Total pages in book: 113
Estimated words: 106422 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 532(@200wpm)___ 426(@250wpm)___ 355(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106422 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 532(@200wpm)___ 426(@250wpm)___ 355(@300wpm)
The hairs on my arms rose. “What kind of trouble?”
“No one ever told me anything. Too young.” Frustration under his apparently careless shrug. “Just heard my parents telling Shumi that maybe he wasn’t such a good boy after all, and she should distance herself. She said she didn’t care, that she wanted to be his wife. They weren’t even dating then.”
A woman like that wouldn’t flip on her husband even if he was dead. She’d lie to protect the only thing she had left of him: his memory as a good man. It would be her word against Diya’s. Diya, who’d married her husband on a whim, a man who was linked to the deaths of three women.
I clenched my abdomen.
I’d never forgive myself if the mess of my past affected the woman I loved with everything I was. If Susanne had taught me about love that was generous and kind and loyal, then Diya had brought the lesson home.
She loved with all of her, no holds barred.
“You think it was Bobby, don’t you?” Ajay met my eyes with that stark question. “That cop, Ackerson, she was here asking about you while you were in Fiji.”
“I’m an easy target. Not a pillar of the community, just some stranger from overseas.” Better to stick to that line as long as I could; I wasn’t going to be the one to spill open the can of worms that was my link to Jocelyn and Virna. Those two at least I could understand, but I hated that Detective Baxter had added Susanne to the list.
I had loved Susanne.
“I wanted to tell Ackerson about Bobby hurting Shumi”—Ajay’s voice was a whisper now—“but…she loves him so much.”
Every ounce of my attention coalesced onto him, onto this moment. “You should.” Ajay’s independent corroboration of my insinuation that Bobby had been violent could dig me out of this hole. “Not for me, but for Diya. If they come after me, then Diya’s the one who’s going to get hurt. And she’s been hurt so much already.”
“I know. She was always the opposite of Bobby, you know—so sweet and gentle. One time at camp, she used her spending money to buy me ice cream after I dropped mine on the ground right after I’d gotten it. I know it’s a silly thing to remember, but it mattered.”
His Adam’s apple bobbed. “I thought it had to be Bobby the instant Dad told us what had happened. He was so angry inside, even though he did a good job of hiding it.”
“You got over the hero worship.”
“I wish I had.” Taking off his glasses again, he put them on the table and rubbed both hands over his face. When he dropped them, his expression was raw. “But I wanted so much to believe Shumi when she said that he hadn’t touched her, wanted him to stay my hero.” His shoulders shook, tears streaming down his face.
I didn’t know what to do, finally got up to sit next to him, my arm around his shoulders. He leaned a little into me and I thought, Fuck, he’s so young.
I wasn’t sure I’d ever been that young.
I’d certainly never had anyone attempt to comfort me when I cried. I didn’t blame my brother—Raja was who he’d been molded to be. As for my mother, she’d always been that person. My father had known who she was when he married her; yet not only had he married her, he’d had two children with her.
“Why did you want a second child?” I’d demanded of him at thirteen, right after I’d swept a glass full of whiskey off his desk.
The smell of expensive alcohol a sickening mist in the air, my dad had pressed his hands onto the desk and sighed. “I didn’t want Raja to be lonely. I thought you two would be best friends.”
That was when I’d understood: I’d been created as a distraction to entertain Raja so that my father could have his wife’s full attention. Deep down, Anand Advani was the one I blamed for what had been done to me—and what I’d become as a result.
Ajay sniffed back the last of his tears. “I’m glad Diya has you.” Breaking contact, he used a paper napkin to wipe his face, then put his glasses back on. “Do you think Ackerson will answer if I call now? It’s after work hours.”
“I don’t think she’s the kind of cop who turns off her phone.” She struck me as a woman with little to no understanding of work/life balance. That was probably what made her the caliber of cop Ngata had warned me against underestimating.
Ajay got to his feet. “I’ll call her before I head upstairs.” His hand was tight around the back of the chair. “My parents…they won’t like it. They want to pretend everything was perfect, that their daughter married into a good family.”