Chapter Text
If she had to remember the happiest day of her life, Ceylin Erguvan would probably shock everyone with choosing an ordinary summer afternoon when her seventeen year old self pushed her little sister higher and higher on a swing in the school yard, both smiling brightly and laughing contagiously. To the outsider that would have meant nothing, but to Ceylin that was the day of her biggest pride.
The day when she got a grant to enter a law school to pursue her dream of being a lawyer.
The day when her mother finally seemed to be satisfied with at least something she did right.
The day when her father’s eyes shone with pride.
But most importantly, the day when Inci with all the seriousness of a seven year old claimed that if she wanted to pick a real hero, it would be Ceylin. And in future she wanted nothing more than to be like her abla.
Cruel irony of life made the best and worst days of her life rigidly intertwined with the memories of her younger sister. Faith just seized the curly little devil from Ceylin’s arms exposing the dirtiest secrets along the way.
Her father was beating up his grown daughter and keeping, it seemed, so many secrets that were too much for a lifetime.
Her best friend was a psychopath and a murderer.
Her brother-in-law slept with her uncle's wife.
Her youngest sister was an experienced drug dealer and…
No day in her past or future was able to surpass the one when Pars savcı pulled the white cover off the still and lifeless form of a young woman, who Ceylin’s new client had supposedly killed. Seeing no glow or spark of life in those eyes, feeling those palms icy cold, the figure even tinier than usual… Inci’s motionless body lying on the metal surface of the morgue’s work table even after four months haunted Ceylin in nightmares.
The only thing worse was to discover that Engin, the closest person to her and only true friend, not only killed her sister but meticulously cleaned all the evidence and threw the body in a garbage container and after that together with his monster of a father put the blame on the young man, Özgür Tuna, whom just by mere chance Ceylin believed and still agreed to defend.
That decision, of course, cost her the world. Upon discovering the fact their daughter was defending the main suspect of Inci’s case, Gul and Zafer Erguvan without second thought crossed Ceylin out of their lives, throwing away all their daughter’s possessions.
The whole life in four trash bags.
Ceylin forgave them the second the door slammed at her face. She knew how much it hurt, realized how difficult it was to believe her. But deep down her heart Ceylin hoped that once made things right her family would come back to her and ask to make amends and…
The cruel reality once again proved that Ceylin was the fate's favorite.
Her family chose to believe Yekta Tilmen’s lies and not their daughter and, especially, not the law system.
“You let the murderer walk away free and set up your innocent friend, Ceylin. Let the sky fall upon your head, I curse the day you were born!”
As if it wasn’t cursed already with the death of the person who mattered most to her.
And when nothing could seemingly go more wrong in her pathetic life, there she was, stuck in an ambulance car with a man Ceylin loathed with all her being and who she probably accidentally almost killed less than twenty minutes ago.
Seeing Cüneyt on the platform of the Taksim metro station was a punch in the gut. All the memories of the horrible trial process this man was a part of as Engin’s defense squad, his and Yekta’s hand in her three month suspension from practice over a stupid advertisement, his lies and schemes, shameless stares and smiles full of pity, - every drop of darkness and evil existing in Ceyln’s soul instantly came into motion and spilled in a grand wave of anger and frustration. Which led to a verbal fight, which resulted in Cüneyt’s dramatic fall onto the rails.
She didn’t remember pushing or even touching him. But what if she did? What if in a blind rage Ceylin actually almost ended the man’s life?
Jumping right after him was an instinct, because in no world Ceylin would have let anyone die because of her. Even such a shitty person as Cüneyt. Even that joke of a human Engin. People on the platform slowed down the coming train with emergency signals, and Ceylin somehow managed to drag the unconscious man to the safe square right at the train stop point.
“You’re gonna regret this, Ceylin, I swear…”, were Cüneyt’s last words before he lost consciousness again.
So obviously she had no chance now but to sit inside the ambulance and watch the monitors, alternating between praying for the man’s quick recovery and a life long coma. With each passing second the latter option grew just more and more attractive.
Nobody stopped her at the hospital reception. Nor at the doors to the emergency room. It wasn’t until she reached the final set of doors to the ICU that her luck ran out.
“You are not supposed to be here,” came the strict voice of a man holding the doors open to let the stretchers swiftly roll into the room. “Are you a relative?”
“I… Is he going to be okay?”
“If you are not a relative, call them. We are allowed to give statements only to the family!”
“But…”, Ceylin was on the verge of a panic.
Yes, she hated Cüneyt with all her heart nearly just as much as the Tilmen father-son duo, but she never wished him death. Or coma. Or any kind of evil.
Ceylin only wanted justice to be served and all the guilty punished. Was it God's plan of fulfilling her wish? Making her a murderer?
Tears began to gather in the corners of her eyes, and Ceylin hurried to blink away an almost forgotten burning sensation. She was not going to cry. She hadn’t cried for her sister, she definitely wasn’t going to cry for Cüneyt. Or even herself.
