dear Matsuda and Jada, may your union be full of honor and grace.”
The crowd raised their glasses again, a murmur of surprise and applause going through the room. The three of us did not join the congratulations.
Ken’Ichi pulled a blue Tiffany box from his pocket, opening it. There was no smile on his face as he pulled from the velvet cushion a ring with a diamond so large it could be seen clearly at the back of the room. He pulled Jada’s gloved hand up.
“Perhaps you should remove the glove, Jada-chan,” Ken’Ichi said, a tease that caused the crowd to laugh, but I saw Jada cringe at the informal endearment she did not want and had already requested he not use.
“Not even married yet, and you’re already asking me to remove my clothes,” she taunted back.
The crowd thought it was funny. Ken’Ichi and her father did not.
“Why must she provoke them?” Dax muttered under his breath.
“Why is she having to marry him at all?” Violet asked, shooting Dax a telling look.
Dax had the graciousness to look away.
Meanwhile, Jada was slowly shedding the gloves, a move that was just what she intended—a stripper tantalizing a crowd who laughed politely. Jada was making a point. She was being sold to Ken’Ichi. I wanted to be angry with her. I wanted to scream and shout and tell her to knock it the hell off, but I also understood how deeply rooted her frustration was.
She didn’t want to be the prize her father gave to a man for doing his bidding.
With the glove finally off, Ken’Ichi slid the ring on her left hand, leaned in, and whispered in her ear much as I’d whispered to Violet, but Jada showed no reaction. He kissed her cheek, and she pulled away from him as if he’d hit her.
“Raise your glasses to the future Matsuda-sans.”
The guests cheered again.
“Thank you for coming. Unfortunately, I must catch a flight back to Japan, but I leave you in the capable hands of Matsuda. Please enjoy your evening,” Mori-sama said, stepping down and away. Ito-san joined him, and the two disappeared back through the door Mori-sama had originally come through.
He was leaving. There was no way anything that went down tonight would be able to be tied to him. It was happening when he was off the property, by people who were merely employees.
“Please”—Ken’Ichi waved his hand toward the tent and the tables arranged underneath it—“join us for dinner.”
Jada’s back straightened at his acting the host for a party she’d thrown, and she moved away from him even as he tried to put a hand on her shoulder to keep her in place.
The guests moved through doors directly into the tent that had been assembled right up against the house to protect everyone from the clouds that had blown in overnight. You’d hardly recognize the space as being a canvas tent with the sets Yuriko had designed standing against the walls. It felt, instead, like an exclusive ballroom. There were no folding chairs or tables in sight. These were all red velvet with gilded arms and legs. Grand chairs set next to tables with marble tops and matching gold frames. Each table was decorated with a birdcage with a live bird inside, exotic and colorful just like the flowers and candles surrounding them.
Over the last five years, I’d dined and partied in some very extravagant places. I’d seen Jada and Dax and their friends throw together parties in mere days that would have taken others months, but this topped them all. The pure wealth and power it had required to make this happen in basically a week was astronomical. Jada and Tsuyoshi Mori had said jump, and everyone had scrambled to see how high they could actually go.
Dax, Violet, and I were seated at the table with Jada, Ken’Ichi, and Ken’Ichi’s sister, a dark-haired, pale beauty who was demur and shy, eyes cast downward the majority of the time. As we moved through the courses, the conversation was smooth only because Dax, the master of all social settings, kept it going.
Dax asked after the Matsuda’s parents. Ken’Ichi’s sister explained they were involved in a great charity event to rebuild deteriorating hospitals and care facilities as part of keiro no hi, a national day honoring the aged.
“This is why Jada-chan’s mother is not here as well,” Ken’Ichi said. “Our families are co-sponsors of the fundraiser.”
But there was something off in his forced words, and it made me wonder of Jada’s mother had