Page 3 of Protect Me
If any man was safe enough to break my iron-clad rules, Vikram would be theonlyone. Like me, he’d remained in the Pineville area after high school, though his parents and sister moved away. A train conductor when it suited him, a ladies’ man without promises, and a freeball adventurer the rest of the time, he commanded life.
Until life handed him an empty bowl of loneliness after his friends paired off with girlfriends or wives. A recent knee injury while dog sledding in the arctic sure didn’t help things.
“I wouldn’t mind checking on him at all,” I said, and managed to mean it.
“Really?” she drawled.
“Really.”
“Listen,” her voice softened, “you know you’re safe with Vik, right? That he wouldn’t . . . I mean you grew up with him. He thinks of you like a little sister. At least, he used to. You know, when he came home more often and didn’t try to shut the world out all the time.”
A heavy lump rose in my throat, but I swallowed it back. “Yes, I know.”
“Still, if you don’t—“
“It’s fine, Vinita. Really. I’m happy to help however I can, especially with you so far away. Being near your brother will be the next best thing to being close to you.”
“I miss you,” Vinita said. “I wish you could be here for the birth of the baby.”
“Me too.”
The amusement in her voice warmed me. Vinita and Vikram had been raised in the US, but kept ties with their family members in South India all their life. Now, Vinita lived in upper New York State with her husband Zayne in an adorable house with a white picket fence nestled in a neighborhood. She would have her son without me there to welcome him to the world.
It stung, but what could be done?
No money, no flight.
“I’ll go check on him now,” I said. “I just got off work and . . . don’t really have anything to fill the rest of my day.”
“You are the best!” she cried, and the relief in her voice made everything worth it. “Thank you, Kate. I’ll text you as soon as I hang up. Let me know what happens okay?”
I’ll fall in love with him all over again,I thought.That’s what will happen. I’ll fall in love for a second time with the one man that I love, hate, and can’t have.
“Of course. Talk to you soon.”
I ended the call and stared straight ahead with the sinking feeling that I’d just altered the course of the rest of my life.
Vikram’s townhouse on the outer limits of Pineville was only a few minutes from where I worked at the Frolicking Moose Coffee Shop. The short drive still provided ample time for me to think out every possible way this visit could go wrong.
Like the time when, as an awkward twelve-year-old, I had dumped tomato soup on his shirt when we ran into each other in the kitchen.
Or the time he brought a date home, smacked lips with her on the couch, and I caught them in a . . . compromising position . . . with a flip of the light. That wouldn’t have been so bad, but Ammahad trailed in behind me.
Vikram had been grounded for weeks.
With memories like those to accompany me, I grimaced the whole drive.
Since I moved into my aunt’s house at ten years old, Vik had had the uncanny ability to turn me into a blundering mess. His quick smile melted my stomach to lava. The sound of his voice as he chattered with Appa made my heart flutter. Around Vikram, I lived like a heart attack victim.
Annoyed, I turned off the highway.
“I’m not twelve anymore,” I said firmly. “Vikram is a friend now. Like a brother, that’s all.”
I pointedly ignored the fact that I knew where he lived, though I hadn’t spoken to him in . . . years? I tried not to count.
Okay, fine.
Four years, eleven months, and three weeks.
