"Anisha! Are you here with us?" She heard her exasperated colleague Mini calling her out.
Pooja who was sitting to Anu's right nudged her elbow causing her to tear her gaze away from the Bandstand promenade.
"Yes... yes, sorry, I am here," she apologized to everyone on the team and looked down to refer to her meeting notes, scribbled on the pad. Blank. Fuck.
"I think the meeting is over, let's regroup tomorrow. Anisha, can I see you in my office?" Her boss asserted.
Anisha nodded in response and looked over at Pooja with wide eyes. Pooja patted Anu's shoulder for support.
"Do you want to get fired?" Pooja hissed at her standing near their desk. Anu shook her head without saying a word.
"Pull up your socks! It's been a three months Anisha since and if this continues, Rajan sir is going to fire you. I've heard Mini telling people that she is going to take your promotion and your desk. If you don't care about your life, fine! But don't make me share space with that devil incarnate." Anu chuckled at her banter.
"I'm serious!"
"I am going to see Rajan. Pray for me," she saw Pooja smile back at her sympathetically.
As Anu walked into Rajan's office, he was typing on his phone. "Yes, have a seat and close the door," he pointed to the door.
"You've been one of my strongest team members, Anisha... What is happening to you?" Rajan leaned forward in his chair, holding his reading glasses in one hand.
"I am so sorry Rajan, I know I haven't been myself lately. I just need more work to distract myself."
Rajan had taken away some of the projects from under her and passed it on to her competitor Mini. She had worked so hard on those projects.
"I can't do that without you being present 100%. Why don't you take a break and come back?" Anisha panicked as the last thing she wanted to do was sit idle.
She had wasted so much time after Lavassa, most of which was spent searching for Siddharth. The only thing stopping her from entering a wild goose chase again was this job.
"No, please! Don't make me do that. I like coming to work. Please!" she begged, holding back my tears.
"Anisha... you haven't even told me why the Kanwal group broke their contract with us. Has it got to do with your relationship with Siddharth?" she inhaled sharply not realizing how much affect his name still had.
Charmi and mom had promised weeks ago that they wouldn't take his name ever again. He was going to stay dead to them.
"I can assure you it's not me. I tried to reach out to their office and the team of lawyers that handled the Kanwal group. They told me that the management had decided to shut down their Mumbai office and later handed me the liability check for the breach of contract. It had nothing to do with my personal equation with Mr. Kanwal," she emphasized.
"You should have told me about your relationship. That was very unprofessional. I was blindsided when Mini came forward with that information. My bosses think it was you who caused the whole issue."
"It was not, I promise you."
"I understand and I am trying hard to get you back in their good books but you can't go around daydreaming during meetings again. That is unacceptable."
"I get it. And I am sorry. It won't happen again"
"Get back to work." Anisha nodded and rose from the seat, realizing how much was at stake.
Thankfully, Pooja was not at the desk, as much as Anu had started to enjoy her chitchat which usually helped keeping her mind off him, she needed a minute alone to reckon her life, all the decisions she had taken in the past year. Anu had worked so hard to reach this position and she was letting him wreck her career.
Mom opened the door with a huge grin on her face when Anisha reached home. She grumbled under her breath because she could sense her mom was up to something.
"Pihu is getting married...in Dubai! Your uncle has booked tickets for us to fly out next month"
"Ma, you know I can't take a holiday again. I've already used up my vacation days this year. Why don't you go ahead," she unbuckled the shoes trying to keep a tender face.
It wasn't that she didn't want to be a part of Pihu's wedding, she honestly didn't think her current state of mind was going to be futile at a wedding.
"That's it! I let you be like this for all these months but you have to get over this Anisha! Charmi said you refused to meet her last weekend. We all are trying our best to cheer you up but how long are you going to continue to brood?"
"I didn't ask you to cheer me up. I don't need you to pity me. And what am I supposed to move on from? He never ended things with me!"
"You need to face the truth Anu! He is gone. He left you. He is not coming back. Ever!" she snapped.
"We don't know that.", she sighed feeling the jabs of the knife.
"Yes, we do. He shut down his office and didn't bother telling you he is going. If he cared enough he would have made an effort to say goodbye. Siddharth was a selfish man just like your father," mom snarled.
