Blossoms of The Heart

by Khardine Gray

  We walked over to a group of seriously cool Japanese guys. Tattoos covered their bodies and they had all muscle and style. Leather jackets, cool hair, cigarettes and booze.

  Tai greeted them in Japanese and they started talking about the race.

  It was nice to hear the beautiful language being used in its casual setting, plus I liked how Tai sounded when he spoke it.

  “Who’s the babe?” the tallest guy asked. He then looked from me to Tai.

  Babe.

  I had to admit that I definitely didn’t mind all this attention.

  “Off limits.” Tai gave him a hard look.

  “Okay.” The guy said quickly, understanding.

  “This is Phoebe, Phoebe these are my guys, Dante,” Tai motioned at the guy he’d been talking to, “Xiao, Lee, Honto and H.”

  I noticed the way Tai spoke, as if commanding respect.

  “Hi.” I gave them a little wave and smiled. They smiled at me.

  “Cough it up, Xiao.” Tai put out his free hand.

  Xiao frowned and pulled a wad of money from his back pocket. There was a whole handful of yen.

  “How do you always know who won?” Xiao asked.

  “I just do.” Tai took the money and smiled. “Pleasure doing business with you.”

  He moved to go but stopped when something caught his eye. It was a bottle of red wine. The good stuff. Not because it was aged like the one Mitsuke and I ordered back at the club, but because it tasted nice.

  “Give me that.” Tai crooked his finger.

  “What? No, that’s for later,” Dante complained.

  “Fuck off, give me the wine,`” Tai said with more persistence.

  “You’re such a prick.” Dante handed it to him.

  I cast a sideways glance at Tai that he noted but didn’t acknowledge.

  I gave the guys another little smile as Tai pulled me away.

  “Where to now?”

  “The beach.”

  “We’re not watching the racing?” I was almost gearing myself up for it.

  “It’ll get too violent this time of night. I’ll take you to watch some other time, earlier.”

  I liked that he’d already planned that. He shifted his hand to the small of my back.

  “Won’t it be dark this time of night on the beach?”

  “Pitch black, baby.” He smiled down at me. “You scared?”

  “No,” I said quickly.

  “Don’t worry—I’ll protect you from the yōkai.”

  Again with the yōkai. I rolled my eyes at him.

  We walked past the people in cars getting ready to race and past the parked cars. That was where the sand began and the air seemed to get cooler. The lights also grew fainter with a few lights here and there but not bright enough to really see.

  We walked until the darkness enveloped us and Tai pulled me closer.

  There was a pit area that looked like people used it for bonfires. It was close to the shoreline that I could just make out in the moonlight. The waves pulled in and out like a gentle breath. It was peaceful.

  Tai released me and walked over to the pit. He pulled a lighter from his pocket, arranged a few fire coals that were already inside then got a fire started. As it got going I could see him clearer.

  He handed me the bottle of wine.

  “You want me to drink?”

  “Yup, unfortunately I can’t but it’ll be fun to see you get drunk.”

  That was a bad idea. “And fall off the bike?”

  “Just have a little bit.”

  “Why’d you take the drink away from your friends?” And how did they all just listen to him?

  “They work for me. I have a garage in town and we specialize in modifying cars.”

  “Really, so there’s more than the center?”

  “Twenty questions.” He smiled and sat by the fire. “We’re playing. This is us catching up.” He motioned for me to sit next to him.

  I smiled. Twenty questions was what we used to play every summer when we saw each other.

  I sat next to him. His eyes immediately dropped to my thighs as I twisted my legs to the side.

  Chapter 9

  Phoebe

  It was more like a hundred questions.

  His batch for me.

  I managed to answer without going into too many details. Basically without revealing the mess my life had been over the last six years. That was a long time for things to be bad and tonight I wanted to be as desirable as he made me feel.

  There was no way that I could have imagined myself sitting on Tokyo beach with Tai, the guy who’d haunted my fantasies for so many years.

  No way did he need to know that I’d married and divorced a complete jerk.

  Instead I talked about work and tried not to get turned on when I caught him looking at my breasts.

  I drank about a glass of wine, just enough to give me a buzz.

  “Two last questions each so choose wisely.” He held up two fingers.

  “You’ve rinsed me out. There’s no way you have more questions for me.”

  “I do, princess.”

  “Okay, you first.”

  “Nah, you. I insist.”

  There was one question on my mind and I’d avoided asking it this whole time.

  It was none of my business, but I wanted to know who that woman was from earlier. The one he left with at the center. He’d placed a protective arm around her as they’d gone through the door and they’d looked like they were involved. Granted, many people could have thought that about us tonight as he held my hand.

  I didn’t want to just come out and ask him because for a start it would show that I had some level of interest in him that would make me want to ask him about her, and next I shouldn’t be going there.

  Business. I was here for business. All work and no play were bad, but I hadn’t even begun to work yet, and playing was…

  Well I thought playing was best left to the back of my shelf of life. I’d been through too much recently and I needed to get back on my feet. Step one was being in Japan.

