Nikki tightened her hold on the katana. There wasn’t room inside to swing the sword; she would be totally without Atsumori’s protection. She wasn’t crazy, but she might be stupid.
While she hesitated, a small furry body streaked out from under the nearest porch and scrambled up into the car’s interior. It was Misa’s ginger kitten, Maru.
“Doko iku no?” Leo growled softly.
Maru climbed up onto the passenger seat and mewed.
“Soto soto.” Leo pointed to the ground at his feet.
The kitten mewed again and scrambled onto the storage case between the front seats.
Leo had been desperate to find his father, impatient with all the roadblocks and lack of information. Yet he’d taken responsibility for the kitten. And if he had wanted to hurt her, he would have already done it. She’d been unconscious for hours. What’s more, he could have kept the katana from her, leaving her completely helpless.
“It’s fine.” Nikki slid into the vacated seat, holding tight to the katana.
Leo gave her a long, hard study and then shut the door, giving in to his stubborn passengers. He walked around the car, got in, pushed the kitten into her lap so he could fasten his seat belt, and started the car up with rumble.
She wanted to ask Leo questions, but there was an unwritten rule that said that once you started to ask people questions, they were free to ask back. It was the main reason she didn’t seek out other expatriates. The conversations all went the same way. What’s your name? Where are you from? What brings you to Japan?
They had already started down that dangerous road by exchanging names. To be fair, she couldn’t expect him to answer to Scary Cat Dude. God forbid, if they got into another fight; yelling “Watch out, Scary Cat Dude!” had shades of Jugemu, the boy who nearly drowned because people had to recite out his ridiculously long name to get him help.
How much did Leo know about her? In the last scene she had written, he hadn’t been able to dig into her past. He didn’t know about her years locked in mental hospitals. He didn’t know how crazy her mother thought she was.
If he didn’t know, she didn’t want him to find out.
It seemed fairly simple. As long as she kept the door shut on personal questions, she didn’t have to answer any questions. They could just sit in silence. It left her in a car, though, with a virtual stranger.
She studied his profile as he picked his way through the heavy traffic. His black mane and dark almond eyes said that one of his parents were definitely Asian. His accent spoke of a childhood in the United States. The car was modified for Japan, with the steering wheel on the right side of the car, but the interior smelled of him.
She could create a personality sheet for him. Whenever she had trouble getting a handle on a character, she wrote out everything she could determine about them. Place of birth. Zodiac sign. Pet peeves. Biggest fears. Anything for her hypergraphia to springboard off of. Her fingers twitched at the idea. She petted the kitten as a distraction. It purred and wrapped paws around her hand and chewed with needle sharp teeth.
“Ow, ow, ow,” Niki said.
“Hoi.” Leo reached over without looking. For a moment his fingers brushed over hers, strong and calloused. The kitten abandoned her and grappled Leo’s hand. He scooped it up and moved it to his own lap.
Leaving her nothing to occupy her hands with.
“Why do you still have it with you?” she asked.
He stared at the road, muscles in his jaw tensing. After a minute of silence, she didn’t think he was going to answer, but finally he said, “Despite what he thinks, he’s still young and fragile. The world is hard a place to be all alone.”
Was that a comment on the kitten or her?
She distracted herself by digging into her backpack and finding a notebook. Curling up in the seat so he couldn’t see the page, she started to write what she wanted to know about the most. Him.
He’d been in the cage for two days without food or water. He lay on the iron bars, panting. His entire body felt like he was buried in sand. His eyes felt like sandpaper and his mouth was parched dry. He kept hearing jets and helicopters flying overhead, which meant he was near either Kona or Hilo airport—unless they had flown him to Honolulu while he was drugged. The first day he had howled as he tried to escape, but he was too weak for that now.
The far door of the warehouse opened, throwing a shaft of hot light through the dimness. The wind came through the open door, taunting him with the scent of the recent rain. A figure stood in the doorway, sunlight gleaming off pale hair.
Behind the newcomer, the familiar voice of his captor was speaking.
“ . . . confirmed that there is only this one. We haven’t determined what it is.”
The newcomer and Williams came striding across the concrete floor, boot steps echoing in the empty space. Leo watched them come, too tired to snarl.
This new man was tall, white and lean with piercing blue eyes. He crouched down, carefully out of arm’s reach, to stare through the bars at Leo.
“Thought you said you took him down with a tranquilizer,” the newcomer said. He had an odd accent. Most of the men sounded like the people from television, even the men that looked like they could have been local Hawaiians.
“I did.” Williams kept farther back, blending with the shadows.
“So what’s wrong with him?”
“He’s probably dehydrated.”
“You haven’t given him water?”
“It didn’t seem necessary.” Williams had all been in favor of shooting Leo from the start. Voices over the radio, though, had ordered for him to be caged until “Fowler” could arrive.
Was this Fowler, then? Did this mean that they would kill him now, or was there some new torture in store?
Fowler scanned the warehouse and spotted the sink on the far wall. He walked to it and turned on the faucet. Would he actually give Leo water? His captors had so thoroughly ignored Leo that he was sure that they were going to let him die in the cage. After filling a plastic jug, the newcomer walked back to the cage, sloshing the water loudly as he walked.
