The Khan Saima Mir (best short novels TXT) 📖

that address. ‘Great love is not the thing of romance novels. It comes from blood. It comes from opening a vein for family, from seeing your face in each other, in your child, your brother, your father. Seeing yourself look back at you through someone else’s eyes, knowing that you would sacrifice yourself, piece by piece, for them, until there was nothing left of you.’

Ahad was afraid to look at her in case it broke the spell. ‘You were so perfect, so alert,’ she said. ‘But you were unable to protect yourself. How I felt about you, it was such an overwhelming thing I couldn’t look at you. The way I loved you was all-consuming!’ she said. ‘If I had returned to your father…been reunited with you…stayed with you…it would have destroyed me and you. You made me afraid. For the first time in my life I was afraid of everything. You were my weakness.’ She looked at him. ‘But I will make you my strength. If you will let me.’

Hot, salty tears washing away years of anger, loss and loathing flowed down his face as he broke down. And as they flowed she reached over and put her arms around him. He couldn’t tell how long they sat there, or how long he wept, but the velvet night deepened and then abated around them, and the azaan was calling believers to prayer when they finally walked through the door to Pukhtun House. Jia covered her head and showed Ahad the way to the ablution room. ‘Do you pray?’ she asked. He nodded. ‘Good.’

Ten minutes later, ritually cleansed, heads bowed and arms folded, they stood side by side on the prayer mat, a very different mother and son from the pair who had met the evening before. When they were done, she whispered the words of the Ayat-ul-Qudsi and blew them across his face. Her mother had done the same for her every night when she was a child, telling her the verse of the Quran would protect her.

‘What is that for?’

‘The world is full of sharps and shards. I can’t save you from them – I have come to terms with that now – so I place you in the protection of Him in whose hands and control my life rests. He is all people like you and I have,’ she said. ‘He is all we have.’

CHAPTER 41

‘Some men are here to search the house.’ Maria’s voice came through Jia’s dream, waking her up. She dreamt of the events that led to Zan’s death so often that it took a few moments for her to realise this time it was real. It was starting to get light outside. Maria was standing by the bedroom door in her pyjamas, much older than the last time she’d said these words. She should have been tucked up in bed beside her husband, but had stayed over to comfort Sanam Khan, who was still having trouble sleeping alone and suffered bouts of insomnia. The coincidence that led to this moment of déjà vu was not lost on Jia.

She picked up her mobile phone to look at the time, noting a couple of missed calls on the log. She’d have to check them later. She hurried downstairs and looked at the video screen. There were five of them, all dressed in black, waiting by the gates to the house. ‘We are here to search your premises,’ said the lead officer, speaking into the intercom. It took a moment for Jia to recognise her. She cast her mind back: it was the officer whose reputation she had sullied in court a few years back, the one she had accused of having an affair with the wife of one of Nowak’s men. She was glad that Maria had been smart enough to leave her out in the cold.

‘Do you have a warrant to search the premises, Officer Swan?’ asked Jia.

‘We don’t need one,’ she replied. Her face was still, but her eyes flashed with anger. Jia could see that that day in court had changed her, and she had been nursing this grudge for quite some time, waiting for the day she would show Jia Khan who was boss. But this wasn’t that day.

‘I’m afraid I can’t let you in.’

‘You are legally obliged to allow us entry,’ said the officer.

‘You don’t have a warrant.’

‘Under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act of 1984, we are allowed to enter and search the premises after the arrest of someone linked to the property. We have made such an arrest.’

‘No one who lives here has been arrested.’

‘Benyamin Khan was arrested at 1.00A.M. this morning.’

Jia flinched. She had spoken without having all the facts. Her mind flipped back to the missed calls: it must have been from her contact at the station.

‘For what?’

The woman pressed her lips together into a thin smile. ‘Kerb-crawling,’ she said.

Jia turned to her sister with a questioning look. She shrugged.

‘I heard him come in about an hour ago. Someone must have bailed him out,’ said Maria.

‘Idris,’ Jia said, under her breath.

‘How long can we leave them out there?’

‘Go and get Ben. Bring him down.’

As Maria hurried up the stairs, Jia picked up her phone and flicked through her contacts for Mark Briscoe. He answered after the third ring; his voice sounded groggy. ‘What time is it?’ he said.

‘Mark, five of your officers are outside my house,’ she said.

‘Let me get back to you.’ He hung up. His instant response pleased her and she logged it in her mental ledger. Over the last couple of months her relationship with the police chief had gone from cold to cordial, and was warming towards friendship. While not entirely throwing caution to the wind, she had accepted the fact that it was in both their interests to cooperate given the deteriorating situation in the city. Jia’s connections gave her access to red carpets, VIP passes to shows, and private boxes at Premier League matches, which she was happy to