A/N: Not the story I planned to publish but way, way shorter and less problematic. I think.

Disclaimer: Everything, except the plot maybe, is copyright Tite Kubo, Shuiesha Publishing, blah blah blah, don't sue me.

"Games"

"Lieutenant Matsumoto?" asked Byakuya with a raised eyebrow as Rangiku entered his study. He was still dressed in his shihakusho, though he had discarded his haori, tekkou and kenseikan. There was a small pot of tea on the low table before him, with only one cup, and a few sheets of paper on the tatami beside him. The doors to the garden were open revealing the fireflies dancing among the flowering trees in the deepening twilight. In this part of the Seireitei where the high nobility lived it was almost as if they were in a different world: one of order, serenity and beauty. Byakuya looked as if he had just settled in to read the day's reports on the daily goings-on of the clan. Or at least, that was what he had said he usually did at this hour.

Her scarf was nowhere in sight.

She swallowed a nervous gulp, berating herself in her head all the while for being so silly, acting as if she had done something wrong, and said, "Good evening, Captain. I just came to collect something I forgot last time." Her voice was calm, steady, she was in control.

He dropped his gaze from her and picked up his tea cup. She watched, heart pounding, as he took a sip, then a second, and put down the cup again. Then he asked, "What did you forget?"

A vision came to her mind. They had been drinking sake and listening to music on the ancient gramophone in the cabinet near the door. There had been fireflies in the garden then too. High on sake she had made an offer to dance for him, a number she had seen once at a geisha house she had briefly worked undercover on the trail of a prostitution ring. The dance itself was nothing out of the ordinary, but the "geisha" would be completely naked by the end of it. Not that she was going to do that for him. He had lifted an eyebrow briefly and then settled back into the cushions. She had smiled at him then and stood with her cup and scarf. She was still smiling halfway through when he tugged on the scarf and pulled her to him and…

"My scarf," she said, willing her cheeks not to redden. She was no blushing maiden. She was way past that. Yet with this man all of a sudden it was as if she was under some kind of kido. It was probably kido. Something known only to handsome noblemen who acted entirely different in private rooms than they were supposed to when they were out in public.

"Oh," he said. Then he set down his cup and called, "Mizuki."

The door slid open behind Rangiku and a maid entered with the pink scarf, neatly folded, in her hands. Rangiku breathed a sigh of relief. She did not really want this conversation to go on longer than necessary. She needed out of this man's presence before he made her do something silly. Like kissing him. That had been enjoyable, quite, but wrong, very wrong. But instead of handing it to her, the maid walked right past the lieutenant and presented the scarf to her employer, and said in a low voice, "Kuchiki-sama."

He took it from her hands and she left immediately. When they were alone again he said, "A maid found it under the cushions after you left and it caused quite the ruckus. I had to swear on my parents' graves to an elderly aunt that I was not hiding women around the house. You should be more careful with your possessions."

She nodded and said, "Yes, yes. Can I have that back now." She took a step forward with her hand out.

He set the scarf beside him and took up his cup for another sip of tea. Rangiku waited, watching him. He looked so much younger when he was dressed down, smaller too. His hands were fine-boned, fingers long and thin. The last time she was here she learned that those hands were also rather strong, his grip a vice on her arm and she was not surprised later on to find that they had left impressions. Then he set the cup down and, looking directly at her, said, "No."

For a second she thought she had misheard. When he made no attempt to correct this impression, her mouth fell open and her eyes grew wide. He continued, "It's mine now. You left it here for over two weeks. The limit at the manor is one."

Her eyebrows climbed her forehead towards her hairline. Surely she did not hear him right. He was watching her, the glint of amusement in his gaze. Then she blinked, and again, before finally sputtering, "What?"

He did not repeat it, but took up his tea cup again and had another sip of tea. For a moment she just stared at him, not at all tracking his lips along the tea cup's rim and remembering with a flush the feel of them on her skin, and then she clenched her hands into fist and marched over to him, her whole body heated, and said, "Give me back my scarf!"

