Work Text:
It starts out innocently. Just a random coincidence, a wire taken home by accident by Katou and forgotten there. An innocent, ordinary little microphone – property of Section Three, costing approximately 12,000 yen. A closed-loop system, monitored by only one device; pathetic, primitive compared to HEUSC’s integrated audio capabilities.
It just happens that, that day, Daisuke is the one assigned to monitor the wire’s feed. And that, as lead agent, he stays late to finish up his report not noticing the wire hasn’t been returned to its box. Not until, at 7:04, he happens to glance at the window showing its feed and notes that it’s still active.
This is the point where innocent absentmindedness slips, slow as ball down a greased slope, towards guilty intentionality. All Daisuke has to do is pick up his phone and call Katou, remind him he still has the wire and to bring it in the next day.
Instead, he picks up the headphones.
“What’s that?” It’s Katou’s voice, a little muffled – clearly he’s shed the wire somewhere in his apartment. “No, you’re not having steak for dinner. No. Money doesn’t grow on trees. Don’t worry, this has plenty of protein. You’ll love it.”
Daisuke frowns. Katou lives alone – that was demonstrated plainly enough by his over-night visit some months ago. No family in town; Kamei told him that. All his friends are work-related, and tend not to meet on weeknights as they’re all busy with their jobs.
Not that Daisuke has been running a background check or anything.
Not an official one, anyway.
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Katou’s saying. “You’re always hungry. I’m always hungry, and you don’t see me behaving so shamelessly.” He clicks his tongue. Daisuke can easily imagine the scene, Katou standing at his stove, making something cheap and simple, yet delicious. Wearing just his shirt, the collar unbuttoned, that pale throat long and lovely…
He shakes his head and puts the earphones down. Tomorrow, he’ll tell Katou to return the wire, and that will be the end of it. He closes the monitoring window on his computer and goes back to his report.
***
The next day is a busy one, the whole team in and out, and as it happens Daisuke forgets to remind Katou about the wire. Also as it happens, he brings his laptop home with him to take a look at some reports Kiyomizu-buchou assigned to him.
Which is how he notices, at 9:00 p.m., that Katou’s talking to someone again. “No, you budge over. Play nice – I wanna watch this. You’re such a bed hog.”
Daisuke’s eyebrows shoot up and he finds the whole of his attention suddenly focused on the window showing the levels and details of the wire’s audio. Who is Katou speaking to in his room at nine at night? And so familiarly? He finds his hands have fisted themselves, and forces himself to relax. It’s nothing. Probably just some movie night. The audio’s picking up background sounds and dialogue. It sounds like some action flick, lots of shooting and explosives. There’s a quiet thump, then the sound of steps.
“If you’re going into the kitchen,” calls Katou, “don’t forget to have some water. You don’t want to get dehydrated again.”
Over the sounds of explosions, Daisuke doesn’t hear the reply. He slips the earphones off and minimizes the window, then goes back to his work.
The next time he checks the window, after ten, there’s nothing but silence in Katou’s apartment. His friend must have gone home, and the assistant inspector gone to bed.
Good.
***
Katou doesn’t seem any different than usual at work, throwing his all into mind-meltingly boring assignments and taking any and all opportunities to lecture Kambe on his improper use of personal funds to solve public problems. It used to be irritating but honestly after everything that’s happened, after Katou took a bullet in the course of catching the man who killed Daisuke’s mother and then shattered the secrecy of the Kambe family to release their pet project world-wide, Daisuke has started to think that he’s not always wrong.
Also, he’s very cute when he’s angry, colour coming into his pale cheeks and those auburn eyes snapping like sparks. Katou is lanky as a scarecrow but there’s strength in him, a surprising amount of it. He’s the only man who’s ever stood up to Daisuke, refusing steadily to back down in the face of wealth, adversity, discomfort, danger, and public chastisement. Daisuke knows enough to know that he doesn’t need another sycophant in his life, someone blinded by his wealth and power. He needs a foil – and that’s exactly what he found, discarded like trash in the basement of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police. If they don’t recognize what they’ve tossed away, he has no problem taking it from them.
Sooner or later. As soon as he can get Katou to stop bitching at him.
That night Katou does something he’s never done before: he goes home early. Admittedly it’s only after pressuring Kamei into signing him out so that his departure appears on time, something that no one has a problem with because everyone knows Katou’s unpaid overtime is the unsung hero of the team.
