As the words fell out of my mouth, we both froze in our places. I couldn't believe that it took me this long to realize my true feelings for him. I covered my mouth in shock as the memories of me humiliating myself in front of him replayed in my brain. The pent-up emotion had finally taken its toll and burst out of my foolish mouth. Hiro gently lowered his fork, put the hood of his jacket up, and wiped his mouth with a napkin.
"I-I didn't mean to boss you around or anyth– "
Like a flash of lightning, he turned and bolted in my direction. It caught me off-guard and we both sunk in deeper into the bean bag with him on top of me. After a millisecond of processing what had just happened, I reached around hug him back. He squeezed me tight in his embrace.
"No one has ever cared for me as much as you do," he whispered.
"That cheesecake really is something, huh?" Tadashi mentioned; leaning on the doorframe with his arm folded.
"Ah!' I panicked and pushed my friend off. "It's not what you think!"
"Have you ever heard of knocking?" Hiro shrugged of the pain of hitting the floor.
"Yes, but I'm here to call you for an emergency meeting since everyone is still awake. I can postpone it by another ten minutes if you need some time to yourself."
"I told you, it's not like that!" I blushed.
"Sheesh…okay. We'll start in 5. I've prepared the case file." He turned and left without a second look.
I stared at the floor in shame at the misunderstanding.
"I might need to put carpets on my floor if you're gonna keep pushing me off, that hurts," Hiro stood up and offered me a hand.
"Sorry, I panicked."
"It's okay. We can talk about it later."
"What do we tell them?" I took his hand.
"What do you mean?"
"They'll think we're just snogging all the time."
"They know me better than that. And they'll get over it. I'm more offended about the ten minutes," he left the room.
"Huh?" I ran to catch up with him.
"Nothing."
We walked quietly to our usual meeting spot. Hiro held my hand and strolled in casually before sitting on our designated seats. I might have shrieked a little by the quaint behavior of my friend.
I could see his brothers trying hard not to laugh as to not offend me. I didn't think they would have cared about what their brother did. It was more of a punishment for me. I wasn't used to this side of Hiro at all.
"Erm…" Kenji cleared his throat. "Sorry for the interruption, but I think that this emergency meeting is necessary. Due to our recent hectic schedule, we had completely forgotten about the anniversary of our grandfather's passing."
"Crap!" my friend cussed as he checked the date on his wristwatch.
"It's tomorrow, the crematorium has prepared the shrine for our annual tradition. I hope you have your clothes ready for the ceremony. Makoto has prepared a spare Haori for Ms. Ren. Hiro, I trust that you will fill her in on what to do. Tadashi, station more security around the premises."
"What about mother?" Hiro asked the elephant in the room.
"About that, we need to bring her with us," Tadashi furrowed his brows.
"What?! But you're putting everyone at risk! You gave us a week to figure out a perfect solution before releasing her. God knows where she might go and who she has on her side," Hiro scowled.
I grabbed his hand under the table to conceivably calm him down. "Though I agreed with your statement, Tadashi must have had a plan; perhaps an ambush or a bait."
"Correct. And it would simply be wrong to break tradition."
"To hell with your tradition! One wrong move and the whole case to go up in flames," Hiro clenched his fists.
"Now, now, Hiro. I'm aware that the success of our case is partially your responsibility, but let's hear what Tadashi has to say," Kenji mediated.
The irate brother let out a heavy sigh and crossed his arms, "fine."
"I did a background check on our parent's branch family and I found something interesting in the file," Tadashi threw a copy across the table. "In there you can see that Ren's lecturer, Mr. Smith, is in fact related to Kelly Smith, our mother."
"I knew I saw the name somewhere, but I assumed it was just a coincidence," I flipped through the report.
"Ren, dear. Coincidence is a rare occurrence in this nasty industry."
"So, what's your plan?" the youngest sibling set the papers aside.
"Well, Mr. Smith had a covert history of being employed by a branch company of Roberto's side of the Tanaka clan."
"Cyber security!" I exclaimed.
"Yes, and we have a considerable reason to believe that he might show up tomorrow if we manage to make that woman an interesting enough bait. His visit would essentially be for surveillance purposes, but if we're lucky, he might try to rescue her himself."
"How do you plan to provoke him?"
"Stage a kidnapping, of course," Tadashi smirked proudly.
Kenji buried his face in his palms. I assumed that it was the most fool proof but dangerous strategy that he allowed his brother to execute.
"What's the success rate?" Hiro asked blandly.
"If everyone does their parts according to my plan, I'd say 100%."
The two youngest brothers stared at each other for what felt like an eternity. Eventually, Hiro exhaled and stood up from his chair.
"Should things go south, I'm not taking responsibility for the failure. C'mon, we have a lot to prepare," he grabbed my arm and walked away.
"Evidently. I'll send the rest to your e-mail."
Kenji was right about how much those two fight with each other over everything. I assumed the argumentative approach they had contained an underlying tone of affection that neither of them managed to show properly in a healthy way. In a way, it was their way of taking care of each other and approving the other's decisions. At the end of the day, those two would trust the other with their life.