Down and Dirty (10 page)

“Yeah, he is,” Cristal said. “I’m a pretty good shot too.”

They went back to their meals.

“What did it feel like when you finally decided Ich was the one for you?” Cristal asked. “I mean, did your toes tingle, did you get the vapors, or did your heart skip a beat?”

“All of the above,” Shaundra said as she moved the lettuce around in her salad. “And my panties always dampened when he looked at me. Why?”

Cristal chuckled. Shaundra was so crazy. But there was no way she had those kinds of feelings for Kioshi.

“Are you in love with someone?”

“I don’t know,” Cristal said. “I’m not sure.”

“Is it someone I know?”

“No,” Cristal said. “I met him a couple of days after we came back from Europe.”

“What’s he like?”

“He’s spoiled, arrogant, augmentative, handsome, and talented.”

“Sounds like Satoshi to me,” Shaundra said. “And the rest of Aomori.”

“No, he’s nothing like them. I can deal with Aomori, but he has me puzzled. We have nothing in common.”

“Is he an idol?”

“No, he’s not an idol, but he’s younger than me.”

“So, I’m twenty-five years older than Ichiro.”

“And I’m taller than he is?”

“Honey, we’re taller than most of Asia. And I don’t mean that as an insult.”

“And he drives me crazy.”

Shaundra laughed. “I don’t know about love, but it does sound like lust. I think you need to go for it. You’re free, single, and disengaged.” She paused. “You could do worse.”

Cristal moaned. “I have done worse.”

Shaundra laughed again. “Me too, honey.  But if it’s love, you’ll know it. Don’t let something like height and age stop you, unless he’s twelve.”

“No, he’s not twelve,” Cristal said.
But not too far from it
.

****

“How well do you know Miss Cristal?” Hiroyuki asked Damien as they sat aside the pool outside their rooms.

“Well enough,” Damien answered. “She’s my boss.”

Izanagi and Kioshi lounged on two chairs a couple of feet away from them inside the heated, enclosed room.

“No, I mean, are the two of you dating?”

“No,” Damien answered. Hiroyuki was usually the quiet one, so the question surprised him. “I have a girlfriend back home in New York whom I plan to marry as soon as she graduates.”

“You’re dating a high school girl?”

Damien shook his head. “No, she’s getting a master’s degree in journalism.”

“But she is in the United States. Long-distance romances usually don’t last,” the nineteen-year-old said.

“Do you have a girlfriend?” Damien asked the inquisitive youngster.

The other two giggled.

“Not at the moment. Mr. Niigata has forbidden us to date until after our debut.”

“So why are you asking about Cristal? Do you like her?”

“No,” Hiroyuki said. “I mean, I like her as a publicist, but not as a lover. I was just curious since the two of you are always together.”

“We’re not together now,” Damien said. “But we work together. It takes a lot to be a publicist. The workday begins early and ends late.”

“So, does she have a boyfriend?”

“I’m not sure,” Damien answered, not as naive as Hiroyuki thought he was. “I think she has an understanding with one of the guys in Aomori.”

Hiroyuki looked surprised. “Which one?”

Damien didn’t like to spread gossip. “I think Satoshi.”

Hiroyuki turned serious. “He has a terrible reputation with the women. Even I know that.”

Damien smiled.
How could Hiroyuki possibly know this when he’s only been in Japan a month
?

“Aomori are our idols. We’ve been following them for years. Yori is the shallow one. Takumijo is the rebel. Ichiro is the shy one, and Satoshi is the womanizer,” Hiroyuki explained.

Damien laughed. He’d heard the same thing, but he hadn’t had the opportunity to meet Aomori since they returned to Japan. Like Distraction, he only read tabloid reports on them.

“If he’s dating her, then is it a given they’ve had sex?”

Damien shook his head. “Adults usually do when they date,” he said. “But I wouldn’t be privy to that information. It’s too personal to ask.”

Hiroyuki didn’t give up. “Have you had sex with your girlfriend?”

Damien reached out and mussed Hiroyuki’s damp hair. “No, she’s saving herself for marriage.”

Hiroyuki frowned.

“You poor thing,” one of the others said. He thought it was Kioshi, but he couldn’t be sure.

Hiroyuki agreed. “Maybe we need to fix you up with someone.”

