A Bad Day for Sunshine (Sunshine Vicram #1)(84)

Auri tucked her chin and said softly, “I was going to jump off the cliffs at the lake.”

Elaine pressed a delicate hand over her heart, but Sun forced herself to suppress her reaction.

“I’d climbed up there and was standing at the very edge, working up the nerve to jump, when a man talked to me.”

Sun struggled to breathe, but only on the inside. Her outside was made of steel. “Who?”

Auri chewed her lower lip. “He talked to me like we’d known each other forever. He called me Red. He asked me how the water looked and if I thought it was going to rain and was I looking forward to the next school year.”

“Auri—”

“Mom, he knew.” She looked at Sun with pleading eyes. “He knew what I was going to do. I don’t know how, but he did.”

Sun’s cool fa?ade crumbled. She sat with her mouth hanging open before asking, “What did he say?”

“He told me he’d thought about it once, too, but then he realized that no matter how messed up his life was, there was always someone with a more messed-up life than his.”

Sun held her breath as her daughter spoke.

“He was with a boy,” she continued. “His nephew. He walked right up to me and took my hand because he said I was making him nervous and that if I jumped I could die. I told him that was the point, but he told me to quit being stupid. Nobody wanted to die in August. It was too hot for a funeral.”

Then it hit her. “Auri, was it Jimmy?”

She nodded. “And Levi. He saved my life, Mom. He saw me up there, and he ran up the mountain to stop me. He just knew. And you always talk bad about him and his family, but I know you’re completely in love with him. I can see why. He’s so handsome and kind. He looks after Jimmy when he doesn’t even have to. And I know his family is bad, but he saved my life, and I love him. I love him and I love Jimmy.”

Sun put a hand over her mouth as fresh tears cascaded over her lashes. Levi Ravinder. Of all the things she’d expected to learn that day, the fact that Levi Ravinder had saved her daughter’s life was not one of them.

She swallowed and thought back to all his uncles and cousins and cousin’s cousins. To his abusive father and his murdered mother. He’d been through so much.

“Thank you for telling me that, bug bite.” She hugged Auri again amid protests of a squished sandwich.

“Mom,” Auri said into Sun’s shoulder, “can you check on Cruz? I think he may have done something silly. Like defend my honor.”

Sun sat back. “I gotta tell ya, kid, I like him.”

Auri blushed again and went back to her sandwich, and Sun had never felt so blessed in all her life.

“You know, you don’t have to go to school tomorrow. You don’t have to go back to that school ever again.”

The look Auri gave her was one of absolute resolve. “Mom, what would you do? Because you wouldn’t run away. So, what would you do?”

Sun tilted her head. “I’d show them that while they may be able to put a hairline crack in my heart, they could never, ever break me.”

Auri smiled. “I guess I’m more like you than you’d thought.”

“Oh no, I had a strong inkling.”

Auri giggled, the sound like champagne bubbles bursting in the air.





19


Deputy Salazar responded to a report of a woman stopping

at mailboxes and going through residents’ mail.

Upon further investigation, it was the mail carrier.



—DEL SOL POLICE BLOTTER

Sun dropped Quincy off at work with the promise of meeting him at the St. Aubin home later, but not before she gave him a little hell.

“Really?” she asked as they were leaving the house. “You let them interview you?”

He flushed. “You know how reporters are. They tricked me.”

“They’re high school students.”

“They’re sharks in a town full of minnows.” After a minute, he said, “I am so sorry, Sunny.”

She wrapped an arm around his waist and squeezed. “I know. What line did these sharks feed you?”

“That it was for a ‘Getting to Know Our Community Leaders’ post for their news program.”

“And you fell for that?”

“Apparently.”

She let him hug her, then left him on the street and made him walk half a block in the snow. Served him right. Sun had almost fainted when she’d seen him in the video.

With him taken care of, she had a mission, and after making some calls, she found herself at the Ravinder home in the early afternoon. She didn’t know what to expect. If there would be family with them or if word had yet to get out about their uncle Brick’s death.

In a surprise twist, Sun found out Hailey had come home to gather some things for her son. Jimmy had received a clean bill of health. They’d feared frostbite, but somehow the kid managed to keep all his fingers and toes, a fact Sun found astonishing. But they were keeping him overnight for observation.

She knocked on the door to the main house.

Hailey opened it and almost growled at her. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“I came to see your brother. Is he here?”

She looked around and then smiled at Sun. They kept their distance while talking softly, but Hailey broke the rules and said, “Thank you so much for everything you did, Sunshine.”