  The bad thing was, curiosity was building within me. That good old curiosity that always drew me to him.

  So far, he’d brought me up to speed on his whole family. His parents were both here permanently. Back when I knew him they lived in LA. And he, like me, would travel between Japan and the States to see Akito in the summer.

  His brother was still in the army, captain now.

  Tai had told me pretty much everything.

  What could I ask him first that could potentially ease in the girlfriend question?

  It came to me. “Back in Iraq, were you ever scared?” That was a normal question, one we could talk about and it was a conversation builder.

  “No,” he answered flatly to my dismay.

  Damn him. He was supposed to go into more details not just say no flat out. I at least thought he’d maybe tell me about one of his missions where he could have been scared, but wasn’t.

  “Really, you go to a war zone for God knows how long and you were never scared. Not even once?”

  He cocked a brow and straightened up, making his dog tags clink, and smirked at me.

  “That your second question?”

  “What?”

  “You want to know if I seriously wasn’t scared?” The devil, he knew he had me. I was willing to guess that he knew what I really wanted to ask but was stalling.

  “No.”

  He chuckled. “What’s your second question, princess?” His gaze searched mine.

  I released a sigh and thought screw it. I’d just ask him.

  “The woman at the institute you left with. Was that your girlfriend?” Heat flushed through me the minute I spoke. I wished I’d had the sense not to ask because there was no way I could have asked the question and not look interested.

  He looked pleased with the question and my embarrassed reaction. Of course because I’d landed myself in that one too.

  “Maybe,” he answere
d, again to my dismay and added annoyance.

  Who gave answers like that?

  “You have a maybe girlfriend? That means she is.”

  “My dear, your questions are up.”

  “It’s part of the same question.”

  “No, that was not part of the same question.” He shook his head and grinned when I frowned. “My turn.”

  Mischief flickered in his eyes and then spread all over his face. Mischief and something else. Something hot, sensual… sexual.

  “What are you going to ask me, Tai? You should see your face.” I too straightened up to get prepared for his last two questions.

  “Oh princess, you should see my mind.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him. Something told me to either answer his questions in the same vague manner in which he had, or refuse to answer altogether.

  “What are your questions, Tai?”

  “Are you seeing anybody?”

  “I can see many people. What do you mean specifically?” Good, that was a clever answer.

  He laughed. “Are you single, baby, as in not seeing anyone, unattached, just you?”

  “That your second question?” I threw his words back at him.

  “You can’t play me. You’re terrible at it. That was definitely one question and you know it. People generally tend to get the drift when asked if they’re seeing anyone.”

  Shit, he was right.

  “Fine, no I’m not seeing anyone. I’m single.”

  The look that washed over his face was unreadable. Strange, strange indeed.

  It was almost like he was hoping I’d say I wasn’t single, but then the mischief returned.

  “Do I even want to know the next question?”

  “I’m thinking.”

  “You never asked if I had any pets.”

  “Because I don’t want to know if you have pets.”

  His eyes dropped to my tits and he smiled wide. My nipples hardened and thankfully the cover of the soft amber glow from the fire wasn’t bright enough to show the imprint I knew they’d leave against my dress.

  The dress had a built-in bra but that wasn’t enough for a woman with double-digit boobs.

  “What do you want to know?” I prodded.

  “Are your tits real? They look a lot bigger than when I last saw you.”

  My eyes bulged. “You can’t ask me that?”

  “I know but I was pretty certain that trying to feel you up would either make you slap me and run off down the dark beach, or slap me and try to get a taxi from here. Or maybe you would have enjoyed it. Never contemplated that in the possibilities.”

  Jesus Christ. Who talked like that?

  The Tai I knew eleven years ago came out with some bizarre things, but this was on a different level. It was like he’d gotten better at being bad.

  Shocking people.

  “What is the matter with you?”

  “Nothing.”

  “So you’re going for my tits and my ass?”

  He laughed out loud. “Don’t get me started, Phoebe. Plus you need to answer the question.”

  Oh I had the perfect answer for him, one he couldn’t get himself around. I leaned forward, giving him a good look at a healthy amount of cleavage.

  “Maybe.”

  “Maybe what? So they’re real or not.”

  “Maybe.” I lifted my shoulder into a shrug. The breeze lifted the ends of my hair, making it flutter.

  His face fell, realizing that I’d mastered the game and thrown his tricks back in his face. Victory.

  He looked at my tits again and that desire came back.

  He shuffled and pulled out a cigarette from his back pocket. Lit up and drew on it.

  “You smoke?” I never knew that.

  “That another question you’re trying to sneak in?”

  “No, it’s a general question. Same as asking me if I’m cold or something.”

  “Are you?”

  “No.”

  “Smoke when I’m stressed.”

  “Stressed?” There was definitely a shift in his mood. “You smoke when you’re stressed?”

  He drew in the smoke and let it out, reminding me of a clip I’d seen of James Dean.

  “Smoking, or angry fucking. Smoking seemed like the safer choice unless… you’re game.”

