Part 1. Part 2. Part 3. Part 4. Part 5. Part 6. Part 7. Part 8. Part 9. Part 10. Part 11. Part 12. Part 13. Part 14.
"Care to explain." Eisuke said, placing his finger to his temple once his elbow rested on the arm of the chair, Rose hid behind Mamoru again.
She felt herself shrink but she saw Mamoru's shoulders square and his posture straighten from her position behind him.
"Took the kid out for a distraction." He offered for an explanation.
Silence followed and it felt like it went on for hours but was possibly only 10 seconds in reality. Rose was pretty sure he wasn't asking Mamoru to answer that question anyway.
"Come here." Bellowed around the silent, tall ceilings of the penthouse and Rose flinched knowing it was directed at her. Automatically, she stepped round Mamoru but he put an arm out to stop her from going further.
"She did nothin' wrong, it was my idea." Rose could hear her heartbeat as she looked up to Mamoru lying for her. His expression was certain, like he'd made up his mind to put his life on the line right this second.
"Irrelevant." Eisuke shut down but Mamoru's arm remained in position.
"Jesus fuck," he said under his breath. "give 'er a break." He practically shouted, so done with Eisuke and the need to exert control over those who he saw as lower than him.
Trying to talk to Eisuke's compassionate side was like talking to a brick wall. Rose knew that even with Mamoru stood in her corner, they'd still lose this fight.
She placed her hand on his arm, squeezed slightly drawing his attention to her. She couldn't let him land in Eisuke's bad books by lying for her, he'd done enough by helping her see Minato. Using some force she pushed Mamoru's arm down so it no longer blocked her path.
And she walked over to Eisuke and stood in front of him.
"Leave." Eisuke commanded of Mamoru. Rose looked to him, he'd made no effort to move, Rose nodded at him to say it was okay but his reluctantance still remained.
"I'll be waitin for yer in ya suite, kid." He called to Rose and also like he was giving Eisuke a warning. What that warning was, Rose couldn't decipher.
Now alone with Eisuke, she bowed at a perfect 90 degree angle, despite the strain it put on her already sore side after her time with Minato.
"I'm sorry, Sir." She said, it was the first words she had spoken to him since the morning of her date with Minato. An apology always meant very little to Eisuke after disobeying his rules but it's all she could offer.
She assumed not taking her pager and phone with her and perhaps because he had no idea of her whereabouts, was the reason for his anger. Because the other Auction Sponsors were allowed to use her for their own amusement as well, to an extent anyway.
"Explain." Eisuke demanded. He didn't seem as angry, maybe the apology had quenched his wrath somewhat but he wasn't happy by any stretch of the word.
Rose straightened herself slowly until her eyes made contact with Eisuke's. She watched his eyes travel to her neck, then back to her gaze and she remembered Minato bit her exactly where his eyes landed. Her hand wanted to fly up and try and cover it but it was too late, if there was a hickey there, he had seen it.
Even if she had planned to lie to him, even if Mamoru had managed to cover enough to hide where she was, it now felt futile. Something in her had changed, possibly seeing Mamoru stand up to him on her behalf, possibly with the threat of death hanging over her from his bride to be, she felt like she had pried a couple of his fingers from round herself and got a hand and foot out.
Who knew? But she wouldn't waste this feeling.
"I went to see Minato." She said after she took a deep breath in through her nose. And finally exhaled after she spoke.
"I did not know friends gave each other hickeys." He stated, his tone was like ice and it sent a chill down Rose's spine. The quelled anger had turn into rage, rage, fucking rage. But he was holding his composure.
"You gave me hickeys and we aren't even friends." Rose surprised herself by saying something like that to him of all people and from the look on Eisuke's face, she surprised him too, the anger flickered to bewilderment for the briefest of moments. She had never spoken back to him like that before.
He stared at her, the defiance in her response had definitely pissed him off even more.
"You seem to have forgotten who you belong to." He stood from his chair and towered over her.
Rose could feel herself begin to waver in this new found confidence she had in herself and she closed her eyes for a moment. Images of Minato, his touch, his unwavering kindness and desire to know her as a person flowed through her. He saw her as a human being and treated her as such. It was about time she started treating herself in the same way and demanding it of other people too.
