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Jaishree Misra
A Scandalous Secret
Copyright
This novel is entirely a work of fiction.
The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
AVON
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A SCANDALOUS SECRET. Copyright © Jaishree Misra 2011. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Jaishree Misra asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Source ISBN: 9781847561862
Ebook Edition © APRIL 2011 ISBN: 9780007443208
Version: 2018-07-19
For AM
Contents
Copyright
Chapter One
Neha stood at the door to her spacious living room…
Chapter Two
Sonya lay under her duvet and looked around the bedroom…
Chapter Three
By midnight, Neha was so exhausted by her hostess duties…
Chapter Four
The eighteenth birthday party was to be held in the…
Chapter Five
Sharat walked towards the breakfast room, humming a jaunty tune.
Chapter Six
Waking up the day after her party, Sonya studiously avoided…
Chapter Seven
On the evening after her dinner party, Neha mustered the…
Chapter Eight
In the kitchen of the Shaw household, Laura gave her…
Chapter Nine
It was only when she was two hundred kilometres outside…
Chapter Ten
Sonya glowered at Tim from her cross-legged perch on the…
Chapter Eleven
When the floor was icy cold, and Neha’s body had…
Chapter Twelve
Laura watched Sonya throw a handful of cotton bras into…
Chapter Thirteen
Neha sat up, unsure of how many hours had passed…
Chapter Fourteen
Sonya looked down at the massive city that her plane…
Chapter Fifteen
At Delhi’s domestic terminal, Sharat walked past baggage collection and…
Chapter Sixteen
Sonya managed to hold on until they had exited the…
Chapter Seventeen
The therapist indicated that the massage had ended by gently…
Chapter Eighteen
By the time Sonya and Estella had made their way…
Chapter Nineteen
By her third day in Ananda, Neha felt as though…
Chapter Twenty
Later that evening, back in her room at Ananda, Neha…
Chapter Twenty-One
It was 1992, my eighteenth birthday party – the last…
Chapter Twenty-Two
Neha’s voice hung in the air as she finally looked…
Chapter Twenty-Three
Sonya looked up at the towering Qutb Minar, the tip…
Chapter Twenty-Four
Neha watched the landscape change as the car she was…
Chapter Twenty-Five
After Keshav had deposited Sonya and Estella back at the…
Chapter Twenty-Six
Neha replaced the phone receiver with trembling hands. Her heart…
Chapter Twenty-Seven
There were no more tears from Sonya that afternoon, but…
Chapter Twenty-Eight
After her ghastly meeting with Sonya in Lodhi Gardens, Neha…
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Sonya was starting to get uncomfortable lying on the lumpy…
Chapter Thirty
