Kaho had her profile done by the end of the week. Knowing Mr. Yagami had trusted her judgement had allowed her to plow forward in her research. She worked tirelessly for days. Profiling a known person was like reading a history book, but profiling an unknown entity was much more fun. It was like cracking a code or solving a puzzle with pieces you weren't always aware were there.

The mistress' profile took her the longest. She was most likely a friend of both Mr. and Mr. Yamazaki. She probably wasn't involved in the actual killing, but she at least knew something would happen. She would have had to have been slightly sadistic to knowingly steal a married man.

Kaho gave the folders to Mr. Yagami, who read them over immediately and in her presence. He hummed at the first, though Kaho wasn't sure whether it was in agreement of surprise. At the mistress', he paused in contemplation.

"I think you're onto something in regards to her being a friend of both the Yamazaki, but there is no one who fits such dark characteristics in their lives."

Kaho tapped her chin. "They would have to be at least a little manipulative. Mr. Yamazaki is neither young nor attractive, and she wouldn't need money if she could afford earrings like the one that was found. There were no records of and such purchases on Mr. Yamazaki's account, so I doubt they were a gift. I'm guessing Mrs. Yamazaki had no idea she was being betrayed, and that she was on good terms with the mistress.

"Otherwise," Mr. Yagami figured, "their ties would have been cut and she would be an obvious suspect." He gathered the papers and tapped them on the table. "Good work, Matsumoto. I'll get a copy of these to the rest of the team. We'll look for a woman who fits this profile and investigate further from there."

He rose to his feet, presumably to head to the printing room. As he passed, he murmured, "By the way, I could use a cup of coffee." He left at that, a small smile the only thing betraying him.

Kaho was pretty sure he was just pulling her leg, and was just bringing back an old joke.

She got him a cup anyway, just to be safe.

Fumiko Harada was not happy. She had been taken into custody by the authorities under the suspicion that she was aware of a crime and hadn't reported it.

Kaho's profile had narrowed the mistress down to two people, but after investigations of those people led them nowhere, Mr. Yagami ordered them to broaden their criteria.

In the end, it was Ukita who thought to question Fumiko Harada. She was a long-time companion to both Mr. and Mrs. Yamazaki, which coincided with Kaho's profile. However, she was the furthest thing from 'slightly sadistic'. She was more like a frightened rabbit, and she quaked in her heels and fancy coat.

Aizawa and Mr. Yagami led interrogation. They had a rough time getting even a peep out of her. Usually, they played Bad Cop (Aizawa) and Scary-Yet-Fair Cop (Mr. Yagami), but this time they both maintained relaxed and welcoming personas.

Mr. Yagami was sure to inform her that she was not under arrest, and could leave at any time, but they just needed her to answer her was reluctant to speak, but she didn't leave. She glanced out the door repeatedly, fear in her eyes. Terror was freezing her mouth shut.

Ukita suggested that she was probably in danger, and was probably threatened somehow.

Kaho watched the interrogation process go down through a wall of one-sided glass. She found herself admiring the integrity and versatility that Mr. Yagami possessed. She was used to seeing him arrest hardened criminals, murderers even, but at that moment he was using a soft and fatherly voice.

She imagined he used that voice with his daughter, who would be about eleven now. He had also probably used it with Light, when he was younger.

Kaho watched Mr. Yagami rise to his tired feet and enter the back room with the rest of the team. He rubbed a smudge off of his glasses with his tie.

"She is adamant that she never had any sexual or romantic relations with Mr. Yamazaki," he sighed. Kaho was surprised, and honored, that he had taken her suspicions into consideration and asked anything in that nature. "However, she did admit that she was being pressured to keep something a secret. She feared for her life, that much was obvious."

Kobayashi rubbed the back of his neck. "Assuming that Yamazaki was truly the one who murdered his wife and was threatening this woman, and assuming that meant she wasn't the mistress, who would have no reason to be threatened…" he sighed, presumably at how ridiculous those words sounded aloud, "Why is she afraid that she'll be killed?"

"Witness?" Kaho shrugged. It didn't sound right to her. Yamazaki probably could have killed any witnesses and claimed the burglar did as easily as he had killed his wife.

Mr. Yagami took a seat in a chair. "I don't think she saw what happened, but she knew Yamazaki did it."

It was frustrating to now hear that the entire team had come to a consensus on who committed the crime, but there was no evidence to convict or even arrest him with. It was like they knew what the picture of a puzzle was and what it would look like when it was completed, but there was one piece missing.

