"We might be a bit late sir, there seems to be an accident further up the road."
"Hm." Sesshomaru was in no hurry to get to his office today, there wasn't much to do.
His gaze drifted out the window and he saw a familiar face. It was his cooking instructor, Kagome Higurashi. She was speaking to a man wearing a blue suit next to a car with an open trunk. What was she doing in the western city?
"Genkishi."
"Yes Sesshomaru-sama."
"Get me a background check on my cooking instructor."
Confusion showed on the mans face but he nodded, "It will be ready in an hour." He pulled out his phone and sent a text. Earning Sesshomaru's curiosity never bode well for the target.
Sango was mid stretch when Kagome walked back into the room, "How did it go?"
"He said it was good." She sighed, "I swear he's never happy with us."
"I think it's because old lady Kaede refused to give him a discount." Sango said cheerfully. "But at least the biggest stressor in our lives is out of the way."
"Tell me about it, who the hell needs five large pans for a single retirement party. Only ten people work in that office!"
"Who cares, we get paid and they get cake." Pulling out a rag Sango began to clean the table of any remaining frosting. "Now get to cleaning, I want to enjoy my next two days off."
Kagome glared at her, "At least one of us gets to have a nice weekend." She grumbled.
"No one told you to rent out an apartment by yourself." Sango snapped.
"Well the one person I wanted as a roommate ended up getting engaged with a pervert." She she snapped back.
"Then find yourself a boyfriend and have him move in with you."
"Bitch."
Shaking her head, Sango smiled at her, "Go out and sweep the floor, I'll finish up here and then we'll get dinner together."
"Fine."
"...some of you responded to my email and voted and the winner, as you can see, was steamed buns. These can be a bit tricky to get right but we'll be practicing for the next two classes, so you at least can get the basics down. Sadako-san is our resident dumplings master so she will be assisting me in today's class. We'll both be coming around too…"
She finished explaining the instructions for everyone and started to walk around class making sure everyone was doing well with the dough, which in her opinion was the hardest part.
At table four, as expected, Karou was glaring at the liquid in her bowl. Kagome wondered how this grown woman always seemed to mess up on her recipes.
"Karou-chan, I might have to move you to the front of the class." She sighed, "Go ahead and throw that out, we'll start over again."
"How am I doing sensei?" Sakura asked holding out her bowl towards her.
"Wet one hand and kneed it again, that'll make it easier to work with once we start to stuff them."
"Hai!"
Looking across the table she watched as Sesshomaru added a bit more water to his dough. "How are you doing Taisho-san?" She asked.
"Sesshomaru-sama actually showed me how to do mine!" Sakura chirped, "He's a very fast learner."
A bit curious, Kagome left Karou to measure out the ingredients as she walked around the table to peer around the tall males arm. Sakura wasn't kidding, there was not a bit of excess powder lining the metal sides of the bowl.
"Can I feel it?" She asked and he wordlessly moved the bowl in front of her. She pressed a few fingers into it and pulled a bit to check how elastic it was. "Wow, have you ever done this Taisho-san?" She looked up to find him looking down at her, smugness gleaming in his golden eyes.
"This is my first time."
"You have some real talent." She smiled, "Maybe you'll rub some off on Kar-" Blue eyes widened as she glanced over at said girl, "It says one cup of water not a glass!" She snapped, moving over to the red faced girl.
"It said one cup," Karou grumbled, holding up her coffee mug, "This is a cup."
"Oh dear."
The rest of class was a bit interesting, everyone, with some help, was able to complete the dough. Getting the filling together was a much simpler task because it was just cutting up ingredients. The next hurdle came when it was time to wrap the buns closed, everyone knew the swirled pleated look was how steamed buns looked, but it required hours of practice to perfect. They had twenty minutes.
"Per class policy you guys are required to eat one of your buns before you leave because part of being a good cook is being able to tell how your own food tastes. The rest of the buns can be taken home and done with what you want. If you're like me and don't have anyone else to eat all eleven of your leftovers, you can freeze them…"
At the end of class she once again made her way to the faculty office where Tachibana and the staff coordinator were waiting, arms crossed. She wanted to turn tail and run but they had already seen her.
"Higurashi-sensei!" Tachibana did not look happy.
"Y-Yes."
"You mu-"
"Tachibana-sensei, allow me to inform Higurashi-sensei."
Whatever it was, it had pissed off the old hag, but she couldn't remember actually doing anything that could've rubbed the woman a bad way. Didn't she?
"Yes."
"We have received multiple complaints of our students and staff feeling uncomfortable with Taisho-sama's bodyguards in the halls."
Oh god, were they going to make her tell him?
"And we would like for you to let him know that he needs to stop bringing them along."
They were.
Cowards.
"Shouldn't you do that?" She asked, "If it-"
"You are in charge of him so it is your responsibility Higurashi-sensei." Tachibana all but hissed at her.
The staff coordinator began to sweat profusely as he looked between the two women.
Kagome narrowed her eyes at the old crone. The lady had never liked her since she had joined and had done all she could to make her life as miserable as possible. Taking first priority on supplies, blocking her from doing certain recipes because they were only for the premium classes and not commoner ones like hers. The people in charge obviously kissed the womans ass so complaining never got her anywhere.
"You have until next week to speak to Taisho-sama about this."
It was on the cold walk home that she wondered why she still bothered to work at this place.
It was when she got home that she remembered. Her coworkers were assholes but the money let her enjoy living in the city. Working at the bakery covered her ridiculous rent, but she needed more than rent money to survive. She needed to get grocery and entertainment money from somewhere.
Setting her bags down she grabbed her mailbox keys and headed back to the lobby. She had a habit of losing her mailbox keys whenever she would take them outside of her apartment building, so she now kept them inside her apartment at all times. She also added like fifteen keychains onto the small, golden key so it couldn't fall into any cracks or hide somewhere.
She needed to figure out how to ask Sesshomaru to not bring his million bodyguards with him. He seemed like a nice enough guy but they had to be there for a reason right. Maybe he wouldn't take it the wrong way.
Wiping the blood off his hand Sesshomaru tossed the handkerchief on the ground. "Find out where he is Genkishi."
The man just nodded, his eyes on the lifeless form sprawled on the floor.
As Sesshomaru emerged from the room someone handed him his phone.
I made pancakes today!
He gazed as the toothy smile of the child in the picture, swallowing painfully as he sent a quick text back.
"I can do better."
Thank you to everyone who reviewed, please continue to do so.
Also I realized that I had been spelling Tashio, Taisho but I'm not going change it since Sesshomaru's last name is practically non existent and the mistake had already been made. I'm also glad you guys were intrigued by the dark bits of the last chapter.