vikas sinha

Crime Thriller

4.0  

vikas sinha

Crime Thriller

Chap 6 - Yellow Jacket

Chap 6 - Yellow Jacket

5 mins
175


Yellow colour symbolizes happiness and sunshine


“As much as it hurts to admit it,” Deepak found his voice, “I have to agree with Shalini. Pawan must have been coming to this house to meet his lady love.”

“Love?” Shalini echoed the word. “Pawan didn't know the meaning of love. Lust, yes. Love, no. An emphatic no.”

“We can find out the details of the tenant,” Vipin suggested. “Before jumping to the conclusions, let us first get our hands on all relevant information.”

They retraced their steps back to Shalini's house. Shalini had to call some of her friends before she could find the number of the owner of the house numbered 7/2D. A short call later, they were in the possession of all the details of the tenant.

“Pawan rented it in his name,” Shalini knocked her knuckles on the notepad on which she had noted the details. “He must have taken it for Jia.”

“Pawan's assistant?” Deepak looked surprised. “Why would she rent an apartment here? Didn't you tell me that she lived with her parents somewhere far away from here?”

“Her parents live about an hour from here,” Shalini replied. “It is far off from here and it would be awfully difficult for them to meet in her parent's house so he must have rented a house here for their dalliances.”

“Hang on for a goddamned minute,” Deepak raised his voice. “Jia doesn't have green eyes.”

“That's true,” Shalini replied. “But she wears contact lenses. Arranging for a contact lens to make your eyes green is no big deal for her.”

“You don't even know if that is true,” Deepak pointed out. It made no impact on Shalini.

“Every time they would arrange for a rendezvous,” Deepak tried again, “Pawan would first make Mohan come here ostensibly to play a game of chess. Then Pawan would rush out to meet his paramour. Soon he would return and then Mohan would be allowed to leave. Why would he do all this? Just to keep his wife unaware of his affair? It doesn't make sense to me.”


“Why?” Shalini asked back. “It makes all the sense to me. He didn't want to go to the hotels. That's always a bad idea. Taking a house for rent is such an easy solution.”

“Why would he take a house for rent so near to his own house?” Vipin shook his head. “A cheater would try to keep his paramour away from his wife.”

“True for normal people,” Shalini sighed, “but not for Pawan. He never cared for my feelings. And I never cared enough for him to throw a tantrum at his affair.”

Vipin felt as if Shalini was lying to herself. He had noticed how angry she had been on finding out that Pawan had taken a house on rent.

“Jia brought the black rose that evening, didn't she?” Vipin asked Shalini who nodded once.

“Was she devastated when she found out that Pawan was dead?” Vipin asked her. “Did you get a chance to look at her reaction?”

“She was with me when we broke the door,” Shalini replied. “Both of us saw the body at the same time.” She shuddered once. “I don't really remember all the ghastly details but I don't think she wailed or screamed. My initial feeling was that of alarm but when some time had passed, I began to feel relieved. It was as if I was suddenly free from all the shackles. I felt as if I was waking up from a very bad dream. It is impossible to tell you about my feelings. I do recall that Jia sat on the sofa after coming out of the room. She seemed perturbed but she didn't shed any tears or anything. At that time, I thought of her as Pawan's colleague and her reaction seemed proper to me. Now that I know that she was Pawan's lover, her reaction makes no sense to me. She was not upset at Pawan's death but she didn't feel relieved either.” She took a breather. “The first time I met her, I was left very impressed by her vivre de joie. She had an easy smile and it sat very well on her face. That day she had put on blue contact lenses and was wearing a yellow jacket. She looked really pretty and I felt jealous of her. I complimented her on her jacket and she actually blushed. She told me that she loved the sunshine and hated the rain. I could see that Pawan was totally smitten with her but I could also see that Jia had no interest in Pawan. Over the past few months, I have met her many times. Once she made me walk for 20 minutes under the bright sun and it gave me a terrible headache. Then there was this one time when we had gone to a restaurant to celebrate Pawan's birthday and it had started to rain while we were inside the restaurant. Jia had been regaling us with some anecdote but the moment she noticed the rain, she fell silent. Pawan then remarked that the rain evoked bad memories for her.” She looked at Vipin. “I asked him then about it. How did he know that Jia's bad memories were jogged by the pitter-patter of the rain? He sputtered but couldn't tell me. Jia squirmed out of it by talking about the beautiful sun hiding behind the rain clouds. I thought of it as very pretentious of her but I dropped it. I should have persisted with that line of questioning but I didn't. Oh, I am really stupid.”

“We need to speak with her,” Vipin suggested.

Shalini gave a call to Jia and put the phone on speaker mode.


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