Page 56 of Kotori

Paige

The family dinner feels like walking through a minefield.

Mizuki sits at the table like a ghost of herself. Dark circles shadow her eyes, her usual perfect posture replaced by a hunched defensiveness that makes my chest ache. She pushes rice around her bowl without eating, flinching whenever someone speaks too loudly or moves too quickly.

Kaito watches her with cold fury barely contained beneath his controlled exterior.

After our conversation in the kitchen, he's been studying his eldest daughter like she's a stranger who's invaded his home.

His jaw remains locked, his responses to her presence reduced to arctic politeness that cuts deeper than shouting ever could.

Since Daichi's visit, he hasn't spoken directly to Mizuki once.

"Mizuki-chan," Aya says cheerfully, oblivious to the tension crackling through the air, "want to help me with my art project after dinner? I'm drawing our family for school."

"Maybe later," Mizuki whispers, her voice hollow in a way that makes Kohana exchange worried glances with me across the table.

"Are you feeling sick, nee-chan?" Kohana asks gently. "You've barely eaten anything today."

Mizuki's hands tighten around her chopsticks, knuckles white with stress. "I'm fine. Just tired."

Kaito's expression doesn't change, but something dangerous flickers in his eyes. The daughter he raised, the child he protected, claiming to be "fine" when her behavior has allegedly brought shame to their bloodline.

"Tired," he repeats quietly, the word carrying weight that makes Mizuki flinch. "From what activities, exactly?"

The question drops into silence. Mizuki's face goes white, understanding the implication even if the younger girls don't.

"I just haven't been sleeping well," she stammers.

"How unfortunate." His voice remains conversational, but ice crystallizes in every syllable. "Perhaps you should have considered the consequences of your choices before they began affecting your rest."

The cruelty in his tone makes my stomach clench. This isn't the protective father from our kitchen conversation. This is a man who believes his daughter has betrayed everything he taught her about honor and family dignity.

Mizuki's chopsticks clatter to the table as her hands begin shaking. "Otou-sama."

"You will not speak unless spoken to," he cuts her off with lethal quiet. "Your recent communications have demonstrated a concerning lack of understanding about appropriate behavior."

Mizuki's face crumples with shame and confusion, tears threatening to spill over.

"Matsumoto-sama," I say carefully. The younger girls are watching with wide, frightened eyes.

"The children should finish their meal," he says without looking at me, his focus remaining fixed on Mizuki with predatory intensity. "Some of us, it seems, have lost our appetites due to disappointing developments."

Mizuki pushes back from the table abruptly, practically running from the room with a choked sob.

Kaito doesn't call after her. Doesn't show any reaction except the slight tightening around his eyes that suggests satisfaction at her retreat.

"Why is Papa being mean to Mizuki-nee?" Aya asks in a small voice, lower lip trembling.

"Sometimes," Kaito says with careful control, "people must face consequences for their choices. Even when those consequences are painful for everyone involved."

An hour later, I stand outside Mizuki's door listening to the sound of muffled crying. The soft, broken sobs of someone who's given up trying to be strong, who's finally allowing herself to fall apart in private.

After that brutal dinner, Kaito disappeared into his study without a word. When I tried to follow, to ask what the hell that was about, he looked at me with such cold fury that I stepped back instinctively.

"She made her choices," he'd said with deadly quiet. "Now she lives with the consequences. And so do we all."

But now, faced with her obvious pain echoing through the door, I can't stand by and do nothing. Whatever Kaito believes she's done, whatever evidence he thinks he has, this is still the girl I've come to love like my own daughter.

I knock softly. "Mizuki? It's Paige. Can I come in?"

The crying stops abruptly, replaced by frantic movement. Probably wiping away evidence of tears, trying to rebuild the composure that's been her armor.

"I'm sleeping," comes her muffled response, thick with recently shed tears.

"No, you're not. And that's okay. Sometimes sleep is impossible when our minds won't quiet down." I rest my forehead against the door, speaking softly to the girl I've come to love like my own daughter. "I brought tea. The chamomile blend your mother used to make for you when you had nightmares."

Long silence. Then the soft sound of footsteps on tatami, the slide of the lock being undone.

She opens the door just wide enough for me to see her face. Red-rimmed eyes, tear-stained cheeks, the kind of devastation that comes from crying until there's nothing left. She looks so young, so broken, that maternal instinct floods through me like a dam bursting.

I step into her room, setting the tea tray on her low table before turning to really look at her. "Come here."

She hesitates, pride warring with desperate need for comfort. Need wins. She stumbles into my arms like someone who's been drowning finally reaching shore, clinging to me with the desperate strength of someone who's been carrying an impossible weight alone.

"I can't," she sobs against my shoulder, words barely comprehensible through her tears. "I can't do what they want me to do. I can't marry him."

