He didn't believe a word of it. Kagome was sure of that. Not because he had told her so of course, but because it was an impossible story to believe, even if he was a demon her tale sounded far more farfetched than his existence. She could hardly blame him though, there were days she thought it was a dream and she'd lived through the whole thing. But still it would have been nice if he'd said something, even if just to call her crazy. Kagome however had been around enough difficult demons to know that that was probably too much to ask.

She leaned forward against the low wall ringing the balcony, shivering at the cold tile that pressed against her exposed arms as she stared at the lights glittering against the darkness of the late night hours. She glanced from the corner of her eye to where he lounged several feet away on that same low wall, leaning against the side of the building with his arm resting against one raised knee. His eyes were pointed in her direction, but she couldn't tell if he was watching her or looking past her. For the last two nights it had been like this, ever since the woods. The first night she'd tried to lie to him, but he'd seen through it almost instantly and had left her no choice. She'd told him almost everything, being careful to gloss over the importance of the jewel, after all as much as she might have wanted to Kagome knew that she didn't know him well enough to know if she could trust him completely, and the jewel's power was very enticing. She'd only known a few people who could resist it, and she knew that she couldn't stand against this demon if he decided that he wanted it.

"The half demon…" His voice made her jump a little, and Kagome found herself turning back to face him this time, crossing her arms in defense against the intensity of his gaze, "You claim he's your friend?"

"Well, yeah." Kagome dropped her arms now. Questions meant he was at least considering that her story might be true. That was a good sign right?

"You're choice in friends seems to be lacking."

"What do you mean by that?" Kagome nearly bit her tongue after the snapped reply came fluttering out of her mouth, but froze at the look he gave her, suddenly found it very hard to meet his red eyes.

"You're so called friend is attempting to murder you." Hiei chuckled humorlessly, looking away from her to the buildings glittering at them.

"It's not that!" She cringed away as his stare snapped back to her, wondering if she was going too far, wondering how he would react to her snapping at him in this way. If he was anything like many of the demons she'd met he'd have been just as happy to kill her as he was to look at her now, or ignore her existence a few moments ago. "It's not… he doesn't want to kill me."

"Then it seems his claws gave me the wrong impression."

"It's just…" She looked down, her hands formed into fists at her sides, the nails she'd carefully filed the day before biting painfully into her palms. "There's something wrong with him. I don't know what it is yet, but…" She shook her head and turned away from him, "I'm hoping by the time I go back it'll have gotten better, or that maybe I can come up with something to do about it."

"Go back?" He demanded sharply, brought her eyes quickly to him.

"Well yeah… I'm going home in a few weeks."

"You truly are his sister. That sort of plan reeks of Yusuke's idiocy."

"What do you mean by that?" She snapped now, fixing her attention on him fully again and this time not caring if she upset him. For the moment she wasn't certain which she was more upset about, the implication that she was stupid, the one that Yusuke was, or just the criticism of her plan. She chose to go with the plan, hoping that it was just more stupid demon rambling about how pathetic humans were in comparison to them. "Okay then, if my plan is so dumb, what would you do in my situation?"

"Kill him."

She stared for a moment. He said it so casually, almost as if he was just saying hello. Kagome felt herself cringing inwardly at that coldness. Surely he didn't mean it; it couldn't have been that simple. "You're… kidding right? That's some demented joke or something."

"No."

She swallowed and her eyes flinched away from his. "You wouldn't have any trouble killing your friend?"

"I don't have friends."

"Then why did you want the picture?" She looked at him when he started to turn away, his expression saying very clearly that he wanted nothing further to do with this conversation. "If what you're saying is true why didn't you just kill them for picking on you?"

"Their pathetic teasing is hardly worthy of such efforts."

"But Inuyasha's is? You saw him; he can't control himself, or whatever it is that's happening to him."

"All the more reason to end his pathetic existence."

"No it isn't!" She glared at him for a moment before looking away, "I don't know what's wrong with him yet, so I can't fix it, but I also can't be around him for a while…" She looked down and away from him now, "Inuyasha doesn't deserve to die just because something bad happened to him. I nearly killed him once when someone put some kind of spell on me… and he never even laid a hand on me. I owe him… I have to make this right again."

"And if you cannot fix it? Then what will you do?"

She hadn't expected it, the question she'd been asking herself since deciding that there was something wrong with Inuyasha that was beyond his control. What if she couldn't fix it? What would she do if she was wrong? Kagome sighed, and this time she didn't flinch away from his eyes, "I don't know Hiei, but… I have to try. If there's anything I can do to save him, or at least help him… I have to do it."

"You're a fool."

"Maybe, but I'd do the same thing for anyone." She turned back to the city, still surprised by the view that was so different from the one she had at home every time she looked at it despite having been here for a week, "No one deserves to suffer and if there's anything I can do to help I have to do it. Even if it's someone who thinks I'm wasting my time or no one else thinks I should bother with."

Before she realized it he was standing beside her and she could feel him looking at her, but didn't turn into that calculating gaze this time. He was making up his mind about something, and there was nothing else that she could do about it. Kagome hesitated for a long moment, nearly jumped when he turned and leaned against the wall beside her with his arms crossed, "I'd do the same for you… you know." She murmured, unable to help herself.

