The Yakuza’s Mute Bride novel Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Two years….

That’s how long it’s been since I last saw him.

Since that quiet airport room, where silence spoke louder than love ever could.

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St youches

“Tadaima…” I whisper softly as I step through the front door of the London house. My voice still carries that rasp – fragile, imperfect, but alive.

The house is quiet at first, until footsteps echo down the hallway.

“Okaeri,” Yuka greets, her smile warm and familiar as she appears from the kitchen, drying her hands on a towel. Her Japanese lilt softens the English air around us.

Behind her, Ai pokes her head from the living room, holding a cup of tea, and Yukito follows with that same calm, steady composure that has always reminded me of Tadashi – though softer, kinder somehow.

I smile back at them. It still feels strange sometimes – smiling without pretending.

The faint scent of roasted tea leaves and rain drifts through the open window. London’s gray sky hangs low, heavy with drizzle, and the garden outside glistens with the kind of muted beauty I used to overlook.

Now, it feels like home.

A borrowed home, maybe, but still – mine.

“Dinner’s almost ready,” Yuka says, her voice carrying the warmth of an older sister. “Ai’s cooking your favorite again.”

Ai waves the spoon in her hand with mock pride. “Miso salmon! The London market finally had decent fish today.”

I chuckle

–

or try to.

The sound that leaves me is soft, broken, but it makes Ai’s eyes brighten with triumph. She Rever treats my voice like a flaw. None of them do.

Because here, in this house that Tadashi built for me, I don’t have to hide.

It’s strange to think about how all of this began.

When I first returned to London, I thought I’d be alone.

I thought I’d step off that plane and vanish back into the city that had always swallowed me whole.

But Tadashi had other plans.

–

I didn’t know until the car stopped in front of this house — quiet, elegant, with its wisteria-covered gates and carved wood doors that looked far too familiar.

Masayoshi architecture.

Even in another country, he found a way to surround me with a piece of him.

Back then, I had turned to Yuka, bewildered.

“Why?” I signed, the question trembling from my fingers.

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Chapter 19

Yukito had answered me, his eyes soft.

—

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“Because you have no one here. He wanted you to live not survive. This house… this life… is his way of saying you’re not

forgotten.”

Those words made me cry the kind of tears that come from deep inside, the kind that burn.

–

“Why does he care?” I’d written shakily on the notepad.

Yukito’s reply still echoes in my mind: “Because you’re the first woman who made him believe there’s life outside the clan. You made him think about freedom.”

I had cried even harder then.

Because I knew what freedom meant to him and what it cost.

–

Now, two years later, I stand by the same window every morning, looking out at the London skyline that stretches gray and endless.

Some days, I almost expect to see him standing by the gate.

Other days, I know better.

The Masayoshi clan still needs him.

Japan still binds him.

And I… I still wait.

Not because he promised, but because something in my heart never stopped listening.

After dinner

Ai and Yuka chatter about tomorrow’s errands while Yukito flips through a newspaper.

Their Japanese words fill the room with warmth, and for a moment, I close my eyes and let the sounds wash over me – like the rustle of bamboo leaves back in Kyoto.

When they leave for the night, I linger by the door, thanking them with small smiles and gentle nods.

Yukito pauses before stepping outside.

He looks at me with that same steady calm, as though reading my thoughts

“He would be proud of you, Naomi-san,” he says quietly.

My chest tightens. “Why?” I manage to whisper.

“Because you live,” he answers simply. “Because you found your voice, even when the world took it from you.”

Then he bows slightly and walks into the rain,

Later that night, I find myself sitting by the fireplace with a sketchbook open across my lap. The pages are filled with drawings not just faces, but moments.

A hand holding a teacup.

A kimono sleeve caught by the wind.

A man’s profile in half-shadow- Tadashi’s, of course-drawn from memory, from longing.

Chapter 19

My fingers trace the charcoal lines of his jaw.

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I can still remember the scent of cedar and smoke, the warmth of his hand as he tucked my hair behind my ear.

That night in the airport feels like another life.

1

Yet sometimes, when I close my eyes, I can still hear him say it ‘Even in silence, I heard you’

It’s strange, how memories can hurt and heal at once.

The next morning, the rain hasn’t stopped.

London seems wrapped in silver mist, soft and dreamlike.

1 pour tea and sit by the window, watching droplets race down the glass. Across the room, the old clock ticks – steady, patient, unbothered by time.

My phone buzzes once on the table. A message from Yuka: ‘Don’t forget your lesson today!’

Right. My speech therapist.

I smile faintly. Two years ago, I never imagined I’d try again.

The sound of my voice still frightens me – rough, uneven, ghostlike – but each lesson teaches me that I can still try.

When I manage to say small words – thank you, good morning, home – Yuka’s eyes always glisten. Ai cheers. Even Yukito

smiles.

I wonder sometimes if Tadashi knows.

If Yukito ever told him that I’m speaking again – even just a little.

Would he smile? Or would it hurt him, knowing he isn’t here to hear it first?