She opened her eyes and allowed them to meet his.
Snap went Eisuke's usual profound composure. His hand immediately grabbed her jaw and it hurt.
"Wrong." He tilted her head so that the side of her neck with the hickey on it was fully exposed to him. "You belong to me."
His face approached and his teeth latched onto her skin. Rose stood frozen and took the pain. He was biting her so hard, she could have sworn she felt his fangs dig into her layers of skin. But she could feel every strand of rage through his teeth and the grip he had on her jaw and the arm he pinned to her side.
It felt like a lion clamping its jaws round the throat of a buffalo. The pain was nothing like she had felt before, not necessarily physically but emotionally.
Eisuke had never forced himself on her, he was a man who never needed to resort to assault or took pleasure in it.
The violation, the disbelief and the hurt was more than she could handle. He was capable of many things but she truly believed he wouldn't do something like this. Her eyes filled with tears and they spilled down her cheek and hit Eisuke's thumb digging into her jaw.
His teeth let go of her skin and his face quickly pulled away, staring for a moment at what he had just done. He turned her face back to him and stared down at her tear stained cheeks and her glazed over eyes.
He let go of her completely and stepped back almost like he'd been zapped by a live wire. If he was capable of showing emotion, Rose might have thought he felt guilty and ashamed by his actions. Maybe even remorse.
But she received no apology, not even a single word. She stood there as he went to the kitchenette and a small moment later he returned with an icepack and placed it against her neck.
The cold from the icepack did little to ease the pain that throbbed from her neck, to her head, and all the way down to her toes. She wanted to get as far away from him as possible but her body wouldn't move.
Her brain tried to find logic and reasoning as a way to cope with what just happened. Humans were complex creatures, emotions ruled every decision that was made. Good people made terrible decisions all the time because of how they feel. But overall didn't make them a bad person, they just made a mistake.
But was that just a mistake? Rose herself had felt so many things, jealousy, anger, sadness and her actions had never done something to hurt him physically or as far as she could tell emotionally. But he had put her through both emotional and now physical turmoil.
He was staring down at her as she stared off blankly ahead of her. If there was ever a time for him to utter the words 'I'm sorry.' Or show some form of humanity, it was now. But there was only silence.
Eventually, Eisuke removed the ice pack and tossed it onto the coffee table next to them. She still couldn't look him in the eye but she could feel his eyes desperately begging hers to look at him.
"Go to bed." He ordered and turned away, heading towards the stairs to his suite.
Even after she heard his door shut, she remained glued to the spot. Her heart had broken in ways that felt impossible to put back together. It hurt more, that even now, after everything and the developing feelings she had for Minato, Eisuke could still break her heart.
Rose had almost started to make peace with the idea that she was going to die sooner rather than later. But each interaction with Eisuke, made her not want to wait for it anymore.
Tears were still falling from her eyes as she shut them. Minato's face appeared and she choked out a sob. The memory of the way he looked at her filled her minds eye and offered her a little comfort, enough that her muscles found the will to move and she turned to head back to her suite.
She had forgotten Mamoru was there, he greeted her by standing from the sofa as she walked through the door. He noticed she was crying immediately and practically ran over to her.
"What happened?" His hands held her shoulders as he searched her face. His eyes honed in on what she could only imagine was a red and swollen area decorated with teeth marks on her neck from the ferocity of Eisuke's bite.
She watched as his eyes turned dark and murderous. His grip on her shoulders got tighter before he let go.
"I'll fuckin' kill 'im." He growled and Rose knew he meant it. He started to push past her but she grabbed onto his arm.
She didn't want him to ruin his life because of her.
"Mamo." She sobbed and it cracked through his rage.
He turned back round to her and she fell into his arms and started crying the space where her heart once was, out. He wrapped his arms around her, cocooning her in his embrace to offer her safety and solace. He stroked her head as she made noises that made him hurt and fester with anger inside. Nothing was said for a long, long while.
Eventually Rose fell quiet. And Mamoru tried to push her out of his embrace but she clung on like a Koala to a tree afraid to leave the safety of its branches.
"Lemme look, sweetheart." He said softly and Rose reluctantly let go of him and pulled her hair to the opposite side for him. Even the breeze from that motion made her neck sting.
