Fealty by littlelinguistme
Prompt 53 from p0ck3tf0x's One Hundred Ways to Say 'I Love You': "Sit down, I'll get it."

Disclaimer: Not my characters, barely my plot, AND IF I COULD JUST SAY I'd never let ShinRan be canon if I had any amount of ownership over this universe.

He'd always admired her. She existed in a plane of quietude that could only be disrupted by her own capricious indulgent invitation. She carried grace and dignity effortlessly; compelled respect and attention with a taunting lift of a singular eyebrow; appraised his worth in a sharp exhale and he was helpless in the face of her everyday majesty.

Yes, majesty is exactly the right word. The detective thought of the way he'd come home to find her reading on their couch. Languishing? His gaze softened as the imprint of countless iterations of her manner of greeting him, or more accurately - the lack thereof, crossed his mind.

He pictured her, stretched across – half lying down, honestly – their chaise with a book resting open on the single arm, a hand idly playing with the next page as she concentrates, refusing to acknowledge him until she'd finished her line, her paragraph, her page, or sometimes, even her whole reading, unhurried and undeterred by his arrival. The phrase, a queen never leaves her throne to address a peasant, came to mind. He doesn't exist until she recognizes his presence. It's a welcome contrast to how everyone outside is always clamoring for his opinions, personal and professional.

When it seemed like she was too engrossed in her reading and that his greeting would be a while yet, he'd start the transition from business professional to homey casual, starting with his shoes. The young detective had long since found the perfect knot for his dress shoes, one such that he'd never have to bend down and tie them again and allowed him to quickly slip them on and off like trainers. Years of soccer training allowed him to kick them into place in the corner by the shoe shelf; today, one of them landed upside down and he frowned, upset in typical male fashion whenever one misses his shot at a garbage bin.

He determined to do better next time, nevertheless, and moved towards their bedroom intent on changing clothes. It was a habit he had learned from living with Shiho, unsurprisingly fastidious. She insists outside clothes are dirty and don't he dare spread his filth around. To this day he remains unconvinced, always thinking back to his parents and how they never did that and our house was pretty clean…He changes clothes anyway.

Tonight, Shinichi emerges and doesn't miss the way her eyes dart up to confirm his identity before relaxing back into the latest issue of Vogue or… whatever. The reminder that she still has every reason to be suspicious and cautious darkens his face. For all the freedom that they currently enjoyed, being able to live as themselves, undisguised, using their own names, not huddling behind witness protection or an elementary school teacher, their enemies still lie in wait. Such patience was almost commendable, if not for their lives being on the line and all. It had been years since they'd taken down the crows, but the most important and least sane member still evades capture. Vodka had been apprehended early on but somehow managed to suicide in jail before he could be questioned about Gin's whereabouts.

She still wasn't ready for his audience. Unbothered, he moved into the kitchen to find a snack, bypassing a rather enticing lineup of chips and chocolates for an apple. Shinichi remembered her words you must learn how to choose healthy for yourself, despite other temptations and anyway, he didn't feel like hearing her nag him tonight even though you burn quite a lot of calories solving murders. Red Fuji washed, he cut it in half and then cut the halves into thirds to share. Time to check if his scientist had finished her reading.

"Was it the barber?"

He blinked; at last, acknowledgment. "Hey, Miyano. Why would you think it's the barber and not the butcher? Apple?"

He liked watching her play detective. On slow days, he'd text her case details. Whenever it interested her, she'd text back questions. On busy days, for big cases and the like, she'd always be there to help, his undisputed partner. The Tokyo MPD welcomed her presence, grateful and trusting enough to give her unlimited unsupervised access to all their labs and equipment. He was pretty proud of how well she fit into his world.

It started as a bet she couldn't figure out who was the culprit before him. It's not that he didn't have faith in her brilliance, his pride just couldn't let him believe she could do detective work as well as him. This is his career! They were supposed to tell Assistant Inspector Sato who the culprit was when they found who the killer was without a shadow of a doubt. Unfortunately, when she heard about this, Sato-san gave them both a stern scolding about how someone is dead and if you two can be disrespectful enough to turn their final rest into a game, it should be to see how fast they could solve the case together so as to give the family some peace of mind and closure sooner.

As they discussed his latest case, munching on horribly unevenly sliced apple pieces, he settled down on the floor in front of the chaise lounge. He leaned back into her and she let her fingers reach down over his shoulder, sure that his would come soon to join her, simply accepting his presence in her space. Shiho continued to flip through her magazine with her other hand but he knew the majority of her focus was on him.

It was the barber after all. She was right, of course. He just wanted to hear her logic, see where the scientists' line of reasoning diverged from his own, understand how she could follow a path almost unique to his yet end up in the same place as him.

"And then he tried to run away! Made such a mess and caused so much trouble, this guy, he had a shaving knife up his actual sleeve! Can you believe it? And then he…" Shinichi unknowingly trailed off, his mind drifting to another time, a different place.

"Kudo." Her soft alto grounded him.

"Oh, sorry. Then he, uh, took one of the bystanders hostage and you know, the hostage got pretty badly hurt. The knife nicked one of the subclavian arteries –" Shiho's eyes widened in understanding. " –and the last time I saw that much blood… was you." And it reminded me of how I utterly failed to protect you. How you looked so pale and fragile and you didn't look like you were breathing under all those hospital sheets.

They were both quiet, lost in the memory of her last encounter with Gin, the single-handed reason for their continued paranoia and anxiety. He'd come upon them by chance while they were camping. Out in the woods, there were few clues to follow without risking getting majorly lost. There was no way to fight back and with Shiho so injured, it was all they could do to get to safety.

He'd never, ever, forget it. She'd lost more blood than there could possibly even be inside a body. He hadn't been able to hold her as she bled; he had been driving – flying – them at a truly reckless speed to the nearest hospital. But he remembered clearly, hypervividly, the image of her body convulsing, each instance that she lost consciousness, the sound of her voice breaking as she gasped.

Utterly useless. He could only stand witness to her suffering and doggedly commit every moment to memory in case the doctors needed it later. The fact that those same commitments now plagued his dreams, well, he saw that as a fitting punishment.

The detective had vowed to protect her. When he made that promise, he meant it with every bit of sincerity that a knight possesses when swearing fealty to their king – queen, in this case. Well, she is rather like Her Serene Highness, he mused, courageous and capable. Captivating. He rolled his eyes at himself. The petite scientist would never let it go if she ever heard he compared her to a queen. She had quite a few opinions about monarchs always being puppets for others' private gain.

The air conditioner roared to life suddenly, jarring them back to their living room, back to each other. Their intertwined hands tightened their grip on the other. Sighing, Shinichi lifted their hands over his head so he could turn around and face her on the little one-armed couch. The magazine fell to the floor, forgotten.

He opened his mouth trying to find the right words to express his regret, his guilt, his determination to never let Gin find her again but before he could say anything, the doorbell rang. They both tensed.

She recovered first. "I think I invited hakase over. That's probably him…" He could tell she was still a little tense as she started straightening up to answer the door.

"Sit down, I'll get it." He'd do this and any number of other things for her. Anything that could ease his guilt and prove to her that he was serious about his vows to her. Like a knight to his queen.