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Holding back an urge to spit out the coffee he’d just sipped, Shinichi carefully sets down his mug.
“Can you run that by me again?” he asks, voice weak. He prays he’d just misheard her. Unblinking, with a mischievous twinkle in her eyes, Ran repeats the question, making a flush crawl across Shinichi’s cheeks.
“Uh,” he says, voice weak. “Why?”
“I’m curious!” Ran’s laughter is beautiful as always, but the context of it all makes the laugh sound sadistic. “I think I know what you’re going to say, but I made a bet with Sonoko so I want to know!” Casually, as if the situation isn’t already awkward enough, Ran pulls out her phone and sets it on the table, recording.
Recording.
Shinichi hides his face in his hands.
“I don’t think my answer is going to be what you think it is,” he mumbles into his hands. Then again, he wonders with a tinge of horror if that means his answer is closer to Sonoko’s prediction than Ran’s.
God forbid.
Ran pokes out her lip, pouting, and asks, “No?” He refuses to make eye contact. He swears that everyone in the cafe is staring and waiting too, but logically he knows the question isn’t that big a deal by itself and they haven’t been talking that loud besides. “Well, even if I’m not,” Ran grumbles, and he peeks through the gaps in his fingers, “I still need to know the answer. To see if my answer or Sonoko’s is closer.” Shinichi wishes he was anywhere else. His wishes are dashed when their waitress comes by to set a piece of lemon pie in front of him, a parfait in front of Ran, and asks how they’re doing.
As Ran replies for both of them Shinichi stares down at the desert and thinks it doesn’t look nearly so appetizing, now.
“Come on, Shinichi, it’s a simple question!” The waitress has left and Ran’s getting impatient. Both not good signs individually, but one’s a good sign in the face of the other. At least the waitress won’t hear.
(He flashes a glare at the phone still recording on the table and wishes Ran wasn’t getting concrete evidence for this. Even if she only shares this with Sonoko, who knows what Sonoko’s going to want to do with it.)
“Shinichi.” Shinichi swallows heavily and stares down at his coffee. He’d already known his answer when Ran first asked. Best to get it over with.
“Kill Vineyard,” he says, because that one’s the easiest to admit with Vermouth’s blood-red smile in his mind’s eyes and the glint of the metal barrel of a gun. Then, he mumbles just loud enough for Ran to hear, hoping he won’t have to repeat it for the recording (how sensitive is Ran’s phone’s mic, anyway?), “Fuck Okino-san. Marry KID.”
Ran drops her spoon, and the sound of it clattering to the table is drowned out by her shriek of “WHAT?!” The exclamation draws the attention of the entire cafe, eyes swiveling to assess the outburst. One guy even chokes. “You- you’d-”
“Ran,” Shinichi hisses, staring apprehensively at the watching customers. They’re slowly losing interest, but they are still sending glances their way.
“You’d-” Ran continues to stammer, incoherent.
“Is there a problem?” Their waitress’s voice is sweet outwardly, but Shinichi doesn’t need to look to hear the underlying edge. He doesn’t blame her.
“No, sorry about the fuss,” Shinichi rushes out, aiming a lame smile up at her. “She’ll calm down. She’s just had a bit of a shock.”
The girl eyes Ran dubiously, customer-service smile still fixed on her face, before nodding and saying, “If you’re sure. Enjoy your deserts!” And setting off again.
Ran seems to have remembered herself through the dialogue, ending her stuttering, and when the waitress leaves again she hisses, “You’d marry KID?” Running his tongue over his teeth, Shinichi picks up his mug if only for something to do with his hands.
“Between those three options, yeah,” he mutters. Ran looks gobsmacked. “Why,” he says with a little edge, irritated at her blatant shock, “who’d you think I’d pick?”