Daisuke sits at his desk, watching the rest of the team start to slip out as the clock hands rise towards five, and slips the headphones on again. Just in time to hear Katou opening his front door. “Yes, it’s me – who else would it be? Glad to see me, huh? That makes someone, at least.”
Daisuke frowns, hands tensing on the desk.
“You wanna go out for a while? You know, for someone who can’t talk you’re entirely transparent. Yeah, we’ll go to the park, okay? I know you love it there. I’ll bring snacks.”
Someone who can’t talk? Is Katou’s friend mute? And what was he doing in Katou’s apartment before he got home. Maybe Katou’s helping him out – that would be entirely like him. So trusting, so warm-hearted. But to let someone stay with him in his one-bedroom apartment… Daisuke grits his teeth. Who is this person?
“C’mon then, Daiki. I’ve got everything.”
Daiki. A first name, without suffix or honorific. Close, intimate. Daisuke frowns savagely, jaw sore with the tension of his grinding. He rifles through his memory for any mention of that name, and comes up blank.
“HEUSC,” he says, and the connection blinks to life. “Correlate the name Daiki with Katou Haru.”
“Working,” says HEUSC. And then, “Thirty-five responsive records.”
“Categorize them.”
“Katou Haru – arresting officer of. Katou Haru, witness interviews. Katou Haru, undercover assignment.”
Daisuke’s eyebrows shoot up. “That one. Tell me more.”
“Case file from two years ago, Katou Haru lead officer with Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department Section One. Subject identified as Hiyama Daiki, undercover assignment was to form a friendship and siphon information related to a possible smuggling operation. Subject was ultimately cleared of association.”
“Show me a picture,” he orders, and holds his watch up. A picture is projected onto the empty office’s white wall of a young man with a chiselled face in a dark suit, his skin dark and his features handsome. Lithe body, attractive clothes.
Is this the Daiki Katou is sharing an apartment with? Perhaps they remained in contact, perhaps they became friends.
Perhaps more than friends.
His collar feels tight; he reaches up and loosens his tie, unbuttoning the top button of his shirt. His skin is hot, uncomfortably so. His head aches a little, like a sinus cold settling in. “Compile a briefing for me on Hiyama Daiki’s current status,” orders Daisuke, and cuts the video feed from HEUSC. He looks back to the laptop – the audio is silent. Katou and Daiki must have left.
Frowning deeply, he minimizes the window.
***
The next day is Friday, and Kamei invites everyone out for drinks at a trendy Ikkebukuro bar. Daisuke manages to avoid answering before Katou, who surprisingly demurs. “Sorry, but I’ve got stuff to do tonight,” he says with a little smile.
Daisuke stares at that smile, mind churning like a car spinning in mud, digging himself deeper and deeper into uncertainty. What does it mean? What’s Katou so pleased about? What is he doing with Daiki – who is Daiki?
Who is Daiki to him?
Daisuke has never had a rival before, because there’s never been anyone who could stand up to the combination of his privilege, power, prestige, and frankly sheer good looks. But Katou Haru is the kind of man to make ridiculous decisions and stand by them pig-headedly, and that’s concerning.
No; it’s terrifying. The idea that Katou might already have found someone to care for, someone he’s so happy to come home to, someone he shares his life with when all he grants Daisuke is crumbs of complaint… it’s a crushing thought.
“Kambe-keibu? Kambe-keibu?”
Daisuke looks up and realises everyone’s staring at him. “What?”
“Do you wanna come out for drinks tonight?”
“Sorry,” he says, rising and unplugging his laptop. “Busy.”
He signs himself out and leaves. But he doesn’t go home. He goes to his car to set up the laptop’s audio feed.
***
The sound of the door opening, key turning in the lock and hinges creaking. Daisuke closes his eyes, picturing the scene. Katou, coming home tired but happy, his hair mussed, his clothes wrinkled – the man could wrinkle leather. Smiling, content with his job, his work, maybe even his interactions with his coworkers, with the coffee Daisuke bought him today, and…
“Hi there. Phew – it’s getting warm outside. Summer’s coming, huh? Oh, it’s good to see you too.” Katou’s voice is warm, tender – the voice of a man greeting not an acquaintance, not a friend, but a lover. Daisuke swallows. “It’s been a long day. I think I’m just gonna take a bath, relax. Oh, you wanna come? Okay, okay – but I’m not washing your back!” Katou laughs and walks across the apartment, followed by the sound of water running.
