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Word count - 4845

Song - Back To Black | Amy Winehouse |

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09 | The King's Woman

Karim knocked twice on the magnificent Brazilian Rosewood door. On the far right corner of the door, there it was—on the pristine white-washed wall—an attestation of his distinguished feat.

Printed in bold, black, and capital letters on a golden nameplate was the testimony of his mighty presence, a sign of the power he exerted over the minds and conduct of the people around him.

A faint yet firm word of affirmation resonated behind the doors. Stepping aside, Karim turned towards her, and then, with a bow of his head, he gestured for her to enter inside.

Taking two steps forward, she nodded and then adjusted the crisply ironed pallu of her navy blue linen saree.

With a deep breath, she rotated the door knob with the cold fingers of her slender left hand, gave it a miniscule push, and then entered inside. In a matter of seconds, there was an instantaneous shift in the aura of her surroundings.

Closing the door behind her, she stood firm, her back ramrod straight. If the term 'aristocratic' were to be a place, it has to be this place—this office that belonged to her husband—because this place screamed old money, it screamed of the powerful influence that the Dogra clan has had over the years.

The energy around her was intensely calm and refined yet so potently autocratic at the same time—so assertively commanding—like the man she was married to.

With his shirt sleeves rolled up to his Herculean upper arms, his right oxford-clad foot crossed over the other, he was sitting on the royal brown settee, which was perched up on the right side of the dark imperial oak wood tiled floor, his specs-clad eyes focused on the Bhagavad Gita in his hands.

"Keep your tote there on the table." He signalled with the thick index finger of his left hand while inserting the prayer bead-like bookmark back inside the holy book with his right hand.

Acknowledging his words, she walked towards the table, which was set down on the far front of the office. She could feel his presence just behind her—every step that he took was in sync with every beat of her heart.

Tak-tak, tak-tak—lub-dub, lub-dub—

She kept her tote on the table, turned around, and then stood up straight, crossing her arms across her chest.

Dark brown eyes collided with midnight black ones. Arms crossed across their chests, back upright, they stood in front of each other with a respectable distance of one metre between their shoes clad toes.

"Now---" A pregnant pause: "What is the problem, Hinduja? What is this entire issue about?" His words were crisp, concise, and clear.

"Sahu; Chittaranjan Sahu is the issue."

"Sahu? Sahu, as in, that illegal mining kingpin?!" His visage displayed the blatant shock he felt.

"Yes, the same Sahu. Remember? You were talking about him with Joseph Bhai the other night when we met your friends for dinner." Slightly leaning back her waist, she caught hold of the paper weight kept on the table nearby and said, "It's him." His gaze shifted towards her svelte fingers, fiddling with the paper weight, the dial of her analog watch glimmering under the LED lights on the ceiling.

"What has he got to do with all of this?" He asked, taking a step forward.

"His men have been tailing me for eight days now." Shifting her attention back from the paper weight, she looked straight into his eyes.

"What the fuck! Why?!" He, who had practised his ever-so-calm and composed demeanour all his thirty-two years of life, suddenly banged his fist furiously on the table. "And why the f*** haven't you informed me about this entire fiasco till now, woman?!"

In an impulsive fit of rage, he picked up the bone china vase kept nearby on the side table and smashed it to the floor, breaking it into pieces—its sharp shards gleaming on the floor of the well-lit room.

Eliminating the gap between them, he held both of her elbows in a painfully unyielding grip. She hissed in pain yet stood deadpan, eyes sharply locked with his own, blatantly courageous in the face of calamity—not an ounce of trepidation visible in her inky globes.

"EIGHT DAYS! Damn it! EIGHT. FREAKING. DAYS?!" Violently shaking her arms, as a result of which her entire body shook, he roared stentoriously, "And you didn't even think of informing me about this?! Do you even understand the gravity of this situation, Hinduja?! ANYTHING! DAMN IT—ANYTHING. COULD. HAVE. HAPPENED. TO. YOU!"

Eyes scarlet and ablaze, his hefty and robust physique tensed, the man looked a living embodiment of everything evil.

