Quiet in Her Bones by Singh, Nalini (mobi reader .txt) 📕

I waited till midnight to leave the house. If Riki was coming, he’d do so early, scout out the situation. He’d already be waiting at the site. Exiting via the back door, I began to make my way around the side of the house, my goal the back door of the Henare house. The door through which Riki would almost surely return to his home.

An arm slammed up against my throat, cutting off my airway as I was wrenched back against a hard body. My crutches fell quietly to the grass.

“Did you think you could lead me around like a dog on a leash, you bastard?” Riki hissed in my ear. “Like mother, like son. Always spying on everyone.”

My lungs struggling, I pointed up.

He squeezed his arm even tighter. White lights flowered in front of my eyes. I thought this was it, one wrong move too many on the chessboard. Then the pressure was gone and I was falling, cold air rushing into my lungs.

“Fuck.” Riki caught me before I ­face-­planted, and I managed to brace myself with one hand against the side of the house. He picked up my crutches as the blinking red light of the security camera looked on.

My father was paranoid these days. I’d never before considered that a plus.

I tried to keep my coughs quiet as I sucked in air and got myself steady on the crutches. Riki’s face was twisted with rage, but the fact he was showing me that face was a good sign. Surely if he’d come with murder in mind, he’d have covered up? Or perhaps my mother’s death hadn’t been a thing of calm calculation, but a crime of passion.

Could be it was Riki’s rage that directed his actions.

Shifting to lean my back against the side of the house, I said, “How did you know it was me?” It came out a rasp.

Hands fisted at his sides, he spat on the grass. “Did you forget who showed you those trails, you dickhead? Nobody else from this fucking Stepford place goes tramping in there.”

I used the excuse of coughing to cover up my ­shock—­now that he’d triggered it, I could see the memory as clear as day. A younger Riki showing me the trail, and how it led to a waterfall that formed a small and safe swimming pool.

“Don’t tell anyone.” Holding out his hand. “It’s our secret.”

We’d shaken on it, and I hadn’t broken the promise.

All my clever plans, and my fucking brain was falling to pieces around me. “I saw you today. With the beautiful girl with the black curls.”

His jaw worked. “What the fuck do you want?”

“The same thing my mother wanted,” I said, in a fit of dangerous inspiration.

For a single frozen instant I thought he’d lunge at me, put his hands around my throat, camera be damned. Then he seemed to crumple in on himself, his eyes hot and wet. “I used to like Nina, do you believe that? That bitch. She crushed my mother’s heart.”

“You need two parties for a tango, Riki.” I wasn’t about to allow him to act as if his father was a shining beacon of purity when it came to the morals department. “Hemi was right there with her.”

Shoving his hands over his head, his leather jacket falling open to reveal a black T-­shirt, Riki strode away, then back. “I wanted to kill him more than I did her. I despised her, but I hated him. I still do.” His voice trembled. “But my mother loves that piece of cheating shit, and so I pretend everything’s fine, because she doesn’t need any more pain in her life. She’s never done harm to anyone. All she’s ever done is try to help people.”

“Is that why you got the girlfriend?” Mrs. Henare was the most devout member of the family, a matriarch respected by their entire church community. “Lies won’t make you happy.”

Riki didn’t try to convince me he was bisexual and had just fallen for a female partner this time around. Even if I’d believed that, the simple truth that he was attracted to men at all would destroy his relationship with his mother.

Tia’s love came with conditions attached, too.

“What the fuck do you care? It’s my life.” He stabbed a finger into his chest. “What dirty little job do you want me to do? Newspapers say you’re a ­millionaire—­you can afford to hire thugs for ­low-­life shit. Or did you gamble it all away like my bastard father?”

I noted the information he’d inadvertently revealed. “What did my mother ask you to do?”

“Ask?” A laugh that was all broken edges. “You’re a ­writer—­use the right word. She blackmailed me.”

“To do what?”

Dark eyes locked on me, a slight smile lighting his face. “You want to know, you drop this blackmail shit.”

“That’s not how it works. And that camera records audio, too. The facts won’t magically disappear if I do.”

The rage that twisted his face was a deadly thing and I knew I was on the verge of pushing him beyond his limits. “You won’t always be around cameras.” A quiet threat as he moved out of range of the security system.

It was too late. “I’ll always have this recording, as well as the photos I took when I was a teenager. I disappear, the police check my ­safety-­deposit box and the photos eventually leak. The end.”

When his shoulders slumped, I felt like the worst kind of slime. Empathy was hardly my strong suit, but I’d never before sunk this low. Bones, I reminded myself. My mother is nothing but bones. And Riki had hated her with every ounce of his being.

“She wanted me to beat up Cora,” Riki whispered so quietly that I had to step closer to hear him. “For the first thing.” He dropped his head. “She said she’d tell me later when other stuff came up.” His eyes were shiny when he looked up. “What the fuck, Aarav? I liked her, and she