Despite the loud thumping of her heart echoing in her head, Ai fully understood now. Shinichi's confusing actions and behavior; the way he looked at her, making her feel uncomfortable; why he suddenly stopped coming to the professor's house for dinner; the random silence and comments he makes when with her—they all finally made sense to her. And she realized why he looked at her with an expression akin to hatred.

Shinichi was attracted to her and fighting against it.

Her brain rushed to separate the many emotions she felt from Shinichi's revelation, trying to find a way to react other than sitting stock-still. What did she feel? Embarrassment? Joy? Shock? Fear? Whatever she felt, they were all mixing within her in aggravating chaos. The only emotion she was fully aware of occupying her heart was pity. As Shinichi leaned his head on her shoulder, pleading to her to help him rid of an emotion he did not want, she felt pity because all she heard in that confession was that he loved Ran. Her heart clenched. Only Shinichi can reject a person through a confession.

"You're the worst."

Her tone was soft yet sharp against his ear. "I know," he agreed.

That doesn't make it better, she thought, her heart aching due to his admittance of being an asshole. In fact, it angered her. "By saying that to me, what do you expect was supposed to happen?"

Shinichi noticed her voice held an underlying cold tenor and tightened his jaw because her words rang true. What did he expect to happen? What did he want to happen?

"What was supposed to happen, Shinichi?" she repeated, her vexation gradually building at his silence.

She felt him shake his head slightly before answering, "I don't know," he said in frustration. "I don't know," he repeated, his head still resting on her shoulder. He didn't want to move. He didn't want to see her face or the expression she was making. "I just… ever since I saw you that first night I got back, you've been constantly on my mind," he said in an annoyed tone. "You don't know how much I tried to rationalize this… this feeling towards you. 'It's only fleeting', 'you just haven't seen her in a while', 'she's beautiful, of course you'll be physically attracted to her'… I keep repeating those words in my head, but… I can't help it…" He saw her hands resting in her lap and resisted the urge to reach out and hold them within his. "I want to touch you, Ai," he revealed softly, and he saw her fist her hands as if she knew they were being watched.

She didn't think it was possible for her heart to beat any faster. She always knew Shinichi was blunt with his words, uncaring of who the recipient was, but to blatantly string such words together and admit it to her. How could he?

She closed her eyes, trying to calm her heart. All the memories of watching him from afar surfaced her mind, bringing back the emotions they came with: the envy, the longing, the hurt, and the sorrow. No other man she knew could make her feel all emotions at once. Shinichi, selfless and arrogant in almost every way, would beg for one reason only. How could she turn him away?

"Then touch m—," Ai wasn't able to finish the sentence when the door to the infirmary opened.

Tachibana Hiro. 17 years old, physically. 28 years old, mentally.

Clever. Agile. Carefree. Perceptive. Handsome. A combination of attributes that give rise to a rather roguish but competent personality. With a relaxed temperament, Hiro always preferred the easy route. He wasn't much of a rule breaker, but he also wasn't the type to be bounded by them either. 'Work smarter, not harder' was his second favorite saying, the first being 'Que sera sera' due to life experiences.

Everywhere Tachibana Hiro went, he easily attracted and got along with many people. After constantly being around others, he learned to read the intentions behind every word uttered and every action made by humans, especially when he witnessed the same people being friendly to him act differently behind his back. Becoming skeptical of people, it became a habit that lead to a career he never planned to pursue.

One day, he was out with some high school classmates at a billiards club when he called out a neighboring table for hustling an unsuspecting victim. The victim turned out to be an undercover cop and questioned how he knew the man was hustling. After pointing out the dubious mannerisms of the hustler, the undercover cop was impressed to offer him a job. With no big dream, Hiro thought why not.

It was three years into his career when he received a mission to accompany a criminal client to a trading meet-up. The agency was given a tip by an arrested drug addict that the meet-up will lead to the supplier. What Hiro encountered instead was an assassination. Their client instantly died by a bullet to the head, and Hiro was knocked unconscious and kidnapped to be taken for questioning.

