'." She supplied lamely, unsure where to go with this as a bitter wind wrapped around them and she shivered. "How was your New Year?"

Enishi was impervious to the cold despite being dressed in little more than a black peacoat over a suit. "Unremarkable," seemed to be all he was going to reply to her question.

Trying very hard not to roll her eyes while he was in a position to see her, Kaoru instead adjusted the scarf at her throat and tried a different approach. "I stayed at home, too, pretty much. My brother decided to come home for a visit at the last minute so we saw a movie and then split a bottle of cheap champagne." The less said the better about how Yahiko had still booked it out to meet Tsubame before midnight, leaving Kaoru to finish off the champagne by herself and stream a ball drop and fireworks on her phone as she lay in bed half awake and half drunk. She was happy for him, she was happy he had finally gotten it through his thick skull to make a move on the girl he'd spent all his teen years pining over, but the loneliness had been undeniable.

Enishi's first text to her had come at a vulnerable time, in other words.

"I didn't think you'd actually take me up on dinner, or so soon."

He looked at her as if she were babbling nonsense, "It's been over a month."

"I guess compared to never anything would have seemed soon to me." Honestly, she thought she had seen the last of him. Gein had disappeared from shadowing her, none of Enishi's associates nor the man himself had come to the restaurant, and it wasn't like Kaoru was trawling dive bars looking to save his soul or whatever else she had been trying to achieve that one day. "Your text was a surprise, I guess is what I'm saying..."

There was a twitch to Enishi's walk that implied he was annoyed all of a sudden, his pace speeding to the point that Kaoru had to nearly jog to keep up with his strides with uncomfortable clacks of her heels. "I don't see why 'Happy New Year' is all that remarkable." His voice was as frigid as the air.

"I guess I didn't see you as the type. I expected it from some people, but not from you."

"Would you rather I hadn't?" He stopped suddenly and blew into his hands, rubbing them together to heat them. It was the first sign he was a human being in this weather.

Kaoru, warmed a bit from her near jog, felt a strange temptation to pull off her gloves and let him heat his hands with her own. Sentimental drivel. That's not what this moment was; she needed to get her mind right. Unsure of her own answer to his question she changed the subject. "Is this where we're eating?"

The streetlights illuminated a storefront that, through craftsman glass, showed that candles burned on small tables where couples dined. This was not an establishment that encouraged large groups, and as they entered and Kaoru noted the tasteful modern interior, she suspected that the menu was going to be in a romance language she didn't read or speak.

"I know I said you could pick someplace you like, but you know very well I can only afford an appetizer at a place like this."

"Calm down Kamiya, I owe you far more than a measly dinner."

It wasn't about who owed who, but maybe to him it was and for some reason that was much more understandable than to think they were on an actual date. Kaoru could grasp the Enishi who dealt in favors—the devil she knew. He removed his coat at the table, revealing a black shirt under his black suit. Other than missing a white tie, he could have easily come from a funeral. The hollow cheeks added to the mourning aesthetic. Enishi seemed like he was held together in this moment mostly by willpower, eyes burning bright in the candlelight.

Kaoru thought with some embarrassment about how carefully she had dressed for this before she had gotten in her cab to meet him at a downtown landmark a couple blocks away. She had taken a straight iron to her hair to get rid of any bit of frizz, and the knee length plum dress may have had sleeves down to her elbow but every inch of it conformed to her body and Kaoru wondered why in the world she ever accepted Megumi's cast offs when it really wasn't her style. It almost felt like Kaoru had tried to dress for Enishi instead of herself…

Well, shit.

Fingering the thin gold chain that held a tiny teardrop of amethyst, Kaoru realized at last that she had fully gone into this as if it were a date. Honestly, she wanted Enishi to think she was pretty, otherwise she wouldn't have bothered to dab that lipstick on before she left. The dress was the sexiest one she owned. The shoes were the highest and least comfortable, purchased with Misao on a whim a year ago. She had put on jewelry, dammit all, rooting out the only bit of gold anything she owned to add some shine to her neck and wrist.

"I need wine," Kaoru blurted out, knowing that her face was going shades of red deeper as the revelations came fast and furious. Lord, she was good at lying to herself. And now she had to sit through dinner and stew in her awkward feelings for this impossibly inappropriate romantic partner.

