Kia Ora...

And the first month of 2022 is almost finished... or is it just 2020 Part 3?

School goes back on Tuesday here in NZ, and I'm looking forward to it, even though the house will only be less one person because of it, but it might be a little quieter. Being able to work with fewer distractions is going to be bliss!

Updates

• Hiroshi (Tokyo Nights Novella 3) is one chapter and an epilogue away from being finished... phew! Though in all seriousness it will be sad to walk away from all my boys in Tokyo, but there is room to come back to the city at least for another series further down the track.
• Rough Sketches (House of Bolton 3) has hit the 30k and after a bit of pain and angst, the boys are going to have a nice soak in a hot bath... before I chuck some more angst at them. But hey, it wouldn't be a mafia x undercover cop story without it.

Merch....

I've rejigged my Redbubble store and have loaded up a few designs/series quotes onto the platform. Stickers, cards, and mugs etc

Buy it Here!

Meet the House of Bolton Boys

Tailored Heart (M/F)

Stitched Together (M/M)

Rough Sketches (M/M)

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Caught - Chapter Twenty-Six

Getting out of Takeshi’s bedroom had proved even more difficult than sneaking his way into it in the first place. Pain and exhaustion working together to hamper Yoshitake’s ability to move, especially when those movements needed to be made swiftly. But somehow he’d managed to slip out of the house, and past the guards Takeshi had put in place—guards who’d either been told to ignore Yoshitake’s limping arse or Takeshi needed to teach the men trusted with guarding him how to do their bloody jobs—and made it back across Osaka to his hotel room. Yoshitake collapsed onto the bed, dropping his head back on the pillows while his hand rested on the gun lying next to him, not ready to stack all his luck on having escaped the safely.

His breath stilled as a floorboard creaked and the door to the adjoining room opened far less quietly than his would-be attacker had anticipated. He snatched the weapon lying next to him off the bed, finger sliding onto the trigger as Yoshitake pointed it in the direction of the intruder. “Tomu… that better be you or I’m putting a bullet in your chest, and I don’t even care that the cops would be here in… thirty-minutes.”

“Yeah, it’s me,” Tomu snarled. “And how the fuck would you managed to hit anyone when your eyes are still fucking closed.”

Yoshitake snorted and placed the gun back down next to him. “Easy. I’d open them.”

“Must say I’m surprised to see your arse still alive. Was certain that your decision to turn up at Matsumoto’s would’ve gotten you killed.” Tomu walked across the room and slumped onto the chair near the window.

“It wasn’t easy getting in, and Takeshi was kind of pissed—”

“And yet here you still are,” Tomu interjected before Yoshitake could finish speaking.

“He wasn’t fucking pissed that I was there… but that I’d waited so long to come visit!”

Tomu released a frustrated sigh. “I really don’t get it… this weird love/hate game that the two of you are playing. I thought the whole reason for this was so that you could take over the Shirokawa-gumi? That is why you killed your boss, right? To run the organisation in his place.”

“In part,” he said, rubbing at his eyes and fighting to stay awake. “But I’d never intended to be the public face of the organisation… too many enemies within it who’d not support my bid for the leadership. Easier to let Takeshi stand at the front and play the role of dutiful bodyguard—”

“And bedwarmer,” Tomu barked with an amused laugh. “Not sure how you ever planned to keep that hidden from the old guard… then again, they wouldn’t exactly stand for Takeshi taking over either. Rumblings I heard, none of them were too impressed that the old boss sent the boy to Tokyo and placed him under the protection of Tatsuo Ogawa, the then Ward Boss of Shinjuku for the Yamashita. Did you know that man has more than one lover? Or that one of them used to be a fucking cop?”

Yoshitake hadn’t been too surprised when Takeshi’s father had sent Takeshi north for university rather than keeping him close in Osaka. It’d been getting harder and harder to keep the information regarding Takeshi’s sexuality hidden from his bastard of a grandfather the longer he remained in the city. There were many places Takeshi could have gone, the Tokyo organisations weren’t the only ones who operated in the modern century, tolerant of all genders and sexualities. Nagoya would’ve been just as safe, and far closer than Tokyo. But it was that closeness that might have been the issue for Takeshi’s father, and because he feared what his own father—the former head of the Shirokawa-gumi—would do… No, Takeshi’s father had deliberately sent the boy far enough way that it would’ve been difficult for Yoshitake and Takeshi to continue the relationship they’d embarked on the moment Takeshi had turned eighteen—hell, it had started long before then really.

