Such a Perfect Family, page 23
A little girl stood looking up at me, blood dripping down her face and a doll clutched to her chest, her eyes huge pools of black. “Bhaiya, you killed me,” she said in a small, high voice…and that was when I realized I was Bobby. Young, with scraped knees and scratched-up arms from all our play.
“I’m sorry,” I said, my pulse a lump of muscle in my mouth. “I’m so sorry.”
Her face smudged, morphed, and suddenly, I was sitting across a table from Jocelyn, the cards scattered in front of us. “I wasn’t that bad, was I, Tavish?” she was asking. “Not bad enough to murder.”
“I didn’t hurt you.” Sweat broke out all over my skin.
A very feline look. “You know that’s a lie, love—you’ve always been so good at those. Audrey’s true son, a man who acts through life itself.” She picked up a tumbler of whiskey. “I’ve begun to think that you believe your own lies—that’s why you’re so good at it. You convince yourself of a whole other version of events.”
I plunged to the ground, the hard concrete rushing up at me so fast that I knew I’d die, my face shattered to pieces and my bones shrapnel. “JOSS!”
I stared at the door to the motel.
It took my brain several long seconds to figure out that I was still sitting upright in bed, not falling from the balcony of Jocelyn’s luxurious suite. Where Susanne had been about sophisticated glamour, Jocelyn had been a proud maximalist.
Velvet, tassels, everything gilded, her home should have looked tacky but it had instead looked like the den of some old-world vampire who’d collected only the best things through time. I’d been part of that collection, a “pretty boy” she’d met at a high-stakes poker table in Las Vegas.
“Don’t tell me I’m too old for you,” she’d purred in my ear in the elevator up to her penthouse suite. “I saw the way you looked at me from the other side of the table.”
I’d lost the game to her, and that night, I’d lost a piece of my innocence. Because Joss hadn’t been Susanne, who had made me. Joss had been the opposite, her intent to break me in ways that I didn’t understand until it was almost too late.
Her death had freed me.
Swinging my legs off the bed, I took long, deep breaths and reminded myself of that. Jocelyn wasn’t around anymore to tempt me with “just a little taste” of things bad and dark and destructive. I’d never understood why she did it, why she went all out to destroy those around her.
Joss smiled at me from across the room…and I realized I was still dreaming. Walking over to me dressed in the long black gown in which I’d last seen her, her hair slicked back in a perfect updo, she leaned down in a wave of musky perfume to tap me on the jaw.
“Make me a villain if you want, Tavish”—a sultry whisper—“but you know the truth: Of the two of us, I’m the only one who’s never killed anyone.”
* * *
—
My face as haggard as if I’d been on a bender, I walked into the ICU the next morning to find an alarm going off and medical staff rushing about. My heart shoved into my throat, but all the patients I could see, including Diya, seemed stable.
It was only a half hour later, when a harried-looking nurse came to log Diya’s vitals, that I said, “Jack, what happened? Before?”
The sandy-blond man’s eyes widened. “You don’t know? It was your sister-in-law.”
“What?” I jerked to my feet. “No. I’ve been with Diya all this time. Figured I’d stay out of the way.”
“She went into cardiac arrest,” the nurse said. “No one has any idea why—her heart wasn’t touched during the stabbing. But she is badly injured, so it’s not out of the realm of possibility that her heart just gave out under the pressure, though the doctors are thinking she’s had a reaction to a change in medication.”
My mouth went dry. “Could someone have messed with her meds, given her something they knew would hurt her?”
Jack’s expression closed up, an acute alertness in his gaze. “Why would you ask that?”
“The cops still aren’t sure there are three bodies in the house, not just two,” I whispered, quick and low. “And Shumi’s husband beat her.”
“Christ.” Open shock. “Do the police know?”
“I tried to tell them, but—” Shrugging, I stroked my hand over Diya’s hair, my fingers trembling. “Diya and Shumi are the only witnesses to what happened in that house. I’m terrified Bobby is alive and about to come after them.”