Daisuke pinches the bridge of his nose, stomach clenching. This… this is… this can only be a lover. Can only be Katou coming home to a nice little love nest, complete with Daiki. Curled up together in his narrow double bed, sharing the bath… he can’t stand it any more, and rips off the headphones.
“HEUSC. Where’s that report on Hiyama Daiki?”
“Loaded to your account,” replies the AI butler.
“Send it to my work email; I’ll read it here.” It arrives only moments later and he opens the large file, complete with photos, interview excerpts and wire tap transcripts, as well as a well-organized synopsis and timeline. Hiyama Daiki is a small-time antiques dealer working in Shibuya, owns his own store, has an interest in Blues, and frequents the same few restaurants. A cozy, boring life. His bank statement and investments are listed – he’s only worth a little more than Katou, who’s paid a state wage. Pathetic. Absolutely pathetic. Not worthy in any way.
Daisuke starts his car and pulls out. Instead of heading for home, he points the car towards Shibuya.
When he arrives in the expensive, business-oriented neighbourhood he switches on the GPS and instructs it to find Hiyama Daiki’s shop. As expected at 7:00 p.m. the lights are out. In the window, Daisuke can see displays of vases, statuettes and porcelain. None of it particularly noteworthy. Is this really the best Katou can do? Is this what he wants? Mediocrity?
Daisuke’s hands tighten on the wheel until his knuckles turn white. Eventually, he goes home.
***
Over the weekend he sits at home, drinking imported coffee made by a trained barrista, staring morosely out the window at the lush green garden in his estate. Suzue asks him if something’s wrong, and he makes a bland answer about nothing being the matter.
Everything is the matter. Katou is in love with a second-rate art dealer, is sharing his home and his bed and his bath with him, and it’s eating away at Daisuke’s sense of reason. Has he been too obscure in his pursuit of the grey-haired detective? Has he been too harsh? Surely Katou must know how much he cares – he stayed in Tokyo, in the Met, in the useless and ditch water dull Modern Crimes for no reason other than to be close to the man. Why does Katou imagine he stayed, now that his mother’s murder has been solved – out of a sense of fun? Surely not. If he hasn’t been more explicit, it’s only because he’s come to enjoy the dynamic of the tension between them – the bickering and the bitching. Katou looks so good when he’s incensed.
He groans, puts down his coffee, and digs the heels of his palms into his eye sockets.
Something must be done.
***
“And so I said – oh, Kambe, Section One’s complaining about some mistake they found in their paperwork. I told them it was 100% your fault and you’d fix it even if it took all night, so you might wanna look into it. Hoshino doesn’t look it but he’s totally capable of flying off the handle if you piss him off, so –”
Daisuke, hardly hearing this tirade, stops abruptly beside Katou’s desk. “Have lunch with me,” he says, staring down at the assistant inspector. Katou looks up at him, eyes widening, then narrowing. He’s in the middle of a phone conversation, and has his hand over the mic while he speaks to Daisuke.
“Hah? Is that the best you can do? You think if you buy me canteen food I’ll fix your paperwork for you? I’ll have you know that I can’t be bought and a real man should clean up his own mistakes.”
Daisuke’s eye twitches. “No. Not that. I’ll fix the report. Just… have lunch with me. Today.”
Katou considers it, skeptical. “I mean… well, if you really want to. Okay. But I’m booked to do a seminar with the school district at 1:30.”
“Fine. I’ll pick you up.”
“Yeah, yeah, we can take the elevator together. Whatever.” Katou waves him away and goes back to his phone call.
***
At 11:45, Daisuke confirms his plans via HEUSC, then appears at Katou’s desk. Katou’s filling out some paperwork and looks up. “Yeah, okay – I’ve just one more –”
“Now, please, or we’ll be late,” says Daisuke, pulling his chair back. Katou squawks and stumbles to his feet.
“Jeez, what’s your hurry?” He tosses his pen onto the desk and straightens. Daisuke looks at him critically. Hair mussed, jaw slack, tie loose, shirt wrinkled. At least, as summer approaches and the temperature climbs, he’s stopped wearing his appalling canvas jacket and is in just a cheap, ill-fitting suit.