When he had awoken with the back of his head immensely throbbing, he saw men dressed in black overcoats and fedora hats staring at him behind dark sunglasses. They didn't waste a second to question which organization he was working with, and after being beaten for keeping quiet, they forced him to take a drug and dumped his body into a nearby dumpster. He felt extremely hot with intense pain shooting throughout his body as if every single cell received 2000 volts of electricity. The next thing he knew, he woke up looking like his 10-year-old self.

Hiro struggled to find any leads to cure his situation. A close partner he worked with acted as his guardian, and Hiro was able to use the agency's resources for his research without too much difficulty; however, nothing was showing up. Years passed and Hiro almost gave up on finding a cure when news broke out world-wide that a famous high-school detective from Japan brought down a huge international criminal organization. Looking through published photos, Hiro recognized the men in the black overcoats and knew he needed to meet with this famous (former high-school) detective.

Eventually, his search for Japan's Holmes brought him to Beika High and there he met her, a face he had recognized from one of the photos with Kudo Shinichi in the articles he had read up about: Haibara Ai. Upon transferring to her class, he tried to get close to her in order to ask about the famous detective, but it proved difficult when he was bombarded by other students and found out that Haibara Ai wasn't exactly the warmest person as she had completely brushed him off the first time he tried to say hello. But that didn't stop him from observing her from afar.

He had asked other students about her and found that she was in a detective club (which surprised him and not surprised him at the same time), she was an adopted daughter of a scientist, and she was popular among the male student body like he had expected. The more he observed Haibara Ai, the more reasons for trying to befriend her grew as her mature aura greatly captivated him: her manner of speech, the way she walked, and how her smile always seemed to hold a bittersweet feeling as if she was hiding something.

Weeks later, Ai was scheduled to be on class duty for the week. The other student scheduled to be on duty had a part-time job and asked if anyone could cover him. Hiro immediately volunteered.

"I'll be filling in for Kitagawa-san," he had mentioned to Ai after school in case she fogot and realized she didn't really care as he watched her simply take a seat and opened the daily log to record the day's entry. He grabbed a nearby chair and sat in front of her. "I'm Tachibana Hiro," he introduced again and stuck out his hand.

Without looking up, she said, "I know," before going back to jotting down notes into the logbook. He quirked a brow at her curt response and smiled, rather intrigued. He retracted his ignored hand and crossed his arms.

"Schools in Japan are quite different," he said observingly, watching her write the day's events and briefly questioned the purpose of the whole thing. Hiro softly scoffed at the fact that his attempt at starting a conversation was ignored. By stating how different Japan was, he thought Ai would question how schools in England were, but he was met with silence instead. In fact, Ai hadn't said a word until she was done writing.

"Good work today," she bid standardly before exiting the classroom with Hiro sighing dejectedly after the door slid close behind her. It's alright, he thought. He had five more days of class duties.

The next day was just as silent as the previous and so was the day after that. Whenever he asked a question, she would always answer in a word or two. It wasn't until the fourth day of class duties that he finally asked, "Did I do something to offend you?" Maybe asking such a straightforward question would at least elicit more of a response from her.

"No, why?" she replied as she was writing in the logbook. Two words again, he thought in slight annoyance.

"Well, you're not exactly responding to my statements," he responded, leaning on the desk in front of her.

She briefly stopped writing to regard him. "Were you looking for a conversation?"

Hiro furrowed his brows at her response. There was no way she didn't know what he was trying to do. He would comment about random things and ask questions he already knew the answers to. From his observation since he arrived, Haibara Ai was no dunce in the social cues department, but before he could say anything in return, the classroom door opened.

The two students on class duty turned their heads at the interruption and saw two females at the door. The first girl who had opened the door looked as if she wanted something and the second girl behind her looked quite shy and nervous.

