Aiko didn't sleep. She lay in the massive bed, Mochi purring on her chest, and replayed the kiss over and over in her mind. It was a single, perfect memory in a sea of chaos. It was a mistake. It was the only thing that felt real.
The next morning, the apartment was so quiet it felt like it was holding its breath. When Aiko finally gathered the courage to leave the bedroom, she found Kaito already awake, dressed, and standing by the window. He was a statue carved from shadow and tension. He didn't turn when she entered. He didn't say good morning.
The kiss was a wall between them, more solid and intimidating than any door.
She made tea, the simple ritual a small comfort. She placed a mug on the small table near where he stood. He gave a short, clipped nod of thanks but didn't move. Aiko drank her own tea at the kitchen counter, the fifteen feet of polished floor between them feeling like a mile-wide canyon.
This was worse than the silence before. Before, they were strangers. Now, they were strangers who had shared something impossibly intimate, and neither of them knew what to do with it.
Aiko knew she couldn't live like this, walking on eggshells around the unspoken thing in the air. Someone had to break the silence. And clearly, it wouldn't be him.
She put her mug down with a soft click and walked over to him. She stood beside him, also looking out the window, her shoulder almost brushing his arm.
"Are we going to pretend it didn't happen?" she asked, her voice quiet but firm.
Kaito remained silent for a long moment, his jaw tight. "It was a mistake," he finally said, his voice low and rough. "A lapse in judgment brought on by a high-stress situation. It will not happen again."
His words were like a slap. A cold, clinical dismissal of a moment that had felt like anything but a mistake. Aiko felt a flash of anger.
"A mistake?" she repeated, turning to face him. "Is that all it was to you?"
"It is all it can be," he replied, finally turning to look at her. His dark eyes were guarded, his face an unreadable mask, but Aiko could see the conflict raging behind it. "Look at this situation, Aiko. Look at me. I am the head of the Ishikawa-gumi. My life is violence, duty, and death. You are a civilian I have endangered and am now responsible for. There is no 'us.' There is only this. A tactical arrangement for your survival."
"So you feel nothing?" she challenged, her heart aching. "That kiss was just... tactics?"
He flinched, a barely perceptible tightening around his eyes. He opened his mouth to reply, but he was interrupted by the sharp, sudden chime of the secure phone he'd given her. It was the first time it had ever rung.
They both froze, staring at the phone on the counter. The sound was an unwelcome intrusion, a harsh reminder of the world outside their bubble of tension.
Kaito crossed the room and answered it, his back to her. "What is it?"
He listened, his body growing rigid. "Where?" he asked, his voice sharp. He listened again. "No. Stay put. Do not engage. I'm coming myself."
He hung up and turned to Aiko, his face grim. The brief, intense personal conflict was gone, replaced by the cold focus of the clan leader.
"What is it? What happened?" she asked, her own problems forgotten in the face of the sudden alarm.
"It's Kenji," Kaito said, already grabbing his suit jacket and checking the gun from the drawer, his movements economical and deadly. "His car was ambushed on his way here. He's pinned down."
Aiko's blood ran cold. Kenji. The silent, loyal man who brought them food.
"They're getting bold," Kaito said, his voice a low growl. "They're no longer just watching. They're hunting my men. They're trying to isolate us. To cut us off." He strode to the door, a dark storm of controlled fury.
"You can't go alone!" Aiko cried out, her fear for him overriding everything else. "It's a trap!"
"I know," he said, pausing with his hand on the door. He looked back at her, and in that one look, she saw everything he had just tried to deny. The worry. The regret. The fierce, protective fire that had led him to kiss her in the first place.
"Lock the door behind me," he ordered. "Do not open it for anyone but me. Do you understand?"
She nodded, her throat too tight to speak.
"Aiko," he said, his voice softer now. "That kiss... it was a mistake. Because it makes leaving you here, even for an hour, the hardest thing I've ever had to do."
And with that, he was gone. The door clicked shut, leaving Aiko alone once more, the echo of his confession a more dangerous and beautiful thing than any kiss.