Tōkan makes a "wait" gesture before replying: "Yes, this is him. How may I help you?"

"Is Yamada Inori near you? I tried to call him just now and he didn't pick up, but I'd been told he often misses calls and that I should call you if he did. Could I talk to him?"

Holy shit holy shit holy shit holy shit—

"Yes, ma'am. Would you rather call him again? I'll let him know he should look at his phone."

"That would be ideal, thank you. I will call him in a minute." And she hangs up.

"Holy shit holy shit holy shit—Inori-kun, do you have a missed call from someone just now?"

"...?" He grabs his phone to check. "Yeah. Who?"

"It's Ōta Makino, from Ōta & Ōta." Both Harutsugu and Kuroji stop to stare at Tōkan at that. "She is a famous lawyer who—"

But Inori's phone rings, then. He frowns at it, too, but picks it up. "Yes."

"Is this Yamada Inori? I am Ōta Makino."

"Yes."

"Would it be possible for you to go somewhere Kokonoe Tōkan isn't likely to overhear you?"

"...why would I want that?"

"You may share the contents of this conversation with him at a later point if you judge it safe but I would prefer it if initially it were a conversation between only you and me. If you do not have a safe way to do this, please respond with 'I'm sorry, Ma'am, but I don't think you're talking to the right person'."

"...safe...? What, you think this wimp could make me do stuff I don't want to do? Fuck off, I'll kick his ass."

The other three slowly facepalm in unison.

"...that is a reassuring reaction," she says, her voice changing from full professional mode to something a lot softer and fonder. "I would nevertheless feel better if you had space for yourself here."

Ugh. "Fine." To Tōkan: "I'm gonna be in my room, don't go upstairs, I'll break your arms if you do."

Loooooooooooove~

He goes upstairs and closes the door behind him then sits on his bed. "I'm alone. What is it?"

"Do you know about Ōta & Ōta?"

"Tōkan said you're a lawyer. A famous one. So what?"

"Our firm focuses on corporate law but my husband and I have a history of activism for omega rights. And when we can, we take cases where rich people—and let's be frank, here, it's mostly rich alphas—are abusing the corruption of the system to oppress omegas."

"I'm not fuckin' oppressed, I just got a shitty alpha on my case 'cause she's mad I beat her up when she was trying to rape a middle schooler."

She sighs audibly over the phone. "Well, we can help with that, too."

"If you need rich person money—"