After my lesson, I take the train toward the old part of the city. The cold air bites, and the streets gleam with rain. I stop by the art shop where I’ve been selling my portraits-soft charcoal sketches of people who never knew they were being watched.

The owner greets me warmly.

“You’re early today, Naomi!”

I nod, signing a small good morning.

He’s used to my silence, but lately, I’ve been trying to whisper greetings – to let sound exist again, however broken.

He hands me an envelope. “A man bought your painting yesterday. Said it reminded him of home.”

I blink in surprise. “Which one?” I ask quietly, my voice rasping like autumn wind.

“The one of the temple garden. You know

My heart stumbles.

The Kyoto temple garden.

—

the one with the white crane.”

The one I’d drawn from memory of Shun-sama’s estate.

I swallow hard, thanking him before stepping back outside, clutching the envelope.

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Chapter 19

The street feels different now the air sharper, charged.

Could it be…?

No. I shake my head.

–

Tadashi wouldn’t come here. He can’t.

Still, for the rest of the day, my thoughts won’t quiet.

That evening, I stand in front of the mirror, brushing my hair. The reflection that stares back at me is softer than the girl who once lived in shadows. My eyes carry less fear now more peace, maybe.

But some things never fade.

–

The

memory of his hand over mine.

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The sound of his voice calling my name like a prayer.

The promise he whispered as I walked away – ‘I will come one day. You’ll see

–

I touch the pendant hanging around my neck — a small, carved crane made of wood. He had given it to me on my last birthday through Yukito.

‘A crane never forgets where it learned to fly, he’d said then.

Back then, I didn’t understand.

Now, I think I do.

‘Because even when I tried to run from the pain, his kindness followed – quietly, faithfully, like a shadow that refused to fade.’

Sometimes, when the loneliness grows heavy, I walk through the garden. The rain makes the air smell of earth and wisteria.

I sit beneath the small cherry tree Yukito planted for me – a reminder of Japan, he said. The blossoms are pale and trembling, but beautiful.

—

I close my eyes and whisper to the wind not in words, but in feeling.

A silent thank you.

For him.

For them.

For the life I was never supposed to have but somehow did.

And sometimes, just sometimes, when the wind moves through the branches, I almost hear his voice again.

Even in silence, I heard you.

A few nights later, a storm rolls in. The rain lashes against the windows, and thunder rumbles across the sky. Yuka and Ai have gone to visit the market, leaving me alone with the sound of rain.

I sit by the window, sketchbook open, candle flickering beside me.

On the page, I draw his eyes – dark, steady, filled with the weight of everything he never said.

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Chapter 19

When I finish, I write beneath it: “You are my quiet place in a world that never stops shouting.”

The candlelight dances over the words.

For a moment, I imagine him reading them.

I imagine him in Japan – standing beneath the same rain, maybe looking at the same sky, wondering if I still think of him.

Of course I do.

Every day.

But I’ve learned that love doesn’t always mean staying.

Sometimes, it means letting the silence speak for you.

**

Yuka, Ai, and Yukito have become my family – a strange, warm patchwork of people who understand me without words, something that I never thought will have in London.

They even helped me face my father.

I still remember that day vividly, two days after my arival to London.

The air was heavy with rain. Yukito drove the black BMW, Ai sitting up front, silent for once. I sat in the back, my hands trembling in my lap.

When I stepped into my father’s house, his expression was the same as always – cold, judgmental. His first words were cruel, slicing through me like a blade.

“Where did you get the money, Naomi? Sleeping your way through life now?” He sneers when watching two unknown person sat beside me.

Yukito and Ai both went rigid, their eyes flashing toward the people that called my father, his wife and his beloved daughter.

But I stayed still. I had expected nothing less.

Then Yukito stepped forward and placed a tablet on the table – a video already playing.

It showed Katrina. And Matthew. Together.

More than once.

Her laughter, her touch, her deceit

—

everything my father believed about her shattered in seconds. She wasn’t the victim

she claimed to be. She wasn’t raped. She chose it.

I watched my father’s face pale, his mouth opening and closing soundlessly.

“Where did you find this… This isn’t true” He gasped before turn toward Katrina who look pale “KATRINA, EXPLAIN THIS?!”

“NO.. No, father, this isn’t true.” Katrina screamed, insisting it was fake, “You made this, is that why you just come? You made the video, huh? Damn you mute girl!” She turn her accusation to me. Then she lunged forward me but Ai caught her wrist mid-air before she could slap me.

I didn’t move. I just looked at them all

—

at the family that once made me believe I was worth nothing.

And then, I smiled. A small, tired, freeing smile.

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Chapter 19

“I’m done,” I told him softly. “You can keep your lies. I don’t live here anymore.” I stood up from my seat “You said I am not your daughter, remember? you know, I hope you’re not my father too, but life isn’t fair, huh”

Then I turned to leave, my steps steady for the first time in years.

–

Because Tadashi had already given me something they never could a sense of worth. A reason to keep living. A quiet, invisible thread of love that still pulls at my heart… even from a continent away.

田

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10:39 Tue, Jan 6 •