Hei stood in front of her, holding out the bottle. He had discarded his down-at-the-heel student look for dark wash jeans and a charcoal gray V-neck pullover that covered his injured arm but did little to hide his physique; he blended in perfectly with the other patrons of the bar, yet she couldn't believe that she hadn't noticed him earlier. How long had he been here?

When she didn't make a move to take the beer from him, he opened it and set it down in front of her, then took the seat across from her without waiting to be invited, his own bottle in hand.

"Call me 'Li' here, there are too many people around," he said. His expression was pleasant enough, but his eyes were hard and calculating. Was he still angry with her? She couldn't tell.

"What are you doing here?" Misaki said carefully.

"The same thing you are." He made a small motion with his chin over his shoulder, towards the karaoke booth where his cousin and her friends were.

"I guessed that," she said, trying to pretend that she wasn't completely unnerved by his presence. He must have been watching Xu's apartment too - so he had probably seen Misaki there. "I meant, why are you sitting here talking to me, instead of lurking in a shadow somewhere? I'm supposed to stay away from you, remember?"

He gave her a wry look. "If you can break the rules, I can too. This place is too crowded; there aren't any shadows to 'lurk' in without drawing attention. Besides," he added more quietly, "you have a bad habit of getting in my way. If you know I'm here from the start, hopefully we can avoid that."

Is he talking about…working together? Of course he isn't, don't be stupid. "What did you say to Kanami?" Her friend was nowhere in sight.

Hei raised his eyebrows. He was being more expressive than he ever had when they were alone, she noticed, but he was still subdued compared to Li. It felt almost natural. "I asked her if she thought you'd let me buy you a drink, and she recommended this." He picked up his bottle. "Then she threatened me with bodily harm if I upset you."

Misaki cracked a smile. "Don't underestimate her."

"Don't worry."

Was he promising not to upset her? She felt a stab of guilt over their earlier conversation, and debated whether or not to bring it up, even to apologize. Maybe it would be best to just follow his lead.

Hei didn't say anything else though, just sat there looking at her.

Misaki picked up the beer and took a swallow, to occupy the silence. Finally she said, "So since you're here, does this mean that you think I might be right, about Xu being involved in something?"

"It's like you said - too many coincidences." He turned his bottle in his hands as if studying it, but Misaki thought he was trying to decide something; she kept quiet and waited.

Finally he looked back to her. "I met with my contact in the park on Wednesday night to take possession of a flash drive. I didn't know who he was, or what was on the drive. As soon as he handed it over, the two other contractors attacked."

Misaki listened in silence, trying not to let her surprise show on her face. Whether or not he was angry with her, it seemed he still trusted her.

"I didn't know they were MSS," Hei continued, "but it didn't matter who they were; I'd been told that other organizations might be after the item. I handed it off the next morning. Later that day, Huang contacted us to say that there was a file missing from the flash drive, a key that allowed the other files to be read. He thought the contact must be trying to extort more money out of us."

Hei's eyes flicked to something over Misaki's shoulder. She was about to turn to see what had attracted his attention, when she noticed that one of Xu's roommates, the girl with the red glasses, was standing outside the karaoke booth and typing on her phone. Hei must be watching the booth in some sort of mirror or reflection in the bar behind her, she realized.

"So you went to talk to your contact that night?" Misaki asked. She'd noticed that Hei was refraining from using Iwakara's name. It was probably a good idea, in public as they were.

He moved his eyes back to her, and didn't answer. She felt her pulse quicken.

"H- Li?"

"What?" It was like he'd completely forgotten that he'd been talking.

"You went to see your contact?"

He blinked, and picked up his beer, but didn't drink. "He was hiding out at that motel near Ookayama. I asked him where the key was, and he said something about someone removing it from the flash drive while a girl distracted him, because this person didn't want him selling it. He looked like he'd been in a fight with someone; that must have happened sometime after he left the park the night before."

Misaki leaned forward so she could hear him better over the din of the bar. "Was the person he fought with the one who took the key? Who was that?"

Hei just shrugged. "I didn't ask."

"What? Why not?"

"I didn't care," he said, as if it should be obvious. Contractors, she thought to herself with a sigh of irritation. If one of her subordinates had neglected to ask such an important question during an interview, he'd be out on his ass.