"Tone. your. voice. down. Dogra Sahib." The power dynamics in the office were thrown out of equilibrium in a trice.

"HINDUJA—!" A thunderous command rolled off the man's tongue.

"You didn't hear me, it seems." She paused, deadly still. "I repeat, tone. your. voice. down." Her inky black eyes, sans any form of terror, still unflinchingly latched to his chocolate brown ones. Standing upright—stance unequivocally erect, feet spread slightly apart—she held her hands behind her back with substantial effort, for her upper arms were still in the tight grip of his sinewy hands.

The lady in navy blue stood fiercely tall despite the towering height of her spouse.

"Now, listen to me and listen clearly, Mr. Dogra—point number one—you have every right to fight with me, question me—we both do. We both have the right to confront each other and quarrel with each other, for we are married and we are each other's spouses. Every married couple has issues; hence, every married couple has fights too. We come under the same domain, so we as a couple are no different. Verbal spats are never a problem, but physical hurt—" She paused and pointed her eyes towards his sturdy, ring-clad fingers holding her elbows in a painful grip, and then directed her gaze back to his eyes. "Physical hurt will never be an option. No—never. I will never tolerate that nonsense. Retract your hands, now." Her soft, level headed, yet razor-sharp words echoed in his office.

As if washed down with the ice-cold water of realisation, the man immediately retracted his hands away from her arms with a jerk.

"Coming to point number two. I am your wife, your woman. I want you to know this fact: every word that comes out of my mouth, every action that I carry forward with, has valid reasons behind it, so unless and until I commit a grave mistake—something absolutely pathetic that is—you. don't. have. the. right. to. disrespect. me, nobody does. If you have any problems with any of my decisions or any issues regarding matters involving me, you can peacefully confront me. Together, we'll sort out the issue, and I assure you of that. But aggression, yelling, hurling out abuses at each other, breaking and destroying inanimate objects around you—" She paused and pointed her index finger towards the vase on the floor—completely broken and shattered. "These types of utterly irrational behaviours—they are never an option. I won't. tolerate. them—have I made myself clear?"

As if suddenly getting out of a daze, his shoulders slacked, eyes fixated on the bright red thick finger marks and bruises slowly forming on the supple skin of her upper arms—courtesy—his discourteous animal-like behaviour, shame engulfed his entire being as Mahadevan Dogra finally nodded—his eyes glossy.

Her entire framework immediately softened as she slowly sensed the remorseful aura around him.

"You might have the entire Dogra empire, all your people, and half the GDP of this nation under you—but not me, never me. Talk with me as a man of honour talks with his woman, as a king that your people address you as talks with his woman—with utmost respect. Nothing less, nothing more." She corrected the sleeves of her blouse, raised her hands up, and cupped his cheeks. "Okay?" Puissant yet soft, she now sounded as gentle as a spring breeze. The warmth of her hands on his cheeks slowly relieved him of his inner emotional upheavals.

"I am sorry."

"It's alright." She stood up on her tippy toes and held both of his bulky shoulders in her warm and gentle grip. Tilting her chin up, she tenderly kissed him on his forehead.

She had never been this close to him.

If this sudden gesture of hers shocked him, he didn't show it in his demeanour.

He gave in slowly, tenderly, completely. He just gave in to her serene warmth.

A week full of her silence, the egregious distance between them, and then the unexpected discovery of her being in danger for the last eight days—that glaring cognizance of the fact that he might have lost her?

All these factors together took a toll on him, and he burst out.

But nothing could justify his actions from a few minutes before.

He slowly felt her withdraw her lips from his forehead and stand back on her heels.

"Now, if you have cooled down, can we talk properly over there?" Rubbing his solidly built back with her left hand, she pointed the index finger of her opposite hand at the royal brown sofa set far in the right corner of his posh presidential workspace.

"Alright," he replied back with a nod.

Two minutes later, they were comfortably settled on the sofa, sitting adjacent to each other.

A tilt of his chin, and words started flowing out of her mouth.