Mamoru held her shoulders as his face drew closer to look. He watched Rose flinch slightly and squeeze her eyes shut, he felt his anger rise again.
"Skins not broken," he said trying to aim the breath from his words away from her swollen neck. "What happened sweetheart?"
Rose's head fell forward.
"I told him I didn't belong to him." She almost whispered. She watched Mamoru's hands that had dropped to his sides ball into fists.
"So he marked ya?" His jaw was tense. "I shoulda never left ya alone with 'im."
Rose shook her head, whether it was that moment or another, it felt like it was inevitable something like this would happen. Like it was encoded in the DNA of their relationship. In Eisuke's head, Rose was something to own, he paid the money for her so she was his. No one could stop him from doing what he wanted with his possessions.
Mamoru's arms wrapped around Rose again.
"I'm sorry sweetheart." His voice quivered as he whispered those words.
Rose felt tears roll down her cheeks again. She didn't blame him, she didn't need an apology either but she did resent him slightly for giving her hope that it'd get better when in fact it had only got worse.
But that wasn't his fault. No one knows what the future holds. Well, maybe Eisuke does since he controlled everything.
"Few more days." He whispered.
Something was happening soon. And it felt like it was going to be something big. Both Mamoru and Eisuke had said something similar, it surely wasn't coincidence, that didnt exist as a probability with these men.
She wanted to ask but that meant she had to find the capacity to care and there was no energy in her for that.
All she could hope was that the Grim Reaper had finally caught up with her before she found out.
Days passed and not much had changed. Rose remained confined in her room, laying in bed and rotting.
Earlier that day or possibly it was the day before, time was merely a manmade concept anyway, a large bouquet of flowers had been delivered to her door by Kenzaki.
Rose stared at them. It was an extravagant arrangement, full of the most beautiful, perfect looking flowers she had ever seen. They were all red - roses being the predominant center piece, decorated by tulips, azaleas, peonys with leaf accoutrements that framed it like an art piece. But as beautiful as it was objectively it evoked no emotion out of her.
There was no card attached, so the sender was a mystery. But as soon as she saw them, she immediately thought of Eisuke. Was this an attempt at an apology?
He couldn't even apologise properly. Even Rose, someone who thought giving flowers was stupid because why would you give someone something that was dying, knew that apology flowers were not red. They were white tulips, yellow roses and purple hyacinths.
With no real emotion Rose put them on her coffee table and left them there. It didn't matter who they were from or what they meant. They would die anyway. She did wonder who would outlive who.
Mamoru had been in her suite with her as often as he could. She appreciated him being around, he didn't expect her to get out of bed, didn't try to get her to talk, just offered her the comfort of his presence.
He was there when a knock at the door sounded and answered it for her. Rose was in bed so couldn't see who it was, not that she could bring herself to care as long as it wasn't Eisuke.
"Hey kid," Mamoru called through the doorway. "The glam squad is 'ere."
Rose blinked. Was it time for the anniversary party already? Time sure does fly when you're having a terrible time.
She pushed herself up and got out of bed and walked towards the doorway.
Mamoru and now Baba and Ota were stood in the lounge. She looked between the men, where were the ladies who usually did her hair and makeup?
"Hey pretty lady," Baba spotted her first. "How are you feeling?"
Rose walked out into the lounge and almost hid behind Mamoru for safety.
Baba's face dropped in sadness at the child like fear that now consumed her towards them when she was once so comfortable.
"She looks like Koro when my dad would shout at him." Ota said, his face looked sad too.
"She ent deaf, brat." Mamoru snapped at him. "This is why we gotta do it now."
"Sweetheart, we need ya to do everythin' we ask ya to do but most importantly t'trust us, okay?"
Rose's brow furrowed, as she looked at all three of them. And then to the trunk that Baba had next to him and the smaller one Ota had next to him.
"What's going on?" She managed to squeak out not expecting an actual answer.
"You're going to spread your wings, little bird." Ota took a step towards her. "It's time for you to fly."
Her brow stayed furrowed. What was he talking about?
"Jesus fuck." Mamoru almost slapped his hand to his face at Ota's cryptic words. "Ya gonna escape, Tres Spades and King Asshole."
