Chapter 23

"So what do you guys think? Ever since I gave those donations last month, the company PR and image has improved drastically as a direct result of my personal choice. Our stocks have shown growth as well. Should I continue? My donations seem to be benefiting the company." Kakashi spoke confidently.

He was currently in an advisor meeting with Tenzo and Shikamaru in his home office.

It had been five weeks since the car accident and Sakura's injuries were healing properly. Most of the bruising was gone and just some yellow discoloration was left. Her check up the day before went great and her doctor gave her the all clear to return to work at her normal pace next week.

The man who had rammed into and shot at them had yet to be located. He didn't go to any hospitals in a twenty mile radius for his gunshot wound, so he had become a ghost at this point. They couldn't even find him on any of the CCTV's throughout the city.

The next time they would probably see him, the bodyguard figured, would be when they attack Kakashi again. Sakura didn't let it get to her, but she was frustrated beyond belief at how that day had turned out. Kakashi had been working extra hard himself to make up for the fact too.

Sakura looked up from her work to see her boyfriend in work mode. His presence and the way he held himself so high when he was fully devoted to his work always made her smile.

Kakashi loved what he did and what he did, he did it well. She wouldn't go as far to say that he was a different man at work than he was at home. It was more like he could easily flip a switch and become this powerful CEO who could easily sway others and operate a multimillion dollar company. However, once he turned off the switch, she was greeted with the goofy and laid back man she had fallen in love with.

If you asked her which version of him she loved most, Sakura would tell you that she loved both parts equally. That you couldn't have one side of him without having the other there as well. Each side leaked into his overall personality and that's what she loved the most about him.

"You should continue. It'll only make you and, indirectly, the company look better to the public and to other companies too. A selfless CEO is a good CEO." she said replied instinctively.

Kakashi looked up from the paper in his hand and grinned big at her.

"No one asked for your opinion. You have no part in this meeting, Ms. Haruno." Tenzo shot out at her suddenly.

The bodyguard jerked her head away from looking at Kakashi and found Tenzo half looking back at her, giving her a dirty look. She furrowed her brow and frowned back at him before hitting him with her own comeback.

"He asked what we thought, so I gave my opinion. I'll give my opinion whenever I feel like it, thank you very much."

The dirty look he was giving her turned into a near death glare that took her by surprise.

"Watch your mouth. Just because you're his new toy on top of being his bodyguard doesn't mean you get to have any say or sway in this meeting. You work for us, not with us. I can and will get rid of you whenever I please." Tenzo threatened.

Sakura clamped her mouth shut in disbelief at the vicious reply. Before she could reply or even get her thoughts together, she heard Kakashi's commanding voice ring through the office.

"Tenzo! Watch your mouth, that was extremely rude to say. We are not removing her from her position, we've discussed this already. Don't you dare refer to her as my 'new toy' again either. Or it will be you that is removed."

Sakura watched as Tenzo stared hard at her for another second before he switched to a blank expression and turned back to face Kakashi.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to snap like that." Tenzo's tone suddenly apologetic, "Been extra tired lately. My mother's health has been rocky."

The pinkette continued to stare wide eyed at the back of the lawyers head as he spoke.

'What the hell was all that about?'

"Is everything alright? Tenzo, you know you can take time off to be with her and focus on those things." Kakashi suddenly voiced his concern.

Sakura pried her eyes away from Tenzo to look at Kakashi. He seemed to not have heard what she heard. She quickly glanced at Shikamaru to gauge his reaction and found him sitting tense and awkwardly staring down at the file in his lap.

'He heard it too. This isn't good.'

The bodyguard stood then, ignoring the conversation Kakashi and Tenzo were sharing and gathered up all her work and headed out of the office.

"Sakura? Where are you going?" Kakashi suddenly spoke to her, "You don't have to leave if you don't want too."

She turned around and shot him a convincing smile.

"I'm just gonna go finish my work in my room. Tenzo made me realize that I'm getting too distracted focusing on what you guys are doing instead of focusing on my work, so it'd be best if I let you guys be for now."

Kakashi pursed his lips for a moment, then nodded at her in agreement. With that, she quickly departed. Walking down the hall, she walked right past her room where her desk was located and into the kitchen. Throwing down her stack of papers and laptop, she quickly studied the pile of work as she crossed her arms in front of her.

She had lied to them.

Sakura had completed all her required work for that day over an hour ago and was just reviewing it when all that stuff went down. Sakura just needed to make a believable excuse to leave abruptly like that without raising too many questions.

