Chapter 19 #3
“The police called,” he said, cutting straight to the chase. “Look, it’s bullshit what I’m about to tell you—but you need to be informed. They found fingerprints on Gita’s clothing.”
“Fingerprints…”
His expression was grim. “They were yours.”
The air left her lungs. “I never gave them my fingerprints. How would they even…”
“They had them from last time. The attack.”
“I did touch Gita. I—I checked for her pulse.”
“I told them that. I’m waiting to get more details. I’ll keep you posted as soon as I know.”
She was breathing fast. Too fast. “So now I go from victim to suspect?”
“Let’s not jump to that yet. They didn’t say that.”
“What else could they mean? Are they coming to arrest me?”
“Hena, don’t panic. It’s okay,” Haris reassured her. “They just said they want you to stay in town. They may have further questions.”
“Stay in town. Lovely.”
The knives are out for you.
Those were the fortune teller’s words. Hena had dismissed them as absurd. But if everything was absurd right now, wasn’t anything possible?
“They want revenge,” Hena said slowly. “Whoever is doing this, that’s what they’re after. It must be tied to the past. To Nasir. To the attack on me that night.”
“Did Nasir ever mention anyone he was worried about, even in passing?” Haris fixed her with a worried look. “Anyone he was scared of?”
“He was scared, but he wouldn’t tell me who it was,” she said. “The week of the wedding, he was so jumpy. I didn’t push it. I didn’t get how bad things were until I got the notification about the empty bank account.”
“He must have used the money to pay off whoever was after him.”
Here it was. The parts she had not told anyone else. The parts Nasir had made her swear never to tell. It was time for Haris to know.
“He did give them the money,” she told him. “But it wasn’t enough. They said no dollar amount would do.”
He frowned. “It’s always money with these people.”
“Not this time. This time they said they wanted him dead. I begged him to go to the police. He said he couldn’t.
He said it would make things worse.” Here it came.
“Haris, I’m sorry, but…I knew he was leaving.
I knew he wasn’t planning to come back. It’s why he came to the boathouse.
It’s what he’d come to tell me the morning of our wedding. ”
Haris’s jaw twitched. She studied the floor. He was angry. Of course he was. In his shoes, she certainly would have been. This was a big thing to conceal.
“I tried to stop him from leaving,” Hena said.
“I begged him to think about what he was saying, what it would mean for everyone who loved him, but he was adamant. He made me swear not to say a word. He wouldn’t tell me where he was going.
Said he didn’t want to take the risk of anyone harassing me or his family about his whereabouts. ”
There was a beat of silence as Haris processed her words.
“That must have been heavy,” he said at last. “To know and not be able to tell anyone.”
“It was painful.” A tear slipped down Hena’s face.
“Pretending the wedding was on. Acting surprised along with everyone else. He needed time. To run. I don’t know if I gave him enough.
Or maybe they caught him anyway…Haris, I’m sorry,” she said, barely above a whisper. “I should have told you sooner.”
“Don’t apologize. I just…Fuck. Poor Nasir.”
“Now they’re back,” Hena said. “I guess if they can’t have Nasir, they want me.”
“How well do you know Reza?”
Hena looked up with a start. This again? “I met him here. At this wedding. Why?”
He put his hands on his hips, considering his words. “It was strange, wasn’t it?” he asked. “Him telling the officers he was out shopping? That’s the alibi? Really?”
Hena shifted. She didn’t want to go here. But—
“I can vouch for him.” Her face warmed. “He was, uh, making us breakfast.”
He frowned, then straightened as understanding dawned on him.
“Of course he was,” he said, his voice quiet. “Well, there you go. That explains that.” He gave her a half smile that didn’t quite meet his eyes. “I was grasping at straws anyway.”
He’s jealous. That’s what Khala had said. If that was the case, had she just hurt him? Someone she cared for, who had always been there for her?
When he left, she checked her phone. There was a missed text from Reza.
Reza: Sorry for leaving so abruptly.
Hena: Feeling better?
Reza: A little.
Reza: Do you think we could talk today?
Hena: I’d like that. I’ll be around after lunch.
Reza: I have an errand to run this afternoon, but I’ll try to swing by your room before the shaadi.
An errand? What kind of errands did Reza have to do while he was here?
She wanted to ask him. She wanted to pick up the phone.
To call him. She didn’t. Instead, she sent him a thumbs-up.
Then she walked back into her mother’s bedroom, set the phone on the nightstand, and sat with her.
Hena held her mother’s hand as she drifted off to sleep.
She tried to still her mind, though it wouldn’t stop churning.
She was here for only a little while longer. The wedding week was winding down. Until then, she needed to hold it together.