“You want some water?” Fowler trickled a little out.
Thirst moved Leo. He heaved up on his knees, pressed against the bars, one hand cupped and thrust out to catch the stream of water.
“Ah, ah.” The flow stopped. “Say ‘please.’”
Leo studied the man. Was this a trick? Did the man merely want him to beg before he died?
“Say ‘please’ and I’ll give you water. You’re going to die in that cage if you don’t. Do you want to die?”
Leo shook his head.
Fowler shook the jug. “Say it.”
It came out a whisper, but he was rewarded with a handful of water. It was cool and delicious despite a chemical tang he wasn’t used to.
“What’s your name?” Water sloshed loudly again, promising more.
He licked his lips. “Leo. Leo Watanabe.” Another handful of water.
“How old are you?”
“Seven.”
For a minute, no water was forthcoming as the man chose to look to the ninja instead.
“You shouldn’t trust it to tell the truth,” Williams said.
Then the water came, three handfuls’ worth.
“Where are your parents?”
“Gone.”
“Gone went away? Gone died?”
He didn’t want to talk about his parents. The man sloshed the water jug when he fell silent. He still was so thirsty.
He reluctantly explained. “Mom went away long ago.”
“And your father?”
“Men came to our farm after New Year’s. They said we didn’t own the land. The king gave it to grandma’s grandfather. Dad took the truck to town with papers to show that it’s ours. He never came back. I’ve been looking for him.”
“Williams.” Fowler gestured, and Williams nodded and left.
The questions ended, but the water continued in handfuls until Leo was no longer
thirsty.
Williams came back after the sun had set. In the darkness of the warehouse, he was just a dangerous voice. “John and Naomi Watanbe were married twelve years ago. They had no children. Naomi was killed ten years ago in a hit and run. It’s lying to you.”
Fowler shook his head. “Hawaii has a large number of yokai that followed the Japanese sugar cane and pineapple plantation workers from Japan. It’s possible that an obakemono took the wife’s place. His father isolated himself and kept the boy hidden. You can’t have a birth certificate for a child born to a dead woman.”
Fowler glanced toward Leo and saw that he was watching him closely. Fowler turned away and lowered his voice to a whisper. “Any word on the father’s whereabouts?”
“He was in a head-on with tractor-trailer truck on January fifth. Killed instantly.”
Leo wailed in distress.
“What are we going to do with it?” Williams came out of the darkness, his pistol in hand.
Fowler shifted in front of Leo, hands spread to ward off a shot. “I’ll take responsibility for him.”
Nikki stopped writing and peered over the notebook at Leo. He was watching the road intently as he whipped through slower traffic, the kitten asleep on his lap. She had no idea what an obakemono was. What did it make Leo?
Who was this man whom she trusted enough for her to get into his car and be driven to parts unknown? He took her away from the multiple lane highways lined with skyscrapers, through little towns with modern houses with metal roofs, and up into the mountains. They stopped at a quaint little town for gas and rice balls. She squatted over a ceramic gutter on the floor of the very Japanese public restroom, feeling more and more lost and alone. Her only evidence that she was doing the right thing was the patience and care that Leo had for the kitten. It had scrambled out of the car when she opened her doors, heading for an empty lot beside the gas station. As she headed back to the car, the kitten was burying its feces.
Leo called it back with a simple “Hoi!” that brought it running. He’d taken a bowl out of the trunk, set it next to the car, and filled it from his own water bottle. As the kitten drank, Niki remembered how Simon had dribbled water into Leo’s outstretch palm. Like everything she wrote, it was like a vivid nightmare. She was left with memories as if she had personally experienced it. Fowler framed in the doorway, haloed with the brilliant light of a Hawaiian summer. Cool water trickling over parched skin. The taste of the water.
It was maddening what wasn’t said or explained in the scene. There was no mention of Leo attacking or killing people. But if he hadn’t done anything, why had the platoon of soldiers ambushed him? Knocked him out, locked him up and then ignored him for days? Why would the ninja only refer to Leo as “it”?
When Leo had talked to Miriam, he had thought about the fact that Miriam was a Sensitive. Miriam had spent most of the scene trying to escape Leo. It was implied that Miriam could sense his hidden nature.
“Are you some kind of monster?” was probably not a good opening question. Most of the other questions she could think of would reveal that she’d been writing scenes about him. Would he mind? He had recognized himself on her Post-it-Note wall, but she had the one notebook with his scenes. It was one thing to imagine her writing about him, but it would be another to read his own thoughts on paper. A little voice she used to call on her writer’s instinct told her that he would be upset by the invasion of privacy.
“I got you water.” Leo held out an unopened bottle that was bejeweled with condensation in the summer heat. “You need to be careful not to get dehydrated.”
“Thank you.” Whatever else he was that led to him being in the cage, he had still been a helpless child dying of thirst. No matter what he was now, he’d treated her with kindness.
