The Blue Bar (Blue Mumbai #1)(42)
“That’s me.” He held her hand for a moment before letting it go. “I’ll pick you up.”
She nodded and left.
After he’d watched her walk in through the hotel entrance, Arnav considered what he’d seen. A picture on Tara’s screen saver that was the spitting image of his sister as a teen. It wasn’t Asha, though. This was a digital, color photograph. The girl wore a T-shirt and grinned. Asha had never smiled for the camera.
One more question Tara must answer.
Arnav turned his old car and drove off, right as his phone flashed with Shinde’s number. Shinde was adamant about having Arnav transfer the charge of the Versova case to one of his other inspectors. Arnav took a deep breath before beginning the long and patient call—to explain yet again that the inspector at Versova who could have competently handled the case was still on leave. Arnav would hand over any intelligence or credit for developments related to Rasool Mohsin. Shinde was like a cranky grandfather when in a hospital bed. Arnav kept him appeased, dead set on nailing the culprit who had tortured and killed so many women with impunity.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
TARA
The last time she had done this, Tara was seventeen. She felt too old to sprint on heels, but race she would if that meant she might earn more out of this trip. She wouldn’t return to Mumbai again, not even for Pia and her school fees.
The air-conditioning in Shetty’s car gave off more sound than air, and she wilted in the heat of the shawl she’d wrapped about herself. All she’d longed to do after she returned this morning was lie in bed and dream about Arnav, about what he’d said, the way he’d acted, the questions he’d asked—but instead, she had trained the girls harder, correcting their mistakes from the night before, moving right alongside them. Now, after a hurried snack way past lunchtime, she was headed out to Borivali Station once more.
Last night, after the performance ended, Shetty had spoken to her.
“Well done, Tara. You brought the house down tonight. I’m adding a bonus to your payment.”
Never good news when Shetty gave you a bonus. This time, he’d offered extra work.
She’d considered it. The blue saree. The silver blouse and heels. The shawl. Mithi and her story about Gauri. Maybe they went to the station, too, wearing the same blue saree she wore right now. Maybe they didn’t have a choice. A lot of her friends at the Mira Road apartment used to send money home to support their families, their children.
She understood that compulsion. She was here because she hadn’t been able to argue with the money—money that would help support Pia, give her the opportunities she deserved. The fat Malayali bastard had offered Tara a bunch of it, and paid her an advance.
Cash. She would take what she could get. Over the decade and more of raising Pia, Tara had found little faith in Ma Kaali, the goddess her mother worshipped. She’d have to look out for herself, as she’d always done, and this was her chance.
Here she was, despite all her misgivings, her heart beating hard.
Leaving the car behind, with instructions on when and where to return for her, Tara headed up the stairs. The railway platform was cleaner, the shops shinier. The train announcer sounded less sleepy. Even during afternoon hours, passengers milled about. Better-dressed people than fourteen years ago, and everyone on a mobile phone. The beggars remained, but they’d been pushed to the street corners outside. She strode down the stairs to the platform number she’d been given this time, and realized it was a different one. Perhaps because there were tall buildings surrounding the place now.
Someone was watching her, whether from within the station or without—that jackal-voiced man in the dark. She’d mulled over it again this morning, and it had to be him—the one paying Shetty, and asking him to send out women in blue-sequined sarees. No longer as young or reckless, she would never take up night work should Shetty offer it. She’d agreed to come here only because this was a public space, safer than that bungalow she’d gone to, clad in a burka and the same blue and silver outfit.
The strings that held up the tiny blouse bit into her back, and the sequined saree chafed her waist. She could not wait to take them off after she left the station. A three-minute limit. Why not less or more? What if she failed?
She peered at the faces of the men who walked by, sat hunched behind newspapers, or spoke on their cell phones. He could be anywhere. Anyone. And he wasn’t far. That sent dread coursing through her, like in those days when she sweated in a car, escorted by Shetty’s thugs.
On one of her blindfolded visits, she’d spotted a policeman’s khaki cap with a gold-embroidered black band. From the brief glimpse, it had belonged to a highly placed officer. It wasn’t like the one Arnav wore as a constable, simple, soft. She remembered assuming that the jackal was a police officer with too much black money, who couldn’t be seen openly visiting a dance bar. That the men escorting her might not be policemen, but they wouldn’t hurt her if they secretly reported to a police officer. A part of her wanted to laugh at seventeen-year-old Tara, who’d felt so invincible—lying to Arnav about her age, thinking nothing of going on mysterious, terrifying assignments, telling herself the jackal wouldn’t touch her.
She knew better this time. If he was a senior officer then, he might be placed much higher now. She shuddered.
Pia had no father: she hadn’t met Arnav and never would. Tara had responsibilities beyond herself.