“Who do you guys know besides Cristal and the secretary, Barbara? Mr. Niigata won’t even let you go out of the dorm.”

“He lets us out,” Hiroyuki assured him. “And we meet girls.” He opened his cell phone and showed Damien his contact list.

Damien whistled. There were a lot of numbers with girls’ names next to them.

“He said we couldn’t date. He didn’t say we had to be celibate.”

“I think that’s what he meant,” Damien said.

“Then he should say that,” Hiroyuki said back. He put away his phone. “Until then, it just means no dating.”

Damien sighed.
Maybe
Cristal is right. Maybe these three are demons
.

“So, are you going to take over your father’s companies when he dies?” Hiroyuki asked, changing the subject.

“Yes,” Damien answered. “I am the oldest child. But I think my father might out live me.”

“I like your father,” Hiroyuki said. “I hope to learn a lot from him about business. Maybe I can work for him when I’m not touring.”

“I think you’re going to be very busy with entertaining for a long time. Mr. Niigata has big plans for you.”

“That does not mean I can’t broaden my horizons. I’m not stupid. Fame is fleeting. Once it’s over, it’s over, and I don’t want to be a broke, angry idol with just gold records hanging on my wall to remember my youth.”

Wow, very mature
. “I think you’re right. I’ll talk to my father, and I’ll get back to you. What about you guys?” he asked the other two.

“No,” both Izanagi and Kioshi answered.

“Don’t worry about them,” Hiroyuki told him. “Iz will be a successful songwriter, and Kioshi will be one of the biggest idols in the world if he doesn’t knock up some princess before then.”

Damien frowned.
Yes, Cristal is very much right on this one. They are devious
. Damien’s cell phone rang. The boys had gotten back into the pool. He looked down at the display.
Cristal
. “Hello?”

“Are you still alive?” she asked.

“Yes. They are frolicking in the pool. Where are you?”

“Outside Hiroyuki’s room.” She disconnected the call.

Damien walked through the open patio door and through the bedroom. He opened the door and Cristal stood smiling at him. He led her back through the bedroom and out through the open patio door.

All frolicking stopped when the youngsters noticed Cristal.

Kioshi swam to the edge of the pool. “Get your suit,” he told her. “The water is warm.”

“Sorry,” she told him. “I don’t swim with sharks.”

Damien chuckled and looked into the pool. All three looked like they should be wearing halos.

“Then don’t wear a suit,” Kioshi said to her. “It would just get in the way.”

Damien shook his head at Kioshi, but the young man ignored him.

“Get dressed,” Cristal told them. “We’re going to see the town.” She pointed to Kioshi. “You, take a cold shower first.” She stormed away from the patio and left via Hiroyuki’s door.

****

They toured Shikoku first. It was a beautiful place surrounded by azure seas and tall mountains. The prefecture of Kagawa, Cristal learned, was the smallest city of Japan, but it was known for its many natural parks. Ich was from Takamatsu, an area located in central Kagawa.

Distraction was pretty worn out by the time they arrived back at the hotel later that evening, and they went to their rooms without complaint, leaving Cristal with a little free time to soak in the tub, roll her hair, and paint her nails.

Tomorrow’s activities would begin early at some temple, followed by a parade, and then by the christening. Cristal yawned. Maybe she should get to bed early too. Her cell phone rang. Cristal looked down at the display and then went back to putting the topcoat on her nails. The phone continued to ring. Cristal lifted it and then pressed the green button. “Hello.”

“Don’t hang up.”

“What do you want?”

“To tell you how sorry I am for what I did. I don’t know what came over me. I can blame it on the alcohol, but I won’t. I guess I just got so jealous that you spent Thanksgiving with Tae instead of me that I lost my damn mind. Please forgive me. I miss you so much.”

“I forgive you,” Cristal told Satoshi. “But I don’t think we can go back to where we were.”

“I understand,” he said. “I broke your trust, and I plan to win it back someday. I don’t know how, but I know my life is so empty without my best friend.”

Cristal willed the tears not to flow. “I miss you too.” There were so many things she wanted to talk to him about. She also missed the zaniness of Aomori.

“I’ll let you get back to what you were doing,” Satoshi said. “See you tomorrow.”

