The sun was orange now, and pinned to the sky by a cluster of skyscrapers that were trying to smother it. Yohji shrugged. “What can I say? I’m a lazy guy.” It earned him a brief smile that was rapidly restrained. Yohji sighed internally. He was trying his best, he’d have you know. The guy just seemed determined to hate him. Strange American.
Actually... “What bit of
“None of your business.”
Another brick wall.
“We’re not getting anywhere,” Crawford grumbled.
Too right. Yohji rolled his eyes. “And I thought I was lazy. Patience, comrade. The only times this is a fast business are the times you realise you were insane for taking it up.”
“Slow and steady wins the race, and all that shit?”
“Doesn’t make a blind bit of difference,” Yohji shook his head. “It’s just a slow business. You walk, you talk, you flash cash and you keep your eyes a bit more open than you seem to be.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Crawford asked petulantly.
Yohji jerked his head at the opposite side of the road. A small pink moped with a large flower painted on it was propped against the pavement. Both men stopped and stared at it. They got a few odd looks, two men standing too close by the side of the road, frowning at a florist’s delivery cart.
The man that came out of the building wasn’t the one they were looking for. He saw them staring at the moped and shot them a strange look. Stocky, but in an athletic way, Yohji felt certain he’d seen him somewhere before. A photo, maybe. He was giving the moped a despairing look and got on it reluctantly. And then he was gone.
“Fuck,” Yohji shook himself. “Didn’t make the most of that.”
“It was a stroke of luck,” Crawford acknowledged.
Yohji glanced at him. “Private Eye’s don’t do luck,” he laughed. “It’s always a result of superior skill and planning.”
“Of course,” Crawford said condescendingly. To his annoyance Yohji laughed.
“Come on. Let’s go find out where that toy comes from,” he grabbed Crawford’s arm and pulled him across the road. Crawford shook him off irritably, frowning at the creases in his suit. Yohji grabbed at him again and continued to tug him along. Crawford looked down at the slender tanned hand clutching his with a look of mild confusion. To his utmost horror his palm started sweating and he yanked his hand away. The PI didn’t even seem to notice.
It was a small hall, the type
reserved for weddings and birthdays and pre-teen discos. A wedding today,
Yohji divined, and a western one. Foreigners who though
Crawford gaped as Yohji stumbled to a stop just inside the hall, produced a bottle from an inside coat pocket and proceeded to take a large swig from it.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Crawford forced himself to keep his voice to a furious hiss.
Yohji looked at him blankly. “Come on. This looks like a rehearsal, which is a good thing. Let’s find a bridesmaid. They deal with the decorations side of things. That or somebody’s mother.”
“What are you drinking?” Crawford tried again.
Yohji ignored him. Switching on a charming grin he sauntered over to a girl in a short dress, smoking and tapping the ash into a vase. She gave him an appraising look.
“Haven’t seen you here before,” she murmured sultrily. “Don’t tell me this affair might even border on interesting.”
“You look like you’d be an interesting affair yourself,” Yohji purred.
“Kudoh,” Crawford loomed over his shoulder.
“I’m looking for the name of the company that supplied these gorgeous flowers,” Yohji traced a long finger along her jawline, eyes on her only. His other hand darted out and suddenly a cattelya was tickling the underside of her nose.
“Kitten in the house,” she told him, eyes wide.
“You stroked my back, I’ll stroke yours,” Yohji leant in further.
“Thank you for your time,” Crawford leant over Yohji’s shoulder and pulled him firmly away. Yohji grinned and winked at her, digging into that inside pocket again (Crawford heard the bottle clink, though what against he didn’t want to know) to produce a crisp white card.
“Call me,” Yohji grinned.
“You’re not a guest?” her eyes widened.
“The only wedding you’ll ever see me at is ours, sweetheart,” Yohji cocked his hat and turned away.
As they made their way back onto the street Yohji gave Crawford a knowing look. “And that’s how a professional does it.”
“Professional what?” Crawford asked, clearly not impressed. “We know the name of the shop. We don’t know if the boy works there, we don’t even know if it’s the right boy, and thanks to your questioning ‘technique’ we don’t even know where it is.”
Yohji glanced down at the flower still between his fingers. “I’d say we’d be able to find it in a phone book,” he mused. “After all, they do deliveries.”
“Why should that make them any more likely to be in the directory?” Crawford demanded.
“If you wanted to bulk order flowers, would you rather call over the phone or go and pick them out individually?” Yohji asked dryly. “Knowing you, I’m sure it’s individually, but for those of us willing to let things slide just a little...”
“You seem to have let things slide a lot,” Crawford said coldly. “Drinking on the job?”