“Okino Yoko-chan is nice,” she mumbles, eyes darting away. “And you seem to like big boobs… so…”
“So you thought I’d marry Okino-san, Fuck Ver- Vineyard, and kill KID?” Shinichi’s voice is deadpan. He sips his cold coffee and mutters, “Harsh,” against the lip of the mug.
Ran sputters, “Harsh?” She quickly gets over her incredulity, demanding, “What's so bad about fucking Chris Vineyard? She won ‘Sexiest Actress' in America last year you know!”
Shinichi grimaces into his mug, saying carefully, “You realize she's supposed to be, like, ten years older than us. Also, she looks exactly like her mother. I'm not into older women, thanks.” Ran scoffs in response, rolling her eyes.
“As if that makes any sense,” she grumbles. “Her looking like her mother just means we know she'll age well.” Her voice gets a bit louder, words more pointed as she adds, “Also, she's got to be ridiculously rich.” Shinichi raises an eyebrow.
“I'm not exactly strapped for cash,” he points out dryly. “Also I didn't realize you were looking for a glucose guardian.”
“Ha ha,” Ran says, unamused. Then she straightens and asks, “Why wouldn't you want to marry Okino Yoko, though? She's really nice!” Shinichi finally picks up his fork, if only for something to point at Ran with. Which he does.
“Sometimes,” he says, “being nice doesn't make up for being a murder suspect three different times. Not to mention one was her ex. I don't want to be the next guy to kill himself with a knife and a block of ice. Nor do I want to deal with her millions of fans and her manager and God just talking about it sounds annoying. Your dad already hates me enough. A one night stand is much easier to keep under wraps.” Shinichi nods decisively, using the fork to cut off a piece of his pie.
“Shinichi,” Ran says, voice flat. “You can’t use fans as an excuse with Okino Yoko then ignore KID’s fanbase.” Around his mouthful of lemon pie, Shinichi hums, then swallows it, pointing the fork at her again.
“Ah,” he says, “but you forget. KID’s going to have a civilian persona that’s highly unlikely to be as famous. That’d make things easier for me.” When Ran opens her mouth to argue, Shinichi adds quickly, “And if you’re going to say ‘KID not his civilian identity’, then I’ll say that I know KID’s fanbase. I also know that a fair amount of them have been shipping him with me ever since I returned from being Conan and went to heists again. I’m a lot less likely to get a negative response from them than I am from Okino Yoko fans.” Ran looks perplexed, her lips pressing together in thought.
“You’ve given this a lot of thought,” she says with some surprise. “One last thing though- you keep bringing up age and how you’re not into older people. Isn’t KID older than even Chris Vineyard?” Shinichi snorts out a laugh.
“If KID’s older than us by more than five years, I’ll resign from being a detective.” While Ran considers that, he takes another bite of pie. “So who won the bet?” he asks after swallowing. Ran’s face falls into a pout, tapping away at her phone with her eyebrows scrunched together.
“Tie,” she admits. “We both got zero.”
Shinichi blinks at that, then asks, “What did Sonoko think I’d pick?”
“Fuck KID, marry Chris Vineyard, kill Okino Yoko,” she says absently. “Something about ‘UST between detective and thief’ and ‘hearing enough about Okino Yoko from your(my) dad to drive him(you) up the wall’.” She stares at her phone, waiting for a reply as she adds a vague, “Also something about ‘Chris Vineyard being a sex fantasy come to life for any teenage boy’.” Shinichi makes a face. He’s still considering replying to that when Ran’s phone chirps another notification, making her eyes snap to the screen. She chews her lip.
“Akagi Hideo,” she reads off, and Shinichi fights the urge to facepalm, “Minerva Glass, and KID.” Ran’s phone chirps again, assumedly with Sonoko’s prediction, and she sits back to stare at the opposite wall in thought. Shinichi resigns himself to considering his options while Ran decides what she thinks his answer will be. Shinichi groans again when he finally slots them all into place.
“Ready,” he mumbles, covering his face with his hands once more.