A gentle touch of a hand pulled the lawyer out of her dark thoughts. Turning her head to the side she saw a kind face of a woman, probably a nurse. And something in those lines around the ebony brown eyes made Ceylin long for her mother’s touch, crave her warm hug and gentle smile. She quickly turned her gaze back to the ICU automatic doors.
“Don’t mind doctor Hakan. He can be rather rude, but he is one of our best,” the circular motions of a palm on Ceylin’s back made the panic wave retreat. “Is the young man your boyfriend?”
“Aha,” Ceylin snorted and rolled her eyes, “fiancee.”
She registered the sympathetic sigh too late to change anything, because by the time Ceylin opened her mouth to clear up the confusion, the two of them were already joined by a familiar paramedic from the ambulance and a curly dark-haired man holding a walkie-talkie.
A police officer.
“Here she is, commissar Eren. The woman who saved Cüneyt bey.”
Commissar? That was new. Only then Ceylin noticed that the guy was wearing casual clothes, not even a hint of any kind of a police jacket. What was a detective doing there with a simple matter of someone falling on the rails?
Her heart immediately sank at the thought of a coming detention prospect.
“Oh my God! So you’re not just his fiancée!” The nurse chose the best time to make the situation more complicated.
“No, I…”
The commissar whistled, clearly impressed with the newfound information.
“Well well! What a story!” The man smiled widely and, coming closer, suddenly gave her a quick and tight hug. “So you are both our hero and our future sister-in-law!”
Ceylin froze on the spot, completely mortified. Damn her luck! First, probably almost killing a man, now finding that Cüneyt’s brother was a detective, what next? His real fiancée was a judge and his cousin - a prosecutor?
“We are not blood related, of course,” what a relief! “But I'm as good as family.”
Be damned all her clients who disappeared without payment as soon as their cases had been successfully solved! With little to nothing in the pocket, Ceylin couldn’t even think of a good run-away plan. And the appeal she had applied against her suspension was still under consideration.
She lived in an office, and its rent had already taken the majority of all the savings the lawyer had, including the small amount of money she managed to obtain for that joke of a car that had broken a week before Inci’s death.
At least she didn’t need lots of money in prison, right? Maybe she’d also stop dying of cold each night with central heating and warm blankets.
“Off, Cüneyt, off, what a bastard to hide you from everyone!” Eren continued good naturedly. “When he joined that Mordor of a company we all thought a demon possessed him. Hope you didn’t meet at that hopeless Tilmen Bureau!”
Ceylin couldn’t contain a loud laughter that made her chest hurt instantly. The detective was naturally funny and obviously in general seemed quite a good man from the first glance. But, of course, even the best people in your life could appear to be drug dealers and psychopaths. Ceylin was an expert on such discoveries.
And anyway Eren's goodness meant absolutely nothing to her as Ceylin wasn’t planning to stick around the man long enough to make friends. If only Cüneyt opened his eyes, she’d trade her way out of this nightmare. She could still try to use the complaint she had applied against the man upon setting her brother-in-law up for Inci’s murder.
“No, we met seven years ago actually,” that was not even remotely a lie. “After graduating from the law school we lost connection and met again accidentally about a year ago.”
“Childhood sweethearts then! Nice,” Eren kept smiling like a Cheshire cat. One muscle movement more and, Ceylin could swear, his mouth would have burst open at the seams.
“Commissar Eren, do you need me to give a statement?” The paramedic, still standing just a step behind the detective, looked rather irritated at their conversation already. “The team is waiting while you are making friends here.”
“Sorry, kardeşim. Of course go do your important work, I got it from here,” Eren suddenly smashed his palm against his forehead. “I swear with these worries one day I’ll forget my own name! We weren’t even properly introduced.”
“Oh, I already figured, commissar Eren,” Ceylin smiled warmly but a bit nervously.
This was not the way she planned the event to go. To be completely honest, of course she didn’t plan it to go any way, but a detective for a close friend completely changed the future dynamics.
Who was she kidding? There was no dynamics and this quick farce was her ebbing agony. As soon as Cüneyt woke up, she’d be looking at the sky through a net of iron bars.
“And you…?”
“Ceylin,” at least she wouldn’t make it easier for the man giving out her surname.
“I think we’ll go without protocols and other stupid paperwork. I’m here by a coincidence anyway. We took an injured suspect here, and I got a message through the walky just on my way to the car.”
Of-fucking-course. Of all the police enforcement the universe naturally chose someone close to Cüneyt, his friend specifically, someone who most probably deeply cared for the bastard. Someone she wouldn’t be able to trick into letting the case go.
“EREN!”
Both Ceylin and Eren jumped at the sound of a high pitched voice coming from the end of the corridor. Turning her head in the sound source direction, Ceylin saw a whole procession practically running towards them.
The family.
A tall woman heading the crowd must have been Cüneyt’s mother, they looked exactly alike except for her not wearing one of his ugly ties inspired by the nineties era.
Right after her hurried a short bulky man who was also, like Eren, holding a walkie-talkie. He motioned in their direction, and the detective immediately ran towards the newcomer.
