Hi there! It´s almost the end of another year and yet we are still here, not even near the end of the story. I did cut some parts I had originally planned but there´s a lot I need to include for everything to make sense. Thank you guys so much for bearing with me through 2021 and let´s hope 2022 find us all in good health and thriving.

TW: There´s still a lot of blood in this chapter. On top of that there´s mention of suicide at the very end. Skip the last part, after the police makes an entrance if you´d like to avoid it.

DISCLAIMER: I still don´t own shit, yet. The characters belong to Rumiko Takahashi Sensei, I just borrowed them.

27- Red

"Hello?" Inuyasha´s voice sounded groggy to his own ears. It was odd, he felt weird all over. His head was pounding, he was dizzy, and his body felt numb.

The incessant ringing of the phone had awakened him from a deep, unrestful slumber. He opened his heavy lids confused about his whereabouts. Was he home? It was dark around him and he was laying down on some soft mattress, but he couldn't scent the place for any clues. His hanyou senses were slowly getting back to him, it was like the dawn after the new moon, but if he had also been hungover and run over by a bulldozer.

"Inuyasha?" It was the third time Rin uttered his name; she could hear him breathing on the line but he wasn´t responding. "Please answer me Yash," she finally begged.

"Rin?" He rubbed his face with his free hand, slowly sitting up then reaching for his night lamp switch, squinting at the sudden flow of light.

"Inuyasha, where are you?" Her voice was increasingly concerned. "Is Kagome with you?"

"Uh..." he looked around, still squinting. He was in his bed, that he had already recognized, but Kagome wasn´t there. He tried to sniff her scent to no avail, his nose twitching frantically. "...I´m home... in my apartment...Kagome isn´t with me. I ... I can´t recall seeing her... what time is it?"

"I´m sorry, I need to find Kagome. I´ll call you back."

"What? Why? What´s going on?"

He didn´t get an answer.

Still drowsy, Inuyasha got up, unsteadily dragging himself to the bathroom. He opened the cold water tab and looked at himself in the mirror. His eyesight was already adjusting to the bright lights of the bathroom and his nose seemed to be starting to function properly.

Eyes widening in shock, he looked down at his bloody hands first and to his rusty-colored clothes, his nose already telling him it was Kagome's blood.

"Fuck!" He retraced his steps back to his bed following the overpowering smell of blood. "No, no, no, fuck no!"

He checked himself over, maybe he had been hurt and had already healed, all that blood couldn´t be just hers. Desperately trying to identify a different scent than Kagome´s blood merged with his own, Inuyasha tossed the stained covered linen. He then focused on the floor, trying to find footprints, sniffing for scents, anything that could give him a clue as to what had happened to Kagome.

There it was!

The faint scent of the ookami lawyer. A vague recollection of Kouga grabbing Kagome by the shoulders played back on his mind´s eye. He could also make out the place where it had happened.

And that was all.

He couldn´t find anything else. No clues as to how he got home or where to find Kagome. It´s like he had teleported from the place where it happened and popped up in his apartment.

The ringing of his cell phone brought him back to the bedroom.

"Yash? I´m sorry we still can´t find Kagome...I´m so worried..." She spoke in hushed tones as if she was trying to hide from someone.

"Rin, listen. I don´t know what´s going on but I woke up covered in blood and I can´t remember anything, it´s like I´ve got roofied or something."

"My god Yash? Are you hurt?" There was a pause as if Rin was dreading making another question. "Is it Kagome´s blood?"

How could she know?

"Why are you looking for Kagome?"

He listened to her sigh on the other side of the line before she answered.

"I overheard my father and Jaken talking, they said there was an explosion where you and a woman were missing. I coaxed my father to let me come, I was worried about you both."

Inuyasha waited patiently as the girl choked on the last words. She took a big breath and continued.

"We couldn´t find you at the parking lot, there´s a huge mess, smashed cars, broken glass all over the place and a ..." another pause, a choked sob and she resumed her story. "there´s a pool of blood big enough for a murder scene..." she couldn´t contain the tears anymore. "Yash, Kagome´s pregnant. She wanted to tell you herself I just thought it´s important that you know..."

She did tell him, didn´t she? What happened after that?

His attention shifted back to the phone, still expecting for Rin´s crying to subside so she could go on. Inuyasha stayed frozen, racking his brain in an effort to remember more all the while.

