breach, noun:

1: infraction or violation of a law, obligation, tie, or standard;

2: a broken, ruptured, or torn condition;

3: a break in accustomed or familiar relations

"Do you like him?"

Rukia spewed.

Green tea dribbled down her chin as she looked up, embarrassed, wet, and disconcerted in the face of an awkward question made even more awkward thanks to her spectacular reaction. Making things worse was the fact that, despite projecting her drink across the table, she missed Kiyone. No—Kiyone ducked, and Rukia sprayed the old man behind her instead.

He turned, dribbling wet, with a glare venomous enough to kill a cobra.

Rukia nearly died.

"I am so sorry!" she gasped, jumping up and attacking the man with a fantastic wad of napkins. "I didn't mean to—I am so, so sorry!"

But he would have none of it. He shoved the napkins at her like toilet paper and snarled, "Noble behavior, eh, Kuchiki Rukia?"

Rukia froze, distantly aware that the teahouse had gone quiet enough to hear the muted drumroll of rain above. He'd called her out as a Kuchiki—Rukia Kuchiki, sister to the head of the highest noble family in the land. If there was one rule of nobility, it was to cultivate elegance and propriety in all manner of civilized behavior. She'd effectively broken that rule. Spat on it, really.

Nii-sama was so going to have her head.

"I am so sorry sir—"

"Get out of my sight!" he screamed.

She fled to her seat, shrinking behind Kiyone as he slapped down a few bills and stormed out faster than Hyōrinmaru on a storm summoning. All around, shinigami stared, expressions ranging from sympathy to outright amusement.

A chopstick clattered to the floor.

"What're you all looking at?" Kiyone snapped, shattering the silence with a sound slap to the table. "Get back to your food!"

Everyone obeyed instantly. Noise returned full blast like nothing happened, except for the occasional peek in Rukia's direction. Rukia, on the other hand, buried her face in her hands and moaned.

Today was not going according to plan.

According to plan, she'd polish up her reports and organize files for a currently furloughed Captain Ukitake. She'd follow that up with a nice dinner with Kiyone, then spend the rest of her day enjoying a well-earned soak. She'd put on music, put up her feet, and while the evening away.

But first thing this morning, she'd learned of an important dinner with some neighboring noble. On top of that, her bath was going through repairs. Nii-sama had given her permission to use his, but she'd declined, certain that in 24 hours she wouldn't need anything more than a quick shower at division lodgings.

So much for plans. It'd be pointless to wash up, then trek through the downpour back to the Kuchiki estate, where Nii-sama would undoubtedly intercept and have a word about containing her drink…

Rukia groaned. "I am so dead."

"Don't worry about it," Kiyone placated, her lips twisting into a poorly disguised grin as she attempted to pass a napkin discreetly over the table. "Or maybe I shouldn't have ducked? I swear I saw little rainbows flying over it."

"Oh my god…"

Kiyone laughed. "But seriously, I ask you to spill a secret and you spill your drink instead. I'm taking that as a yes, by the way, and don't try to hide it because I know that reaction had to mean something."

"It means I felt sick just thinking about it," Rukia retorted, snapping upright. "They're my friends—nothing more, nothing less."

"Oh?" Kiyone's grin widened. "Then you're missing out. You're around boys all the time, but they might as well be part of the scenery, like cabbages at the supermarket." She narrowed her eyes. "Or don't you like cabbages?"

Rukia's face went blank. Then she covered her mouth coyly, making a delicate blush bloom on her cheeks. "I prefer muffins…"

Kiyone rolled her eyes. "Now you're just thinking of tomorrow's breakfast."

Rukia dropped her hand, smirking. "Of course! Besides, it's not like you miss anything if you don't even know what it is you are missing."

"But you do know what you're missing!" Kiyone protested. "You've got this big, gaping hole in your life that can only be filled with that one special somebody, and since you're such a soft-hearted romantic you know exactly what I'm talking about and now the only question is who. But you're just too stubborn to admit anything."

"Touché." Rukia sipped her tea.

Kiyone slumped. "Come on, Rukia! Even your dead fish of a brother married for love, and if he can do it, anyone can." She paused. "Well, I guess there are exceptions. Kotsubaki may not be a fish or dead, but I think I'd die if I ever met a girl in love with him. That idiot couldn't get two pigeons together if he tried."