A tall olderly man with snowy white hair walked slowly, holding a bit to the back as if not being sure he belonged there.
Another woman holding a little girl’s hand closed the small group. If Ceylin had to guess, the girl must have been related to the first man. Maybe she even was his daughter, though the lawyer couldn’t find any trace of Cüneyt’s features in her cute face.
With each passing second Ceylin felt more confused and genuinely scared for her own future.
Eren quickly updated the newcomers on the situation with the limited knowledge he himself had. The women kept bombarding him with questions, never paying any attention to the girl who, as Ceylin didn’t fail to notice, was standing several steps behind the crowd, quietly sniffing and rubbing her already considerably swollen eyes.
“Hey, sweety,” she began slowly, approaching the child and squatting in front of her. “What’s your name? I’m Ceylin.”
“Denfe,” the girl sniffed loudly this time, and her big brown eyes quickly watered again. “Is Cüneyt abi dead? Is this why nobody is telling me anything?”
“Hey, no!” Ceylin shushed the girl and gently put palms on her cheeks to wipe away the teary traces. “All is fine, Cüneyt abi is with a doctor now, and last time I saw him he was most definitely not dead.”
Defne looked at her so intensely, as if reading her thoughts and weighting the soul that shone somewhere deep down Ceylin’s eyes. As if one glance was enough to trust her forever or never come close ever again.
Ceylin wondered what ugly darkness could this girl saw in her heart.
“Defnecim,” a female voice broke the spell, but Defne didn’t tear her eyes off Ceylin’s face. “And who are you?”
“I…”
“Oh, Makbule hala, that’s Ceylin, Cüneyt’s fiancée,” proudly announced Eren causing a wave of surprised exhales. “And it was her who saved our precious lawyer from dying a tragic death under the train!”
And in that exact second Ceylin found herself tangled in embraces, being asked a thousand questions not requiring answers. Little Defne held her tight around the waist, the tall man smiled at her affectionately. It was such a strange, almost forgotten feeling of belonging, being loved for just existing, not needing to prove anything to anyone…
If only you knew you may be hugging a failed murderer…
The thought struck Ceylin as an electric shock. Suddenly all she saw was Engin’s face smiling at her with those traitorous eyes, all she felt were his hands on her back in a fake attempt to support her, all she heard were his deceitful words beating in her ears.
What was she doing? Why was she pretending to be a savior when in fact she was almost the angel of death of this family? Was she as evil as Engin, ready to lie her way out of her mistake?
If only she could talk to Cüneyt. If only he woke up.
She knew he had it in his power to lock her up even if she was not guilty at all. Ceylin knew the man well, he could do it just to beat her once in his life. But if it was her fault, she wasn’t going to fight fate this time.
ICU automatic doors slid wide open revealing a man in a white hospital robe, doctor Hakan. Acknowledging the family’s presence, he gave a full detailed report on Cüneyt’s condition.
“You don’t have to worry. The MRI came back clean, there's no significant swelling, although I might say it’s definitely a miracle.” Ceylin’s heartbeat instantly accelerated. “We can’t say when exactly Cüneyt bey will wake up, but there is no reason to suspect any permanent damage to his health.”
Ceylin sighed in relief. She wasn’t a murderer after all, and Cüneyt was going to get well soon. Only the thought of that seemed to give the lawyer additional strengths. She could talk to him, she could ask for his forgiveness. After all, it was Ceylin who also risked her own life dragging his heavy body in close proximity to the contact rail.
You are an awful person, Ceylin Erguvan.
“We’ll keep him in the ICU to monitor the condition. I can allow one visitor now, but only for ten minutes.” Doctor Hakan nodded in the nurse's direction. “Selma hemşire will give you the robe and show the way.”
The nurse smiled gently at Ceylin, clearly already having her own romantic thoughts on who should have been the first visitor to the sleeping Romeo. Unfortunately the family seemed to share her enthusiasm.
“You should go, dear,” the mother embraced Ceylin once again tightly. “You jumped on the rails after him, you saved him. And you are going to build a life together.”
“But you are his mother…” Ceylin tried to reason with the woman. Without any luck.
“It should be you, kızım, no objections. We’ll go home now, but you have to promise you’ll join us in the evening for dinner. You’ll tell us everything about your romantic love story.”
“But…”
It was insane. Family dinners? Romantic stories? Hell no.
Something definitely must have been written on her face, because the look the tall old man gave Ceylin was rather unnerving. But before she could elaborate on that thought Defne gave her another tight hug and instructed her on the correct address, leaving Ceylin rather surprised that such a child knew her address by heart. At her age Inci failed to remember even her own birthday. Although Ceylin suspected the little imp just wanted to celebrate all year around on any occasion.
The thought made Ceylin smile despite the pain the memories brought with them.
***
It was so strange to see Cüneyt completely motionless. His handsome features were relaxed and still, and only the breather mask revealed that he, in fact, was laying on a hospital bed connected to several beeping monitors.