Ran hums, thinks a bit longer, then nods, taps out her predictions to Sonoko, and echoes, “Ready.”
“Fuck Akagi,” he says with no preamble, and Ran nods, pleased. “Marry KID, kill Minerva.” Ran freezes mid-nod, eyes shooting open wide.
“WHAT?” she shrieks again, leaping to her feet. They once more draw the attention of the entire cafe, onlookers less surprised this time and a little more irritated. The same guy chokes again.
“Ran,” Shinichi says, the corners of his lips tilting into a scowl, “I don’t even have to do this. You need to stop freaking out. If you get us kicked out because you can’t seem to predict me right then we’re not continuing this.” He forcefully stuffs another forkful of pie into his mouth as Ran immediately drops back into her seat with a sheepish look. She glances around, smiling apologetically whenever she makes eye contact, and sees their waitress coming, the woman’s smile just a little more forced than last time. She mouths, ‘I’m so sorry- won’t happen again- we’re fine,’ at the woman, who pauses mid-way in response. The plastic smile tilts a bit, eyes flicking between Ran’s pleading look and Shinichi avoiding her gaze by continuing his pillaging of his pie, then nods once and about-faces.
Shinichi doubts they’ll get a third chance.
“You were still expecting me to kill KID?” He asks once most eyes have once again stopped watching. He refrains from repeating ‘harsh’ out loud, but he certainly thinks it.
“You’d kill Minerva-san?” she whisper-hisses as a demand, leaning towards him over the table. “But you helped her during that case in London- right?!” Shinichi levels an unimpressed look at her.
“What’s your point?” He asks lazily, finishing off his pie. “I’ve helped all three of them in a case one way or another. It’s not like we even talked.” He leans back in his chair and eyes her, adding, “And sure she’s pretty but I’m not going to marry someone for their looks.” Ran gives him a mild stink-eye.
“But you’d marry them for their criminal record?” She snips back, and Shinichi scoffs.
“Honestly Ran, Minerva would be boring to marry. Practice tennis all day everyday? I barely know what she’s like personality-wise. At least KID’s eccentrics are fun.” Ran slumps back in her chair, grumbling under her breath, and crosses her arms, huffing irritably. Shinichi eyes her and asks, “So if you thought I’d fuck Akagi, marry Minerva, and kill KID, what did Sonoko think? Did she win? Is that why you’re so annoyed?” Ran shoots an irritated look at him, snatching up her phone to furiously text Sonoko again.
“No,” she retorts. “Sonoko thought you’d fuck KID, marry Hideo-san, and kill Minerva-san. Same thing with ‘UST btwn detec&thf’, then ‘matchmake the soccer geeks’, and ‘rando hot blonde chick got killed last time so why not now’.” Shinichi has to suppress an amused smirk at that. He catches the eye of their waitress, and feels a little bad when she seems to steel herself before approaching with a bright smile.
“How can I help you, sir?” she asks, and he smiles apologetically at her.
“Sorry for the bother- I was wondering if I could get a refill?” He gestures to his mug and her eyes look simultaneously relieved and frustrated. Relieved he’s not being a jerk, but frustrated they’re not leaving yet, maybe? He hopes she can hold out for as long as this game lasts- he’s stuck right here with her until then. At least the cafe isn’t packed- he’d feel worse if they were table-hogging on a busy day.
“Of course sir- not a problem!” She chirps with a smile, power-walking away. Ran’s still tapping away on her phone, her brow furrowed in thought, when she returns with a coffee pot and an empty mug.
The waitress is already leaving, a steaming mug clutched in Shinichi’s hand, when she finally looks up and says, “Okay- for two of them, just ignore age, okay? They’re attractive otherwise!” Internally sighing, Shinichi just wants this over with. So, taking into account the slight pleading tone to her voice, Shinichi nods once in assent. She looks relieved as she looks back down at the screen, and he’s taking his first sip of (hot!!) coffee in a while when she opens her mouth and says, “Okiya Subaru, Amuro Tooru, and KID.” Shinichi feels his eyes shoot wide before he nearly inhales his coffee, doing his best to set it down rather than slam.
