by Constantine
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like that there, but I’ve only been there a short time.” Ai looked down at Nobu’s card. After a few moments, she looked up at him. “You want me to ask around for you?”
Nobu’s head jerked in surprise. “What? No, that’s dangerous. They beat the crap out of me, what would they do to you?”
“They beat the crap outta you because you came off as suspicious,” said Ai. “But I work there. It’s not at all unbelievable if I ask about the girl who worked there before me, since I’ll probably get some of the customers she had.”
Nobu shook his head with a sigh. “I dunno…”
“I think I can help. Really. And I’d like to, if you’ll let me.”
The last thing Nobu wanted to do was endanger this woman who’d shown him more kindness than he probably deserved. But there was no way he’d be able to go back to Idol after last night, and they needed to know what kind of people Akane associated with. Ai might be their best chance at learning something more.
“Okay, but be careful. If people start getting curious about your questions, stop asking. Do we have a deal?”
Ai smiled and nodded. “Yup!”
“Thanks.” Nobu looked at a wall clock and saw the time was already close to noon. He checked his phone and saw no missed calls or messages from either Kyoko or Saori. Wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad sign. “I should get going. I’m later than I should be. You’ve got my card, call me if you hear anything.”
He stood from the tatami and approached the door. Ai followed him to it and he turned to her as he stepped into the genkan and slid his feet into his shoes.
“Thanks again for helping me out last night. You didn’t have to do that.”
She smiled and waved at him as he stepped out the door.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The nameplate ICHIKAWA was stamped right above the mailbox. Kyoko stared at it, studying the two kanji characters for a few moments before she pushed the doorbell. She checked her watch. It was noon, who knew if anyone was even home? There was a car in the driveway, but when you lived as close to the subway as they did, public transportation was usually a lot easier for a commute.
No answer. She pushed the button again, hearing the doorbell echo inside the house. Kyoko reached into her pocket and looked at the phone Tomiko gave her. The one that belonged to Akane.
The screen was smashed to hell and when Kyoko tried to turn it on, nothing happened. Damaged in the fall, no doubt. As of right now, it was useless. But with any luck, Kyoko hoped the data on it was still intact. There was a chance Akane had something on that phone that could add another piece to the puzzle.
The sound of the door opening drew Kyoko’s attention from the phone. She looked up into the face of a woman around the same age as Tomiko, but far more ragged. Like she’d barely gotten any sleep.
“Mrs. Ichikawa?” asked Kyoko.
“Who are you?” she asked.
Kyoko took out a business card and bowed as she held it out with both hands. “My name is Kyoko Nakamura, I’m a private investigator.”
Mrs. Ichikawa hesitantly took the card and read it. After a moment, she looked up at Kyoko. “What do you want with me?”
“My office called you the other day, we’re looking for your son, Yuki.”
“What do you want with Yuki?”
“I’ve been hired by the Suzukis to look into their daughter’s associations. I understand your son had a relationship with her?”
“Yes. Until she started treating him like he was trash.”
Kyoko tilted her head to the side. “What do you mean?”
“She thought she was so much better than him because of her fame. He’d call her, leave her messages, and she would just ignore him for weeks at a time.”
Seemed odd to Kyoko. If Akane was so detached from the relationship, why wouldn’t she have salvaged her career? All she had to do was break it off with Yuki, then Star Rise would probably find a way to come to some sort of agreement with her.
“Have you heard about what happened to Akane?” asked Kyoko.
Mrs. Ichikawa nodded. “Of course I heard. This may not be the smallest neighborhood, but word still goes around pretty quickly.”
“No one has seen your son since Akane’s death. We’d like to ask him some questions, fill in some blanks about Akane’s life before she died.”
Mrs. Ichikawa scowled, her brows knitting together, and started to pull the door closed. “He doesn’t know anything.”