Ceylin was used to arguing with him, swearing and screaming at him, but in no world she could have imagined him not being able to answer. It was odd, surreal even. Although of course she really preferred the man silent and not getting on her nerves with his uselessness. Yekta’s right hand minion on a hospital bed. A real Hollywood happy ending. Why wasn’t she ecstatic?
“They say you’ll be fine in no time,” she started after clearing her throat. “No wonder, your head must be as hard as a cast-iron kettle. Not sure there’s anything inside to concuss really…”
She adjusted the white hospital robe nervously. It was unfair, Ceylin knew that, but the temptation was too strong.
“Look, I’m sorry. In any case it was an accident, I didn’t want you to fall on the rails. It’s so funny, because you and your boss would have never wasted the opportunity to watch me get beheaded by a train,” she laughed halfheartedly. “But we both know I’m not like you. No matter what Yekta says, I will never be like you.”
Inci’s murder was the culmination of Yekta’s personal vendetta against Ceylin, she has always known that. Yes, he was trying to save his precious maniac of a son, but the force the man used against her wasn’t just for Engin’s sake.
Yekta Tilmen could never take no for an answer. It didn’t matter what it was: a business proposition or a filthy intimate offer. Ceylin had the audacity to reject both. And on top of that she made Engin leave the Tilmen Bureau and start a business with her. No need to say, Yekta used every opportunity to face Ceylin in court. Half the cases she took made her regularly look at his revolting face twisted in a scowl.
But the hell Yekta made her go through during her sister’s case was unmatched. And Cüneyt never failed to make his hands dirty for his boss.
“Sometimes I wonder what made you side with this man. I remember you from school, you were so talented and smart. But I look at you now and all I see is a shadow of that memory. It’s like you’ve lost your voice together with your conscience,” she hesitantly squeezed his shoulder. “I don’t know if that man is still somewhere inside there. I hope he is. I hope he recognizes that I didn’t have bad intentions even if it’s my fault. And if he doesn’t he at least will take my offer instead. You know I can end your career in a blink of an eye. At the end of the day, I still saved your life, Cüneyt.”
A loud warning sound from one of the monitors completely obscured the quiet noise of a closing door.
***
“What does it mean, Cansu? What mistakes are you talking about?!”
“ Ceylin, remember not to kill the messenger ,” the voice on the other end of the phone sounded defensive. “ That’s what the secretary told me. You need to re-apply the petition .”
“It’s him, right? Fucking Yekta Tilmen! But wait, Cansu, wait. I will dance at his funerals even if it’s the last thing I do.”
The phone was the first victim of Ceylin’s rage. A huge pile of case files followed. A teacup, pack of snacks, pens and pencils - everything joined the device on the floor. An outsider would have thought a local war happened in this small freezing cold office. But fortunately it survived worse days after Inci’s murder.
“Bastard. Son of a bitch,” with each swipe of the broom Ceylin used another name for Yekta. “Asshole. Douchebag.”
She continued using her wide vocabulary, getting more and more creative. Cursing helped a lot to get her anger under control, though only now, when Ceylin was living alone, could she really get the benefits of it.
If her mother heard her, she’d have disowned Ceylin all over again. It didn’t matter anyway. She already was a failure of a daughter and a sister. Obviously she was also a failure as a lawyer if she couldn’t save even herself.
“It’s like a battle happened here, kizim. You didn’t have mercy even on a poor pot.”
Ceylin jumped, absolutely stunned and terrified. Her first instinct was to beat up the intruder with the broom handle, but the lack of any combat skills, apart from being a good shot, was really not in the lawyer’s favor.
But the person she saw was the least expected one. It was the old man from the hospital, one of Cüneyt’s crowd of relatives.
“You…” She pressed a hand to her chest and tried to calm her breathing. “You scared the shit out of me! I thought you were a maniac.”
The man smiled strangely, making Ceylin really question her safety.
She had to be reasonable. Nothing would happen to her, no matter how scary the man looked. But at the same time she couldn’t deny the unmistakable sense of danger he radiated.
“Sorry for that, girl. I can assure you though, if you ever get my black mark, you’ll have no time to analyze if I’m a maniac indeed.”
For a second Ceylin didn’t find words for a witty enough answer, but then she just burst out with an uncontrollable laughter. Out of nerves probably rather than the actual fun.
“Please, can I get it sooner?” She managed to force out of herself between the hysterical hiccups. “A tragic death from a serial killer’s hand will be a great conclusion to my overdramatic life.”
Now it was the man’s time to laugh. Shaking his head he slowly crossed the room and occupied the nearest chair. Somehow Ceylin felt as though he owned the place. She wasn’t sure she liked that feeling.
“I think we haven’t been properly introduced. Merdan Kaya.”
Ceylin nodded in acknowledgement. For sure that should have indicated her recognition, because obviously her real fiancée would have told her a lot about this Merdan. Maybe she would have known why the man oozed such a dangerous vibe.
But she was a fraud, so how would she know?
