In the House of Lies

A/N: It hasbeen a long time, hasn’t it? My apologies. When editing this chapter…I had to rewrite it about three times. Nothing seemed right, and things were moving way too fast. So, you get the toned-down version, which I believe will ultimately better serve the plot of the story. Thank you to those who have chosen to review. And a special thank you to DemonLadySesshomaru, who hit the nail right on the head. I am a tease. Proud of it, thank you! And if you can, please hold out for a teeny bit longer for them to have “fun”…

Chapter 3: Contract

“Madame,” Tatsumi said gently, “it is time for your medicine.” The woman lying on the futon raised her head, dark circles beneath her eyes marking her illness. Her eyes fell onto him, strangely vacant. Shakily, the ailing woman raised herself from her futon, making not a sound. After a short moment, her arm could not support her weight, so Tatsumi looped an arm under her, holding her up as the other hand held the small bowl to her mouth.

When she finished drinking the contents of the bowl, he set her down again. “The doctor will come to see you later,” he said, rising from where he had knelt near her head. Bowing deeply, Tatsumi said his farewell for the time being, and backed respectfully from the room, closing the door behind him. A short walk up the corridor took him to the stairs that led upward to the rest of the house. It was strange, he thought, that Hisoka’s mother was kept in the same room he had been as a child.

But then, he wondered. What kind of family treated the heir (or any child) with such callousness? His own family had been poor, of little significance to the rest of the world, but his mother would never have tossed him away like Hisoka had been. He was lost in his thoughts—a state that he found himself lapsing into more and more of late—when he reached the head of the stairs. This was why he did not notice the little ball of brown flying at his face until it ran right into his forehead.

Luckily, 003 was not very heavy. Otherwise, he would have taken a tumble back down the flight of stairs he’d just mounted. The little owl dropped dazedly into his hands, making a soft sound that resembled a groan. Blinking down at his small, feathery burden, Tatsumi made a face. Watari was going to blow their cover if he let his pet go flying around the house. “What are you doing here, little one?” Almost as soon as the question was asked, the owl jumped up, hopping in his hand and hooting excitedly. “What are you on about?”

But it was not as though 003 could answer him, so he proceeded to the room he shared with Watari. When he got there, Watari was punching buttons on his computer, his brows drawn down, and teeth worrying at his bottom lip. “You called, Watari?” Tatsumi asked as he entered, making sure that the door slid shut behind him. Piercing golden eyes looked over the tops of perfectly round glasses, and a lopsided smile formed on the scientist’s lips.

“Ah, there you are.” Watari’s voice said in a teasing tone, causing Tatsumi to snap at him.

“I was precisely where I was told to be, Watari-sensei. There was no need to send your minion to find me.” He let the little bird hop off of his hand and onto Watari’s shoulder, where he immediately burrowed into the crook of the man’s neck, nearly disappearing in waves of gold.

A bubbling laugh echoed throughout the room as 003’s feathers tickled at the skin of Watari’s neck, and the scientist had to pull the owl away from him so that he could speak. Eyes still dancing from his laughter, Watari said, “I believe, Mr. Secretary, that I might know where to look for information regarding this demon.” As they had discussed, it became glaringly obvious that it was not a god, but a demon they were dealing with.

Tatsumi seated himself on the other side of the computers from the golden-eyed scientist (what he hoped was a safe distance) and removed his glasses, taking out his handkerchief to clean them, before replacing them carefully. “I have already searched Kurosaki-san’s private chambers. There was nothing evident.”

Watari leaned over one of the monitors, and Tatsumi heard a button from his lab coat click against the plastic casing. “But you forget, my dear secretary,” muscles in the dark-haired man’s back tensed as the feeling of Watari’s close proximity sent strange shivers up his spine that needed repressing, “that Kurosaki Ren was not the one who struck the bargain with the demon.”

“Watari,” Tatsumi’s voice came out tight, strained.

“Hm?” came the happily inquisitive sound, just before the man barely grazed his lips over the corner of Tatsumi’s frowning mouth. His heart was beating faster…and his fingers itched to touch, but they had to get down to business.

He shoved thoughts of the kind of business his body would prefer doing quite well away and grunted, “Work.”

