Shadow Reaper

by Christine Feehan

  As he neared the end of the tube, he slowed, hating to lose precious seconds, but he couldn't take chances. Ryuu was nowhere in sight, but again, shadows raced up the walls and under the doors. Ricco stepped into the nearest one and followed it under the door of the caretaker's suite, to the outside, private entrance provided for Darin.

  Ryuu was waiting, standing draped against the ornate column just outside the door. Ricco couldn't see any resemblance to Mariko. Ryuu was almost the spitting image of his father, Daiki Tanaka. He grinned at Ricco.

  "Ferraro."

  "Tanaka."

  "So you know."

  Ricco nodded. He took the time to allow his body to catch up with itself. His heart needed to find a calm, steady rhythm while he assessed his opponent. Ryuu couldn't stand straight. His back appeared to be twisted just enough to throw one shoulder higher and his frame on the right side forward. Still, he was a handsome man by most standards.

  "I see Nao stomping you into the ground when you were a baby didn't stop you from learning to use the shadows," Ricco said. Ryuu was an intelligent man. He would need to show Ricco how smart he'd been. The more they talked, the better the chances that Ricco could find every weakness.

  "Nao had nothing to do with my bones. That was my dear sister--the woman who claims she's my sister. She was playing in a car and took it out of gear. It rolled over me."

  Ricco shook his head. "I suppose Osamu told you that lie. She was very good at manipulation. Mariko told me you were intelligent, but that can't be true if you didn't recognize Osamu's madness and hear the lies in her voice."

  "Riders can hear lies," Ryuu informed him. "I'm a rider and I never once heard a lie in my mother's voice."

  "Your mother was Marie Tanaka."

  "My mother was Osamu Saito," Ryuu explained patiently. "Daiki Tanaka was my father. Look at me if you don't believe me."

  "I am looking at you, and I see a fool."

  Ryuu smirked. "I spent so much time in your house I know the entire layout by heart. I photographed it foot by foot for Nao. He was obsessed with you. Totally obsessed. He thought you were a god. The perfect rider." He snorted his derision. "I was right under his nose and he didn't even know it. All those years, sucking his company dry and he never suspected until I let him know it was me." He laughed softly. "Nao, sitting on this throne, believing he was better than me because he had the pure blood of a rider."

  "It must have been difficult listening to his bragging. I knew him when he was seventeen. He was a braggart and bully then, too."

  Ryuu shrugged. He moved position just slightly, easing his weight from his right leg. "I found him tedious. I was stealing him blind, right under his nose, and all he could do was wonder what you were doing, what you were up to, how many women you'd screwed, what paintings you were acquiring."

  "Why?" He didn't take his eyes off Ryuu, breathing evenly, his body relaxed now and waiting. Coiling to strike. To defend. Every defense was an offense.

  "He wanted to be you." Ryuu smirked again. "I used to talk about you with him, show him all the magazines. He went to every race you were driving in. I switched out the casing for your car and made certain he was at the race to watch you go right into the wall. I had a difficult time deciding who to watch--you crashing or him watching you crash. I chose him. The expression on his face was well worth it."

  "Why would you hate him so much if you don't believe he was the one who twisted your bones? He's Osamu's nephew."

  "He took Eiji and Hachiro from us--my true brothers. Both were great riders and he was jealous of them. He tried to dishonor them. He was driving the car that killed them and he'd been drinking."

  Ricco shook his head. "Eiji, Hachiro, Kenta Ito and Nao murdered the Tanaka family. Nao pulled you out of a closet and stomped on you. Mariko saved you by kicking him in the groin. She was just a baby, too."

  "That's bullshit. Everyone knows the story, apart from Nao's guilt. His father refused to allow anyone to tell the truth of it. My brothers were lost to us and the entire rider community. No one did anything about it."

  "Ryuu, does that really make sense to you? She raised you on hatred and revenge. Every moment of your existence, she forged a weapon against those she perceived as her enemies."

  "They were her enemies. They were enemies to the entire riding community."

  "Mariko was an innocent child, just as you were. Why would Osamu target her? Why would she have you turn on your own sister?"