The surname registered though. It was a strange stirring feeling somewhere in her upper abdomen, as if a knot tightened in her solar plexus. But why? The only option was that irritating, rude, full of himself prosecutor Ilgaz Kaya who she never wanted to see or hear ever again. She avoided every contact after their one and only mutual disaster of a case. Any case she saw his name on, immediately got transferred to Engin. Thankfully in the eight months she managed the mission outstandingly. And after that her life got turned upside down with a usual phone call from Umut offering another client to her. An interesting case of a young girl’s murder.
Her sister’s murder.
Sometimes she wished Ilgaz Kaya was the prosecutor in that case. Pars was not bad, and at some point Ceylin hoped his special attitude would grant her favors, but that illusion quickly evaporated as soon as she got downgraded into the victim’s family category. All the doors closed shut for her at once. And the worst thing was that Pars savcı didn’t care for the truth. He only wanted to close the easy case and proceed with his own daily life of flirting with pretty lawyers and collecting court gossip.
No matter how annoying Ilgaz savcı was, Ceylin was sure he would not have stopped just at the circumstantial evidence. One case was enough for her to realize that the man’s meticulousness, righteousness and sharp mind didn’t leave much room for mistakes. If only he led Inci’s case, they would have caught Engin in a matter of a week, and Ceylin wouldn’t have to spend every waking hour proving her every lead to Pars.
“I’m not a psychic to interpret your extrasensorial six sense, Ceylin hanım.”
But it must have been just a coincidence. In no way this obviously criminal Merdan bey was related to the most boring prosecutor in the whole Istanbul. Needless to say that it was also impossible for Ilgaz Kaya to share brainless genes with Cüneyt.
“I won’t ask how you found me, because obviously I don’t even want to know the answer,” Ceylin said good naturedly, leaning on a door frame. “But what brings you here, Merdan bey?”
“No need for formalities. We are family. Merdan dede will suit me.”
“I don’t think I’ll be comfortable with that yet. So let’s keep some formalities at this stage, and let’s hear the answers.”
Merdan dede. She wasn’t planning to stick around this family so long to start calling this man any kind of informal nicknames.
“No conspiracy theories, I promise.” The man smiled and crossed arms across his chest. “I’m picking you up for the family dinner.”
Ceylin’s heart instantly sank. That was the worst-case scenario, because in no universe she planned to visit this Kaya family. Yes, she was going to still push the whole fiancée agenda to continue getting info from the hospital (thanks to the romantic nurse, with whom Ceylin exchanged contacts, the lawyer was already getting hourly updates on the slightest changes in Cüneyt’s condition), but it was going to take a lot to sell the story to the family.
Yes, they were elated with the news and grateful for saving their precious son’s life, but as soon as the euphoria passed, there would be questions. Questions to which Ceylin did not have the answers.
“Actually, I don’t think I can come, Merdan bey. Too much work, new clients…”
“Of course, I understand.” The man nodded in understanding and after a pause added, ”Must be hard, though, to work on cases without your license.”
“It’s all just a silly misunderstanding,” Ceylin hurried to soften the blow of him catching her on a lie. How could this man know everything about her?
“Sure, sure. I didn’t even imagine you being involved in anything that could professionally cost you, dear.”
It was a lie though, and they both knew it. Ceylin did borderline illegal stuff on a daily basis, that was the essence of her work and what she was extremely good at.
Ceylin didn’t have any illusions about the system. If she did… Probably she would have ended up being a prosecutor. But no, realistically she just would have become a marketing manager or something else mainstream.
But the law system had too many holes and injustice in it. Some people waited years for a sentence. Others got mistreated in the course of the investigation. So many broken fates, families mourning the living. If helping them meant breaking some stupid rules, Ceylin was ready to do that over and over again even if it cost her a whole career.
“The sign on the wall says “Ceylin Erguvan,” Merdan suddenly said, looking in the entrance direction as if diving into the memories of a place or time far away.
“That’s my name.”
“I knew a man sharing your name. A good man, a captain of a trade ship. Too bad we met under awful circumstances,” the man turned his gaze right at Ceylin, clearly calculating her reaction.
But how could she react? Ceylin just felt frozen in place, completely motionless and speechless. Could it be her father Merdan was talking about? Of course it was him, she doubted there were many Erguvan captains in prison. And there was not a single doubt the man was referring to that place.
Six years ago the life of her family got divided in half, catalyzing the whole chain of future tragic events.
If they had a father, Inci wouldn’t have felt the need to fill the void with drugs, money and expensive things. She wouldn’t have felt an outsider in her own circle of friends and so wouldn’t have fallen in the trap of this seemingly easy life of drug dealing. Maybe she would have been alive still if they had their father taking care of them.
Maybe her mother wouldn’t have drowned in fear and guilt, hunching down under the pressure of the public humiliation and cruel words. She wouldn’t have become bitter and judgmental, angry at the whole world, even foul sometimes.
Maybe her sister wouldn’t have to use heavy tranquilizers, and her son would have been running around their garden and not laying two meters under the ground in a cold and dark pit. Always a child. Always their little angel.
