(BL) Mafia Love; He who falls the hardest loses-Chapter 180: Blackmail

***

"Where is Hiroshi?" Haruki asked directly, finding perfunctory greetings unnecessary.

Dr. Yamamoto cleared his throat cautiously before responding, "He clocked out an hour ago. I think he has gone home."

Think? Haruki was very sure that the man was avoiding him. He rose up and nodded at the old man before walking past him out of the office. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

Hiroshi had left work from the ward without returning to the office. He was certain Hiroshi had left his bag in the office and returned it simply because he didn’t want to meet him.

As he walked towards his car, he wondered if he should go to Hiroshi’s home or return to the hospital the next day. To think the man left work in a hurry after finding out he was waiting for him at his office; he decided to drive home for the day.

***

Haruki agreed to accept the inheritance. Aiichiro gave him his house and a few hundred million he invested. Just when Haruki thought he could relax, sell the house, and donate the money to completely disconnect himself from the inheritance, Aiichiro’s lawyer gave him a box.

Haruki looked down at the small black velvet box cautiously before reaching for it. He opened it. There was a gold-plated key in it and a card. The card had a string of numbers.

He closed the box, still confused as he looked at Aiichiro’s assistant. "What is this?"

"My boss wanted me to give it to you if you accept the inheritance. I would have used it some other way if you killed him yourself or rejected the inheritance."

Haruki’s brow furrowed deeply. The man’s response had not provided him with the answer he would have appreciated.

"What’s the key for?" Haruki asked directly when the man didn’t offer any more explanation.

"That’s the key and password to his vault. You might need a laundryman for it," the assistant replied.

"What vault?" Haruki asked.

"Behind the mirror in his walk-in closet," the lawyer replied. "You can have your lawyer contact me for anything else." The assistant rose up and bowed deeply to Haruki.

The man walked out of the office and closed the door behind him. Haruki sighed in relief. He didn’t know what was locked up in the vault, although he could guess it was money from the need for a laundryman the assistant mentioned.

He didn’t lack anything. He would easily have gone on living in wealth after rejecting the inheritance, but he could not ease the nagging feeling he felt as he looked down at the small box he held.

He wanted to go there to see for himself what was left in the vault; he had a strong feeling it went beyond just cash or gold.

He rose and put on his coat. Kiyoshi met him at the door.

"Let’s go to Aiichiro’s house," Haruki ordered.

Kiyoshi was curious, but he followed Haruki quietly.

He was allowed in through the gate. There were no guards around like that night; instead, the place looked deserted. And it has only been a month. He met someone who allowed him in at the gate without asking any questions.

The furniture was draped, and it was obvious that dust had begun to accumulate around the house. Haruki had no idea where the man’s room was.

"Spread out; let’s find the master’s bedroom."

"I don’t think you should walk around alone," Kiyoshi said.

"I will be fine," Haruki said firmly.

"I will bring the other guards in. I will go search when they arrive," Kiyoshi said stubbornly.

"He didn’t kill me when he was alive; how will he do it now that he’s dead?"

"We . . ." Kiyoshi began disagreeing aloud. He moved closer to Haruki and whispered, "We don’t even know if he is really dead."

Haruki sighed. It seems he was not the only one who had that tiny voice in the back of his head asking him what he would do if Aiichiro suddenly showed up before him.

"Stop having wild imaginations," Haruki replied with a tired sigh and walked towards the stairway. "I will check the top floor; you check down here."

Gym, library, and three rooms, all of which simply looked like guest rooms. It was not fun walking around the same space Aiichiro lived in. The wall paintings, furniture arrangements, the dying indoor plants, and everything else seemed to share a piece of Aiichiro’s personality.

Haruki sighed when he finally got to the master suite. The room was almost twice the size of the other rooms. He rushed into the first door and pushed it open. It was the closet.

There was a large mirror. He called Kiyoshi. He told him he had found the room and the directions. He began looking for the mechanism that would move the mirror away.

He moved his fingers around the large mirror. He made almost no progress. He began searching the drawers for a keyhole that the key he had would open.

He tried fitting the key in all the keyholes until one finally responded when he turned it. He heard a soft clicking sound before the mirror slid to the side and showed a door.

He hadn’t thought much about what the size of the vault would be, but after opening the door with the password on the card, he was met with a large room with shelves on the wall. The shelves were stacked with brown boxes of different sizes.

Aside from the shelves, it was furnished to look like an office with a desk and chair. On the desk, sat a closed laptop. Kiyoshi arrived and walked into the room.

"What are these?" Kiyoshi asked, pulling out one of the boxes. It had a small flash drive in it with a name taped on it. Kiyoshi read the name, causing Haruki to turn to him.

"Was he blackmailing the prime minister?" Haruki asked. He was certain the flash drive didn’t have a song playlist or something completely innocent.

All the boxes on that side contained flash drives, SD cards, phones, pictures, hard drives, files, and documents. There had to be things Aiichiro used to keep people under his control. It was no wonder no one was interested in further investigating whether his death was murder or not.

He had too many enemies for them to care. They all looked like they stood by him, protected him, and were on good terms with him, but from what Kiyoshi saw, Aiichiro simply kept them on leashes.

Kiyoshi stopped and looked at Haruki, who was trying to log in to the laptop on the table. "Your name," he said when Haruki glanced at him.

Kiyoshi lifted the box and brought it to him. There were more than a dozen flash drives in the box. He reached in and picked one of them.

Kiyoshi, knowing what he wanted to do, went on to the other side of the room to check the boxes there.

Haruki finally logged into the laptop using his date of birth and inserted the flash drive into the port. His gaze on the screen hardened with every file he clicked on. It had pictures and videos of Haruki. They were all taken outside, and they were taken five years ago.

He picked another and went through it. By the time he was done, he was certain that Aiichiro had been watching long before they even became friends and could only infiltrate his life properly when he made a deal with Ren.

He sighed and rubbed his forehead. The man was obsessed. He had even very intimate recent photos and videos of Haruki, all of which Ren made possible. It made him sick to his stomach.

"Let’s burn everything," he said, glancing at Kiyoshi.

On the other side, the boxes were filled with cash of different currencies and gold bars. Haruki finally understood what Aiichiro’s assistant meant when he said he would need a laundryman.

He sighed. Cleaning all the money did not seem to be a difficult task, but Haruki, looking at all the boxes and remembering what he had seen on those flash drives, didn’t want a single penny.

Kiyoshi, looking at Haruki’s weary expression, could not hold back a sigh. He was certain that whatever Haruki saw on those flash drives must have been extreme.

"Are we really burning everything?" Kiyoshi asked.

"I will leave the laundry to you. Handle it and donate every penny," Haruki replied firmly. He didn’t want to spend a penny on the man. "Sell his watches too and donate his clothes, but burn everything on that side."

He knew it was a common practice to control people with their secret, and it was something he was not new to. He had enough secrets he needed to survive; he didn’t need any more.

Kiyoshi packed up everything related to Haruki, including the laptop, and followed Haruki.

Haruki was finally able to breathe well when he walked out and exhaled.

"I think you should handle these yourself," Kiyoshi said when they got into the car. He pushed the laptop and the flash drives to Haruki. "

Haruki looked down at them. He wondered what Aiichiro’s assistant would have done with them if he had rejected the inheritance or, even worse, killed Aiichiro himself. It was all thanks to Hiroshi.

Remembering the doctor who had been actively avoiding him, Haruki ordered them to drive to Hiroshi’s house.