Chapter 24

It’s only when I’m lying on the floor of the bedroom I’d seen earlier, curled in blankets that smell like Yukimi, that the guilt catches up like a slow-moving sludge.

I’ve been running around as a fox with Yukimi—frolicking, damn it—and I’m not any closer to why I came here. I’ve been letting her control me, manipulate me into doing what she wants. I ate the anburojia, I shapeshifted for her, and I went to bed like a good little boy when I was done.

I’m chasing a memory. Okāsan doesn’t exist anymore.

My throat clenches on a knife-sharp feeling. My hands are still shaky, my forehead dotted with sweat, the lingering taste of anburojia sour on my tongue. This bedroom has no windows, but the darkness isn’t helping me fall asleep, no matter how strongly fatigue tugs me down. I glance at my watch: 6:24 a.m.

Gwen. She’s usually a night owl, waking up around noon on weekends, but the lure of Japan has been dragging her out of bed at ungodly early hours.

What is she going to do when she sees my empty bed? What is she going to do when she tries calling me, and my phone goes straight to voicemail?

I crawl out of my tangle of blankets. Now is no time for sleep.

My legs wobble beneath me, my kneecaps like Jell-O. My stomach growls, and the thought of anburojia makes my mouth water so hard it hurts. I shake my head. No addictive fruits for breakfast. No breakfast at all. Time to get up and go.

I’m halfway to the door when it creaks open. I see the silhouette of a woman.

“Yukimi?” I whisper.

“Oh, sorry.” It’s Aoi. “Did I wake you?”

“I wasn’t sleeping.”

Aoi shuts the door behind her and flicks on the light. I squint, my eyes aching. She leans on the wall by the door like she’s guarding it. Did Yukimi send her to keep me in?

“I’ve been thinking,” Aoi says, “about what you said.”

I rub my forehead, trying to drag myself out of this grogginess. “Have you decided I’m actually Yukimi’s son? Or did she decide to tell you herself?”

Aoi twists her mouth. “That’s the thing. I asked, and she didn’t say no. But she wouldn’t tell me any more.”

I try not to hold my breath. “Any idea who my dad is?”

“I haven’t known Yukimi for—how old did you say you were again?”

“Seventeen.”

“I haven’t known Yukimi for that long.” Aoi tilts her head to one side and tucks her hair behind her ears. “And she’s never been one to show much interest in men, if you know what I mean.”

“I don’t.”

Aoi laughs, a cigarette-rasped sound. “She’s never had a boyfriend for as long as I’ve known her. Not even a one-night stand, unless she’s very secretive about it.”

I raise my eyebrows. “So?”

Aoi shrugs and slips a pack of cigarettes from her jean pocket. “Do you smoke?”

“No.”

Aoi hits the bottom of the pack to knock a cigarette out, then reaches for a lighter. “Yukimi was dating this lady maybe a year ago, but they split up. Hell, even farther back I thought Yukimi might be flirting with me—but she said she would never date one of the Sisters. She doesn’t mix business with pleasure.”

“Really.” I stare at the ceiling. “Okay.”

Yukimi never told me that. But why would she?

Aoi lifts her lighter to her cigarette, then hesitates. “Is the smoke going to bother you?”

I nod absently.

She heaves a big sigh and slips the cigarette back into the pack. “I figured. You look like somebody with virgin lungs, uncorrupted by nicotine.”

I’d laugh at her joke if I were actually paying attention. “So how does my father fit into the picture? She told me that he was ‘not a good man.’ And that she would tell me more about him when it wasn’t dangerous to do so.”

“Dangerous?” Aoi arches her eyebrows. “Pretty much everybody in Yukimi’s life is dangerous. Myself included.”

“Sure,” I deadpan.

She bares her fangs, a wicked light in her eyes. “Don’t underestimate me, fox boy.”

I hold my hands in the air. “Joking. Just joking.”

Aoi crosses her arms, her gaze distant. “Well, there was that one guy… he had a particularly dangerous look to him.”

“Who?”

“Oh, I never actually met him.” Aoi tosses her hand. “But Yukimi keeps a photo. I found it one day by accident, when it fell out of a mirror of hers.”

“What did he look like? Besides particularly dangerous?”

