Quiet in Her Bones by Singh, Nalini (good e books to read txt) 📗

weak sunlight. “Why don’t you ask him? It’s his fucking father who’s a psychopath.”

I gave him my most charming smile.

He flinched as if I’d hit him. His wife put a hand on his arm. Statuesque and striking Veda with her long red curls was way out of Brett’s league if you were judging solely on looks, but while they were prats to everyone else, they seemed to have a great marriage.

My mother had never reached out to a young Veda as she had to Alice, and maybe it had been a simple case of differing personalities, but looking back, I think it was also about envy. One evening, when I was a teen, I’d caught her watching the couple from my bedroom. She’d had an ­odd … yearning look on her face, and when I’d gone up to her, she’d put her arm around my shoulders and said, “Look.”

Following her gaze, I’d seen Brett silhouetted against his large kitchen window. He’d been cooking, and as we watched, Veda had slipped her arms around him from behind, and pressed a kiss to his neck. He’d smiled and said something that made her laugh.

“Sometimes,” my mother had murmured, “I see beauty and I want to break it.” Then she’d smiled and kissed me on the cheek and asked me if I wanted her to make my favorite cookies, and we’d never again talked about Veda and Brett except as our annoying neighbors.

I’d automatically discarded doughy out-­of-­shape Brett as a possible suspect when it came to my mother’s “tall and ­dark-­haired” lover, but now I wondered. Because Brett hadn’t always been bald. Had she done it? Had she damaged the unexpected beauty of the Fitzpatricks’ marriage just because it hurt her to see them have what she didn’t?

If she ­had … Well, Veda was a smart, strong woman who took no shit.

“Mr. Fitzpatrick.” Constable Neri’s clipped tone. “I’m going to have to remind you to stop making unfounded allegations that inflame the situation.”

Brett’s cheeks turned a mottled red.

Veda, meanwhile, looked around at all the neighbors watching the show, and suddenly ducked her head. I couldn’t hear what she said next, but Neri nodded and the four of ­them—­the other officer ­included—­filed onto their drive and up through the tree ferns at the entrance. Shadows filigreed their bodies before they disappeared from sight.

Lily didn’t look at me as she said, “That bother you?”

“No. My father is a shit.”

“You think he could’ve done that? Poisoned a dog?”

“Sure. But do I really think my father would skulk around at night to lure a dog?” I shook my head. “If he was going to do something like that, he’d probably wait until the Fitzpatricks were away for the day, then chuck a poisoned piece of meat over the fence.”

“It’s kind of scary how you can just say that like it’s no big deal.”

“It’s hypothetical. I do hypotheticals all the ­time—­it’s my job. Writers are professional liars.”

A frozen moment as she stopped, stared at me, before her ­lips—­soft with ­gloss—­twitched. “You had me going there, Aarav.”

I grinned and left it at ­that … and tried not to think about my dirty feet. No way could I have done anything to the dog. First of all, I had a fucking broken foot. I could’ve hardly chased down the huge ­animal—­or run away from the vicious thing. And where exactly would I have obtained poison in the middle of the night? It wasn’t like I’d bought it and stored it away in readiness for the murderous urge to strike.

I’d gone sleepwalking. Weird, but that was it.

“Aarav.”

No mistaking that voice. Unlike Leonid, Anastasia had a thick Russian accent. She was just coming out of the café as we reached it, ­and—­after waving to Lily as Lily slipped ­inside—­leaned forward to kiss me on both cheeks in that way she had. For a second, my mind hitched on the scent of her perfume, before a sudden breeze blew it away.

The wind played through Anastasia’s long and expertly cut ­blonde-­brown tresses. That hair framed a pointed face with slanted green eyes and ­razor-­sharp cheekbones. She could’ve been a catwalk model if not for her diminutive height of ­five-­foot-­one.

“I hear the news,” she said, her lips downturned. “About your mother. I am sorry to hear this. You are doing all right, yes?”

The genuine depth of her concern took me by surprise. “Part of me always knew she’d never leave me if she had a choice.”

She nodded firmly and beat a small-fisted hand against her chest. “Da. That is mother love.” A glance in the direction I’d seen Leonid walk off with the stranger and the twins. “I hear this terrible news, and I ­think—­how my babies grow up if I am gone? Leonid is good papa, but he is not mama.”

I didn’t know if she expected an answer to that, so I just gave her a quiet smile.

Her eyes softened. “I know you are sad, Aarav, but it no good to walk around with so less clothes in the cold.”

“What?”

“Last night.” She waved in the direction of my father’s ­house … but it could as easily have been halfway to the Fitzpatricks. “I wake to look after babies. I see you standing there. No shirt. No shoes.” She clicked her tongue. “Your mama would not want this.”

Oddly, for a woman who’d never met my mother, she was right. I could still remember how my mum would wrap my jacket around me when I was younger, how she’d remind me to pack my sweatshirt if I had an ­after-­school thing that might run late.

The memories unfurled at hyperspeed in a brain that seemed to have otherwise slowed down to molasses, it took so long for Anastasia’s meaning to penetrate. When it did, the possible consequences jolted into me. “Veda finds out I was out at night,” I said in a wry tone that was a mask over my skittering pulse, “she’ll probably say I poisoned her dog.”

Anastasia snorted. “Leonid, he message me about this stupid