He heard Watari make a whining sound. Faster than he could blink, however, the complaint was gone from the voice that spoke against his mouth, in favor of a low, breathy tone that drew over his skin like silk, seducing his senses and drawing him in…not quite against his will. “But I can’t send you to go investigating at night,” a warm, slender finger dragged over Tatsumi’s neck, down to where the first button of his shirt was fastened, barely peeking up over his dark tie, “it might look suspicious.” His last word was punctuated with a teasing lick at Tatsumi’s lips, which sent a hot jolt through the secretary. Apparently, there was no such thing as a safe distance from Watari Yutaka. Nimble fingers toyed with the button, as if they were only teasing, but even this was something that Tatsumi could not stand.

“Stop it, Watari.” Tatsumi’s voice was flat, not showing the torment that his mind was going through from simply not giving in to the evil little voice in the back of his head that told him it wouldn’t be so bad to take a break. That voice was becoming difficult to ignore. Before, when he had only thought of his co-worker as an annoyance, a drain on the departmental budget, he could have simply gotten up and walked away. But something about Watari had burrowed under his skin, and there was nothing that was going to get him out again, short of—well, he wasn’t thinking about that, was he? He knew he sounded cold, but he couldn’t do this. “We have work to do, and there isn’t time for your games.”

The younger shinigami’s face faltered and he looked away, settling himself once again behind the computer screen. He looked crestfallen as his eyes focused on whatever data was being compiled, and that expression sent a stab of guilt into Tatsumi’s stomach. This feeling only worsened when Watari said, “I guess I’ll just go ahead and analyze the blood sample I got from the lady…”

Resisting the urge to sigh, Tatsumi got up from the floor and walked around the computers, behind the other man, who was pretending to concentrate, and beginning to pointedly ignore him. His fingers reached out, barely touching the top of Watari’s head, and he felt tension stiffen the seated shinigami. “I…it is…difficult for me to let anyone close enough for the kind of intimacy you’re asking for, Watari.” Tatsumi lowered himself to his knees, trailing his fingers over wild falls of beautiful golden hair before digging them in, unable to resist. Watari’s breath caught, and Tatsumi gave in, if only a little. He closed his eyes, and rested his cheek on the back of Watari’s head, inhaling a scent somewhere between lemons and oranges. “Have patience,” he said quietly, “please?”

“Okay,” Watari whispered back, “but can you…can you hold me, Tatsumi? Just for a few minutes…and then we go back to work?” Without being able to see his face, it was impossible to tell if Watari was serious, or if it was simply another ploy to goad him into a position that might be more than Tatsumi could handle at the moment. But after a second, when he sat and put his arms around lab-coat-covered shoulders, he merely felt Watari relax, leaning back against his chest. One gloved hand skimmed fingertips over Tatsumi’s bare forearm, and he smiled into Watari’s hair. “This feels…nice.”

Making an affirmative sound, Tatsumi agreed. It had been years since he was so physically close to someone for an extended period, and even longer since it was due to a mutual…what? Whatever it was he felt, this thing between them…there was no way to easily define it. Explaining it away as stress no longer worked. As Tatsumi rested his chin on Watari’s shoulder, trying desperately to cling to the strange sense of peace he felt, he was amazed to discover that he did not wish to define it.

To give it a name would be too easy. Labeling it as lust—which he could say honestly was only a part of it and had nothing to do with what he felt at the moment—would have cheapened the feeling this embrace gave him. Unsure what to call the strange bond that seemed to be forming between them, and not wanting to figure it out, Tatsumi did something he never had before. For the first time in his existence, Tatsumi Seiichirou stopped thinking.

“Tatsumi,” Watari said quietly, nudging him gently from his thoughts, “thank you.”

“Mm.” He didn’t really understand what was going on, but he found himself not wanting to let go of the younger man. Watari’s face nuzzled against his neck, and Tatsumi suddenly had the urge to lie down. How would it be, he wondered, to wake up this way? To open his eyes in the morning to see sunlight glinting off of mounds of golden hair, to feel his arms around something other than his pillow? It was something he would like to experiment with.

--

“It is done.”

