Capitulum II – Bring her to me alive.
Eyes shut, yet he could still see her everywhere.
It's been a week since she's returned to Japan and his life was utter chaos. And he fucking hated chaos. He's been getting calls from his business partners and other clan heads day and night. Understandably so, they were all furious at her return. After the stunt she had pulled three years ago, they banned her from ever stepping foot on Japanese soil again. Some of them did, in fact, believe she was dead, that's how good she was at hiding.
Until now.
He couldn't, for the life of him, figure out the reason for her reappearance. She knew she wasn't welcome here; she knew she didn't have any friends or people that would help her. She was like a lamb, presenting herself on a silver platter, waiting to be slaughtered. Yet nothing happened. There must be a reason for such a reckless behavior, he thought to himself. Or maybe she's just suicidal. He dismissed that thought as soon as it popped into his head. Sakura was many things, a temptress, a deceiver. A liar. But she was not suicidal. She must be on some sort of mission.
He opened his eyes and looked at the video footage on his computer screen. Images of her stepping out of the car in front of the Plaza Hotel, having meetings with unknown people, lurking in the shadows during shady business transactions in abandoned warehouses. And then the latest footage: her stealing a suitcase from a container on his docks last night.
He was having her surveilled 24/7 ever since her arrival. He wanted to know everything she did, every step she took, every hand she shook, and every life she took. He was hoping to figure out her motives by watching her, before he decided on any action, but so far nothing came up. There was no clear pattern in her actions, they seemed random. However, one thing tied all of them together: Sasuke was always involved in some way. The people she had met worked for him and the places she had gone to belonged to him. It almost seemed as if she was trying to get his attention by interacting with his employees and being on his property. And another thing all of these scenes had in common, apart from the presence of his treacherous ex-wife, was that bodyguard of hers, trailing her everywhere. Kai was his name, or at least it seemed to be. There wasn't much his people could find on him, not even a surname. What they had found out, however, was that he was ex-military. Figures, Sasuke thought. Bulky, muscly, always carrying around an arsenal of weapons with him, including two katanas on his back and shooting people in the head that came too close to Sakura.
Except for Sasori, Sakura shot him herself. He rewound the footage of the robbery on the docks again and watched it closely. After her henchmen had gotten the upper hand in a short gunfight against Sasori's gang, Kai executed all of them, save one. Sasori was beaten to a pulp and thrown at Sakura's feet. She appeared to be talking to him, probably asking about the location of the suitcase. He looked visibly angry and spat blood on her shoes. Sakura looked disgusted for a moment, before kneeling down to him and whispering something in his ear. Sasori's expression turned from pissed to afraid in a matter of seconds. Sasuke knew this was the moment she had broken him. He saw her do it a couple of times during their marriage. He never figured out what exactly she tells people in these situations, all he knew was that she was almost frighteningly persuasive. Sasori looked defeated and opened his mouth. After Sakura seemed to have gotten what she wanted, she shot him in the head. She signaled her henchmen to open one of the containers, grabbed the suitcase and left the docks. But not before looking up at the cameras with a cocky grin, as if knowing Sasuke would be watching this merely 30 minutes later.
"Fucking bitch", Sasuke muttered under his breath. He ran his fingers through his hair and leaned back with a groan. He looked around his office. His gaze rested on the black and red samurai armour encased in glass on the left wall. It had belonged to one of his ancestors and served to remind him of the principles he shared with the elite warriors: discipline, restraint, and sacrifice. Oh, the things he had sacrificed for Sakura. He had given her everything, and she had brought him to his knees.
A knock on the door interrupted his trip down memory lane and his white-haired adviser appeared. "Sasuke, the other heads are breathing down my neck. They gave you a week to monitor her, but the time's up and they want you to take action now." Kakashi looked at his former student patiently. He couldn't imagine how hard this must be for him. The thought of Sasuke's ex-wife was unsettling on the best of days, when she was far away and could do no harm, let alone when she was in the same city, turning Tokyo's criminal underworld upside down. Sasuke pondered for a moment, still looking at the samurai armour with the Uchiha crest embedded in it.
"Send Juugo. Bring her to me alive." Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kakashi's bowed head and his retreating figure. He closed his eyes again and let out a sigh.
I will bring you to your knees, Sakura.