He only scoffed for a moment, and then his shoulders dropped almost as if with a silent sigh. "You really are an idiot, even for a human." But there was no judgmental harshness in his voice when he said it, "You'll get yourself killed some day with these stupid ideals."

Kagome smiled just a little. "Yeah maybe… I guess I'll just have to hope I have a friend who'll remind me of that before I do anything too stupid."

Beside her Hiei scoffed and looked away.

XXXXX

It was maddening. The second evening was drawing to a close and there was still no news from Hiei, who seemed to be avoiding him for some reason. Something had happened in the forest, something that had Kagome and Hiei together and keeping secrets. Secrets that he wanted desperately to help keep, just so he would know what they were. It was practically cruel. And he was somewhat certain that Hiei at least was doing it on purpose. Surely this torture was something the other demon would find amusing, but why would Kagome trust her secrets to Hiei, whom she'd only seen a few times and barely said a word to, and not to him? Something drastic had to have happened, particularly if Hiei was keeping secrets with her. That seemed very out of character. But then, they all seemed a bit out of character when it came to her. Kurama knew that he was no exception.

Perhaps he should have just followed Hiei's advice and simply asked. Perhaps he still could, after all his plan of getting close enough to her to figure something out wasn't working as well as he'd hoped, and Hiei must have figured something out, that was the only explanation for that smirk he'd been wearing, the one that was somehow smugger than his normal smirk… unless they were keeping another secret that had nothing to do with the unusual items she was hiding, or the spiritual energy that came from her that was so different from the others he'd encountered. But what else could they possibly be keeping secret? What could have happened to have Kagome covered in dirt and leaves like she'd been… rolling around… on the…forest floor. The curve his thoughts had suddenly taken had Kurama freezing in the middle of a step, green eyes widening almost painfully. Surely not; it just wasn't possible. Hiei would think such entanglements with a human below him, and hadn't Kagome been furious at the very suggestion that she might be one of those girls?

He forced off the ridiculous thoughts and made his way down the street once more, hands tucked carefully into his pockets; head down as he watched the sidewalk just ahead of his feet through his bangs. Kurama allowed his feet to pick his path as he focused his energy on keeping the idiotic ideas from filling his mind once more.

The wind pushed his hair back and he couldn't help lifting his face into it, closing his eyes against the cold air and drawing a slow breath in an attempt to analyze the scents it carried. His eyelids lifted slowly as the smell filled his lungs, something unbearably familiar and sweet, the only scent that could bring this strange tightness to his chest and force his brain to go instantly blank. He knew it even before his eyes recognized what they had settled on.

Even in the dim light he was able to see every detail of her, how the wind pulled her hair past her face over the wall surrounding the balcony, the soft smile on her gentle and delicate features. He could see her how her dark eyes sparkled and how her eyelashes fluttered just a little, so dark against her pale skin. Her coral pink lips would be tipped up at the corners, or maybe trembling since she seemed to be slipping back into that sadness he'd noticed around her again. That sadness he was rapidly discovering he hated. His eyes swept over her small frame that he shouldn't have been able to see so clearly from where he was standing, and a small smile pulled at one corner of his mouth as he watched her lean forward against the wall, and he almost hoped she would see him, would acknowledge that he was there. That was when his eyes found it, a small blur of black that rapidly solidified into a shape beside her, dark clothes and black hair. Hiei.

He couldn't move suddenly as the air left his lungs and refused to return, leaving him to stare from where he stood down the block, hoping now that she wouldn't see him lingering in the shadows, his brain whirling in scattered circles. What was Hiei doing with her at this time of night? Maybe he'd been wrong; maybe they were having some form of clandestine meeting under her brother's nose just to avoid detection. Maybe there was something more, after all he wasn't the only one drawn to Kagome, Yusuke and Kuwabara hardly left her alone, though Yusuke was her brother, however he and Kuwabara now behaved more like her best friends, and he was entertaining some strange tendencies toward her lately, perhaps it wasn't so outlandish that Hiei would be pulled to her in some way as well. But why did the image bother him so greatly? Sweet Kagome standing there with a demon he knew to be an emotionless killer when the situation called for it? That innocent, intoxicating girl so close to a demon he'd seen bathed in blood, her gentle brown eyes that were always sparkling even when sad meeting the red orbs he'd seen dance for joy with the pleasure of a difficult kill. It was disturbing.

He stopped himself from shaking his head as he prepared to take another step. If Hiei knew anything about this little mystery he was working on he would tell him, it was likely he was just trying to get answers from her as well, and if there was anything else going on between them there was nothing he could do about that, it was none of his business after all. Then why was he depressed about it?

XXX

Normally she noticed him far sooner than this and this time he wasn't even trying to hide his presence from her. He didn't take the time to appreciate that image she made this time, her eyes glued to the sky over the trees only a short distance away with that wistful thoughtful expression that had become common on her face over the last few days. He only wondered for a moment what she was thinking about, considered for less than an instant simply leaving her in peace, and resolutely made his way to seat himself on the bench beside her. He was almost surprised when she flashed him a quick smile and went back to her thoughts, her eyes unfocused on the trees themselves now, and for the first time in his recent memory Kurama struggled to find the words to begin a conversation.