Kyoko stuck her foot between the door and the frame to keep it open. “Mrs. Ichikawa, perhaps you should let me be the judge of that. All I want is a few minutes of his time to ask him some questions.”
Mrs. Ichikawa shook her head. “You have no right to be here.”
“Just please, if you’ll let me—”
“If you don’t leave my family alone, I’ll call the police!”
Kyoko narrowed her eyes. “Are you sure you want to involve the police in this? Potentially, your son may be the last person who saw Akane Suzuki alive. If you want to call the police, they may decide to take a closer look at this supposed suicide.”
The look on Mrs. Ichikawa’s face was one of total fear. There was doubt in Kyoko’s mind that the police would re-open the investigation, but if the threat of that could get Yuki’s mother to cooperate, Kyoko calculated the bluff was worth an attempt.
“Yuki did nothing wrong! He’s a good man! He loved that girl and she threw it back in his face!”
“If he did nothing wrong, then he should sit down with me, answer some questions, and I can cross him off my list.”
Noise came from the back of the house. Kyoko started to move from the front door, but Mrs. Ichikawa grabbed her wrist. Kyoko spun back and saw the woman’s face on the verge of panic. In that instant, Kyoko knew what the sound was.
Yuki was here. And he was trying to run.
The detective pulled hard, yanking her arm free of the mother’s grip. Mrs. Ichikawa shouted after Kyoko as she ran around the side of the house. A sliding backdoor led out to the veranda, and it was open. She heard footsteps echoing in the distance. There was a small gap between homes and Kyoko had to turn sideways to squeeze through, just as he must have.
She emerged onto one of the neighborhood’s side streets and saw a young man with blond hair running ahead of her. Kyoko ran after him, trying to follow the turns he made. Yuki had the advantage—he grew up here, had walked these streets every day to and from school. If Kyoko lost sight of him, she’d be lucky to find him again.
Kyoko saw him head towards the main street, Minato-dori. Six lanes of traffic to cross, with a divider separating the opposing lanes. And the cars were moving through those lanes at a fast clip.
Yuki stopped when he reached Minato-dori and Kyoko slowed her pursuit. Surely, he wouldn’t risk his life to run across while cars were racing through.
A look at Kyoko. The two made eye contact and then Yuki took another look at the busy street. He darted into traffic.
“Shit!” Kyoko ran after him.
Cars honked and swerved to avoid the young man running through the three lanes. He jumped over the grass on the divider and made another attempt to run past.
Kyoko followed him, holding up her hands to try and get the approaching vehicles to slow down. Horns and angry curses were thrown at her. She made it to the divider and saw Yuki already on the sidewalk.
Her legs pumped. A car came at her, the driver trying to slow down while laying his hand on the horn. Kyoko couldn’t get out of the way in time, so instead she rolled across the hood. The driver shouted at her through the open window, but she ignored him and ran to the sidewalk.
Looking to her left, she saw Yuki running down the sidewalk along Minato-dori. Kyoko had an idea of where he was going. Instead of chasing after him, she went straight down one of the smaller streets.
The roads around this block formed a kind of triangle, and as Kyoko circled, she was on another street
heading back towards Minato-dori. An overhead walking bridge enabled pedestrians to safely and easily enter the Asahiobashi subway station.
Sure enough, Kyoko’s theory paid off. She made it to the steps leading up to the bridge just as Yuki came around the bend. He saw her running towards him and instead of trying to beat her to the bridge, he crossed the street.
“Oh you little bastard…” Kyoko pumped her legs harder, following him across the lanes. This was slightly less treacherous than crossing Minato-dori, but still no picnic.
Yuki scrambled, running through the bike racks. He banged into a few of them and tried to throw some into Kyoko’s path. She slowed down a little, but still managed to keep up.
They ran across the crosswalk, entering Yahataya Park. Steps led up to the front entrance of the Osaka Pool. Yuki darted up the steps and once he reached the top, he turned right.