"Um, Hiro-kun, if you have time, could we talk to you?" the first girl questioned.

Hiro knew what they wanted. It was the third time to have someone come to the classroom and ask to speak to him that day alone. "Sorry," he apologized. "As you can see, I'm quite busy filling out the logbook with Ai-chan."

"It's o-," Ai started to say until Hiro grabbed her hand while continuing to smile at the girls at the door. It wasn't until the girls left that he removed his hand from hers and apologized for grabbing it.

"Sorry, I just didn't want you to finish that sentence," he said sincerely and noticed Ai unconsciously move her hand to her lap, and he internally scolded himself for making a teenage girl feel uncomfortable. Before any more awkwardness can fill the air, he immediately added with playful narcissism, "Lately, it seems like I'm being requested to go to some part of the school."

Ai arched a brow at his conceited remark and said, "Anyone who transferred in the middle of the semester with superior facial and physical attributes would gain the attention of those around him." She then resumed writing as usual.

Hiro fell quiet as he realized that was the longest sentence she had ever said to him. It also alluded to the fact that somewhere in that sentence Ai thought he was attractive. For some reason, compared to everyone else in the school and despite knowing she was younger than him, Hiro found himself wanting only Ai's attention. The more he was around her, the more he wanted her to react to him. He then leaned down to get a better look at Ai's face before saying, "I didn't get yours," causing Ai to pause in the middle of writing.

She lifted her eyes to look at him, expecting him to smirk haughtily as usual but, just as his reply was unexpected, so was the expression he had as he looked directly back at her. With the sun slowly setting in the background, casting a deep orange glow to the classroom, and the sound of a bat colliding with a baseball heard from nearby baseball field, he held her gaze. And after five silent seconds, he watched her scoot her seat back, grab her bag, and walk out of the classroom, leaving him behind with a half-written log entry.

With a small quirk of the lips, he grabbed the discarded pencil and finished the entry with a single sentence: Tachibana Hiro finally gained Haibara Ai's attention.

She erased it the following day; however, she couldn't erase its truth. He confirmed it when she left the clubroom as soon as she saw him, a sign that she was fully aware of him.

"Let's play a game, Ai," he said a couple of weeks later after officially joining the detective club much to Ai's chagrin. It was just him and Ai in the clubroom as the other members were at their other clubs. The strawberry-blonde member lifted her eyes from her book to acknowledge him momentarily. "A simple game of war with an added twist of truth or dare," he said, picking up the plastic deck of cards Genta had placed on the bookshelf after playing a game of poker with Mitsuhiko the previous day.

"Don't want to," she rejected and went back to her book.

He expected that. Despite allowing him in the club, she was still rather apprehensive of his presence. Maybe because of that, he developed a hobby of riling her up. "Aww, come on," he pleaded playfully, joining her on the worn-out sofa.

"I have no reason to play," she replied, readjusting herself comfortably after being shifted from his added weight.

He quirked a brow as a sudden thought came to him. "Not even wanting to know the true reason I applied to the club?" He grinned internally when Ai broke attention from her book to look at him again. He was becoming a pro at reading her. "Every time you get a higher card, you can ask me anything you want or make me do anything," and then he added, knowing she'll definitely play, "even have me quit the club and never bother you again."

Ai was quiet as she looked at him contemplatively. "You won't even choose dare," she spoke in suspicion.

"I promise you, I will," he vowed. "On the fifth time you draw a higher card, I will choose dare. I'll even give you an advantage, the highest card I can hold will be a 7." With stakes like that, there was no reason for her not to play. The odds were stacked against him. Despite knowing that, he added confidently, "But by the time I choose dare, you won't ask me to leave."

He smiled victoriously when Ai placed her book down. "Okay," she agreed.

The two club members moved to the table. After separating the cards and shuffling each of their cut of the decks, they both drew their first card. Ai easily won with a jack of spades against Hiro's 4 of hearts.

Despite being the loser of the first round, Hiro grinned. "Truth," he spoke.

