Misc. Erotica After the Ashes (Completed)

[krish_999]

Chapter - Twelve

Madhav just stood there, stunned by Anjali's claim. Anjali knew he was wondering if she was out of his mind.
But she didn't mind. She was even more stunned by the truth, which she had found enough reasons to believe so strongly that it would take a lot more reasoning to convince her otherwise.
“What… what are you even saying, Anjali?” Madhav asked slowly, still staring at her.

Anjali took a slow breath, steadying herself before she began. “Dad, I need you to listen to me fully before you decide anything,” she said, trying to sound calm. “I’m not saying this without reason.” She held his gaze, and he didn’t look away. “Yesterday evening, when you were leaving for Lonavala, Vikram took your photo with the car.” She paused and then asked quietly, “Has he ever taken your photo before?”
Madhav thought about it.
“No,” she went on. “He hasn’t.”
She paused for a brief moment, letting it sink in.
“I can tell you why he took it yesterday,” she continued. “It wasn’t random. It was to send it to someone… to arrange your accident.”
The wrinkles on Madhav’s forehead deepened.
“You were the target, Dad,” she said, her words in a hurry. "But his plan didn’t work. You cancelled the trip… and he didn’t know that.” She waited a moment to see if Madhav was shaking his head.
“Vedant went instead,” she added quietly. “Same car. Same route.”
Her eyes didn’t leave his.
“And he became the unfortunate victim.”
However, Madhav still wasn't ready to buy it completely.
“Anjali, your theory could be wrong,” he said. “Just because he clicked a photo, you’re concluding all this? That he sent it to someone, that he planned an accident?”
He shook his head, clearly unconvinced.
“That doesn’t prove anything,” he added. “You’re connecting things that may not even be related.”
He paused, then looked straight at her.
“And Vinayak?” he asked. “Why are you dragging that into this now?”
His voice grew firmer.
“That was an accident, too. Or are you saying Vikram killed him as well… just like that?”
“No,” Anjali said, cutting him off before he could go any further. “I’m not saying it just like that.”
She took a breath before she continued. “This is not coming from nowhere, Dad. It’s from what I understood about him…last night when I was with him.”
He looked at her, confused but listening. Anjali sat down on the sofa. Madhav sat with her.
“Do you remember the last time I went to the resort with Vikram?” she asked, turning half right to face him. “On the way… that shopowner, and especially his friends… the way they behaved?”
Madhav’s expression showed that he remembered.
“After that, Vikram cancelled the trip,” she continued. “We came back. He was in a bad mood.”
Madhav shook his head this time. Anjali went on. “We thought he was being wise… not to pick a fight with those men.”
Madhav shook his head again.
“But he didn’t avoid it because he was wise,” Anjali added quietly. “He avoided it because he had other plans. Yesterday, when we went again, Vikram parked at the exact same spot.”
Her eyes were fixed on him now. “And that shop guy… didn’t say a single word.”
Silence remained as Madhav's response.
“Because Vikram already knew he wouldn’t."

"This morning,” Anjali continued, her voice quieter now, “I saw something on the news.”
Madhav watched her, still saying nothing.
“A black Fortuner… being pulled out from a fall. Two men had died. I didn’t think much of it at first. But then I checked… searched for the news again. Articles, clips… They were the same men, Dad,” she said, looking straight at him. “The ones who misbehaved with Vikram last week.”
Madhav’s face tightened.
“That wasn’t just an accident,” she added. “They were killed.”
She didn’t rush the next part.
“It happened on Friday night. The car was found on Sunday morning. And yesterday… the way Vikram parked right in front of that same café…” she said slowly. “The confidence he had… He knew they wouldn’t be there to confront him this time. Only he knew that.”
She held his gaze. “Because he had them killed, Dad,” she said. “He has someone who kills for him.”
Madhav listened carefully this time, his expression no longer dismissive.