Aizawa joined them in the room. "I can't get anymore out of her. She doesn't trust me enough." He ran his hand through his shaggy afro. The room was filled with frustrated sighs and groans, but then Aizawa added, "I think it's because I'm a man. She doesn't seem to like us very much."

Mr. Yagami suddenly looked to Kaho. "Could be. Matsumoto, I'd like you to try just asking a few questions to see what happens. Let me know if her demeanor changes in any way."

Kaho nodded, slightly unprepared, slightly excited. She slipped into the front room. It was small and square with bright yellow lights. Mirrors replaced the walls, and Kaho felt more confident knowing that her team was behind them.

Her talk with Fumiko was short. She stuck with simple questions, like "What a beautiful blouse, where'd you get it?"

Her job wasn't to get information. It was to enact a test.

Fumiko had actually talked to her with a warm and relieved voice, and suddenly Kaho realized why.

Mr. Yagami had suspected it, with the lack of responses and the cold shoulder she had given him, despite his kindness and earnestness. She hadn't liked him because he was a man.

After the test, Kaho took a day or two to research past medical history, and was surprised to find a very important piece of the puzzle. Fumiko Harada had been diagnosed with a minor case of Androphobia, the fear of men.

So she couldn't have been Yamazaki's mistress—

—Not Mr. Yamazaki's, anyway.

Kaho made a new profile on Fumiko, and she was sure to incorporate her sexual orientation.

After the revelation of her sexual orientation had been made clear, Kaho easily got Fumiko to spill the beans.

She had been having an affair with Mr. Yamazaki's wife, and he had caught them. Fumiko had fled (not realizing she had dropped an earring until months later). Before that, a week after Mr. Yamazaki had walked in on her and her lover, the woman she loved had been murdered.

"He couldn't divorce her," Fumiko sobbed bitterly, "because then people would know she was a lesbian. It would shame him."

Kaho knew something about older men and their honor. Every time she heard the name Yamazaki, an image of her grandfather popped in her head. The others seemed appalled that something as trivial as honor and reputation was reason enough to kill.

Fumiko had confronted Yamazaki when he was in the hospital. There was probably a security camera with footage of their talk, but there wouldn't be sound. Fumiko's testimony would be the only way to learn what words had been shared between them that day.

She was heartbroken about the love of her life. She had been too weak to confront her murderer, especially with her words, but she felt like she had to try. She approached his hospital bed and threatened to tell the police what had truly happened.

Yamazaki told her that his wounds weren't as bad as they looked because they were self-inflicted, and as soon as he was out of the hospital, and if anyone knew of his wife's affair, he'd choke the life out of her body. She had believed him.

He had also gone on to admit that, yes, he shot his own wife in the back of the head and faked a breaking and entering.

Fumiko's count of 'Obstruction of Justice' had been excused on account of realistic and plausible threats.

Fumiko asked for her earring back, and tears streamed down her face when her pair was reunited. Mrs. Yamazaki had given them to her as a romantic gift.

Ukita checked the wife's name at the bank twice as vigorously as the time he'd done it before. Apparently, she'd had a secret checking account that not even Mr. Yamazaki knew about. There were very few purchases on it, but sure enough, one of them was the earrings. That was even more evidence that Fumiko's story was true.

Yamazaki had admitted to it all after he'd been cornered in an interrogation, one that had been initiated, led by, and concluded by Mr. Yagami.

Yamazaki came home one day and found his wife with another woman. He chased the woman out—someone he was acquainted with, no less—and punished his wife. But she wasn't sorry.

She threatened to leave him, and openly share her sexual orientation. He'd had enough. He bound her arms in her sleep and shot her execution style, as they had seen in the house. Worried about what the police might think, he took a small paring knife and inserted it into a fatty part of his stomach. It was painful, but covering the truth was more important to him. Then he drove around the city to think of what to do next.

He eventually made the plan to go to the bank, withdraw fifty million yen, stash the money in a hole in the ground, and purposefully slam his head onto a brick wall. It took two tries to knock himself out cold.

He awoke at the hospital, knew he had succeeded, and then pretended to ask for his wife, because why would he think his wife was dead if he'd done what 'they'd' asked.

Kaho almost punched his teeth in when Yamazaki was arrested. She had to restrain herself, and that was almost just as difficult as catching him was. She saw how… un-sorry his eyes were. He didn't regret it. In his eyes, he hadn't killed his wife. In his eyes, she was already dead.

He was sentenced to life for one count of First Degree Murder, as well as a plethora of several less major offensives. Fumiko looked more heartbroken than relieved at the news.

