Chapter 266: Threatening Bourbon
Toru Amuro stared. The resemblance was uncanny, as if the two had been cast from the same mold, one male and one female. A coincidence of that magnitude was statistically impossible.
The observation clicked with a memory, a snippet of a conversation he had carefully extracted from Vermouth not long ago. Cointreau, she'd hinted, had been searching for someone for years. His sister, the rumor went.
Bourbon had no idea how long Cointreau had been with the Organization, which meant he couldn't guess the man's true age or how long that search had been underway. He only knew that this girl, a near-perfect reflection of the enigmatic codenamed agent, was very likely the person Cointreau had been looking for.
Even if she wasn't, there had to be a connection.
And if there was a connection... could he use this girl to uncover some clue about Cointreau's true identity?
At the thought, Toru Amuro's gaze sharpened, his eyes locking onto Natsume with a new, deep intensity. His hand slipped into his pocket, fingers brushing against the cool surface of his phone. He was just about to message Yuya Kazami to run a check on the girl when the device in his palm suddenly vibrated.
Someone was calling him.
He pulled out the phone. The name on the screen made him pause.
Cointreau.
Speak of the devil. The timing was almost too perfect to be a coincidence. A prickle of unease ran down Amuro's spine. Cointreau had been paying far too much attention to him lately. His gaze instinctively swept across the bustling mall, searching for a shadow that didn't belong, a watcher in the crowd.
He found no one suspicious.
Frowning, Amuro stared at the caller ID for another moment before finally accepting the call. He brought the phone to his ear but remained silent, letting the other man make the first move.
It was Cointreau's voice, smooth and laced with a faint smile, that broke the silence. "Hello, Bourbon. What are you up to? How is our little plan progressing? Have you learned anything from prodding the FBI?"
"If you already know I'm in the middle of an operation," Bourbon's tone was clipped and professional, "then why call and interrupt me?"
"That's because," Cointreau paused, and when he spoke again, the warmth in his voice had evaporated, replaced by something colder, "you've just seen something you shouldn't have."
Bourbon's expression tightened. He scanned the surrounding crowd again, this time with careful care. Cointreau had to be watching him from somewhere nearby. There was no other way he could have reacted so quickly, mere moments after he had spotted the girl.
His eyes calmly swept over the faces in the mall, but his voice remained steady, tinged with only a hint of doubt. "Things I shouldn't have seen? What are you referring to?"
"Heh." A soft chuckle came through the receiver. Cointreau didn't answer the question directly. "No need to look so hard. I'm not inside the Beika Central Mall."
The words struck Bourbon with sudden clarity. His gaze immediately snapped upward, past the shoppers and decorations, to the small, dark domes mounted on the ceiling—the mall's surveillance cameras.
Through one of those very cameras, Cointreau watched Bourbon's head tilt up. "As expected of the Organization's intelligence expert," he remarked. "You're quite sharp."
At that, Bourbon knew any further attempts at probing were pointless. He dropped the pretense and went straight to the heart of the matter. "I must admit, I didn't expect you'd already found the person you were looking for, Cointreau. Congratulations," he said, his voice laced with insinuation. "I'm sure the Boss would be thrilled for you, if he knew."
"He won't know," Cointreau stated flatly.
"Oh?" Bourbon's eyes narrowed. "Don't tell me you plan to keep this from the Boss, Cointreau. That wouldn't be good..." He let the sentence hang in the air. When Cointreau offered no response, Bourbon pressed on, sensing an opening. "So, you want my silence. What's in it for me?"
In truth, when Amuro first saw Natsume, the thought of reporting her to the Organization never crossed his mind. The girl was clearly living a life in the sun, and he had no desire to drag her into the shadows unless absolutely necessary. His initial impulse was purely tactical: to see if he could use her as use or a source of information on Cointreau.
But as Bourbon, a loyal member of the Organization, he couldn't be seen actively concealing such a vital piece of intelligence. Since Cointreau had come to him, perhaps he could use this situation to gain an advantage, a foothold against the other operative.
He truly hadn't expected Cointreau to have found his target long ago, let alone to have hidden her so effectively from the rest of them. To be this protective… the girl must be incredibly important to him. Could she really be his sister?
Countless thoughts flashed through Amuro's mind in an instant. To his surprise, however, Cointreau seemed to have no intention of bargaining.
"Oh, I'm not planning to make a deal with you, Bourbon." Cointreau's voice regained its light, smiling quality, a chilling contrast to the words that followed. "I'm planning to threaten you."
A knot of ice formed in Bourbon's stomach. It was one thing to be threatened; it was another to be threatened by someone who sounded like they were enjoying every second of it.
He narrowed his eyes, his gaze fixed on the space ahead. "Then how," he asked, his voice low and even, "do you plan to threaten me?"
"Look up," Cointreau said. "Do you see the fire sprinkler system above you?"
Without waiting for an answer, he continued, his tone dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "There's a special medicine inside..."
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