His Revenge Baby: 50 Loving States, Washington (16 page)

“You think I want to take care of you?”
Her mother’s voice rang in her ears.
“You
think anybody want to take care of your needy ass?”

And of course there was the fact that she really didn’t want to stay on the phone with No’s unfriendly assistant a moment longer than absolutely necessary.

In the end, pride won out. “Yes, um…please tell Mr. Nakamura that I’m sorry and I hope he has a nice trip.”

There was yet another cold pause during which Lilli swore she could actually feel Riyu’s annoyance seeping through the phone line.

“Yes, I tell him,” she said in slightly better, but even colder English.

“
Domo arigato
,” Lilli answered as clearly as her clogged nose would allow.

“
Hai
,” Riyu answered before hanging up.

She needed to go back to bed. Rest. Then she’d rally for liquids and see if the delivery app she’d used when she lived with Doug and Ruby worked in this part of town.

That was the last thought Lilli had before falling back into a miserable black sleep.

“GET OUT
! Get! I never wanted you in the first place!” her mother was screaming from the
porch, throwing her things out into the snow on their unshovelled porch.

“Mama, please!” Lilli pleaded, crying. “Just let me stay until the end of senior year.

Please!”

“No, you ain’t staying with me no more!” her mother slurred, still drunk from the night
before. “You stupid-ass bitch ruined my life! Now get out! GET OUT!!!”

Hands were on her, shaking her awake. And Lilli blinked back tears as she woke up in overly bright light. She was no longer on the cold streets of Seattle but in a broiling hot room. What time was it? How long had she been asleep?

“Water,” she croaked to the hands that had shaken her awake. Too dehydrated to care about keeping her tone polite.

A bottle of cold water was pushed into her hands and, thank the Lord, it was already open. She was so weak, she had no idea if she would have been able to unscrew the cap herself.

Only when she sat up to take a grateful but uncomfortable—thanks to her aching throat—swallow, did she realize it was No and not Riyu who’d passed her the water.

No said something under his breath in Japanese, and lifted the bottle to her mouth again so she could take another swig instead of staring at him.

“What are you doing here?” Lilli croaked after taking a few more painful but necessary gulps. “Wait, are you a hallucination? Is this another dream?”

Could be, she decided. No was dressed in his usual suit, and he looked very handsome, as usual. But if it were really him, wouldn’t he have on a surgical mask or something to prevent himself from getting sick, too? This was fairly common practice in Japan and she knew No wasn’t all that interested in hanging out with sick people.

But most telling of all, Lilli couldn’t imagine No tending to her like this. Bringing her water and helping her drink it. Holding up a squat, white spoon filled with a broth she assumed was miso soup, but couldn’t say for sure because her sense of smell and taste had been compromised by this truly nasty virus.

But oh, Jesus…the soup felt heavenly on her throat. It went down a lot more smoothly than the water, and was totally worth the painful act of swallowing.

Yeah, this had to be a hallucination. But she ate the imaginary soup until the bowl was empty. And then No seemed to vanish…only to reappear a few minutes later.

“Can you stand, Ana? Walk?”

Lilli paused for a moment, wondering why an adult was calling her by the name she only gave to her niece and other Japanese children. Until she remembered she was Ana

—at least to this one adult. She nodded in the general direction of Imaginary No and the next thing Lilli-Ana knew, she was making her way to the bathroom in a slow shuffle with the support of No’s arm and shoulder.

“Do you need help?” he asked when they finally stopped in front of the GoNo toilet.

Probably. But she shook her head. Finding a secret reserve of strength, she managed to force her weak hands and arms to push down her panties so No wouldn’t have to do it for her.

Perhaps sensing she didn’t want an audience, Imaginary No turned his back and allowed her some privacy as she peed. But a sixth sense seemed to guide him, because he turned to face her again before she could pull her underwear up.

“
Chigau
, I would like for you to step out of those, please,” he said in a soft voice.

Imaginary No stepped forward and pushed Lilli’s underwear all the way down to her ankles, then helped her stand so she could step out of them without falling on her face.