One drop of tear turned into a watercourse within minutes as she couldn't hold back her emotions any longer. Mom gave up tormenting her, stepping closer to cradle Anu as she wailed into her chest. His name crushed her into a thousand pieces.
"Anuu... this is not healthy. You have lost weight. You don't meet your friends, you cry at the drop of the hat. Do you want to consult with a therapist? I can ask Misha aunty if she knows someone in Mumbai."
"No..No, I will be fine."
"I will believe you're fine only if you come with me to Dubai. Or I will tell your uncle, even I am not coming."
"No, Ma, you should go. Mishu aunty will not like it."
"In that case, she won't like it if you don't come too. Please, will you at least think about it?"
"Okay, mom!" she snorted, wiping away her tears.
At the dinner table later that night, mom hesitated, "Mishu aunty sent a picture of the guy I spoke to you about a few months ago, Abhir Bala. Would you like to see his picture, for my sake?" Anu sighed in defeat.
It wasn't like looking at a picture would harm anyone so she agreed for the fun of it. Anisha watched as her mom scrolled through her phone to find the guy's picture.
"This is Abhir. He is so handsome," she passed her phone to Anu.
Anisha stared at the man in the picture and felt nothing like she was dead inside. Abhir had this rugged suave look about him, an athletic body with bearded jaw and thick hair longer than Siddharth's. Stop thinking about him.
"There is another boy, Karthik, he is from Banglore. Wait, let me show you..." she swiped to the next picture.
"Naah, that's fine. I like Abhir." Anisha conveyed.
"You really do? He is coming to India next week to meet his parent. Should I call him?"
"Yes but I have a condition. I want to meet him alone first, the family can come later."
"Done, I'm so happy that you agreed. God bless you, Anu," she placed her phone down on the table with Abhir's photo still visible on the screen.
Anisha smirked looking intently at the picture, not at Abhir but the tower that stood behind him, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai.
He might know them
***
The week past the Lavasa trip was exhausting. After many unanswered phone calls and unreturned texts, she decided to pay a visit to his apartment.
Anisha used the office entrance to see if his assistant knew anything about his whereabouts, since his office phone was going straight to voice mail.
Anisha's stomach drop when her eyes scanned the deserted office through the glass barrier, the lights were off but she could still see that the once occupied desks were wiped clean.
The door was surprisingly left unlocked so she walked over to the switchboard and flicked the lights on.
Anu headed straight to Sid's cabin but apart from some folders, all his certificates, photo frames and awards were gone.
She marched across the office, knowing too well what to expect in his apartment but she had to see it for herself.
It was a ghost town, where once there stood a bookshelf, sofa and bar, it was all vacant. The bedroom surprisingly still had the bed frame and dresser. Anu rushed to pull open the drawer, a ray of hope.
There were some documents still there in the drawer so she turned to the cabinets to find his clothes still hanging. He is still here.
Anu heard the floorboard creak in the living room, someone was lurking in the apartment. She didn't see anyone on her way in.
Maybe, just maybe it was Sid! She sprinted out of the bedroom and came face to face with the intruder. Like me.
Her eyes wide open, she felt the blood drain from her face. A cop, in Siddharth's house?
"Ma'am! What are you doing here?" the tall uniformed individual stared at her.
"Uh, I was looking for Siddharth, my boyfriend. I... he hasn't been returning my calls."
"When was the last time you spoke to him?"
"He texted me Saturday morning, I haven't heard from him since."
"How did you get inside?"
"The office door was unlocked"
"You will need to come with me to the station, you just walked into an active investigation."
"Active investigation... what for?"
"Murder..." her whole world stopped.
***
"Anisha, you're not eating anything", her mom interrupted her thoughts.
"Sorry, I was... just thinking about stuff," she avoided sharing too much.
"Did the Inspector give you an update about the case? I haven't seen anything new in the papers." Anu shook her head.
Anisha hadn't heard from Inspector Rathod for over a month now. He had said his team was going to interview other friends of Sid in town which included Charmi and Sahil, both of whom were big support for her.
Anu didn't know how she had found the strength to plaster a smile through their wedding nuptials without even a drop of tear.
