Page 56 of Summer Haze & Tokyo Craze

"Thank you," I tell her. "I’m trying not to think about it too much. It happened. It sucked. I survived. And I love my siblings. So, yeah. It changed the trajectory of my life, but it could have gone worse. I'm happy with where I am now, and I'm happy with where my siblings are now.”

Am I happy to have had to step in as a father figure? Well, hell no, and I definitely don’t want to be called ‘Daddy’. But still, I'd do it all over again.

"That's very noble of you," she says. "Speaking of your brothers, I heard you tell Eve something about Akihabara?"

"You listening in to my conversations now?" I grin when an adorable blush tints her cheeks and run my hand through my hair. "Yes, I did. I have no idea where Akihabara is, but Reed demanded for me to go and shop merchandise for him or I won’t get the jet for the flight back."

"Ah,so your brothers are good blackmailers as well,” she points out and I grin. Now that she’s saying it, I guess she’s right, they are.

“Anyways, I've been meaning to go," she says and crosses her arms in front of her chest. "They have a shop I'm interested in going to." There's a mischievous twinkle in her eyes, and I narrow my eyes at her, trying to make her tell me.

"Is that so?"

She hums without elaborating, and we step out of the elevator. "You might like it. You should totally go there with me."

"How intriguing," I say, and both of us take a deep breath as we step into the thankfully cool summer air just as Lily begins to grimace.

"It's going to rain soon."

The word hasn't even left her mouth when suddenly the heaviest of rain showers comes down, soaking the two of us within seconds.

"Well, fuck," Lily says and drags me after her until we’re back at the entrance of the building, under a small roof. "Now I'm all wet."

I turn my head to her slowly, and when she meets my gaze, I wiggle my eyebrows at her. She slaps my upper arm playfully but starts laughing.

"Naughty!"

I pretend like her weak slap hurt, while her eyes dance down the street. She didn’t bring an umbrella either. I guess we could make a run for it, try to get to the nearest store to buy anumbrella, but at this point I doubt even that would help. If it weren’t for our phones, I’d take her hand and just walk through the rain, but they’re kind of important.

"I'll tell you naughty." She nods to the other side of the street, and I follow her gaze to a red neon sign I can’t quite read from here.

"What do you think about staying at a love hotel until the rain dies down?"

"Love hotel?" I raise my eyebrow at her. Honestly, I’d go wherever she wanted with her, but the name intrigues me.

"A hotel you can rent by the hour," she explains, and a grin starts to spread on her face as realization dawns on mine.

"You know what? That sounds perfect."

We grin at each other, and then quickly run across the street.

Lily

"Okay, this isn't at all what I pictured," I admit with a giggle as we step into our room for the next few hours.

"What the...?" Adam stops mid-sentence and freezes.

From the outside, the hotel seems pretty inconspicuous. Aside from the red neon sign, nothing indicated that this would be a love hotel at all, much less themed. But the inside is on a whole other level.

There were some BDSM elements in the lobby, so I figured that's the theme we're going with here. I thought they would have some toys, whips or restraints to borrow, but I did not expect to walk straight into a BDSM dungeon.

"Is that a goddamn St. Andrews cross?" Adam asks, judging by his expression not sure whether to be impressed or shocked, pointing to our left. I follow his gaze and burst into laughter, because yes. It most definitely is.

Still chuckling, I walk further into the room, turning around to take it all in. The deep red walls are adorned with several methods of restraint: ropes, handcuffs, satin bands, everything a BDSM heart might desire right over the bed.

A shelf at the wall on the far end of the room has feathers, whips and other tools I can’t even make out. Another wall has a bunch of sex toys, dildos in all kinds of shapes, which I am definitely not touching with a ten-foot pole.

I’m sure they clean them well but… just no. Not a chance

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