Enishi's mouth actually quirked up as he handed her the wine list which was all in French. She didn't know what any of these wines were but she knew the word 'merlot' and so when the waiter came to take their drink order she picked one at random. It was only when the waiter returned with a tasting glass for her choice that she wondered just how much money said choice was going to cost Enishi. Her dinner partner seemed unconcerned.

"Not drinking tonight?" Kaoru wanted to slap herself as soon as she said it. Given how he had practically been a human pickle the last time they had seen one another it might have seemed like a snarky question.

"How could I? There's a distinct lack of pool tables." It was delivered so dryly that Kaoru's brain had trouble registering the fact that he had just made a joke. Her weak laughter was many seconds too late. Enishi undid the top button of his shirt, seemingly relaxing more in her presence and continued. "I realized it was an ignoble way to die. It would bring too many people too much pleasure for me to kill myself with alcohol."

Kaoru grimaced. "I'm glad something got you to stop, even if it was spite."

They didn't talk about anything for a while after that as they looked at the menu. Kaoru's guess had been correct and she couldn't read a damn thing on the French menu, but she could guess at some of it. The only thing she was reasonably sure she could order with confidence was the coq au vin, and she hoped Enishi didn't think it was some sort of meta-commentary about him when she did. The waiter came and left with their dinner order, and before Kaoru knew it someone was depositing a second glass of wine in front of her shortly which let her know she was much more nervous than even she had realized.

"I thought I had hallucinated you at first," Enishi said, conversational but his eyes were sharp, observing everything about her like he could pick her apart as he did a mathematical equation. "But then Gein asked me about the favor you promised him. I told him he deserved a few more weeks standing in the cold for knowingly directing you to seedy bars when diverting attention from you was half of his job."

"I only went to one seedy bar, for the record. My luck is never that good when I play the lottery..."

He took a drink of water. "You should have made the smart decision and left me there." Enishi watched her, knowing she couldn't help but retort with annoyance.

"You know I couldn't do that." Sick animals. Friends who needed a place to stay for a little while. Relatives who had hit the skids, no matter how distant. These were the staples of her childhood and the model her father had set for her for hospitality, possibly goodness itself, and she couldn't do less than her sainted father. Kaoru wasn't sure when she started to think of Enishi as a wounded animal, but he was a far cry from the man who had cornered her in an alleyway a few months ago.

Through soup and salad Kaoru held up ninety percent of the conversation. Enishi ate slowly, finishing everything without a shred of relish but with a determination that seemed more like a devotion to calorie intake rather than love of food. He sometimes ate for enjoyment, given that he never seemed this wooden when he came to Kaoru's workplace, but tonight he was mechanically completing a task. Meanwhile, Kaoru talked about everything in her life.

How Yahiko might finally get a new girlfriend, the only girlfriend he actually feared losing and so had never tried.

How Soujirou had finally proposed to Misao, and Kaoru had to endure call after gushing call about being a bridesmaid when her friend didn't even have a date picked out yet.

How Megumi had thrown Sano out on his ass, again, when he implied maybe they should move in together. It hadn't worked well the one time they had tried, but only Megumi seemed to remember that.

Enishi grunted responses to her observations and feelings until Kaoru finally dropped her spoon down in her meal with a clatter, splattering the rich sauce on the pristine tablecloth. "I appreciate the meal, but if I wanted to talk to myself you could have just as easily ordered a pizza sent to my home so I wouldn't have to pay for a cab or sit here for ages in my least comfortable clothes!"

Wherever his mind had wandered, he appeared to come back to earth because Kaoru practically felt the intensity of his concentration. It was like suddenly having a spotlight trained on her, and she wondered why she had agreed to tonight in the first place.

"I can't imagine how you manage to have such enthusiasm for so many things that have nothing to do with your goals." His voice was casual, but lashed her all the same. Couldn't she have been satisfied before with his vague attention and assume he was being a polite listener to her banal life story?

Maybe she needed that third glass of wine after all. "As you pointed out at Thanksgiving I don't appear to have any goals."