16
The Tree of
Many Colors
Leo took her up and over the mountains to a little town called Izushi. She had researched it extensively, so she had a weird feeling of déjà vu as they came down off the mountains into the narrow streets. Izushi had been founded back in dawn of time—the town had been mentioned in Japanese literature as early as 27 B.C. Like much of Japan, it put all “historic” parts of California to shame. It had seen the rise and fall of several empires. Unlike Osaka, which had been mostly bombed to rubble and rebuilt, the small town looked like a medieval Japanese village with modern technology lightly sprinkled on it.
Leo threaded through the narrow streets, lined with the stone walls of ancient samurai houses, muttering darkly at the GPS system. The kitten stared at the moving arrow and occasionally lifted a paw to pat at the screen, changing the information.
After the third time, Leo pushed the kitten into her lap. “Keep him out of trouble.”
He reprogramed the GPS and in short order they were at a beautiful inn that looked hundreds of years old. They drove through the huge fortified gate to a parking lot.
“This is the onsen that the Brit—Simon checked into.” Nikki eyed the entrance she had studied via the website. It was a beautiful centuries-old inn. “This isn’t the place he’s being held. It’s a more modern place.”
“I know this is safe for you. I’ve been here twice already, questioning the staff.”
Scaring the staff silly, judging by looks of the yukata-clad woman who went scurrying away at the sight of Leo’s car.
The kitten scrambled out when Nikki opened the door. Leo called something after it as it went scampering away.
“What did you tell it?” Nikki thought of Leo in the cage and changed her person to. “Him.”
“To be careful of the cars.”
“Why do you use Japanese with him?”
Leo shrugged and looked vaguely guilty of some crime. “He’s a Japanese cat.”
He surprised her by lifting her Hello Kitty suitcase out of the trunk. He must have found it while she was unconscious. His own suitcase was a simple black, hard shell. While it probably held clothes, it looked like it could contain a number of pistols, too.
They were greeted at the door by an elegant kimono-clad hostess. The woman was beautiful, with creamy skin and glossy long black hair coiled into a bun. She greeted them with a graceful bow. Nikki was instantly aware that she hadn’t bathed since Inari’s shrine, that her hair was oily and lank, and she was wearing the same underclothes she’d been shot in.
One look at Nikki, and, despite Leo’s attempts to keep the discussion in fluid Japanese, the hostess insisted on speaking very broken English.
“Tsuma desu.” Leo waved a hand toward Nikki.
Nikki understood enough Japanese to translate: this is my wife. She stiffened as all the unhappy endings of her relationships collided with the word. The woman smiled gently at them, pleased with their fictional happiness.
The hostess led them to their room tucked in the back of the hotel. Apparently their room had been vacant because it was the most expensive suite in the place. Not only did it have a Japanese-style porch with wooden sandals already waiting, but also a private open-air hot spring bath carved into a rock grotto. She couldn’t imagine how expensive the room was. She had priced out stays at similar onsen-style hotels. A standard room with access only to communal baths often ran over two hundred dollars per person a night.
“Why did you tell her that?” Nikki whispered after the woman bowed and left.
“Tell her what?”
“That we’re married?”
He blanked his face. “I did not think you would understand what I was saying.”
“I know enough to understand that.”
“I see.”
He didn’t see. He couldn’t understand how much she had always wanted a normal life. To go to high school. Attend the prom. Go to college. Date. Marry. She had spent eighteen years dreaming of being free of her mother, only to have it all snatched away. She’d spent the last two years running and hiding like a wanted criminal. Miriam was the only friend that she would recognize face-to-face. Team Banzai was all women she had
met online through a shared interest in manga and fan-written fiction. The few guys she’d met since she turned eighteen had turned tail and run after they got to know her. If it wasn’t the hypergraphia or the graphic nature of what she wrote, it was all her hang-ups from growing up in mental hospitals. The only men she knew growing up were doctors or orderlies. One ordered that she be given drugs “for her own good” and the other stood over her, making sure she took them. Then there was the small issue of being tied to a bed while the woman in the next room was raped.
The likelihood of her ever getting married was slim to none.
“Don’t say we’re married,” she said. “Just don’t.”
“Okay, I won’t.” His phone started to ring. He took it out and stared at it.
“You’re not going to answer it?” she asked.
He took a deep breath and answered it. “What is it, Ananth?”
The caller apparently was one of those men that shouted at their phone. She could hear him clearly even from two feet away.
“You’re to check in every eight hours,” Ananth barked. “See that you do. Where are you?”
Leo closed his eyes and was silent for a minute before saying, “Izushi. I have a lead on Simon.”
“You’re to find Nikki Delany!” Ananth shouted.
Leo glanced at Nikki and then turned away. “This is the first lead I’ve had on my father for six weeks. It will only take me a few hours to check out.”
The voice on the other end sounded like whatever sympathy the man had for Leo been worn off weeks ago. “You’re going to have to come to terms with the fact that he’s most likely dead!”
“I’ll believe that when I see his body. I will look for him until I find him.”
“You’re utterly failing to prove that you can be trusted without Simon as your handler! Shiva cannot allow you to run amuck!”
Leo pressed his fingers to the bridge of his nose. “It’s late. I’m tired. I’ll return to Osaka tomorrow.”
There was a long silence on the other end, and then something murmured that Nikki didn’t catch.