Wearing the Cape 5: Ronin Games (33 page)

There were a lot of awkward conversations. First there was the one with Blackstone, who we had to tell that we’d lost a multi-million dollar piece of NASA equipment east of Japan. Then there was the one I
didn’t
have with Veritas, where I
didn’t
explain what we
hadn’t
done and what his boss
didn’t
need to know about, and the one I had with Father Nolan about Kannon. The worst was the one with the parentals—there were going to be a
lot
of home waffle-breakfasts over the coming weeks.

And then there was the news coming out of Japan. The worst of
that
was my Catholic horror and guilt over being turned into a Shinto kami—and Chinese
shen
! But there were leaders in Japan and the Chinese states who were milking the nation-hopping adventures of the beatified Three Remarkable Ronin for all they were worth, and I supposed I couldn’t blame them. It was one more step to burying China’s memories of Japan’s early 20
^th
Century crimes against it, one more tie that could bring them together in the League of Democratic States.

And one more reason for the Three Remarkable Ronin to forever remain
Japanese
heroes. Nobody would ever,
ever
find out that I, Hope Corrigan, had been made a kind of
saint
—before I was even dead.

One possible downside to not disappearing down the rabbit-hole, one that occurred to me with my mother’s reminder a week after my return, was I wasn’t going to miss the Silver and Green Ball. I couldn’t even plead injury, since all the post-operation damage I’d done to myself seemed to have gone away and Dr. Beth had been able to put me on a workout regimen to help me compensate for the lost muscle.

The ballroom had been decorated with silver lights and green potted topiary—textured bushes, shrubs, and mosses in the shapes of real and fanciful creatures. I even found a Chinese dragon. Julie had picked my dress since we’d all come together with Dane as our escort; I wore a jade green strapless floor-length gown with a patterned silver ribbon that ran over and beneath my minimal bust before crossing to hug my waist, doing my shape some justice. I’d known I was in for a lot of handshakes and conversation since Hope Corrigan had long been outed as Astra—but despite that everybody
looked
at Annabeth and Dane, and Julie and Megan too, when they took the floor to dance together. Which was how it should be.

“Are you having a good time, Hope?”

Mrs. Lori’s question shook me out of my mellow reverie.
Grande dame
of Chicago and Mom’s charity-rival she might be, but she had introduced me to five “nice young men” since I’d arrived. Blood of the bluest blue, of course, even if one had the misfortune of being the scion of a
Boston
family. I was feeling too good to care.

“I am! Thank you Mrs. Lori. Next year I’ll be able to drink the champagne, and then it will be even
more
fun.”

“Scamp.” But she smiled approvingly. “You’ve done your duty and can run along with your friends if you desire; the young always have more interesting places to be. But before you go, I wanted to bring you one more gentleman who seeks an introduction.” She stepped aside and I finally saw the man standing beside her.

“Hope, may I make known to you Mr. Yoshi Miyamoto. His is an old Japanese family.
 
He has come to Chicago to acquire some art, and even to buy some property in town.”

“It is a pleasure to meet you.” Kitsune bowed formally, and I bowed back without thinking. Same narrow face, high cheekbones, night-black eyes; his dark hair was longer, feathered to lie almost like fur on his head, and he sported facial hair again—the shadow of a mustache and fringe of a beard along the edge of a strong jaw I’d seen on a different face.

And he looked really,
really
good in a tux; I knew without looking that a flush had started to creep up my chest, and his smile grew as I desperately scrambled for a thought, something to say, anything at all.

“Have—have you found anything you like?”
What did I just say?
I turned beet red as he opened his mouth, closed it without taking dastardly advantage of my idiocy, and smiled again.

He held out his hand. “May I have this dance?”

The End

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