His words were said with bald despair and Kaoru felt immediate guilt. "Then I'm in good company." He set his fork down, his rare cut of beef only half finished. Kaoru could see she was losing him again to whatever obscure place his mind wandered to when he was depressed, and panicked.

"How can that be true? You have a successful, uh, business. You have a home that I'm betting is fully paid for, and probably piles of money all over the place."

"Window dressing. Means to an end."

Kaoru blew a puff of air at some hair that had fallen in her face. "What is success to you then? I'd say that looks a lot like success on the outside to someone like me."

"Success?" He stabbed his fork into some meat, pressing it down to make it bleed onto his plate. "Success would have been my brother-in-law's head on a pike. Some peace for my sister."

Unsure if he meant literally or figuratively, she stayed silent.

"But that turned out to be a childish dream, the misplaced grief of more than a decade crystallized into a singular purpose. I can't even blame Heishin for my failure in hunting my brother-in-law down and disposing of him, as much as I'd like to." He set his silverware down with a clink on the plate. "As it turns out, my revenge was destined to be a dead end."

Kaoru was getting increasingly irritated with his obtuse statements and her foot tapped with force against the table base. "I can't believe someone as smart as I thought you were could be so dumb!" Enishi narrowed eyes at her but a nice meal couldn't cover up the BS he was spewing. "Revenge? Destiny? Get real. You have a nice life, loads of money, and all the time in the world to figure out what you want to do next. Millions of people would kill to have your 'window dressing'—which by the way I wouldn't necessarily kill for but I wouldn't mind that kind of freedom. Feel your feelings, those are real enough and I know what it's like to lose a family member too soon—how the pain never really goes away completely—but life is for the living. And maybe once you've rejoined the living we can go on a real date."

From the bilious look in Enishi's eyes Kaoru could sense she had gone too far, but she also sensed he had enough self-control not to make a scene in the restaurant.

"Maybe I should head on out." Sheepish again now that her temper had been spent with unwise words, Kaoru slowly stood and grabbed her things. "Thank you for dinner, it was, um, really very good. And despite what I said I really, uh, respect how patiently you helped me with math. I'm sorry about your sister." Did she even know what she was saying anymore? Was she still talking? Retreat was all that consumed her mind.

In her haste to leave, Kaoru felt her ankle turn and she had to windmill her arms and grab onto a nearby table to steady herself. She apologized to the elderly couple who looked at her in shock, but didn't dare back to see if Enishi was still watching her progress. She suspected he was. Honestly, Kaoru was a bit shocked at herself for saying all those things. She should have just smiled and nodded along with his nonsense. It's just that… she knew he could do better! It was so frustrating to watch someone who had everything act like he had nothing. If Kaoru had half his brainpower and even a tenth of his money she would be in college figuring out what she wanted for herself!

Maybe that was her answer. If she had all the time and all the money in the world, what would she really want to do? It certainly wasn't Finance.

It was galling that he had been right about her, but maybe he could get past his anger and see that she was a little bit right about him as well.

It was past midnight when her phone beeped at her. Unluckily, she was sleeping light and restless after making a cake of herself at dinner, so when she saw Enishi's name on the screen she couldn't have jetted upright faster. Maybe there's no point to it, after all, his text read.

It could have been sleep deprivation, but the first place her mind leapt to when she saw those words flash across the screen was that he was a depressed person talking about how life had no point. And he lived enough floors up that a fall from his balcony would be deadly.

Are you alone? Kaoru waited five minutes after her texted response, but he didn't reply.

Do you need someone to talk to? Another five minutes passed and Kaoru felt her adrenaline dump in alarm.

Don't do anything hasty. I'm coming over. She'd be damned if she let him harm himself! Who cares what she said to him earlier!

Pulling jeans on at full stumble, and some running shoes without socks, she grabbed a thick coat and a knitted cap near the door and fumbled with her keys in the lock before she sprinted through the light dusting of snow down the street to the condo complex. Luckily, she didn't have to buzz in because a small group of drunk teens in equally messy clothing was trying to navigate their way out of cabs and into the building in a cluster. It wasn't hard to hide in the crowd, even if the loud ride in the elevator also reeked of alcohol and marijuana.

