Page 32 of The Dragon 1 (Tokyo Empire #1)

For When You Must Burn

Kenji

Reo let out a long breath. “The Claws will want immediate vengeance.”

“Yet, they’ll have to wait until we have a strong plan. If my father were easy to kill, he would have already been dead. Even in that damned hospital room, he has an army guarding him.”

The city lights blurred outside my window but I couldn’t stop seeing Nura’s face as she smiled at Hiro right before that bullet hit her head.

Why did she smile?

Reo spoke. “Do you truly understand your father’s lesson?”

I didn’t look at him, “deal with the Lion. Don't let enemies too close. Control the optics.”

“No, Kenji. There was something else.”

Slowly, I put my view on him. “What?”

Reo stared out the opposite window, watching Tokyo disappear behind us. “Hiro has dated many. Slept with men even. Women of all sizes. Yet, all have been Japanese. Your father’s turned a blind eye to every single one.”

I knew where this was going but I prayed I was wrong.

Reo continued, “but tonight, the girl he grabbed? Nura? She had skin the same color as your Tiger.”

My jaw clenched.

Reo raised one finger. “But he couldn’t touch Nyomi. Not with your Fangs around her tonight, not with you watching her like a dragon over a crown jewel. And certainly not with you waiting at the restaurant’s private garden for her.”

I said nothing.

“Your father’s twisted but he understands one thing: he still needs you to rule the throne. Even the Fox respects certain limits.”

“If he understood limits, he wouldn’t have killed Nura.”

“He figured she was just another one of Hiro’s flings.”

“Well, he figured wrong. Hiro is broken. I’ve seen my brother dig a man’s eyeball out with a spoon while sucking a goddamn lollipop but I’ve never seen him cry.”

Reo pursed his lips.

I scowled. “What?”

“You can’t see Nyomi tomorrow night.”

I looked away, stared at the glinting city.

“If this is war, Kenji. We need strategy. We’ll place more men around her. Keep her protected. But you need to disappear for a while. We must also change your meeting place with the Butcher.”

“To where?”

“Paris. Where your father’s eyes can’t follow.”

I shook my head. “I promised Nyomi I’d see her tomorrow night.”

“Better to break a promise than carry her dead body in your arms,” his words stabbed me in the gut.

I inhaled sharply, reached into my jacket pocket and pulled out my phone. My thumb hovered over her name.

Nyomi.

I exhaled like I’d been punched. My fingers trembled—just slightly—as I tried to figure out what to say to her. . .how to cancel tomorrow’s date with her.

God, I wanted to see her now. Even just a glance. Her laugh would be enough. Her skin, that scent. . .

I almost called the driver.

Almost ordered him to take me to her.

But I didn’t.

Instead, I slipped the phone back into my pocket like it was a knife I couldn’t unsheathe.

She’d never know how close I came to choosing her over vengeance.

Then my eyes drifted down.

To the seat beside me.

To that gift she’d given me.

I stared at it with the quiet ache of a man who didn’t know how to feel anything but fury. “I want to see her.”

“I know you do.”

“But I want her alive too.”

“Correct.”

“Hiro wasn’t sure what Nura and he would be but I am dead certain that Nyomi will be my forever.” I reached out, picked up the gift and slowly slid the black ribbon off.

Next, my fingers dug into the gold paper.

Once I removed it, I spotted a flat, square lacquered box made of dark polished wood—wenge maybe, or ebony.

Expensive.

Lush.

Like me, Nyomi didn’t do cheap.

What could be inside?

Reo watched too, just as curious.

The moment I opened the lid, my breath hitched.

There, folded with intimate grace, was a silk handkerchief.

And not just any silk.

This was Habotai , the kind that shimmered like moonlight on moving water. Turquoise—vibrant and royal—the color of oceans that had never known storms.

Embroidered into the center in painstaking detail was a tiger.

Not a cartoon image.

Not some abstract wash of stripes.

This was a real tiger watching a breathtaking and huge dragon—shoulders low, body crouched, eyes alight with intelligence.

Not in fear.

Not even in challenge.

Just awareness.

Like the tiger had found something equal.

Or holy.

The threadwork was exquisite.

Every whisker.

Every stripe.

Every scale on the dragon.

Gold and black shimmered against the turquoise background.

Reo spoke. “That is an incredible piece of art.”

My fingers brushed the silk. It felt like her skin.

Cool.

Smooth.

Sensual in a way that made my lungs tighten.

“Beautiful,” I turned it over with trembling hands.

There, stitched in the bottom corner in the tiniest, cleanest script—was the message:

“For when you must hide your fire but still burn.” — N.

The words swallowed me whole.

My throat closed up.

“For when you must hide your fire but still burn.”

I stared at the embroidery.

A silk handkerchief but it might as well have been armor.

I closed my eyes and let the weight of it settle into my palm. Her fire. My fire. The kind of burn I couldn’t show now, not yet. The kind I had to sheath behind diplomacy, behind strategy.

But I was burning.

God, I was burning.

A war had begun the moment that bullet cracked Nura’s skull.

A father had declared war against sons.

And the battlefield would be Tokyo, painted in blood and violence.

Had Reo not been in the car, I might’ve pressed the silk to my face and disappeared into it. Just for a moment. Just long enough to remember the scent of peace.

Instead, I brought it slowly to my nose and breathed it in.

Her scent—black amber and ripe plum—curled around my senses. Rich. Intoxicating. Feminine in a way that made my chest ache. The silk had absorbed it. As if even the threads had longed to hold her.

I swallowed against the tightness building in my throat.

The handkerchief trembled slightly in my grip.

I had to wear a mask of stillness, of logic, of leadership.

But beneath it?

I was setting Tokyo on fire.

“For when you must hide your fire but still burn.”

Reo was silent across from me, letting me breathe her scent in like a madman.

Sighing, I pressed the silk flat against my chest, right over my heart.

And I didn’t let go.

Not for a long time.

Not even as the car turned, and Tokyo’s bright lights faded into shadows. Then, with a breath that felt like surrender and resurrection wrapped in one, I folded the handkerchief carefully and I slipped it into the inner pocket of my jacket.

Right next to my heart.

Where her fire would stay.

Where her scent could remind me of what I was fighting for.

Not revenge.

Not power.

But love.

Because I believed what Reo said. . .my father’s lesson wasn’t just about Nura, he was warning me to stay away from Nyomi, just because she wasn’t Japanese. He was saying that bullet would hit her skull next if I didn’t put on his leash and bow to him.

But that would never fucking happen.

I would do anything to keep all violence away from my tiger and in that same breath, I would fight for our new love too. Rip my father's fucking heart out of his body just to have the ability to have her heart all to myself.

She gave me silk. I will give her war.