“Yeah,” Cristal said, sounding like Shaundra. “Good night.” She disconnected the call before he got the chance to reply and went back to painting her toenails. Cristal blew out an exasperated breath of air.
Why did he have to call now when my heart is so confused
?

After painting her toes, Cristal opened her laptop to check her e-mail.
Wow, maybe I should check it more often
. There were several advertisements and get-rich schemes clogging up her inbox. She sent all of it to the trash. There were several e-mails from her parents and even one from Tae. She opened the one from him. “Have a good time in Kagawa.” Cristal quickly deleted it. If she and Satoshi were to be friends again, she had to stop entertaining his brother. She finished with the e-mail, put her laptop away, and then checked the itinerary for tomorrow. Afterward, she lay down on the bed and half listened to the news on the television.

“
Then don’t wear a suit. It would only get in the way
.”

 “Very bad boy,” she muttered as Kioshi’s words came back to haunt her. She smiled and closed her eyes.
Eighteen
. Damn. If he was just a few years older, she might have entertained the idea of joining him in the pool.

Chapter Five

Shaundra and Dae-Hyun loaded the twins into the car seats, got into SUV, and headed for Takamatsu. She’d been allowing Dae-Hyun to drive since she didn’t have any experience maneuvering around mountains or driving outside of Osaka. And he was a much better driver.

Dae-Hyun turned on the heater, making the van feel comfortable. It was still bitterly cold outside, but at least it has stopped snowing. The first time she’d seen the snow covering Osaka, she’d thought it looked pretty. She’d thought the same thing about the first snow she saw in New York, but lately, she missed the warmer winters of New Orleans where she had spent most of her adult life before her first husband died. She sighed, wondering what her life would be like had she stayed in Louisiana. There’d be no way she’d ever taken the trip to Japan. She never would have met Aomori, and she certainly never would have had the two bundles of joy in the backseat.

She didn’t know when she began warming up to the little darlings. She’d never expected to ever become a mother again, and had looked forward to the empty nest once Tricia graduated and got a life of her own. But fate played a wicked trick on her and brought her a potent Japanese male whose sperm knew just how to awaken her old eggs and make her fertile. Damn him. She knew she didn’t set a record for being the oldest woman in the world to give birth to twins, but she had sent tongues wagging at Osaka General Hospital, especially with the other stuff she’d been dealing with.

More and more of the memories about the earthquake and tsunami were returning, but she didn’t wake up screaming any more. Dae-Hyun had been helping her with this by teaching her how to relax and meditate. The big Korean had been a godsend. He was good with the boys, knew how to cook, and was a good listener. She smiled. But he did have to improve on his dancing. He wasn’t bad at slow dancing, but his body had too much bulk to maneuver some of the current fast dances.

But Ichiro’s body, though muscular, could still take on the new dance crazes. Shaundra frowned. Why was she thinking about him? God, she missed her pretty blue-eyed baby, with his soft lips and rock-hard…

One of the babies whined in his sleep, disturbing her fantasy. Shaundra turned as much as she could and peeped into the backseat. Raiden seemed restless. She used to put a pacifier in Tricia’s mouth when she was a baby, but she refused to make the boys dependent on the substitute nipple. Over the years, she’d learned a thing or two about mothering, and she didn’t want to ruin their future teeth. She’d spent a fortune on dental work for Tricia and her older siblings.

Raiden stopped whining and went back to sleep.

“Maybe he’s upset because we disturbed his rest this morning,” Dae-Hyun said. “You know he’s not a morning person.”

True. Of the two, Raiden slept the most while his younger twin was an earlier riser and liked to be entertained. “He better break himself out of that. He’ll be off to kindergarten soon and he won’t be able to just lie in his bed and make Ryoto late.”

Dae-Hyun chuckled. “That’s at least five years away.”

“I know,” Shaundra said. But she also knew how quickly time passed and she prayed she’d live long enough to see them enter school. Chances were good that she wouldn’t be around to see them graduate from high school, but Ich would make sure they did. She also wanted them to go on to college, if Mr. Niigata didn’t have them on the road. She frowned. That man was impossible.
No pictures
. Who in the hell did he think he was? She’d make sure to find out the name of the photographer he’d hired and make sure that both families got plenty of baby pictures.

Shaundra looked out the window. The huge mountains they’d been passing looked close enough to touch. Some of them still had snow on top.