Page 19 of The Last Letter of Rachel Ellsworth

Chapter Sixteen

Sitting in the café with Henry and Mariah, Veronica was again filled with an acute sense of gratitude.

She was here, not at home in her apartment.

This morning, she’d ridden the tube for the first time.

She was visiting a neighborhood in London she’d never seen, and eating in a place she’d never heard of.

If she hadn’t divorced, this would never have happened.

They ordered a great quantity of food, so much it made Veronica feel strangely nervous. The table was filled with fluffy white rolls with butter and cream called bun maska ; eggs two ways, in omelets and in a tomato sauce; a chicken rice dish studded with spices; spiced chai; and lime soda.

“This smells fantastic,” Veronica said, bending in to inhale the steam coming off the dishes.

They all filled their plates, Henry and Mariah with copious helpings of everything, Veronica with bits and dabs, half a bun, a spoonful of eggs.

“Oh, come on,” Mariah said. “How can you write about food if you don’t dig in?”

“I’m not the writer here. I’m the companion.

” She tore a piece of the bun away and tasted it.

It was fluffy, fresh white bread, the raisins making it slightly sweet, with fat slathered between the layers.

She took her time savoring it, looking at the light crumb.

“You don’t need a lot of food to get the feeling of it. A little goes a long way.”

“Does it, though?” Mariah countered. She dove into the chicken and rice—was that a pulao ?

—and big bites of the bun. She wiped her fingers, then her lips, and shot Veronica a glance that was just this side of flirtatious.

“And I would love to have you do some writing if you wanted to. I mean, I can’t write it. That’s just not my skill set.”

It took a beat for Veronica to understand her meaning. Once she did, her heart squeezed—oh, yes! That would be so much fun!—but there was worry in it, too. Could she pull it off? It was a big project, and she hadn’t ever written anything like it.

But her thin finances were always at the top of her mind, and it would definitely be worth a try. “You’d have to pay me more.”

She shrugged. “I get that. We can figure it out.”

Veronica focused on taking a small bite of omelet, trying to hide the fire that suddenly burned in her chest. Excitement, possibility, but also pride in asking for more. “I still want to do the research I want to do, too.”

“Maybe we could trade that out somehow.”

Veronica raised her brows. “We can definitely talk about it. In the meantime, I’m taking the notes you wanted anyway.

” Which reminded her to type notes into her phone about the bun, about the dishes, all their names.

“What is that called again?” she asked, pointing to the eggs and tomatoes.

She looked at the menu she’d kept at her elbow, and typed tomato per eedu.

Henry said, “So good. All of it.” He looked around, assessing the room. “I need to get permission to shoot photos, maybe make an appointment to come back at some other time.”

Mariah nodded. “Whatever you need to do.”

“You’re supposed to be spearheading this,” he said, cocking an eyebrow. “It’s your project.”

She’d just taken a massive bite of the bun maska and covered her mouth with her napkin, using a thumbs-up to show him she heard. “God,” she said around the food to Veronica. “You’ve gotta try it.”

Veronica nodded, but now she was assessing the room, too.

If she wrote about it, what would bring it alive?

She’d talk about the people, the young couple by the window, he in a turban, she in a bright-yellow outfit, a long tunic over loose pants—what was that called?

She needed to find out. Several men sat by themselves, obviously businessmen out for lunch, some in short sleeves, others slightly more formal, with polished shoes.

A woman in a rose-printed hijab sat with a child who ate a sandwich almost bigger than his face.

She laughed when food fell out the other side.

“Is this connected to the places we’ll see in India?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” Mariah answered. “I’m guessing maybe. I wish my mom had talked about this part of her life, but I only found out she’d been to India after she died, when my aunt gave me some stuff she bought.”

“I wonder why she didn’t talk about it. Was she private?”

“God, no.” Mariah rolled her eyes. “Not private enough, if you ask me.”

It seemed like a clue. She’d only hidden her time in India. Maybe Rachel had been planning to excavate something from her past. “What did your aunt give you?”

“Just some clothes and jewelry. I think she wrote letters, but I didn’t want them.”

“Hmm.” Veronica perked up, but kept her external reaction small. “Letters might be helpful.”

Mariah closed her eyes. “I can’t look at her handwriting.” She pressed two fingers into her solar plexus. “It just ... I can’t.”

“Okay.” Veronica touched her arm, and Mariah allowed it. In a moment, she was steadier.

“I’m going to go ahead and shoot a few things now, and he said I can come back in the morning before they open, too. Better light. His mom is the owner, and he thinks she’d love to talk about the café for a book. She’s really proud of it.”

“Can we interview her?” Veronica asked, a fluttery mix of nerves and anticipation mingling in her body.

“That would be the idea. He said she’s just run an errand and will be back shortly.”

Mariah excused herself to go to the ladies’ room, limping dramatically enough that Veronica frowned. “Maybe the stairs to the train are too hard for her.”