Rukia smiled.

Despite Kiyone's provocations, there had been a time when she'd devoted undue attention to a man who, despite his teasing and playful rebuffing, was decades her senior and married to the woman he loved. It took his death—in her arms, by her own blade—to prove adoration unwieldy in the hands of a soldier whose purpose was to protect the living and purify the dead.

That didn't mean she disliked the idea of love. It didn't mean she wanted to be single for the rest of her afterlife. But inviting anything more would be asking for trouble, and frankly, babysitting those idiots was enough trouble as it was. As a shinigami, duty was duty itself, and like Nii-sama she would commit herself to that ideal.

Sympathy, friendship, love…such feelings aren't necessary for shinigami.

In her mind's eye, Kaien smiled.

Rukia cringed.

"But you're not an exception!" Kiyone thumped the table, jolting Rukia back to reality. "You're a lovely young lady who just needs a little push, and that's where I come in. I'm a wonderful matchmaker, you know. I just need to hear the word and voila, I'll work my magic." Kiyone leaned in, so close that Rukia had to recoil from her mysterious wasabi breath. "So which is it? Fiery red…or tawny orange?!"

"Kiyone—"

A hurricane of reiatsu crashed onto the table, upsetting the teacups and startling nearby diners. Rukia didn't flinch. Kiyone did, less out of surprise and more because she was this close to having an actual stroke.

"Kotsubaki!" Kiyone shouted, her face turning an unflattering crimson. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Kotsubaki sat on the table like a meditating Buddha, arms crossed and expression stern—at least as stern as Kotsubaki could look when picking a fight with Kiyone. "Skipping work again, eh, little monkey?"

"I'm not!" Kiyone screeched. "I finished mine! You're the one who didn't finish yours!"

"We have the same work, monkey!"

Freezing water dribbled down the back of Rukia's head. She whipped around so fast she got a crick in her neck. "Ichigo! You're in Soul Society?"

"Renji's here too," Renji said with a wave.

Kiyone eyed them with disdain. "Getting busy in here."

"Yeah." Ichigo rubbed a hand through his soaked hair. Clearly he'd underestimated Soul Society's wetter weather or general lack of it. Beside him, Renji shook out his mane like a wet dog, his usually perky ponytail another sopping testament to the rain. "School's off, so I thought I'd visit," Ichigo continued. "I ran into Renji while I was looking for you, and Kotsubaki was looking for Kiyone, so I guess it all worked out."

Kiyone glared at him. "You're breaking up our tea party?"

"Not when there's no party," Renji countered. "You two are having tea. We three will be having sake. That's more the party."

Kiyone scowled. "That's not a party, that's a gang of drunken idiots."

"You shouldn't be talking," Renji shot back. "At least I don't show up to work drunk."

"Because Kuchiki-taichou would whip your ass!"

"Alright!" Rukia barked. "I already made a scene, let's not make two."

"Three," Kiyone said, nodding at the table.

"Three," Rukia agreed. She fished out the little Chappy coin purse Kiyone had given her after their first mission together. It'd been her first collectible, and yes, it was starting to show, but she couldn't bring herself to part with it. She unsnapped the little button nose and set down some money as she rose. "Listen. I have a family dinner tonight. That means no horseplay, no fooling around, no nothing—and definitely no sake," she said, ignoring the collective groan from the boys. "'Presentable' means I can't be falling down drunk."

Renji looked crestfallen. Kiyone turned on her, expression fierce. "You're ditching?"

Rukia glanced at the upset teacups and doomed rice crackers as Kiyone followed her gaze. Point taken. "We could hang out tomorrow," Rukia began. At Kiyone's prompting glare, she shrugged. "Over muffins?"

Kiyone laughed. "Over muffins."

It wasn't far to the residential districts, so Rukia led the way as Ichigo and Renji followed. They turned onto a washed out street where the ground was slick with excess rainwater. This area was infamous for sending more than a few broken limbs to 4th, so being the kind and considerate friend she was, she warned them. (Or perhaps she didn't want to deal with said broken limbs—these two were enough trouble as it was.)

"Careful, it's slippery!" she called.

To prove her point, Renji slipped. Or at least it was probably Renji. All she knew was that one second she was running down one rain plastered street at the heart of Seireitei, and the next she was flying face first into the mud with two full grown men on top of her.