  "She's not my sister," Ryuu spat the venomous statement out, his face twisted with hatred.

  Behind Ricco, Mariko gasped. He silently swore. He didn't want her to hear any of this, to see the evidence of just how far gone her brother was. He'd been raised by a madwoman and he believed every word she'd said.

  "She's a Tanaka. Even if Marie wasn't your mother, Ryuu, by your own admission, Daiki is your father. That makes Mariko your half sister."

  "A whore? Osamu said she would sleep with you, and she has." Ryuu raised his gaze to his sister's face. "Haven't you?"

  It was the small distraction Ricco waited for. He slid across the entryway, slamming the ball of his foot into Ryuu's right thigh, his full body weight behind the kick. Ryuu went down hard and Ricco was on him. He couldn't just kill Ryuu, not with Mariko watching, and that gave Ryuu a huge advantage. He hit him hard in the pit of his stomach and Ryuu jackknifed his body, drawing up his knees and slamming his feet into Ricco's chest, knocking him back.

  Ryuu leapt to his feet, limping now but coming at Ricco, pressing him hard. Ricco feigned falling back a step or two and then went to the right, kicking the leg again, this time a solid round kick, targeting the exact same spot. Ryuu's face paled a little, but he kept moving, switching to a left-handed stance to better protect his leg.

  "Stop. Ryuu, stop," Mariko pleaded. "You don't know what you're doing."

  "Shut the fuck up," Ryuu snapped, never taking his eyes from Ricco. "You don't talk to me. You're dead to me. You always have been. You're nothing but a little whore like your mother."

  "Ryuu, you don't mean that."

  Ricco winced at the pleading in her voice. He hated this for her. He knew there was no taking back all those years of Osamu whispering to Ryuu, turning him into her instrument of revenge. He had wanted to be loved, and Osamu loved him as long as he did exactly what she said.

  "I despise you." Ryuu spat on the floor. "She took you in and even allowed you to become a rider, but you were never grateful. You were just like your mother, always flirting with Dai until she had to send him away. When he pleaded to come home, she relented, but there you were, trying to lure him to your bed."

  "I didn't," Mariko denied.

  Ricco heard the tears now. His woman was crying. Her heart breaking. He feinted a punch, forcing Ryuu to turn his body just enough. He landed another solid kick.

  Ryuu's gaze went desperately around the entryway, seeking a shadow. His right leg had to be numb, a dead leg. Ricco had many of those during early training years before he'd learned to protect his legs. Ryuu had been taught to ride the shadows and he definitely had trained in hand-to-hand combat, martial arts and street fighting, but he didn't have the years of training and experience that Ricco did.

  Ricco circled him, keeping him away from the shadows, forcing him to drag his right leg around to keep Ricco in sight at all times.

  "She lied to you," Mariko said. "She lied, Ryuu, about everything."

  "I told you not to talk to me," Ryuu said, his voice low and vicious. He kept his attention seemingly centered on Ricco, moving awkwardly forward with a series of punches. At the last moment, he flung himself to the side, right at Mariko.

  There was a large shadow directly behind her. Mariko stood her ground, and Ryuu slammed into her hard. He punched her twice in the mouth.

  "Keep your filthy mouth shut," he spat at her as he rolled, coming up on his feet triumphantly right at the front of the tube.

  She staggered back under the assault, but didn't lose her footing. She reac
hed out a hand to her brother. "Ryuu." Just his name whispered.

  He looked back at her.

  Mariko cried out. "Don't."

  The last was said to Sacha Archambault. He emerged from the shadow directly behind Ryuu and caught his head in both hands.

  "Justice is served," Sacha said as he wrenched hard.

  There was an audible crack. Mariko screamed and went to her knees. Sacha dropped the body and looked at Ricco.

  "I'm sorry she was here," he said softly.

  Ricco nodded and went to her, wrapping his arms around her, forcing her to her feet. They had to get out of there and leave the cleanup to the people in charge. They were riders. They dispensed justice.

