Chapter 83: A visit to Miranda
( this Chapter is a continuation of the previous one and still told from raina’s pov )
"I’ll call you back."
I ended the call before Malcolm could say anything else and sat on the edge of the bed staring at the dark screen.
Rhonda missing. Kuro. The Aizawa family. Felix. My grandfather. Every answer I uncovered seemed to split into three new questions and I kept arriving late to a game everyone else had been playing for years.
I scrolled to Tengu’s number and called.
He picked up on the third ring, which for Tengu meant he had considered not answering.
"Himari." His voice carried the particular flatness of a man interrupted during something he considered more important. "Back from Japan already."
"I need your help."
A slow exhale came through from his end ."Of course you do." A pause. "It’s late so Make it snappy. I got a hot date waiting for me, if you catch my drift ."
"I need to find a missing person."
A brief silence. "We have networks for that. Whether we use them depends on who’s missing and whether the situation warrants it."
I leaned back against the headboard. "The missing person herself might not interest you. But the person who took her will."
The silence that followed felt different. Sharper. More focused.
"The Aizawa family’s surviving son," I said.
Nothing from his end. Not even a breath.
Then: "What did you just say?"
"You heard me, Tengu San. The same job you left unfinished years ago."
A longer pause this time.
"Did your grandfather tell you that?"
"No." I kept my voice even. "I did my own little investigation. You can imagine how I felt discovering that everything currently happening now is because you couldn’t finish a simple job .
"I did exactly what I was ordered to do." The frustration surfaced before he could stop it. "How was I supposed to know the kid would survive? I checked. I was thorough."
"And yet here we are."
He grunted.
I waited a moment, then let the thought I had been sitting with land properly. "Is that why you’ve been spending so much time in Harrington lately? All these visits with no clear reason?"
Silence.
A smile crept across my face.
"Oh my God."
"Himari—"
"Did Grandpa kick you to the curb?"
"No."
The response came too quickly.
I laughed.
A genuine laugh.
"So it’s true."
"He didn’t let me go."
"Really?"
"He is simply upset."
"Upset?"
I cut him off.
"Tengu-san, I’ve known my grandfather my entire life."
I stood and walked toward the window.
"He cares about two things from the people who serve him."
Loyalty.
Results.
" From the look of things , You’ve got one."
Silence.
"But ....You seem to be struggling with the other."
The line remained quiet.
Then I delivered the final push.
"If you want back into his good graces, you’re going to have to work with me."
Nothing.
I waited.
Eventually he sighed.
"Who exactly are we looking for?"
I smiled.
Good choice.
"Her name is Rhonda Johnson-Stein. Married to a Malcolm Stein. ..
A pause....
"Yep that Malcolm stein " .
Last seen in the parking lot of a grocery store this morning" ...." If I were you I’ll grab a pen and write this down ."
" Don’t worry I got it "
" Ok if you say so . I’ll send you the rest of the details. Later ."
"If we know who took her," Tengu said, "why not go directly? Walk in and demand she’s returned."
"Because we don’t know that he actually has her. And if we go in assuming and we’re wrong, we waste the approach entirely. If we’re right and we go in hard without knowing the situation, we risk her life." I stood and walked to the window. "We find her first. Confirm her location and condition. Then we decide the next step."
"Fair." A pause. "Why does this woman matter to you? I mean her husband is practically your enemy "
I rolled my eyes.
"So many questions tonight."
"I’m serious."
His tone sharpened.
"I need to know how hard I should push."
I looked away from the mirror.
Rhonda wasn’t my friend.
She wasn’t family. She was Malcolm’s wife and I’m partially responsible for her being missing .
And under normal circumstances I probably wouldn’t have involved myself.
But—
I looked at the city below. "She’s pregnant."
Tengu said nothing for a moment.
"I have enough on my conscience already," I said. "I’m not adding a child to it. Find her and bring her back in one piece."
"Understood."
He hung up.
I put the phone down and stood at the window with the city spread out below me in its usual arrangement of lights. Everyone moving. Everyone knowing something I was still chasing. My grandfather. Kuro. Tengu. Even Malcolm, sitting in a warehouse cage, probably thinking he held more cards than he did.
I was tired of arriving second.
I picked up my phone, opened a conversation I had not used in some time, typed a message and sent it before I could reconsider.
Then I went to bed and did not particularly sleep.
The camper van was parked on the eastern edge of the city where the industrial units thinned out and the lots sat empty on weekday mornings. I had brought coffee from a place on the way and it was still warm when I settled inside and crossed my legs and waited.
Eleven minutes later the door opened.
Kuro stepped in and stopped.
The look on his face when he saw me sitting there made the early start entirely worth it.
"Himari." He blinked once. "That’s a surprise."
"I have my moments."
He pulled the door closed and moved deeper into the van before dropping into the seat across from me, the practiced composure of a man deciding not to show he had been caught off guard settling over his expression. "How did you find this place?"
"It wasn’t particularly difficult." I took a sip of coffee. "I know people."
"Apparently." His eyes moved around the interior of the van and something in his expression shifted, less guarded, more genuine. "I wasn’t expecting you to find Miranda this quickly."
I looked at him. "Miranda?"
He patted the wall beside him. "The van."
I stared. "You named it."
"Her," he corrected, with the specific energy of someone who had made this correction many times before and intended to keep making it. "And yes. She’s been my home for three years. My comfort. The most consistent thing in my life." He said it without apology or self-consciousness, which was somehow more disarming than any armor he had shown me so far.
"That’s genuinely sweet," I said.
"Thank you."
"I mean for a psychopath ..."
His palm came down on the small table between us. Not slamming, but hard enough that the coffee cup shifted and the sound filled the van completely.
"I am not a psychopath." The professional ease was gone. What was underneath it was old and worn at the edges in the way that things got when they had been carried too long.
"Your grandfather made me what I am. He killed my entire family." His voice had dropped to something low and steady that was harder to hear than shouting would have been.
"Do you know what that’s like? I was twelve years old. I still smell the smoke and burning flesh when I close my eyes. I still see my mother. My father. My brothers." His jaw tightened. "Every single night since that fire I have woken up knowing that an old man gave one order and everything I had was gone by morning. So don’t sit there and call me a psychopath. Point that word at the person who deserves it."
The van was immediately quiet.
I didn’t immediately argue.
Because part of me knew he wasn’t entirely wrong.
Grandpa had done terrible things.
Things even I was only beginning to understand.
Still—
"Kidnapping Rhonda Stein won’t bring them back," I said. Quietly.
He looked at me for a moment. Then he leaned back and the tension drained from his shoulders.
like he was almost disappointed.
"Rhonda." He said the name like he was placing it somewhere. "Don’t worry about her. I have plans."
"That doesn’t make me feel better."
His eyes narrowed slightly, something assembling behind them. He leaned forward.
"Wait." A smile appeared that had nothing warm in it. "Is that why you came? Did little Himari grow a conscience after all?"
I set my coffee down and met his eyes across the table.
"No," I said. "I’m here because I want to hear your side of it. All of it. Not the version told in tabloids and newspapers ."
His expression changed.
Just slightly.
Enough for me to notice.
I kept my voice leveled and my gaze steady.
"Tell me what happened."
The van fell silent.
Outside, the wind rattled against the metal frame.
Inside, Kuro stared at me without speaking.
As if trying to decide whether this was a trap.
to be continued...if you are liking this so far please leave a review of golden tickets to show your support I’d really appreciate it .