“He wasn’t smiling. He was wearing a suit. I couldn’t think of why Yukimi would keep a photo of him if he wasn’t somebody important to her, maybe a brother.”

Wearing a suit. That could be anybody, but…

The snow doesn’t even touch his dark suit, just falls right through.

“You know,” Aoi says, “she probably still keeps it there. I never brought it up because I knew she would kill me if I said anything. Yukimi can be secretive, to say the least.”

I square my shoulders. “Where is the mirror?”

“In her bedroom,” Aoi says. “But she’s sleeping there.”

“Maybe if I asked her…”

Aoi frowns. “Oh, don’t tell her I said anything to you. This whole conversation is top secret, okay?”

“Okay.” But I’m walking to the door. “Which room is hers?”

Aoi sighs. “I’ll show you.”

We climb a rickety staircase with narrow, creaky steps. Upstairs, doors branch from a dimly lit hallway. Aoi stops at the first door on the left, and nods. I creep up to the door, which stands ajar, and raise my hand, ready to knock. Inside, I hear hushed breathing.

“I wouldn’t wake her,” Aoi whispers. “She’s had a rough night.”

“I won’t,” I whisper back.

Gently, I push open the door. Yukimi’s room is a deep red, like the inside of a plum, with thick curtains draped over the window and four-poster bed. Yukimi lies with her body curled around a pillow, her face creased as she sleeps. She’s still wearing everything she was outside, except for her boots.

“Over there,” Aoi breathes into my ear. She points to a silver hand-mirror, adorned with roses, lying on a battered dresser. “That’s the mirror with the photo in it. But don’t—!”

I slip past her and tiptoe to the mirror. It’s cold and heavy in my hand and leaves my skin smelling sweetly metallic. Must be antique silver. Yukimi doesn’t stir. Stolen mirror in hand, I sneak back out to Aoi and hand it to her.

“Show it to me,” I say, my voice low.

Aoi glances into Yukimi’s room, then wedges her fingernails between the mirror’s glass and its ornate silver frame. She pries the circle of glass out, catches it in her other hand, and takes a wallet-sized photo from the hollow in the mirror.

“Take it,” Aoi whispers, barely audible.

I pinch the paper between my fingers and hold it up to my eyes.

Is it the man from my dream? I stare at his strong jaw and sharply angled eyebrows. He’s wearing a dark suit, but it’s so generic—and how can I match a face to a faceless ghost? I turn the photo over, hoping for a name—

“Give it back,” Aoi chants under her breath, “give it back.”

There’s no name. Nothing.

I hand the photo to Aoi, who slips it into the mirror’s frame and clicks the glass back into place. She hands the mirror to me, then takes a step back into the shadows.

The door to the bedroom bangs open.

Yukimi stands there, her face perfectly calm but her eyes glowing like a fox’s. “What did you take?”

Is she bluffing? Did she see us look at the photo?

“This mirror.” I hold it out to her, and she snatches it from me.

“There’s no need to steal from me,” Yukimi says, her voice icy.

I plaster a hurt look on my face. “I wasn’t. Aoi brought me to your bedroom because I asked, but I didn’t want to wake you up.”

“Don’t touch my things.” Yukimi steps into the hallway. “Aoi?”

Aoi leans against the wall and lights up another cigarette, puffing smoke into our faces. “He didn’t break anything. The fox boy just wanted to see where you went.”

Yukimi looks between us. “Well, I’m awake now.”

“Sorry.” I give her an attempt at a smile.

She sighs and puts her hand on her hip. “Aoi, stop breathing smoke in my face. Tavian, don’t give me those hopeful, starving eyes. If you want breakfast, cook it yourself.”

I mentally breathe a sigh of relief. “Breakfast sounds good.”

Aoi saunters away, her cigarette smoke trailing behind her.

Yukimi glances down at her clothes. “I might as well show you the kitchen.”

“Thanks,” I say.

She heads for the stairs and I follow her. Every step I take, a thought thuds in my mind.

Do not speak to him.

Why would she not want me to speak to an anonymous ghost, one that had no connection to her, unless of course he knew her? Why would the ghost try so hard to keep me away from her? My father was not a good man. Was. Is that why she keeps his photo behind her mirror, so she can remember him every time she looks at her reflection?