'I need to figure out how to go about this without them knowing what I'm about to do… I have a sneaking suspicion I'm being monitored somehow.'

Sakura's eyes glanced over to her laptop and cell phone as the thought came to her.

'I can't use these anymore for the investigation. They're company issued and obviously bugged.'

An idea popped into her head then and Sakura quickly made her way to her old room and began rifling through her desk drawers. Now that she stayed with Kakashi every night and all of her stuff had been moved into his closets, her old room basically became her office with a bed. After a couple seconds, she found the item she had been searching for.

"Yes! Perfect!" she quietly whispered to herself excitedly as she studied the unused notebook.

It was a small journal with cherry blossoms printed all over the pale green leather cover. Kakashi had gotten it for her for Christmas and she loved it. She didn't have a use for it until now.

'Who knew that this would be used for this… Maybe I can get another one to use for happier reasons?'

Squashing the thought for the time being, Sakura all but ran back to the kitchen to begin furiously writing in it. She needed to be quick as possible if this was going to work out like she hoped.

Three hours had passed since she left the office when the sound of a door opening and closing down the hall, ripped her from her thoughts. Sakura snapped the journal shut and quickly hid it under a file as she stared at the hallway entrance to see who exactly was coming. She hadn't stopped writing in that notebook once that entire three hours.

She set out a sigh of relief when she watched as Shikamaru walked into the kitchen.

'The gods have answered my prayers!'

"Oh, hey, Sakura." he smiled at her as he went to the cabinet and pulled out a glass and filled it with water, "I needed to step out and stretch my legs for a second. Was getting a little stir crazy sitting there."

"No, this is actually perfect! I need to speak with you about something. Something important." she smiled back at him as she grabbed the journal and hopped off the stool she was on and made her way over to the advisor and spoke in a hushed whisper, "I need your help. You heard it too, didn't you?"

"You guys have a good evening. Thanks for sticking it out all day." Kakashi spoke with a tired smile.

Both advisors just nodded with their own tired smiles and made their way out of his office to leave. After a few more minutes of gathering his bearings, he stood and made his way out of the office to go find his girlfriend. It had been about six hours since Sakura abruptly left his office after that little verbal spat she had with Tenzo.

'Hopefully the two weeks off I gave him will put him into a better mood. He's been overworking himself it seems. He looks so stressed out because of his mother.'

Walking into the kitchen, he saw her piles of work but no Sakura next to them. He looked up from there and scanned the rest of the open living space and didn't see her in the dining room or living room either.

"Sakura?" he called out to the open air.

'Where is she? It's only six. Could she be in bed?' he thought when no response came.

The tired CEO made his way back down the hall in search for the pinkette. Opening the door to their bedroom, he found Sakura snuggled up in the center of their bed watching TV half asleep. The sound of him coming had stirred her back awake. He smiled back at her when she turned to smile at him.

This was something he could get used to he suddenly thought. Coming home from a long day at work to crawl into a warm bed with the love of his life.

"You look cozy. Mind if I come join you?" he asked as he started to remove his suit jacket and tie.

"Hmmm, I guess." he heard her reply lazily while he was inside of his walk in closet changing.

Kakashi walked out once he had his sweats and an old t-shirt on and gave her a curious look.

""I guess?"?" he pouted playfully as he kneeled onto the bed and leaned over her to give her a soft kiss.

He leaned back after a second and made his way under the blankets to join her. Sakura wiggled herself into his arms in seconds and he basked in the warmth she was giving him.

'Seems like she's been in here for a while now.'

"How was work?" she asked while nestling her head into the crook of his neck.

Kakashi let out a soft sigh as she traced lazy circles onto his chest with a single finger.

"Long, but we got everything I wanted done, done. We're actually ahead of schedule now." he said as he pulled her flush against his side and placed a chaste kiss on the top of her head, "Oh, by the way, I gotta ask you something."

He felt Sakura shift in his arms and prop up herself on an elbow. She looked down to him with a quirked pink brow.

"And that is?"

"Would you be my date to a party this Saturday?" he asked with a devilish smile.

Her other brow shot up at the question so she looked completely surprised then.

"A party? What kind of party?" she asked back.

"Semi-formal black tie if you want specifics. It's a Valentine's event hosted by one of the companies I'm invested in. They asked me to make an appearance and I couldn't say no. It's a grand opening party at an art gallery. Theme is romance, ironically." he easily explained.