Charmi had even offered to postpone the wedding for her till the case was resolved but Anu couldn't let her do that. One, she had a baby on the way and second, Charmi had been waiting so long for that special day, she couldn't let Siddharth ruin that for her.
It was as devastating for both Charmi and Sahil too since they had grown so close to Sid and for him to abandon all of them without providing an ounce of closure was selfish. The least she could do was be there for their wedding with a smile on her face.
Anu caught her phone screen flickering, she saw the number and instantly knew who the call was from so she stepped away from the dining table and punched the call.
"Can you meet me at cafe coffee in 10 mins?" the authoritative voice on the other end demanded.
"I told you whatever I knew."
"Please, we found some evidence" the demure changed.
"Okay but I will be able to reach there in the next 30 minutes not 10"
"That's fine. See you there," the line went dead. That was it, that's how Inspector Rathod rolled.
The last two times Rathod asked her to meet him over the three months, she had started to get suspicious.
In fact the day she had accidentally bumped into Inspector Rathod in Sid's apartment, approximately a week later, she received a bouquet at work with a note that stated, 'Watch out'. It didn't have a sender name similar to the bouquets she had received previously on two separate occasions.
Inspector Rathod placed 3 evidence bags in front of her in the cafe. Is this legal? Anisha looked at them intently but didn't say a word.
"Did any of these belong to Siddharth?"
"Where did you find these?"
"I ask the questions, Ms. Rai."
"You told me last time that Siddharth had left the country, he could be anywhere, Dubai, UK or America! How can these be his then?" She raised her eyebrows.
"That key fob," he pointed to the first plastic bag, "We found the VIN for the associated vehicle. It's a keyfob for a BMV, registered to the Kanwal's. Didn't you tell me he drove one?" She nodded to confirm.
"So are you saying Siddharth is still in Mumbai?" she felt her heart race.
Rathod banged the table in frustration causing some of his coffee to spill, Anisha sat still not flinching a muscle.
"Why don't you get things into that pretty head of yours. Siddharth is not in Mumbai! Someone probably has stolen his car or had access to the keys, we are investigating this."
"Who does that belong to?" She pointed to the gold cigarette lighter in the evidence bag.
"I was hoping you'd know something about it. Did Siddharth smoke?"
"No... but I mean there are clearly a lot of things I didn't know about him."
"Clearly...Well, if you remember anything, you have my number." he gathered the evidence bags into a folder.
"For your own benefit, stop hoping he'd come back because if he did and you get caught rendezvousing with him. That will be illegal, you will be deemed an accomplice, you do realize that, right?"
"Illegal like sneaking evidence outside the station?" she was treading dangerous waters but she brazenly smirked at Inspector Rathod.
"Tell that to the parent's of Neil Alluwalia, who's son was brutally murdered by Siddharth."
He threw some cash on the table and started to walk away when Anisha yelled something he couldn't hear so he turned to face her again on his way out.
"Allegedly, you forget to put the word allegedly before the crime. You're still investigating the crime, Inspector Rathod. You're not the court of law." she crossed her arms as he stormed away.
Anu picked up a relatively old newspaper copy of the Mumbai Mirror in the newspaper stand beside her table.
Her eyes landing instantly on a picture, a face she had fallen in love with last year. Below which was the photo of Neil Alluwalia and his father, Sidhesh Ahluwalia, a Member of Parliament in Dehli.
The controversial headlines in bold letters stated- MP's son found murdered in hotel room registered to Dubai based Company- What really happened?
Anu sighed. Did she really know Siddharth that well? She knew that he disliked Neil for dating his sister but was he capable of a heinous crime like murder?
Anisha had seen those sweet brown eyes turn red when beating the crap out of Aman. Was that an isolated incident or a pattern of behavior?
The only thing she knew for a fact was, who that gold lighter belonged to. She hid that information from Inspector Rathod because she wanted to speak to that person before Rathod or any policeman did.
Anisha believed that he'd know what really happened in that hotel room on that fateful day. Sid had requested him to watch over his sister Shanaya when he was away with her in Lavassa.
Dharam was the key to solving Neil's murder and he would know if Sid was involved.