  I didn’t know how many more times I could be shocked tonight.

  The crazy part of this was I was completely turned on and now I was thinking about him bending me over and taking me from behind.

  I’d bet I would enjoy it.

  I’d also bet that wine did a number on me because what the hell was I thinking?

  He was looking at me like he really expected me to answer that.

  “Never did get that far, did we?” He added but something else flickered in those eyes that tamped down his lustful watch over me. I didn’t know what it was, but it looked like hurt.

  Last time Mom had walked in on us making out. I would have slept with him, handed over my V card to him and it would have been a lot more special than the way I threw it away back in college. A one-night stand with Todd Jefferson, one of the big men on campus types who thought he owned the world because he was the president of the Sigma Kappas and his father was the mayor of California.

  Tai observed my silence, drew in another puff and held out the cigarette for me to take.

  I did not smoke and I’d never tried, but like most things Tai gave me, I took it thinking this was like drinking when you shared a bottle. It was sociable.

  He watched me in that predatory manner I’d seen on his face earlier as I placed the cigarette to my lips and drew in some smoke just the way he did.

  It didn’t look all that hard when he did it.

  Again I blamed my lack of common sense on the drink and the rugged angles of Tai’s jaw. I drew in too much smoke and started coughing. God, my throat was on fire.

  I stood up, dizzy and coughing.

  Tai got up and took hold of me, rubbing my back as I coughed.

  I smacked him in his chest when I regained some of my footing.

  “You asshole, why did you give me that?”

  He laughed. “You weren’t supposed to take it.” He dropped the cigarette and immediately the ember burned out on contact with the sand.

  “You offered it to me so I thought I’d be fine.”

  “Must you take everything I give you?”

  “It’s because I stupidly assume you’d never hurt me.”

  His expression turned more serious. “I wouldn’t.”

  He held my gaze, still holding my waist.

  We stared at each other in silence for a few seconds. The moonlight, the soft shush of the sea pulling in and out from the shore like a breath, the faint sounds of car engines in the background as the racing continued.

  It was a moment, and in that moment I felt a peaceful sensation I hadn’t felt in years.

  “I’m not the same old Phoebe.” I broke the silence.

  That Phoebe he knew still had a bright future. She didn’t know yet that in that future she wouldn’t be able to have children, or that she would marry an asshole who made her feel like shit.

  “Oh but you are,” he breathed, getting close again. “You still look at me the same.”

  I wasn’t aware that I was looking at him any differently, but maybe I was.

  “I’m not eighteen anymore.” Like that should mean anything. I’d already said something like that earlier today.

  A wicked smile danced on his lips and there was something I just realized.

  He’d changed a lot, but he still looked at me the same too. That curious look, guarded yet filled with interest, want and desire.

  “Not eighteen and not off limits. No mommy dearest around to protect her princess from the tattooed freak.”

  My mom actually called him that. I’d never forget it.

  I reached up and toughed the exposed skin on his chest. I ran my finger along what I could see of a Japanese character for fire.r />
  He couldn’t see it now but I had one just like it on my lower back.

  “I like your tattoos.”

  He moved his face closer to mine. “I know. Same as I know I shouldn’t kiss you on your first day back in Japan, but fuck it.”

  His lips came crashing down on mine and I met his kiss with my own, the power of desire fueling me.

  God, it was like I couldn’t kiss him enough or reach enough of his lips to satisfy me.

  I wanted him to devour me the same way that he kissed me.

  This was from not finishing what we started years ago, and from me trying to find a guy who wasn’t like him. Someone my mother would approve of.

  Tai smoothed his hands up my neck and cupped the back of my head to bring me closer. I welcomed the thrusts of his slick, hot tongue into my mouth and sucked on it, surprising him.

  He kissed me harder, feasting on my mouth. Kissing me like he too couldn’t get enough.

  I didn’t even feel when his hands left my head. All I could feel was fire all over my body before his hands were on my breasts, squeezing and kneading, flicking over my nipples.

  I moaned into his mouth .

  “They’re real,” he whispered against my lips, a smile in his voice.

  “Yes.” I breathed.

  “Jesus Christ.” He pulled back slightly and we both watched him squeeze my right breast and move across the hard nub of my nipple, pressing against the cup inside the dress. He dropped his hands and stepped back, pulling in a deep breath. “I have to take you home now.”

  “Home?” As in to his house or…

  “Akito’s. Catch up over.” He was so abrupt like he wanted to get away from me yet looked at me like he wanted me.

  Calm down. Chill, breathe.

  I needed to because my heart was galloping.

  He scanned over me again and I wondered if he knew deep down there was something wrong with me.

  “Why?” I had to ask. Had to know that he wasn’t rejecting me.

  “It’s complicated.”

  Chapter 10

  Tai

  Jesus Christ.

  I knew, knew, I shouldn’t have kissed her.

  But there was no way that I could have helped myself.

  I remembered where we left off eleven years ago. I remembered how I felt.