"It was around two years ago—when I got my first posting in Khorda, Odisha—my home cadre. Everything was pretty much going smoothly. A month later, in July 2021, a senior of mine, Prabhakaran Iyengar, got posted in the Keonjhar District of Odisha as the new District Collector; his family stayed back in Chennai though." She paused with a sigh and then rubbed her palms together. "Prabhakaran sir, was an absolute Braveheart, a man of courage. Nothing, absolutely nothing, could stop that man from fighting against what was morally and ethically wrong."

"Was?" He already guessed what was to come next, but he still wanted to clarify.

"He is no more." Her misty eyes were focused somewhere else, at a distant locus, gazing at nothingness. "He; Chittaranjan Sahu killed him."

She exhaled.

"Keonjhar—well, activities of the Left Wing Extremists are pretty much a recurrent thing in that district. In those extreme conditions of terror, Sahu somehow caught hold of some confidential information that disclosed the fact that there were colossal iron ore deposits in parts of the Singhbhum-Keonjhar-Bonai belt. And then came COVID; that treacherous man was basically served with the best chance of his life on a golden plate. The locals all blindly trusted him, for he would act like their messiah in broad daylight and then kill them in the pitch-black darkness of the night. Anything or anyone who jeopardised his position or plans—he or she would be found dead the next day. In between all this, he contacted the mining mafia Guru Surya regarding the illegal mining of the iron ores. Eventually, they joined their forces." She coughed a bit.

Mahadevan poured her a glass of water from the jug kept on the centre table. Taking a few sips, she kept the glass back on the table and said, "Thank you."

He nodded.

"Unknown to Sahu, Prabhakaran sir planted one of his informers in Sahu's gang. Slowly but steadily, with the help of that informer, Prabhakaran sir started gathering information about all of Sahu's illegal activities, including the mining issue. Maybe he foresaw it, I guess, but one fine day in December 2021, at midnight, I got a scheduled email from Prabhakaran sir's private email ID. Pictures, videos, root maps, and a document of five hundred pages—every last bit of information regarding all of Sahu's criminal activities, especially the mining fiasco plan that he was soon going to execute with that bast*rd Guru Surya. Initially, I was confused. I mean, why would my senior send me information about criminal activities in an area that didn't even come under my domain? I was a Sub Collector posted in Khorda, and he had sent me information about Keonjhar?! But guess what information I got the next day!" A mirthless chuckle escaped her lips as a thin layer of sheen coated her eyes.

"He was dead." He completed her sentence while rubbing her right shoulder as a comforting gesture.

"Bingo!" She snapped her fingers.

"Those dogs—those money-hungry dogs—staged his murder as a COVID death case!" A single drop of tear slithered down her pearly left cheek, which she promptly wiped off with the edge of the saree's pallu. "That entire group of corrupt officials, basically Sahu's lap dogs, successfully covered up Prabhakaran sir's murder and convinced his family that he had not informed them of him catching COVID because he thought that they would get worried, unknown to the fact that Prabhakaran sir had already left behind traces for me to follow. The scheduled email that was sent to me from his email ID had disappeared from his email history altogether. Most importantly, he had called me the previous day using his Burner phone, and during that three-minute call, he recurrently repeated one sentence in between our conversation: It's high time, Hinduja, now I pass it over to you."

"Even after continuously asking him about the meaning behind his words, he just laughed it off. Moreover, he didn't tell me anything about him catching COVID. And the fact that he called me with his burner phone was already odd for me. All his emails, call logs, and information stored in Google Drive—everything was deleted as per what my informant told me. Eventually, as I started investigating and went through all that data that he had emailed me, I got the entire picture clear. Sahu had brutally killed not only Prabhakaran sir but also that informant whom sir planted in his close group of right-hand men. All this time, I have been working on this case in hiding."

"It's you. You were the one who leaked all that confidential data to the I.B.M. and E.B. C.I.D. anonymously, weren't you?" He asked.

"Yes." Her one-word reply was absolutely clear, concise, and to the point—just like her personality.