"We'll explain while we get you ready princess." Baba said stepping forward too, the confusion evident on Rose's face.
First Rose went and showered, while alone her mind ran a mile a minute. Escape? Be free from Tres Spades and Eisuke? This was a joke, surely.
Why would they help her? Why now? Why at all? And how in the fuck were they going go get away with it? Eisuke would kill them all.
When she was clean, which was in record time as she was desperate to figure out what was going on, she then put on the dressing gown she always did when the regular glam squad arrived to doll her up.
Ota dried her hair for her, drying it back so it would be easier to keep in a slicked back bun.
"Eisuke's broad ent who she says she is." Mamoru said when Rose kept looking to him for an explanation.
"Do you remember the man who took you hostage a few years back?" Baba took over and asked.
Rose nodded. Of course she did, the feeling of the blade he held to her neck as he restrained her from behind was not something easily forgotten nor the man wielding it. The Auction Sponsors were in front of her, Eisuke at the center gouding him to kill her, 'she was just a maid and was easily replaced' - he said.
It was enough to disarm him mentally, the blade no longer at her neck as he panicked about losing his leverage. Soryu shouted 'down' which she did before he shot the man in the shoulder, physically disarming him and she ran and hid behind Eisuke who was closest, he held an arm out as if to shield her behind him.
She wondered if this was the time she started to really notice the things Eisuke did. He knew the man wasn't going to harm Rose if he thought she meant nothing to him because all he wanted to do was destroy Eisuke. And the arm poised to keep her safe behind him, made her realise she held some importance to him. Even if that use was just to make a decent cup of coffee.
"Well, he had a daughter." Baba continued, "Emiko Suzuki."
Rose could almost see where this was going. She had watched enough Miss Marple and Murder She Wrote growing up to work out this who done it.
"She supposedly killed herself not long after her father," Baba paused. "Disappeared."
"She'd covered her tracks pretty well," Baba hummed.
"But she was no match for us." Ota chimed in, practically shouting to be heard over the hair dryer.
"What d'ya mean us? Ya did fuck all." Mamoru rolled his eyes.
Rose couldn't see Ota's facial response but she imagined it was something childish.
"She managed to coerce two outwardly successful realtors who were drowning in debt and lawsuits by making it all go away in exchange for being her parents - she moved all her assets that her father transferred into her name to a offshore bank account and to top it off had several surgeries to change her appearance."
Rose nodded along, Jessica Fletcher couldn't have written this better herself.
"She faked a birth certificate and medical records, doctored photos, paid people to corroborate their story all to create a new one to get close to the Boss without suspicion."
Rose thought back to her first encounter with Mako aka Emiko as Ota turned off the hair dryer. Everything almost made sense, just not the way she spoke about Eisuke. It seemed genuine that she loved him in some twisted way.
"Her persistence was what gave her away. She was desperate and not the cute kind. But when she finally got that date with the Boss, her plans seemed to change."
Rose gulped. She was gripped to this story, as if it wasn't part of her own.
"You know Boss, he's a charmer with the ladies." Rose bit back the grimace she wanted to make and looked to Mamoru who let his grimace show. "And unsurprisingly she fell in love with him so taking him down was no longer her plan."
Rose agreed, not with Eisuke being a charmer but that Mako wasn't acting in how she felt about Eisuke. She had fallen in love with the man responsible for her father's disappearance/death. And that now explained why she wanted Rose dead so much.
The blame for the loss of her father had to fall on someone. There was obviously still much hurt and anger she hadn't worked through over it, that Rose the woman Eisuke, the cause of all her anguish but she wanted to keep, had been sleeping with, became her target instead. And by getting rid of Rose, she could simultaneously hurt Eisuke and have him all to herself.
"And it would seem, you, princess are a threat to her."
Rose's head fell down. It was sad in reality, that so much unhealed trauma had lead to this. Mako was as fucked up as Rose was because of Eisuke.
"She hired the guy who drugged you and the one who stabbed you."
Her trying to get rid of Rose went that far back? How long had she know about her and Eisuke? And yet it seemed Baba and Ota at least were none the wiser.
"She was on the bridge that night I went to get ya too, probs was gonna push ya in." Mamoru chimed in, tho he and Rose knew she was gonna beat Mako to it that night if it wasn't for him.