But life was too cruel to them, leaving the five Erguvan women on her brother-in-law’s neck. Which inevitably quickly broke. And so Ceylin had to take the place of the head of the house, working her ass off without weekends, taking any case that got into her hands and working shifts as a hotel receptionist for more than three years just to save enough for Inci’s education.
Apparently all her efforts were in vain, as her little sister obviously made more money in a week than Ceylin managed to earn with tips and that joke of a salary.
All those five years only one thing helped her stand steady on her feet: she knew her father was innocent. It was irrational, as Aylin said; stubborn, as her mother repeated; silly, as Osman never failed to comment on. But Ceylin didn’t doubt her inner voice even for a second. It always guided and helped her through the most tangled and difficult cases. It was that small voice in the back of her head that brought her exactly to the spot where Inci was murdered.
Too bad you couldn’t prove anything based just on intuition. But maybe for the first time in these six years she finally had a chance to at least try and prove her father’s innocence. To clear his name at least and bring some peace to his soul. Even if it wasn’t enough for him to embrace her back into their lives, she had to try.
So when Merdan continued talking, Ceylin didn’t interrupt him once.
“I remember him telling so many stories about his girls. He had three daughters, you know. But most of all he missed his second one. You could say the man loved her more than anyone in this world.”
Ceylin swallowed all too familiar lump of tears and hardly managed a smile.
“He only repeated he was innocent,” Merdan continued, seemingly not noticing the effect his words had on Ceylin. “That’s the only common song you hear playing in jail. Different variations but the motive never changes. But from time to time you recognize a small voice, almost a whisper. And you know it’s the voice of an innocent.”
Merdan slowly got up from the chair and after fixing his colorful jacket started walking towards the door.
“So, are you going, girl?”
It didn’t require a lot to make a decision. In one swift motion the lawyer took her coat and a small bag from the hanger.
If solving the mystery of her father’s false accusation meant getting close to Merdan Kaya, Ceylin was ready to lie her way out of the whole mess she created.
She wasn’t going to give up.
***
“Oh wow, our sister-in-law has an appetite!”
Ceylin tried to smile at Eren’s comment, but in fact she was too busy chewing her enormous portion of chicken pilaf which Makbule hanım had been so kind to make for the occasion. The woman was a culinary genius, much more superior than Ceylin’s mother. Although now with day to day struggle to put anything in her stomach she would have agreed to anything.
Some days she barely ate at all, some days she met with potential clients (some day her license was going to be renewed after all) and they had the sense to order something for her lunch. Though mostly she survived on cheap snacks. That’s why any homemade food Ceylin considered to be an ambrosia.
“Don’t embarrass the girl, commissar,” Merdan said from Ceylin’s right. “Don’t listen to him, feel at home.”
“That’s quite unlikely,” she mumbled barely audibly.
And that was entirely true. Her dysfunctional family could never compare. One hour in this house brought more smiles and laughs than the last half a year of Ceylin’s life. Mostly because of the young Kaya siblings and commissar Eren.
Little Defne was absolutely adorable telling Ceylin all the stories about her friends at school, her teachers and, of course, her toys. Mostly she talked about the bear her brother had given her as a present around three months before. It had a name and a great story of life worthy of a cartoon or even a feature film.
But these stories wouldn’t have been even half that funny if her brother, Çinar, didn’t encourage the girl, absolutely enjoying the creative process. Although Ceylin didn’t fail to notice the tension between the guy and his father, Metin. One deep accusing look from the man, and his head immediately hung, shoulders sank, and Çinar clearly started reminding a lost puppy.
If she was completely honest, Metin made Ceylin rather uncomfortable herself. She had noticed that before, in the hospital, but then she didn’t pay much attention to her feelings, because obviously it was an unexpected situation for the family. But unlike everyone else welcoming her with open arms, Metin Kaya kept to the side, throwing strange glances in Ceylin’s direction.
Could it be his distrust? After all, he was the chief of the homicide police department, seeing straight through liars was literally his job.
Ceylin tried not to dwell on that thought for too long.
The women were on the contrary extremely welcoming and nice. At least Cüneyt’s mother, Zehra hanım, danced around Ceylin, always caring, always smiling at her, asking a thousand questions at once. And the lawyer couldn’t help but smile back.
“I’m so happy we finally met you, dear!” The woman claimed, clenching Ceylin’s arm. “Yes, I’d love the circumstances to be different, but knowing my son I doubt we’d have met earlier than five years into your marriage!”
“Or never at all!” Ceylin joked back.
That was the truth though, she would have never sat in this living room drinking tea with pakhlava if not for Cüneyt being stupid enough to loose balance.
“Tell us all about how you met!” Defne practically jumped on her knees. “Was it romantic like in a Disney movie?”
“Well… I’m so far from being a princess, Defnecim.”
“You are as beautiful as a princess, Ceylin abla,” the girl declared in a tone that suggested Ceylin’s immense silliness.
The lawyer smiled sadly, hearing the name Defne used for her. Abla. She wasn’t sure she’d ever be able to accept anyone other than Inci calling her like that. But Defne was so different that she won Ceylin’s heart completely in a matter of an hour.
