A/n: Thank you for the reads and comments!

Miyazono Kaori POV:

The innocent Kousei that I once knew is gone as he became too different from the boy I loved long ago. He's different, now, but that's understandable as he was raised by a dangerous man for three years. It's obvious that he would absorb whatever he was teaching him. I survived my surgery but by the time I had woken up, he's gone. No one knew where he had gone to. We were never able to play the piano together again. At the time we met again, he was too different. I can't even recognize if he's really Arima Kousei or someone pretending to be him. He called himself 'Friend A' in front of Watari Ryota when he visited him in his suite.

Could it be because I didn't say 'Yes' to him, yet? I was slowly feeling so much guilt that I said a lie at him when we were fourteen. Kousei was distancing himself from me when his best friend arrived as he seemed to give his best friend space to talk to me. I stopped walking when we were already in the lobby to tell Watari Ryota about the truth of my feelings. "Watari Ryota, I know you're happy right now that you're- we're released from any kind of surveillance but I'll cut everything I have to say as I can't make excuses. I don't love you. I'm sorry."

Watari Ryota swallowed the truth painfully. "That's fine. I know you're in love with Kousei. It's obvious that you used me to get close to him."

I was about to leave and return to Kousei's room to give the letter he should have read if I did pass away in my surgery when Watari Ryota held my hand. "I'm sorry for lying for so long, Watari Ryota. I'm so sorry that I used you."

"You're in love with him. I know and I will respect that," he told me. "Even so, are you sure that you know the man who's living here? I was happy when I was released and I wasn't a hostage anymore. I was excited to see him but when I was finally able to see him here... I can't recognize and feel that I know him. He's not the Kousei we know."

"You do misunderstand, Watari Ryota. Something changed him," I said as I lower down my eyes. "We have to understand."

"Don't worry," he said to me. "I'll try to understand why you still love him."

"He's still the pianist I know but he was being raised closely by a treacherous man! He kept telling me about his fear towards his uncle," I told him. "I know that he had changed but that was understandable. He's seen things and he experienced considerable trauma. He was stolen from his father! It's obvious that it will take a huge toll on Kousei's psyche!"

"That man who had him threatened me upon the time I arrived in Las Vegas," he told me. "At those times, Kousei was still Kousei."

"What do you mean?" I asked him.

"He was still the innocent boy we all know," he answered me. "He was still the boy who wanted to leave the man that detained him here in Las Vegas, Nevada! I don't even know if I know him anymore now that he had adopted in his world!"

I slapped Watari Ryota. "Kousei's not fourteen anymore! Of course, he will be different! You don't know anything."

"If you know something, tell me!" he shouted. "He's drinking wine and smoking cigar now! That's not the friend I know!"

"Why don't you both low down your voices?" Kousei suddenly spoke that interrupted the two of us from arguing. "I heard all of it."

Watari Ryota stared at him. "Tell me why you don't want to leave the Ashworth Group? Didn't they take you away from your father?"

"Is that it? Is that why you think I became a different person now? Maybe I am," he exclaimed. "If there is anyone that changed me, that's my dad, himself."

He was about to leave but I held his hand to stop him from leaving. I need answers, too. "Can you stay for a bit?"

"Alright," he told us. "I'll stay."

"Kousei, what happened between you?" he asked. "There's something you need to explain to me."

"Whatever it is, you're free from Jupiter's power, now," he replied to him. "I endured fear and misery to protect you even if I don't understand why he had taken me and overhauled me in a gilded cage."

"Why don't you tell the police about him?" he asked him. "You have a lot of time to tell them that you were kidnapped and you're the 'Kousei Arima' that had gone missing six years ago!"

"They would just question my motives on why I would tell them that he abducted me. It had been six years ever since it happened and now, I am free. I have no evidence. More on, they would eventually know that I am related to him," he answered him. "One more thing, never call me 'Kousei' in public. Only Kaori can call me by that name. I won't be Arima Kousei in the next few days."

Ryota looked confused. "What are you talking about?"

"Nothing that truly concerns you," interrupted a man wearing a silver suit. He has small, dark brown eyes and a square face. "Seeing that you're bothering my son about his past was the reason why I kept telling him he doesn't need you."

"They're my friends and they deserve an explanation for why I accepted you as my guardian. You don't need to interrupt me from explaining things," Kousei spoke annoyingly. "They're merely having a shock of what I am, now. We haven't met for six years."

"Almost seven years," he said with a smile. "You're forgetting that you're twenty- one years old, now."

Kousei smiled. "I'm glad you know when mom gave birth to me."

"Why wouldn't I? It's your special day!" greeted Jupiter to him. "Why don't you introduce yourself to them?"

"I know you know him. He's my 'uncle' but I want him more as my 'father'. It's all thanks to him that I learned the truth about my 'dad'," he answered him. "That's my explanation of why I chose to stay in his wings."

I saw how confused his best friend was and he seemed to want to know more but at the same time, Kousei and Jupiter didn't want to keep explaining to him and so, they just walked away.

...

Three days later, while I was with Watari Ryota, the two of us saw Kousei chatting with a woman who has auburn hair and brown eyes. As I had remembered, Kousei was given exclusive floors by the dormitory management. Kousei looked happy around her, too. It was also strange that she wasn't calling him 'Arima' but instead she was calling him 'March'. We immediately chose to hide in a safe corner when we both learned that they were talking about something personal.

"March, I gave you the DNA Test that your Dad had asked for," the woman in front of him said to him. "You look very different today from the boy I robbed from his own birth father."

"Thanks, August. You tortured me those days around but I was thankful now by what you did," he said as he takes an envelope from her. "I grew up and learned it's better to be with my dad's half- brother."

"Yes," she answered him as she gives him a suitcase. "Aren't you afraid? You'll always be in perilous situations."

"No. I've lived with it for so long," he said as the woman opens the suitcase. It shocked me and Watari Ryota that it contained such huge money inside. "Can't you hand what I asked for? The envelopes were just a diversion for you to meet me, right?"

"Ever since you ate it as a meal as a child while we've locked you inside that container van, you've wanted to keep using it," she told him as she gives him another suitcase in front of his door. "You eat it as if you're a goat."

"I can't open this here," Kousei told her. "I can't be exposed immediately. Someone's watching us."

Exposed? What was he talking about?

"Understood. I can feel the tension in the air, too," August told him as Kousei open his room with a passcode. "Young master, you really are an amazing man, now."

...

Moments later, the two of them entered and five men immediately stood in front of his huge suite.

What was all of that?

"Let's go find a way to eavesdrop, Kaori," Watari Ryota nudged me. "I think there's a way we can know what was going on."

...

A/n: Hope you like this chapter! I'm glad that you are all reading my book!