Crows Zero

Chapter One

Serizawa Sumi stepped into the police station and glanced around. Several men turned to look at her—the pink miniskirt and flowery tanktop she wore, most likely. She ignored them as she spotted a familiar profile near the far back corner. Her lips pressed tightly together, but she managed to relax them by the time she reached the desk. The old man behind it nodded in greeting, and she returned the gesture. "Detective."

The guy in the guest chair, Serizawa Tamao, snapped his head around and winced up at her. He was not too tall, but he was certainly tall enough next to her. Unlike her pale, light-hearted features, his face arched and sharpened in distinct areas, giving him an aggressive but wise persona. He still wore his uniform jacket and slacks, covered in patches of sandy dirt that slightly polluted his brown hair—it shone chestnut in the bright lights of the station. The hair flowed back away from his face, and long sideburns pointed the way to a light goatee. And the subtle fear at the sight of her showed in his light almond eyes. "Sumi."

The detective stood and walked around his desk. "Keep a better eye on him, huh Sumi-chan?"

"Arigatō, Detective." She watched him leave then looked back at Tamao, who quickly turned back around. She glared, yanked his head back by the hair, and locked her arm around his throat. "You stupid jackass! How dare you get arrested again! How many times do you expect me to bail you out, you worthless idiot?"

"I-sor-ry," he gagged against the hold, flailing his arms and legs madly.

"You bet you are! I'll strangle your sorry ass till your head turns into a blueberry!"

"Heeeeeeelp!"

Tamao scuffed his feet as he and Sumi walked down the lamp-lit night street. "Thanks for bailing me out, Sumi."

Sumi sighed dramatically. "What can I do? You're hopeless without me." She slipped her arm around his elbow and leaned against his shoulder. "So what did you do this time?"

He shrugged. "I drove Tokio's motorcycle without a license. Kuroiwa chased me down and lost in an innocent game of chicken."

"You flipped his car over, Tamao," Sumi reminded, and he shrugged again. They both laughed. "As long as you're safe, anything you do is fine with me."

Tamao smiled down at her then pulled his arm free and wrapped it around her shoulders. "You're the best cousin in the whole world, do you know that?"

She beamed. "Of course I do!"

"Sumi! Over here!" Takahashi Meiko stood up on the tiptoes of her black stiletto heels and waved her arm frantically across the club. Tall and dressed luxuriously, Meiko always turned eyes with her long straight locks, porcelain skin, and shapely figure. Sumi liked Meiko's face best, though. Her eyes were perfectly placed in proportion to her small nose and long but well-rounded lips—Meiko could never hide any emotion, and she rarely tried. "Sumi!"

Sumi waved back at the table of girls. "You guys been here long?" She slid in beside Meiko at the end of the booth and spied the three men pleasantly squished between the other females. "I got tied up cleaning a little mess."

"Smoothing things over with the police for Tamao-kun, no doubt," Meiko responded, a slight disapproval present.

"No point in that," a girl giggled. "With how often he's there, trying to cool down the cops is next to impossible!" The girls laughed.

Sumi resisted the instinct to reach across the table and mark the girl's pasty face with her knuckles. It wasn't that she didn't like her; she just disliked people's snide remarks about Tamao more than she liked anyone.

"It's not like more than half the time the people don't deserve what they get," she amended. "Tamao isn't a bad guy."

"The police are?" the second girl teased.