“Drinking, but not drunk,” Yohji said calmly. The blunt admission stunned Crawford for a moment, and Yohji noticed this. “Maybe where you come from people don’t talk about it, and just pop pills and swig champagne and pretend nothing’s wrong until they end up in one of the fashionable rehabs, but in the world I come from life is life. I need to drink sometimes. It’s not as though I can afford to live any other way.”
Crawford looked at him. “I suppose I ought to appreciate your honesty,” he said, “but my opinion of you, having started at rock bottom, recently bought some mining equipment.”
“You have a way with words,” Yohji said shortly.
“There’s a phone booth over there. We can call directory enquires, or the operator, or something,” Crawford said roughly.
Yohji stepped into the booth and closed the door in Crawford’s face. He stared at the scratched Perspex in dismay. Someone had inscribed “HK and FS forever” at eye level. He stared at it for a moment before realising he must look a little strange, nose to booth, and stepped back hurriedly.
Yohji’s phone voice wasn’t very different from his getting information from hot women voice, though Crawford supposed that he didn’t usually have much reason to differentiate. He draped one arm around the coin receiver like an old friend and laughed with the person on the end of the line. There was a moment when Crawford wanted to be the one being spoken to like that by a complete stranger.
When Yohji emerged from the booth, face glowing with triumph, Crawford slipped past him and closed the door in his face before he could announce his success. Card in the slit and fingers dialling a number he’d learnt by heart the day he heard it.
“Mr Takatori?”
“Crawford?”
“Hirofumi.”
“Has something gone wrong?”
“No,” Crawford sighed.
“Why are you calling?”
Crawford tried to picture Hirofumi draped around the phone, smiling at the receiver. The image frightened him. He glanced out of the booth to see Yohji chatting to a pair of schoolgirls who were also queuing for the phone. Weren’t they all supposed to have cell phones these days?
Hang on a second, didn’t he have a cell phone?
“I wanted to forewarn you that this might all be over by the end of today,” Crawford forced himself to say. “Also, Kudoh’s suspicion has been aroused by your reluctance to say where you took the photograph. He’s going to investigate.”
“Dissuade him,” Hirofumi said brusquely. “Don’t call me again unless you have my brother on the line, understand?”
“Yes sir.” Crawford stared at the buzzing receiver. Yohji pushed the door open and stepped back. With a sigh Crawford hung up and took his card. As he walked out Yohji casually let his arm move from the door to Crawford’s shoulder. Crawford stiffened slightly.
“Hirofumi’s keeping tabs on me?” Yohji asked.
Well, it made more sense than any reason Crawford could think of. “Sure.” He shook his head. “So, are we off to buy some flowers?”
“Red or white roses?” Yohji grinned. It was brittle. His arm slipped down Crawford’s back and buried itself in a pocket. Crawford watched as the bottle came back out in the middle of the street. He didn’t object. It looked almost reasonable right now.
“Black,” Crawford said.
“Oh, symbolic,” Yohji laughed tiredly. “It’s a long walk or a short drive, take your pick.”
“Walk,” Crawford said. “Know how to get there?”
“Yeah, the kid on the end of the line glowed the instructions at me.” Crawford gave him an odd look. Yohji grimaced. “You know what I mean. Very enthusiastic. Might even be the kid we’re looking for.”
“We really could have this wrapped up by this evening,” Crawford mused aloud. “What a pity, I won’t get to meet your sleazy friends.”
Yohji almost stopped walking. “I have no friends,” he said bluntly, and went from almost stopped to almost running.
* * *
Crawford stared through the window in horror.
“Yes, flowers deserve that kind of disgust and terror. They are fearsome things,” Yohji said.
“The redhead.” And then, “the kid!”
“Expand,” Yohji said, pulling him to a nearby park bench, out of sight of the shop.
“I was with Mr Takatori, Reiji, at a certain club, when we were attacked. Terrorists who go by the name of Weiss. The redhead through a katana at our helicopter, screaming ‘Die, Takatori’. Not a face I’m going to forget.” Crawford’s mind clicked in gear. “Perfect. We know where they live. This is perfect.”
Yohji looked a little disturbed. “You can stay here. Not killing people. I’ll go and establish if the boy we want is in there.”
“I suspect he may be involved with Weiss as well,” Crawford said. “This won’t be over tonight.”
Yohji looked him over for a moment. “Do you really kill people?” he asked quietly.
“I’m a bodyguard,” Crawford said. “I have to do everything I can to ensure the safety of my charge. Sometimes that means taking a proactive stance.”
