The Draped Assassin

Chapter 15

I woke up with a pounding head. When I looked around I saw Raghu already left. I got up, brushed my top with my hands and stepped outside the room.
 
  I walked to Gopal's room where I saw Raghu sitting beside the bed. "So shall we start?" I asked him. "Yeah. We should." he said, while getting up, "Check Anthony's room at first, I'll go search for what else is missing. Especially the footage." With that he left the room. I looked at Gopal and walked beside him. "I'll find the guy who did this to you and then make him bleed slowly and keep him alive until all of his blood is drained." With that I planted a kiss on his head and left.

  I'm currently checking Anthony's room even though something told me it was useless. And it turned out it was. I got outside and started looking at the corridor hoping for some footprints to pop out magically. I observed all the CCTVs in the corridor trying to find a CCTV that could go unnoticed. I called up Raghu and asked to check the footage. Which as expected was deleted. There has to be something. I started at the rooms down the corridor, questioning myself if I should start interrogating everyone here. Let's do it. 

  At first I went to the first room, Vina's room. She's a dancer in one of Raghu's clubs, and she gets to stay here because Anthony likes her. Not in a crush sort of way, it's just physical between them. After knocking twice she finally opened the door, "Oh hello,Ranja! Can I help you?" She asked. Even though she was older than me she knew it would be better for her to not show me her attitude right now. Everyone knew. "Let's cut to the chase, what were you doing two days ago when Gopal got stabbed?" I asked looking straight into her eyes. "I was at the club, I got to know about it when I came back. You can ask the manager." She said, which I believed. She's got no reason to lie. I nodded and bid my goodbye and turned to walk away. "You don't deserve this, Ranjana." She called from behind, to which I just turned and gave her a questioning look. "I know better than anyone here how it feels to be kidnapped and forced to do the things you don't want." She said with a sympathetic smile. I didn't know what to answer so I left. I chose this life because it was death other than that. I walked to my next destination, Kaushal's room.

  I didn't have to knock on the door, it's always open. So I entered to see a Kaushal who was too high to talk. Typical. I looked around searching for.... something I have no idea about. I kept looking around until my eyes fell at his desk. There were papers scattered on it. The pen stand was an old coffee mug. Wait a minute...

  I looked closer to a particular pen in the stand, it was a camera, facing directly towards the door. It might have caught something. With that I picked up the pen and sprinted towards Raghu's office.
"Raghu! Check this. It might have caught something. It was in Kaushal's room, facing the door." I said handing it over to him. He immediately snatched it from my hand and plugged it into his computer. I moved near him to get the view of the monitor. Raghu played the footage, we both waited till the time of the incident, then we saw Anthony rushing out of his room, probably it was the time when he got the news about Gopal.

  "Fast forward to the next hour." Raghu followed the instructions, it was half an hour past the incident when an unknown man walked towards Anthony's room. "He's the one deleted it." Raghu said what was in my mind. "Zoom in on his face."
Raghu followed. "I know this guy, he hacks the basic things that are waste of time Anthony, his name is Nirmal Lakra." Raghu said. "I'll go and bring him in." I said and turned towards the door when Raghu caught me and pulled me back to my previous position, "I'll call the gaurds to bring him in."

  Within ten minutes Nirmal was brought in, dragging on his feet. He was scared because he knew he was caught. "Well well well, I didn't know you were this talented to hack into Tony's computer." Raghu said in his smooth voice. "Sir, I had no idea what I was doing, I'm not a traitor if that's what you are thinking. I'd never do that, you saved my sister's life. You gave me a job. Vina would be dead if you hadn't saved her now." So that's Vina's brother. I don't know what exactly  happened to her but I have an idea. This man really was repenting what he did without knowing. "Then why did you do it? Why would you delete the footage?" Raghu snarled at him. It even sends chills down my spine.  "I was asked for it, it was a guy from the newbies. He said Gopal wanted it removed. So I didn't asked anything else." He cried. Raghu turned around and took his gun out ready to shoot him, I stepped in front of Raghu to stop him, "Don't, killing him would be a stupid move, we can use other methods for the compensation, plus we still need the guy who told him to do it."

   Raghu took a deep breath and asked in a calm yet dangerous voice, "Who asked you to do it?"
The guy gulped and answered "A guy named  Javed, he was limping badly. He told me that Gopal asked him to delete the footage so that no one will know about the new weapons. And I did."
I took a few steps towards him then landed a punch on his face hard enough to break a tooth or two. "And you thought Gopal would ask you to do it instead of asking Anthony. All those talents are useless if you don't have common sense. That guy is still roaming freely after stabbing Gopal and killing two of his trainees. You could have come clean when you got to know what happened. But you were hiding. If Vina wasn't your sister I'd have gladly killed you." With that I landed a kick on his gut and stormed out.

   I went to the trainees dorm and didn't bother waiting outside until they all were properly dressed. "Where is Javed?" I demanded. Nobody answered. "I'm asking for it one more time,  if no one answers now I'll kill everyone present in this room." Boy that worked. A guy from the back pushed him towards, he stumbled forward then regained his consciousness. "Do I need to ask you why I am here ?" I asked, tapping my foot on the floor. "I never wanted that to happen, me and the other two guys got into a fight. But the trainer got in the middle. I only wanted to kill the other two. That's why he got stabbed." He said, with no remorse. "So you are telling me you don't regret doing what you did?" I asked, "And you thought you'd be perfect in the gang with that attitude of yours? I don't think so. Does he have a habit of starting a fight like that where he'd use daggers to kill his classmates?" I asked the rest. Everyone hesitated until one spoke up, "He once said that Gopal is just keeping you with him for your body."
I scoffed, "Why don't you fight me? If you win you'll live." I challenged him.

  And he launched himself on me, but he's slow and he was panicking. I dodged him for sometimes carelessly until I was bored and decided to end it. I waited for him to come to me, and when he did, I raised my leg and I kicked him  in the throat. And he fell on the floor coughing blood. "So the lesson learned by us is don't judge a book by its cover. And Javed, see you in hell." With that I took out my gun and shot him two times on his heart and left him to bleed to death.

   I went to Gopal's room, took off my shirt and wore another shirt of Gopal for his scent. And sat beside the bed until I fell asleep.

  Just wake up, lover.