25
I was back in my car by the time the phone-company guys tramped out from the bush, orange-vested and with safety helmets on their heads. I didn’t know what they’d been doing in there, but they’d made it out just in time—the sky was starting to darken fast.
“Yo, mate, you break down? Need a jump start?” One of them leaned down to look through the open passenger window; a tattoo snaked up the side of his neck, and his knuckles spelled out love.
I pointed at my leg. “Just needed a rest. Safe to drive the auto but it starts to hurt after a while, so I have to get out and stretch.” Damp shirt and hair now explained.
“Bad luck, eh. Broke my leg once—bloody hard to get around.” The small leaf stuck in his short black beard moved as he spoke. “Hope the sucker fixes up soon.”
“Amen to that.”
He bumped fists with me before returning to his workmate.
I watched as the two loaded up their gear, and figured I’d have to give this up for today—no way could I sit on the road without the cover provided by the van. It wasn’t like people parked on this road—it was empty of any stationary traffic as far back and forward as I could see.
The brunette exited the house.
Starting up the engine, I pulled out a minute after she’d left. The phone guys gave me a thumbs-up as I headed out. I waved.
Brunette’s car broke down on cue five minutes later. The small part I’d removed safely hidden in the glove compartment of my car, I pulled to a stop next to her. Speaking through my open window, I put on my most charming smile. “Hey, you need help?”
“I have a phone,” she said through her partially raised window, a sulkiness to her face that a lot of men probably found attractive. “It’d be better if you knew how to fix the car.” Sarcasm thick in the words.
“No can do. But I can offer you a ride—or I’ll wait with you while you call for help.” It was getting dark and roadside support would take a while to drive out here. “My name’s Aarav Rai. Internet-search me—promise I’m not a serial killer.”
“Sure, Mr. Big Shot,” she said, but input my name.
I knew the instant she saw it:
Million-Dollar Man—How a Young Writer Went from Pauper to Prince
By some quirk of algorithms or the whim of the internet gods, that article was always the first hit when you input my name. I actually had far more than a million thanks to the movie deal, but the article worked to get attention—and engender trust. My face would’ve also populated the screen, both my official head shots and candids taken by fans.
A quick flick from under her lashes to check my face matched the one onscreen.
I smiled.
Sulkiness morphing into sultriness, brunette fluffed her hair. “I’ll leave the car here for pickup. Damn thing probably needs a tow.”
She slid into my passenger seat. “You know, even though you’re famous, I wouldn’t have gotten in the car with you if I hadn’t seen your leg just now.”
She’d obviously never heard of Ted Bundy. “You want to call for that tow? Then I can drop you home.”
After she did, she wiggled in her seat. “I’m Ginger. It seems too early to be going home.”
“I know a bar.”
I deliberately chose a higher-end city bar, and she was all wide eyes as I pulled into a parking spot. “Are you sure we can get in?” she whispered, and smoothed her hands down her little black dress. “I heard they only let in VIPs.”
“I know some people.” The other writers I knew were always goggle-eyed when I did things like this—most people couldn’t ID a writer if that writer was standing next to their head shot while holding a neon sign that spelled out their name.
But the “Pauper to Prince” journalist had included a whole lot about my “mysterious and tragic” past in the piece, and they’d styled the photo shoot with me on the motorbike I’d sold after buying the Porsche. It hadn’t been in the plan, but the woman running the shoot had gone nuts when I turned up to it on my bike.
Only reason I’d done the shoot was because I’d known it’d piss off my father to have his son in such a major publication—but in the arts section rather than the business one. Yeah, it hadn’t been all that mature, but I take my wins where I can get them.
The photos had gone viral.
End result of it all had been an unexpected wave of celebrity. Then came the hit movie; it had boosted my profile to the next level. No longer was I on the B-list. No, I was a firmly A-list “moody genius” who—according to Kahu—women wanted to fuck and mother at the same time.