That explains what he was looking at over her shoulder.
"She purposely ripped your stitches, didn't she?" Baba's tone changed, it held hatred for Mako in it and guilt for leaving Rose unattended.
All she could manage was a nod of her head. It had been days and Rose could still feel Mako's fingers digging into her wound.
"I'm sorry princess, I shouldn't have left you alone." He crouched down in front of her and took her hands.
"But you don't have to worry about her anymore."
Rose's eyes widened. What?
"King Asshole, had 'er take a trip t'Tokyo bay courtesy of ole Evil Eyes." Mamoru confirmed.
Rose looked between them in disbelief.
"When we told boss what she had done to you and got a confession out of the man that stabbed you that she paid him to do it. They took a trip for two. And he made sure it was a painfully long one."
She stared down at Baba. There should have been a feeling of relief but there wasn't.
If this was the first incident of being a tool to threaten Eisuke, or come into the crosshairs purely because of proximity to him, maybe she would have felt the crushing weight lifted from her shoulders.
But his enemies were no longer the only threat. Eisuke himself was one now.
"You have been through so much and we have all had a part to play in it. We knew what she was up to, but had no proof. And we let it happen until we did."
Rose looked at him, she could see the same sincerity in his eyes as she could Mamoru. She truly believed he felt remorse for how things played out for her and for not doing anything until it was almost too late.
She watched his eyes flicker to her neck as Ota pulled her hair into a ponytail.
The bruise took the majority of the right side of her neck, blood blisters and smaller bruises in the shape of Eisuke's teeth sat in the center. Rose watched Baba turn to Mamoru.
"Is this what he did to her?" He asked in disbelief.
Mamoru nodded in response, that murderous anger rising in him visible after seeing her neck again.
Rose could feel the warmth from Ota's breath close to her neck now too.
"What are you, a bitch in season? Why did he do that?" Ota asked, his fingers rising to trace the gradient patterns of the bruise.
"Ota!" Baba shouted. His angry voice was terrifying and made both Rose and Ota recoil. "This isn't a joke. There is no justification for brutality. And this why she needs to leave."
Ota returned to fixing Rose's hair without another word.
"Princess, saying sorry isn't enough. We should and could have set you free a long time ago to save you from all this." He squeezed her hands tighter in his own.
"But selfishly, we like having you around. You bring a little sunshine into our dark world." He smiled softly, like he was reminiscing of nicer times they spent together.
The corner of Rose's lip turned too. She thought back to the time the four of them played the card game snap at the poker table. It started off as a boredom buster for the men, but quickly turned into a full on tournament. The bickering between Rose and Ota like they were competing siblings, Mamoru and Baba telling them to settle down like they were their parents, jibes and taunts as the intensity rose, celebrations of the victors, sniping of the losers, if it wasn't for the insane amount of money being bet between them, it would have been just like a normal mundane family games night.
"But," Baba's tone darkened. "We also used you to our advantage, forced you to help us because you couldn't say no."
Rose's lips dropped too but she shook her head.
"No," Ota interjected. "Don't excuse it, Don't accept it, don't forgive us, we're horrible people."
Rose turned in her chair to look up at him. His face was that of a sulking child who was upset because he felt guilty.
"You've always been good to us, even when we haven't been to you." Ota looked at her, those sad puppy eyes letting her know he was capable of understanding the damage he himself and the others had caused.
"Shh," Baba stopped her. "We don't need you to say anything. We aren't looking for your forgiveness, we don't forgive ourselves. We just want you to know, as hard as it may be to believe, that we love and care about you. And we will do what we can to make up for what we have done to you no matter how impossible."
Rose felt tears fall from her eyes.
"Thank you." She whispered.
Ota wrapped himself around her shoulders and squeezed her gently, this was the only time she would allow him that.
"Don't thank us. It's the least we can do," he paused. "Rose."
She chuckled through her sobs at Ota having to pause to stop himself calling her 'Koro' and she smiled down at Baba and moved her hands so they could squeeze his back.
"Alright 'nough of the mushy shit," Mamoru interrupted the moment of closure. " 'eres the plan."
Rose sat up straighter, the hope set the shattered pieces of her heart ablaze they revealed their plan.
