~Even more Complicated~

**~Gio?~

Sinister.

“You need me to execute your plan.” She put air-quotes around plan.

“Don’t get too confident now.” He chuckled. The Ha ha’s of a rich man. “Yes, you are part of the plan but I don’t need you to execute it. I will get rid of you, the minute you slip up. I’ll just remove the baby from inside you and he or she will be my heir. It’ll all be done silently.” Eshaal looked down at her palm, it had already made it’s way to her stomach in protective mode. She quickly peeled it away and looked back up. His eyes had turned soft as he leaned in on the table. Crushing the butt of the cigar on the bare table and then giving it a puff. “Pumpkin, just cause I’ll be at your mercy as a father doesn’t mean you won’t be at my mercy as the captive that you have become. Be wise, don’t be like your father, he made a terrible decision.”

She was silenced at the last sentence. Don’t be like your father, he made a terrible decision.

As wrong as it felt, she felt good that someone else thought it was her dad made a terrible mistake leaving her and her mum. Internally, she curled, cringing at the fact that she had major daddy issues she thought she had gotten over. Zach had told her the same thing.

Your father lost someone valuable and that’s that. He said.

She let out a shaky breath, she didn’t want Zach to find her dead, at least. “Alright.” She forced a smile.

“Alright?” He gave a questioning look as he puffed the small of his cigar.

She nodded trying to convince herself that she wasn’t finding validity or comfort in the words of the man smoking in front of her, the man who’s holding her captive in an uncomfortable comforting way. “Alright.”

He was back to giving that warm smile as he stood us keeping the bit of his cigar on the table, as he walked over to her and kept his robotic hand on her shoulder. Her whole body tensed at the touch, she had the urge to grab his hand and twist it into a pretzel, she clasped her hands together trying to be patient. “I’m glad we’ve come to an agreement.” He patted her shoulder. “Suppose we go out, I would like you to look for a befitting way to tie your scarf according to the occasion,” her hand went to the end of her scarf hanging by her neck. “…or better still…you are free to take it off.” with that, he walked away.

How dare he tell me to take my hijab off. She scowled. “Also,” her gaze shifted to the Korean-styled door where he stood with his hands behind his back, “In case, you’re hungry. You can always call, Nisha.” With a smile he walked off.

Nisha?

*****
Zach had made a call to his mum and he thought deeply about the conversation as they were on air.

“...I found something, Zach.”

“What’s that?”

“A letter. I called one of the housemaids to look through some of my stuffs and they finally found the letters.”

“Sent by R?”

“I’m not sure,” her voice wondered off, “this was before the I knew R even existed.”

“How many are they?” He asked acknowledging her use of plural for letter.

“Just two.” She stated. “I used to think they were from a secret admirer back then. I even told your father…” She mused. “I remembered your dad had mentioned seeing ‘sister’ in the letter but it just flew over our heads since the letters stopped coming in. Take a look, I’ve sent it, I’ll get back to you.”

She hung up and Zach immediately opened up his laptop to view the message sent to him mail. A picture of a white paper with a straight crease line in four meeting at the middle. The cursive handwriting seemed almost AI generated and the first thing he noticed was the name ‘Gio’ right under the letter.