Anjali picked up her phone and moved closer to him.
“Look at this,” she said, opening the news clips.
He leaned in, watching the footage of a black Fortuner being pulled out of the valley. She swiped again and showed him the photos of the two men reported dead.
“These are the same men,” she said. “The ones who rudely asked him to move his car that day… right in front of their shop.”
Madhav kept looking at the screen for a few seconds longer before straightening up.
A brief silence followed.
“Okay…” he said slowly. “What you’re saying… it makes sense.”
He glanced at her again.
“But even then,” he added, his tone still cautious, “how does this connect to Vinayak’s death?”
Anjali shook her head slightly.
“My deduction is not just from this,” she said. “It’s from understanding him… and then connecting the dots with what we have.”
Madhav stayed quiet.
“Vikram is not normal, Madhav,” she continued. “He’s the kind of man who will go to any extent to get what he wants.”
She held his gaze.
“Those two men confronted him. Insulted him. And what did he want after that?” she asked. “Not just revenge… he wanted to come back, park at the exact same spot, and look that shop guy in the eye while doing it.”
A pause.
“He planned their elimination,” she said flatly. “Who does that?”
Her voice sharpened slightly.
“Who, with a sane mentality, takes that kind of risk?”
Madhav didn’t answer.
“I think only someone who has already done something like this before,” she went on. “Someone who has the arrangements… the people… everything in place.”
She let that sit for a moment.
“This,” she said, gesturing lightly toward the phone, “is one piece of evidence... that he could have planned Vinayak’s accident too… even if it happened in Dubai.”
Madhav exhaled slowly, his resistance easing.
“For a man like him…” he said, almost to himself, “…it’s not far-fetched.”
He fell silent after that, his expression turning thoughtful.

Anjali watched him, and for a brief moment, something else crossed her mind - something she had heard about him.
A story.
About how he had once sent his men all the way to Africa… to track down a man, beat him brutally, and force him to apologise to his wife - one of Madhav’s own staff - for physically assaulting her.
She felt Madhav was remembering that story. Or something similar he had done in the past. She didn’t ask, though.
Anjali drew in a slow breath, then looked at Madhav.
“Do you remember what Vikram told you the other day?” she asked. “‘I’m not the kind of guy who lets go easily.’”
Madhav nodded, faintly.
“He told me something too,” she went on, “that delays irritate him. He said he prefers permanent solutions. And he has said this more than once… that he’s not the kind of person who forgets his dreams.”
Her eyes stayed fixed on Madhav.
“You know what his biggest dream was?” she asked quietly. “Me! From the day he proposed to me… the day I refused him… and the day I chose Vinayak over him… I became his biggest dream.”
Madhav looked on, silently.
“I have seen the kind of change he has gone through,” Anjali continued. “It tells me how determined he is to chase what he wants. He’s not just determined, Dad. He’s cunning. Calculative. He plans… and he executes.”
She took a moment of pause before she went on.
“He can spill blood for that. From the very beginning, he believed I belonged to him. And I can see it now… he must have thought Vinayak stole me from him. Even yesterday, he told me… ‘Once I set my eyes on something, it has to come to me.’”
Anjali hesitated for a moment before continuing, her voice losing some of its firmness.
“At the resort…” she said slowly, “he had already arranged a honeymoon suite.”
Madhav’s expression tightened, but he stayed silent.
“He told me he was ticking off things he had dreamt of… long ago,” Anjali went on. “You know we weren’t together for the first time, but this… taking me there, celebrating it like that… it felt like a box he had always wanted to tick.”
She paused briefly.
“He said he had waited long for me,” she added. “And that it hurt him… that he had to wait because of Vinayak. In fact," she paused a bit, "he has brought it up many times. About how I used to make love to Vinayak.”
There was hesitation in her mind, but she knew she needed to share more. “Vikram is very aggressive… in bed,” she said, her voice lowering. “He likes the use of mouth…giving and receiving… you know…”
She trailed off, unable to complete the sentence, her eyes fixed on the floor, unsure how to face Madhav.
Anjali’s voice trembled slightly as she went on.
“He… he made me tell him things,” she said, still looking down. “About Vinayak… about how he was with me.”
Madhav’s jaw tightened, unable to say anything.
“He kept asking… what Vinayak liked, what he didn’t,” she continued. “And I told him… that Vinayak never preferred making me use my mouth to give pleasure.”
Her voice broke at that point.
“Vinayak was like a lover to me, Dad…” she said, her eyes filling up. “The care… the affection… he never hurt me.”
A tear slipped down her cheek as she remembered.
"Did Vikram hurt you?" Madhav asked, his voice unexpectedly firm.
Anjali quickly wiped her eyes, trying to steady herself.
“Vikram…” she continued after a pause, her tone hardening, “…he’s not like Vinayak, Dad.”
Madhav watched her closely.
“He used me like an object,” she said. “Using my body… my body parts… and all the while, he kept making those comments… about how I chose Vinayak over him. I don’t know why I have let him dominate me like that… perhaps…” Anjali stopped, hesitating to continue.
Madhav noticed it. “What is it?” he asked, his voice tense.
She hesitated… then made up her mind.
“There’s something else,” she said quietly.
He watched her closely.
“Vikram… somehow knows,” she said. “About us.”
Madhav’s face went blank.
“…What?” he asked, almost in disbelief. “What are you saying, Anjali? I mean, how?”
Anjali shook her head. “I don’t know. I tried to find out. I kept asking him… but he never gave me a clear answer.”
She paused.
“He kept me confused… curious,” she added. “And in that state… he got closer to me. He used that shock… to break my resistance.”
Madhav leaned back slightly, unable to process it.
“This is not possible,” he muttered. “He must have done something. Bugged the house… or our phones…”