"Rin, I need you to focus now," he couldn´t wait for her panic attack to recede. "Try and calm down. If Kagome´s hurt, we must find her. I´m gonna call-"

"Otouto, listen up." He didn´t expect to hear Sesshomaru's voice cutting into their conversation. Apparently, his brother didn´t want his daughter to get more involved than she already had. "The police have arrived, we can´t keep them off for much longer. You have to clean yourself of all the blood, we can´t have you involved in a crime-"

"Crime?! What crime? What the fuck are you saying?"

"The evidence is right in front of me, there´s footage where you, the wolf lawyer, and that Higurashi woman involved in something gruesome..."

His mind was spinning, images of a fight with the wolf and Kagome trying to stop them. The look of abject horror in her eyes made his skin crawl.

"I´m pregnant, Kouga. Inuyasha is the father."

He felt nausea rising, twisting his stomach, a sense of dread he had never experienced before. Kagome was pregnant and hurt, how did that happen?

"Let them do their job."

"What?!" Sesshomaru could not hide his perplexity.

"Let the police do their job." He sighed before explaining, bracing himself for the outlash he was sure would come. "Kagome is pregnant, if she is hurt, we must find her ASAP."

"You stupid, irresponsible... you are making the same mistake and you want to drag the police into it too. You will be singlehandedly responsible for destroying the company´s reputation, not to mention what this could mean to the human-youkai relations."

Sesshomaru was livid, all the hard work he had been doing, his father's legacy, the name they had made for themselves, all in jeopardy because of his younger brother´s recklessness.

"None of it matters. We can take care of that after I find Kagome safe and sound." He spat through gritted teeth. "I don´t care what you tell the police, I´m not going to lie. Send them to my place for all I care. In the meantime, I´ll be looking for Kagome."

He hung up the phone before his brother had time to rebut his last statement. He dialed Miroku´s number immediately after.

"Yash, my friend. To what do I owe the pleasure?" His friend carefree answered.

"No pleasure this time Miroku. Is Sango with you?"

The violet-eyed man sat straight at the urgency in his friend´s voice.

"Of course, let me get her." He didn´t even waste a minute asking the reason for said urgency.

"Inuyasha, what´s going on?" It was only a few seconds before he heard Sango´s voice

"It´s Kagome. Have you seen her today?"

"Nope, I haven´t. we just talked over the phone, a couple of hours ago."

"Did she tell you where she was going after..." he sighed before adding the next part, "after meeting the ookami?"

As he expected, Sango gasped on the line.

"She told you about that?"

"It doesn´t matter now. I need to find her Sango; she might be hurt and -"

"Kouga dared to harm her?" she screeched making him take the phone a little further from his sensitive ear. "How did you find that out?"

"I´ll tell you guys everything once Kagome is safe."

"I don´t know anything else Yash, she promised we would talk after the meeting."

"Would you call her mother? I don´t want to upset her before I know what happened. Just tell her you can´t reach her and find out what she knows. I´m going to search the hospitals."

"Oh my god, Inuyasha. Is it that really necessary?" Fear was gripping her voice now.

"Sorry Sango, I can´t just sit around and wait. Call me when you have news."

He hung up the phone and dialed Shippo´s number. He needed all the help he could get to cover all the hospitals and emergency rooms in the city.

xXxXxXxXxXxXx

"Good evening Higurashi-San, it´s Sango. I´m sorry to bother you but I can´t find Kagome, I was wondering if she was with you by any chance?"

As Sango had feared, Kagome's mother was instantly worried about her daughter, having not heard from her since the day before. It was hard to calm her enough to finish the conversation, not without promising to call each other when they had something to share.

Sango´s dread kept growing as Miroku drove them to Inuyasha´s place while she dialed the numbers of anyone she could think of, their high school friends, even Hojo, always getting the same answer, they haven´t heard from Kagome in a while.

They were already at Inuyasha´s apartment building when she hung up the last call with Kagome´s younger brother while Miroku rang the bell. They were already reaching the elevator when they heard the police sirens. By the time they reached Inuyasha´s floor, the police were already running up the stairs and banging at the door at the same time they arrived.

