Lost Girl, page 23
‘Then Anurag called me one night. He said he had located Megha and Vaishnavi in Mumbai. He told me to stay put in Delhi and that he would figure out how to get them out of the place where Tushar had people holding them hostage. But I wasn’t waiting around for someone else to find Megha. I told Yug I had information that Megha could be in Mumbai and asked him to stay back in Delhi. I thought I could protect him , but he insisted on flying to Mumbai with me. Still I kept things from him. Like meeting Anurag, because I was sure the family was following my movements. It was evident in the continuous threats I was getting.’
She looked at Yug, sitting silently beside her. ‘I thought if they did not know you were with me, you would be safe.’ ’
Yug looked back at her with sadness in his eyes. ‘If only you had … had told me all this, then.’ He exhaled deeply.
She put her hand on his and gave it a tight squeeze. ‘I’m sorry. Truly sorry. But the things I found out, I was scared for you. This was our mess and I was determined to keep you away from all of it. You don’t know how many times I have regretted dragging you into this. Look at the mess it’s made of your life.’
‘I’d have died for you, Kiara. Didn’t you know that?’ he said. She brought his hands up to her lips, kissing it. ‘And look what that’s got you,’ she said tearfully.
He said nothing. Just put his hands around her shoulders and pulled her in, pressing his lips against her temples.
Shanaya sighed, sadly. ‘I guess I realised my mistake soon enough.’ she continued to Aiden and Namita. ‘When I met Anurag in Mumbai, he told me he had a plan to break both Megha and Vaishnavi out of the house where they were being held prisoners. I did not know Yug had followed me and my guess is Tushar’s men too must have been on our tail because they followed Yug and the attack on him was the first warning. They told me they had left him alive and in the hospital. I should take him and leave. When I reached the hospital, I realised how near I had come to losing him. The police had registered a false case of drunk driving when it was very clear he had been beaten. No amount of arguing or pleading could change that. And then in the hospital, I found out that they were drugging him instead of treating his wounds, and I had to fight to check him out. I called Anurag and we got him out of the hospital.’
‘Anurag took us to his house and his housekeeper, an old woman, helped me look after Yug. We started to treat him with whatever medicines we could get. We did not have a proper doctor’s prescription, even though I could treat him, getting the lifesaving drugs was hard. Yug needed urgent medical attention. He needed hospitalisation and I was afraid to take him to any hospital for fear that they would kill him. At the same time, I couldn’t abandon my sister and leave the country. Two days later, much to our relief, Megha and Vaishnavi had managed to give Tushar’s guards the slip and called up Anurag. We were ecstatic. Now we could leave and never look back. But there was a problem. Vaishnavi was pregnant and getting her out was going to be a challenge. She could be easily spotted. But through friends, Anurag managed to contact some guy who could get us the necessary papers.
‘Anurag had gone to get the papers ready to get us out of the country when he called to tell us he was being followed. The guy who was supposed to help him get the papers ready was dead and Anurag was being framed for the murder. The next four days of our lives were the most harrowing. Anurag was chased all over Mumbai by the police and had to keep moving from one place to another to stay alive. On the other hand, we were being continuously harassed by Tushar’s goons. The men would keep calling us up spewing hate and telling us what all they would do to us. At nights they would rattle the doors and windows of the house. We were cut off from the world, scared with little or no rest with a half conscious Yug and a pregnant Vaishnavi. Just when we thought that this nightmare would never end, Anurag contacted us again, through a friend, Cyrus, from his neighbourhood.
‘The neighbours had been warned not to offer us any help and the presence of the police and Tushar’s men had scared off even the bravest of them. But somehow Cyrus had managed to convince one of the neighbours who had an old sick relative to help us. On the pretence of an ambulance for him, we managed to escape. Even then there was nowhere to go. Not in the city. We made a run to the next city, Pune. Cyrus, was our only lifeline in a hostile city. He assured us he would get Anurag to meet us in Pune and then we could plan our next move. But we never reached Pune. By then Yug was delirious with fever and pain. And to add to our woes, Vaishnavi’s water broke even though she was still six weeks before her due-date. I guess the stress got to her. The driver of the ambulance took us to a private clinic at a nearby village. The staff there was easily bribed not to report anything and we admitted both Vaishnavi and Yug under their care.
