Sector 5, Nehru Marg, Shiv-Shakti Apartment. Flat 5 had a dim light on. Samuel Fernandez lived here with his aged parents. His father was a retired bank clerk, and his mother - a housewife. There was an elder sister too but Darsh didn't know much about her.

What he knew was that someone was texting his wife. Someone from her past who was either close to her or wanted to get close. They had some information that they wanted to leverage. To what end, he did not know but he intended to find out. He needed to act fast, and what better place to start than this boy who already had a lot to explain?

He watched as Sam climbed down the stairs, one step by one, leaning on his crutches. He was out of plaster but the limp was clearly visible.

"Good to see you recovering," Darsh commented as the boy hobbled closer. "I take it you know why I am here?"

"Yes." Sam gave a nervous nod, then met his eyes. "I...knew you would come one day. But you are late." A moment passed in silence. Darsh bristled.

"Care to elaborate?"

"I mean your culprits are gone. They left Delhi the day you got married."

*****

The tranquilizer worked. Well... sort of. Her head felt heavy but sleep would not come. The room was hot, her pulse rushed erratically as she sat up on the bed wiping her face.

It was past two in the morning. By now Sam would have started talking. Everything would come out, everything, right from the first moment she set her eyes on them. Or rather they set their eyes on her as she finished the race that morning and plodded with Aron back to the enclosure.

She still remembered that day. It was beautiful, so clear and bright with a cool spring breeze weaving through the woods. If someone had told her that day that it was the start of her doom, she would have laughed them away.

"Congratulations, Di. That was an amazing win!" Balbir had greeted her as he walked Grandpa Raisingh's mare to the stalls. She smiled at him and got off Aron to give him a much-deserved nuzzle when there was a clearing of a throat from behind.

"Indeed it was spectacular, Ms. Sharma. But then it's to be expected from a magnificent rider such as you." She turned to find a group of young men standing a few feet away. Four of them precisely, near Mohit's age if she was correct. Their leader came forward to shake her hand and the look on his face told her he was no Mohit. This was a man - a properly grown, experienced man. His face broke into an oily leer as his eyes ran down her body. A weird unease ran down her spine.

"Thanks, but I'm sorry," she raised her hand covered with Aron's dribble to indicate it would not be a pleasant handshake. To her surprise, he didn't budge. He shook her hand anyway, for slightly longer than necessary, his grip slightly tighter than she was accustomed to.

"I wonder if you would consider giving riding lessons to... my friend here." He pulled forward one of his friends who looked alarmed.

"Ajay... please. I don't want to. I don't like horses..."

"All the more reason for you to get the lessons, Vicki." Ajay slapped his shoulder and turned to her. "So what do you say, Ms. Sharma? It would be great to do a few lessons with you. And that would give us an opportunity to get better acquainted."

She refused politely and left there as fast as she could. Something was off with that man. The way he controlled his friend - Vicki, and he did look like Mohit - told her it was better to stay away.

But the next day Vicki himself approached her. This time he was accompanied by Sam who looked more like a friend and less like an overgrown bully.

"Please. It would be a great help. You see, I have been wanting to learn to ride, my older brother is a pro. But for some reason, I can't even get in the saddle. I am just too scared." Vicki pleaded and she found herself agreeing. There was something endearing about this boy. He looked genuine, a little shy yet eager to learn. And the amount he offered would be a good addition to her hospital fund.

The lessons resumed and she soon relaxed. It was only Sam and Vicki who attended lessons while the other two preferred to watch from a distance. They laughed and mocked when the boys made mistakes. Aditi was irritated. If they thought it was a cool way to impress her, they were sorely mistaken.

"Why do you let him bully you?" She had asked Vicki once during one of the lessons. Ajay was sitting in the viewing gallery laughing his head off as Vicki struggled to control his horse.

"Oh..it's just his habit," Vicki waved it away. "He is my childhood friend. He is not that bad."