The nurse’s breathing was faster now. “Look, don’t worry. It was probably a genuine medical reaction, nothing more.” He took a deep breath, was calm again by the time he began to take Diya’s pulse for the chart. “I feel even worse for her now, though. I didn’t realize she was an abuse victim.”
“All hidden. Shame’s a big thing in Indian families.” Enough to silence a woman who’d once held a high-powered job and had endless interests. “With the Prasads being so notable, and with how much she loved them, I don’t think she would’ve wanted to rock the boat.”
“I can imagine. What a mess.” He touched my shoulder. “I’ll give the other staff the heads-up to keep an eye out for Bobby Prasad. Just in case.”
After Jack left, I went to look in on Shumi…to find her alone but for Ajay; as with Diya, the nurses were keeping an eye on her from their station. He was dressed in jeans and the same checked shirt he’d been wearing the day he arrived in New Zealand; his expression was stark, his voice shaking as he described the events of that morning. “I was the only one here. Mum and Dad were having breakfast near the motel. I didn’t know what to do, Tavish.”
I hugged him.
Arms clenching tight around me, he clung to me and sobbed, a young man who was doing all he could to be there for his sister. “It’s okay,” I said, over and over, until at last he was able to breathe again, speak again.
Drawing away, he took off his glasses to wipe the backs of his hands over his eyes. “My parents will be here soon,” he said, almost as if he was apologizing for their absence. “They love Shumi so much.”
I just nodded, the Kumar family’s relationship dynamics not my business except for the fact that they went a long way toward explaining why Shumi had attached herself to Bobby from such a young age—and why she’d never turned on him even when he hurt her. To her mind, his controlling nature might well have equaled love.
Because even when they weren’t dating, they’d spent time together.
Shumi fell down a gravel embankment. Scraped up her legs, bruises everywhere. She said she wasn’t paying attention and slipped, but I know she was out walking with him.
It was attention, after all—of which, it was becoming clear, Shumi had received precious little from her mother and father. One preoccupied with her golden boy, the other a workaholic. “I’ll stay with you until then,” I said. “You want me to get you coffee?”
“Yeah, thanks.” A shaky smile. “I’m so glad you’re here, Tavish.”
* * *
—
It was just over twenty minutes later that I returned to Diya, thinking of how desperate Mrs. Kumar had looked as she checked that Ajay was okay after the fright he’d had. All the while, her brutalized daughter lay unmoving in the ICU bed behind her.
“I wonder if either she or her husband ever think about how they set Shumi up for abuse,” I said to Diya. “I know she’s your best friend, but she’s broken inside, sweetheart. I don’t know if she’ll tell the truth about what happened the morning of the fire.” Because to do so would be to betray the one person she believed loved her. “You have to wake up, D. For me.”
A twitch under my hand.
“Diya?” I jolted up, staring at her.
Her eyelids fluttered.
“Baby, come on, baby, wake up.”
A sigh, another flutter, then a little sound.
Chapter 54
Private notes: Detective Callum Baxter (LAPD)
Date: Aug 17
Time: 16:12
Still haven’t talked to the friend who stayed with James Whitby prior to Virna’s accident. Whitby was happy to provide her name and contact info, but turns out the woman is a professor who studies remote tribes or something and has been incommunicado in the Amazon since the start of June.
Per Whitby, “She’ll come out when she comes out. Never ended up missing yet.”
Not much I can do but wait.
Time: 23:09
Decided to drive by Tavish Advani’s condo, and Jesus, he has a woman living there with him. I was hoping it was just a hookup when I spotted her out on the balcony, but I managed to chat to a neighbor of his who was returning from a party, and he confirmed that the woman moved in recently—he couldn’t give me an exact date.
I have to warn her.
Chapter 55
It took Diya four hours to fully wake, and even then, she was groggy and lost.