Ai looked at him in the eyes and asked, "Why did you want to join the detective club?"

"Oh? First question immediately?" he said, amusingly, but Ai said nothing and waited for his response. He chuckled lightheartedly and answered mischievously, "I'm looking for someone."

Although Ai wasn't smiling, Hiro watched her expression drop from his vague answer and almost laughed in entertainment. The Ice Doll of Beika High could be unexpectedly cute, he thought. He saw Ai's brow quirk, and if he could read her mind, he knew she was thinking 'Two can play at that game.'

Both individuals drew their next card. Ai won again with a king of diamonds against Hiro's 3 of hearts. Hiro waited for her question but knew what she would ask. "Who specifically are you looking for and why are you looking for that person?"

"Japan's Holmes. I wanted to interview him about one of his cases," he answered truthfully.

"Kudo-kun?" he heard her whisper to herself.

'Kun?'

He knew Ai knew Kudo Shinichi, but to refer to him as 'kun' instead of 'senpai' or 'onii-san' was rather odd. And her expression when he said his nickname was not what he anticipated at all. He expected a light surprise at the unexpected answer that he was looking for an alumni of Beika High, but Ai's expression was more of shock in a protective manner. The look Ai had told him that there better be a better reason than wanting to interview him, which made him curious to why Ai would hold such a look for indirectly mentioning Kudo Shinichi. In fact, he always wanted to know why she was there in the photo that was published about the takedown of the Black Organization, albeit she was only in the background.

"What case?" she asked, brows furrowed, but Hiro shook his head.

"You asked your question already. Next round."

Ai slightly huffed but flipped a card over, revealing a 5 of clubs. She glanced to Hiro's flipped card and saw a 6 of spades. Hiro grinned. "Truth," she chose as he had expected.

There were many questions he wanted to ask Ai, especially about her ties to Kudo Shinichi and the Black Organization, but what surprisingly came out of his mouth was, "Are you in a relationship?" He internally cursed himself as soon as the question left his lips. He was 28 for crying out loud! Why the hell was he asking a teenage girl if she was in a relationship? From the look on her face, he could tell his question was not what she thought he would ask, but she answered him nonetheless.

"No," was her answer, which admittedly made him smile in relief, and he immediately felt guilty for remotely feeling that way.

The two players flipped another card, and the winner of the fourth round was Ai with a 9 of hearts, making Hiro the loser with a 7 of clubs. Ai did not waste any second to ask, "What case did you want to ask him about?"

Hiro was somewhat surprised to see Ai very curious about why he wanted to contact Shinichi, but he knew it was more because of the other party rather than him personally. "The international criminal syndicate that he destroyed," he answered and saw Ai's brows furrow more in confused speculation. "I wanted to ask him some things about them."

Ai was about to open her mouth to ask another question but flipped another card over instead and won with a ten of hearts against a 4 of clubs. "It was a pretty big case. You could easily look up the information online." It wasn't exactly a question, but he knew her intent in saying those statements.

"I read all articles and watched all the interviews related to that case. What I want to know wasn't answered." He could see her mind working, trying to figure out what he really wanted. Maybe she was more involved than he initially thought she was. She seemed to be too concerned about why he wanted to see Kudo Shinichi. In fact, she didn't hesitate to flip another card over, moving the game along. However, Hiro won with a 2 of diamonds against her ace of spades.

"Truth," she chose once again.

After his first question, Hiro thought he should keep the questions on the main topic and avoid breaking any law of showing interest in a minor even though he could argue that he was a teenager himself. But as he thought about what question to ask, he kept recalling Ai referring to the famous detective with an honorific that wasn't suitable to her age. He always thought she had a maturity that wasn't found in other students. Maybe it was wishful thinking somewhere within him, but after waking up as a ten-year-old again, anything was possible. After all, she seemed to be connected to his targets of questioning. With all that in mind, he decided to test the waters. "When were you born?"

