Willy and Sushmita were having their tea when I returned to the bungalow.

“You’ve been gone a long time,” she said. I saw the concern on her face, even as she tried to disguise it.

“Exploring,” I said.

She cocked her head. “Exploring? Where?”

“Around. I visited the ashram.”

“Oh, Danny, darling,” she said. “You didn’t do something mad, did you? Buy robes and sign up for their meditation classes?”

“No. Excuse me. I’ve got a headache. Maybe I ate something bad. I’m going to lie down.”

“Stick your fingers down your throat, Danny Boy,” called Willy as I took my leave. “You’ll feel relieved, trust me.”

In my room, I tried to put the pieces of my meeting with Harlan, Ranjit, and Birgit into some kind of order I might understand. First, I’d been a complete dupe. Granted, I was new to India, but this went beyond mere naïveté. I’d exposed myself to ridicule and perhaps worse, by carrying on the least secretive affair in the history of lovers. Second, Ranjit, who was the lead investigator on the case, and Harlan, who was working closely with him in an advisory role, wanted my help in bringing down Willy. I hadn’t even had a moment to consider their request, and I was too confused now to give it serious thought.

Finally, third, I was crazy for a woman who’d welcomed into her life—and two of her expensive homes—a man who would falsify, corrupt, and steal to make a dishonest buck. For, make no mistake, I blamed Sushmita as well. It was one thing to fall in love with an urbane, rich man from the Continent. But it was quite another to prop up his felonious, immoral business dealings in her heritage homes. She had to know what he was up to. Hadn’t she told me herself the day before that we could never survive on my salary? Was that all that mattered to her? Money? She owned beautiful properties in Bombay, Lonavala, and Poona. Surely, she could sell one of them, or get a job. She’d studied at Cambridge, hadn’t she?

These were the thoughts torturing me as I lay down on the bed, shades drawn and ceiling fan buzzing, to close my eyes and decide a course of action. Harlan had asked me to help. And Ranjit and Birgit had made compelling cases against my friend Willy. The friend I realized I didn’t know.