Anjali didn’t respond immediately.
That silence made him look at her again.
“What?” he asked. “What is it?”
She hesitated once more… then spoke.
“My Daddy knows too.”
Madhav froze again. Anjali didn't look at his face, knowing it would be too much for him. There was no need to read his facial expression. Anjali didn't have the heart.
“Manohar… knows?” Madhav asked, as if to confirm she had said what he heard.
Anjali nodded faintly.
“He was at home that night, Dad,” she said. “The first time when we…” She struggled for words to continue. “The next day, he confronted me,” she said. “He had seen me… walking out of your room… around midnight.”
A heavy pause.
“He had come out to get water from the dining hall,” she added quietly. “He confronted me the next morning. I told him it just happened accidentally, the truth as it is. I made him believe it wasn’t meant to be repeated. He tried to force me to leave you, this house, and return home. But I was adamant about staying back. I threatened him that I would end my life, but since then, he has been trying to make me move on from you. That’s how he found Vikram for me. Whenever I tried to refuse him, Daddy put pressure on me to go easy on Vikram by blackmailing me, saying he would destroy your image and reputation. I had to obey.” Anjali’s eyes were down, filled with tears, and she relived the mental agony she had buried.
“Why didn’t you tell me, dear?” Madhav asked helplessly. “I could have found a way to help you. It was my responsibility. It was my doing.”
“I didn’t want to hurt you anymore, Dad. You were all I had left to hold myself onto, to find peace. Even in my own home, my Daddy weren’t giving me that.”
“Manohar! How could I understand him!” Madhav pressed his face into his palms and shook his head. “Oh my God…” he muttered. “And he told Vikram? How can he do that?”
Anjali shook her head immediately.
“No… I don’t think so,” she said. “I don’t think Daddy would tell him directly.”
Madhav looked confused.
“But…” Anjali added, uncertainty creeping into her voice, “It is possible the information leaked from him somehow.”
“How?” Madhav asked.
Anjali thought for a moment.
“He used to write a diary,” she said slowly. “Regularly. I’m not sure… but maybe Vikram got access to it… or something like that. It's just a guess because I have no idea. I don't even know if Daddy would write such stuff in his diary.”
Anjali looked at him, her voice steadier now, as if she had already crossed the hardest part.
“He doesn’t know everything,” she said. “He believes it happened only once. That itself tells me… he hasn’t bugged the house. I told him it was accidental… that it happened just once. And I think he believed it.”
“That also explains the truth must have reached him through Manohar only. Because Vikram also has no clue about how many times we've done it.”
She paused a moment.
“But yesterday…” she continued, her voice becoming weaker, “he spoke about you too. In a very… degrading way. He was curious about things… about what I hadn’t done with you,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “And he seemed… eager to make it happen with him.”
She swallowed.
“He made me accept that what I did with you was wrong,” she went on. “That I betrayed Vinayak.”
Her voice dropped.
“He slapped me… called me a bitch… and made me accept it as punishment.”
Madhav didn’t move.
A world unknown to him was being revealed, and he was completely unprepared for it.
“I’m sure that was just the beginning,” she added quietly. “Next… he would have made me admit that I betrayed him too… by choosing Vinayak. He was brutal, Dad,” she said. “Not just physically… but in the way he controlled everything. Punishing me… using me… getting into my head.”
Anjali couldn't continue as her throat tightened. Her eyes lowered again. Madhav just waited.
“My guilt kept growing,” she said softly after a long pause. “And at one point… I stopped resisting it.”
Anjali broke down again.
Madhav immediately moved closer, putting an arm around her, pulling her gently towards him.
“Oh dear…” he said, his voice filled with guilt. “Why did you take all that? You should have told me… oh my God…”
He shook his head, overwhelmed.
“So much has happened to you because of me,” he added. “It’s my mistake.”