Then he did something else the real No had never done before: stripped her out of her clothes. And she was vaguely surprised to notice that he handled the job with the efficiency of a health professional.

Still, even this small act managed to turn her on. A latent bit of their usual sexual tension kicked up as his hands moved over her aching body, pulling the dress she’d worn during their “dinner date” over her head before leading her to the step down at the edge of the bathroom’s tub. Lilli had admired the huge—especially for Japan—tub when she first moved here, but had never managed to use it. Like most Americans, she took showers…too rushed and impatient to take the time to fill up and soak in a bathtub.

But Imaginary No had filled it with water and offered his hand for her to take as she wobbled her way into the tub. The surprising scent of lavender hit her, a smell so lovely and sharp, it somehow managed to force its way into her congested sinuses and—sweet Jesus! The water felt warm and heavenly to her aching muscles. Lilli seriously could have stayed in the tub forever, and probably would have fallen asleep there had Imaginary No not rolled up his sleeves and begun cleaning her body with a wash cloth.

At this point, it dawned on Lilli that either this was the longest and most interactive, non-drug induced hallucination ever or…it was real. If this experience and Imaginary No were truly imaginary, she’d have pulled him into the bath with her and fucked him in a water-based version of their usual “naked female, fully clothed male” position. But her body, try as it might, only slightly stirred, sending up a few pitiful sexual flares, even when he pushed the washcloth between her legs.

Also, if this situation was simply a creation of her fever-addled brain, No would not have pulled her out of the warm, soothing water just as her eyes began to drift closed.

“You can sleep in the car,
hai
?” the no-longer-imaginary No told her while drying her off with a large bath towel. “I would like for you to come with me…”

Too tired and sick to protest, Lilli allowed him to bundle her into the fashionable

trench Miyuki bought her last November. Then they slowly made their way out of the apartment, him guiding her with an arm around her shoulders. No’s arm remained around her in the elevator, but he released her briefly during their public walk across the lobby where they might be observed by others.

In the past, they’d always leave the building at separate times. Lilli had always gone out the main entrance of the building. But now she realized all this time No must have been using the back. He led her there now and they emerged through a rather unexciting brown door into a parking garage where a car was idling in wait.

They remained separated as No’s driver helped her into the right side of the car. No entered on the left. But as soon as the driver was back in his seat, No closed the partition and pulled Lilli into his arms. As it turned out, he was right about sleeping in the car…

With her nose running like a faucet into a tissue, Lilli drifted off with No’s arms wrapped around her, his heart beat calm and clear beneath her ear.

She woke a few times during the drive. The road was sometimes bumpy, and now and then No would reach over to switch out her crumpled, damp tissue for a fresh one.

Although Lilli was pretty out of it, she could tell the drive lasted for a while, and she noticed the landscape outside the window dramatically changing. Going from tall buildings to tall trees to forest and snow-capped mountains and then, finally. a whispered, “We’re here.”

Lilli groggily opened her eyes just as the car rolled to a stop and No released his hold on her. The driver came around and opened her door and Lilli gingerly rolled her aching shoulders as the driver reached in to help her out of the car. The heels No had put her in crunched as soon as her feet hit the ground and she gazed sleepily down at her feet trying to make sense of what her eyes were telling her.

Snow! There was snow on the ground!

But that was nothing compared to what she saw when she looked up. A mansion, seemingly lit by candlelight. Huge and old.
A samurai mansion
, she realized, but only because the year before, Ruby had been obsessed with a J-drama featuring a teenage girl who accidentally time travels to Edo-era Japan.

“We are in the mountains, Ana. In a small town. This is my mother’s ancestral home. Where her ancestors started the sake brewery which would go on to yield them a great fortune after the end of the Samurai age,” No explained, coming to stand beside her. “We will remain here until you are well.”

