He had said it. Just out loud.
An even bigger silence filled the room. Karou turned almost green she was so white, and Yahiko and Sano looked like they where about to pass out. Kenshin on the other hand hadn't changed at all. His face had stayed the same but inside he was livid. No uptight braggart will marry his precious Karou.
"Kenshin?" Karou whispered. His face must have now showed shock at the thought of calling Karou his.
"Wow. And here this one thought he wouldn't have the honor to meet you until Karou-dono's birthday. Congratulation." He put a smile on his face.
"Well thank you" Roy looked over at Karou and, to Kenshin's horror, grasped her hand. His eyes flashed gold for a split second but he recovered quickly.
"If you'll excuse me." He stood quickly and walked out of the room. Headed for his room he passed Karou's. Making a last second decision he entered her room.
His eyes quickly scanned the room before he saw the fallen papers laying on her futon. He snatched them up and quickly scanned them over.
'There must be something that can stop this.' He thought as he read through them. In the will, all her father's worldly possessions had been left to her and then it came to the part about her marriage.
In the event of my early death, I wish that my daughter, Karou, be married to Roy Etna, the son of a fellow dojo owner that I wish to be combined with my own.
Kenshin sighed in defeat but kept going. Hope returned when he came to the next paragraph.
Should the case be that Karou is married by her eighteenth birthday, then the deal with Roy Etna is void, and all savings and possession will be combined in the marriage to Karou's husband.
If she were married before her birthday, then she wouldn't have to marry that Roy bastard. A plan started in his mind.
He returned to the dinning area after he heard the tell tale sounds that Roy had left. Karou stood waiting for him.
"Where were you?" Her eyes told the rest. They shone with sorrow and Kenshin guessed that she would have liked his support but the past is the past.
"This one is sorry he made you worry. This one had some things he needed to work out." Mainly in my head. He thought to himself.
"Oh…alright, well, if you wouldn't mind, could you start dinner? I have some stuff that I have to find out abo…" she trailed off and Kenshin knew she was talking about the will.
"All right." He gave her what he hoped was a heart stopping grin and walked to the kitchen.
'So all I have to do…' he fell on the floor in shock.
'Marry her…' where the words that kept repeating in his head. How could he just up and marry her just to keep her for that Roy person. Who knew, maybe Roy will turn out to be an OK guy. But he sure hoped not.
"Kenshin, are you ok?" Yahiko had come into the kitchen and looked at the fallen Kenshin.
"This one merely locked his knee out and fell." He gave a half laugh and smiled his goofy smile and hoped to Kami-sama that Yahiko didn't see right through his mask.
"Oookkk…could you hurry up on dinner? I'm starving!"
"Well, Kenshin, I think this one of the best dinners you've made in a long time." Sano looked at Kenshin in surprise. The other two nodded while licking their plates clean.
"Yes my dear Himora, I must say that was very good." Roy put in, dabbing at his face.
"Yeah, Kenshin, what's the occasion?" Yahiko asked the older man.
"Nothing, this one just felt like making something good tonight." He smiled a dashing smile and even Sano and Yahiko where dazed for a moment while Roy was busy cleaning his face. Sano was the first to recover.
"Well, Kenshin, why not any other night?" He gave Kenshin a calculating look and Kenshin felt the weight of it and almost crushed under it, but he held firm.
"It takes a lot of time the make something that tastes good so this one never had time to cook it. Tonight this one had time." He put a smile on and began to clean the table up.
Kenshin kept this up for almost a week. Fixing meals that she liked, cleaning the dojo, and doing odd jobs that she found annoying. He didn't mind doing all the things but he felt that after a week it was all in vain. Although she always said thank you and made a point about it, she never did anything that said that she knew what he was doing.
"Miss Karou?" Kenshin popped his head in the dojo, "what would you like for dinner?"
"Umm how about…"
"Well, if your asking Himora, why not something meaty and spicy." Roy popped out of no were and wrapped his arms around Karou's shoulders.
To Karou's eyes, Kenshin seemed to blur for a second. A moment later she felt Roy's arms ripped from her shoulders and a loud crash sounded. She turned to see him in a heap on the floor, out cold.
"Umm, Miss Karou? I didn't hear you. What did you say?" He gave a charming smile.
"What ever you feel like." She grinned and continued her training as he left and a blush blossomed over her face.
'Was he jealous?' She blushed and looked at the red head's retreating back.
