house and led the way to the office studio. She snatched the bustling canvas off the easel and hid it away with the paints and palettes. Her previous client might as well have been draped in a toga, he looked so Roman. She pointed to the chair and sank into her own behind the antique desk. She’d get them coffee and clean up while her new client was writing.
“Do you know much about what this involves? Have you ever been to a Vision Painter before?”
The woman shook her head. Kiran dragged her eyes away from the flames curling around the straight lines of jaw and neck. It was harder to look into those eyes so she stared at the trees that peeked in through the windows peering back at her around the woman’s silhouette, their leaves comparing and admiring as Kiran had done.
“Okay. I’ll explain the process and the rules and if you’re comfortable to do it, we can start whenever you’re ready.”
The woman nodded.
“I need you to think about what you want in your life. Try to be as exact as possible. You can write this vision out in words, or draw it if you want. I can only paint what you describe. I’m not allowed to add or take away anything. What I paint will materialize in the timeframe you specify. There is no monetary fee.”
Kiran smiled at the look of surprise on the woman’s face.
“The payment, if you can call it that, comes later. When what I paint materializes for you, you can paint something onto your canvas for me. Or if you don’t have paints, just use a pen or pencil and draw it in.”
Kiran broke a rule. She couldn’t help it; she had to see more of this woman.
She said, “You can come in over the next few weeks and perfect your vision if you want. What’s your name, by the way?”
“Ashley.”
“Okay, Ashley. I’ll give you a form now and I’ll go and get us something to drink.”
She handed Ashley a form and went to the door. She couldn’t do it. She turned back and she could feel the heat of red in her cheeks.
“Actually, Ashley, we’re only allowed one session. It can be as long as you like but once you give me the completed form and leave, that’s it as far as that visualization is concerned.”
Kiran was glad blushes weren’t obvious on her brown skin, that her cheeks just turned a shade darker. As Ashley quirked an eyebrow, Kiran felt like sinking through the wooden floor, of blending into the pools of blue and gold in the silk rug. Again, a crimson tinged twitch of those lips. Kiran hurried to the kitchen. Ashley was getting coffee; that was all Kiran could manage and she was not waiting around to ask what the woman wanted to drink.
She cleaned herself up but didn’t put on any makeup. That would be too obvious. Professional, she reminded herself. Still capitalized. She wandered back into the office with their coffees and settled down to wait and drown in looking; she hoped this client would take the whole day and night and maybe the next morning too. After which, Kiran had her shift at the restaurant. Obviously none of her clients had figured out how to paint in ‘mortgage debt forgiveness’ for her either.
Ashley seemed to be struggling. Writing down words then rubbing the pen back over them, obscuring the squiggles. She looked up at Kiran every few minutes and the red was obvious on her cheeks.
Kiran said in a gentle voice, “I won’t judge anything you ask for. No one else will see the form.”
Ashley went redder. “It’s not that. Well, it is a bit. I thought I had a clear idea when I came in and now it is… well… it isn’t as clear at all now.”
Kiran got the feeling this woman wasn’t used to being confused. Then Ashley took in a deep breath and seemed to make up her mind. She stood up and placed the form on the desk.
“I’m sorry to have taken up your time for nothing.”
Kiran had had a few clients that backed out at the last moment but she hadn’t expected this one to stall. Ashley gathered herself and was gone within minutes, taking the colours with her, leaving grey.
Kiran picked up the form and examined it but there were just obscured scrawls on the paper.
Extract of HEART STOPPER
Book Description
Dr. PRIYA JOSEPH is an Irish-Indian coder working at a new pacemaker clinic in Galway, a small city on the west coast of Ireland that is a research and manufacturing hub within the multi-billion-dollar medical devices industry. Priya’s life is already off the rails; in fact, the train has disappeared screaming into a ravine when, after a night out that she does not remember apart from a vague memory of being with a mysterious woman, she wakes up in an unfamiliar apartment and finds the dead body of her boss, American cardiologist and inventor, Dr Daniel Fairer III.