It’d all turn to dust if I didn’t deliver a second book that replicated the success of the first—or maybe I’d just slide into permanent D-list celebrity status. For now, however, I was a bona fide A-lister complete with superstar “friends” who followed my social media, and the ability to get into clubs that liked to tout themselves as exclusive.
I didn’t drink in those bars and clubs, though I was very good at giving the impression of it. Even when I’d had a problem, I’d only ever gotten blind drunk in the privacy of my home.
“You think this means you’re in control?” Paige’s green eyes looking down at me where I sat in the spa, a vodka on the rocks in hand. “Open your eyes, Aarav, or you’ll pickle your liver by the time you’re thirty.”
I should message her, tell her my liver was now safe, ask her … What? What was it that I desperately needed to ask Paige?
The thought slipped away, just like the woman who’d inspired it.
Once inside the bar, I got Ginger a cocktail and myself a soda water that’d pass for vodka because that’s what she’d expect it to be. Then I set to charming her. I was very good at it—some would say psychopathically good. Before long, she’d imbibed two strong cocktails and was giggling. I maneuvered the conversation to her work.
Another giggle. “I’m in hospitality.”
“Oh yeah? At a hotel?”
“No, private.” Teeth sinking into her lower lip, she ran her fingers down my lapel. “I’ll be hospitable to you for free though.”
I closed my hand gently over hers. “You have any friends who can join us?”
Another pout. “You like that?”
“Why not? We’re young, sexy, free.”
She leaned in close, the sweet scent of peach schnapps on her breath. “I could make it so good for you that you wouldn’t notice that I was the only one.”
I tucked her hair behind her ear. “I believe that. You’re not even my type.” Gentle words. “I usually go for Asian women. Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese.”
She twisted her lips. “Ugh, seriously? Why are guys like that? It’s creepy, you know. The Asian girls who work with me are totally squicked by it.”
I told the truth for the first time in this entire conversation. “My first lover was half Thai. Maybe that’s why.” Then I ordered her another cocktail.
Well lubricated in the aftermath, she spoke about other things before anger made her return to our earlier discussion. “You’d probably like Lily. She puts out she’s all sexy, but she’s one frigid bitch.”
I stroked her hair. “Who’s Lily?”
Her eyes closed. “Hmm? Lily runs the booking system.” Another giggle.
I continued to stroke her hair as I thought that through. “Come on, let’s get you home.”
Instead of driving her myself, I called a cab. I might need help getting her into her apartment. I rode with her all the way—address courtesy of a little tag she had on her keys, and yeah, that was surprising in a woman I’d assumed would be street-smart.
“Wait,” I told the taxi driver when we got to her ground-floor apartment. “Keep the meter running. Here’s my credit card so you know I won’t run off.”
“Nah, it’s fine. Recognize your face. I’ll wait.”
Being recognized could be problematic, but in this case, it was a plus. Sh
ould Ginger decide to sell a story to the tabloids about our “wild night” together, I had a witness who’d know it for a lie. Then again, I might let it go—it’d all add to my reputation and fuck with my father’s head.
Ginger wasn’t drunk enough not to be able to walk, though she did lean on me a little too much for my foot. She slid into bed with a seductive smile, but she was snoring by the time I locked up her apartment from the outside, then slipped the key back under the door.
The cabdriver nodded when I got back in—this time in the front passenger seat. “Respect, man. I see too many young fellas go home with trashed girls—and they got that hungry look in their eyes.”
Oh, I’d taken advantage of Ginger. It just hadn’t been sexual. “Comatose women don’t do it for me.”
“Not like the psycho house-husband in your book, right?” the driver said as he pulled away. “I listened to the audio version while waiting for jobs. Chilling shit. How do you even come up with that stuff?”
We spoke about the book and the movie until he dropped me back at the bar. From there, I drove first to Ginger’s Mini, to return the part I’d stolen; she’d helpfully mentioned that the tow truck wouldn’t get there till morning.
