Zayn Harroun was being escorted by an army, handcuffed. He was sentenced to prison for a lifetime, in addition to a fine of a few billion dollars.
He looked at his old, sick father for one last time. He was being carried by two men back home. He had almost killed him when he had found about his devious son's treacherous deeds; to seek more truth, he had confronted Zayn. To not risk his security, Zayn had shot his own father in the head. Too bad, his scheme had failed.
It was Zayn's father in the hospital bed when Moutasim and Riya had gone to visit him a couple of days back in hopes of him being conscious enough to lead the case further as a prime witness and several other important testimonies. However, he became stable in a few days and it seemed like, they were lucky enough because God Himself and everyone else weighed their existence to help make Moutasim succeed the case.
Riya stood there, rooted to the ground. She had just worked on her first-ever case and she had also won it. What an outstanding start to her new career, she had thought sarcastically. She had helped the authorities to put Zayn behind bars, the most wanted criminal in the whole of Middle East was finally gone for good. Also, she had sent her father in jail. Not like she did it on purpose or she had a choice. She had to. She did well for herself and her scruples, it was high time that things were supposed to be done for what was right.
As for Moutasim, he was the star of his agency. Success was doing him outstandingly, he was grateful to Riya as well, of course; without her taking over the case, it wouldn't have been worked out the way he had imagined it to be; purely dramatic. He could have hired a top-listed professional lawyer in the city, well-experienced public prosecutors were quite everywhere. Then why did he want a newbie like her to do it?
He wanted to extinguish that fire in his heart. The one that had been put in this same courtroom. He wanted the same pawn to finish the game. Zayn and Riya's father had started it, using her to be the false witness against Moutasim's hit-and-run case. Today, years later, he finished off the chess game in his own style; the only thing similar was, the Queen.
He looked across the room at her, she stood there with a frozen face, it was hard to tell what she could be feeling at that moment. He walked over to her and signalled her to leave, she quietly followed and left, without saying a word or even looking at him for once. Even he couldn't meet her in the eye, not like he felt guilty for sending her father and her ex to jail. He didn't want to look into those eyes, not right then.
When Riya reached home, she heard some angry voices bursting from the living room. As she went closer, she was shocked to find Agha Jaan there. She knew Hufaiz had flown in from London early that morning, but her grand father's arrival was too unexpected. Nevertheless, he had just had to come, he was the major backbone of her family and she could sense that it was already tearing apart.
Hufaiz gave her a poisonous glare and wagged his finger at her, trying to push her away. Somehow, Agha Jaan got in the way and stopped him, giving him a nudge in the shoulder to stay off limits.
Hufaiz yelled at her, "You just proved that you're not one of us, didn't you?" He stared at her as if he'd kill her right there, "You're a snake, Riya Barham Jahangiri!".
She knew that a tornado of this sort would hit a blow at her when she'd face everyone at home, but what perked up her ears was that middle name.
"Barham?" She looked at Agha Jaan in confusion. Hufaiz had possibly blundered her name while in anger. His brain must be fuming, of course.
"YES!" He shouted again, "You, filthy little cheater, aren't good for nothing. You're not our sister."
"Hufaiz!" Agha Jaan bellowed with his face turning crimson; his temper flamed.
Riya was still too perplexed to figure out what was happening. What was Hufaiz trying to reveal? Was this some sort of another secret opening up?
She had resurfaced far too many times after drowning into the deep seas of nothingness. Nothing could possibly push her down again, or so as she may have thought.
"Don't let me stop, Agha Jaan. I need to speak today." Hufaiz was still furious and continued to ridicule Riya. He suddenly paused, dashed in his parents' bedroom and fetched a handful of filed papers. He unclipped some sheets, threw a quick-tempered look at them and threw it in Riya's face.
"See? This is what you are. Nothing, but a helpless child. My parents adopted you when your parents died in a car crash."
Her shoulders were slumped and her eyes cast down in a mournful gaze struck at that adoption certificate signed twenty-three years ago. She felt dejected and alone. Never had she thought that life would make her stand at that stop where there was no turning back nor a way ahead. It all looked hazy as if she had been captured into an air bubble and that was it. It was like this whole life was nothing but an illusion. All her hopes to become better just dissolved into thin air, her dreams, what she aspired to be; nothing mattered anymore.
Agha Jaan sat down on the sofa in distress with his head held in his hands. He never wanted this hidden truth to be disclosed the way it did. Riya was a piece of his heart, the only living memory of his oldest son and daughter-in-law who died in a car accident so many years ago. He had trusted Zar Wali upon his request to make Riya his daughter soon after a year of his marriage to Sarah. Obviously, she was his older brother's daughter, he would make a special place for her in his life. But shockingly not more than a while later, Agha Jaan had found Zar Wali's real and only motive.
All Zar Wali wanted was Riya's inheritance. The inheritance from her parents' wealth, as well as from the family business in Swat. That was the deal he had made with Agha Jaan back in the day. As her legal guardian, in return for the consent of his daughter's marriage to whoever Agha Jaan chose, Zar Wali knocked down the price of her net worth all in his selfish manner. He didn't care who he chose to give her away in marriage, but her wealth should definitely be signed off to him first and foremost and that's what he did at the end; he had made Riya sign some contract papers and pushed a mocking revelation down her throat about Zayn's unfaithfulness along with the announcement of her marriage to the person she detested.
It was the biggest deal swap, but Agha Jaan knew what he was doing. He compromised some one-hundred and fifty thousand dollars to make Riya completely come out of Zar Wali's treachery and married her to Moutasim, the man Agha Jaan knew would genuinely love her unconditionally, no matter what. No doubt, the sole proprietor of that huge sum was no one except Riya, but lives cannot be forsaken; money can always make it's way back in, just how it makes the way out. Her grandfather did it for her and he knew she would never accuse him otherwise.
There was a loud wail of cry. Everyone jumped out and leapt towards where it came from.
Sarah had dropped down senseless on the bedroom floor.
"Mama!" Riya cried and shook her mother's body. There was no movement.
Hufaiz got in the way and pushed Riya behind, "If anything happens to my Mama, I swear I'll make life hell for you. You already took away our father, wasn't that enough?"
A strand of crystal clear beads dropped down those beautiful eyes. Would Mama be okay? She wept silently. Sure, she never knew her own mother, but whom she had now, she never wanted to lose. Not once more.
Hufaiz, Arshiya and Agha Jaan were rushing the motionless body towards the ambulance that waited down in the driveway. She watched from the big glass window of their living room and continued to watch until the ambulance faded away down the road and was no more to be seen...
-------------------------------------------------------
The so-called unstoppable gang leader, 'B'anther Al-Amoudi; that's what his Arab men called him as, was now behind bars, in a tiny and dark prison cell. It seemed like a pothole at the end of the earth with no way out, ever. Yet, his face was calm, like he was having the time of his life in a breezy summer garden laying under an Apple tree.
"Scoundrel! I wasted my life after you!" The cell door in front of his shut loudly and thrown in was, of course, the quiet player of all, Zar Wali.
Zayn (Panther) let out a snort. "You sure didn't feel the same when you had cash flowing in your a*s, because of me."
Zar Wali leapt forward and shook the iron bars in rage, wanting to kill that man across.
Panther's demonic laugh echoed down the entire prison corridor.