“Agreed. We’ll head back.”

A woman in her fifties came out of the kitchen, tying a red apron around her short, curvy body.

She had thick, dark hair cut short and wore a single gold bracelet.

“Hello,” she said, standing beside Henry’s chair.

“I’m Hufriya Mistry. You wanted to talk to me?

” Unlike her son, her accent rolled with the cadence of India.

Henry spread a hand toward Veronica, who gulped and said, “We’re working on a book about café culture, and one aspect is Parsi cafés. It’s fascinating that you opened your business here. There are not very many Parsi establishments outside of India, are there?”

“Not many at all! I’m surprised Americans even know about them. What brought you here?”

“It’s kind of a treasure hunt,” Veronica said, improvising. “I think Mariah might be able to say more. Here she is.”

The woman watched Mariah limp toward them. Her brows pulled down in a frown as Mariah sat down.

Veronica saw the thunderous expression and felt suddenly protective of Mariah, wondering if she should stand between them or—

The woman spat out, “Is your mother Rachel Ellsworth?”

Stunned, Mariah stared. “Yes. How did you know that? Do you know her?”

The woman tsked loudly and stepped back, waving her hand. “Get out of my restaurant.”

“But we—”

“I will never speak to you. Leave now.”

Veronica stood up instinctively, using her body to shield Mariah. “We’ll go. Don’t worry. We just have to—”

“Go, now!” the woman shouted. Her hands were trembling as she pointed, and it seemed like fury, but also pain.

They gathered up their things and got out, everyone staring. Veronica’s hands shook with an emotion she couldn’t quite identify—the heat of protectiveness, the tangle of embarrassment, the wish to strike back.

In the alley outside, Veronica said, “Wow, what was that about?”

Mariah’s face had drained of all color. She dropped her cane to limp hurriedly over to vomit in a nearby trash bin. Henry rushed toward her, taking her coat, which he threw over his shoulder as he held her shoulders. “Get her cane,” he barked to Veronica.

Veronica picked up the cane, holding the round of the carved lion’s head in her palm.

She reached into her backpack and pulled out a bottle of water, holding it out when Mariah straightened, the back of her hand to her mouth.

Strands of pale hair came loose from her braid and stuck to her cheek, illuminating the faint scar that pulled her mouth up so very slightly.

She trembled visibly. Henry helped her into her jacket, and she leaned on him to drink the water.

What was going on here? Veronica thought. What had happened when Rachel went to India? “We’re going to need some more information, I think.”

Henry nodded grimly.

A man of about fifty, tidy, with short hair, had followed them out. “Is she all right, ma’am?”

Veronica frowned. “She’ll be all right, I think.”

“I’m sorry about that. My wife has strong opinions.”

“Why is she so furious?”

“That I do not know.” He clasped his hands in front of him. “I thought you might.”

Henry said, “She must have known Rachel Ellsworth. Is that name familiar to you?”

“The food writer, yes? Her book on vegetables is a classic.”

Mariah shivered. “I need to go home.”

Henry pulled a card from his front pocket. “If you think she might come around, give me a call. We’ll be in London for a week or so.”

Accepting the card, the man tilted his head side to side. “I doubt that will happen, sir, but I will remember.”

Mariah pressed her hand over her mouth.

“Let’s take a cab,” Veronica said.

Back at the hotel, Veronica walked Mariah to bed, helping her undress to her panties and a T-shirt. It was the first time she’d seen the scarred leg. The flesh held divots and lines and irregular fat pockets. “Ugly, isn’t it?” Mariah said, pulling her bra off through the sleeves of her T-shirt.

“Looks painful. It must have been quite a crash.”

Mariah was quiet for a moment, as if remembering. “You don’t know,” she said. “I just thought you were being nice, not talking about it.”

Veronica pulled the covers back, smoothed the pillows, and helped the young woman settle. Her color was still pale green. “We don’t have to go through it right now.”

“I don’t want to talk about it, ever,” she said, closing her eyes. “Google me. It’ll come up. Honestly, dude, it’s weird that you didn’t. What if I’d been lying about who I was?”

“My kids wanted to run a background check,” she said with a smile, and ran a smoothing palm over the duvet. “Curtains open or closed?”

“Open, please. I want to see the sky.” Her voice was thin. “And will you get my meds and bring them over? The pain meds.”

Veronica looked through the bottles and found a tranquilizer and a pain reliever. “These?”

“Yep.” Mariah popped two into her mouth and drank a long swallow of water. “Google,” she said again. “But I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Okay.” Veronica paused. “I also think I’d like to ask your aunt about the letters. You don’t have to read them, but if I’m going to write about this journey, I need to know more about what happened.”

“Makes sense.” She picked up her phone, scrolled. “I sent you her contact info. Will you turn off the lights on your way out?”

Veronica did as she was asked, her mind whirling. She had some serious digging to do on Rachel’s past.