My next stop was the Corner Café—which had transformed into Lily’s Bites for the night. It was quietly busy inside, the lighting muted and candles on the limited number of tables. The murmurs went silent when I entered, but then Lily came over to me and her guests seemed to take that as a sign to keep eating and drinking.
Two svelte waitresses moved around, keeping an eye on things and chatting to guests. With Lily, that made three waitstaff for a café with only five tables. And that didn’t include the kitchen staff.
“Aarav.” Lily’s eyes held a question but no irritation. “We’re fully booked, but I can do you a takeaway box—or you can come grab a seat in the kitchen.”
“Actually, I could use a friend. You got a few minutes to talk?”
Lily’s eyes tightened at the corners a little, but she looked around the restaurant before nodding. “Come out back. We can talk in the garden for a couple of minutes.”
She should’ve listened when I’d told her I was a professional liar.
In front of the native plantings was a small patio staff used to sneak cigarettes. The ashtray was a terra-cotta pot concealed behind a camellia blooming a blush pink. Grass grew between the stones that made up the patio.
“I really am sorry about your mum,” she said, her breath a white puff in the cold dark. “She wasn’t my favorite person, but I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.”
I angled my body to look her full in the face. The wash of light from the café’s back window was enough for me to see her expression. It appeared sincere. “Why did you fuck my father, Lily?”
26
Lily flinched. “I didn’t.”
“Liar.” It was a soft murmur. “I don’t care by the way—you didn’t belong to me, could be with anyone you wanted, but why the son and the father?”
She turned to go back into the café. I slammed my palm down on the door to stop her. “Did my mother know?”
She paled. Spinning around, her sleek ponytail flying, she said, “What the hell? Do you think I drove your mother off the road?”
I shrugged.
“You know what? Screw this. I fucked you and your father because I wanted to stick it to your bitch of a mother.” Lips pressed tight. “She treated me like an indentured servant. I liked knowing I’d deflowered her precious son, and screwed her asshole husband. I also liked knowing it was something she didn’t know.”
I remembered how my mother had spoken to Lily, drunk on her power over this young woman with hopes and dreams. A young woman she’d never again be herself. “She wasn’t very nice to you.”
Lily’s face … shivered, before she got herself under control. “Shit. Shit. I shouldn’t have said that, not after …” She hugged herself. “What I did to you was wrong. You were a kid. The guilt eats at me.”
“You were only three years older.”
“Three very long years.” A shake of her head. “I better go back in, but please tell me I didn’t mess you up sexually.”
I thought of my emotionless hookups with every woman who wasn’t Paige.
Was that on Lily?
Or was that who I’d always been and always would be?
Pulling a cigarette from a pack I didn’t remember putting in my jacket pocket, I said, “Don’t worry about it.”
My answer didn’t seem to satisfy her, but when one of her staff stuck their head outside looking for her, she left with them. As I stood there in the dark, an unlit cigarette in my mouth, I considered what I’d learned. Lily was running a brothel. Which wasn’t illegal if she’d done the right paperwork, paid her taxes, and the location was in a permitted zone.
Just another business.
Depending on how long she’d been running it, that explained her ability to buy this café. Maybe the café was also a discreet way for possible clients to check out the merchandise—no doubt for a fee—and yeah, that was probably crossing the line, but I wasn’t the morality police. Neither was I the neighborhood snitch.
The only thing about which I cared was whether Lily had anything to do with my mother’s death, and I couldn’t see the motive. Even if Lily had started young in the industry and my mother had discovered her secret life, it wasn’t like she could bad-mouth her—the two hadn’t moved in the same circles.
Pulling a lighter from my pocket, I cupped my hands around the cigarette and lit it. A flare of heat in the darkness, and then the tip glowed. I drew in the nicotine, feeling my lungs burn with each breath.
After smoking the poison of it down to the filter, I crushed the butt under my heel.