“Dirty cops aren’t exactly a new thing, Tomu. I don’t see why it’s that surprising, Ieyasu Tonagawa, head of the Kominaka Group in Nagoya, is currently fucking a cop too.”

“Gods this is all so fucking complicated. Why the hell would you go to all this fucking trouble just so you can… fuck him? His arse better be worth it, because we could still wind-up being dead over this, you know.”

Yoshitake chuckled. Tomu wasn’t wrong, there was still a chance that things could go pear shaped and they’d both wind up dead—he and Takeshi that was. If anything, the game had only gotten more dangerous since his supposed betrayal had been made public within the Shirokawa-gumi. It wouldn’t only be those who wanted Takeshi removed from his rightful position at the head of the organisation who’d be seeking him out, but those who wanted to prove their loyalty to him. And even those who joined up with Yoshitake wouldn’t necessarily support him taking over the leadership…men who’d happily turn around and kill him the moment Takeshi was out of the way so they could claim the position of power for themselves.

But they’d planned for that.

“He is worth it. And as long you don’t piss off the wrong people-” glaring at Tomu “-then this will all be over soon.”

“Does that mean you haven’t told Wu where I am?” Tomu asked nervously, his hands fisted on his knees.

“No. I haven’t.”

Handing his friend over to the Xuechan wasn’t something he’d do willingly, though the threat of it did help keep his friend in line and stopped him from doing something reckless. Yet he couldn’t deny that if Zimu Wu walked into Osaka and started tearing up the city looking for Tomu, Yoshitake would hand him over in a heartbeat. The Xuechan Triad weren’t an organisation that the Shirokawa could afford to offend.

“But you will—”

“If it’s a choice of your life or Takeshi’s… I’ll choose Takeshi’s every damn time.”

Tomu sighed and slumped down further in the chair, legs splayed in front of him. “Fair enough I guess. If I had a lover, I think I’d put their life ahead of everyone else’s too… but that aside, what are our next plans?”

“We wait.”

“Wait? That’s fucking boring.”

Yoshitake shrugged his shoulders. There was more to it than just simply waiting, but the injury to his foot had changed his and Takeshi’s plans a little. He couldn’t exactly stalk the streets of Osaka looking for his lover’s enemies and take them out. Nor would it work to try and disabuse members of the Shirokawa-gumi that Yoshitake wasn’t the enemy right now. Not that it would be easy to do at any stage of the plan now that they were all aware that he’d been the one to kill the last head of the organisation. Takeshi had assured him that he had a plan for that situation when the time came, but Yoshitake wasn’t too hopeful that many would accept whatever justification Takeshi put forward. And it wasn’t that he’d killed Takeshi’s father that would upset the high-ranked members of the organisation so much as the way he’d kept quiet about it and pretended an outside force were trying to destroy them.

It didn’t help that everything that had happened had been based on a plan he and Takeshi thrown together four years ago… one that had been filled with hypotheticals, and what if scenarios.

“Okay… fine… we wait. But what then? You must have plan for whoever it is we’re waiting for to appear.”

“When Takeshi’s enemies emerge out of the shadows they’ve been hiding in, we’ll kill them… make examples of them, and watch as Takeshi’s prestige amongst those who’ve remained loyal goes up.” Yoshitake stifled a yawn, the night’s earlier activities coupled with the ache of his foot was finally catching up with him. “Once his position as head of the Shirokawa-gumi is indisputable and the other organisations operating in the city also accept him as the next head of the Shirokawa-gumi… then this game will end, and I will once more take my place at his side.”

“So long as you don’t die first.”

Yoshitake snorted. “Trust me… no one in Osaka wants to see what happens if I’m killed. Takeshi will burn the city to the ground to find those responsible.”

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Tokyo Nights Series (MMM/GQ)

Deadly Game

Deadly Gamble

Deadly Gifts

Nagoya Crimes One (MMF)

Deception