Once more, Azul was in hell.
Yuu had the excuse of the bathroom to disappear into, but Azul would escape the matching leers of the Leech twins on the day that he was dead, and not a moment sooner.
The door had barely clicked shut behind Yuu before Floyd and Jade struck.
Azul pulled himself back up to sit on the bed, and Floyd was suddenly draped over his shoulders like a particularly annoying scarf.
"Sooo," Floyd sing-songed, draping himself over Azul’s shoulders with all the grace of an eel who had just spotted his favorite new chew toy. "How’s my little cuddlefish feeling this fine morning?"
Jade, ever more refined but no less insufferable, clasped his hands behind his back. "Yes, Azul. How are you?" His smirk was sharp. "Not well-rested, I dearly hope?"
Azul pinched the bridge of his nose. "This is neither the time nor place for whatever nonsense you two are planning."
"No? Care to explain why you looked sooo comfy all tangled up with Shrimpy?" Floyd drawled, grinning ear to ear.
Azul stiffened, gripping his knee hard enough to turn his knuckles white. "I don’t owe either of you an explanation."
Jade hummed, ever the picture of composed amusement. "Oh, but you do. You see, dear Azul, a situation like this requires proper interpretation. And since you are notoriously bad at articulating your true feelings—"
"—We’ve taken it upon ourselves to help with that!" Floyd finished, clapping a hand on Azul’s back hard enough to make him lurch forward. “Aw, Jadie, I told ya last night was gonna work!”
“You did, Floyd, but I doubt either of us thought it would have been so….successful.”
Azul gritted his teeth. "Nothing happened—thanks to you two, I might add, so you can both add ‘self-sabotaging’ to your resumes of undesirable traits."
Floyd snorted. "Something sure happened. You should’ve seen your face when she left. All ''Oh no, my only love is walking away, and now I’m left in the cold abyss of my own despair—''"
"It is too early for this, Floyd."
"You did," Jade confirmed, eyes twinkling. "Azul, really, there’s no need to deny it. We all saw the way you looked at her during dinner last night. And before. And, well, just now."
Floyd flopped onto the bed with a groan. "Ugggh, he’s still fighting it. This is painful to watch." Then he perked up, shooting Azul a sharp grin. "Hey, y''know, if you don’t want her, I could take her off your hands—"
The sheer force of Azul’s glare could have shattered his glasses, had he been wearing them.
Floyd burst out laughing. "There it is! The Azul Special—Seething Jealousy, served piping hot! Ooo, it’s been forever since I’ve seen you this bad!"
Azul groaned, burying his face in his hands. "I despise you both."
Jade merely chuckled. "Perhaps. But we are right."
“Do I need to remind you both again that she hasn’t chosen any of us, or this? She is still leaving!”
Floyd grinned, stretching out like a lazy cat. "C’mon, Boss. Count the victories. You did good. Real good from the looks of things.”
“We are moderately proud… and a modicum richer. Floyd?” Jade held out a hand, and Floyd slapped ten thaumarks into it before Azul could even blink.
Azul gaped. “You two—bet—on whether I would—”
“Hey, did we mention that your mother wrote? She’s visiting today,” Floyd yawned, stretching over Azul’s head.
“My moth—” This was far too much for one morning. “Again!? You couldn’t have LED with that, Floyd!?”
“Nope!”
Azul threw his hands in the air. “Fine. Fine. This is a disaster as it is. I’m leaving to get dressed. If shrim—, I mean, Yuu, comes out, tell her I’m gone for the day.”
He left the room to the sounds of cackling and snickering, respectively.
*
The moment he was out of earshot of Jade and Floyd, his mind began catching him up on the ‘notes’ of that morning with the relentless irritation of a meeting that could have been an email.
-Firstly, the relief of having the venom extraction successfully performed and complete washed over him. It was done. DONE! That debacle was permanently behind him.
If he were a gentleman, he would bring Yuu a healing potion to undo any potential scarring now that she could heal properly. Perhaps he could delegate this step, all things considering…
-Secondly, he had catching up to do in his work, and now a very distinct time-frame in which to do it—namely, before his mother arrived with her latest scheme.
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-And thirdly….thirdly, was something of equivalent importance, he was sure, but once more his focus was slipping away from him as he realized that now, without the cloying distraction of Jade and Floyd’s voices, other notes were reaching his senses.
Notes of Yuu’s scent from the night before, familiar, and utterly her still clung to the fabric of his sleepwear—a mix of passion fruit shampoo and something softer, something that curled around his senses like a lingering whisper of last night.
And then those memories came flooding back in a rush of heat and phantom sensations along his skin where he’d touched her.
His entire body locked up.
His face burned hot enough to steam the water in Mostro Lounge’s finest teapot.
And then, with the grace of a man fleeing for his life, he bolted for his personal bathroom.
