Page 5 of Best Kept Secret

Once Roxy and Pari went out, Beau seemed to relax, as if he could now speak more freely. Pari was two and a half, so it wasn't like she could understand half the stuff we talked about.

"I'm going to need to do a paternity test," he stated.

"Asha was certain she's yours."And my sister didn't sleep around.

"I'm pretty sure as well, but to be able to claim custody, I need to show parentage."

I felt foolish. Of course, he did.

"How old are you now, Mira?"

I licked my lips. "I turned twenty-two…last week."

He nodded somberly. "And you've become an impromptu mommy and were Asha's only caregiver?"

"Something like that."

"I thought you were planning to go to culinary school?"

He remembered, and I was flattered. "I got into CIA, but I had to defer. Asha was bedridden, and after she had the baby…well, I couldn't go."

Going to the Culinary Institute of America had been my dream, but life sometimes gets in the way, and you have tochange your dreams. I had for Pari and didn't regret it at all, except for wishing I had that associate's degree in my pocket so I could earn a good living and take care of my niece.

"You put your life on hold to take care of my daughter, Mira. I'm grateful."

I felt everything inside me tighten. Was he going to send me away? Now that he had his daughter, he didn't need me. He had a lot of money. He could hire an army of nannies. I felt fear course through me.

"I'm her guardian. Asha wanted me to be her…I'm her person." I was breathing hard and was pretty sure I was about to hyperventilate any second now.

"Hey, hey, calm down." Beau slid an arm around me. "YouarePari's parent in all the ways that matter, darlin', and no one's goin' to change that. Okay?"

I felt his lips brush against the side of my head, and that was the last straw.

I had been holding on so tightly to everything, to Pari, to keep her safe and away from my parents. I'd had to take care of Asha and all the things you had to do when someone died. I hadn't breathed properly in the past month since I was kicked out of Asha's house, and her accounts were frozen, so I couldn't access them any longer. I'd been struggling to make ends meet, and then they stopped meeting at all. Then, my parents' smarmy Indian lawyer came to tell me that they'd take Pari away. It had been the last straw.

Everything just came crashing down after that.

The stress of it all suddenly became unbearable, like a dam bursting. A pressure built inside me, and my vision blurred as tears welled up in my eyes. I gasped for air, but I felt like there wasn't enough oxygen in the room. My hands shook uncontrollably, and before I knew it, I was sobbing—loud, ragged cries I couldn't hold back, even if I tried. The world spun,and all the pain, fear, and exhaustion I'd buried for so long came rushing out, overwhelming me. I felt like I was unraveling, falling apart, piece by piece, and there was nothing left to hold onto…nothing except Beau.

Chapter 3

Beau

Iheld Mira as she wept.

She was a kid, just twenty-two, and she'd been carrying way too many burdens. I didn't understand her and Asha's relationship with their parents, but I knew from Asha, the brief time we'd dated, that she stayed away from the Indian community. She'd been working as a marketing manager at a software company, and we met at a tech conference in Atlanta. We'd hung out a few times and hooked up whenever I was in Atlanta. Asha was cool. Laid back.Notlooking for a relationship. I could understand why she thought I wouldn't want or care for a child—after all, I'd been pretty explicit about how I conductedmy affairs. I believed in sex and in having fun. I wasn't going to get married and settle down. Thankfully, my brother had married the love of his life, and my mother could nag them about having children and steer clear of me.

In any case, I couldn't take it up with a dead woman as to why she'd hidden my child from me. Mira, obviously, was under the misconception that I'd signed my parental rights away. She didn't know me, hell, nor had Asha, so it made sense that she believed her sister.

Still, a part of me was enraged that I hadn't known about Pari's existence for nearly three years. I watched her out in the garden with Roxy, and a pang went through me. I didn't know my child, and I had to tamp down the desire to blame the woman in my arms.

Regardless of my latent annoyance, Mira curled into me felt right. She was nearly twelve years younger than me, and every protective instinct of mine was wide awake, and so was, unfortunately, my dick. Apparently, my libido had zero discretion. Of all the women I could and had fucked, Mira Sen was the one that wasforbidden. There was something unseemly about sleeping with sisters.

I nuzzled Mira's hair and took a deep breath. She smelled of sandalwood. After spending any time at all in that car of hers and wearing what looked like clean but old clothes, she didn't look like someone I would be attracted to, but I was.

After a while, Mira raised her head, her eyes red and blotchy, her thin face looking even more haggard. She was carrying the load of the world on her slim shoulders.

"You okay, darlin'?"

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