Then I began to walk home, cloaked in darkness. No sense in moving the sedan when I hadn’t parked it that far from my father’s house. At one point, I found my eyes drawn to a lit window just visible through the trees. Someone was moving in Alice and Cora’s laundry room. I knew the full layout of the lower floor of their house. I’d snuck in there a couple of times as a kid for shits and giggles.
All I’d taken was a banana from the fruit basket to prove to my waiting schoolmate that I’d actually walked around the home.
No Grandma Elei back then. Watching. Always watching.
I needed to talk to her, but she’d say “No English” and shut the door in my face if I tried. But she liked Shanti. I’d use Shanti.
“Just like your father. I wish I’d had a girl.”
My abs clenched at the voice of memory. How old had I been when my mother had quietly said those words, alcohol fumes merging with the rich scent of her perfume? Twelve? Thirteen? I’d pushed her that day, shoving past her so she staggered into a wall.
“Your father’s son.”
The words of regret had followed me out the door and all the way down the street as I pumped the pedals of my bike with furious speed. I’d wanted to hurt her. I’d wanted her to be sorry. I’d said I hated her.
I’d said I wished she was dead.
Were those normal things for an ordinary son to think or say? I didn’t know. I just knew I’d heard my father wish my mother dead much of my life. It was my normal. But I’d never actually wanted it to come true, never wanted her to vanish from my life.
My phone rang in my hand as I closed in on my father’s house. Seeing Kahu’s name on the screen, I felt my lips kick up.
“Hey,” I said, and leaned against a kōwhai tree to give my foot a break.
“Hey.” His voice was off by a small margin. “I saw the news about your mother. That’s dark shit. I’m sorry.”
“Thanks.”
Nothing from the other side.
“So yeah, that’s why I called. Later, man.”
“Why do you sound like you have a stick up your butt?”
“Fuck you, you asshole.” He hung up.
And I knew. I’d fo
rgotten something important.
Flicking back through our text message history, I saw a bunch from Kahu the night of the accident. I hadn’t replied to any of them.
What the fuck, Aarav. She was mine.
Fuck you, man.
She was fucking hanging on my arm when you rolled up.
Flashing your money and your car.
Talentless trash hack.
So, this was over some woman. Probably Daisy, since she’d been in the Porsche when we crashed. Which meant Kahu had been at the same publishing party that night. Not a big surprise. New Zealand had a small publishing scene, and if the hosts had been aiming for media coverage, having both me and Kahu around would’ve upped their chances.
I must’ve been in a seriously bad headspace to move on a woman Kahu’d been interested in, damage my only real friendship.
I didn’t realize she was that important to you, I messaged back. Sorry for being an ass. An apology was just words. Easy to say if it meant Kahu would talk to me again.
“Protect the bonds with the people you can trust,” my mother had said to me as we crossed over to Diana’s house one day. “Those bonds are rare. A person who won’t stab you in the back is a gift.”
Paige’s amused voice blended with the edge of that memory. “Kahu would stab you the instant you won a literary award. He’s only friends with you because he thinks he’s better than you.” Eyes as green as the bush, staring at me. “You surround yourself with nasty people who hurt you.”
But in the end, Paige had broken what little heart I had, and Kahu had stuck around. He was the one who’d called even though he was pissed off at me, while she kept a cold silence. Paige really could hold her grudges.
I was about to walk through my father’s front door by the time my phone buzzed again. Shifting direction, I sat down in one of the comfortable outdoor chairs on the front patio and said, “Hey.”
“You’re a definite ass. Some lines you don’t cross.”
“At least you know not to waste time on her.”
“I’m giving you the finger.” No anger in his voice.
“You didn’t come see me in hospital.” Since it was becoming clear that I couldn’t remember much of my hospital stay, I didn’t know that for certain, but it sounded like something Kahu would do in a snit.
Quiet in Her Bones Page 14