Kyoko followed and she saw an entrance for Asahiobashi up ahead. He was going to try and lose her in the commuter crowd. She couldn’t let that happen.
People were already moving through the corridor leading to the station. The congestion forced them both to slow down. Yuki was ahead of her and Kyoko could keep tabs on him by his hair color.
They moved down into the subway station, Kyoko pushing past commuters and trying to reach him before he could get to the subway. She took out her phone—the case held her rail card if she needed to get past the gate. And she assumed Yuki had one as well, otherwise he wouldn’t risk going into the station when he’d have to purchase a ticket in advance.
Craning her neck as much as she could, Kyoko could still see him heading towards the automatic ticket gate. So, he was going to try and escape on the train. He went past the gate. Kyoko pushed through, trying to close the distance. When she approached the gate, she tapped her card to the sensor and the small doors parted, allowing her to pass.
Announcements came over the PA system. Kyoko looked around, trying to catch sight of him. After a moment, she finally saw his hair. Except he wasn’t heading to the train platform. No, he was heading towards one of the other exits.
Try to lose her in the crowd, make her think he’d escaped on a train. You had to give it to him—it wasn’t a bad plan by any stretch. But Kyoko wouldn’t let him get away that easy.
“Thief!” she shouted.
People stopped in their tracks, looking at the source of the cry. When they saw Kyoko, they could see her pointing. Commuters moved out of the path of her finger, which was pointed directly at Yuki. Even he’d stopped and turned to see what the commotion was.
Then he made a break for the gate. Kyoko ran after him, continuing to shout, “Thief!” Most of the people parted for him, and Kyoko cursed them for their unwillingness to get involved.
Yuki approached the gate and touched his card to the sensor. As soon as it parted, he ran into the path of two station security guards. He turned around, seeing if he could run the other way.
But Kyoko was there already, passing through the ticket gate. The guards restrained him and Kyoko came closer, smiling down at him.
“Nice try,” she said.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The guard finished talking on the phone, then held the receiver out for Kyoko. She took it and placed it to her ear, saying, “Hello?”
“Just what the hell do you think you’re doing, Naka-chan?” Takeshi Hashimoto’s voice was as stern as ever. “Falsely accusing some kid of theft, then dropping my name when the station guards realize you were full of shit?”
“I had to act fast, Sensei. He was getting away and didn’t want to risk losing him again,” said Kyoko.
“The hell’s this about anyway?”
“He was Akane Suzuki’s boyfriend and he’s been missing. I think he might be connected to her death. Might even have had something to do with it.”
“That’s a lot of speculation, you have any proof?”
“If I could talk to him, I could find out for certain.”
She could hear Hashimoto’s sigh over the phone. A pang of guilt hit her. Dragging Hashimoto into this was a risk, but she had to do something to get her hands on Yuki. Kyoko imagined her mentor sitting at his desk, nervously rubbing his hand through his hair as he tried to make a decision.
“You realize I could get in a lot of trouble for helping you out, don’t you?”
“You’re the only chance I really have of making sure I can hold onto him,” said Kyoko.
Another sigh, followed by, “Hand the phone back to the guard.”
Kyoko did so and the guard took the phone. He spoke to Hashimoto for another minute or so, but it mostly consisted of the guard offering one-word responses to whatever it was her mentor was telling him.
“Understood. Thank you, Inspector.” The guard hung up the phone and looked at Kyoko. They were sitting in an office in the subway station. “Inspector Hashimoto requests you be given a few minutes alone with that young man in the next room.”
“I just need to ask him some questions.”
The guard leaned back. “You know I can refuse his request. And there’s the matter of your false accusation, which is causing a nuisance in my station.”
“A girl is dead, possibly murdered. He may have information. Please. Just a few minutes.”
The guard took a deep breath. “You get five minutes. After that, I let him go.”
Kyoko bowed. “Thank you, that’s all I need.”
