by M. V. Kasi
He went closer to her. “I’m not trying to judge you for what you want to do to him. Hell, I wanted to destroy him from much before for what he did to you. But, I can’t let you do something that is irreversible. You could get arrested, and sent to jail for taking law into your hands.”
Sia looked crushed and disappointed as she heard him trying to talk her out of whatever she was planning out of sheer rage and helplessness.
“You think they don’t deserve to get punished for what they have done?” she asked.
“They deserve to suffer in the worst way possible, Sia,” he said with an edge to his voice. “But it should not be at the risk of you getting arrested.”
She didn’t reply.
“For god’s sake, Sia!” he shouted, shaking her once. “Don’t do anything rash or stupid. We have a daughter! We are a family now. Think about us!”
She didn’t look at him. She stared at the floor. “I can’t give up,” she whispered in a hopeless tone.
He then knew that the beginning of a very rocky patch ahead had already started.
CHAPTER TWENTY NINE
A week had passed since the child trafficking bust. Sia was seated at the police station to give another ‘statement’ of what she had seen that day during the child trafficking bust. Usually Ajay or one of her vast legal team lawyers should have accompanied her. She was told that Judge Sundaram wanted to meet her, and he would do it if she came alone.
And so, she did. She was sitting in front of Judge Sundaram, along with a police officer and a lawyer.
“I told you before that you can’t do anything,” said the judge. “And also that the world works that way.” He sighed. “I forgive you Mrs. Manthena. Only because of your uncle. Also because we are of the same status and level. We all need to work together. Why do you want to rock the boat for a few filthy kids that nobody wanted in the first place?”
When she didn’t reply, he broke into a small fleshy smile. “You need to be careful, you know. I heard you have a beautiful daughter.”
Her breath caught in her throat, but she remained silent.
“How old is she?” he asked. “Less than a year I assume. A few more years and she’d be... just right,” he taunted.
Sia felt the walls closing on her when he spoke of Anika that way. The fact that she was at a police station where criminals should have been locked away, instead of threatening the witness— further added to the feeling of claustrophobia. Everything was fading around her. Shrinking, condensing. She wanted to scream and punch the animal in front of her. She wanted to tear out his face, and throw him on the floor, and stomp on his head until all that was left of him was left a bloody pulp.
But she stopped herself.
“For god’s sake, Sia! Don’t do anything rash or stupid. We have a daughter! We are a family now. Think about us!”
Ajay’s words rang through her mind. She knew what Ajay had said made absolute sense. He was being practical and reasonable.
The only problem was that those things were also killing her quest for retribution.
Someone cleared their throat noisily, interrupting her murderous glare and thoughts. It was the police officer, who was obviously on the judge’s payroll. “Mrs. Manthena, we called you here to speak with you personally. There was obviously a misunderstanding on that day. Please—”
“What about the other evidence that was presented?” she asked in a chilling tone. “The bank statements with transactions made to Jagadish Naidu from him.”
Judge Sundaram’s lawyer frowned and shuffled through all the bank statements and other information that linked most of the people to Judge Sundaram. “This isn’t exactly evidence,” he said. “All this proves was that there were a few check deposits made into Mr. Jagadish Naidu and his son’s bank account every month. The fact that some of those people, in a very roundabout way are known to Judge Sundaram is merely a coincidence. You must know that most of the elite are known to each other in the city.”
“What about the missing children?” she pressed further.”Don’t you think it’s strange that the missing children’s cases spiked over the last few years in the city? And even the children in the orphanages who were supposedly adopted, couldn’t be traced?”
“I assure you, Mrs. Manthena. We have our best officers looking into this matter. But at present, we want to tell you that there is no connection to those missing children to Judge Sundaram or to Mr. Jagadish Naidu.”
“Find all the adopted children from Naidu Trust over the past few years and I’ll withdraw the case,” she said.
“We don’t have the resources to do something like that,” the officer answered.
Sia knew she was wasting her breath demanding answers from the officer in front of her. The asshole must definitely be working for them.
“Mrs. Manthena, let it go,” said Judge Sundaram. “Like I said, spend time with your family. Don’t waste your time for a bunch of nobodies. I wanted to tell the same to your husband. But he seems to be quite a hothead.” There was another fleshy smile. “I really like Ajay. I’ve met him a few times before. I would hate anything happening to him or your beautiful daughter,” he said.
* * *
The next few weeks were devastating. Not only did the news channels dig into her murky past, but they made out her uncle seem like some sort of misunderstood hero.
She didn’t care what people thought about her. However, she couldn’t bear the thought of her uncle being hero worshipped blindly by his followers even though he was caught red-handed and there were videos of him being present in the party.
“We have been living in the same village as him for over thirty years now. Not once had he made an overture against any woman, even though many tried to get his attention. How can such a person abuse a child?”