He usually just went alone to these events, made his social rounds and took the necessary photos for the reporters and paparazzi and then made his exit home. But, this time around, he wanted to make it a proper night out now that he was dating Sakura. Whenever he was with a woman before, he never brought them to these types of events because he knew that the relationship wouldn't last. They never did because he didn't want them too. They were simply flings to him.

However, Sakura was different. He loved her unlike those other girls. She was not a fling to him. She was the real deal. He wanted to show her off to the world. Show her that he was serious about them and the life they had been sort of creating together these last couple months. When he got the call earlier after she had left the office, he didn't groan at the invitation, but eagerly accepted and said yes as Sakura came to mind.

"I don't have a dress though."

"We can easily get you one, darling, you know that."

He watched the confliction in her eyes as she looked away at nothing.

"I don't know… I've never been an actual guest at an event like that before. I've always been on the side as security. I don't want to embarrass you or the company." she reasoned.

It hurt him slightly, hearing the lack of confidence that came from someone as strong as Sakura.

"Hey," he replied in a soft tone as he gave her a reassuring squeeze with the arm loosely wrapped around her waist, "Don't think so little of yourself. I want you there with me that's why I'm asking. You won't embarrass me or the company, I do that plenty well on my own. Think of it as, uh, our public debut as a couple."

The bright green eyes he loved so much, flickered up to meet his gaze then and she pouted.

"That makes it even more nerve wracking for me! That's a big deal, Kakashi! I just don't want to disappoint you… We are technically from two different worlds after all. I'm nervous that all those other snooty people won't accept me when they learn I'm not some heiress or from a known family."

He pursed his lips at the statement, the annoyance ebbed its way into him. That was the true reason why she was so apprehensive about this invite he was offering. Sakura felt like she wasn't good enough for him.

"Fuck them then." he bit out as he furrowed his brow.

Sakura gasped at his sudden foul mouth.

"If they have anything to say about you, or me, or our relationship, they can all kiss my ass. I'll even pull my investments out if I do have any with those people. I'm not going to support a company that's classist in any shape or form. I have a zero tolerance for that bullshit."

"Kakashi!" she cried out quietly, clamping a hand over her mouth, "You do not have to go to those lengths for me! You can't just pull out million dollar investments over a relationship!"

"But I will. I'm not going to let anyone disrespect you, Sakura. I love you too much to allow that type of behavior to occur."

The earlier conflict she had in her eyes was replaced with warmth as she laid back down next to him. Kakashi half rolled onto his side and used his free arm to wrap around Sakura and pull her into his chest more to comfort her. She tucked her head under his chin and he felt her take a deep breath as she inhaled his scent and release a content sigh.

"Okay. I'll go to that party with you." she spoke, voice muffled by his shirt, "I'll obviously need to get the security details though in advance."

Kakashi pulled back enough as she looked up to him and he smiled warmly at her.

"Thank you." he replied as he leaned down to kiss her.

They lay cuddled like that for a little while longer.

"I'm sorry for Tenzo snapping at you like that. I gave him another earful after you left and told him to take two weeks off." he informed her.

He felt Sakura stiffen in his hold for a brief second before she shifted and sat up.

"It's fine. He's probably just stressed." she replied with a shrug.

He sat up as she spoke and placed a chaste kiss on her shoulder.

"Maybe so, but that's no reason to snap at someone like that. He said he'll apologize next time he sees you."

"I'm hungry." Sakura suddenly said.

Kakashi gave her an odd look at the random subject change before he smiled and nodded.

"Do you want to order in or cook something here?" he asked her.

Sakura brought her hand up to her chin and pretended to think hard before she smiled at him.

"We haven't had Chinese in a while and I'm craving something salty and with soy sauce." she explained.

He nodded again with a smile.

"Chinese it is!"

"Can we get an extra order of dumplings too? Oh, and crab rangoons. Oh, and egg drop soup!"

Kakashi started laughing as he nodded to agreed to all her requests.

"I'll buy out the whole restaurant for you if you want." he teased as he leaned over and gave her a quick kiss.

He laughed more when she rolled her eyes dramatically at him.

'I love her so much.'

A/N: Boy did a LOT just happen. What do you guys think? What's gonna happen now?

Please leave a review if you can! You guys are my biggest source of inspo and I looooove hearing your theories and ideas of what will and won't happen!

Thank you as always to Taytay95 for being a blessed beta and working so hard! She's been my beta for over year now! I've been writing on her for over a year! It's crazy to see how much I've done and how far I've come as a writer and I can't thank her enough. 3333