Nearly nine months after the start of the case, and it was finally over. Kaho found herself adjusting to her 'pre-case' schedule surprisingly quickly. It felt strange to go home to her empty apartment every day. She almost felt like she was skipping classes.

Life slowed to normalcy. Mr. Yagami had her on any case that needed a profile.

Kaho sharpened the practice until it was her specialty, and at the station, she was practically the profiler. She liked it. She excelled at it. She found it rather fulfilling that she wasn't completely wasting her old experiences, and it made sense to her that she would do this part of her job.

Kaho was at her desk when someone fetched her from the front.

"There's a girl here," the receptionist, Tanaka, told her. He looked annoyed that he had to come get her.

Amused at his rolling eyes, Kaho followed Tanaka back to the front of the station.

Much to her surprise, there she found a young woman with a cute yellow dress and a wide grin.

"Misao?" Kaho called. Misao squealed when she saw her old classmate and ran into her as a form of hugging.

"What brings you here?" Kaho wondered, pulling away. She was glad to see her old friend, but she had a lot of work to do.

Misao wiggled her eyebrows. "I needed to come see you! I needed to tell someone about this news!" Kaho was trying not to rudely laugh at the way her voice cracked and broke in her excitement.

"What news?" Kaho caved, slightly curious now. Misao's grin widened, if that were possible.

"I just graduated Nursing school!" she exclaimed.

Oh, had two years passed already? That had felt way too short. Time flew when you were putting bad guys behind bars. It was almost December, which meant she would be twenty-four soon.

Misao broke her the other news.

"Oh, and you're totally treating me to dinner tonight."

Kaho had gotten... around in her old life quite a lot. Acting immature like that in her new body felt wrong. She almost felt like this was her chance to try the taste of both types of life, and it didn't feel right to taint this new opportunity with old habits.

And so, she hadn't gone out since the Yamazaki case, and she barely wanted to with Misao, but she eventually relented and met the woman at the train station. Misao wanted to go near Ikebukuro, which was close to where they had grown up. It would feel strange to go see her grandfather's dojo, so Kaho hijacked her plans and kept them out of Toshima. Besides, it would have been an unnecessarily long trip, even with the shinkansen.

They went to a restaurant with classic Japanese cuisine. Kaho got herself caught up with Misao and her life, and purposely kept her talking about herself. Kaho didn't like talking much, and when it was about her own life, even less so. Misao didn't seem to notice, or to mind. It was quite a lot like high school, actually, and Kaho found herself surprised that she enjoyed the nostalgic calmness it brought her.

The two women were nearly twenty minutes into their conversation, their food not yet there, when two men entered the restaurant. Misao waved them over, ignoring the glare Kaho shot her way.

Misao folded her hands and bowed a few times. "I know this will make you angry, but please don't leave. My boyfriend, Daisuke-kun, and his friend who just got dumped—"

They were now in hearing range, so she zipped her mouth shut like a jacket. She looked up and smiled at the men. They bowed politely and sat across from them, much to Kaho's disgruntled protests.

"Sorry we're late, we had to change our destination." Daisuke grinned at his girlfriend. That would explain why she wanted to go to Ikebukuro so badly.

Daisuke was very direct and open, while his friend stared at the table for ten minutes straight. His name was Ryohei Nakamura, she learned from Daisuke. Ryohei rarely spoke, and ate his food sullenly. Other than his crappy attitude he was polite. Just unresponsive.

Then Misao pulled another trick—a disappearing act. She totally, completely, and heartlessly ditched Kaho to go to Heaven-knows-where with Daisuke, who went along with her devious plan clad in a love-stricken grin.

Kaho swore her vengeance but couldn't enact it, as Misao had vanished.

She ate in silence, not even bothering to start up a conversation with the grump in front of her. She was going to get her money's worth for her meal, and then she would leave. If Ryohei wanted to talk, he would.

She really hoped he never did.

Alas, he eventually opened his mouth.

"I don't know why they did this to me," he grumbled, gesturing at the table. "I told them I'd get better on my own, but they couldn't keep their noses out of my business. I'm not looking for a serious relationship right now."

Kaho almost didn't reply, but he was staring at her as she ate. She sighed in defeat and set her chopsticks down.

"I'm not, either."

Ryohei and Kaho became an official couple after their fourth date. They had many, many more dates after that point as well.

Aizawa joked that, with his sour attitude, Ryohei was a male version of Matsumoto. Or maybe he wasn't really joking.

All Kaho knew for sure was that she was actually starting to like the guy.

AN: Thanks for reading! Please let me know what you think!