“He has a son! How can a man who has intimate relations with his wife be a pedophile?”
“Jagadish Naidu is God! He has saved so many children from being abandoned. How can such a person ever abuse and then sell a child as a commodity?”
“It’s definitely a conspiracy from that ungrateful lying niece of his. We all heard from her ex-husband about how she was a drug addict who slept around with several men. The poor guy even told how despite her cheating on him and dumping him after their marriage, he still came back for her all the way from Boston.”
“She’s greedy that woman. She wasn’t satisfied with the money her adopted mother left her. She wants to grab the Naidu Estate too. And in the process, she chose to defame her own uncle.”
“It’s also been confirmed that Mrs. Sia Manthena, formerly, Miss Sampath was a troubled child. She was diagnosed with being delusional, having hallucinations and also to being psychotic.”
“She is definitely a psycho! Have you seen her face in those videos? When she confessed that her uncle used to abuse her as a child? She gave me the chills with her blank expression, and eyes devoid of any emotion. That’s not how a person behaves if they were a victim.”
“Yes, Mrs.Manthena does portray the symptoms of a psychopath,” said a so called noted psychiatrist that has never even met Sia. “Compassion, happiness, anger. She is incapable of experiencing any true human emotions. She can only just mimic those she observed once in a while. She is also quite skilled at identifying the weakness of her victims, the way it suits her purposes. She knew her uncle loved to save downtrodden children. So she used it to falsely accuse him and his friends of being child abusers.”
Sia was more than just angry. Nobody even for a moment thought through any of the junk that came out of their mouths. There were some half-hearted discussions on the news about how a typical pedophile and their victims behaved. People just refused to listen to anything negative against their favorite leader.
“Is there some kind of list with behavioral rules that victims need to follow, so people are satisfied that they are ‘acting like victims’?” Sia raged when she spoke to Dr. Patel.
“No,” Dr. Patel replied.”Everyon
e copes differently.”
“Apparently, I’m a psychopath. Because I didn’t show enough reactions on my face.”
“You aren’t the psychopath here, Sia. Your uncle is,” stated Dr. Patel. “From what you have told me so far, and from what I’ve learned about human motivation and experience, he fits the profile perfectly. Despite his lack of conscience and lack of empathy for others, he is quite good at fooling others. And for typical pedophiles, having any kind of conscience would deter them from abusing.”
“There are clear proofs with videos. But no one is willing to doubt his innocence.”
“Sadly, there are many such cases. I’m sure some of his supporters will continue to invite him home and leave their young children alone with him.”
Dr. Patel was right. During the following days, her uncle’s supporters grew in size.
Sia was fed up and felt let down with how things were proceeding. Each day, she withdrew to herself. She longer wanted to speak with Dr. Patel to find any kind of logic or reason towards the things happening around her.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Several weeks had passed since the child trafficking bust. Ajay worked constantly with the legal team, leaving no stone unturned. Each time, they thought they could file charges again, they hit a dead end. He was frustrated. Not just with the way things were proceeding, but also with Sia.
She stopped showing interest in the investigation. She became a shadow again. Going through the motions, with a vacant look on her face, lost in her own world.
Maybe having Anika with them would have taken out some of the emptiness inside her, but she insisted that Anika remain with Jo for safety purposes.
“Sia,” Ajay called out to her one night after finishing another long call with the legal team.
She didn’t respond. She continued staring outside the window.
“Sia, look at me,” he demanded.
She turned and saw the frown on his worried face. “Why are you not talking to me? Tell me what is happening with you,” he demanded.
“I’m fine,” she said in a calm, vacant voice.
“You are not fine. You are holding in everything.”
“I said, I’m fine,” she repeated.
“No. You are not fine. If you were, then you would be speaking to me. Be involved in some of the decisions I’m making with regards to the legal team.”
She looked away from him and stared outside the window again. “I just don’t care anymore Ajay,” she said.
That made him angry. He held her shoulders and swung her to face him. “Don’t feed me with bullshit. You care. More than anything. In fact you care so much that it is breaking you inside.”
That made her angry. “I’m not breaking. And instead of leaving me alone, you are the one forcing me to break right now.”
“You have been breaking down for a while, Sia. It started the day your uncle was released from the jail. You are forcing yourself not to feel any anger or hurt at that verdict. And you pushing me away or presenting a barrier between us is proof to you breaking down.”
“Leave me alone. I’m fine,” she snapped.
“No. You are in denial. I can see right through you.”
“Don’t push me, Ajay,” she warned, pissed that he could see right through her and wouldn’t leave her alone.
“I will push you, until you agree to get back to the living world again.”
She held a stony look on her face.
“You have been living like a ghost these past few days. Simply existing,” he said. “I left you alone initially thinking you needed time. But it has gone long enough.”
“What do you want me to do? I’m right next to you all the time. Every morning and night.”