Ackerson had got wind of her stirring consciousness and was hovering near the monitoring station, but the head nurse stood her ground and said the patient needed to see a familiar face first.
Now the nurse and Dr. Chen kept Ackerson at bay as Diya focused on me at last. “Hi, baby,” I said, fighting to keep my voice from shaking. “You’re in the hospital. You’re fine.”
When she tried to speak, nothing came out.
“I have water.” Picking up a water bottle into which the nurse had placed an extra-long bendable straw, I put the straw to her lips.
Diya managed to take a sip or two before whimpering, “Tavi, it hurts.”
My heart broke. “I know, baby, I know.” Dr. Chen had warned me that she might wake in pain since he had adjusted her pain medication to assist her rise to consciousness. “If you press this button”—I touched the pressure switch taped to her finger—“you’ll get a hit.”
I’d been told it was controlled, so there was no risk of an overdose.
Her finger moved.
It took several minutes, but the fuzziness finally faded from her eyes, the lines from around her mouth. “Why?” she rasped. “Hospital?”
My throat dried up. “Baby, what do you remember?”
I could all but feel Ackerson straining at the seams, wanting to take over, but I’d also heard what the doctor had said: If she made any attempt to question the patient, Chen would ban her from the entire ICU.
“I…” Diya’s eyes welled up, her breathing shallow gasps. “Fire. Fire everywhere. I can’t…”
“Her vitals are starting to deteriorate,” the doctor warned in a quiet tone.
“Shh,” I murmured to my wife. “You’re fine. The fire didn’t burn you.” I stroked her hair, careful to avoid the side where she’d suffered a head injury. “It’s all okay.”
A shaky smile. “Really?”
The vulnerability in her voice twisted me up. “Just rest now. We’ll talk about everything else later.”
She hesitated. “Tavi? Was I alone in the fire?”
I chose the answer that would cause her the least pain. “Shumi was with you—but she’s in another room in the hospital, just down from you. She’s not burned, either.”
Diya’s brow furrowed. “I can’t remember…” Her fingers clenched on mine, her other hand starting to rise to her head only for her to put it back down when the line on the back of it tugged against her skin. “Why can’t I remember?” The pulse in her neck jumped, her breathing ragged. “Dark, it’s so dark. Smoke. Fire. I can’t breathe. Tavi. I can’t—”
The doctor gave me a sharp look.
“Shh.” I leaned down to kiss her nose in that way that always made her smile. “Everything’s fine. You’ll remember after all the medicine’s out of your system. Sleep now. The more you rest, the better you’ll feel.”
Turning toward me, she said, “I’ll remember?”
“You’ll remember,” I promised, but later, after she was asleep, I stood with the doctor in the hallway outside the ICU, Ackerson beside me, and learned the truth.
“It’s possible she’ll never recall what happened that day,” Chen said, his large hands in the pockets of his white coat. “Could be because of psychological trauma, or it could be physical—she did sustain an injury to the side of her head.”
“Are you saying her memory’s gone?” Ackerson demanded.
“Nothing is guaranteed. She has just regained consciousness.” He looked at me. “Do you have any further questions, Mr. Advani?”
“I guess…just…what do I do? About telling her about her family?”
“Play it by ear. Right now, she’s in an extremely vulnerable state, but if she becomes distraught when she realizes they’re not visiting her, then tell her—we’re keeping her in the ICU for the time being, so you’ll have staff nearby to help deal with the aftermath.”
Once he’d left, I slumped into one of the armchairs in the otherwise empty waiting area.
Ackerson came down next to me.
I was expecting her to grill me, but she said, “Why did you go speak to Andrea Smithy-Carr?” in a quiet voice.
So, she had put a tail on me—or she’d bugged my car. I didn’t really care. “Because I think Bobby was behind the fire, behind everything.”