  "It's over, farfallina mia. Let's go home." What else was there to say? Now he had to find a way to keep her with him.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  "It's been a month," Mariko said softly. She'd filled her days with making Ricco's house her home. He'd told her to change anything she wanted and she took him at his word. The International Council had decreed that the families pay restitution to her and Ricco. Hers was an enormous sum, one she could barely deal with. She'd turned the headache of all that money to Ricco's financial people.

  She made her way through the house to the Japanese garden. It had become her favorite place since her brother's death. There was no reason to go back to Japan, although she would always love her country. She couldn't bear going there when there was no one to go to. She crossed the bridge over the koi pond, pausing to watch the fish swimming lazily. She found peace in watching them, naming them, studying the variety of koi and trying to identify them.

  Ricco had been more than good to her--always patient--never asking anything of her. They shared the same bed and he hadn't touched her until she'd turned to him. He was gentle with her, loving, never going wild, and she often sensed the restraint in him but hadn't had the energy to tell him she wanted his wild. Or his Shibari. She'd heard him several times in the workout room, hitting the heavy bag, and she hadn't gone to him. She should have.

  "Mariko?"

  Emmanuelle's voice made her smile. She looked up and both Emmanuelle and Francesca were walking toward her. She stopped at the entrance to the elaborate tea house that Ricco had built in his garden. It was traditional style and very beautiful. She loved it and spent quite a bit of time there meditating. Emmanuelle and Francesca came every day to see her and knew to find her in the tea house.

  She flashed a genuine smile, the first she'd felt in a month. "I'm glad you've come," she greeted. "I'll make us tea. There are things that need to be said."

  Emmanuelle and Francesca exchanged a worried frown. "Things that need to be said?" Francesca echoed. "Do you need us to get Ricco? Are you all right?"

  "Finally. I'm finally all right." Mariko stepped into the tea house and looked around it. There was peace and serenity in this building. "Ricco told me he'd built this place of meditation hoping someday to find a woman who would enjoy it with him. I know I'm that woman. I was born to be that woman." She said it with absolute confidence.

  Francesca and Emmanuelle looked relieved. They followed her into the building and sank down onto the comfortable low chairs across from her. The sound of the waterfall traveling downhill over the rocks to fall into the pool soothed her. She looked at their faces. She had come to love them in the last month. They'd been as patient as Ricco with her. Neither pushed, but they let her know they were there.

  "I have to let Ryuu go. The brother I loved so much died that day when I lost the rest of my family. He never had the chance to have a normal life. I was clinging to the man I wanted him to be, the one I made up in my head in order to survive. That man wasn't my brother." She looked down at her hands. "I've grieved long enough for someone who didn't exist."

  She looked up at the two women who had been her constant support. "I have a family now, and I'm not going to risk losing it to cling to someone who never actually existed. I'm sorry it's taken me so long to come to that realization."

  "You have the right to take all the time you need," Emmanuelle assured. "We are your family and we'll always be here for you."

  The dark shadow in Mariko, the one that had been weighing her down for so many weeks, lifted even further. "I've never been a part of a family that I can remember, so I'm going to make mistakes. I hope you both will find it in you to be tolerant."

  Francesca laughed softly. "We're Ferraros. We have to be tolerant of one another. You might want to remember that today."

  "Today? What's different about today?"

  Francesca and Emmanuelle exchanged another look and then both turned their full attention on her, eyes sparkling with mischief, reminding her of Ricco when he was up to something--which was often.

  "Oh dear. What are you up to now? If you make me a part of it, how upset is Ricco going to be?"

  "Ricco isn't as patient as he might be, not when it comes to you," Francesca said.

  Mariko shook her head. "No, he's been amazing. Far better than I deserve. I lost sight of what I had right in front of me. I'm lucky he is so patient. Another man might have walked away."

  "If he walked away, Mariko," Emmanuelle said, "he didn't really love you in the first place and you'd be better off without him."

  There was something in her voice that had both women looking sharply at her. She flashed them a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. She shook her head and forced a smile. "We've come to help you get ready."

  "Ready for what? There's nothing on the calendar. Did I miss an important event?" Her stomach tightened. They really were up to something, and her gut told her it was big.