Roy peeked into the kitchen as Kenshin stood there peeling what was going to be dinner.
'How,' Roy thought staring at his back, 'how did he do that in the dojo but could hardly dodge me when we first met?'
Kenshin felt the stare on his back and called out to the foreigner.
"Is there something that you need from this one?" He asked, not turning around and kept his eyes on the carrots he was now chopping.
"Ah…" he was caught, "I…just… wanted to know if there was anything I could do to help."
"No but this one thanks you the offer." Thank you my ass, this one would rather run you through with this knife first. Kenshin paused at his own thoughts. Man, this one needs to stop hanging out with Sano…
Roy, by this time had slunk out of the room pondering why he had been let off the hook so easily. He found himself walking into the town and staring at the shops wondering what the town was like. He found himself in front of a little stall that was selling jewelry. Browsing he saw a small silver ring, a round blue sapphire adorning the center. He lifted it up to the sun and the little man sitting behind the table spoke up.
"It's nothing too fancy but for a simple little lady, it would be perfect for wooing her over." He said with a gleam of a sale in his eyes.
"I'll take it." Roy said slapping more than enough money on the table and walking off. A plan was forming in his mind of how he was going to get Karou to warm up to him. After all, all too soon, she would be warming up his bed on a cold night.
Roy slipped back into the dojo some time later and managed to get to his room before anyone saw him. Taking the ring he had just bought, he put it in a velvet ring box that he had also managed to purchase. He turned to make sure no one was watching from the doorway before slipping the box under the pile of dirty laundry that had accumulated in this room. He figured that Karou would never look there because she avoided laundry like the plaque.
Roy mentally patted himself on the back for being so smart. He walked down the hall to find Karou and 'play' with her (not that way you pervs out there, play with her to win her over…sickos). He turned the corner and almost ran into Kenshin who was holding a large basket half filled with dirty laundry.
"Sorry" he said and continued on his way to the dojo.
"It's alright." Kenshin answered to his retreating back. He shook his head and made his way into Roy's room and gathered up the man's clothes that where in the corner of the room.
"For only being here for a short time, the man can dirty a lot of clothes." Kenshin mumbled to himself flinging the clothes with the rest of them. A small box fell out of the stack and landed by Kenshin's feet.
"Umm?" He picked it up and stared at it, never once thinking that it could open. Shrugging he stuck it in his pocket and hefted the large basket and made his way outside.
Meanwhile, Roy's tiny brain had finally put two and two together and concluded that Kenshin was about to pick up his clothes and find the box.
"Shit!" He ran back to his room to find the clothes and Kenshin long gone. Roy turned on his heel and fled to the yard.
All the while, Kenshin had already done half the clothes when Karou came out. She had brought out with her a small basket filled with gardening tools and she headed for the small garden that she and Kenshin had started a year earlier. As Kenshin moved to the clothesline, the little box fell out of this pocket. Karou, having the eyes of a hawk at the most inconvenient times, saw it fall.
"Kenshin? What's that?"
"Hm? Oh, just something I found…" he trailed off as she opened it. The little blue stone shone in the sunlight, glinting off her face making her eyes sparkle.
"…that I thought you might like." His actions shocked him somewhat too. One: he openly lied to her and two: he basically stole from Roy but that one didn't really count. Karou's eyes shone in that way that Kenshin couldn't just correct himself.
"Thank you…" she blushed and slipped the ring on her finger.
Roy came around the corner and happened to see Karou slipping the ring on her finger and Kenshin standing right in front of her. He backed up into the shadows and backed up ageist the wall, furious.
'That lousy, lying little bastard. When I get him…" His thoughts where cut off when someone (aka Sano) came up behind him and knocked in his knee (1).
"What the hell are you doing sulking in the shadows? I'd almost say you where stalking them." Sano looked down on the man.
"N…No, I was just enjoying the shade on the hot day."
"It's March"
"I think I'll just go inside." Roy slunk away.
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(1): You know when someone comes up behind you and "knee's" in your knee and you had them locked and you fall slightly? Yeah, that kind of thing.
Yay! Second chapie done!! Thank you all for reading and please review. They say if you really like a story you tell the author, right…sooooo…I'm said author and I like to hear form you'all!!!
Just to let all those who did review and are reading this I get a warm fuzy feeling when I read it and I would just like to say
THANK YOU SOOOOO MUCH!!!