Anjali quickly stopped him.
“No, Dad,” she said firmly. “It’s not your mistake. It’s not mine either. It’s how Vikram manipulated me.” Madhav kept patting her arms, trying to soothe her.
A brief pause… then her tone changed.
“But his first mistake…” she said slowly, “…was when he pushed me over the dressing table. We were in a standing position,” she continued, keeping her voice controlled. “And that’s when I saw his phone.”
She looked up at him.
“A message flashed on the screen,” she said. “It said… ‘Done.’”
Madhav’s expression froze.
“From what I remember,” she went on, “the timing of that message… it matches the timing of Vedant’s accident. The accident first… the message next.”
She held his gaze.
“He stopped...I mean, whatever he was doing with me, for a second, and checked his phone, read it… and there was this look on his face,” she said quietly. “Satisfaction. I saw it through the mirror in front of me. His satisfaction was like, as if he had just executed something."
"At that time, I thought it was about some business deal,” she added further. “I didn’t think beyond that at that moment. But now… when I think about that smile… that victory on his face…”
She let the words land.
“He truly believed he had eliminated you.”

Madhav slowly got up, taking deep breaths, as if trying to steady himself.
Anjali’s eyes followed him.
He exhaled heavily and walked to the dining hall, picked up the water jug, and gulped down nearly half of it in one go.
“It’s too much…” he said, wiping his mouth when he returned. “I don’t know how I ended up so innocent.”
He let out a hollow breath.
“Feels like I’m not clever enough to survive in this world.”

Before Anjali could respond, there was a sound.
It was Shalini. She had come for the evening chores. She walked in through the front door and hesitated for a moment, as if afraid of interrupting their conversation.
Madhav immediately glanced at Anjali, then turned to her.
“We’re stepping out,” he said. “There’s a funeral we need to attend.”
Shalini nodded, then said, “I’ll just check the kitchen once… see if there are any dishes left.”
“No kitchen work today, Shalini,” Anjali said firmly. "You can leave now."
Shalini paused for a second, then nodded and left quietly.