That question ultimately answered everything Ai wanted to ask. He could have simply asked what her age was, but he decided to ask her birthdate instead. She answered him, purposefully leaving out the year.

For the first time since they started this game, Hiro's heart beat increased with unexpected hoping. He flipped over another card and lost to Ai's queen of spades with a 7 of spades. "Dare," he said as promised and waited patiently for her to speak.

He could see her contemplating what to dare him to do after knowing his story. It wasn't until a whole minute later that she finally spoke. "Don't ever call me Ai-chan again."

He smiled knowingly and tipped his head to her in elated defeat, "As you wish."

After that day, Ai no longer held a barrier around him, and he no longer felt guilty for flirting with her. After telling Ai how he had shrunk to his ten-year-old self, Ai revealed that she was the creator of the drug and offered to create an antidote for him. Thus, he was constantly over at the professor's house and over time got to know more about Ai and her past as he revealed his to her. However, he realized that whenever the topic would head to talk about Kudo Shinichi, Ai would deliberately be vague about her answers and change the topic, and he would never question why. Haibara Ai wasn't as secretive as she would like to be.

When Ai finally gave him the pill to reverse the effects of the APTX-4869, Hiro placed the pill in his pocket and asked what was for dinner. She never asked him why he didn't want to take the pill after searching for years on how to find a cure. Instead, she suddenly kissed him when they were washing dishes after eating dinner. Pleasantly surprised that she made the first move, he snaked a soapy hand around her waist and pulled her body flushed towards him to kiss her deeply, stating he's been wanting to do that for a long time now.

"I know," was all she said before grabbing his collar and pulling him down to kiss him again.

He was at her house every day since then unless he had soccer practice. They never explicitly stated what their relationship was. They kissed, but they never held hands or hugged in public or in private. It hasn't been a year since they knew each other, but they developed a unique trust within one another.

And then Kudo Shinichi returned to Japan.

"He couldn't stop looking at you," Hiro had said in the clubroom the day after they all had dinner together. Ai was laying on the sofa as usual, reading a fashion magazine. He knew she heard him, but as usual, she remained silent whenever Kudo Shinichi was the subject of conversation. He moved to join her on the sofa, gently lifting her legs before sitting himself down and placing her slender legs on his lap.

"How long has it been since you last saw each other?" he asked as he caressed her smooth legs, his hand slowly sliding up her leg, behind her knee, and to her outer thigh. He stopped when he saw Ai drop the magazine to the floor and place an arm over her eyes as she fought off the color to her face, and Hiro immediately knew that the blush on her cheeks wasn't due to him touching her but the memories she was recalling from the previous day.

"Kiss me," she whispered, and he willingly and painfully obliged.

Since Shinichi's return, Ai was oddly more vocal in requesting he touch and kiss her. It used to be strictly behind close doors, but the time and place slowly didn't matter anymore. The more she asked him to kiss her regardless of the public, the more he knew Kudo Shinichi was plaguing her mind… and heart.

He was currently waiting patiently for Ai outside the infirmary. At first he could barely hear their conversation, but after a minute of silence, Hiro had a sudden foreboding feeling. He immediately opened the door. As if brought back to their senses, he saw Ai and Shinichi immediately separate.

"Ai, we need to close the scavenger hunt," Hiro said calmly, leaning on the doorway.

Afraid that her voice had betrayed her earlier, Ai simply nodded her head, and Shinichi watched her exit the infirmary with Hiro.

Hiro followed Ai, observing her from behind. She hadn't said a word nor looked at him since they left the infirmary. When then got to an empty stairway, Hiro pulled Ai to a stop and turned her to face him, her face expressionless.

"He finally confessed, didn't he?" he questioned, knowingly.

Only then did her expression falter as she slowly nodded her head. Looking as if she wanted to cry in self-frustration, Hiro pulled her into a hug for the first time. Burying her face in his chest, she hugged him back, cursing Shinichi in her thoughts.