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“I have to admit,” Michiko told Cas when he looked skeptical, “this will solve the problem of why I won’t be having sex with anyone. If I kept just sceneing with these two for too long and not having sex, they were right. This crowd would’ve seen right through that.”
“Okay then.” Cas slapped his desk. “Looks like chance has saved the day. Let’s go catch some bad guys.”
When Michiko gotto Sam and Dean’s place later that day, she was surprised to see Shawna at the table for lunch. The poor woman was so damaged from her ordeal that she’d stayed hidden in her room every other time Michiko had been there. It was heartening to see her out now. The bravery it showed had tears stinging her eyes.
“Michiko,” Kimberly said as soon as she had reached the table, “this is my best friend, Shawna. Shawna, this is Agent Michiko Tanaka of the FBI. She’s on the case and is going to help bring the others home.”
The beautiful Black woman looked up at Michiko and the wariness in her eyes held such pain that she wanted to turn away, but she forced herself to meet that solemn stare head on.
“It’s nice to meet you,” she told her. “I’m sorry for all you’ve suffered.”
Shawna inclined her head and Michiko sat. Enough said on the subject for now. She was sure the woman had shared her ordeal enough since her rescue. Michiko had read her account as soon as she’d been brought on the case, and it had chilled her to the bone.
Shawna had been in a brand-new relationship with a Dom who it turns out had been the man they called Grungy. The sexual relationship had quicky become more and more deviant, and Shawna had let the man convince her she needed therapy in order to embrace her true sexual nature. Then Bradshaw had weaseled her way into Shawna’s psyche like a computer virus and corrupted the way she saw herself. Shawna had walked away from her life and everyone she knew less than a month after her first session with the woman. Once she’d been taken, Shawna couldn’t remember if she’d seen the therapist again, which was the only thing keeping Bradshaw out of jail at the moment. The tortures she’d endured at the hands of Grungy and others—who’d all worn masks to avoid identification—had been bad enough that Michiko forced her mind to a grinding halt. No way was she going to relive those testimonies if she could help it.
Over the meal, talk was of simple things. Kimberly shared stories from her clients and the agents shared redacted tales from bygone cases that thrilled their civilian companions. For one blissful hour, there was no talk of torture or rape, no thoughts of missing women or the men who prey on them, and Michiko found herself relaxing and enjoying herself for the first time in months outside the company of her family.
Her family was her sanctuary. Miwa had come to America in search of freedom and cowboys and a life of joy for her children and her parents. And she’d found it. No, she’dmadeit. Because America wasn’t the land of joy that she’d been expecting, but that hadn’t kept Miwa down. Not Michiko’s ever-exuberant mother. No, Miwa had rolled up her sleeves, donned her beloved cowboy boots, and assembled the life she’d dreamed of for herself and her family. Then she’d built a wall around it.
Their multiplex might as well have been a commune for all the exposure to the outside world they’d been allowed. Not that Michiko was complaining. The world was a dangerous place, and she should know.
It wasn’t as if she’d never had any experience either, Michiko mused as the conversation continued to flow easily around her. Once she’d gone off to college and then enrolled in Quantico, she’d seen more of the world than most people would in a lifetime. And all she’d seen and learned only made her gravitate more and more toward home and her mother’s sanctuary.
Safety. Love. She’d thought to never find that anywhere else—that ease of laughter and comradery, that sense of belonging. Yet here she was, at a table with virtual strangers, and she felt that same connection with this strange hodgepodge group of would-be heroes. As she looked down the line and her eyes settled on Cas, he laughed at something Sam said, and she felt a warmth that was totally unexpected but happily welcomed all the same.
Cas looked up and their eyes locked for one moment. Michiko didn’t know why she couldn’t look away or why his laughter abruptly cut off. He cleared his throat and broke the contact first. It broke the spell, and suddenly she didn’t know what to do with her hands.
“What’s the plan when you guys go into the club tonight?”
Michiko glanced up in surprise. They’d gone over this at the office. A small smile tugged at the corner of her lips.
Was Cas nervous? Was that why he’d just blurted that out?
“Um…” Sam acted a little flustered, going from chit-chat to business on a dime, but he recovered fast enough and cleared his throat. “Michiko is gonna head in first. She’s going to case the joint and find herself a Dom to scene with. That way, when we get there, we can set up our scene so we have her in our line of sight.”
“And if Bradshaw is there?” Cas wanted to know.
“Then we got double surveillance,” Dean said with a quizzical frown. He glanced between Cas and Michiko. It made her bite her lip to keep from smiling. It also made her take another look at the handsome, somewhat disorganized man. Hmm, there was potential there, she thought. Then she let the thought flutter away like a butterfly. Men weren’t for her. She hadn’t met one yet who could take what she needed in the bedroom. With a sigh, she let the momentary infatuation she’d had with Cas go and shifted her brain back into work mode.
She’d long ago come to terms with her twisted sexuality. She knew there were sadists who enjoyed doling out the kind of pain she needed in order to get off. Her dilemma was, she had a problem with someone getting off on hurting her. Go figure. That was her own messed up mind, though, and she was too up in her own head to confess it to anyone. So, she just kept that to herself and let Master Kato take care of her; she was fine with the arrangement.
As she stole surreptitious glances at Cas while the men hammered out details, she tried to convince herself it was still true.
Chapter Three
When Kimberly walkedinto The Lion’s Den that night, she almost burst out laughing. Michiko was dressed like a Borg from Star Trek. Seven of Nine to be exact. She had on a silver body suit that covered her from head to foot with ribbing that made her look part machine. There were things on one hand that gave the illusion she had a mechanical arm, and she had a metal half-moon shaped disc under one eye that highlighted her bone structure until it looked carved by God himself. She’d expertly donned a blonde wig in the classic French twist the character had worn on the show and stalked the room like the badass she was. Kimberly wanted to give her a round of applause.
She had a trail of men following her too. It was unprecedented. There were four hulking men who traced her every step and Kimberly was hard pressed to keep the smirk off her face as she watched them. It cracked her up the way they tried to keep from tripping over themselves every time Michiko changed direction.
“If I didn’t know any better,” Sam drawled, “I’d say that was a fan club.”
Kimberly felt warmth spread in her chest as she smiled up at him. He was so tall and handsome. His square jaw and crystalline blue eyes had made her trust him from the very start. His innate gentleness and kindness had made her like him just as quickly. His lovemaking was the flipside to his soft nature and the dichotomy fascinated her. He made love to her with such raw and sometimes brutal passion he left her gasping and cross-eyed. There was so much power and strength in his impressive frame and he kept it all contained in his day-to-day life, only releasing it during their scenes, and Kimberly felt both awed and privileged to allowed to see that side of his nature.
“They look like an old Chaplin movie, don’t you think?” Kimberly whispered.
“Yeah.” Sam chuckled warmly and rubbed her bare back. “I wanna see ‘em topple like bowling pins.”
“I didn’t think the Comicon getups would work,” Dean added, “but, damn.”
