Chapter Eleven #2
They left Pai’s trailer to find the constable, who had disappeared somewhere.
As they looked around, they brainstormed the key witnesses they could talk to—Jagannath, the producer; the assistant director and the lead actor, who were married and had shared that specific trailer; perhaps other crew members—wondering if any of them might have information they could use.
The constable was nowhere to be found, but a maintenance worker stood in the distance, sweeping up plastic food containers and wrappers, likely left behind by the authorities during their last investigation.
His forehead wrinkled when Naina asked something in Kannada.
She bit her tongue and asked him, in Hindi this time, who the trailer belonged to.
“Yeah, it belonged to that married couple,” he replied.
Tejas flipped through his notes. Gopal Krishnan, one of Sandalwood’s biggest actors, had married assistant director Bina three years ago. Now they were the perfect team, churning out blockbuster after blockbuster, and they had one rule: They worked on projects together or not at all.
“Sir,” Naina asked, “were you working here the night of the murder?”
The worker hesitated, then replied, his words rushed, “I’m so sorry, madam. I can’t testify in court. I have a wife and children here, but we’re not—” He averted his gaze. “Never mind.”
Tejas’s heart dropped. This man was probably undocumented, from Bangladesh or a neighboring country, and wanted to lie low. It was best not to drag him into this.
Naina must have had the same thought. She spoke again, her voice soft and kind. “We wouldn’t ask that of you, sir, but if you could answer some questions, off the record, we’d be so grateful.”
He bit his lip, then nodded. “All right.”
Tejas put his notebook back in his bag, then clasped his fingers together. “Did you notice anything that was off, suspicious, or concerning about that night?”
“I wasn’t here when the—the incident happened,” the worker said. “I rent a small shack a short distance away, where I stay with my family. I only work here in the daytime. But”—he swallowed—“I did notice occasional arguments between the…person who passed, and the other man.”
“Which man?” Naina asked, frowning. “Jagannath or Gopal Krishnan?”
“I don’t know their names,” the worker said apologetically. “I don’t watch those movies. But it was the tall man in a soldier costume.”
“Gopal,” Tejas said. “Do you remember what they were fighting about?”
The worker let out a wry smile and folded his hands. “I couldn’t understand them, sir. I don’t speak either English or Kannada. I’m a simple man. I do my job and I stay out of conflict.”
Naina smiled back. “Thank you for your time.”
The worker resumed picking up the trash, and Tejas and Naina got back to work. A quick sweep of their client’s trailer showed nothing out of the ordinary, not that they’d expected it to be. It matched the poorly lit photographs well enough.
They returned to the parking space, talking about what Gopal’s arguments with Pai could have been about. Creative differences? Personal beef? Or something far more sinister?
Suddenly, a cat sprinted ahead of them. “Look at that!” Tejas exclaimed, just as the cat stopped in its tracks, its wide yellow eyes staring back at him. “That poor baby, it’s so bedraggled and thin…”
Naina tsk-tsked from beside him. “What a shame. Maybe there aren’t as many rats here for it to catch.”
“Let’s fix that.” Tejas rummaged in his bag until he found the extra cat treats he carried everywhere. Unfortunately, he couldn’t adopt every stray cat he chanced upon, but he could at least feed them one meal. He bent low and urged the cat forward, enticing it with the treat.
Slowly, hesitantly, the cat approached him to sniff the treat. Within seconds, it had gobbled up enough for an entire meal. “Wow,” Naina breathed as the cat meowed and scampered away. “You keep cat food in your work bag?”
Tejas straightened and gave her a smile. “Yeah. Why, is that weird?”
Her face was unreadable as her mouth twitched. “No. It’s not weird, it’s…Never mind. Let’s head back.”
After Naina unlocked her dad’s car with a beep and strapped herself in, Tejas followed suit, and she backed out of the parking area, turning on the radio again.
Tejas held back a sigh as music blasted from the speakers. He shifted toward her, hoping to start a friendly conversation, but she only exhaled, keeping her gaze staunchly on the road.
A minute later, Tejas spoke, if only to diffuse the tension in the air. “I can’t believe how much cheaper the rent is in Bangalore than Mumbai.”
“Uh-huh,” Naina said as she made a left turn along the hilly path.
“Renting a pet-friendly apartment in a decent neighborhood would have cost me an arm and a leg back home, but here?” Tejas laughed. “Astrid is so happy with all the space—”
Naina sighed loudly, and he stopped mid-sentence. As the car barreled through the soil, she said, “We don’t have to fill every moment of silence with a conversation.”
“But I want to,” he said. “Naina, I’d love for us to be friends, if nothing more. From what I know about you—”
“You don’t know me anymore, if you ever did,” she said, slowing the car as they drove down a road with particularly rough terrain. “Besides, weren’t you the one who told Dhanush that I’m ‘unapproachable’?”
“How did you…” His mouth fell open. Fuck, Dhanush must have said something. He obviously didn’t like Naina. “I was just wondering about it on my first day,” Tejas said finally, “and I fully expected the guys to correct me.”
“But they didn’t,” Naina said sharply.
“They didn’t,” he agreed.
Then, after a pause, she added, “Look, Tejas, we’ve had sex. Multiple times.”
Tejas let out a breath. Hearing her say it out loud, for the first time since they’d met again, brought equal parts relief and anxiety.
And, of course, beautiful old memories. The slight coolness of her skin.
The tug of her teeth on his lower lip. Her spunk, her energy, the light in her eyes… none of which he saw in her anymore.
Finally, Tejas bowed his head. “We’ve had sex,” he agreed. “And if I don’t know you anymore, I’d like the opportunity to begin again.”
Naina bit her lip. “I can’t be friends with someone I’ve slept with. Let’s leave it at that.”
“Then we’ll be friendly,” he countered, “for Preethi’s sake, if no one else’s.”
He waited with bated breath as she considered it, his heart in his throat. They’d shared so much in Goa that was impossible to shove down or ignore, but now there was so much at stake in Bangalore. A woman’s life was on the line, after all.
Finally, after the longest minute of Tejas’s life, Naina turned down the radio and said, “All right, Tejas. Friendly it is.”