And still, despite it all, Daisuke feels the hum of attraction in his bones so strongly that his teeth seem to be vibrating with it, his skull throbbing in sympathy with the resonance of his emotions. He leans forward and grabs Katou’s tie in an uncompromising grip, tightening it and setting it straight.
“What – hey! Hands off!” Katou flinches back, but doesn’t actually stop him. Daisuke nods.
“Better. Come on, let’s go.”
They go to the elevator together, but instead of pressing the button for 5, where the canteen is located, Daisuke presses R. Katou frowns. “This isn’t a picnic is it? We’re not at school here, we can’t just go up to the roof to eat lunch, you know.”
“We’re not eating on the roof,” says Daisuke, a little appalled by the thought.
“Then what?”
The elevator dings as they reach R and the doors open. They step out and Katou’s eyes widen as he sees the helicopter on the landing pad – a black private bird, equipped with offensive capabilities. “That’s your helicopter.”
“Well spotted,” says Daisuke. He opens the door to the elevator room and leads the way across the roof to the helicopter, climbs in. Katou, bemused now, clambers in behind him and accepts a pair of headphones. Daisuke leans over him and pulls the door shut, stomach tight at the sensation of Katou’s body briefly pressed beneath him. Then the bird is sealed, and he’s giving the order to HEUSC to take off.
They rise into the sky above Tokyo. It’s a clear day, the air hazy with pollution but still clear enough to see for kilometers, to the green hills and the blue sea and the distant point of Mt Fuji. Katou stares out the windows at the sky scrapers, mesmerized. Daisuke’s smile is sharp, satisfied.
It’s a short hop over to Shinjuku, landing on the landing pad of a private sky scraper. Daisuke pulls off his headphones as the rotors power down, and Katou does the same, opening the door. They decant themselves out onto the roof, and Daisuke leads the way to the elevator. They take it down only one story, to the 90th floor. A restaurant with a 360-degree view of Tokyo, cleared for the afternoon of other customers. A string quartet is playing soft music in the corner; a waiter in impeccable dress greets them and takes them over to their table.
“Is this the point where I ask what the hell’s going on?” says Katou, after taking his seat with a flawless view of the city. “I was agreeing to get some onigiri at the canteen, not… not wining and dining by the rich and famous.”
“I was hungry,” shrugs Daisuke, slipping his brilliant white napkin into his lap. “And the food in the canteen is barely edible.”
Katou looks unimpressed. “Yeah, okay. But why am I here?”
“I thought… you might appreciate it,” he says, struggling a little in the face of Katou’s skepticism.
“Oh. I see. You thought you needed to remind me I work with the richest, most powerful man in the country? That I should be happy to do your paperwork for you because where you really belong is taking private ‘copter rides across the city and eating at fancy restaurants with other billionaires?” His eyebrows are drawing together now, his lips thin.
“You’re putting words in my mouth. I told you – I’ll repair the error in paperwork. I simply thought this would be enjoyable.”
The waiter comes out, bringing clear turtle soup. The menu is pre-set, the courses many and elaborate.
Katou picks up his spoon with a doubtful look and samples the soup. He makes a face, but continues. “Why now?” he asks, after several spoonfuls.
“I beg your pardon?”
“We’ve known each other for months. You’ve dropped me off bridges and gassed me and sent me alone to infiltrate your ridiculously guarded compound. You’ve never given my thoughts or feelings a second thought. And now we’re having a gourmet lunch together? Why?”
Daisuke puts down his spoon. “In all the time I’ve known you, I’ve held expectations about your behaviour. You’ve shattered all of them. I’ve tried again and again to see if you would bend to me – to my power, my wealth. You refuse every time. That’s rare, Katou. And rare things are valuable.”
Katou’s face freezes, then unfreezes in an ugly expression. “I see. You’ve been testing me, so you can put a price on me. Is that it?”
Daisuke blinks. “No – that’s –”
“Money is all you understand, so you thought you’d run a little experiment and see how long it was until I caved and gave into your wealth? And when I didn’t, you decided I was a unique specimen to be collected? Well, newsflash: I’m not a thing to be admired and appraised and auctioned off. I don’t give a shit how much I’m worth. You can’t put a price tag on people. So if you were hoping that I would accept some kind of offer to enrich your pockets, you can forget it.” He stands, tossing his napkin on the table. “I’ll take the subway back. Thanks for the soup.”
