Chương 2 - THE CONTRACT WITH MY NAME ALREADY ON IT
The contract was waiting for me the next morning.
That should have been my first warning.
Kazuki had not asked where I lived.
I had not given him my phone number.
Yet at nine precisely, a black sedan stopped outside my apartment building and a woman in a charcoal suit delivered a cream envelope with my full name written across the front.
NAOMI SUZUKI.
Inside were twelve pages.
Four months.
Public appearances as Kazuki Takahashi’s girlfriend.
Family dinners.
Charity functions.
Business events when necessary.
No obligation to share a bedroom.
No physical affection beyond what we both agreed to.
Either party could end the arrangement.
And one clause printed in bold:
NAOMI SUZUKI RETAINS COMPLETE PROFESSIONAL INDEPENDENCE.
I read that line three times.
Then I found the payment.
I nearly dropped the contract.
He was offering enough money to cover two years of rent.
I called the number at the bottom.
Kazuki answered on the second ring.
“That amount is ridiculous.”
“Good morning, Naomi.”
“You knew I’d call.”
“I hoped.”
“I’m not taking this money.”
“Then don’t.”
I frowned.
“What?”
“Cross it out.”
“You’re serious?”
“Yes.”
“What kind of negotiation is this?”
“The kind where I want you to agree for the right reason.”
My irritation deepened.
“And what reason would that be?”
“Curiosity.”
I hated that he was right.
An hour later, I was sitting across from him inside a private dining room above a Ginza restaurant.
Kazuki had changed from last night’s tuxedo into a dark navy suit.
No tie.
Somehow that made him look more dangerous.
I put the contract between us.
“There are conditions.”
His mouth almost curved.
“Good.”
“I keep my job.”
“Yes.”
“You do not interfere with Château Noir.”
“Agreed.”
“You do not tell me what to wear unless the event has a dress code.”
“Reasonable.”
“You never use Ken to manipulate me.”
That erased the faint amusement from his face.
“Agreed.”
“And if I ask you a direct question, you answer honestly.”
Kazuki paused.
Too long.
“There may be things I cannot discuss.”
“Then say that.”
I held his gaze.
“Do not lie.”
Something changed in his expression.
“All right.”
I reached for the pen.
Then stopped.
“Why me?”
“You asked that last night.”
“You didn’t answer.”
He leaned back.
“My family expects someone polished, obedient, and connected.”
“And you chose an anxious sommelier who panics when her ex walks into a ballroom.”
“I chose a woman who identified a 1989 Haut-Brion from one sip while three collectors twice her age were confidently wrong.”
Heat touched my face.
“You heard about that?”
“I was there.”
I looked up.
“That tasting was six months ago.”
“Yes.”
The room went strangely quiet.
“You knew who I was before last night.”
“Yes.”
There it was.
No denial.
No attempt to soften it.
“How long?”
Kazuki’s eyes stayed on mine.
“Longer than six months.”
A chill slid down my spine.
“How much longer?”
He didn’t answer.
I closed the contract.
“I’m leaving.”
“Naomi.”
“You approached me pretending we were strangers.”
“You approached me.”
“Because you positioned yourself where I would.”
His silence told me I was right.
I stood.
“This is not a fake-dating arrangement. This is surveillance with cocktails.”
Kazuki rose too.
“I have never had you followed for romantic reasons.”
“That sentence is somehow worse.”
“It probably is.”
I turned for the door.
“Your father’s name was Masato Suzuki.”
I stopped.
Nobody at Château Noir knew much about my father.
I rarely spoke about him.
He had died when I was ten.
Warehouse fire.
Accident.
That was what my mother told me before she died five years later.
I turned slowly.
“How do you know my father?”
Kazuki walked toward a cabinet near the window.
He removed an old photograph.
The edges had yellowed.
My father stood outside a wine warehouse wearing his familiar brown coat.
He was younger than I remembered.
Beside him stood a teenage boy.
Tall.
Thin.
Dark-eyed.
Kazuki.
My heart started pounding.
“That’s you.”
“I was sixteen.”
I took the photograph.
Dad had one hand on Kazuki’s shoulder.
They were both smiling.
I had almost forgotten my father’s smile.
Seeing it without warning hurt.
“What were you doing together?”
“Your father supplied wine to several Takahashi hotels.”
“That doesn’t explain this.”
“No.”
Kazuki’s voice became quieter.
“He also worked for my father.”
My fingers tightened around the photograph.
“As what?”
“Someone my father trusted.”
I laughed nervously.
“My father sold wine.”
“He did.”
“And?”
Kazuki looked toward the city.
“My family’s legitimate businesses required people who could move expensive goods internationally without attracting attention.”
I understood before I wanted to.
“You’re talking about smuggling.”
“Sometimes.”
“No.”
“My father was not a criminal.”
“I didn’t say he was.”
“You just said—”
“I said my father trusted him.”
Kazuki stepped closer.
“Masato discovered what certain men were hiding inside legitimate wine shipments.”
“What men?”
“That is part of what I have spent years trying to prove.”
I stared at him.
“And this fake relationship helps you how?”
“My uncle will meet you.”
“Why does he care who I am?”
“Because he remembers your father.”
My stomach turned.
The contract suddenly looked very different.
“You didn’t choose me to avoid an arranged marriage.”
“I do want to avoid it.”
“But that isn’t the whole reason.”
“No.”
“Was anything you said last night real?”
“Yes.”
“Which part?”
His gaze settled on me.
“The part where I said you surrender space you have already earned.”
That should not have mattered.
It did.
I hated that.
I looked at the photograph again.
“What happened to my father?”
Kazuki’s jaw tightened.
“You were told the warehouse fire was an accident.”
“Yes.”
“It wasn’t.”
The air disappeared from my lungs.
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying your father found something inside one of my family’s shipments.”
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then how do you know the fire wasn’t accidental?”
Kazuki reached into his jacket.
He placed an old silver lighter on the table.
The initials M.S. were engraved into its side.
My father’s.
I remembered watching him light birthday candles with it.
I had believed it was lost in the fire.
Kazuki pushed it toward me.
“This was found three blocks from the warehouse.”
My hands began to shake.
“Who found it?”
“I did.”
I looked up.
He was sixteen.
A boy.
Standing three blocks from the building where my father died.
“What were you doing there?”
His expression changed.
For the first time, the controlled man from the ballroom looked almost afraid of his own memory.
“Running.”
“From what?”
Kazuki’s eyes held mine.
“From the men who had just tried to kill me.”
My heartbeat stumbled.
He continued.
“Your father got me out of that warehouse before it burned.”
I stared at him.
“You were inside?”
“Yes.”
“And my father?”
Kazuki swallowed.
“He went back.”
“Why?”
“To retrieve something he said could destroy the people responsible.”
My knees weakened.
“What happened?”
“The warehouse exploded before he came out.”
I couldn’t speak.
Kazuki’s voice dropped.
“That is why I knew your name before you ever held my hand.”
I looked at the contract.
Then at the photograph.
Then at the man who had apparently carried a piece of my father’s final night for fourteen years.
“You said he went back for something.”
“Yes.”
“Did he find it?”
Kazuki looked toward the photograph.
“I thought he died trying.”
A cold feeling moved through me.
“Thought?”
He turned the photograph over.
There was handwriting on the back.
Not Kazuki’s.
My father’s.
One sentence.
IF NAOMI EVER MEETS THE TAKAHASHI BOY, GIVE HER THE KEY.
Beneath it was a date.
May you like
Three days after the warehouse fire.
My father had supposedly been dead when he wrote it.
