Club You to Death Anuja Chauhan (best ebook reader for ubuntu .TXT) 📖

gently in the white wicker daybed on the terrace of their beautiful Vasant Vihar home, staring out at the silk-cotton trees, which are in full, riotous bloom.

‘Hmmm?’

‘You heard?’

She looks around. ‘What, Mukesh?’

He says hesitantly, ‘Did you know?’

Her beautiful face grows inscrutable. ‘Did I know what?’

He blunders forward. The bruise around his eye, the mark of the dead Leo, has still not faded entirely.

‘About the body! In the kitchen garden! Did you know it was there?’

‘Oh that,’ she murmurs and sips her tea.

Mukesh stares down at her. The silence lengthens.

‘And if you did – who told you?’

She turns more fully towards him and gives a light musical laugh. ‘No, Mukesh! How would I know?’

‘Leo.’ He continues doggedly, ‘He knew for sure! That’s why he got offed! Matlab, it’s only logical! You two were as thick as thieves. Always exercising together!’

Urvashi puts down her teacup. ‘How many times, Mukesh Khurana?’ Her voice has a pained edge to it. ‘How many times have I asked you to exercise with me? Yoga, tennis, cycling, walking, anything! And how many times have you told me no?’

‘Don’t make this about my fitness!’ He is immediately defensive. ‘You ghumao things, and twist my words, and somehow always manage to put me in the wrong! Don’t I go to the gym and train with Thampi?’

‘You could train with me.’ Urvashi’s calm is definitely stirred now. ‘I’m a qualified yoga instructor, for heaven’s sake!’

He shakes his head, stubborn. ‘I can’t learn from you.’

Her face grows bitter. ‘Chauvinist.’

‘No!’ The word emerges like a maddened bellow. ‘I am not a chauvinist! I’m proud of your achievements – and your work ethic. I’m proud of our girls!’

Urvashi stares at him, bewildered, hands on her hips. ‘Then what’s the problem, Mukesh?’

There is a pause. Mukki is clearly trying to gather his thoughts.

‘Problem yeh hai, Urvi,’ he says finally, slowly, ‘that you have been wanting that kitchen garden dug up for months! You claimed it was for the rainwater-harvesting plant – but that could have been placed somewhere else also! So my question is – did you know there was a body in there?’

‘Of course not,’ she says crossly.

‘That snoopy item number didn’t tell you anything?’ he asks her. ‘Your Leo?’

She rounds to face him, pale. ‘Show a little respect for the dead, Mukesh!’

He lets out a loud, neighing laugh. ‘That’s a good one! Respect for the dead? How much respect did the police show for the dead – digging up some peacefully sleeping corpse today?’

‘Just what are trying to imply anyway?’ Her voice is icy-cool. ‘Why am I being interrogated in my own home, by my own husband?’

He’s walking agitatedly about the room now, whirling around every time he reaches the exquisitely papered walls.

‘You have secrets from me! You’ve always had secrets from me! A husband and wife shouldn’t have secrets!’

‘Can we please stick to the point? Which precise secret are you alluding to?’

‘You’re trying to phasao Mehra!’

‘Mehra is trying to phasao you,’ she says coolly. ‘He was clearly in cahoots with that club secretary, Srivastava, who rigged the tambola to start a fight between you and Leo. They’ve been keying you up for ages, going on about a non-existent affair between me and Leo. And you succumbed to their chaabi-ing and fought with Leo – then went to the gym five hours before the murder! They all think you poisoned Leo’s protein shake. That square, smiling policeman definitely does.’

‘I didn’t kill him!’ Mukki bellows agitatedly. ‘I would never poison a man! I’d take him in a fair fight!’

‘A fight between you and Leo couldn’t possibly be fair. He was so much younger and fitter than you,’ she says pityingly.

Mukki deflates slightly. ‘I know.’

He stops pacing, and sits down beside her on the daybed with a dejected thump.

‘I’ve made a total mess of things, haven’t I. You won’t win the election now, because of me …’

She turns to face him. ‘I believe you’re innocent,’ she says earnestly, ‘but they may not – and so—’

‘And so you’re trying to get them to suspect Mehra? Is that the game? If it is, then it’s a damned dicey game, Urvi …’

It is a very exhausted Bhavani Singh who pushes in the small gate and enters the house in Police Colony several hours later. Shalini, back from school some time ago, freshly bathed, and sipping a cup of tea in the jute swing-chair, takes one look at his face and gets to her feet.

‘I’ll get the cold milk.’

He shakes his head, his eyes tired but twinkling. ‘It’s Friday.’

She smiles understandingly and goes into the house. When she emerges, carrying two iced whisky-sodas, he is sitting in the rope swing and staring at the jasmine hedge, his mind clearly miles away.

She hands him his drink, and sits down on a moodha beside him.

Bhavani glugs it down like he’s drinking plain water. Shalini raises her eyebrows, then takes his glass and hands him her own.

‘We found the skeleton exactly where Guppie Ram said we would.’

She gasps. ‘Bhavani! That’s a huge breakthrough!’

‘Yes.’ He sips her drink slowly, savouring it this time, and his expression changes. ‘What is this, Shalu, why did you give us the Johnny Walker? The VAT 69 would have been just fine.’

‘Nonsense!’ she says firmly. ‘You’ve had a tough day. Spoil yourself a little.’

‘Chalo theek hai.’ Bhavani sinks back into the swing with a sigh of satisfaction. ‘Like you said, it’s a big breakthrough. President Bhatti can’t talk about self-inflicted drug overdoses any more! Leo was clearly murdered – that too because he knew about a previous murder! It’s all starting to add up!’

‘Fantastic,’ she replies. ‘So this was the body Leo was alluding to in the “Secrets” song!’

‘Yes.’

‘How easy will it be for you to identify the remains?’

‘Krishnan is on it,’ Bhavani replies. ‘He said he would phone as soon as he has something concrete. We will nat hold our breath though – it is a Friday night.’

The call comes when Bhavani is finishing his 5BX workout in his tiny garden the