He walks out, just as the waiter comes over to clear the plates and lay out the next course. Daisuke stares after him, shocked. Then he closes his eyes and leans back in his seat.
He’s such a fool.
***
That night he contemplates returning the laptop – wiping out the link to Katou’s forgotten wire, and erasing the whole thing from his mind.
But he can’t erase Katou. Can’t delete from his memories all the images of the grey-haired detective, his smiles, his glares, his expression of exhausted relief.
Daisuke picks up the headset and listens, sitting alone in his office at home, his leather chair worn just the right amount and a glass of burgundy by his elbow.
“I hope your day was better than mine,” Katou’s saying, the sound of chopping in the background. He’s making dinner. Dinner for two – drinks for two, also? Daisuke shudders. “Who am I kidding – it couldn’t possibly be worse. Of course it was Kambe – who else? He’s just so… so… aargh.” The sound of a knife slamming into a wooden board. “You’re so good natured, you don’t have to worry about self-important assholes with their own obscure agendas. Things would be so much easier if he were just a little less blind. I wish he knew… I wish I knew… Fuck.” The sound of water running, then Katou’s footsteps.
“Don’t worry. Whatever happens, I’ll be here for you. You’ll always be my number one, Daiki.”
There’s a soft, wet sound. A kiss?
Daisuke takes off the headset slowly and lets it slide out of his fingers onto the floor.
Then he picks up the glass of wine and throws it across the room.
***
The next day, he skips work.
***
He’s reading some random news article on the early successes of international scientists in harnessing Adollium for public benefit when his phone rings.
It’s eight at night, a light rain falling outside, the sky starting to darken. He glances at his phone, and sees the name there: Katou Haru. He picks up. “Kambe.”
“Kambe – I need a favour. I mean – I need your help.”
Daisuke sits up, eyebrows rising. Katou sounds worried, voice tense, a hint of breathlessness. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s – I’ve lost him. That is… he disappeared.” Katou sounds frantic now, sucking in breaths, the sound of traffic in the distance behind him.
“You’re not making any sense.”
“Daiki. He’s gone.”
Daisuke’s hand tightens on the phone.
“Hello? Kambe?”
“I’m here. Where are you?”
“By the police box in my neighbourhood.”
Reporting a missing person? Daisuke closes his eyes. “Alright. I’m on my way. Have a picture with you.”
“Okay. Okay. Kambe – thanks.”
Daisuke grunts and hangs up, then stands and goes to find a decent rain coat. One an art dealer couldn’t possibly afford.
***
He arrives at the kouban to see Katou further down the street, his hair plastered to his skin by the rain, his clothes wet. Did they have a fight, and Daiki stormed off? Is he unfamiliar with the neighbourhood? Why would Katou be out in the rain looking for a grown man? Overprotective? Or just in love. He shakes his head and parks.
Katou comes jogging over when he sees him. “Kambe! Thank goodness. I’ve already checked with the kouban – no one’s seen him.”
Daisuke sets his jaw. “Picture?” he says.
Katou pulls out his phone, thumbs it to life, and shows him a picture.
It’s a dog.
It’s Katou, and a curly-haired brown dog.
Cuddling in his apartment, the dog slobbering, its long tongue hanging out.
It’s not Hiyama Daiki, never was. The whole time Katou has been talking to a goddamn, fucking dog.
“Unbelievable,” says Daisuke, who for a moment wishes the ground would open up beneath his feet and swallow him whole. For more than a week, he’s been driving himself mad over a street mutt.
“Huh? What do you mean?”
Daisuke shakes his head. “Never mind. This is Daiki?”
“Yeah. I got him a couple of weeks ago, and he’s already the most important thing in my life, so don’t laugh.”
“Okay. What happened?”
“We were out playing in the park – he was off-leash – and a car backfired and he freaked out and ran. I went after him, but he’s much faster than me. He came in this direction, but it’s getting dark and there are so many streets and… I need to find him.” Katou’s eyes are wide, his expression distressed. His hand is balled tight around his phone.
