I decided to plunge right in. “Why didn’t you tell me the police were questioning you?”
He said nothing for a minute, then reclined and took a sip of his coffee. “I haven’t exactly seen you around lately. The festival seemed a poor place to bring it up. You were already scared of me.”
I pressed my hands against the cool tabletop. “With good reason. You were being creepy. And your wrist—we were defending ourselves. What exactly did you tell the police? I thought you wanted Tomo to have a choice. Why are you pressuring him to join your Kami?”
“Whoa, matte yo,” he said, lifting his left hand to tuck a blond highlight behind his ear. “I didn’t press any charges. The police were at the hospital that night because of Ishikawa, and when I went in they recognized me. They wanted to know what had happened. But I swear I told them it was an accident, that I fell on my wrist and broke it.”
“Well they don’t believe you,” I said. “They said the bone fracture showed it was an assault.” I shuddered at the term. Is that what we’d done to him? But we’d had to fight back that night. Jun hadn’t left us a choice. The bubbles in my melon soda swarmed my straw and it started to tilt over the side of my glass. I pressed it back down with a shaky hand. “And now because you and Ishikawa both went to Kenritsu Hospital the same night and wouldn’t talk, they think the two incidents are related.”
Jun leaned in, toying absentmindedly with his silver earring. “They are related.”
“I know, but it has nothing to do with this whole gambling-on-kendo-results theory they have.”
“Gambling?” Jun frowned. “Two of the prefecture’s most promising kendouka injured and out of commission on the same night, a few weeks before the tournament.” My straw made a second bubbly escape, but before I could reach for it, Jun grabbed for it and pressed it down. “Yeah, I guess that looks suspicious.”
“I know. I hadn’t even thought of that before, but it does. But that’s not even close to what happened. It had nothing to do with the tournament.” I rested my head on my arm. “And they...they think Tomo’s involved. They found his tenugui at Sunpu Castle, and they overheard you two butting horns at the festival. You can’t let us get pulled into this, Jun. It’ll be bad for all of us. Please.”
Jun frowned. “I can keep denying everything, but it’s not like they’re going to believe me when Ishikawa is being silent, too. It just makes it look gang related if we won’t talk. I mean, what if they get video of us or something? We were all in the same places that night. Che! What a mess. If only I’d made it there before the Yakuza shot Ishikawa.”
“They didn’t,” I said. “Wait, you didn’t know that?”
“What do you mean they didn’t?”
Crap. Crap, crap, crap! Of course Jun didn’t know. He hadn’t arrived until after the gun went off. Now I’d run off to the enemy and given him all our secrets. Now he had all kinds of info to blackmail us into joining his Kami cult. Stupid!
“Katie?” Jun asked gently. “Who shot Ishikawa?”
“Never mind.”
“You can trust me,” he said. “I’m not going to tell the police anything, and I’m not going to force Yuu to join me, either. Right now I just want to help you, but I can’t unless you let me.” My straw made another jump for the table and we caught it at the same time, our fingertips touching as they wrapped around the slippery plastic. His fingers were soft and warm, slender the way Tomohiro’s were. I pulled my hand back but Jun didn’t, holding the straw in place as he smiled at me. “Ano saa,” he said, “you really need to drink some of this before your straw leaps to its bubbly death.”
In spite of everything, I felt a grin curl its way onto my lips. It seemed so ridiculous, the two conversations side by side. I took a huge sip of melon soda and the straw sank down.
I looked at Jun carefully. He seemed so normal sitting here. He sat forward, shrugging his blazer off in the booth. He looked a little flushed, his cheeks pink.
“It’s hot in here,” he laughed, but I wondered. Was it because of me? Did he— No, it didn’t matter. Why did I keep thinking about it? He had way too many screws loose up there.
“Um,” he said, “I have a problem.”
“What?”
He grinned and rose to his feet, taking slow steps toward my side of the booth. His blazer was half off, half on, crumpled around his elbows like he was chained.
“The cast,” he said, and I could see where the jacket had snagged on the thick white bandage. “Could you...?”
“Oh.” I paled. “Um, sure.” I lifted my hands to his sleeve, the weave of the fabric soft under my fingertips. I carefully unhooked the edge of the cuff from the cast, my fingers brushing over the hard bandaged shell as I worked the sleeve down.
My heart pulsed faster. Shut up, shut up, I told it. I wished I could shut off my shallow brain. Sure, Jun looked like a poster boy for the next TV drama series, but couldn’t I look past that to the fact that he had some serious issues?
The sleeve slipped off his arm and I watched the jacket collapse into folds of fabric as it fell. Jun caught the blazer with his good hand, throwing it onto the bench beside him and sitting again.
“Thanks,” he said, reaching for his iced coffee with his now-bare arm. I could see the welts of the snake kanji he’d carved into his skin, faint and scabbing.
“It’s the least I could do,” I said. “I guess the cast is kind of my fault.”
His smile disappeared. “No, it’s not. It’s my fault—I came on too strong about the Kami. I should’ve given you more time to think about it. It’s just—I’ve been alone with my secret for so long. None of the other Kami can do anything close to what Yuu can do. And when I realized there was ink in you, too—I was just so happy not to be alone. I got carried away. I’m sorry, Katie. I’m sorry for frightening you.”
I didn’t know what to say. He’d put his life in danger to rescue all of us. And the words he spoke now, they were genuine. He meant them.
“It was a sketch,” I whispered. God, I hoped I was making the right choice.
“A sketch?”
“The gun,” I said, my voice dry.
“A sketched gun?”
I nodded.
“Shit. Is that what they asked Yuu to do?”
“And money. Sketching money.”
“Bastards.” Jun’s eyes shone like hard marbles. It frightened me, the way he looked. Maybe I shouldn’t have told him after all. “They never learn.”
“What do you mean?”
“Just old business. What matters is that the police don’t suspect Yuu. I won’t say a word, and if Ishikawa’s any kind of friend he won’t, either. It’ll blow over soon enough.”
My thoughts raced. This is why I’d met with him—to save us, and he was willing to do it. “Why are you protecting Tomo?” I said. “So the police don’t learn about the Kami?”
“I’m sure the police know about the Kami, conspiracy-style,” Jun smirked. “Some of them probably are Kami. But no, that’s not why. First, I’m worried the stress of being arrested for assault would make Yuu more dangerous. Second, I’m not joking when I say I’m on your side. If Yuu can learn to control his power—if you can learn to control the ink—we’d be able to do anything.”
“Like kill the Yakuza?” I said, rolling my eyes. I felt like I should be frightened, but sitting here in our school uniforms sipping soda and iced coffee somehow muted the terror.
“That’s not fair,” said Jun. “I don’t really want to kill anyone, if I can help it. I just want to save the world from crime, poverty, famine—everything. Wouldn’t you? There’s so much these powers can be used for, but until Yuu knows how, he’s just a mine in a field waiting to blow up the innocent. He’s stronger than me, Katie. Two weeks ago he proved that. I can’t do it alone—I need you two.”