He lifted his gaze to hers now, and raised an eyebrow again. Her cheeks warmed, for an entirely different reason this time. The Soul King had done some of his finest work when he sculpted that face. He said, "Please lower your voice. You'll alarm the staff."

Rangiku was already at her limit. Embarrassment turned to fury. "The what? What the hell? Give me my scarf back!" she demanded, fists clenched tightly as if to pound him about the head with them. She could do it too, standing now just a few inches away and towering over his seated form. Captain or no she would have her scarf back. Not that she cared what anyone thought or anything, but its absence had been noticed and commented on so frequently in the past two weeks that she simply had no choice but to return to the scene of the crime to retrieve it.

He dropped his gaze from her face and drank his tea again. Then he said, "You took too long to return for it. It is now my property. Now, will that be all?"

This man was actually toying with her. Did he not know how much courage it took her to work up the courage to come back to this manor after what happened the last time she was there? Not that she was afraid of him. But damn it to hell she was the one who played games with men's heads, not the other way around! How dare he?

With a cry of rage, Rangiku rushed at him, but then he was standing and had seized her hands. His tea cup and the pot lay upended at their feet, spilling tea all over the tatami, soaking into their tabi and the hem of their hakama. A heartbeat where they just stared at each other, she stunned, he looking only mildly alarmed and then there was a whoosh of shunpo and the room was filled with black-clad figures: the Kuchiki guards come to their master's aid. For a moment there was absolute silence and then Rangiku snapped with barely contained rage, "What the hell is this?"

Without releasing her, Byakuya inclined his head to the closest guard and said, "The situation is under control."

They needed no further instructions; a blink later they were gone again. Then Byakuya turned to Rangiku and said, "Why are you being so difficult? Nothing happened that you did not want."

The fury went out of her as quickly as it had appeared. Her cheeks heated and reddened again and she dropped her gaze, grinding her teeth. She had always known that this was not a man to trifle with. But it had been so tempting. There he had been walking into the teahouse with his head high and scowling with Ukitake and Kyouraku trailing behind, shepherding him to their booth like a little lost lamb. And he had been so polite, so proper all evening, she just could not resist asking him look for her scarf after she handed it to Nanao and then "forgot" about it. And the next time when she set him on that wild goose chase for where the SWA were hiding their meeting in his manor, a meeting that happened to end some two hours before he arrived. A part of her had always known that she only got away with it because he played along, but she had always been the one to set up the terms of the game.

Or so she had thought. So this is what it felt like to be at the mercy of someone else's whims: at once maddening and exhilarating, as if she wanted to try beating him into submission again or kissing him until he surrendered. She could feel her heart racing, gooseflesh rising along her arms and legs, and it was a little difficult to breathe. Oh yes, it was definitely the latter. Then Byakuya released her, oblivious, she hoped, to the thoughts racing through her head, turned his back and said, "I will return it on one condition."

She took a deep breath to calm herself, massaging the hand he had held though his grip had not been anything like the last time, and asked, "What?" She made no attempt to conceal her irritation.

"Well now, you've spoiled my tea and with all this commotion the staff will be too distressed to prepare a proper dinner," he said. Then he looked back at her and said, "Have dinner with me, tonight. There is a restaurant not too far from here where, if you are worried, no one will recognise you. It is not normally frequented by shinigami."

Before she could stop herself, she said, "I'm wearing my uniform."

He gave her a sweeping glance from head to toe, and then said, "That can be easily rectified. Mizuki."

Once again, the maid appeared, bowed and kneeling at the door. "My lord," she said.

"Lieutenant Matsumoto and I will be dining out this evening. Find her something suitable, and then get Yukiko to help you get her dressed," he commanded.

"I can dress myself. Who said I was going with you!" snapped Rangiku, feeling her ire rising again. A date? He was attempting to blackmail her into going out with him? Who did that? This was not how guys usually asked her out...though she had to give him points for creativity. The bastard.

But the maid had already disappeared and Byakuya turned back to her and asked, "Do you want your scarf back or not?"

She scowled at him but he just smiled.