He coughs, then asks almost pleadingly, “Please tell me you didn’t just say that.”
Ran looks confused at his plea, tilting her head a little as she half-asks, “But they’re attractive, though?” ‘That is the last problem I have with this match-up,’ Shinichi thinks half-hysterically to himself, bringing his hands up to rub at his temples, staring down into his coffee.
“Fine,” he tries not to snap out after a couple minutes of thinking, taking a long draw of the coffee to try and soothe his coming headache. ‘The irony of this whole thing is just pathetic, honestly,’ Shinichi admits internally, then repeats aloud, “Fine. This is the last one though. I bottom line refuse to do this anymore. If you guys tie again you can do this with someone else or hash it out with rock-paper-scissors for all I care” He takes in a deep breath, lets it out slowly, then says, clearly and concisely, “Fuck Subaru-san, marry KID, kill Amuro-san.” Ran’s eyebrows twitch, an odd expression crossing her face as Shinichi glares moodily into his half-empty coffee.
He also notices as an aside that that one guy chokes on his drink again and what’s his excuse this time?
“Care to elaborate?” Ran requests blandly, seemingly doing her best to keep a flat expression on her face. Shinichi resists the urge to glare at her for fear of her breaking his facial bones in retaliation.
“There is so much backstory you do not know,” he grumbles, glaring instead at the table as he holds the mug’s rim to his lips. He sets the mug down again, irritable, and it is not gentle but not quite a slam. He resists the urge to look around to see their waitress’s reaction.
“First of all,” he says, holding up a finger, “Subaru-san, who is actually Akai Shuuichi, which I may have forgotten to tell you but wouldn’t matter much since you didn’t interact with him much anyway- has a terrible history with relationships. He was dating Jodie-sensei when he needed to infiltrate the Black Organization undercover since he’s FBI, and when he went undercover he fell for his mark so he broke it off with Jodie-sensei. But he ended up getting discovered as a mole, so he got driven away from his new girl and because he was a mole she was killed by the bad guys. I am not marrying that disaster. He’s hot, he’s nice enough, I’ll fuck him, but I am not subjecting myself to that complicated-as-fuck mess.” Ran looks like she’s been bull-whipped, her mouth stuck open in shock, but Shinichi is not done.
“Second,” he presses, sticking up a second finger, “Amuro Tooru, another double-agent in the now-fallen Black Organization, is PSB.” Ran’s mouth somehow manages to gape wider. “I didn’t know he was a double-agent at first. He did a lot of shitty things, and he proved quite a few times that he’d be willing to endanger an ally in order to maintain his cover. On a personal vendetta he nearly ruined months of hard work- aiming to take out none other than Shuuichi Akai. He gave me several heart-attacks, both before and after my discovery of his double-agent status, so yes, fuck him, and not in a nice way. I don’t care if he’s hot. Not worth it.”
He nearly groans, slowly raising his thumb, and looks anywhere but at Ran’s shell-shocked expression as he says, “So yes, Ran, between the two law enforcement officers and the criminal, you actually managed to make me choose to marry the criminal. Congratulations. I hope this settled yours and Sonoko’s bet, because as I said before: not again.” Ran’s mouth creaks closed with a quiet click, speechless for once as she stares at him in shock. Shinichi refuses to meet her gaze as he returns to staring moodily down into his coffee.
Ran seems to grind through several beginnings before she finally manages to say, apropos of nothing, “I won.”
Shinichi deadpans back, “Good for you. What’d you win?”
“Sonoko can’t keep trying to set me up on blind dates anymore~” Ran says with a small, smug smile, typing up the message into her phone. “I got one right, she got none~”
Unimpressed, Shinichi asks, “So which of those three made you the winner?”
