Page 73 of Born in Sin

“Promise?” One tear escaped, streaking down her cheek. Virat wiped it away gently with a thumb ignoring the growly sound from her mother’s throat.

“I promise,” he said. “Go clean your feet and bandage them.”

It was only then that Celina noticed her scratched and muddied feet. It was nothing compared to the wounds she could see on Virat. She looked up to say so but he was already walking away from her, his friends helping him when he listed to one side, a hand going to his ribs like they were hurt.

“Now will you come?” Her mother’s harsh voice intruded on her troubled thoughts.

She watched Virat’s figure recede into the distance as her mother dragged her away from him. This time, she didn’t resist.

Chapter Twenty-Four

CARA

We would have been happy.

Cara looked at him, her eyes filling with tears she had no intention of shedding. Virat took a step forward, toward her, when a knocking started on the glass again.

“Sir.” Shourya was back. “We really need to talk. The Calcutta client needs a word.”

Virat didn’t reply, still watching her with those tormented, beautiful eyes of his. “Go,” she said, quietly.

“The rest of the gang will be back here for dinner. They’re picking something up.” Virat shoved his hands in his jean pockets, his intense gaze boring into her.

“Oh,” she said, shifting uncomfortably. “Maybe I should leave then.”

“Will you stay?”

Cara froze.

“Just for tonight? Will you stay?”

She swallowed hard, finding it difficult to form words.

“Please Celi? Just for tonight.”

She nodded, still fighting the tears clogging her throat and threatening to spill from her eyes.

Virat hesitated near the door, looking like he wanted to reach for her but fighting himself. “You can call Kabir back also,” he offered. “If you’d like.”

“No.” She shook her head. “He needs his sleep. He’s been out almost every night of this week with the DD’s.”

Virat stepped aside, allowing her to precede him into the flat. Shourya heaved a sigh of relief, looking harried.

“I just have to take this,” Virat told her quietly, leading Shourya away while he talked nonstop about someone whose daughter was being blackmailed by an ex-boyfriend.

Cara wandered over to the screens, but it looked like Majid was sleeping off the afternoon’s drinks and drugs session. Come to think of it, she’d seen him drink but she’d never seen him partake of the hard drugs the others did. Several messages had come through on his phone, but none were relevant to them, and they all sat unanswered as he slept.

The front door opened and Amay and Dhrithi wandered in with paper bags of what smelt like Chinese food.

“Hi Cara.” Dhrithi smiled, hesitantly.

In another lifetime, Dhrithi had been her friend. Until life and the men they’d loved had dragged them down different paths.Now, Cara didn’t know how to be friends with the girl who was so tangled up in her painful past.

Her friendship with Kabir was uncomplicated by all these ties, a fresh start that helped heal her lonely, hurting heart. But now…as she looked at old friends, her heart ached to be able to go back to that time when their friendship had been the only uncomplicated part of her life.

“Hi,” she said now, sitting down in a chair at the dining table as Amay helped Dhrithi unpack everything they’d bought. “Can I help?”

“No, we’re good.”

---