‘While Vaishnavi gave birth to a girl, Yug was still unconscious. Cyrus left us in a lodge there promising that Anurag would be with us soon and the driver left too as he couldn’t be away from his job for too long. Megha and I were left to deal with Yug and Vaishnavi and we were scared of talking to anyone. Thankfully Anurag did come and told us Cyrus was working to help us get the papers for us to leave the country. But it would take time as they had to take extra precautions this time.
‘We couldn’t stay in that place for too long for fear of someone alerting Tushar. Anurag came up with a new plan to hide till this storm calmed down. He told us about this place here in the hills, where he was born and assured us we would be safe. He told us that when he had still been a kid, he had wanted to become a monk. And fascinated by the stories of the monk from Tibet who had stayed here and built the Gompa, he had run away from home and tried to live like him. He had built himself a bunker and had lived in the hills for many months. He assured us the bunker was still there and no one, not even the villagers knew about it. We could hide out for some time and by then Cyrus would have everything ready for us to fly back.’
‘Wait. Why is this story of Anurag so familiar?’ Aiden asked. ‘Didn’t Nima tell us her brother…?’
‘Yes, I think so too. I just realised that. Anurag’s last name is the same as Nima’s, and his story matched what Nima told us about her brother.’ Shanaya said sadly. ‘Nima was his sister, I am sure of it now.’
‘Perhaps, that explains this then,’ Yug reached inside his pocket and brought out some photographs. ‘I found these at Nima’s house.’
‘So Nima and Anurag were trying to protect you,’ Namita said contemplatively. ‘But then what was the need to impersonate Yug?’
Shanaya shook her head, helplessly. ‘I don’t know. And now Nima is dead. Because of me.’ Tears ran down her face and she wiped them away angrily.
‘It isn’t your fault.’ Yug said, trying to comfort her. ‘I wish…I wish I had been more helpful. I wish I had been there for you.’
Aiden got off his chair and came towards them. ‘You both have to stop blaming yourselves for everything that has happened. You are not responsible. This whole rotten system is. If anything, we are to blame for how rotten everything has gotten here. This corruption, this power we give to people who don’t deserve it, we are responsible. We are the ones who should be apologising. The things that you kids went through and survived, not many people could have done that. And yet you two have persisted and found each other.’ He cupped each of their face with his hands. ‘I am proud of you both.’
Shanaya threw her arms around him and clung to him crying. ‘I wish I had met you then. I wish I had known someone like Vanessa. Then all these people wouldn’t have died.’
Aiden felt weighed down by her grief. The Rawat’s were the lowest form of humanity. They were everything that was wrong with humans. Greed and an insatiable hunger for power drove them to make a monster out of their only progeny. In spite of everything he pitied this Tushar. He did not know better. Conditioned perhaps since childhood, believing in such toxic need to conform to society’s rules of what is right and wrong for him, he hadn’t seen the life he could have lived, with the support of loving friends. He chose power and money over love and friendship.
‘I think I need stronger tea,’ Namita stood up and walked away. Aiden knew she was struggling to control her own emotions.
Nijoyee served a fresh pot of tea and Shanaya became calmer, ‘I want you guys to understand what we are going to be facing. Now that they have found us, they will not stop, until they destroy everything. Nima was the first casualty. And I am afraid Phavit will be next. He is going to come after each one of you, before he comes for me. He needs something from me and he will torture it out of me. It is what he does.’ Her voice held a tone of hatred that Aiden had never heard. He was only just now realising how much she had gone through. The physical pain and endurance of that night, when they had found her, and the pain that came later was just a miniscule part of the whole sordid tale.
‘The question was how to move Yug, who was just recovering and was barely conscious, and Vaishnavi, who was still in pain after her difficult birth, along with a new born infant, so far away. We spent hours trying to form a plan and nothing seemed right.