“HEUSC, search surrounding cameras for this dog.” He uses his sunglasses to scan the photo of the dog. Even as he gives the order he’s looking around. Katou lives in a cheap residential area, with few shops or businesses nearby. Limited cameras, limited opportunity to track the dog by its surveillance footprint. “While it’s doing that, we’ll split up,” he says. “I’ll veer to the south, you veer to the north. Does it answer to its name?”
“He,” says Katou, upset. “And yeah, he does.”
“Alright.”
“And Kambe?”
He turns, just as he’s heading out. Katou suddenly, despite his height, looks small, shrunken. “If… if he’s not okay… I don’t want another dog,” he says, voice guttural. “This isn’t Shiro.”
Daisuke nods once, curtly, and heads off.
***
Daisuke is familiar with working dogs. K9 units, bloodhounds, hunting dogs. From time to time their family has employed trained guard dogs, and he’s become used to their sleek, rippling forms, all muscle and close-cropped fur.
Pet dogs kept for nothing more than affection, he is much less familiar with. He doesn’t know where a pet dog would run if spooked, where he might hide. Do dogs dislike the rain? Daisuke doesn’t know.
He keeps thinking back to Katou as he searches. To the tight lines of his face, the high ridges of his shoulders, his huddled form wet with rain. Pathetic, petrified. So damaged at just the thought of losing this dog who he’s only had for two weeks. Would he feel the same at the prospect of losing Daisuke? He can’t imagine so.
He searches street after street, looking under benches and into bushes, over garden walls and in the dark alleyways behind houses. He finds a litany of crows, a rat, and a shiba inu sniffing at some garbage.
“Identification of dog, Daiki, on camera in Ni-Chome shopping arcade,” announces HEUSC. Daisuke, a few blocks away, starts to run in that direction.
The shopping arcade is along covered street. Most of the shops are closed at this time of night, with just a couple still lit-up. There are fishmongers and butchers, bakeries and bookstores. All have electric signs set out beside them, most of which are switched off. Daisuke jogs down the long tiled street until he sees something move up ahead.
“Daiki? Daiki. Come.”
A shaggy shape trots out into the centre of the arcade and shakes itself. A scruffy, brown dog wearing a collar. “Daiki?”
As it comes closer Daisuke can see that this dog looks very similar to the one in Katou’s photo, albeit much wetter – and smellier. The dog comes up to him and looks up with black gleaming eyes. He bends and pats its head, then reads the name on its collar. Katou Daiki. Daisuke nods. “Good dog,” he says, patting it again. The dog whines quietly and wags its tail. Daisuke glances around for something to act as a leash, and sees nothing.
Well. Needs must. He undoes his tie and fastens the narrow end around the collar. “Come,” he says, then heads back towards Katou’s house while he makes a call. “Katou? I found him. Meet me at your place.”
***
It’s raining in earnest now. Daisuke’s rain coat has protected his jacket and trousers, but his ankles and shoes are soaked, as is his hair. The dog, of course, is a wet muddy mess.
And yet, when they arrive at the front of Katou’s building and meet the assistant inspector, Katou’s beaming so wide there are tears in his eyes. He opens his arms and Daisuke releases the tie; the dog bounds over to him and jumps up to lick his face while he hugs it on the rainy street. “He found you. He found you. Good boy. Good boy Daiki.”
Daisuke stands, hands in his pockets, a little overcome by how adoring Katou is. Even in such a short time, clearly the dog has become family. He turns to go.
“Hey. Kambe. Where’re you going?”
Daisuke glances back. “Home,” he says. “My work is done.”
Katou chews his lip as he strokes the dog’s head. “D’you want… I mean… would you like to come in for dinner? It’s katsu curry.”
Daisuke looks at him, his hair lank and soaked, beads of water hanging at the ends of silver strands. His face pale from the cold but his cheeks and nose pink with exertion. Eyes so bright, shining like stars. Daisuke swallows. “Okay,” he says, trying to keep his voice cold and not succeeding.
Katou smiles. “Good. Let’s go.”
They walk up the stairs together and go inside. “I’ve gotta wash Daiki, he’s filthy. Could you put on the rice cooker and heat the oil? It’s already on the stove, you just have to turn it on.”
Daisuke nods, shrugging out of his coat and hanging it on a hook by the door, and Katou leads the dog away. In the kitchen he finds the cutlets already breaded and the rice and water in the rice cooker. Clearly they had stepped out for just a bit of air before dinner when the dog made a break for it.
