Club You to Death by Anuja Chauhan (pdf e book reader .TXT) 📗

who watch with envious eyes as the smartly painted police Gypsy coasts through the ninth lane – reserved for VIPs – and disappears down the highway.

‘I’ve always wanted to do that!’ Kashi Dogra grins. ‘Perks of the job, eh, Bhavani ji?’

Bhavani Singh chuckles genially. ‘As you say, vakeel sa’ab, perks of the job!’

The Gypsy makes good speed on the open road, empty except for the occasional tempo traveller or bus. For a while, both men stare out at the dusty road, which bifurcates a classic Aravalli ridge landscape of grey-green thorned keekar trees spreading out as far as the eye can see.

‘I met my girlfriend on this road,’ Kashi says, after a while. ‘Exactly a year ago.’

‘O really?’ Bhavani looks at him, surprised. ‘You have a girlfriend? We thought—’ He checks himself, shaking his head.

‘You thought, what?’ Kashi’s tone is slightly challenging.

Bhavani shrugs. ‘We thought that if you had three weeks off, you would want to spend them with your girlfriend. But it’s none of our business.’

Kashi’s lean cheeks flush. ‘Oh that,’ he says, a little awkwardly. ‘We had a Goa holiday all planned – which is why I had taken the three weeks off in the first place, but then she cancelled at the last minute.’

‘That is nat nice,’ Bhavani says sympathetically. ‘We hope she is nat unwell? Did you get your money back?’

Kashi nods. ‘Yes, all that part of it is okay, but … we uh, well, we had a bit of an argument when she called to cancel on me.’

‘So you are sulking,’ Bhavani states, shooting a sideways glance at the younger man.

There is a longish pause.

‘Yes,’ Kashi admits ruefully.

‘Young couples fight all the time,’ Bhavani says comfortingly. ‘It is all part of getting to know each other better.’

‘Kuhu and I already know each other well enough.’ Kashi is immediately defensive.

Bhavani smiles reassuringly. ‘We’re sure. We’re sure.’

‘Our tuning is amazing,’ Kashi continues doggedly. ‘We complete each other’s sentences.’

If Bhavani thinks Kashi is protesting too much, he doesn’t let it show. Instead, he asks, ‘What does she do? Your girlfriend?’

Kashi’s face clears a little.

‘She’s an architect. In fact, the day I met her, she was driving out very early in the morning on this very road to see how the light of the rising sun hit the plot of land she had been commissioned to build on.’

‘Wah! It’s good to see young women focusing on their curryars,’ Bhavani remarks admiringly. ‘We have two daughters and they are curryar-minded too. Your girlfriend sounds really committed.’

‘I’m committed too,’ Kashi says at once, and then is utterly mortified. Why the hell did he say that? The ACP was clearly talking about commitment to a career, not to a relationship!

He has Kalra to thank for that first meeting. The two of them had gone to see a late-night screening of the new Creed movie, and the fucker had been texting Walli while driving, about how foul it was, and crashed the car into a barrier on a lonely stretch of the Vasant Kunj ridge at three in the morning. Kashi, asleep beside him, had woken up with a godawful jerk to the sight of Kalra, his nose all bloody, bent over in pain, screaming, ‘My cock, my cock!’

It had turned out to be his leg, not his cock – but he was definitely unable to walk. The two of them ended up sitting in pitch darkness by the side of the forest road, besides the totalled car. Kalra’s phone had got smashed in the crash, and Kashi’s had been dead anyway. Their best hope was that Walli, wondering why Kalra had stopped texting mid-rant, would be alarmed enough to come looking for them.

Just when Kashi had started thinking it made more sense to leave Kalra there and start jogging to civilization for help, a car had driven up, its beams shining on their bloodied faces. They had waved frantically. The car had slowed down uncertainly, the driver clearly in two minds – the Badshahpur forest road is notorious for rapes and muggings. Kashi had leapt to his feet, run forward and beaten his hands on the glass, shouting for help.

That settled the matter. The car accelerated, and sped off.

‘I’m dying!’ Kalra had groaned thickly, collapsing to lie on his back on the road. ‘I’m dying, Dogra!’

Then, as Kashi had watched, holding his friend, helpless with fury and frustration, the car executed a three-point turn, drove back and stopped nearby. The window on the driver’s side had lowered an inch.

‘You guys need help?’

It was a hesitant female voice, slightly musical, very wary. At that moment, it seemed to Kashi he had never heard a more beautiful sound in his whole life.

‘My friend’s hurt!’ he yelled hoarsely. ‘We need a ride!’

There was a long pause.

‘Don’t drive off!’ Kashi begged, panicking. ‘Please! Our phones are smashed! And the signal’s shit, anyway!’

‘Okay, but we can never tell my mother about this,’ the girl had finally said in a tight voice. ‘Get in.’

Needing no second invitation, Kashi had half-carried, half-bundled the bloodied Kalra into the backseat, then clambered in beside him and slammed the car door shut.

‘If you pull out a knife or a gun now,’ the girl said, in the same tight voice, ‘and this spirals into some ghastly rape and robbery, you’ll have destroyed my faith in the human race forever. Remember that.’

‘I’m speaking perfect English, bro,’ Kalra groaned in reply. ‘Do I sound like a fucking rapist?’

‘That’s fucking classist,’ she’d shot back at once. ‘You’re clearly an elitist asshole.’ She met Kashi’s eyes in the mirror. He glimpsed narrowed eyes behind black-rimmed glasses, a belligerent nostril and a tiny nose piercing. ‘Are you an asshole too?’

‘No no, I’m just thankful you stopped for us,’ he had hurried to assure her. Then he couldn’t help adding, ‘Though you do realize you took a terrible risk! Never stop like that again! And you shouldn’t be driving alone, on such a lonely road, so late in the night, anyway!’

‘Okay, Mummy,’ she had replied, now disgusted with both