Priya is dragged by his family into an investigation of Daniel’s death. As they uncover secrets about the groundbreaking pacemaker technology that Daniel and his research partners developed and the wireless controllers that communicate with the implanted pacemakers, their investigation threatens a multi-million dollar enterprise. Priya learns that she has unwittingly been involved in research that could have consequences far beyond the small city where she has been trying to hide from her life. She discovers that her past is not what she thought it was and now that she actually wants a future, she may not survive long enough as she is being pursued her and her pursuers will do whatever it takes to complete their mission but time is running out. And they have a problem. Which they need Priya to solve.
PROLOGUE
Fairer Hall, New York
June 1974
Daniel Fairer the Third (or Three as his mother called him in her rare moments of levity regarding matters of the family) crouched behind the bulk of the couch in his grandfather’s study. He was nine years old. The sound of his mother crying cut through him bringing out tears of his own. He strained to hear her as she spoke, her voice filtered through the dust-laden sunlight that streaked its lines from the arched windows to the wooden floor. He could see the rocking horse his grandfather had carved for him hugging the paneled wall.
“You know this isn’t fair, he’s my son. Just because you didn’t have a son, that doesn’t give you the right to take mine from me.”
“I’m not forcing you to do anything.” His grandfather’s voice was only marginally louder than his mother’s was but the words carried farther and clearer.
“But you’re leaving me no choice!”
“You always have a choice. You can walk out of here with Daniel and try to make it on your own. It was your choice to get pregnant out of wedlock, your choice to have him. Your choice not to marry his father. And now you’re repeating your mistakes.”
“If it was all that bad why do you want him all to yourself now? Why can’t you help me for once and just let me take him with me?”
“He is still my flesh and blood; he will do what you would not. I will make sure of that. Catherine, these are your decisions. You can portray me as a villain all you want but I am doing, as always, what is right for this family. If you’re going to insist on leaving, on following these, these...barbaric people…”
“Father! They are not barbaric. I love Leo and he feels the same. He’s going to be really famous one day, as a true healer.”
“Those are your choices, Catherine, you take Daniel with you and bring him up in that pack of heathens, no money, no inheritance, no medical education, no chance to be what he is destined to be; or you leave him with me and he will have everything he could possibly need and he will be a Fairer.”
“I can’t leave him and you shouldn’t be punishing him for this.”
“Then take him, it is not my decision to punish him, it is yours.”
Daniel heard his mother’s footsteps walk past to the door of the study and then echo through the grand hallway.
“Daniel!” Her voice was shaky but determined.
Daniel crept out from behind the couch and walked over to his grandfather who was sitting at the antique desk, head in his hands, eyes closed. He touched his grandfather on the shoulder and the man raised his head to look at him.
“So, my
boy, you were here the whole time, were you? What did I tell you about the nasty things that happen to little boys who eavesdrop?”
“Sorry, Sir.”
“Then you heard your mother. She has gone to find you. You had better get packed.”
“I’m not going to go with her, Sir.” Daniel rushed on when he saw his grandfather’s eyebrows rise slightly. “I want to stay here. You said I’m a Fairer, I’m Daniel Fairer the Third and I’m going to be a world famous cardiologist, just like you.” His back was straight but his lower lip was trembling. “Why can’t Mother stay?”
“Daniel, it is not my decision. She will be leaving today and if you don’t go with her you probably won’t see her for a very long time.”
“But if I go with her I’ll be a barbari like you said...”
His mother’s voice was sharp as she spoke from the door to the study. “Daniel! I’ve been looking everywhere for you. Go and pack your things, we’re leaving.”
“I’m not going Mother, I’m staying here with Grandfather.” He glanced at his grandfather and then raising his chin he turned to face her. “Why don’t you stay, please?”
His mother’s shocked face made him feel nauseous and the tears started running down his face freely.
“I have to go, and you’re coming with me, you’ll see, you’ll be happier.”
“No,