  "Just the fact that you're getting married today."

  Mariko's breath stilled in her lungs. Ricco had been watching her closely, but he hadn't brought up marriage other than to have her fill out the necessary papers to apply for residency since she wasn't from the United States. "That's impossible."

  "Ricco is a Ferraro. Nothing is impossible. We brought everything for you to get ready. Stefano is giving you away and we're standing up for you." Emmanuelle looked immensely pleased at the idea.

  "But I've been so difficult lately," Mariko said. "No." She shook her head. "I need to talk to him first." She had to tell him she was sorry for spending so much time mourning a brother, mother and father who were never real in her life.

  Francesca flashed another smile. "At least you aren't protesting getting married. If you did, he said we were to remind you of your promise."

  Mariko rolled her eyes. Of course he would throw that silly promise at her--that she'd marry him at the time he chose. So, he was choosing now. She was thankful that she'd come to the realization that the family she had right in front of her, the people willing to love her, were worth far more than the ones who had rejected her.

  If he was insisting on marrying her without any preparation, at least the wedding would have to be small, not the huge event the paparazzi would attend and splash across the cover of every magazine. She didn't want a billionaire's wedding. Or even a celebrity's wedding. She wanted the ceremony to be about them, not about the hundred-thousand-dollar dress and fifty-thousand-dollar cake.

  "We need to get started," Emmanuelle said. "Ricco might have decreed you get married today, but he doesn't know what we've got planned."

  "Rose petals for your bed. Tons of them," Francesca said.

  "I've got a few plans as well," Mariko said. "Let's get started. At least I've just bathed." She'd been late getting up and Ricco had already been gone. She was upset with herself over that. He liked early morning sex and yet he hadn't disturbed her. That might have been the catalyst for her finally realizing she was throwing away something good over something unreal.

  The next two hours went by very quickly. The two women styled her hair simply, pulling it back to let it hang in loose curls down her neck. They did her makeup flawlessly, smoky eyes and an accent of dark lipstick that made her look terribly sexy.

  Her gown was her dream gown, one
from a designer, Yumi Katsuri. She'd loved her work and often looked at the gowns online, never thinking she'd actually get married in one of her creations. She had mentioned the designer one time to Ricco, in passing, and he must have remembered. Of course he had. He remembered everything she said to him. If he thought it important enough, he took the time to get whatever it was, or do it for her immediately. He had discussed having the designer make her a one-of-a-kind gown, but she didn't want to spend that kind of money.

  Even though she now could buy anything she wanted, she had been very frugal growing up and living on the tiny amount she was given. Everything she bought had been carefully chosen. She'd seen so much poverty and so many others in need that she'd been very grateful for what she had. She wanted to stay that way, and she wanted her children to value what they had and be aware of what others didn't. In her mind, it was a splurge to have a wedding gown so beautiful, and as it was, she knew the gown chosen was expensive, just not by Ferraro standards.

  It had a modified ivory halter top, fitted to her perfectly. The dress dropped into swirls of white tulle, layer after layer, so it appeared light and airy.

  Mariko touched the dress reverently and then brushed her hand along the Swarovski crystals adorning the top. "I love the crystals." It was becoming real now that she had the dress on. Her heart began to pound. She was marrying Ricco Ferraro. She would be his wife, beloved by him, cherished by him. It seemed a fairy tale, something she might have read about in one of the thousands of books she'd read. She never believed she would find a man who would really love her, let alone make her the center of his universe.

  "Um, honey," Francesca said. "Those aren't crystals."

  Mariko frowned, her eyes meeting Francesca's in the mirror. "They are. Believe me, I've read the description of this dress a million times. I've always loved it."

  "This dress was specially made for you. Those are diamonds."

  Mariko's breath caught in her throat. "He didn't."

  "I'm afraid he did," Emmanuelle said. "It was fitted just for you and the neckline made with diamonds. He said something about how he loved the way diamonds looked on your bare skin and he wanted to see that when you came up the aisle toward him. He also sent these earrings and a necklace."