She had shrugged and put it off her mind. Thinking back now, she knew it was a big mistake to ignore her intuition. She should have paid heed. She should have listened to the whispers of fate warning her off.

*****

He was late. Maybe by three months. He should have been here the night he realized his wife's innocence. He should have been here the day he had planned his course and offered Balwant Sharma his business proposal.

A lot had happened since then. Time had taken its own course. He had lost his opportunity to act and now he was reduced to being a mere spectator.

"Please, Sam," Darsh couldn't believe he was begging. "No more games. I want the truth - what happened that night, how it happened, why did you and Vicki not do anything to stop it..." He rambled on haphazardly as his head started pounding. Sam's words kept pummeling his brain - He was late. His culprits were gone.

"That night...we climbed up the mountain. The mood was somber. Ajay was agitated, frustrated at losing his chance with Aditi. He had already finished half a bottle. Paddy kept teasing him, adding fuel to the fire."

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"We reached early and set the camp. Ajay kept drinking, finding faults, and snapping at us at every opportunity. Paddy too joined him and I and Vicki ended up doing all the work."

Darsh listened as if it was a story with some new characters. The Ajay he knew did not drink. He was a sober boy. Yes, a little boisterous and a fitness freak too, but still very much sober.

Paddy - Darsh realized he didn't know much about him. He had joined the group sometime in their second year in college. The son of a powerful local corporator, Paddy was obviously more 'worldly', and knew a lot of things, probably having been there, done that. Darsh hadn't paid much attention. He was busy in his own life - work, work, and more work. With Ananya gone, he had a big void to fill. Come to think of it now, he realized he had missed a vital part of his brother's life. Was that when the equation began to change?

"We set the camp early and started for the sunset point. That was when we saw Aditi. She was looking after the horses while her friends walked ahead to watch the sunset."

*****

A twig cracked behind her and she turned to find Ajay a few feet away. His face was flushed, eyes red. Aditi put it down to the red gold of the sinking sun.

"Hi Aditi," he said after spending the first few seconds roving his eyes up and down her. She felt her hackles rising.

"You! What are you doing here? I thought your holiday was only for two weeks?"

"Tonight is the last." He kept staring. "We came here camping. And look at our luck - here we meet again." He kept staring and her blood boiled. Of all the people in the world, she had to meet this lech.

"Okay then. Have a nice time. I have to go now, my friends are waiting..." she turned to leave when shot forward and grabbed her hand. It was then that she smelt the whiff of liquor. Disgusted, she tried to shirk him away but he didn't move an inch.

"Listen Aditi. It's my last night here. We may not meet again. Why not spend some time together so we remember each other forever?" She stared at him in confusion.

"What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean Aditi. You have known it since the day we met. Please. No one will know. I won't tell anyone. And we'll be gone tomorrow. Just a night Aditi, just a few hours. A couple would suffice..."

She didn't know when her hand landed on his face. He stumbled backward in surprise, nearly hitting a tree.

"Get lost, Ajay. And leave as soon as possible if you know what's best for you."

She returned to her friends in a huff without sparing him another glance. Her friends didn't notice, probably they too put her red face to the sinking sun. It was now glorious orangey-red, as if molten gold flowed from it, submerging the mountains in its lustrous haze. She began to settle but ten minutes later Vicki approached.

This time all her friends witnessed it.

"Aditi, please. Ajay loves you. He'd been in love right from the day he met you. Please at least give him a chance. At least consider his proposal..."

She listened to him as her face drained. She had considered him a friend. A close friend, nearly her brother same as Mohit.

"Do you even know what he is asking?"

"Whatever it is, just do it Aditi. Please. Or..or he would..." He looked pathetic as he blabbered shame-faced. Bile rose to her throat as her respect for him plummeted to rock bottom.

"Just leave Vicki. Just leave and don't show me your face again."

*****

Sam sighed as Darsh looked aghast.

"So Vicki proposed her on behalf of Ajay? And that was the 'confrontation' you told me about?"