Okay
…Lilli was still too sick and too weak to question anything. A few words were exchanged between No and the driver, who returned to the car soon after. Then No escorted her into the mansion, which she’d later find out wasn’t so much a single house as a compound residence consisting of a number of smaller buildings. He led her into a free-standing pavilion and immediately busied himself in the tatami mat room. He lit a fire from a coal source beneath the floor, the Edo-version of turning on the heat, then rolled out a futon and motioned her over to a nearby mat.

Flu, definitely the flu, she thought. Colds were bothersome. But in her experience, flus were what really brought you down. Laid you out flat on the futon rolled out for you by your lover over tatami mats. Making it so you barely even notice the beautifully preserved room before falling asleep under the fur blanket provided by your lover.

Lilli remembered very little about the next few days. Pills and sleep. Soup and sleep.

Tea and sleep. Occasionally water. Pee breaks that took all her energy, because she had to squat over a toilet nested in the floor, and then…

One morning, she woke up. And though she was still weak, her nose was clear and the painful body aches were gone.

Beyond that, her eyes were no longer itchy and watery, but filled with fantastical creatures! A dragon with wide, bulging eyes, wrapped around a sword. A hawk, so fierce Lilli was half-afraid it would take her up in his claws and fly away with her.

It took her a few wake up blinks to finally realize the creatures weren’t real. Rather they were part of an elaborate back tattoo, one that extended all the way down and past the line of blankets she and No slept under.

The art on his back was mesmerizing. So much so, she didn’t realize she’d reached out to touch it, until No’s voice said, “You are awak-oo,” his Japanese accent much stronger in morning light.

“Yes,” she said, drawing back her hand. “And I’m feeling much better, thank you.”

The fantastical tattoo disappeared from sight when No turned over to face her. But it was replaced with the beauty of his gentle smile. “This news pleases me.”

“Me, too. Being sick totally sucked,” she joked, only to suddenly grow serious. “But you missed your trip to Tokyo…”

Now he became somber even as he replied, “I would not like for you to worry about that trip, Ana.”

Easier said than done, but she could tell this was a subject he didn’t want to discuss, so she stroked his hair out of his face and said, “Thank you for taking care of me. I really hope you don’t get sick, too.”

“I will not,” he answered, taking her hand from his hair and kissing it. “Getting sick is not our family’s way.”

Lilli had to laugh a little, because he spoke of it as if his family were biologically immune to the flu virus, which of course wasn’t possible.

As if to confirm her thoughts, he conceded. “At least that is what my mother told my brother and I when we were boys. If either of us so much as blew our noses, she’d have a car bring us here. ‘Your father is descended from hawks, but I am descended from dragons. And dragons do not get sick,’ she would tell us.”

From the soft tone his voice had taken on, Lilli could tell No held fond memories of his mother and wished she could say the same for her own.

“It may only be in my mind,” he confessed. “But I consider this place to be one of healing. I came here after my mother died, and by the end of a week, I found myself able to return to Osaka and to work. Also, as I said, I never get sick, so…”

“It must be true,” she softly agreed, smiling gently.

He returned the smile with a beautiful one of his own . “
Hai
, exactly.”

There was a moment of silence as they stared at each other for the first time in what must have been days.

Then she said, “I saw your tattoo. I really like it.”

No’s eyes darkened, and an avalanche of thoughts seemed to flit across his normally inexpressive face. But all he said was, “Thank you.” Then, “We should now bathe.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

THEY STAYED for an entire week at his mother’s ancestral home. Barely touching because Lilli was still too weak. But they connected in ways they never had before.

Making meals over the fire pit. Taking baths. Sipping tea, mostly in silence.

It was funny…Doug had accused her of being a “goddamn chatterbox” on several occasions, complaining about how she filled up their townhouse with words, even when he returned from practice frustrated and tired and in need of silence. But contrary to his assertion that she never knew when to shut up, Lilli found herself passing numerous comfortably silent hours with No.

This was something she couldn’t help but ponder on their seventh day at the place she’d come to think of as the Samurai Sake House. They were walking behind the property, through a dense forest feathered in snow. Lilli was struck by the otherworldly beauty of the snow-covered landscape. It never snowed in Osaka, and snow was definitely one of the many things she missed about Seattle.