"And if I am correct, both Sahu and Guru Surya are still unaware of your involvement in this? And both of them are still searching for the officer who unearthed their plans. Isn't it?"

"Yes, again." Scratching her forehead, she continued, "Chittaranjan Sahu, at the current moment, is not someone we should be worried about. It's his nephew, Kalkinath Sahu, and that dog, Guru Surya, obviously. Chittaranjan is in prison, currently awaiting a death sentence. Kalki, on the other hand, is a hundred times more dangerous than Chittaranjan. After Chittaranjan's arrest last month, Kalki has been basically gathering intel about every other bureaucrat posted in all thirty districts of Odisha in the last four years. Just recently, his henchmen started digging up information about me, but I must say, he is smarter than his idiot of an uncle."

"How?" He cracked his finger joints.

"Rather than asking his men to physically follow all those officials, he has basically fixed trackers in our officially authorised government vehicles, which again means there are black moles in the organisation itself. Bakhtawar discovered the chip attached to my vehicle a day after it was fixed to the back seat of my car. Thankfully, in those twenty-four hours, I had used that vehicle only for a site visit."

"Who is Bakhtawar?" He couldn't help but hide that edge in his tone.

"Who is Karim?" Instead, she threw back a question at him with a smirk tugging at her lips.

"You know him, wife. He is my most trusted aide, the head of my private security force." He couldn't help but chuckle.

"Likewise, Dogra sahib, Bakhtawar is my most trusted aide as well—an ex-serviceman. He was not appointed by the government; though, Vijay Bhai set him up for me." She replied back.

"So he knows? Vijaypath Bhai knows everything." Mahadevan couldn't hide the incredulity in his voice.

"No. I stopped Bakhtawar from informing him. Gosh! I know my brother, as calm as that hooligan appears from outside, he is a hot-headed donkey. Only God knows what he would have done!?" She refrained from even thinking about her brother's reaction.

"How did Bakhtawar find the chip, though?"

"That man is sharp, Mr. Dogra. Had it been one of those government-appointed bodyguards, let alone finding the G.P.S. tracker, none of them would have even guessed that I was being followed! But not Bakhtawar, though. He knows his business well." She proudly boasted.

He cleared his throat. "Okay, enough of that. Tell me one thing: where is that chip now? If it has already been removed from your official car, where is it now?" He adjusted the rolled-up sleeves of his shirt while gazing at her. "Because if it stays stationery at one particular site for too long, they might start suspecting you again."

"Valid point—which is exactly why I asked Bakhtawar to get it fixed inside another government vehicle and you know, it's funny how that man literally takes an empty car for site visits just so that the tracker shows an active movement in locations—this way, none of Kalkinath's or Surya's henchmen are now suspicious about me. I am off their list, as per our informant."

"Smart." He gestured her a thumbs up while smirking.

"Oh, that I am, but I still can't let my guards down, though." A soft yet thoughtful expression emerged on her face. "Believe me, Dogra Sahib, I have never really cared about my safety. I practically grew up in a family where dying for just causes—achieving martyrdom for the welfare of one's nation—was a common occurrence. But, for the first time, I was scared, and I am still scared to take the next step. It's not you I am worried about; it's neither our parents nor my brother; it's my child, my Anirudh. The moment his face flashes in the deep corners of my visual memory, I feel like leaving this entire fight behind, leaving everything behind and rushing back to him, hiding him in my embrace, and keeping him away from all things evil in this world."

The tender look in his eyes only intensified for her. Thinking about her thoughtfulness, she was amazed at the magnitude of her love for Anirudh.