A wizened face pulled into a smile at the low, feminine voice that came from the doorway. Dark eyes that nearly hid behind a maze of wrinkles watched her shadowy reflection in the glass of the window. She stood as she always did, hands folded demurely, deceptively submissive. His own voice came, wheezing with age and shaking with relief, “And does he suspect?”

“No.”

“Good.” Gnarled fingers scratched at his long, white beard, their liver-spotted flesh stretching over aching joints. He made a slight face at the mild discomfort. “Make sure you keep it that way.”

“Yes, grandfather.” There was a shuffling sound as she began backing out of the room.

“And Miya?”

There was a short pause, and he knew she was studying him. The girl always did this, since she was small. Her eyes were too keen. “Yes, grandfather?”

“Don’t wear yourself out too much. You’ll need all the energy you have when you are with child.” He heard a small, girlish giggle before her voice returned to normal to answer him. It was a strange thing, to think that his granddaughter could produce such a sound, when he knew that she was far from the vacant, flighty child she pretended to be.

“I will try, grandfather. But Kurosaki-san is still rather young and…vigorous.”

If he had not planned the entire thing, the old man would have scolded his granddaughter for being a harlot. Though, there was no telling what depraved sexual practices that man had in mind for her, so he supposed it was a good thing that she enjoyed it as much as she seemed to. With a light cough, he replied, “Well…be that as it may, I forbid you to let him injure you.”

“Yes, grandfather.” Miya then left the room, to return to Kamakura, and to Kurosaki Nagare.

--

Watari lay awake, staring up at the ceiling. The silvery moonlight cast shadows around the room, painting the stark setting in high relief. Nearby, he heard Tatsumi’s even breathing, letting him know that the man was asleep. Since earlier in the evening, he had been deep in thought, and nearly unable to think of anything but the man that slept no more than a meter away. Tatsumi had proved to be very different from the way he had first perceived.

Far from being a heartless suit with a cash register for a brain, Tatsumi Seiichirou was a strangely sensitive—albeit overly cerebral—individual that had a massive store of repressed passion hiding beneath that cool exterior. How else did one explain the way he had kissed Watari into a state of senselessness? True, he might have pushed the man a bit too far earlier, but he had just wanted…more. Chuckling silently at himself, he wondered how he had managed to so grossly misjudge Tatsumi.

He never saw the Shokan Bureau’s secretary outside of work, so he had no idea how the man behaved when he was in social situations. In fact, Watari had thought that Tatsumi must wear his suit to bed. All preconceived notions about the blue-eyed man had been shattered, one by one, on this assignment. For one thing, his tongue did not stick to Tatsumi like when he was a boy and tried to lick a flagpole. And for another, the man wore pale blue pajamas to bed.

Watari would not pretend that this new image of Tatsumi—however improved—was perfect. They both had their share of flaws. But it was encouraging that in spite of his fear of closeness; Tatsumi was trying to make allowances for Watari’s exuberant and tactile personality. The ‘few minutes’ he had asked for had turned into hours. While he would have much preferred finding more active ways to be close to the warm body that held him, he did recognize the boundary Tatsumi was unwilling to cross. So they had remained the way they were, with Tatsumi practically wrapped around him, and Watari relishing the warmth and strength the other man provided.

It was odd, the way opposites—even polar opposites, like he and Tatsumi—seemed to attract. Strange attractors, I believe is the term. Though the time they spent holding each other was almost painfully tender, Watari anticipated that within the next few days, another violent burst of attraction would occur. The two of them were far too different for things to transpire in any other way. Just like when he was thrown to the floor. It took a mountain of tension and a lot of pushing to make that happen.

Perhaps the man had a problem with trust. For some people, trust and intimacy were easy. A hug was given freely, and sex just as easily, because those people craved human contact of any kind. But for those like Tatsumi, every touch gave away a little piece of their soul. It was difficult to put that kind of trust in just anyone.