Then suddenly, Vaishnavi announced that she wasn’t coming with us and we were surprised. She told us that the best thing to do was for her to go back to Tushar. That way she said she could protect us. Nothing we said could change her mind. She had already made a call that would reach Tushar and he would come soon. Weighed down by guilt, she believed we were unnecessary victims of a situation she was responsible for. If she went back, Tushar would stop hunting us. All she just needed from us was to get the kid away.
She would tell Tushar and his family the kid did not survive. She told us that she had also asked Cyrus to come get Yug and move him to another location. He would be safe and it would give him time to recover. Meanwhile, she planned to contact someone she trusted in her security detail. Someone who had helped her and Megha escape from Tushar’s hold before. She told us that guy could help us get our papers ready and when the time was right we could take her daughter and fly to UK.
‘We were helpless. Tushar would soon be there. She promised Anurag she would stay in touch, so that she could update him when everything would be ready. We left. Anurag, Megha, me and the baby.’ She looked at Yug with tear filled eyes. ‘So you see it was I who had abandoned you, when you were helpless and not the other way around. I believed Vaishnavi. I should never have trusted her.’
Yug frowned. ‘I don’t remember any of it. Bits and pieces at the house maybe but nothing from the hospital.’ He said.
‘That was because you were unconscious, almost all the time.’
‘It now makes a lot of sense, though ...’ he paused frowning, as he was trying hard to remember.
‘What?’ Shanaya asked.
‘How did I get back to that hotel in Mumbai?’
Shanaya shook her head. ‘I don’t know. Perhaps Cyrus left you there, I am not sure. We fled to the mountains. Some part by train, then some parts we hitchhiked and then some by bus. Anyway we could. When we reached the Gompa, Anurag led us to his bunker up there …nearby. It was basic, but it was safe. We stayed holed up there, waiting for word from Vaishnavi . Every evening, Anurag would go to market to fetch supplies for the next day and things for the baby. He knew the tongue and shabby as we were, he would go totally unnoticed in the village. He would try to contact Vaishnavi and Cyrus and for many days we heard nothing from either of them. Winter was fast approaching and we knew we couldn’t stay there with the baby. The baby would die. We were getting desperate.
‘So we came up with another plan. Anurag’s family were still here in the village. He decided he would make contact with them. Send them to Shimla where his sister was studying. He would tell them that the baby was his and the mother had not survived childbirth and leave the baby in their care, till it was time for us to go. That way the baby would be safe and have a proper home. That morning, he stocked up on supplies for the next two days and left with the baby and his parents. That was the last we saw him.
‘Lalit came for us that night. Thinking back, I think we had become complacent. We thought we were safe on that mountain and when they came we were fast asleep.’ She paused.
‘What exactly happened that night Shanaya?’ Aiden asked.
‘When Lalit and two of his men barged in we were caught unawares and helpless. They dragged us out into the cold in our pyjamas. Lalit wanted us to tell him where Anurag and the baby were. They knew the baby had survived and they beat us up. Somehow we escaped from him and his men and reached the Gompa before they caught up with us again. Lalit gave me this, there.’ She touched the scar. ‘He beat me and then threatened to push me from the cliff. He threw me against that fence. When it broke, he caught me but left me hanging there. I think he enjoyed it. Megha begged him to let me go, for the sake of the friendship they once shared, but he kept me there and told her that he would let me go but down there if she did not start talking.
‘I guess the feeling of helplessness was too much for Megha. She did something reckless then. She lunged for the gun of one of the men and grabbed it and swore she would shoot him if he didn’t back up. It worked and he pulled me up. But instead of letting me go, he threw me against Megha and we both fell down. In the panic, Megha pulled the trigger and shot him in the leg. As Lalit fell, the other guy with him threw a knife at us and it pierced my side. We ran from them but in the darkness and in that unfamiliar territory, it was anybody’s guess where we were going. All I know is we were running downhill. Megha was convinced that there would be some human settlement in the valley and we would be sure to find help there. But I had lost a lot of blood and couldn’t go on. I remember the groove of the Devadaru trees, where we stopped to catch our breath. Megha left me there to find some water.