"Both sides of our family are always heavily surrounded by guards—yours with the ones you have appointed, mine with experienced ex-servicemen assigned by my brother. Coming to our siblings, my brother has his own team of security officials surrounding him; Aridaman Bhaiya and Nirjhara Didi stay overseas. And you—you practically bring an entire entourage of those men in tailored black suits, along with yourself—no matter wherever you go, plus you have Karim Bhai. Secondly, you all are adults. Though a bit hesitant, I am not worried about any of you, but Anirudh? My blood dries up the moment I even think of him in any sort of dangerous situation." She articulated softly, "The day we met your friends for dinner was exactly the day one of our whistleblowers provided us with the intel that Kalki is spying on all those officials who were posted in Odisha in the last four years. Bakhtawar checked all my belongings thoroughly for any bugs, and we did find one—in my official car. We removed that chip and attached it to that other car. And exactly that evening, when I was coming to the hotel, Bakhtawar called me to warn me that there might be spies following me around. I had an intuition that there weren't any, but still, as a preventive measure, I immediately booked the dining room 11B, which was right in front of room 11A, which was booked by you for the get-together. I used my maiden surname while making the reservations instead of the surname 'Dogra'. Somehow, I dodged the CCTV cameras in that corridor and entered 11A. I was worried that if someone was following me inside the hotel, they might eventually find out that I am married to you. Not that it would cause any danger, as they still don't know that it was me behind the recent arrests of Chittaranjan Sahu and his men, but still, both of our professions have one common factor involved in them, Dogra sahib—powerplay. And amidst this entire battle of power, I don't want my Anirudh or our families to be in danger."

He just kept looking at her.

"You underestimate your husband too much, dear wife. Nothing, absolutely nothing, will happen to you, our child, or any of our family members. I won't ever let that happen. Kalki and Guru Surya have already sealed their own fates. Forgive me, for I am not as rule-abiding as you, wife. They had the audacity to follow my woman; the King's woman. Now, they should be ready for what's coming next for them."

And there it was, that chilling, lopsided smile of his. It lowkey scared her. It seemed dark, and those eyes appeared almost psychotic, as if in a trance, gazing at the distant nothingness.

He slowly directed his eyes back to her, and in a split second, his expression returned to the same one as before: gentle and tender.

Coming a little closer, he traced her eyebrows with his left-hand thumb, and just seconds later, she found his lips attached to her left cheek.

Eyes widened; she tried to stand up with a sudden jerk, yet was pulled back by him with force. It was comical to see her getting flustered and bashful.

"Calm down Inu; it was just a cheek kiss. Married couples do much more unholier things than this." He teased her, "Moreover, you too kissed me on my forehead some time back—didn't you? So, equal-equal, okay?" He asked, raising his eyebrows.

"What unholy? Nothing unholy. Mr. Dogra, Can we talk about the main business, please?!"

His uncontrolled laughter echoed in his colossal professional space. It dawned on him that unnerving his wife's ever-so-composed demeanour was his new favourite pastime now.

"Dogra sahib, enough now!" Rotating the Sankha adorned around her wrist, she directly locked her eyes with him and said, "Enough of me answering your questions. Time for the tables to turn now."

His chuckles stopped almost immediately. "What?"

"Ask your man to be a bit more discreet." She folded her right leg over her left one, her posture absolutely presiding and serious.

"Which man?" He tried to be as calm as possible.

"That idiot who follows me around the whole day."

"No, I have no idea about this. Just how many people are following you around, wife?" A nervous laugh left his lips.

Play it cool. Play it cool.

"Cut the crap, Dogra Sahib." Her stance was dead serious: "I know that you have put one of your security men behind me. That nincompoop follows me around the whole freaking day."

A sigh of resignation left his lips.

This was it.

"How?" He exhaled. "How did you know?"

"Correct me if I am wrong, but you put him behind me from the following day of our first meeting? Didn't you?" She asked.

He nodded open-mouthed. "But how did you come to know that someone was following you?"

"It was not difficult; that fool of yours is quite a fashionista. I must say—but then again, I think he doesn't wash his clothes regularly. I mean, come on! That idiot wore the same black Saint Laurent jacket for three consecutive days." She clapped her hands while giving a comical expression: "I caught him on the fourth day itself, but I didn't let him know that a poor guy would have lost his self-confidence. Anyway, while following someone, a spy has to be as undetectable as possible, even in regards to the clothes he or she wears. And he literally wore a luxury brand jacket while tailing behind me; obviously it would attract attention. What an amateur!"