He rose from his seat and led Kyoko to a door connected to another room. The other guard stood against the wall, arms folded and staring at Yuki Ichikawa, who sat in a chair at a table. The two guards spoke quickly and then left Kyoko alone with Yuki, closing the door behind them.
“Yuki Ichikawa,” she said as she approached the table, sitting in the chair across from him. “I’ve been looking for you.”
There was no response from him. He just sat quietly, staring at the table.
“In looking for you, I’ve learned a few things,” said Kyoko. “For one, I know Akane Suzuki’s idol career ended because of you. I also know that you were a source of friction between her and her parents. And that you complained to your neighbor about her infidelity.”
“You don’t know shit,” muttered Yuki. “I had nothing to do with Akane’s death.”
“I found some used condoms in her apartment. Three different men, all in the same day. What are the chances that one of those DNA samples is a match for you?”
“If you had anything on me, you’d have called the police. You wouldn’t be questioning me yourself.”
“I just want to know what part you played in Akane’s death.”
Yuki slammed his hands on the table. “Akane killed herself! She got drunk, she felt like shit, and she jumped! That’s it!”
He was getting agitated. Kyoko maintained her cool. “So why hide from my people, Yuki? Why did your mother refuse to tell us where you were? Why did you run out on me when I came to her house?”
Yuki shook his head. “You don’t know anything…”
“I know Akane was working at a hostess club because she had no other options. I know she was involved with drugs. And I know she was probably selling her body. Which is why the two of you weren’t on such great terms.”
Kyoko leaned forward and rested her hands on the table.
“I went to your apartment. Your neighbor said you hadn’t been there in some time. In fact, no one’s really seen you since Akane’s death. That seems a little strange, don’t you think?”
Yuki didn’t say anything.
“Where have you been, Yuki?”
He sighed. “I was at my mother’s.”
“Why?”
“Because I felt like shit, okay?” He scoffed and folded his arms, looking away. “Akane and I had our problems, sure. But I loved her. I’ve loved her since I was thirteen. I would’ve done anything for her.”
“And the infidelity?”
“When she started working at the hostess club, I was upset. I’d be lying in bed, staring at
the ceiling, imagining her at that club, all dolled up, with some old fart sitting next to her. His hand on her leg while she poured his drinks, lit his cigarettes, and flirted with him.”
Yuki sniffed and looked up at Kyoko. She could see his eyes had started to become glassy.
“You have any idea what that’s like?”
“No, I can’t say that I do,” said Kyoko. Although she had seen the other side. Her job had brought her into contact with a lot of women whose husbands were the ones cheating on them with girls like Akane.
He continued. “So yeah, it was stressful. We’d fight about her job. I’d try and tell her to find something different. She kept saying she was going to get back into the music business, but I told her to give it up. Get a job at an office or something, go back to school, talk to her parents—anything.”
His words hardly seemed believable. The way Yuki tried to make it sound, he was almost a stabilizing influence on Akane. But that didn’t seem to fit with everything else she’d learned up until this point.
“And the infidelity?”
Yuki sighed, looking down. “I was at her place. Akane was taking a shower and her phone beeped. I ignored it at first, but then it beeped again. The message was just sitting there on the lock screen, so I glanced at it. It was from some guy, telling her how amazing she was last night.”
“What happened after that?”
“I just stared at the screen. I couldn’t unlock her phone to read the rest of the message, but I knew what he was talking about. Just knew it.” Yuki looked down. “I sat there, staring at that damn screen, waiting for her to come out of the shower. Seemed like I was waiting for hours. When she finally came out, I looked up at her and showed her the phone. That look on her face…”
He sniffled again, this time wiping his eyes with his sleeve.
“Did she confirm?” asked Kyoko.
A nod. “She said she had no choice. That she needed the money. I got pissed. Told her that she should’ve asked me for help. I-I called her a slut. She cried, said she was sorry, said she loved me.”
