Konnichiwa!
I would like to thank those people who never forget to leave reviews and such. You guys keep me inspired. So much for the waiting, here's my chapter 3. Aside from their hair color, it looks like Ino and Naruto share a common food fetish this time. Read and don't forget to leave reviews.
Have a nice day minna-san.
Naruto reread the overview of the proposed mission that Lieutenant Nara Shikamaru handed him just minutes earlier. The overview didn't look any good the second time around, and he didn't hold out hope that a third read would make it more palatable.
There were quite a few points of contention so Naruto chose the first one.
"You really think that the shooting the day before yesterday was a result of a botched burglary of the building next to the Sacred Heart Church?" he asked the man in front of him.
"No," Shikamaru readily answered. "But I'd rather have the press report than link it with the shooting that happened a week earlier."
The spiky blonde male nodded, but the two shootings wouldn't stay unlinked for long. All it would take was another incident, and unfortunately another incident was already in the planning stages. That is, if the gunman hadn't already finalized his next hit. But the real question was – was the killer associated to the matchmaking agency or the florist?
Or neither?
The "or neither" part was the most troublesome scenario he could think of. If the shootings weren't connected through the businesses, then maybe they had a thrill killer or just a plain psycho on the loose.
Not that they didn't have that anyway.
But Naruto preferred his psychos to keep to a discernable pattern, because with hard work and some luck, patterns could be identified.
"The shell casings taken from the two crime scenes didn't match," Ino said as she read her copy of the overview. "Which makes things more complicated." She finished as she gave a weary sigh.
"It just means that our shooter likes to trade off weapons," Naruto advised her. "it doesn't mean the crimes aren't related,"
Another sigh came from the platinum blonde.
"Do you have any arguments? Comments? Objections and violent reactions?" Shikamaru asked them. "If you have, then please direct them to me, and not at one another." He sighed. "Troublesome blondes." He whispered.
The lieutenant was definitely a multi-tasker. While he tossed out those leading questions and semi-reprimands, he looked through a report, scrawled his signature on it and tossed it into his out-box before he went onto the next one. But then, no one had ever accused this particular person inefficient. Just the opposite. The only accusation had been in the area of his preferential treatment.
"Concerns," Naruto volunteered.
Time to move on to point two. He had a lot of concerns, but the major one was the woman with the long platinum blonde hair and aqua-colored eyes sitting next to him. Now the question was how to voice that concern without thoroughly riling Ino's superior and friend, a man he had no desire to rile. Even under a cloud of suspicion. Shikamaru was formidable. Naruto's investigation into departmental favoritism would no doubt irritate the man enough without adding more to the mix.
"Sergeant Uzumaki thinks this case is too personal for me," Ino countered. "He believes I should step aside because I knew Sakura."
And with that totally accurate observation, she looked across the desk that separated them and met her former teammate's dark gaze. In the next few seconds, at least a hundred or more words passed between them, even though, neither spoke.
It was an interesting encounter to watch.
The lieutenant stared at her and lifted his eyebrows, just a fraction. That was it. No other changes in his otherwise calm expression. Yet the simple gesture caused Ino's mouth to tighten, and her grip on the chair arm whitened her knuckles. Naruto could have sworn the temperature in the room dropped by a full ten degrees.
"Detective Yamanaka has renegade tendencies," Naruto added. "I'd prefer to work with another detective on this case." He finished.
"Bringing in another detective might be a problem," the lieutenant extracted a manila folder from a stack and slid it on Naruto's way.
"This'll be an undercover assignment and Ino here has already her foot in the door," the lieutenant continued..
"What door?" Naruto raised his eyebrows.
"At the matchmaking agency that might be connected to the two shootings." Shikamaru answered.
With that, Ino let out a soft groan as she sank lower in her chair.
"I must have missed that foot-in-the-door part when reading the overview," Naruto commented.
Shikamaru pointed to the folder. "It's all in there."