She gives him a rueful look as she admits, “I called that you’d kill Amuro-san. I thought that you’d marry Subaru-san since he likes Holmes too and he’s a college student so he’s going places, and figured if you liked KID enough to marry him twice you’d be down to fuck him more than a waiter you never seemed particularly fond of.” Shinichi does a weird shrugging motion before bringing the coffee back to his lips. The headache has not been and will not be avoided, it seems.
“What’d Sonoko think I’d say?” He asks dully. He honestly doesn’t care at this point, but figures that sometime he might. Ran hums.
“Still with the ‘UST btwn T&D!!!!!’ with an added angry kaomoji and a note about you continuously trying to steal her KID-sama from her, then ‘hot waiter boi cn make him cofee 4 the rst of his lyf he’ll lik tht’, and finally ‘blond glses holmes boi is hot bt if he lykd tht he’da tapped tht by now so he goes 6ft undr’.” At this point Shinichi’s honestly hard-pressed not to laugh. He hides the twitching of his lips by finishing off the last of his coffee, then once more flagging down the waitress, who seems to teleport over with restrained hope in her eyes.
“Check please?” He asks politely, and the relief floods her face for .2 seconds before she schools it behind another smile.
“Of course sir!” She replies brightly before practically blinking out of his sight. Shinichi turns his attention back to Ran who’s directing a gloating smile at her phone.
“While we wait,” he says, tapping the table, “I want a turn. I give you three people, then guess what you’ll say.” When Ran glances up at him, slightly askance, he raises his eyebrow at her and points out, “It’s only fair.” She bites her lip then winces, settling back into her chair. She raises an eyebrow as a prompt.
“Okay,” Shinichi says, tracing the rim of the empty mug. “Fuck marry kill: Sonoko, Sera, Kazuha-san.” Ran’s face floods into red, making her sputter out protests, which Shinichi ignores by leaning against the back of his chair as he looks at her, prompting. Ran stumbles, mutters, then finally goes quiet, resigning herself to her fate. He watches her face crumple in consternation, hesitation, red still hinting in her cheeks. She doesn’t even look up when the waitress comes by with the bill, an actual smile on her face, and takes the credit card Shinichi hands her. The parfait that Ran had consumed all while judging his choices is the most expensive item they'd ordered, which considering Shinichi’s paying the bill seems like a metaphor for his life. It’s not until the waitress comes rushing back with his card that Ran finally screws up her face, tilts her head, then nods.
“Okay,” she finally says, then startles as he stands up. “Aren’t you going to guess?” Ran asks, bewildered, as he stretches. Shinichi just looks down at her.
“Do me a favor,” he says. “Now that you’ve admitted it to yourself: resolve that unresolved sexual tension with Sonoko and ask Kazuha-san out. You’ve been waffling for ages, Ran.” This time it’s Ran that chokes, face burning red once more.
He’s already halfway out the cafe when she yells after him, “How did you know??” He smirks as he hears her rush to follow, the doors of the cafe opening to release them.
~Bonus~
“Kaito,” Aoko grinds out, looking irritated as she stabs her spoon into her ice cream. “Stop staring- it’s rude.” Kaito honestly can’t help it, staring wide eyed at the pair that’s sitting a few tables away, scrubbing his mouth to get rid of the water he’d choked on (for the third time). “Just because she yelled doesn’t mean we can just be rude- she already apologized!” Aoko hisses at him.
“I’m not staring at her,” Kaito mumbles absently. He can’t tear his gaze away from the detective that’s aggressively glaring at his mug of coffee. The detective who’d just said- for the third time- A flash of blue and he yanks his gaze away. Meitantei had noticed him again.
Kaito strains his ears, doing his utmost to eavesdrop, but all he can hear is an info-dump about some guy named Akai.
“Kaito! I know there’s a hot guy that’s apparently down to marry your criminal persona but I am trying to eat so can you stop staring?!”