"Mr. Takahashi, you need to come with us," An officer who wasn´t in uniform spoke. " We have a warrant for your arrest." He then brought a paper into Inuyasha´s line of sight before continuing. "You have the right to remain silent. You have also the right to legal counseling."

"Have you found Miss Higurashi?" Inuyasha asked concerned as he was being handcuffed and pushed to the elevators.

"We are not at liberty of sharing any information with you right now."

"Miroku, Sango," he noticed them as he was taken away, "Any news?"

They both shook their heads in the negative.

"I left Shippo in charge, please contact him and find her."

"I´ll call a lawyer, don´t worry brother. We got you." Miroku said in a hopeful voice trying to convey security he didn´t feel at the moment.

"Call Sesshomaru," he saw the look of disbelief in Miroku´s eyes so he added. "He´s a dick, but he´s likely to help. He wouldn´t want our precious company affected by a scandal."

The policemen were already pushing the elevator's buttons when Inuyasha when he added. "Sango, Kagome´s pregnant, I don´t know if she told you." He waited for her answer, but the woman seemed unable to answer. "When you find her, please take care of her and the baby."

xXxXxXxXxXxXx

There was blood everywhere, the bathtub, the floor, the curtains. The child toddled into the red-painted scene, her small feet stumbling on the slippery tiles.

"Mama?" her small voice trying to reach the lifeless figure in the.

She fell to her knees and crawled the rest of the distance before she was finally able to reach the lifeless hand hanging from the side of the tub. It was wet, warm, and sticky, so gross the child thought sobbing audibly.

So much blood, it was impossible for someone to survive that blood loss, Jaken let out a rough croak as he stopped at the edge of the red pool, then slowly backtracking to the door.

"What is it?" His master´s voice inquired from the corridor "Did you find her?"

"Se-Se-Sesshomaru -sama... don´t. It´s... awful..."

"I can hear the child sobbing in there and I can smell the blood too, tell Sara to cover herself up and we´ll take care of the baby."

"It´s not... the child... Lady Sara is..." jaken couldn´t even articulate

"Let me through." Sesshomaru´s patience has reached its limit. He moved past the gawking imp and was now facing the bloody scene for himself. He rushed to the bathtub and kneeled by its side, his hand checking for a pulse on the exposed pale neck.

Nothing.

There was nothing he could do, the body was already cold.

The child however was pretty much alive, crying softly and refusing to let go of their mother´s hand.

"Come on little one." Sesshomaru coaxed firmly tugging on the little hand until it loosened its grip on the dead mother´s one.

He grabbed a towel from a stand nearby and wrapped the sobbing child with it before getting up and turning his back on the bloody scene.

The landlord who had opened the door for them was already at the door, his face transfigured in horror from the scene in front of them.

"I´ll... I´ll... call an ambulance..." the stout, short man stuttered.

"Don´t bother. It´s too late. Call the police." Jaken advised him as he almost run away from the bathroom door.

"The neighbors say the child has been crying for over an hour now. The landlord only called us because Lady Sara dared to name you, my lord, as her emergency contact."

"She was my secretary, and she had no family after the child´s father passed away. She never got over it. I should have noticed." The last part he spoke softly, almost to himself as he looked down at the child in his arms, the crying nearly subsided by then.

"So now the child is an orphan, you should hand it to the police, my lord, they will take care of it.

The daiyoukai gave the imp a shocked look and then looked back at the child. The little hand that had been grabbing their mother´s cold flesh was now softly hugging his index fingers, smearing the still sticky blood all over his digits.

The little girl made eye contact with him for the first time, eyelashes still wet from the tears she had just stopped shedding.

Sesshomaru´s heart felt a tug, something stirred there. Something he thought he was unable to feel. Tenderness. It was not something he had experienced in his life and this child seemed to connect to that part of him.

"No. I´ll take care of her."

Rin´s eyes shot open, she sat up in her bed, her breath coming in gasps. She had expected the nightmares after what she had witnessed in the parking lot but never thought it could bring back memories of her mother´s death.

xXxXxXxXxXxXx

I Looked it up, Japanese law enforcement does a version of the Miranda rights, the part about getting a lawyer though doesn´t happen until you go to trial. So, no lawyer during interrogation. I´ll stick to the American system, just because it adjusts to the story.

Thanks again for reading. Comments, favorites and followings are very much appreciated.

Love,

ALP