Walking towards Shekhar, I whispered, “We have found the body of Ansh Awasthy”. I expected him to wipe his sweat, cry his heart out and speak the truth but ground swept off my feet, when he uttered, “How?”

Raman Gupta, who was beyond frustrated by this point, glared at me and hollered, “You cannot harass me and my brothers by dragging us in this murder case”.

“Sir, I have proofs”, I challenged him and gestured Radhika to begin our next part of plan.

It was the spirit of Ansh Awasthy who spoke, “Papa, someone tried to kill me”.

Randhir Awasthy wiped his tears and whispered, “Ansh, how are you child?” while Atharv mirrored the same expressions but the Gupta brothers lost color of their faces.

I could hear faint voice of Shekhar chanting Hanuman chalisa while Raman Gupta mumbled, “How can he be alive?”

I glanced at Priya who had stoic expressions on her face. I could not understand what was going in her mind.

“Is Ansh alive? Is he fine?” Atharv bombarded me with these questions and I hated myself for reviving the hopes of Awasthys. Thankfully, I was not forced to lie.

It was Raman Gupta who mumbled, “He cannot be alive. I killed him myself.”

“Why?” I asked getting worked up while Rahul and Mr. Rai stopped Atharv Awasthy who was ready to lunge an attack on the Gupta brothers. No doubts, he was blinded with rage.

“Because he had made my life a living hell. I could not breathe freely. His incessantly callings was killing me every now and then. After the so-called break up, he was calling me three hundred times a day. I was frustrated with his harassment.” Priya shrieked in despair.

“You witch!”, Atharv howled at her while Mr. Rai questioned, “Why did not you visit the police station? Why did not you lodge a complaint against him?”

Letting out a sardonic laugh, she muttered, “Do you think I didn’t?”

“When he was after my life forcing me to talk to him, I visited the Women Cell where they judged me to be a characterless woman. I was forced to be friends with my stalker because of this law and order, sir.” Priya shouted in agony glaring at Mr. Rai.

“On my birthday, he forced me to spend my day with him only to ruin my life more. Just because my senior colleague wished me on my birthday, he stole my phone and abused my senior. The next day, I was homeless and jobless but my complaint was not even registered. The policemen blamed me that I was throwing myself on him.” Priya screeched with tears in her eyes.

“I never threw myself onto him. I was not a characterless woman. I had my self-respect which was brutally crumbled by Ansh Awasthy and police was never there to help me.” Priya yelped as she broke down in front of everyone while Mr. Rai had his head hung in shame because he too, knew that police officers in the city judged victimized women every now and then while men were never judged even when they were the wrongdoers.

“I am sorry that you had to face all this because of my son but why did you kill him?” asked Randhir Awasthy wiping his tears slowly.

“She did not kill Ansh", spoke Prem Gupta for the first time.

“Then who killed him?” I bellowed at him. He looked at Raman Gupta who gestured him to keep quiet but Prem had made up his mind to speak the truth.

“I met Priya one day outside the police station when I had visited to bail out my friend. She was crying incessantly. When I asked her she did not tell me anything but after a while, she narrated how Ansh Awasthy was harassing her. I found a sister in her and I decided to help her.” Prem revealed leaving all of us shocked.

“When you met her?” I asked.
“In the month of November when Ansh was calling her at least three hundred times a day and she refused to talk to him and tell her whereabouts to him. She tried to register a complaint but police officers were already paid to not register the complaint.” Prem answered. “I asked her to contact Shekhar who in turn, asked her to talk with Raman bhaiya”, Prem told taking a deep breath.

“I lied to you, Mr. Mishra. She did not review our restaurant. She met us to share her problems.” Raman Gupta spoke guiltily.

“How could you decide to help a stranger? What if she lied to you?” I asked glaring at him.

Raman Gupta chuckled lightly, “I investigated everything at my end. When I realized that Ansh was harassing this poor girl, I despised Ansh. I asked Priya if she was okay with me killing him and Priya was shocked. All she said was that she wanted to keep Ansh away from herself.”

“We are businessmen”, boasted Varun. “She paid us ten lakhs by selling her jewelry to keep him away from her and we found an impeccable way to do that”, he revealed earning a glare from his brothers.

“From that money, you bought the Renault Kiger, the lost car", I spoke connecting the dots to which Raman glanced at me with disgust in his eyes.

“The car was never lost, right", I demanded to which he nodded.

“Where is the body of my son?” asked Randhir Awasthy while Atharv was too shocked to react.

“We disposed it", spoke Shekhar.

I walked towards Shekhar and hollered, “Tell me the truth".

“No", Raman warned and my subordinates trapped Raman and other Gupta brothers preventing these culprits to run away. Radhika checked upon Priya and once I was sure that no one was running away, I smacked Shekhar and bellowed, “Speak up!”

😎😎😎

Word count : 974

Hi everyone

So, I am excited to know what Shekhar has to tell.

Killing was not the option!

I am posting the final chapter soon, stay tuned.

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With immense love
♥️