6- It's All About Vengeance

6.

 

“Payback’s a b***h” Mrs. Rehman grumbled, her shadow rising from the dark. “Isn’t it Ross?”

“Amila?” Ross sighed, out of breath and tired

“Yes, it’s me. Your mother-in-law” she continued

“The darkness, you see, is not just around us. It’s something that also grows within”

She slowly started walking towards Ross as she spoke, a mischievous smile delineated something malevolent she might had been up to

“It is not what it seems, Ross. The faith is now shattered. The faith we had in you”

“What are you talking about?” Ross whispered as his heart-beats kept fluctuating.

Amila reached the spot where Ross was tight down. She bowed her head and added

“You can pretend all you want to, Denver. But I am sure that deep down inside you know all about it. Our concern is about your next move because you always have something crazy going on in your mind, Don’t you?”

“Where is my son?” Ross ignorantly interrupted.

“Ah! Love…It’s a many splendid thing”, Amila sighed with a wicked laugh, turning towards Eliza.

“Let me get straight to the point. Your son is safe but I am afraid not for long. You have two options. It’s either your wife or your son”

“It is your decision to make, Denver. It’s your choice” She whispered.

“You can either take your son with you or can have a nice life ahead with your wife”, she added.

“How could you do this to your own daughter?” Ross asked when all of a sudden Amila started laughing wickedly as the sound of her laugh could be heard all over the warehouse as it echoed all the place over. She abruptly stopped with a wide spread smile on her face and began talking

‘She is not my daughter’

 

Learning that Eliza was’nt Amila’s daughter left Ross in an extreme state of bafflement. He looked into Amila’s eyes with distrust.

“Yes, you heard me. She is an orphan who was adopted by my f*****g idiotic husband”

She looked away at the ceiling in exasperation as she continued to speak.

“That son of a b***h thought he owned me but who is dead now?” she continued as she turned her gaze again at Ross. 

“Anyways let’s come to the point that concerns you, Ross” Amila said.

“Just so you know I am not that vicious. I am going to give you some time to think because you know I want you to feel the humiliation I have been through just because of you”

Amila walked away as she talked. She walked towards Eliza who was silently crying, and stroked her hair. Ross was now convinced the woman was delusional. He felt his knees go weak just at the thought of the situation he found himself in.

Ross looked into Eliza’s weeping eyes with kindness, trying to assure her that they would get out of this mess.

“You will get my message for our next meeting spot” Amila lastly added, as she disappeared into the shadow she had walked out of.

“See you soon, Mr. Denver”  

Ross’s gaze remained on Eliza as it was intolerable for him to see her in such a desolated situation, and the pain he felt became one with the disappointment he had in himself, for not keeping his promise, for not being able to get his family out of trouble. 

A loud blow rendered him unconscious again, throwing him into the sullen darkness. Eliza’s desperate face would be the last image on his mind.

 

Detective Vaughn had now reached Beaver Creek road with Allison. He parked the car in front of Denver’s house on the common road.

Allison took out her gun and followed Vaughn as he made his way directly to the main door of the house. He quietly peeped inside through a glass window from the front porch, but there was not much to see due to the problem of moisture recurrence on the glass consistently persisted as the frosty morning has already begun to indicate a snow storm. He looked around and recalled the morning weather forecast. A snow storm was on the way. Great weather to go man hunting, it seemed.

Vaughn rang the doorbell expecting Ross to come and greet him. But after a few minutes of silence, Vaughn assumed he was absent and he decided to break in; even though he knew he shouldn’t be doing that. He needed Allison’s help to break the door open. They were sure about something wrong but neither of them said anything. Instead, they kept themselves busy in a hassle to find him for that very moment…

Vaughn did not mention anything about what had to be done once they found Ross, and neither did he justify their action, since they did not have a search warrant yet, but that was one of the special traits about our foolhardy Vaughn that always managed to keep him on the papers’ front page.

In spite of all this being illegal, Allison positively nodded as an adrenaline rush shot through her body in anticipation of what was to be unveiled. She thought that maybe the curtain behind the whole mystery that was cooking up all of this time was about to be brought up. She vigorously took her position along with Vaughn, and awaited his signal to trigger the move.

He began the counting after Allison placed her gun back in the concealed pouch attached to the belt of her uniform trouser with a nod to indicate Vaughn for starting the count.

He counted down and then they broke into the Denvers’ place keeping in mind their synchronizing scheme. They both pushed themselves toward the door in heartiness together with each other hitting the door with their respective shoulders which resulted in a well-disposed upshot.

Apparently their shoulders were strong enough to break the lock of that wooden door in their foremost attempt.

 

Allison kicked the door fully open while taking out her gun. She was the first to her step inside the house in order to see if the coast was clear keeping her gun forward ready to confront any danger. They walked through the whole house, searching for anything that was suspicious.

She was looking for something that could be useful in their case. Meanwhile Vaughn was checking out drawers and shelves.

Vaughn was wearing a mink collared fox fur jacket which he removed and hung it on a coat rack right near the staircase. He then followed Allison into the hall…

Soon enough a white envelope on the center table caught Vaughn’s eye. He slowly walked over to see what it was about. Just like Ross did, he looked all over the envelope to discover if there was any stamp or code that could lead them to the sender but also in vain.

Without taking any longer, he looked into the envelope to detect the content but unluckily it was empty and proved to be the unhelpful evidence.

Vaughn by that moment was very curious to find out the contents of that envelope as his instinct suggested it to be a useful link in this baffling case.

On the spur of the moment, he heard Allison calling him near the window. He found her with a diary in her hand that she was observing carefully.

 

“You must see this, Detective” she offered the diary to Vaughn so that he could examine it.

The cover page of the diary read: “A Forgotten Sin” and the name of the writer. The name that was either about to entangle the mystery in an all new distinct way or it was about to unfold some hidden cards. Engraved on the cover page of that diary in golden-colored letters was a name that he was by now, so familiar with. The name was Ross Denver.

Vaughn looked Allison in the eyes and handed her the book.

“Keep it with you, Allison. We are going to need it”

“Sure Detective” Allison accepted the diary with her left hand as her right hand was already busy holding the gun.

She continued to explore the house for some reference to any identity about Ross Denver, Detective Vaughn decided to take a round upstairs.

He took the wooden staircase that cracked with every step. He reached a hallway on his left with two rooms on both sides and one room straight ahead.

“Now that’s a bit spooky” he thought, as the lights dimmed as he entered a corridor. It felt almost too silent.

He decided to check all the rooms one by one in an orderly fashion.  He carefully opened the door to the first room on his right, where discovered something rattling strange for a bedroom.

Reviews

[Prritiy]

He decided to check all the rooms one by one in an orderly fashion. He carefully opened the door to the first room on his right, where discovered something rattling strange for a bedroom.

wow! intense!

best wishes

[Talal Hussain]

That is a wonderful write Gaurav...keep up the good work :-)

[Gaurav Walia]

Thank you so much, pal.