“So yes, Ran,” Kaito hears, the voice sounding exasperated, “between the two law enforcement officers and the criminal, you actually managed to make me choose to marry the criminal.” For the third time, Kaito wants to interject, heart in his throat as a flush rises up to his cheeks and he stares wide-eyed at the table. Meitantei had chosen to marry KID three separate times. Is that telling- or is hoping it’s telling just wishful thinking? The other choices hadn’t been that bad- had they? Aside from the rant he’d gone into about why he didn’t go for the law enforcement guys- he’d said he thought KID's personality was fun. He’d said KID’s fans shipped them and didn't seem bothered by it.
Kaito may be having a minor brain-overload right now.
He barely notices that Aoko flags down their waitress to pay the bill, just watches with blood rushing through his ears as the detective stands up and says something to his friend and begins walking away, Mouri-san scrambling to follow.
Kaito does notice it when Aoko grabs his shoulder and yanks him to his feet, bodily dragging him out the cafe after the other two with an, “Oh my God, Kaito, you are so hopeless this is embarrassing.”
“Aoko?” Kaito squeaks, scrambling to keep up. He wants to tell her she’s walking too fast because- his eyes get wide as he starts protesting- trying to drag his feet, “Wait- wait Aoko wait-.”
Nakamori Aoko is on a mission.
Fuck.
“Excuse me!” She calls after the pair in front of them, and they both turn to look back. Kaito somehow gets paler. She somehow meets Kudou Shinichi’s eyes squarely and says, with no tact whatsoever, “I was wondering if you were interested in men and single.”
Kaito stifles a dying noise in the back of his throat.
“...Excuse me?” Meitantei says after a fair pause. Kaito refuses to look at him.
“My friend has been staring at you for the last ten minutes,” Aoko says, and Kaito tries to subtly kick her. She doesn’t seem to notice- or maybe she just doesn’t care. “He’s kind of a mess though, so I wanted to see if he had a chance before shoving him at you.”
Mouri-san makes a surprised sound of amusement in the back of her throat when Kaito squawks, snapping his head up to fix Aoko with a glare. The glare is uneffective.
“Is this because I called your girlfriend a witch,” he hisses at her. “Because that was nothing but the truth and I refuse to be punished for-”
He hears a sound of realization and stops talking mid-sentence, mouthing wordlessly. Pink crawls up his cheeks again. He feels a pinch-and-tug on his sleeve, and only spares a glance at it because he knows that hand, before jerking his gaze back to glare at Aoko. Who smirks at him.
And shoves him forward and away.
He’s caught in the arms of someone that smells like coffee and lemons and thinks hysterically that Aoko is not going to get a birthday present from him this year- no sir.
“Sorry Ran,” the voice above him says in amusement. Kaito stares down and goes a little limp. Maybe he can play dead? “Looks like my three-time marriage candidate came to cash in. Mind if we go discuss our nuptials?” Kaito’s eyes snap up to meet Meitantei’s, heart drumming in his throat, and sees an amused yet fond smirk on the detective’s face.
“What?” Mouri-san asks, sounding a bit bewildered. Kudou breaks eye contact with Kaito to look over at her.
“Backstory,” he says simply, tugging Kaito upright and wrapping a hand loosely around Kaito's wrist, idly stroking his vein. After a few moments of mooning at Kudou, Kaito glances at Mouri-san to see her face go through several expressions before settling on a mix of resignation and ‘you better explain later’. Aoko just looks smug.
“Fine,” Mouri-san says, rolling her eyes and bumping shoulders with Aoko. “Guess it’s time to make friendly with the in-laws.” Kudou only grins at her before turning away, tugging Kaito along.
“So KID,” he laughs after walking a bit, Kaito easily keeping pace, “I didn’t think I actually had a chance. You’ve been staring at me for the last ten minutes?” Kaito sputters incoherently.