I think I had slipped into unconsciousness for I was awakened by Megha’s scream. I tried to find her but that night…I…I never saw her again.’ She broke down again.
Yug was there quickly drawing her into his arms, rocking her to and fro. ‘I am sorry, love. I am so sorry.’
‘I should never have trusted Vaishnavi. I should have known better.’ Shanaya was saying again and again.
‘How do you know it was Vaishnavi who betrayed you?’ Aiden asked, softly.
‘Who else could it have been? Only she knew our exact whereabouts.’ Her eyes were large as she looked at him.
‘What about Cyrus? He knew too.’ Namita theorised.
Shanaya nodded. ‘Yes, maybe, but Tushar had no reason to have connected Cyrus to us.’
‘True, then again he could have found out.’ Namita said grimly. ‘Remember, Vaishnavi risked herself to save you all. She even gave a statement to the police when you went missing. Imagine the risk she is still taking.’
‘Yes, maybe.’ She conceded. Aiden could see that she hadn’t thought about that.
‘How long have you remembered, Shanaya?’ he asked.
She looked at him apologetically. ‘In bits and pieces, since I found Megha. Then I wasn’t sure who she was, just that she was someone important to me. The story I told you about my dreams was true. It was like a huge jumble of bits and pieces of a puzzle, which I was trying to piece together. Sometimes I never knew the difference between memories and dreams. The days following it, were very bad. Headaches became my constant companion again as my mind started to open up. And now I have been having clear memories for some time. Remembering Yug was the first of my memories and I had to know what had happened to him. Yug’s mom was my way to find out and I sent a photograph of myself with the address of this place to her. At that time it seems like my way back to my past.’
‘But Yug wasn’t the first to arrive. It was Anurag. Didn’t you recognise him then?’ Namita asked thoughtfully.
‘No, like I said it was bits and pieces. I guess my memory was not so clear and since he had disguised himself to look like Yug, it confused me. I couldn’t tell the difference between my memory of Yug, the dreams that I was having and the familiar man standing in front of me. It was such a task putting the pieces together, trying to form the picture I knew was there somewhere in my memories. When I spent that day with him, I knew for sure he wasn’t Yug but I still couldn’t figure out why he was so familiar. I knew he was lying when he showed me those photographs and told me he was my fiancé. Then when I saw Yug, it clicked into place.’
‘Why was Anurag pretending to be me? And Nima? Nima was around you for two years. What were they up to? If they were just protecting you why not just contact me or mom?’ Yug asked.
Shanaya shook her head. ‘I am not sure what his intentions were. Perhaps they thought I was safer here.’
‘Maybe he impersonated Yug to gain your trust. Maybe they were planning on getting you out of here.’ Namita mused and frowned. ‘It was a dangerous game you played though. Didn’t you think about how your actions would bring your enemies here, too? Didn’t you think they may have been keeping tabs on Yug?’ Namita asked.
‘I did not know then what had happened to me, remember?’ She said. ‘Just this memory of a man I loved and even that was something vague. When I sent out that mail, I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I was desperate.’
‘Now they know we are here, what is our next move? And the baby, how safe is it now, considering they killed Nima and Anurag is critical?’ Yug asked, his eyes darting between their faces.
‘He will not harm the baby, but we can’t let him reach her either. We don’t know what they would have got out of Nima … before … before,’ Shanaya stopped, pulling in a shaky breath, and then continued. ‘That guy will do anything to get to his daughter. If I was sure he was human enough to love his own blood, I might have given her to him. But I am more inclined to agree with Vaishnavi, that she needs to stay as far away as possible from her father. He will use her as a means to impress his father about his manhood. She will face the same abuse in that household as her mother did.’ She shook her head. ‘No, we have to make sure he never ever gets to her and at the same time get Phavit out of his clutches.’
