Aishite Tatte, Himitsu wa Aru

Official Website
www.ntv.co.jp/aishitetatte

Broadcast
From 10.30 p.m., Sundays, 16 July 2017 (except Ep 1 from 10.00 p.m.)

Station
NTV

Story
Okumori Rei, a legal apprentice who aspires to be a lawyer, is dating Tachibana Sawa, a fellow apprentice. She proposes to him and the two of them decide to get married. Life seems to be going well for Rei but he has a secret which he cannot tell anyone. 11 years ago when he was in his last year of junior high school, he saw his father Kosuke being physically violent to his mother Shoko. Rei sensed that his mother’s life was in danger and ended up beating his father to death on the spur of the moment. The two of them then buried the body in the garden. To hide his crime, they dumped Kosuke’s car in the ocean, and staged everything to make it look like his father had gone missing. This became the secret between Rei and his mother. He decided that he did not need any friends or a girlfriend and lived without forming deep relationships with anyone. He worked tirelessly to become a lawyer – a dream that was the only meaning he found in life. That was until Rei met Tachibana Sawa who attends the same law school and dreams of becoming a prosecutor. She is like a sudden light that illuminates his dark life and the two of them soon fell in love. Rei is training to be a prosecutor at the Kanagawa District Public Prosecutors Office with his friend Adachi Kotaro. Because he ended up killing someone himself, he is convinced that there are all sorts of reasons for crime. He is sincere to every suspect and gets to the bottom of cases. Then one day, Rei visits Sawa’s family to announce their marriage and learns the secret she has been hiding all this time. Her father is Tachibana Hiroaki, the fierce-looking chief public prosecutor of the Kanagawa District Public Prosecutors Office. Tachibana has the reputation of being able to nail any kind of vicious criminal. He comments that his daughter’s boyfriend is like a suspect, and Rei gets grilled as if it were an interrogation. Rei inadvertently lies that his father died of illness four years ago. However, right after Rei’s marriage to Sawa is decided, he starts receiving ominous messages from an unknown person who knows that his father was murdered. Who is trying to expose his secret? And what will happen when Sawa finds out?

Characters
Fukushi Sota as Okumori Rei
A legal apprentice. During the summer of his third year in junior high school, he ended up beating his father to death in order to protect his mother from violence. He aims to be a lawyer who defends criminals since he personally knows there are various circumstances behind a crime. He has a kind heart and is diligent. He loves his mother and has a strong sense of responsibility because he is the only child. He does not believe he has the right to fall in love. Then he meets Tachibana Sawa and falls for her.

Kawaguchi Haruna as Tachibana Sawa
A legal apprentice. She has set her sights on being a prosecutor because her father is an elite prosecutor. Her older brother Akito rebelled against their strict father and refused to become a prosecutor so his hopes rest on her. She has been pampered by her parents. She is direct, cheerful and naive. Although she is the popular type who can get along with anyone, she also cannot stand being alone. She wants to get married to Okumori Rei but … …

Kaku Kento as Tachibana Akito
Tachibana Sawa’s older brother. A freelance journalist who goes in and out of weekly magazines. He had shouldered their strict and elitist father’s expectations since he was a child. However, he rebelled against him after some incident, and chose work which exposes the darkness of power. Although he has cut ties with their parents, he is still in touch with Sawa and loves her.

Shirasu Jin as Adachi Kotaro
A legal apprentice who is a friend of Okumori Rei and Tachibana Sawa since university days, and he is training with Rei now. He is the second son of a family that founded a famous food manufacturing business. He is narcissistic but friendly and easily gets carried away. He secretly likes Sawa.

Horibe Keisuke as Okumori Kosuke
Okumori Rei’s father. A doctor at a university hospital. He died 11 years ago but the official story is that he is “missing”. He was a very ambitious man who lived only for his work. He hardly cared about his only son Rei. He would say “Be strong in everything yourself” and was always strict with him. He started being abusive to his wife Shoko after some time.

Endo Kenichi as Tachibana Hiroaki
Tachibana Sawa’s father. The chief public prosecutor of the Kanagawa District Public Prosecutors Office. He is a serious, rigid man who hates dishonesty and devotes his life to punishing crime. His beliefs are the complete opposite of Okumori Rei. To him, a crime is a crime and must be punished. He had expectations of his son Akito who had taken the same path as him, but disowned him after he became a journalist. After that, he placed his hopes on Sawa and dotes on her.

Suzuki Honami as Okumori Shoko
Okumori Rei’s mother. A nurse. She married Okumori Kosuke who was a doctor at a university hospital, became a housewife and gave birth to Rei. She had supported her busy husband and brought up their son. But at some point, Kosuke’s abuse began to trouble her. After his “disappearance”, she returns to being a nurse. She is a sensible, kind mother. She blames herself for being the reason her son has to bear a heavy burden for life and wishes from the bottom of her heart that he will forget the past and be happy.

Scriptwriter
Kuwamura Sayaka (Sukina Hito ga Iru Koto, Koinaka)

Original Work
Akimoto Yasushi

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