Clothes were yanked off with frantic necessity, tossed aside in his desperation to erase the evidence. He turned the shower on to its hottest setting, stepping in without hesitation with the intention of scalding the remnants of those memories from his person.
The water hit him like a slap. Azul exhaled sharply, pressing a hand to his face.
This was ridiculous.
And yet… he could still smell traces of her on his skin, in his hair. It sent his thoughts down roads they had no business wandering.
He scrubbed harder.
“She is leaving you, Azul. Focus!” he chided himself through gritted teeth.
He just needed clarity. Rinse. Reset. Ignore the way his heart had nearly leapt out of his chest when he''d realized how close they’d been, how natural it had felt to wake up beside her—
Azul let his forehead rest against the cool tile with a groan.
Your dealings with her are done, man! What is the situation staring you in the face? What needs to be done now?
Letting the water run over his head and eyes, Azul steepled his hands together, glaring at the faucet as though the fixture somehow had the answer to what his mother was planning. First her demands to lessen the tariffs on cecaelia. Then the invitation to join her efforts… in what? She had restored his contracts restored to him. Then…
No, all his attention should be consumed by a far more pressing concern—his mother was coming to the lounge.
Not just writing. Not just summoning him home with a clipped demand. She was physically coming. Stepping into his domain. Taking an interest where she previously had none.
And that was suspicious.
Madam Ashengrotto had never been one to meddle unnecessarily. She was precise, calculating—she only moved when there was something to be gained. And yet, in the span of a single week, she had tangled herself in his affairs more than she had in the last several years combined.
What had changed?
Azul tapped his fingers against his lips.
It wasn''t difficult to guess. Yuu.
A shiver of unease traced down his spine.
He had been very careful. He had ensured that any... lingering effects of the wedding fiasco were being handled. That no one could twist their situation into something improper, something binding, something that would invite—
He exhaled sharply. Yuu was leaving. Everything for that was already in motion.
And yet…
Azul ran his finger through his hair, dissatisfied.
If his mother was coming, it wasn’t just to observe. No, she was a woman who saw the ocean in chess moves, who maneuvered even the most stubborn of pieces into the places she wanted them.
And right now?
She was looking directly at him.
But WHY!? To ensure there was no real threat? To make sure Yuu left, as she’d said she might?
“As if Yuu would, or even could threaten Nerissa Ashengrotto,” he almost laughed. But, even as he heard it, he knew…. That was a lie.
Yuu had made connections in circles where Nerissa only could have dreamed of moving, and then, as usual, she’d seen Azul’s own affections before he’d even realized them himself—she’d seen parts of her potential worth as well, because, despite the years of his inattention to her, Yuu… knew him.
She had never seen him as just a polished businessman, or just a dealmaker—not the image he’d spent years refining before her arrival at NRC. She’d seen him sulk when he’d taken losses at boardgames, the him that overthinks his own jokes, and even the echoes of that small, insecure boy who wanted to make the world fear him, because fear was better than mockery. And yet, despite all of that, she seemed to genuinely like what she saw in him.
She wasn’t scared of him. She wasn’t afraid to leave—and that was the real kicker, wasn’t it?
Yuu didn’t need him. She wouldn’t cling to him, or fall for sweet words on a glossy contract. She would go where the tide took her, whether or not he chose to follow.
Though he wanted very much to lie to himself, that was a lie that he could at least briefly recognize—for a man who had spent his life ensuring he had the upper hand, the thought of losing her should be easy to accept.
It wasn’t.
“DAMN it!”
He pounded a fist on the steamed wall in front of him.
None of that changed the fact that, sooner or later, Yuu would bow out of his world, in more ways than one. Already, his excuses to see her had waned and vanished. He would be incredibly foolish to start something up again, especially when it would only make things harder for them both.
However, even he knew that he couldn’t just send her off with nothing.
A burst of ice-cold water slammed against his back. He gasped, muscles locking as the realization hit him with all the force of a rogue tidal wave.
Oh.
Oh, no.
His hands braced against the tiled wall, nails scraping as his breath came too fast, too unsteady. His mind reeled, trying to deny the words forming so clearly, so inescapably.
I am in love with Yuu.
It wasn’t admiration. It wasn’t mere fascination. It wasn’t some fleeting infatuation he could lock away, neatly categorized and tucked behind ironclad walls. It was her. Her laughter. Her sharp wit. The way she challenged him, stood beside him, chose to stay when she could have walked away. It was the way he ached to be near her, even when it was a terrible idea. The way her absence left his chest hollow, and her presence filled it again, like air rushing into lungs after nearly drowning.
Azul exhaled, forehead pressing against the cool tile.
The water dripped down his face, mixing with the ocean salt on his lips. He was going to be monstrously busy the next few days entertaining and distracting his mother—figuring out what exactly she wanted from him. But still, he had no idea when either Yuu or Nerissa would leave, and he DID know that he had new priorities.
“Well then…” he said to himself, quietly. “I really can’t send her off with nothing…”