He hears the water running in the bathroom while he puts on the rice cooker and fires up the gas stove, placing the deep pan of oil over it. Katou’s voice is a low, resonate rumble in the other room, talking to the dog while he washes him. Eventually the water stops and the dog trots out, damp but clean, to sniff Daisuke’s hand and knees.
Katou follows a few minutes later, and Daisuke’s heart catches in his chest. He’s changed out of his wet clothes and showered briefly – his hair is mussed and damp, an untidy bird’s nest that makes Daisuke long to run his fingers through it. He’s wearing just a tight white t-shirt that shows just how thin he is, but there’s definition to his shoulders and chest. His jeans are tight too, hugging his hips and ass.
“Thanks,” says Katou, coming over with bare feet. He has Daisuke’s folded tie in his hands, which he gives back. “I’ll pay you back for that,” he says.
It’s a 40,000 yen tie imported directly from Italy. Daisuke makes a demurring noise and slips the ruined tie into his pocket. Katou nudges him aside to take charge of the cooker. He grabs a pair of chopsticks and puts the first of the cutlets into the oil where it starts frying. “You know, that was pretty nice of you. Coming all the way out here to help me.”
Daisuke shrugs stiffly. It had been an even grander gesture when he believed the missing Daiki to be a man, not that he can tell Katou that. “It was clear he’s important to you,” he says.
“Yeah. He is. I’d do anything for him. But I didn’t think I’d see you running around in the rain at night looking for a lost dog. So, thanks.”
“No problem.” Daisuke takes a breath, then another. “Katou?”
Katou’s back is to him, the grey-haired detective focused on deep-frying the cutlets. “Yeah?”
“Before. At the restaurant. I wasn’t trying to buy you, or put a price on you. I simply… I wanted to have a meal with you. Because I enjoy your company.”
He waits, watching Katou prod at the cooking pork.
“I know,” says Katou, after a minute. “I know you stuck around here for me, or because of me, or… well, whatever. But every time you try to hint at why I should be interested in you, it just comes across as high-handed and overbearing. I don’t want to be bought, I don’t want fancy meals and helicopter flights. I want a man who’ll come out in the rain to look for my lost dog with me. A man who cares about me more than he does about money.” He takes out the cutlet and puts it down on a piece of paper towel, puts the second one into the oil, then turns around. “I want that to be you. I hope it can be. But I’m not always sure.”
“What can I do?”
Katou smiles and reaches out, presses his open-palmed hand to Daisuke’s chest over his heart. “Stop trying to impress me. It’s not your money I care about – you know that. Be a good man in your own way. I think that’s what your mom wanted. That’s what I want, too.”
“I…”
“I’m not asking you to throw away your wealth and live here with me in poverty. I’m not even asking you to change who you are with others, although frankly it does appall me. But with me – for me – you need to be just Daisuke. Forget the Kambe.”
Daisuke reaches up and lays his own hand over Katou’s, holds it close. “You’d like that?” he murmurs, voice low.
Katou stares back, eyes dark, eager. “I’d really like that.”
“Then I’ll try. I can’t say I won’t make mistakes, but…” his heart burning like an iron in his chest, he reaches out abruptly and catches hold of Katou, pulls him close. “I need you,” he says in Katou’s ear.
Slowly, Katou returns the embrace, fingers digging into Daisuke’s back, his body fitted tightly against the inspector’s. “Kiss me,” says Katou, his voice breathy, bubbling with laughter and excitement. Daisuke does, catching his lips and sealing his own over them, feeling Katou’s heart beating against his. It’s warm, and wet, and wonderful, and he never wants it to end.
Beside them, Daiki barks. Katou breaks away, glancing down at the dog, then over at the stove where the second cutlet is black. “Fuck,” he says, rapidly fishing it out and turning off the gas. The cutlet is burned to a crisp. Katou’s staring at it sadly, and from his expression it’s plain to see that there isn’t any more food to come.
“I know a place we can go,” says Daisuke, leaning in. Katou glances at him.
“Oh?”
“Yeah, right around the corner. It’s open all night.”
Katou blinks. “Do you mean 7/11?”
Daisuke smiles. “Unless you’d rather something more haute cuisine.”
Katou bends his head and kisses Daisuke again, just a quick one. “I’ll get my coat,” he says.
END