Chapter 6

I set the pages aside. Tamarind and Miles watched for my reaction.

I felt like I’d entered the Twilight Zone as soon as I stepped into the restaurant that evening. I was already feeling out of sorts because Raj had recently told us he was thinking of retiring soon, and the restaurant had become like a second home to me. I wished Lane hadn’t canceled on me that night. It would be another day before I could tell him about all this. And I didn’t have a day to make a decision.

“You need sustenance,” Tamarind said, pushing the curry in front of me.

Raj caught my eye and tapped his watch.

Five minutes until our next set. There was time for me to make a phone call.

“Shut. Up.” Tamarind said as I ignored the curry and tapped a number into my phone. “So you’re in?”

“Was there ever a question?” I stood up.

“Touché.”

I maneuvered my way through a group of people waiting to be seated and stepped outside. The light fog that so often fills the Inner Sunset neighborhood had descended, and though it wasn’t raining, I felt light droplets of mist on my face. I called the number Rick Coronado had left. The phone rang three times. I pulled the phone away from my ear. The screen’s clock assured me it was three minutes before eight. Over an hour before the deadline.

I pressed my ear back to the phone. Another ring sounded. Where was he?

After the fifth ring, a click sounded. My breath caught. A voicemail message kicked in. This is Rick. Followed by a beep.

“Hi, this is Jaya. I received the package you sent me. I’m honored you thought of me.” And I had no idea what else to say. “It’s an intriguing premise. I don’t know how I can help you, but I hope you keep writing the book. I’ll be up for several more hours if you want to call me back.”

As I hung up, I became aware of laughter filling the sidewalk and the hum of cars in the street. Two giggling young couples stepped out of the Japanese restaurant two doors down. An antsy driver honked her horn at the electric car in front of hers as soon as the light at the corner changed to green. Half a dozen pedestrians filled the crosswalk at the busy intersection, including two who barely looked up from their cell phones. Life carried on as usual.

I glanced down at my phone. One minute before eight.

Back inside, Tamarind raised her eyebrows at me. I shook my head and proceeded to the stage. I took one last look at my phone before putting it away for an hour—and froze. Rick had texted me back.

I’m relieved you’ve accepted. More to follow soon.

I texted back, Can you tell me more? And added my home address and personal email, so he wouldn’t have to go through Miles to reach me.

Tamarind was at my side five seconds later. “What? What is it? Are you having a stroke? Are you good about wearing compression socks on all those long flights you take? I know they’re not sexy, but I read how they totally help with blood clots—”

“Why didn’t he answer the phone?” As I showed the text to Tamarind, a terrible suspicion came to mind. I swore. “How do I know it’s really him?”

In spite of the different set-up for Gabriela, the style was Rick Coronado’s. My gut instinct told me it was him, but the rational part of my brain still wondered if this was a joke. I wished I hadn’t just given out my home address. Maybe I could call his publisher to confirm. Though at eight o’clock in the evening in California, I doubted anyone in New York would answer the phone. That would have to wait until the next day.

“You think some Misery action is going on?” Tamarind asked.

That was something I hadn’t considered. Now I really wished I hadn’t just given out my address. “You think someone is holding him captive, so they can’t risk him talking on the phone?”

“You’re the one who suggested it.”

I scowled at Tamarind. “I was thinking it might not be him at all. Maybe an unpublished writer who wants to get attention, or someone who doesn’t like me and wants to get back at me.”

“You’re right.” Tamarind pursed her purple lips. “That’s more likely. What? You know it’s true. There are a lot of people who aren’t happy you’ve foiled their plans. But you know what they say. If you’re not making some people love you and some people hate you, you’re doing something wrong with your life.”

  

The rumbles of my empty stomach were rivaling the volume of my drums by the time Sanjay and I finished our second set an hour later. Miles and Tamarind had left after slipping a note onto the stage to make sure I’d call her if I heard more from Rick. I hadn’t.

As I packed my drums into their cushioned black case, the whiff of extra spicy curry hit my nostrils. Sanjay began coughing, which told me it wasn’t my imagination. A second later, Juan appeared with a steaming bowl.

“You want to try my latest,” he said, “or do you want something off the menu with less spice?”

“Never.” I hopped down from the stage and took a bite. The curry was off-the-charts spicy. Just the way I liked it.

Sanjay coughed harder as he snapped his sitar case shut. “You two are crazy. See you tomorrow. I’m off to get a burger like a proper human.”

Juan chuckled and shook his head as we watched Sanjay make a hasty exit. “I’d be offended if I didn’t know he’s the one who’s missing out.”

“You’ve outdone yourself this time.” I kissed the head chef’s cheek.

“Careful,” he said, “or the spice on your lips will burn a hole through my cheek.”

“You’re the one who made it.”

“Yeah, but I can’t actually eat it. This batch is just for you. And my grandma. I’m saving some of it to bring her. We’ll see which of you is tougher.” He grinned before stepping back into the kitchen to help his team clean up. He didn’t have to at this stage of his career, but he always pitched in.

The kitchen had closed at nine, and most of the diners cleared out as soon as we finished our set. A few tables remained with people finishing their dinners or enjoying tea or dessert. But nobody was paying any attention to me.

I’d slipped the letter and manuscript pages from Rick Coronado into my messenger bag, and I pulled them out in the empty break room. I looked again at the sketch of a cobra on the first typed page—which I now thought of as a serpent. Was this the Serpent King statue the murdered Luc’s mother had hired Gabriela Glass to find?

I did a quick internet search, which yielded unsurprising results. The Serpent King statue was a product of his imagination, as were the Delacroix family and Tristan Rubens. But the Serpent King idea was based on real historical carvings. Serpents, or naga in Sanskrit, are revered in India, acting as a protector in many circumstances, including watching over Buddha and being guardians of treasure.

A treasure and a woman in need of help were common themes in the Gabriela Glass novels, but the set-up with Gabriela asked to solve a murder supposedly committed by a ghost was different from his earlier thrillers. This was more like a Gothic ghost story than anything he’d written before. His experience on the secret research trip he’d taken seven years ago was traumatic enough to have caused him to stop writing, so it wasn’t surprising it would impact the themes explored in his new book. But a ghost?

Strange facts surrounded Rick Coronado’s six-week disappearance. He packed a bag and said he’d be traveling to research his next novel, the subject of which he kept close to his chest. This in itself wasn’t unusual. An immersive writer, he was known for his thorough attention to detail.

Seven years ago, he left his oversize mastiff, Clifford, with his business manager brother Vincent, walked down the road with his rucksack—and wasn’t seen again for six weeks.

Six weeks and a day later, he was found by two Swiss hikers in a remote region of Thailand, on an obscure trail that hardly any Westerners knew about. A full beard covered his face, and he was fifteen pounds thinner than when he’d left. When the hikers discovered him, he was unconscious and barely breathing. When he woke up in a hospital in Bangkok, he said he couldn’t remember anything. Even his doctors questioned this account, but nobody had ever gotten the story out of him.

What had happened during those missing weeks? Did it involve family ghosts, murder, and a thief who stole the Serpent King?