The silence stretched and settled, banishing unease temporarily from its presence as they sat there. He followed her gaze, half expecting to see red eyes staring back at hers from the trees, after all he'd noticed Hiei hovering around her recently, lending credibility to his strange concern that there might be some kind of developing attachment between them. However he knew that the trees were empty.

"Sorry, guess I was sort of zoning out there." She turned to him with that brilliant smile and he nearly felt his heart stopping.

"That's alright, I don't mind." He found himself returning her grin as he turned away, and the silence settled over them again.

"So, what were you doing out so late last night?"

The question froze him for a moment before he turned to her, that small disarming smile settling on his lips. So she'd seen him watching her then? This could end in an interesting way. "I was having some trouble sleeping and decided to take a walk."

"Yeah, well I hope your late night walk ended better than mine did." She mumbled, looking away for a moment before she seemed to catch herself and looked back with another of her heart stopping smiles, "I waved, but I guess you didn't see me."

"I saw you were with Hiei and I didn't want to interrupt."

"I wouldn't have minded." Kagome looked away, "I couldn't sleep either and Hiei was just around."

"He seems to be around quite a bit, it appears he likes you."

"We've kind of become friends over the last few days, not that he'll ever admit it."

Friends? "Well, that is how he is." So they were becoming friends? "You must have had quite an eventful walk through the woods."

"You could say that." She looked down, biting down on the inside of her bottom lip again.

"You seem to have recovered from whatever happened."

"Oh… I… just fell down a hill… I got sort of turned around and I… slipped." She threw together the cover story she'd found upon exiting the forest several days earlier, maybe she'd been a little too hard on Gramps, it was hard to keep up cover stories even when she was making them up herself, she'd have to remember to do something nice for him when she went home to the shrine.

"You're very fortunate that Hiei was there to lead you out then. It would have been a shame for you to be lost in there."

"Well you guys were coming to find me weren't you? I'm sure I would have been okay." She smiled over at him again, but it vanished once she met his eyes, "I guess I would have owed you, since Yusuke and Kazuma were only coming after me because you insisted."

"It was hardly anything."

"Still…" She couldn't pull her eyes away from his, their gazes locked helplessly with each other's. "Thanks for worrying about me." She should have looked away, but Kagome felt frozen, her eyes held in place by his that were almost drilling into her. Inwardly she shivered, but couldn't bring herself to look away from him. She swallowed almost nervously in an attempt to break the spell settling over her, but it did not good.

Her cheeks had turned a soft pink color that was rapidly becoming red and it took him a moment to realize why. Even as the extended eye contact and closeness registered Kurama for some reason couldn't bring himself to look away. He knew that he should have, that he was making her uncomfortable, but as he stared into her eyes all he could do was lean closer, one hand coming up to brush back a few strands of her hair before settling on her cheek. She seemed frozen, her eyes darting to his hand before coming back to his wider than before. Her lips trembled and he couldn't help a trace of a smile that quirked the corner of his mouth as it was pulled helplessly toward hers.

Her heart jumped into her throat as he leaned closer, her eyelids fighting to fall closed even as the sharp edge of panic kept them open. Her brain spun in its blankness. She should be pulling back, telling him to stop it or just knocking him away, but she didn't want to, and that was an odd idea for her. Even when Inuyasha had been that close it had been unnerving, but sitting here with Shuichi she couldn't help but wonder what it would be like to actually be kissed by someone, no what it would be like to be kissed by him. It wasn't the first time she'd wondered, when he looked at her like that with that strange glint in his eyes that made her squirm inside. A few days ago when he'd looked at her like this she'd secretly hoped that he would. Her eyes closed as he neared.

His lips were only a breath away from hers now, he could nearly taste her as her sweet scent washed over him, stealing what was probably the last of his reason as the world slowly began to disappear around him, falling away until there was only her. He shifted his hand running his palm slowly over her neck in an effort to calm her, felt her shiver slightly against the touch, and then he moved to remove that last centimeter of space between them and feel her soft full lips against his…

"I… I have to go." She found herself on her feet before she meant to move, already dragging her backpack up from beside her feet as she practically raced away from him, her breathing difficult and her heart pounding so hard in her ears she could hardly hear herself speak.

Gasping Kagome rounded the corner and nearly collapsed against the wall, letting her backpack fall to the ground again as she pressed her back and palms against the cold brick building. Panic sent adrenaline through her, making her tremble as she mentally berated herself. What was she doing? This was one of her brother's best friends, however she might have liked him she couldn't let herself forget that. No matter how sweet he was, no matter how badly she may have wanted to… she couldn't. Yusuke would never forgive her, particularly after he'd already been so upset by the idea. Besides, she had more important things to be dealing with. She should be trying to find out what was wrong with Inuyasha, protecting the jewel or thinking about school, not some cute redhead who had dreamy green eyes and had been about to kiss her. Kagome shook off the thoughts, trying to remind herself of the important points she had made to herself only seconds before. He was Yusuke's friend. She couldn't.