Yohji mulled this over. “Yeah, proactive. I’ve done that.”
“Going to talk to our boy?” Crawford asked. “I’m going to move to a position where I can keep an eye on you.”
“What, in case I grab him and run off? Hold him to ransom?” Yohji grinned. He reached into his pocket and drew out the bottle. Expensive stuff, Crawford noted. “Keep an eye on this for me,” Yohji told him. “You look like you need something to guard.”
“You want me to sit on a bench with a bottle of,” Crawford looked at the label, “whiskey? I refuse to.”
“When I said you looked like you need something to guard? I lied. You look like you need something to drink,” Yohji told him. He left Crawford staring at the bottle and disappeared around the corner. Crawford moved cautiously to a bench across the road, and settled down to watch.
“Good afternoon!” a chirpy voice met Yohji. The flowershop was bustling with school girls out of uniform, a redhead glowering at them from a corner and the brunette he’d seen earlier serving three at once.
Yohji switched on the smile. “You must be Omi!” he sauntered across the shop, all hips and legs. The fangirls were momentarily distracted. “Thank you for the directions.” He tipped his hat.
“You’re welcome,” the boy beamed.
“Has anyone ever told you that you have a wonderful phone voice? I could have talked to you all day,” Yohji purred.
Omi blushed. “Is there anything in particular you’re looking for?”
“Something pretty for someone special,” Yohji told him. “You’re making this hard for me though.”
“If you tell me a little more about the special person?” Omi smiled.
Yohji gestured vaguely. If he wasn’t careful he was going to end up describing Asuka. “Well, if it were you, what would make you feel as special as we both know you are?” he leant against a shelf and ran a hand down Omi’s sleeve.
“Oh, ah...” Omi glanced around the room. Yohji looked up and saw the brunette fuming. Ohhh. “I have some arrangements that might please you,” Omi gestured to the back of the shop.
“Wonderful,” Yohji said warmly. He followed Omi through the simpering girls. “How old are you?” he asked.
“Seventeen,” Omi said cautiously.
“What do your parents think of you working here? You seem to attract a lot of female attention,” Yohji grinned cheekily. He tugged on the brim of his hat and rearranged it slightly.
“Oh,” Omi looked trapped. “I’m an orphan,” he said softly.
Yohji’s grin disappeared. “I’m sorry,” he said sincerely. His hand froze on the hat, arm half hiding his face.
Omi stared at the flowers he was holding. “I don’t remember it,” he said. “I guess it must have been quite traumatic, to give me amnesia, but it’s not really as sad as it sounds you know. I don’t have anyone to miss.”
Yohji let go of his hat and reached out to brush wispy hair from huge blue eyes. “I bet they miss you, wherever they are. Anyone would.”
Omi held up the flowers. “Shall I wrap these for you?”
“No, thanks,” Yohji sighed.
As Omi rung up the totals on the till Yohji watched him sympathetically. “Do you support yourself?”
“Yeah, pretty much,” Omi smiled. “The three of us run this place pretty well. You’d be surprised what we make.”
“With this many customers I’m not sure I would be,” Yohji grinned.
“So what do you do for a living?” Omi asked innocently.
“I’ll tell you when you’re older,” Yohji leant down and murmured in his ear.
“Buy something else or get out,” a voice said from behind him.
“I was just giving him his change, Aya,” Omi said earnestly.
Yohji turned to meet cold lilac eyes. “On the other hand, with that kind of attitude I’m surprised you’ve got customers at all,” he muttered under his breath. He tilted his head to one side, rearranged his hat and gave Aya a critical look. “Though perhaps not.” He turned back to Omi. “Is hiring gorgeous guys a marketing ploy?”
One of the schoolgirls overheard him. “Oh, it definitely works,” she enthused.
Her friend chipped in, “they should hire you!” She giggled loud enough to make those surrounding her flinch.
Yohji smiled at them and winked at one of the other girls’ who attention he had drawn. “I’m flattered,” he purred. If any one of them had been over eighteen they’d have walked out of there with flowers and a date, but to Yohji’s dismay they were all still very much girls.
He left then, swinging the bunch of flowers casually, exchanging winks and nods and waves and eye-contact with most of the customers and very much with Omi, just to watch the two other men in the shop fume for very different reasons. Somebody else was fuming as well. Yohji smirked at Crawford and collapsed bonelessly next to him on the bench.
“Flowers for the lady?” Yohji joked. Crawford’s glasses dazzled him with reflected light, but despite that Yohji knew his joke hadn’t gone down well. Which was why he was deeply shocked when Crawford gently relieved him of the bouquet, and sat calmly with it in his lap.
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