"Alright," she said, leaning on the table and holding her bottle in both hands. "You didn't know it might be important. But we can probably assume that whoever he fought with was the person who didn't want him to sell whatever information he had?"

Hei nodded. "He also said something about this person sending the contractors who ambushed me to kill him, but that was wrong; they were after the flash drive."

"Maybe they were going to kill him after they stole the drive from you?"

"No," Hei said matter-of-factly. "There were two of them, and the contact was an easy target. If they wanted him dead, one would have killed him while the other distracted me and tried to take the item."

She could probably trust Hei's judgment on that; he knew better than she how contractors thought. "How does this connect to the laboratory fire, if your contact was at the motel? Why did he go to the lab?"

"He said he had a back up copy of the key in his office, so I met him there. He was pulling it off his computer when I noticed a piece of equipment rigged to start a fire; there was just enough time for me to get out. The contact was killed, and the key was destroyed along with his computer."

It gave Misaki chills, the way he could talk about such a close brush with death so casually. Then again, it was just a typical day at work for him, wasn't it. She stared down at her beer while she thought. "The MSS agents wanted the flash drive; presumably they'd want the key as well, so it doesn't make sense to destroy it. It doesn't make sense to kill Iw - the contact either, because they might need him to replace whatever information he was selling in the first place."

Hei listened to her think out loud, without interrupting. She felt his gaze on her, and kept her own eyes down so she could focus.

"So whoever set the fire was probably the same person who got into a fight with your contact, who didn't want him selling this information. If the key is destroyed, no one gets it. This person doesn't work for the MSS then." She tapped her fingers on the bottle. "But this person is familiar with your contact, and seems to have access to the laboratory." She glanced up at Hei then. "Is this…is this where Xu might fit in?"

Hei looked uncomfortable. He leaned in closer so that he could lower his voice even further. "I don't know. I have trouble believing that she has anything to do with this. But she was in the park while I was meeting with him, there was that message you found, she takes his class, and…" He hesitated. "She was in the hallway outside the lab right before the contact and I went in."

Misaki's eyes widened. She found it almost impossible that someone like Xu could do something like set a fire, even if she didn't mean to hurt anyone.

"That's one hell of a coincidence," she murmured. Hei nodded slightly, and there was something in eyes that looked like…sadness? He caught her staring at him and held her gaze. Misaki could sense without looking that if she moved her hands, gripping her bottle tightly, just an inch forward, her fingers would brush his.

"Ah-hem."

They both looked up, startled. Kanami was standing next to the table, her arm around the waist of a very tipsy, giggly woman that Misaki didn't know. Kanami's cheeks were flushed.

"I hate to interrupt, but you weren't answering your phone." Misaki hadn't even felt it buzz. Kanami continued, "We're going to go dancing at a club up the street. You can join us, but something tells me you'd rather stay here…"

Misaki felt her own cheeks turn as red as her friend's. "I'll be alright on my own, thanks Kanami."

"On your own, huh? Well, have fun." Kanami winked at her, then she and the other woman headed back to a group of people waiting by the door, weaving a little.

"Don't worry," Misaki said, turning back to Hei. "She won't tell anyone I was talking to you."

It seemed as if Hei hadn't heard her. He was just looking at her, frowning slightly. "How do you do that?"

"Do what?" she asked, confused.

"Distract me." He swept a hand across his face as if trying to wake himself up, a natural and uncalculated gesture that surprised her almost as much as his words, and looked away. Then his eyes narrowed. "Jiao-tu wasn't the only one the hallway. There was a man with her, and another woman - that woman."

He was looking over her shoulder again; Misaki glanced at the karaoke booth, where the girl in red glasses had just exited. "I think that's one of her roommates," she said. They both watched the young woman take a pack of cigarettes out of her pocket, drop it, pick it up again, and stare at the karaoke booth for a long minute before heading towards the front the door.

"Keep your eyes on Jiao-tu," Hei said, standing abruptly.

"Wait," Misaki said before he could walk away. "What are you going to do?"

"I'm just going to watch." His eyes lingered on hers for a moment before he disappeared quickly into the crowd, leaving her alone at the table. Misaki felt a warm glow spread throughout her body. Maybe she hadn't dreamed that kiss after all.