"What the fuck! You fox." He kept staring at her—just how observant was this woman!? "But tell me one thing: you noticed that he was following you because of his jacket but how did you deduce that it was me who put him behind you? It could have been anyone. Why did you think that it was me?"

"There were three factors that gave you away." She cracked the joints of her fingers. "Number one was his clothes. No roadside hooligan or gunda from a local political gang would wear clothes from an expensive brand while following someone because they just don't earn that much money from their unethical escapades, but he did, which clarified the fact, that, financially he was well off—he earns a really good amount. Number two: He changed his mode of commutation, that is, his bikes, every day. Together, these two factors cemented my doubt: He was not some local hooligan, but a well-trained and well-paid man working under the instructions of a power much higher in the hierarchy, and immediately your precious face like a bolt of lightning flashed in front of my eyes."

He couldn't help but chuckle. "And the third factor?"

"Oh, the third one? Nothing much. I asked Bakhtawar to tail that idiot while that idiot was tailing me. And then one fine day, at around midnight, Bakhtawar saw him entering the premises of the Dogra Corporation. That's it; I immediately knew that it was you."

"The fuck! What in the freaking Sherlock Holmes was this, you fox!? And Gurung—that bloody idiot!" He felt like scratching all his hair out.

This woman knew everything. freaking everything!?

She was sharp-witted.

And that got him hot, bothered and hard. Again.

He adjusted his pants.

She laughed.

"Inu?" Calming down his senses and hormones, he called out her name.

"Yes?"

"You won't ask me, why did I put him behind you?" He asked her thoughtfully.

"Dogra sahib, I trust you, and I think I recognize your psyche as well, maybe not completely, but I do." She gently took hold of his hands. "I know that you don't come under the category of those men who constantly suspect their own wives. Your intention behind this was pretty much clear from the very start. You wanted to ensure my safety, didn't you? That man, Gurung, is one of your personal security officials, right?"

"Yes." A soft smile embraced his lips. "How? Just how do you understand me so deeply?"

"I observe and analyse things much faster than most people do, Dogra sahib."

"Yeah, whatever!" He flicked her forehead. "Acha suno—one more doubt, okay? Gurung has been following and providing protection to you for almost three months now. How come he never saw Bakhtawar with you? As per him, you were always travelling alone with one of those government security guards with guns. He never saw you with anyone else. How?"

"Vijay Bhai chose him as my aide for a reason, Dogra Sahib. And as I told you earlier, Bakhtawar knows his job well, but he keeps a low profile and mostly stays at his own residence or sometimes my office. He is not my bodyguard who has to follow me around wherever I go; he is my most trusted aide. His job is to gather all the risky information, and he does it efficiently."

"Okay, I get it now, but I am sorry again, Inu. I should have told you about Gurung earlier on. I thought you would deny any form of security assistance from my side, and I was just worried about you." He said this while tracing the lines on her palm.

"I am not an unreasonable fool, Dogra Sahib. I know how things work out in our world. Your concern for my safety was justified. But, please, do inform me about such things next time."

In a flash, she found herself on his lap, in his tight yet comforting embrace, the difference in their body sizes clearly visible. As a form of reflex action, she tried to get up almost immediately.

"Don't." He clutched her waist even tighter, his face in the crook of her neck. "Stay—just stay like this for some time, please." He whispered softly in her ears.

She hummed.

Moments of peaceful silence followed as a week worth of distance was extinguished.

"Inu."

"Yes?"

"I want you safe, please. You might never be cautious about your own well-being, but I am, and this entire case you told me about is dangerous—menacingly life threatening even. Chittaranjan Sahu is still in prison, but Kalkinath Sahu and Guru Surya are not. Let me help you out, please." Face still in the crook of her neck, he voiced out whatever was going on in his mind.

After thinking about his suggestion for a few seconds, she replied back.

"Let me manoeuvre through this situation on my own, Dogra Sahib. In case I need your help, I'll definitely tell you."

He sighed.

"Alright." His hold around her torso tightened ten folds. But, please be safe."

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