“Yes, you are next to me but you are not really there. Do you think I don’t know that you don’t go to sleep during the nights? You are lost somewhere deep in your mind, hiding from the reality.”
She responded by glaring at him.
“Talk to me!” he demanded.
“Is it just talking or have you been missing something else?” she spit out. “You are just pissed off because I would lie next to you on bed each night, but I wouldn’t let you fuck me anymore.”
His eyes flared and pulled her close. “Let go!” she shouted as he held on.
“You think this is about my ego?” he asked. “And all because I am not able to have sex?” He was fuming with anger. “If I wanted to, you know damn well I could have had you anytime.”
That made her furious because he was right. All he had to do was touch her, and she would be panting for him, begging him to take her, until he wiped away everything from her mind. That was one of the main reasons why she had been staying away from him. She wanted to continue to hurt, and keep everything bottled inside before it destroyed everything around her.
Pushing his hands away from her, she ripped open the side zipper of her dress, and let it drop. She tore the hooks off her bra and threw it away. Then, she pushed down her underwear to stand naked in front of him.
“Take me now,” she taunted. “However you want and how many ever times you want. Maybe that will stop you from badgering me any further.”
His eyes remained on her face, and he looked infuriated. “Stop being in denial. You know damn well, it’s not just your body I want. Without you being present, I have no use for your body.”
Her face fell at his words. She looked away from him, feeling ashamed.
“I am present,” she whispered.
“No. You are not, Sia,” he said with frustration.
She slowly raised her head to look into his eyes. For the first time in her selfish state of grief, she noticed how exhausted he actually looked. She hadn’t even considered what he had been dealing with over the past few weeks.
“I can’t face the reality, Ajay,” she confessed softly.
His hands held her face. “You can. I need you to try, baby. If you keep it all in, you are going to snap.”
She stood quietly, not saying anything for a long time.
Soon, his hands dropped from her face, and he looked at her for a few seconds before walking away from her without another word.
She didn’t try to stop him.
She let him go.
She sat down on the floor, naked and shivering. Leaning against the wall, she bent her head over her raised knees, willing her mind to clear up.
She thought through what she had to do.
Outrage and fury with her uncle and his cohorts, fought alongside sadness and longing for her husband and daughter.
But soon, fury took over.
She had mourned her childhood the way no other child should ever have to do. She had allowed the retribution to dominate her existence, giving her the will to survive. Without that need for retribution, she would be consumed with fear for her family and loss of control.
Right from the beginning, that had been her choice. The choice, she would now take up.
She could begin implementing her plan for retribution once again but there was one more critical thing left to do. The right thing to do. To compensate Ajay for what she had put him through.
The very thought of it, almost broke her.
CHAPTER THIRTY ONE
“Why?”
That one little word from Ajay held anguish and anger.
Ajay stood near the doorway of their bedroom, waiting for an answer.
“I want a divorce,” Sia declared in a quiet voice, not quite meeting his eyes.
He took long, quick strides and stood right next to her. “I understood that as soon as I received those fucking papers you sent through a lawyer to my office,” he growled out. “What I want to know is why!”
“I’m signing away all the rights to our child. Anika will remain with you and—” she broke off.
“Me and who?” he demanded.
“Whoever you decide to marry or be with. I’ve already opened a trust on our daughter’s name and gave you complete access to use it.”
&nb
sp; He kept his eyes on her. “You want our daughter to be taken care by me and who?” he demanded again.
“Does it matter?” Sia asked softly.
“To you, obviously.”
“No. It doesn’t,” she lied.
“I saw the date, Sia. Some of those papers were prepared a month after you recovered from the coma. You already knew you wanted to leave me and our daughter.”
Sia was quiet. “I’ve always known. Even before our marriage. I just changed the terms and conditions recently. Now, you’ll have complete custody of Anika.”
Her words were not a surprise for him. When they got married, he knew she had planned to leave him at sometime. But after spending time together as a married couple, and after what they had been through, he had expected...
He had expected bloody miracles apparently.
Ignoring the pain, he continued pressing her for more answers. “Who do you think I should be with?”
“You already know.”
“Say it! I want to hear it from your mouth.”
She looked at him. This time along with pain, there was regret in her eyes. “I’m sorry, Ajay. I can’t be someone I’m not.”
“I’ve never asked you to be one either,” he said angrily.
“I love Anika, but she’s better off with someone like Jyotika as a mother. I’m not a good role model for her. And I can never be one.”
Ajay watched his wife in disbelief.
This wasn’t the woman he knew and loved desperately. This was an entirely different woman. The woman he knew was bold, and could make decisions based on her ever present cool. This woman looked heartbroken and insecure while spouting nonsense.
“According to the will—” he began, pushing everything else from his mind other than fighting for them. “—we are supposed to be married for at least a year after our baby is born for you to claim the Naidu estate,” he said.