"Yes. Vicki begged her but she was furious. She told him to get lost and decided to leave with her friends. Vicki returned with the news and that made it all even worse. Ajay looked craven as if something snapped inside him."

"That was when he hit me first. He kicked me in the shin and I fell to the ground. Vicki tried to interfere but Ajay had lost it completely. He pushed Vicki and he fell, hitting his head on a rock. For the next five minutes, he stayed disoriented. I scrambled up to help but Ajay and Paddy didn't let me. Sometime later when Vicki was awake, they started beating me again. They would only stop when Aditi came. Or they would continue until...until our holiday was truly over."

"I don't believe this. Ajay would never do this. He can't be this insane..."

"He was drunk. Angry. Frustrated. Paddy too egged him on. They wanted to teach her a lesson. They both were beyond reasoning."

Teach her a lesson. Yes, that sounded familiar. He too had wanted to do just that, after believing the garbage these 'boys' served him that night in the hospital. How gullible he was, how blissfully out of touch. No wonder these boys had taken him for a ride. He pressed his lips and gulped down the acid rising to his throat.

"So...Vicki called Aalok's phone?"

"Yes. He said I was injured and needed urgent help, which was true. She came, as he knew she would."

The rest he knew. She had struggled, screamed, begged, and beseeched. But no one listened. No one came to help her in that dark forest. The sun had set long ago and there was no one around for miles. Even the animals had decided to stay hidden on that vicious black night.

"They...they silenced her by shoving a bin bag over her head. When she still struggled, Paddy used a broken bottle to paralyze her completely. After that, there was no sound. She went sort of...limp. They dragged her to their tent and..."

Darsh opened the car door and staggered out to puke on the pavement. In the silence of the dark night, his retching sounded like the last scuffle of a dying man. He stood on the cold pavement catching his breath, clearing his face, wiping the tears and muck. Five minutes later when he got back in he had barely any strength left.

"I don't know what happened after that. Both I and Vicki were nearly passed out. A few hours later we were woken up by shouts in the woods. The goons started thrashing us and we scrambled to get away."

It was difficult to evade their pursuers. The woods were dark, deep, and deadly. But once their survival instinct kicked in, no hurdle was great enough to stop them. They managed to reach the fork where their car was parked. Somehow they managed to escape, only to go over a sharp edge.

The rest was history. They returned to Delhi in a rented car. Paddy had made a call and it came to pick them up. He then asked the driver to scamper off as he took the wheel himself. Vicki was bleeding and they made a detour to the village clinic to sort him out. But the damage was severe. The doctor asked them not to waste time and get him to a hospital.

There was a hospital in Rajpur but Paddy and Ajay decided not to go there. Staying here was not an option, the goons might come back. And going back to Delhi meant going back to Darsh Rathore who would skin them alive. They needed a plan. An excuse to cover it all and put the blame on someone else.

That's when the plan formed.

"Let's just say it was Vicki. He fell in love. He confronted her and raped her when she rejected him. That way Darsh won't be able to point fingers at us." Ajay threw them a calculating look. "And I don't think Vicki would survive to tell the truth. So we are safe."

"But that's a lie." Sam protested unable to hold his tears. "Why not just say we got into an accident on our way back? Why drag that poor girl into this, have you not already punished her enough?"

"She is no poor girl," Ajay snapped. "That bitch is too rich, too arrogant for her own good. And what I did to her was just her punishment for rejecting me. This one is to send those goons after us. Letting Darsh Rathore go after her would be a fitting answer. The bastard dog would do a better job than those goons she sent after us."

The car was silent as they contemplated this. 'Letting Darsh Rathore go after the girl' had many implications. He might kill her, he might maim her. He would not rape her, he was too honorable for that, but he would do much worse to avenge his brother.

"And what if... he falls for her?" Sam voiced his doubt. "What if she tells him the truth?"

"That will never happen," Ajay said shrewdly. "He is still hung up on Ananya. And our princess is too proud to share her shame so easily."

***** *****