Ceylin already regretted lying to these people, but lying to Defne seemed almost unbearable.
“Tamam canım, thank you for this unexpected coronation,” Ceylin pinched her cheek affectionately. “In fact, our meeting was very boring. He turned to me during the exam and asked to pass a note to the row above.”
“Cüneyt abi cheated?” The girl was terrified with the newfound information.
“Oh, he was a cheater, but a very unlucky one. I remember teachers catching him all the time. Another person would have given up, but not Cüneyt. He was so stubborn. He still is, I think.”
She quickly bit her tongue. She had to stop talking so much if she wanted to make it all work. Yes, the best lies were based on the truth, but the amount of information also should have been quite dozed.
“But then you met again, right?”
Damn this Eren for already telling her quick and not planned improvisation to them. It was good, though, he and Metin had left already being called on duty due to another body being discovered somewhere. With the room less crowded Ceylin felt already so much better. At least, all the people left weren’t as hostile as the head of the family.
She wasn’t sure about Merdan yet, but at least nothing suggested him being defensive or mad at her. On the contrary, it seemed the man was jumping over his head to make Ceylin feel at ease.
“Yes. We did. During one of the hearings we were the opposing parties.”
“And you fell in love?” Now it was Makbule hanım asking stupid difficult questions.
Ceylin nodded with a fake smile, trying to focus on braiding Defne’s hair. The braid appeared to be so ugly, she kept redoing it. At least that was a great occupation for the mind.
“He smiled, and I was gone.”
That wasn’t a lie either. They really were representing different parties in a divorce case. And he really smiled at her presenting his obviously fake evidence. And Ceylin for sure was completely gone with rage. Needless to say, she lost that case. And it was her first one after rejecting Yekta’s offer. One of the worst memories Ceylin had.
“I always liked polite guys. Gentlemanlike. Respectful and kind. Smart of course.”
The exact opposite of the rude and brainwashed misogynist your precious Cüneyt is.
“I’m so glad you’ve found each other!” Exclaimed Zehra hanım, tearing up. “Honestly, we haven’t seen our boy for more than a year now. Ever since he joined that law firm… He only calls me occasionally, but he is always so busy with cases.”
Oh, Ceylin didn’t doubt that. So many lives to ruin, how could it compete with family bonds and quality time.
“But you came into our lives, dear, and now I’m sure, it will all change for the better!”
“İnşallah,” aunt Makbule closed her eyes in a quiet prayer. “Maybe you’ll be able to bring Cüneyt and Ilgaz together again.”
Ceylin almost ripped out a strand of Defne’s hair in shock. This could not be happening. It was worse than a worse-case scenario. It was a real time apocalypse.
“Ilgaz?” She repeated in a small voice, still hoping her hearing had failed her.
“Oh, how stupid we are, Makbule,” Zehra rolled her eyes. “Ilgaz is my nephew. He is Metin’s and my late sister’s eldest son.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry for your loss,” Ceylin said hurriedly but earnestly.
Of course she realized all the signs, but hearing the confirmation of the tragic suspicion still hurt. Especially for Defne who suddenly stiffened in her arms. These two women couldn’t be more sensitive casually dropping delicate topics right and left.
“He is a state prosecutor and doesn’t appreciate Cüneyt’s choice of profession and especially the workplace,” continued Zehra ignoring Defne’s reaction completely. “When my son joined Tilmen Group, they had a huge fight and as a result Cüneyt all but vanished from our lives.”
So now Ceylin was also supposed to be a mediator for the annoying prosecutor and his cousin. As if she could add counseling to the never ending list of her troubles. On the other hand this business was very profitable, so maybe she could at least fleece the Kayas for all the trouble Cüneyt bey had given her in the past.
“Look, Ceylin abla!” Suddenly Defne jumped to her feet and stormed to the coffee table by the sofa only to return seconds later with a photo in a beautiful frame of dark brown. “It’s all of us one summer ago. We slept in tents!”
“Oh no!” Ceylin exclaimed theatrically. “But you weren’t afraid, were you? I think you are so brave.”
“I was with Ilgaz abi, nothing bad could happen!” Said the girl with all seriousness.
Ceylin finally averted her gaze to the photograph held out to her. Four people were laughing back at her: three men and a little girl. Defne was standing in the front, and she was even smaller than now, with the same two funny dark brown braids and a button-like nose. Çinar was pinching her plump cheeks and looked so at ease that Ceylin’s heart involuntarily ached for the guy, remembering the guilty glances he threw in his father’s direction.
Cüneyt stood at the back and clearly was holding back laughter. And for the first time since law school Ceylin didn’t want to strangle him with bare hands. But in truth all her attention was glued to the fourth person in the photograph.
For sure this was a completely different man than the one she knew. The contrast to the serious and always focused prosecutor Ilgaz Kaya was so striking, impossible even. The man was wearing a casual white t-shirt, his hair was effortlessly messy and his brown eyes sparkled with mischief.