Moments later she was pounding on his door and twisting the knob as if she could will it to unlock. Mumbling under her breath, she checked her phone again, dialing his number this time when she saw no new messages. It rang once to voicemail. She tried again.

"What." He flat voice was clearly something in between surprised and annoyed.

"I told you I was coming over. Open the door!"

Silence on the other end was telling, but after a bit Kaoru heard what sounded like someone fiddling with the lock and the door opened to reveal a curious Enishi with a phone to his head which he dropped to his side when he saw her. His eyebrows raised up, clearly not expecting this eventuality.

"You didn't answer my texts." Kaoru said lamely. All the dots she had connected might just have been the products of a guilty and sleep deprived mind. "You made it sound like you were in a dark place."

He was examining her disheveled appearance, no doubt, as Kaoru watched his eyes flick up and down. "I was acknowledging that you had a point."

"I'm an idiot," Kaoru murmured under her breath to herself. She turned to go, face flaming with mortification, but a hand shot out to loosely encircle her wrist.

Once she halted and faced him, he let her go. "Or you could come in."

And there it was, Kaoru knew what the right decision was but somehow she couldn't make it. Maybe some of it was the way his plain t-shirt stretched across muscular shoulders, or the way his low slung lounging pants revealed the vee of muscles near his hips, but her feet carried her into the dark room all the same. The click of the door behind her made her back straighten, nervous energy causing pinpricks against the back of her neck.

"If you promise not to make it a sauna again, I'll let you turn on the heat." A light came on in the kitchen and illuminated enough of the living room to show Kaoru that it was completely empty.

"Are you moving?" She hazarded, as she crossed the room to close the balcony door. Had he been out there in this cold wearing nothing but a t-shirt? Maybe she had been right to be concerned for him after all.

Enishi came out with water bottles in both hands, one of which he offered Kaoru. "Possibly. I sold my controlling interest in the consulting agency. Technically, this property belongs to the company but they wouldn't dare evict me." There was a spark of the old Enishi, Kaoru thought with some relief. "And for the record, if I were going to kill myself I wouldn't have told you. I don't do things in half measures."

Kaoru jetted a severely unamused glance at him, but in the dim light she wondered if he could make that out. The room seemed huge and cold without any sort of furniture in it. Pale walls and dark curtains, a cloudy winder sky and orange light from the street made it feel claustrophobic. Kaoru wandered to the parted curtains anyway with her water, sipping slowly. She knew he was next to her even though Enishi hadn't made any noise in his approach. They stood there, looking out at the occasional passing car and Kaoru felt that maybe she was the stupid one and perhaps there was something like destiny out there that kept them orbiting one another.

"I—" She'd never know if the apology that was trying to slide out of her would have any impact because Enishi's tongue was in her mouth before she could get another word out. He was hunched forward to make up for their height difference and this close his skin looked orange from the reflected light outside. This was no practiced seduction, Kaoru thought before her mind became muddled, he was too frantic and too forceful in his technique.

Not that Kaoru was all that experienced, but there had been a time shortly after her father had passed when she may have thrown herself at a few men she was only marginally attracted to in an attempt to feel something other than pain. The thought that she was being used for something similar put a damper on the mood even as her hands seemed to disagree with her as they moved outside of her conscious will under his shirt against heated skin. No wonder the cold wasn't bothering him.

"Before we… continue…" Kaoru said breaking away from a kiss that had felt more like tongue and teeth than lips. "I need to know why."

Pupils blown wide with desire, Enishi coughed out a humorless laugh. "Only you…" Then sensing she was serious he clipped out the words she needed to hear. "You know me and even so you're here. I'm unsure you even like me, but I know we fit."

"I don't dis-like you…" Kaoru whispered defensively. But she did in fact get what he meant. For all their personality problems, their arguments, their differing worldviews and past experiences somehow they were on the same plane: at a crossroad in their life—aimless—missing someone who would never come back to them. She had literally bandaged his wounds and dragged him out of a hellhole, and he had challenged her to be a better version of herself and protected her in his own way.