Naruto opened the folder in which he found a lengthy questionnaire from the Perfect match Agency on the top page. It was dated a week earlier and it'd been filled out two days after the shooting.
And the name at the top?
Asakawa Ino.
Naruto felt a groan coming on, as well.
"Is this your handiwork?" he threw the question at the platinum blonde.
"Yes. But no one at the Perfect Match has any idea that I'm a cop. No one. Asakawa is obviously an alias." Ino directed her answers to both men. "I wanted to get a look at the people who worked there. I figured this was the fastest way to do it." She continued.
"But not the smartest way," Naruto quickly added. "You could have jeopardized everything in there by going out on your own." He let her know.
"But I didn't." Ino moved on to the edge of her seat. "I can do whatever you need me to do to make this undercover assignment work." She said towards her lieutenant and former teammate, Shikamaru.
"Im not the one you need to convince, Ino. The chief assigned Sergeant Uzumaki as the lead for this case." And the lieutenant sat back and left it at that.
The proverbial ball had just been tossed into Naruto's proverbial court.
Unfortunately, he also knew how these next few minutes were about to play out.
Hell.
Yamanaka Ino had certainly put him in a hard place with her coloring-outside-the-lines attitude. Still, it'd only compound the problem if he let his personal feelings influence the most logical way to approach this. Well, it was the most logical way considering she'd already tossed a monkey wrench or two into the scenario.
"It wouldn't be smart for me to use another detective at this point," Naruto concluded, speaking more to himself than the two police officers with him. He glanced at the questionnaire while he finished up his explanation. It figured. Ino had listed "ramen" as her favorite food.
"If the killer's a part of the Perfect Match Agency, then he or she might be suspicious of anyone registering so soon after the second shooting." He continued talking.
"Guess that leaves you out then, huh?" Ino all but smirked at him.
Even though it was a borderline petty, Naruto liked it when people did that, especially when he could smirk right back. He calmly shuffled through the papers in the folder, extracted his own questionnaire and passed it to her.
Her eyes widened and skimmed over the first page.
"You filled this out the same day that I did?" she was astounded.
Let the smirking begin. "Yes." He casually replied.
She hissed out a breath. "Need I remind you that you just accused me of jumping the gun by going to the agency?!" she was very pissed.
"The difference is- I was on this case, and you weren't." Naruto held out his hands to emphasize the space. "Big difference. I'm talking huge." He sarcastically added.
The temperature went down another notch, and her aqua eyes narrowed to slits.
"Which brings us up-to-date, I believe," Shikamaru interjected. Good timing. Naruto thought, since Ino looked ready to implode.
"We have to act fast. There are only five days until Saturday. Five days until a whole host of weddings are scheduled to take place all over the village. Five days to stop a killer from striking again."
Naruto was well aware of that. Those five days were already breathing down his neck. "I've learned the florist in question is doing the flower arrangements for two weddings this weekend, one Saturday, another at Sunday night. If fact, I haven't been able to connect any of the upcoming marriages to a matchmaking agency."
"Neither have I," Ino pulled out her own set of notes from a leather briefcase that was leaning against her chair."And therein lies our problem. Perfect Match doesn't release all the names of their clients who've made wedding plans. So it becomes a needle-in-the-haystack approach."
"It's the only approach we have now." Naruto fired back. "We could stake out all the weddings here in Konoha, but it'll eat up a too many questions and maybe even panic. Plus, there are other ceremonies, the ones that aren't listed. We wouldn't be able to cover those.so our best bet is to go back to the source of connection –the Perfect Match Agency. They require matched couples to meet there first for an icebreaker, and there's one every Tuesday night, including tomorrow night."
"It starts at seven-thirty," Ino provided. 'We don't need an invitation. We just need to be computer matched…somehow."
It didn't surprise Naruto that she knew those details. She probably already picked out the clothes she was going to wear. And she'd done all of that before being officially assigned to the team.
His team.
He hoped like the devil that she didn't wear those sexy stilettos. He'd have enough distractions as it was.