He turned onto his side, watching the moonlight as it moved over Tatsumi’s face. Dark hair had fallen over his forehead, and Watari reached out to smooth it away. Without his glasses, everything he saw was slightly fuzzy, effectively smoothing the sharp angles of Tatsumi’s face, and somehow making him even more beautiful. It was a dark, solemn kind of beauty, and he was sure that the man used it to keep people away. He had pushed Tsuzuki away, long ago, and had nearly succeeded in doing the same with Watari. But unlike Tsuzuki, Watari had a stubborn streak that involved every aspect of life, not just where the safety of others was concerned.

--

Dawn broke warm at Kamakura, and Tatsumi took a deep breath when he woke before opening his eyes. That orange-lemon smell drifted on the air, and at first he thought that Watari might have moved to sleep nearer to him. But just when he nearly gave in to such a thought, he realized that the shower was running. Tatsumi pushed himself into a seated position, and looked around. Watari’s futon was rumpled, as usual, and his pajamas had been wadded up and thrown onto the center of the blanket. His mouth twisted in a wry smile. Even if he was a brilliant man, Watari still needed a course in etiquette, it seemed.

A glance at the bathroom made one slender, dark eyebrow rise. The door was open. Now, Tatsumi left a crack in the thing when he showered, so that the steam could escape, but…he had always been out of the room by the time Watari woke up (with a few exceptions), and had no idea that the other man simply let the bathroom open onto the rest of the room. Reaching over to where he had his glasses, his hand gripped silvery metal and pulled it onto his face. There was a blurred pink shape behind the fogged shower glass, and Tatsumi watched it move, a sinuous and fluid series of motions. Watari was washing his hair. Little wonder that the smell of shampoo was the first thing that he smelled when he woke up…

“Ah…” he heard, the man in the shower groaning in a pleased way as he obviously rinsed lather from his body. Tatsumi’s cheeks took on a faint pink stain as he listened to the shower sounds take on a different tone. A wet slapping noise, like skin on tile sounded loud in his ears, and the blush on his face intensified when it was followed by a shallow gasp. What was he doing in there? Well, Tatsumi was a smart man, and he actually knew very well what Watari was doing in the shower, but who does that with the bathroom door wide open? Blood began pooling in a very inconvenient place, and he whimpered.

Tatsumi didn’t know if he wanted to just walk over and close the door, lie back down and pretend to sleep, or plug his ears and curl into a fetal position. Because…right now, what he really wanted to do was to—

“Unnn…” The sound of Watari’s pleasured groan echoed off of the tiles in the bathroom, and bounced out into the sleeping area, causing Tatsumi’s mind to lock up, and his body to jerk. Mortified at the compounding of his usual morning problem, Tatsumi gripped the blanket that had pooled in his lap. Watari was still… “Oh, God…” He swallowed ineffectually at a lump that had suddenly appeared in his throat, trying to clear it so that his somewhat labored breaths could get out more easily. The knowledge of what the blonde man was doing, and the sounds he made were enough to cause a short-circuit in Tatsumi’s brain. And just when he thought that there was no spare blood left in him to allow him to blush, Tatsumi’s ears caught the final strangled whisper as the man in the shower reached his climax. “…Oh, yes…” These words were followed by a barely audible breathing of his own name, and the secretary simply stared at the blurry shape as it stood so still that Tatsumi wondered if Watari had injured himself.

How long he stared, he did not know. But when the door to the shower finally opened, letting Watari out into the relative chill of the rest of the world, Tatsumi still couldn’t look away. The door closed again, and he saw the white towel first. Then, there was a large amount of skin, flushed pink from hot water—not to mention exertion, but Tatsumi was pointedly not thinking about that—and a tangled mass of wet blonde hair that hung down to the man’s waist.

Watari walked into the sleeping area, and froze as he saw Tatsumi sitting up. The smile that pulled at the full lips on the scientist’s lovely face was rather sheepish. “Um…good morning, Tatsumi…how long have you been up?” Tatsumi was astonished. He had not thought that anything could possibly embarrass Watari. His face must have shown all of his shock, because one of those lips was now being worried at by perfect white teeth, the image doing nothing for Tatsumi’s equilibrium.

Taking a very deep breath, he wrenched his eyes away from a large droplet of water that had begun sliding down Watari’s chest, fixing his eyes on the man’s face instead. He was unsure what to say. What did one say when one overhears someone pleasure himself, and hearing one’s own name being called at the time of climax? He didn’t know. This was entirely unfamiliar territory, and Tatsumi could honestly not see a path that did not lead to an even more awkward situation.