Kaoru had more layers to shed as they collided again, and she could feel dexterous fingers tangle in her still smooth hair as Enishi pulled off her hat and let it free from the confines of the hairband she had hastily tied it up with. She had never managed to get to the thermostat, but seeing as she was bodily pressed next to Enishi's volcanic skin she wasn't cold. Her jacket and shirt were next, followed by his shirt. Kaoru kicked shoes in random directions, and wondered fleetingly if anyone had ever vacuumed up all that glass when they stumbled into his bedroom, Enishi's mouth on her neck. He was still being too aggressive with the suction, and Kaoru was glad Yahiko had already returned to college or else she would have had some really hard questions to answer about the marks that were no doubt being formed.

"Slow down," Kaoru tried to reassure him as she placed hands on Enishi's cheeks and guided his lips back to her own. Once that was accomplished she worked at the fastenings of her jeans, pulling them off with a sweeping motion that forced her breasts to brush down Enishi's chest as collateral damage. He responded by pulling her with him onto the bed, her body covering his and their legs in a tangle.

The topic of a condom came up, but Enishi didn't keep any in his living space because up until this moment this bed had only been for sleeping. Sex was usually something he planned at external sites, he said, and Kaoru had to stifle the pity she felt before it reached her eyes and gave it away. They compromised, neither being willing to stop long enough to go to a store to remedy their issue. Intimacy took many forms.

There wasn't much dignity as Kaoru gave gasped directions to Enishi, words melting to groans as his fingers worked inside of her and his tongue stroked and prodded her to climax. Despite it having taken time to navigate the tempo and general overstimulation of her second climax, he seemed willing to keep going but it was Kaoru who stilled him and shifted position. She encouraged him to lean back against the pillows, and while he hesitated to give up his dominant position, a few stokes of her hand down his length seemed to convince him finally. It was an act Kaoru had never liked because of the way men she had been with had behaved with grasping hands and thrusting hips, but Enishi was nothing if not controlled when it counted and she felt like she could trust him on this as her lips encircled him.

Strangled oaths that could have been in any language were all the warning she got as his muscles shone and flexed in the lamplight, and his own climax crested. The pulsing aftershocks seemed to overtake his whole body like a seizure, so when his pale eyes found hers she was glad he had kept the glasses on as he appeared to be able to focus on her. Both slick with sweat and cooling too quickly in the frigid room, Enishi suggested a shower.

"Not together," he clarified as Kaoru's eyes grew wide, her body still sensitive from earlier. Her defensive body posture might have given her away.

It was while he was in the shower after her that she fetched her shirt from where she had discarded it in the living room and then hid back in his bedroom. It was the work of a moment to flick on the heat in this one room, and the answering whir of air was comforting in a situation that was becoming increasingly uncomfortable as she considered the repercussions.

Unwilling to explore the room, Kaoru sat down next to the lamp that was on his bedside table and picked up the book there. It fell open to a particular spot towards the end where the binding had broken from being read too frequently. Precise yet stylistically sprawling cursive made Kaoru wish she had stuck with handwriting drills a little longer, because this was art. Before she knew it she'd read a few sentences before it occurred to her that if she hadn't been willing to violate his privacy by searching his room then surely reading his diary was a far worse offense. Flipping to the front page she saw that under the 'this journal belongs to' line there was the name Tomoe Yukishiro.

She had put the journal down just in time because Enishi emerged from the shower naked and rubbing at his hair. Kaoru knew she shouldn't stare, but she couldn't take her eyes off of him all the same as he pulled underwear from his dresser and put them on before joining her in bed without an ounce of the self consciousness that plagued Kaoru.

"Staying?" His voice was carefully neutral, neither encouraging nor disparaging.

"If you don't mind." Kaoru thought of her cold, empty house. Of how even a couple weeks of Yahiko back had made her realize how rambling and cavernous the house was without him. A normal person would get a pet, not sleep with a neighbor she chastised herself mentally.

Even though he had a king-sized bed, Kaoru somehow found herself sliding close enough to feel the radiant heat from his back. Despite probably being too warm due to her adventures with the thermostat, Enishi didn't edge away from her.

My brother comes out of foster care to live with us today, she had read, and while I know he'll never like Kenshin because of who he is, I hope he finds peace from my peace…