“A peace offering,” he said, holding up the brown paper bag. “Aji’s ladoos. Besan.” Her favorite.

She looked over her shoulder at the homeless man dozing under the umbrella, then at the ladoos his grandmother made better than anyone else in the world. He hated that she was trying to figure out what his angle was. But she took them.

“I’ve missed these.” As soon as it slipped out, she looked like she wanted to take the words back. “You just don’t want to eat all that ghee and sugar and you don’t know how to tell Aji.”

“You got me.” It was impossible to get his grandmother to stop feeding him high-sugar, high-fat foods. “This body takes work.”

Her eye roll made the world perfect and familiar again. “Your loss. What are you doing in the city?”

“I’m here to see Hari.”

Of course she stiffened.

“Can’t you at least hear me out? I thought we could talk about things.” They’d talked for hours about her work when he’d lived in Sripore and she’d visited his aunt there.

Part of him waited for her to lose her temper. But she seemed oddly vulnerable as they stood there in the drizzle with his grandmother’s ladoos clutched to her chest. “We can. But I’ve worked really hard for this, Vansh.”

There were shadows under her exhausted eyes. There always had been. He, like the rest of the world, tended to miss them under all the glamour, because Naina Kohli never let anyone see her like this, in a faded oversized sweatshirt with frayed edges.

I work hard too, he wanted to say. “I know,” he said instead. “I would never let any harm come to your work. We can do both, right?”

Her eyes took him in as incisively as they always had, but there was a brightening of surprise there too. Something new. “Let’s talk about it after Mehta’s party,” she said, and without inviting him up, she walked away, fuzzy boots splashing muddy water around those endless legs.

HARI LOOKED LIKE he hadn’t moved in twenty-four hours. Hari, in fact, looked like he hadn’t blinked since Vansh had left him rolled up in a ball on his bed, wide awake. Vansh threw the drapes open and sunshine streamed into the room at the Embassy Suites.

“Have you eaten anything?”

Hari pulled his knees tighter into himself and shook his head. “Did you tell Yash and Nisha?”

“I told you I wouldn’t tell them. I don’t break my word. You have to trust me. I’m not going to let anything bad happen to you.”

Before Hari could say you’re so nice again, Vansh patted his leg. “Why don’t you get out of bed and take a shower and let’s go out and get some food. I have some ideas I want to discuss with you.”