The moment stretched out, the tense, uncomfortable feeling growing larger until he felt like he was going to crack. Watari was still just standing there in his towel, his hair dripping water on the floor and shifting his weight slightly from one foot to the other. Finally, after nearly two full minutes of this torture, Tatsumi had had enough. He stood, without really knowing what he was going to do, and moved toward his dripping-wet partner. Watari’s eyes widened when he drew near, and he opened his mouth to say something, though nothing came out.

--

Watari thought that his heart might have stopped. There was no way that if Tatsumi had been awake, he didn’t hear…and from the look of complete stupefaction that had been plastered all over his face, the secretary heard all of it. The question remained simple, however: what would he do about it? He thought that he’d find out soon, since that shocked expression was gone, leaving Tatsumi’s face carefully blank, and he was closing the distance between them quite quickly.

The tall man came to a stop only when the front of his pajamas began to soak in the water that still clung to Watari’s chest. His mind was reeling, trying to calculate the possible strategies that might exempt him from a physical beating. But then, when he felt warm breath on his cheek, he was uncertain that a beating was what Tatsumi wanted to give him. A small sigh gusted over his ear, and he felt fingers drawing up his arms, very lightly, but still enough to cause him to shiver. “Yutaka,” the use of his given name gave him a jolt, but not so much as the tone in which it was said. Tatsumi’s voice was thicker, deeper, and somehow, rough. Lips grazed his ear, and Watari leaned into him, letting out the breath he had been holding. The fingers that had been traveling up his arms now reached his shoulders, and slid up, cupping his face. Then he felt Tatsumi’s lips touch his, almost too lightly, before a sensation unlike anything he had ever experienced came over him. It was a gentle pressure, the feeling of the other man’s mouth, but Watari still felt like his entire self was being invaded.

His body went weak, as if his legs would not support him. Somehow, he managed to grasp a handful of pajama shirt, which kept him from falling. Watari was unsure what to feel when Tatsumi’s mouth left his. So intimate a feeling was more than welcome, but it had not been enough. That seemed to be the way of things with Tatsumi. No matter the duration or intensity of the encounter, Watari was always left wanting more. He felt his body begin to tremble when he heard the man say in his ear, “Call me Seiichirou,” before it was all…gone.

Tatsumi had pulled back, and all that lovely body heat was missing, along with the strength that had kept his legs under him. Watari fell to the floor, his bottom bouncing slightly when it hit the tatami. He felt dazed, unable to focus on anything. “Are you all right?” Tatsumi was kneeling at his side now, watching him anxiously. Watari blinked, trying to clear his thoughts, and will his body to move so that he could get dressed. No such thing happened.

Instead, his hands had developed a mind of their own, reaching out to grip the lapels of Tatsumi’s pajama shirt and pull him closer again. A startled—though not unpleased—sound came from Tatsumi when Watari kissed him. The gentleness had gone now, the scientist pressing his mouth against the other man’s lips and opening, nipping and all but begging to be let in. Why did he have to feel so addicted to this? Couldn’t it have been someone—anyone—else? But as those thin lips opened, he stopped thinking about that. He explored every surface he could, listening to the small gasps and moans they both made, a kind of bodily concerto that he could only will to continue. Watari knew at that moment that he was hooked. Addicted, captivated, obsessed. It was no longer a question of want. He needed this.

When the taller man finally disentangled himself from Watari, gently pulling his hands from where they gripped his shirt, the blonde man whined, almost crying. Why did he have to have a fear of intimacy? Why, when it was so painfully obvious that they both needed each other in so many ways? Tatsumi smiled then, and pulled him close, cradling Watari against his chest. “Patience,” he whispered, and though it might have been his own imagination, Watari heard a note of desperation there.

Trying not to sound like a petulant child, he replied, “I’m trying,” which really, was all he could do.

--

A/N: So now you see my problem. It really was moving quite fast, and the third actual chapter is far too early for them to have that much fun. Next chapter…I think I might be able to allow them a bit more. But not before there is a large plot bomb dropped. Review…please?