Diamonds and Stones

"She thought she'd already seen the worst, but then her captor's gritty eyes set upon her, a leer that stalled her senses. In that moment, she understood—she was the target."

At 24, Meera is exactly the girl her parents wanted her to be: subtle, upright and compliant. She abandoned her dream of becoming a pilot at the first whiff of disapproval from her family, accepting the bland office job her father secured for her at a friend's company.

When she visits the company's offshore plant in Saharanpur with a team of coworkers, she is desperate to return to Delhi—the factory is dull, dusty and the air is thick with the smell of chemicals. On the trip back to Delhi late that evening, the team becomes a victim of a violent highway robbery.

Next morning, the police find everyone at the crime scene except Meera. The news of the attack also reaches the media. In the investigation that follows, Meera's family blames her boss for their daughter's disappearance.

How does one girl's abduction ripple through the lives of an entire community? What happened to Meera? Are her captors more than they seem?

Navreet Sran is a novelist and wanderer. In spite of a dread for numbers, Navreet completed her bachelor’s degree in accounting from GNDU, India. Thereafter, she moved to Toronto to pursue marketing from Humber College and then went on to study event marketing at Seneca College. Currently, she is Event Coordinator for GDG Cloud Toronto, a networking group sponsored by Google. She speaks regularly at various Canadian fora on issues related to working women and on career challenges faced by South Asian women. Her favorite pastimes are exploring different cuisines, collecting stones during riverside walks and photography. She lives in Ontario.