Madhav came back and sat beside Anjali.
She looked at him for a moment and sensed it - he was ready to hear more.
She continued.
“In the morning today,” she said, “when I woke up, Vikram was in the washroom.”
Madhav listened quietly.
“That’s when I saw another message on his phone,” she went on. “‘It wasn’t him.’ That was the exact text of the message. That must have been them,” she said. “Telling him it wasn’t you who got killed… even though they carried out the accident at night.”
She took a small pause before she continued. "Remember,” she said, “he had sent them your car photo. Isn't there more reason to believe what I said earlier?” But she didn't wait for an answer. “Then Vikram returned from the washroom and hurried me to freshen up. When I came back from the washroom, he pulled me to the bed… and again, he was aggressive.”
Madhav remained still.
“By then, he must have learned that you had escaped his plan,” Anjali continued. "His aggressiveness was like that. He told me I shouldn’t have let you touch me… because I was his. Forever.” Her voice tightened slightly. “He spoke badly about you. I tried to stop him… but he said he was hurt.”
She looked down again.
“He said he had never stopped loving me… despite everything. Despite me choosing Vinayak, marrying him, moving abroad…”
A silence followed.
“And then he said something,” she added slowly. “He said Vinayak’s death wasn’t the biggest accident in my life…”
Madhav looked at her.
“It was letting you have sex with me.”
The words hung heavy.
Anjali let out a slow breath.
“I believe he said that because… Vinayak’s death wasn’t an accident,” she said. “It was his plan.”
A pause. “But me being with you… that was an accident. Because he didn’t see it coming.”
She looked at Madhav.
“Accidents are what come unexpectedly… right?”

Madhav could only shake his head this time, struggling to comprehend everything.
Anjali continued, her voice no longer hesitant - there was anger in it now.
“He kept asking me… how it happened,” she said. “How I ended up sleeping with you.”
Madhav’s jaw tightened.
“He said he was jealous,” she went on. “But at the same time, he said he felt great the other day… when he came out and faced you after having sex with me, in our house.”
There was no verbal response from Madhav.
“Not only that,” Anjali added, her eyes hardening, “he put your photo on his phone… and made me look at it while we were doing it.”
Madhav’s fists clenched.
“He said he would love it,” she continued, her voice steady despite the anger, “if you were there… watching him take me like that.”

That was enough.
Madhav’s teeth ground against each other, his face darkening.
“That bastard…” he said, his voice low but filled with rage. “He’s not going to survive my wrath.”
Anjali’s anger hadn’t settled. If anything, it had sharpened her clarity.
“I came back without even a fraction of doubt about him, Dad,” she said. “Not even a second thought.”
Madhav listened, unmoving.
“But when you told me Vedant had gone instead of you… and that he met with an accident…” she continued, her voice tightening, “…everything started clicking. Then I checked the news,” she added. “That black Fortuner… those two men... They were killed… just because they stood in his way. Because they denied something he thought was rightfully his.”
She looked straight at Madhav.
“With that mindset… you think he would spare you?” she asked. “No, Dad. He wouldn’t.” She shook her head sideways, and then added, “And he didn’t.”

Silence filled the room.
“The same logic applies to Dubai,” she said more quietly now. “Vinayak’s accident… it wasn’t...”
She stopped.
She didn’t need to finish it.
Madhav slowly nodded.
He understood.
A long pause passed before he finally spoke.
“If what you’re saying is true…” he said, his voice cold and measured, “…we don’t confront him.”
He looked at her.
“We end him.”

Anjali looked at him, her eyes shining with anger.
“But we can’t confront him blindly,” she said. “A man like him… doesn’t fall easily. He must be prepared for getting caught one day or the other.”
“I will end him as he ended my son,” Madhav replied, his voice firm, leaving no room for doubt.
Anjali didn’t react immediately.
“I don’t want to kill him first,” she said after a moment. “I want to break him first… his mind, his ego.”
Madhav looked at her closely.
“You’ve already done something most people couldn’t,” he said. “Figured him out.”
He paused.
“Yes, maybe he made mistakes. Maybe he got overconfident,” he added. “But it still takes a mind like yours to connect all of this.”
His voice softened slightly.
“Vinayak would have been proud of you.” His arms tightened around her as he spoke.

For a brief second, something flickered in Anjali’s eyes - but it vanished just as quickly.
“And I’m guessing…” Madhav continued, studying her, “…you’ve already thought about how to play this.”
She gave a faint nod.
“Vikram thinks he’s in control,” she said, her gaze steady. “I want him to keep thinking that.”
A slow breath escaped her.
“He thinks I’m still his…” she added. “And I want him to realise… that it’s his biggest mistake.”
The silence that followed wasn’t empty - it was charged. A plan was taking shape inside her head.

Little did she know what was awaiting her.