"Detective Yamanaka and I'll do this intro thing tomorrow night at Perfect Match," Naruto continued making sure he sounded like the boss. Because after the mini-fantasy involving her choice of fashion, he needed he reminder in the worst sort of way. "We'll pretend we were high school sweethearts and that we're surprised but happy to be reunited."
She nodded. "Good idea. And that'll explain a hasty engagement and equally hasty marriage."
"Well, hopefully." It might also make the wrong person suspicious, but he'd deal with that when and if it happened. "While we're there, we'll have a good look around the place. Without breaking the law, of course." He let that sound as a reminder for Ino's sake.
Another huff came from the platinum blonde.
Naruto ignored her and continued, "In the meantime I'll keep going through the background checks I've been doing on the employees and the owners of the matchmaking agency as well as the florist."
"I've done background checks as well," Ino informed him.
"Of course you have," Naruto commented mockingly.
The woman had an incredibly effective scalpel-sharp glare. "I'm not an idiot. I did them discreetly."
Naruto might have questioned her on what she considered discreet, but the lieutenant spoke first. "Sounds as if you have everything under control."
Not even close. Naruto kept the sentiment to himself.
"Good." Shikamaru stood and reached for the jacket draped over the back of his chair. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have an appointment with the chief. Feel free to use my office to hash out the rest of the details. Oh, and it goes without saying – keep me informed."
"Wait," Ino called out to him. "You're both missing a key point. Yes, Sergeant Uzumaki and I filled out these questionnaires, but that in itself doesn't give us a computer match. I hate to state the obvious here, but the computer does that. In fact, it generates a list of matches so the candidates can meet the people at the icebreaker. What if neither of us have any matches? What then? We cant just show up there."
"I'd planned to have one of the techs to go into the system and arrange for the questionnaires to be matched." Naruto explained.
Ino shook her head. "That sounds risky. Someone at the agency might figure out –"
"A match isn't a problem," Shikamaru assured them. "It's all in the folder."
There was something strange about the lieutenant's self-satisfied expression that sent Naruto thumbing through the rest of the papers in the file. Ino must have sensed it too, because she leaned closer so she could see the documents as well.
It didn't take Naruto long to find it. There it was. The dozen or so men listed as "dream date" matches for client 6341B, Asakawa Ino. His own alias, Namikaze Naruto was the first name on the list.
He felt as if someone had slugged him in the solar plexus.
"You already had the tech rig the system?" Naruto asked. But he didn't think that's what had generated the look on the lieutenant's face.
"No. the two of you matched without any tech interference." Shikamaru answered.
And with that little scud missile attack, the lieutenant left them sitting there in somewhat stunned silence.
"It had to be the ramen, or the hair color." Naruto mumbled under his breath.
Or maybe Ino just jotted down a whole bunch of lies while filling out the questionnaire. He hadn't. That was for sure. Unnecessary lies were just too hard to keep track of, so with the exception of his name, address, and occupation, everything else was true.
Yet, they'd matched.
Even if she'd lied, that was an unsettling coincidence because it meant her lies matched his truths.
Naruto quietly pushed that coincidence aside and moved on to the mission at hand.
"I'll see you at the Perfect Match tomorrow night." He stood and tucked the folder beneath his arm. "Until then, we keep doing these background checks and hope we find a smoking gun. Oh, and by the way, I insist officers on my team follow the rules. MY RULES." He emphasized. "If you jeopardize this assignment again – "
"I wont," was her short reply.
"If you do, I'll have your butt and your badge." He continued.
She nodded after a contemplative moment.
Naruto almost decided to leave it at that, but there was something he couldn't leave unsaid.
"I hope it's occurred to you that this plan is designed to send a killer after us."
No hesitation this time. "It has."
Good. At least underneath all that wisecracking talk, Yamanaka Ino was smart enough to know what they're up against.
An what they were up against was a killer.
Even more, the moment they stepped inside Perfect Match, they would become the ultimate bait.