Mio Famiglia, Mio Scudo

Episode XI

Dark brows were furrowed in worry, light amber eyes darted back and forth between the two tanned figures in front of him. Two men with bright red eyes stared at one another in silence, both trying to see if the other one will crack first and draw out their weapon.

It all had started out so innocently.....

"Oh hey Nao! How about we go to the cake shop today? Just you, me, Tetsuya, Baku and Suri?" Valentino suggested as the two were walking down the hallway, Baku not too far behind. "You mean the new one in the centre? I think that Hitatchiin's mom runs it?", "Hitatchiin? Oh, you mean Mai", "How is it that you are able to refer to everyone so casually, but when I do it everyone seems to get a heart attack?"

"It must be because of my devilishly good looks", the blonde said as he flipped his hair dramatically, rewarded with another girl fainting. Naoki snorted at this, both already knowing that it was probably because of Valentino being a foreigner, so people forgave him a lot easier for such mishaps. "I think that Mayoi was given a special permission to work part time, I was told that the school usually doesn't allow it", the teen said before he stopped to look at his own reflection from the mirror. It'd been now a month since Xanxus had told him that he'd be trained by Varia, month and a half since the said male had instructed him to eat better and it was starting to show.

He'd grown couple centimeters since then, he was sure of it, and on top of it his features had become finer. His eyes looked narrower, as did his face, over all he was starting to look more like an adult. And it was about the time too, he was already eighteen years old after all.
Valentino stopped to look at his friend, noticing his apparent confusion, and smiled gently. He then ruffled his friend's hair earning a yelp and group of protests. "Don't worry about it Nao, you'll be in good shape in no time", it had turned out that the flame leech had caused a delay in the boy's growth spurt, but he'd be sure to catch up with the rest of his age group, the treatments he'd gone through along with the changes in his diet had taken care of that.

With the city being once again silent and safe, the Sumiyoshi-kai had come back from hiding their presence. The graduation time was nearing and some heirs were preparing to take over their responsibilities as dons and donnas. Naoki himself was very nervous himself, he'd been invited to two inheritance ceremonies, it'd be the first public appearance of Paravento. He'd also be watching over the Syracuse base's renovations.
Tetsuya, Suri, Valentino and Baku had all gifted Naoki a small fortune, which he'd used in buying an actual castle by the ocean to become the official HQ, Haruka having the ability to tap into his own inheritance already was also an advantage to them, and thus they could start the building and rebuilding a lot earlier than anticipated. They'd also managed to get few new members in Kaname, Haruka's childhood friend and bodyguard Jean, Natalia (Haruka's maid), Mochida and few others.

Baku caught up on them right on time for Tetsuya and Suri to join them. The French Donna to be immediately tried to glomp Naoki, who narrowly avoided it. One day he'd be able to tell the woman that he wasn't some plush toy to be hugged and squeezed.
The group left the building, Suri now slightly pouting as she was attached onto the arm of the indifferent Tetsuya.
The quintet walked through the city, not bothering to go home first to change from the uniforms, minus the only woman of the group, Suri had never taken up to wear the school uniform and was even now wearing a light green gown. It was incredible what the mafia managed to get away within the usually strict Japanese society.

At the cake shop, named Soleil for some reason, the duo first encountered Haruka wearing a frilly outfit with lace and a bow in their hair. Naoki stared at the uniform, his mind blank. He hadn't expected to come across his friend like this, nor had he expected to see them wear the obviously working uniform of the new cake shop.
"So...Haru...um", "I wanted to get experience on the field of customer service", "Ah"