Then, despite Ngata’s command that I not have any conversations with the detective without him, I told her all of it. From the death of baby Ani, to Shumi’s teenage fall and adult bruises, to Rhiannon’s mysterious death, to the allegations of bullying. Whether she believed me or not, I’d done everything I could—and now that Diya was awake and alive, she had to be my focus.
“They blamed a five-year-old for another child’s violent death?” A stunned shock that felt real.
“Easier to sweep it under the rug than if it was a boy of eleven.” I looked at her. “Especially in that time and place.”
Lips tight, she stared at the wall across from us. “We’ve conclusively identified Sarita and Rajesh Prasad’s remains.”
I’d known inside that Diya’s parents were dead, but it still felt like a punch to the gut. “Bobby?”
Instead of answering, she said, “His business was on the brink of bankruptcy. We just gained access to his business accounts today.”
I thought of the sea of red on those invoices, remembered again how proudly Rajesh had spoken about Bobby’s business at the party. “The family didn’t know that.”
“Detective Baxter is convinced you killed Jocelyn Wai in a rage.”
“I wasn’t there,” I said tiredly, concentrating on being here, in this moment, rather than in the dark hours before Joss’s fall. “He has all the security camera footage that shows I couldn’t have done it, but he zeroed in on me after Virna’s death and can’t bear to be wrong.”
“What about Virna, then? Lot of money involved there.”
Leaning back against the wall, I let the past tumble through my head. “I was still gambling then; pissed it all away.” Ackerson had likely dug up the gambling by now, or Baxter would’ve clued her in, so better not to hide it. “But I always needed more. So if it had been about money, I’d have been better off with her alive.”
I leaned forward with my forearms braced on my thighs. “I wasn’t in her will—and she’d gifted me that quarter of a million, so it wasn’t as if I was in debt to her. Her death held no benefit for me.”
“It wasn’t? About money?” Softer voice, softer words.
I considered my earlier belief that Ackerson’s anger was rooted in sympathy for the women she thought I’d conned. “You know who my mother is, right? Beautiful, striking Audrey Advani. Stunning at sixty-two and still an icon.”
“She knew Virna Musgrave?”
“Not as far as I know.” I smiled at nothing. “I was answering your question, Detective. About why I was attracted to Virna, to Joss, to other older women.” Chasing love that would never be mine. “My therapist said it was an attempt to make up for the lack of maternal love in my life.”
So pat, so easy. But sometimes, it was that banal.
“Audrey is a good mom to my brother, but she has a small heart—she only had enough love in it for a single child.”
Just like Mrs. Kumar.
Which was why I understood Shumi’s choice to stay with a man who hurt her. I’d stayed with Joss, hadn’t I? Because when she wasn’t being cruel, she could be a loving, attentive woman of sharp intelligence and wit.
“I never thought I’d fill that void inside me until I met Diya,” I continued. “It ended that night.” Under sparkling colored lights reflected in the enigmatic darkness of her eyes. “I don’t need the validation from women like Jocelyn and Virna anymore.”
“It’s a good story.”
I shrugged. “Not really. It’s a dumb one. You’ll probably find one like it in every fancy neighborhood in LA. Lot of poor little rich kids left to the nannies.” Mine had been named Inez, at least for the first three years of my life. I barely remembered her, because I’d apparently called her “Mom” once in Audrey’s hearing, and that was it.
No more nannies, just a string of babysitters that changed at Audrey’s whim.
She wouldn’t love me, but she wouldn’t permit me to love another maternal figure, either.
“I’m only interesting because I had the bad luck to be involved with Joss and Virna.” My laugh held no humor. “You know what the most ridiculous thing is? Baxter thinks I tampered with Virna’s car—but I don’t even know how to change a fucking tire, much less where the brake lines are or whatever it was that was done to Virna’s car.”
I liked to drive fast cars and learn about their specs—that was the extent of my mechanical knowledge.
“I know you think I have it in for you,” Ackerson said, “but I’m a good cop. I looked into Bobby, and into any disgruntled employees of his, along with any patients who might have held a grudge against the doctors.”
