Page 62 of Hercules

“Nobody puts Baby in a corner.” Despite his admirable ease about whipping that one out, he matched the solemnity of Swayze’s delivery tone for tone. Nobody in this room was going to put Lois’s story in a corner either, which had him prompting, “So you found out that the plan really wasn’t for a summer in the Catskills, and your parents were actually planning an escape of some sort. From where? Their jobs? The city itself?”

She canted her head, looking more self-conscious than before. “Bigger than that.”

“The country itself?”

He dropped his head at the same angle, battling to read deeper into her tense expression. But she didn’t offer even half a glance in return, and Herc’s stomach fell.

“Shit,” he growled, tempted to string out the vowel in place of his next thought. But why? The delay wouldn’t make any difference. “Lois. Was your dad involved with the yakuza?”

Two unignorable factors were his fast confirmation. He finally got her full stare, newly coated in ten shades of scared. Unbelievably that wasn’t as confirming as her fingers’ violent shivers.

“Not at first,” she finally murmured. “He had a high-end accounting position at a real financial firm and didn’t learn about the mob’s connection to it for a while. He was fully done with his first job for them before the truth started unraveling. He honestly thought he was just doing a favor for one of his supervisors.”

“Who was a yakuza operative?” he asked, already hating where it led her composure again. But even with the sheen in her eyes and the corners of her mouth tightly clipped, she fortified her head and squared her shoulders, bravely intent on giving him the whole story.

“Not just an operative,” she said. “I mean, to me he was just a good-natured uncle at first. Nao Ito was the generous guy who always brought presents and good luck trinkets from the shrine. But my goodwill fizzled as I got older, noticing more of my parents’ apprehension when Oje Ito came to visit.” The tension spread inward, now taking over the whole of her mouth. “Yet very little changed as the years went by. I escaped the tension at home by focusing on school. Joined a bunch of clubs and even led the book club for a while. When I started writing short stories too, Father even dubbed me his sakkachan. Oh, God.” A flush rushed her cheeks. “I was so furious when he started to use it in front of my friends too.”

Though the blush remained, she looked both humbled and mortified to have admitted the factoid. He wasted no time to repeat, “Sakkachan.” Then pulled back a little, mentally aligning the syllables with her adorable features. “Like little writer? It fits…almost as well as scribester.”

A light chuckle bubbled from her lips. “Almost, eh?”

The levity presented a perfect detour to chase, taking advantage of the light distraction to land them both back in the pillows, sweaty and sexed up—but they had a bigger subject to finish here. A more meaningful piece of her that he craved to discover.

“So.” He had to grit his teeth while finding her hand and threading their fingers. Touching this woman’s skin was better than angora silk, and nothing would ever change his mind about it. Though the detour beckoned his brain again, he fought past it. “There you were, living a double teenage life…”

“Accurate,” she supplied, the sarcastic edges betraying her sincerity. “And yes, it was as hellish as it sounds. By the time I turned fifteen, I’d really become that pouty and moody stereotype. I’m sure my parents felt helpless to do anything, because they knew exactly why. I’d begun to see the luxury for what it really was. My pretty clothes and dream library, the lavish birthday parties and group vacations to Hayama resorts…they were all links in the golden handcuffs that those bastards had on my father. Buy-offs for his silence about the illegal activities being whitewashed through the company.”

Herc offered a strict nod, sensing she needed strong understanding more than fuzzy strokes at this point. “But your parents had the escape funds. And hopefully, by that time, a plan for how to use them.”

Lois nodded. “They finally sat me down and let me in on everything, not that I hadn’t already written the whole book in my brain.”

“Of course.” And just like that, he abdicated to syllables of softness. Unsurprisingly, his Erastís had possessed the wisdom of a mage and the insight of a seer even in girlhood. He had to make sure she heard his awe and admiration for it.

“My father secured us tickets for San Francisco, even paying for round-trip fares so they’d electronically appear like the family vacation he told everyone we were taking. I told the same story to my school friends but entrusted the truth to only one. Chiyo was my closest confidante and caught me crying in the bathroom because of having to lie to her. I was fifteen, and leaving my best friend behind felt impossible even under those circumstances. I couldn’t hold in the sorrow any longer.”

Before she paused with the heartrending hitch in her words, Herc was freshly tense. Her recount already set up the hopscotch course in his mind. It took painful, brief seconds to get to the inevitable end square.

Private school. Lavish parties. Group vacations.

Well, shit.

He took two necessary seconds to utter that part aloud before rendering more of his thoughts. “Chiyo’s dad also worked for Uncle Ito, didn’t he?”

Lois’s face crumpled. Battalions of awful emotions battled for control there, but Herc only focused on the larger campaign. The remorse and shame he’d be able to spot from ten miles away, much less ten inches. He’d lived too damn long with both.

While he struggled to say all that in more eloquent terms, Lois dropped her head. Her shoulders shook.

“I should’ve known better,” she rasped. “Should’ve remembered that Chiyo was generationally loyal to those bastards, before…”

“What?” he prompted when her pause dragged for way too many concerning seconds. “Before what, Yamaneko?”

He’d already noted the poetic name and made a note to use it for prime startlement factor; he just didn’t know the opportunity would spring up so fast. But it accomplished the trick. Before she finished snapping up her head, there was a fresh sheen across the surfaces of those stunning whisky eyes. And the thrum of thanksgiving in the hand she lifted to his chest.

A precious moment, not lasting long enough. Defined lines of sadness crept over her features once more.

“Before Ito took our secret straight to the top of the organization, and my father was a marked man” —she gulped hard before clearly forcing herself on— “but he was also a smart one and was monitoring internal message threads in deep ghost mode. He knew about the hit order as soon as it came down the line. That was when he also knew…”

“That he had to get you and your mom out of Japan.”