It was hard to tell if it was karma or stupidity.

Probably both.

"You!" she shouted. Dirt stung her eyes as she jumped up, wiping her eyes with dirty hands and dirty hands on dirty clothes. Her shihakusho was drenched. Her face was masked in mud. She frantically scrubbed the soil from her lashes and whirled on the heap of idiot at her feet. "What part of dirty me and die did you not understand?"

"It wasn't me!" they chimed, then glared at one another.

"Look at his shihakusho! It's clean 'cause he used us as a doormat!"

"Idiot, you call this clean? Go look at a mirror!"

Rukia punched them both. "You call yourselves shinigami but can't keep your footing on the damn street? Now look what you've done. I can't go to dinner like this."

With dinner an hour away, she didn't have much choice. She attempted a futile brush-off of her shihakusho, smearing the grime deeper into her clothes, then worked Ichigo's crick out of her neck and shot them both a look that would've killed any lesser shinigami.

"I will see you two later," she ground out, flashing off toward the Kuchiki estate.

Byakuya sighed.

Finally, the end of a day of endless meetings, but it was far from over. After discussing everything from family issues at home to politics with the bureaucracy that was Soul Society, the last thing anyone needed was for such meetings to extend into the night. But no point in wishing otherwise. He arrived home as the sun broke through the rain, teasing the kenseikan out of his hair as he played over the meeting.

The family meeting, to be specific. Most Gotei 13 meetings weren't interesting enough to dwell on, but the family ones could be serious food for thought. Today's meeting in particular. He shouldn't have been surprised. The elders had been itching nervously ever since Aizen's defection, and though there was little reason for the traitors to target him outside the fact that he was a captain, they wanted absolute assurance it would not be the end of the family line.

Personally Byakuya found this a bit backward. Who would be worrying about family lines if there was no Soul Society left to begin with?

But there was no point in arguing. It was his duty to produce an heir, and he wouldn't be marrying for love this time around. It was better this way. Giving in to needless emotions was proof of an inability to control them, and if there was one thing Byakuya excelled at, it was control.

That, and the feel of Hisana's cold, limp hand would be engraved in his memory forever.

Byakuya shut his eyes. It'd be right back to work tomorrow, so he resigned himself to at least try to enjoy this one night back home. With marriage hanging over his head like a prison sentence, he whipped open the door, wondering how long he could stall before they forced the issue. He stepped in and set his kenseikan on the counter when movement caught his eye and he looked up.

His heart stopped.

She was on the edge of his bath, her back toward him, poised delicately on the ledge as she ran slim white fingers through wet black locks. Her skin glowed in the gold evening light, beaded with dew-like rivulets that ran down the perfect crescents of her shoulder blades, the small of her back, the curve of her hips down to her backside.

Whatever thoughts he'd had dissipated like water on a steam boiler. The resemblance was shocking. For a moment Byakuya stared, too stunned to look away.

Had he been so preoccupied that he failed to sense her reiatsu?

But now he hesitated. He'd opened the door and she hadn't heard, but who was to say she wouldn't hear it close? Could he shunpo out in hopes that she wouldn't notice the burst of his reiatsu? Or should he back out and leave the door quietly untouched?

His heart raced as his fingers worried the door. It was unacceptable to leave it open. While he appreciated the virtues of the hired help, he wasn't sure that any man (other than himself, of course) could stand up to the temptation of a beautiful woman caressing herself in his bath. And she was beautiful. It didn't help that she looked like a woman he probably shouldn't be comparing her to, a woman who'd had the same moon-kissed skin, the same slight frame, the same warm, delicate curves that trembled ever so slightly when—

Badtrainofthought.

Byakuya swallowed.

This was Rukia. It was a breach of conduct to even look at her like this, and he'd been virtually staring now with the sick interest of a voyeur. But before he could move, Rukia stood up.

Byakuya froze.

His stomach turned to ice as she propped back her arms and gave a catlike stretch, flashing way too much thigh to even pretend to retain any last shred of decency.

It was too much. He stepped back to leave, door open or otherwise, but in his haste to put some distance between them, Senbonzakura's scabbard slammed against the door with a reverberating crack.

He froze.

Because at that moment, Rukia turned.

"Nii-sama!"