“I didn’t realize he knew how to laugh,” she mumbled, not able to tear her gaze away.
“What did you say, dear?” Makbule’s voice shook Ceylin out of her daze.
“Oh, nothing! Just…” Ceylin shook her head. “I think I should go, it’s rather late already.”
She had to get out. If there was one person in the entire world Ceylin had no chance of fooling, it was prosecutor Ilgaz Kaya. Obviously, the fates were set on ruining her life.
But, really, what were the odds?
“Oh no, girl, you’re staying. There can be no discussion.”
“But, really…’
“I won’t hear another word,” Zehra cut her off with a hand gesture. “Metin took the car, so Çinar won’t be able to take you back home. And my daughter-in-law is not taking a taxi so late at night.”
Ceylin opened her mouth to argue further and use the words of reason, but decided against it.
After all, she was exhausted with the day’s events and, if she was being honest, the prospect of spending this night on that parody of a sofa in her cold office was killing Ceylin. She had to do something about the gas payments after the sleeping beauty woke up, otherwise the office temperature would have no significance at all.
As it appeared Zehra lived in Adana, where Metin’s wife was originally from, and was in Istanbul by chance for the time of the accident. So she occupied the only free guest room in Makbule’s apartment on the ground floor. The apartment upstairs belonged to Ilgaz, and it only had a bedroom and a living room, and Ceylin point-blank refused to even set foot there, let alone occupy the prosecutor's bedroom.
“But abi is on duty tonight, he won’t mind, you are family!” Çinar shrugged, handing her out a pillow and a plaid.
“That’s out of question, Çinar. I’m intruding enough already.”
“ Tamam, yenge, as you wish,” the guy snorted. “Call me if you need anything, I usually stay up late.”
Ceylin nodded, placed a colorful pillow on the white leather sofa and lay down. It was better than the one in her office, softer at least, but her back still immediately protested. At least, it was warm.
The living room was lit only by a torcher, but Ceylin didn’t hurry to turn it off. Her eyes kept roaming the surroundings, appreciating the furniture and the simple style of the apartment. She was sure that only a woman could create something so pure and beautiful. Somehow Ceylin didn’t even for a second assume Metin had a finger into the repairs design-wise. Probably, the family didn’t change even the curtains after Kıymet hanım’s death. Given Defne’s age, it must have been relatively recent.
For a second she wondered what the apartment above was like. Was it also of white color? She believed so. Spotless area with a bare minimum of things. A modern computer on the working desk, some kitchen gadgets, a big plasma on the wall. Probably the sofa wasn’t leather, though. The prosecutor was too smart to buy anything so impractical.
Ceylin shook her head and checked the phone. The red icon on the messenger app indicated long awaited news and information from Cansu. If she couldn’t help with the license, maybe her school friend could at least save her now.
Ten minutes later Ceylin finally turned off the light and tried to make herself as comfortable as possible, and very soon sleep got the better of her.
In her dream she was running through the forest. She searched, reaching for something that simply slipped through her fingers.
Everywhere around her was darkness. Every turn she took, every path she stepped on only led to a pitch black nothingness, threatening to engulf Ceylin, capture her in its strong clawed paws.
She constantly fell, struggling to get up; kept calling for someone, but no words came out of her mouth. Suddenly Ceylin was drowning, suffocating, gulping for air.
Maybe that was for the best? Could this obscurity simply erase her from existence? Could it show her mercy that life didn’t?
Ceylin abla, wake up.
Was Inci calling for her? Ceylin tried to reach out to her sister but her arm refused to make even a simple movement.
“Ceylin abla, wake up,” the voice sounded closer, more insistent.
“Go away, Inci, let me sleep.”
“Who is Inci?”
Ceylin’s eyes shot wide open. Bright morning light was sharper than a knife, and she had to blink at least ten times to focus. But when she did, it was Defne’s smiling face nose to nose with hers.
“So who’s Inci?”
“My…” Ceylin’s voice was hoarse after sleep, and she had to clear her throat. “Inci is my younger sister.”
“You have a sister!” Defne’s eyes shone bright. “How old is she? Is she going to my school? Can we meet?”
All too familiar lump formed in her throat, and Ceylin had to swallow quickly to prevent tears clouding her eyes. Defne was just a child, even if she was smart beyond her years. And Ceylin wasn’t ready to be delicate on the matter of Inci’s death.
So instead of answering she just smiled and patted the girl’s cheek. Rolling onto her back, the lawyer yawned and ran fingers through her hair. Only then she caught the mouth-watering smell of scrambled eggs and pungent sausages.
Maybe she died and woke up in heaven.
“Good morning, avukat hanım,” Ceylin sat right up straight at the sound of the familiar serious and measured male voice. “As I see you’ve finally woken up, you can join us at breakfast and tell the story of becoming my future sister-in-law.”
Looking straight into the discerning brown eyes of prosecutor Ilgaz Kaya, searching for any signs of mercy in his handsome sharp features, guessing her fate in his knitted eyebrows and arms crossed on his chest, Ceylin clearly realized one thing.
She woke up in hell.