Ice floods through my veins. Marriage. Kaito mentioned political pressure, arranged matches being considered, but seeing Mizuki's terror makes it real.

"Who wants you to marry whom?" I ask carefully, keeping my voice gentle while my mind races through implications.

"Daichi-sempai says Otou-san has already agreed to consider his proposal," she whispers, the words emerging like something toxic. "He says I've compromised myself, that no traditional family will want me now unless someone 'generous' overlooks my behavior."

The way she says behavior, like it's something shameful and dirty, makes my stomach clench with understanding that I desperately don't want to have.

"What behavior, Mizuki? What do they think you've done?"

She pulls back, and I watch her face cycle through shame, confusion, terror. Eighteen years old and carrying a weight that's crushing her.

"They have messages. Pictures." Her voice cracks. "Evidence that I was inappropriate with older men."

"Were you?"

"No!" She collapses forward, and I catch her instinctively, maternal instinct overriding everything else. "I would never. I don't even know how to be inappropriate with men. But they have proof, and everyone believes it."

Her bewilderment is so complete, so genuine. A child trying to understand how she became guilty of crimes she never committed.

"They say marriage is the only way to save the family's honor."

I stroke her hair, my hands steady with protective fury.

"Tell me about the messages."

She flinches like I've struck her. "Daichi-sempai said I was naive. That I needed to understand what makes men happy if I wanted to be worthy of marriage someday." The words pour out in a rush, like confession. "He said it was educational."

The rage that floods through me is so pure, so fierce, that for a moment I can't speak. This bastard convinced an eighteen-year-old girl that exploitation was education.

"When did this start?"

"We've known each other since we were children.

Our families have been discussing potential marriage arrangements since I turned sixteen.

" She draws her knees up, making herself smaller.

"But it changed at this summer's Tanabata festival.

He said I'd grown into such a beautiful woman, that he'd been watching me mature and waiting for the right time to guide me properly. "

The classic predator playbook. Positioning himself as patient and respectful while admitting he'd been watching her develop. My skin crawls.

"What did he want from you?"

"Questions at first. About my fears, my dreams. Whether I understood what would be expected of me as a wife." A bitter laugh escapes her. "He seemed so concerned with my education, my preparation. Said understanding my body was important for marriage. That curiosity was natural. Healthy."

I want to scream. This predator spent years positioning himself as her inevitable husband, then used that assumed authority to groom her.

"He said since we'd likely be married anyway, it was practical to help me learn.

That sending pictures would help me understand my own beauty, build confidence for our wedding night.

" She's shaking now. "When I hesitated, he said he was trying to protect my reputation.

That it was better to learn with someone who cared about me than to be naive and embarrass myself later.

He said other men might take advantage of my inexperience, but he wanted to keep me safe.

That this way, I'd be confident and prepared instead of scared and ashamed.

" Her voice drops to a whisper. "One picture became more.

Always more. But he said I was being mature, preparing properly.

That this was normal between engaged couples. "

The twisted logic makes me sick. He used their childhood connection and assumed future to normalize increasingly inappropriate requests, then lied about having her father's blessing.

"He says Otou-san is just waiting for the right time to announce it formally," she continues, voice breaking. "That the family discussions have been positive, but they want to make sure I'm ready to be a proper wife first."

"Why haven't you told your father what's been happening?" I ask gently.

Her face crumples with fresh shame. "Daichi-sempai said Otou-san wouldn't understand.

That fathers get uncomfortable discussing such intimate preparations with their daughters.

" She wipes her eyes roughly. "He said Otou-san trusted him to guide me properly, that bringing these lessons to his attention would only embarrass him and make him think I wasn't mature enough for marriage. "

Another layer of manipulation. Isolating her from her primary protector.

"But Otou-san..." Her voice breaks again. "What if he thinks I should have known better? What if he's disappointed in me for being so stupid?" The raw fear in her voice, terror of disappointing the father she adores, makes my chest ache.

"He's going to protect you," I say fiercely. "Whatever else happens, he's going to make sure you're safe."

"Will you stay with me? When I tell him?"

"Of course." The answer comes from the deepest part of me, the part that would do anything to shield this girl from more pain. "We'll face this together."

She nods, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. For a moment, we sit in silence, the weight of what she's revealed settling between us. "I thought I was doing everything right," she whispers finally. "I thought I was being the daughter he wanted, preparing to be the wife I was supposed to be."

"You were being manipulated by someone who knew exactly how to exploit your trust," I tell her firmly. "This isn't about what kind of daughter you are. This is about a predator who targeted you."

She looks at me with desperate hope, like she's been drowning and I've thrown her a lifeline. "Do you really believe that?"

"I know it," I say. "Come on, let's go set the record straight."