8 months back......
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March in Mumbai was always unpredictable, but once every decade or so it was downright sadistic, fluctuating wildly between tantalising promises of spring and the last angry death throes of stubborn Summer that had no intention of going.
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Mumbai was out of force cherishing the temporary solution that the state was actually habitable to.
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Inspector Nakuul Shetty far stretched out on chair on his front porch, newspaper in one hand, a mug of coffee in the other. He hadn't forgotten about last week's drama in his office about a petty robbery case, sipping his coffee he watched, as the neighbourhood engaged in all manner of personal torture, huffing and puffing and sweating furiously against the hot climate.
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He was on a second cup of coffee and almost to the sports section when a Volvo station wagon pulled into the driveway. Viraj Yadav hopped out with his enormous cooler and a bag of chips ,his belly fitted the generous limits of Tommy Bahama shirt and a beefy legs poked out from a terrible pair of plain Bermuda shorts.
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"Hey Nakuul" he jumped of onto the porch and dropped the cooler. "I come bearing gifts of animal flesh and fermented grains with chips."
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Nakuul lifted a dark brown" At 8 o'clock in the morning? Tell me this means Anjali finally kicked your sorry ass out so I can call her and propose."
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"You should be so lucky. This is charity. Anjali folks took her and the kids to some craft thing at the mall so I had a free Sunday thought I could liven up your so called life."
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Shetty got up and looked into the cooler. "What's the craft thing?"
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"You know this places with all types of booths with people make houses out of old grocery bags and stuff like that"
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Shetty pulled out a package of sickly looking plump grey white sausages, "What are these things that look like your legs?"
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"Those are uncooked brats imported all the way from Nepal you food pygmy. Where's your grill?"
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Nakuul gestured towards a rusty old Weber in the corner of the porch.
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Viraj nudged it with his foot and it collapsed. "We are going to need a duct tape."
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Nakuul shifted a suspicious looking dark Orange break of cheese,"12 year Cheddar? Is that legal?"
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Viraj grinned. " That stuff will make you weep with joy I promise. Got it at great little cheese house in Bangalore somebody forgot about a wheel in the cellar and found it 12 years later covered in about of foot of mold. Nirvana my friend. Pure Nirvana. It's amazing what a cow and some bacteria can do."
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Nakuul sniffed it and cringed." Oh yeah everytime I see a cow I think, Heyy, wouldn't it be great to get some bacteria and really do something with this thing, And why do you have a file folder in the cooler?"
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"It's a cold case."
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"Very funny!"
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Nakuul sat down on the chair and open the folder "Victim is sort of a plumber right."
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"That's the one. Shot 7 times 3 of them in places I don't even want to think about."
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"Plumbers charge too much."
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"Tell me about it, but other than that this guy was damn near a candidate for Sainthood. He made alive out of warlife, migrated to India ,started business ,married ,had three kids Deacon of church, about to be minority leader of the political party and then bled to death on bathroom floor after someone used him for target practice."
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"Suspects?"
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"Hell no. According to the reports in there everybody loved him. Case dried up in about 2 seconds."
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Nakuul grunted and tossed the folder on the floor," Most guys with the free Sunday would probably find something else to do like sit on a beach or Lake or count bikinis or watch porn."
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"Yeah, Well I am a crime fighter, I have a higher purpose."
Then ran a hand through his closely cropped hair reconsidering.
"Besides it's probably too early for porn."
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Before the call, Nakul had finally finished duct taping the legs back on his grill. Viraj had gone inside to unload the cooler and when he came back out to the porch he was beaming.
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"Hey, want to see a body?"
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Nakul sat back on his heels and frowned "You found a body in my kitchen?"
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"Nah silly, phone rang when I was in there so I picked up got an honest to God homicide call. It's a hotel. The maid found the famous singer Vivaan Singh on the stairs. Truly gruesome they are saying, beheaded."
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Nakuul looked wistfully at the grill and sighed. "What happened to the on-duty guys who were supposed to be taking this? It's gonna be a field day for media"
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"Aditya and Rohit, just what I wanted to know. They got at the train yard over in Thane, found some poor bastard tied to the tracks."
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Nakuul winced.
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"Nah, Don't worry, the train never hit him."
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"So, He Okay?"
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"Nope, He's dead."
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Nakul looked at him expectantly
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"Don't look at me that's all I got."
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He jumped when his shirt pocket spit out an irritating ringtone.
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"What is that?"
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Viraj pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and stamped the screen viciously on the patterns half the size of his chubby fingers.
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"Dammit ,Sania--- kids programming in all this weird things cause she knows I got no clue on how to change it"
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Nakuul grinned," That's funny.'
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The phone beeps again.
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"Fourteen year olds are funny only when they belong to someone else, Shit, I'm going to invent one of these things with big fat buttons and make a billions out of it"
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" This is Inspector Yadav."
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Nakuul stood and brushed off the rust of his hands, listened to Viraj grunt onto the phone for a few seconds then went inside to lock up. By the time he got back out to the porch Viraj had retrieved his gun from the car and was looking at the belt that almost held up his Bermuda shorts he looked like an armed and dangerous tourist.
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"I don't suppose you have got a pair of pants that would fit me?"
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Nakuul just smiled at him.
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"Aww, Shut up! that was Rajan on the phone. He and Sam just got called for a suspected homicide. "Suspected" meaning someone did a little interior design with a few gallons of blood but there's no body and guess what?"
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"He want us to take it."
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"Nah, dispatch told him that we were on the hotel thing that's why he called. The bloody house is just a few blocks over."
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Nakuul frowned "That's a very pretty decent neighborhood."
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"Right not exactly a killing field. And all of a sudden we have got two possibles in one day."
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"The guy who lives in that house is- or was also a influencer which means famous just like our guy."
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Nakuul thought about it for a minute. "He's thinking cluster? What that some psycho's running around killing rich famous people?"
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Viraj shrugged. "He was just giving a heads up thought we would keep in touch just in case something clicks!"
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Nakuul sighed looked longingly at the grill.
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"So we are back in business."
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"Big time" Viraj paused for moment.
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"You ever think there's something wrong with a job where you only have something to do if someone gets murdered??
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"EVERY DAY my friend."
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