Conflagration

Chapter 6: ACP on the Hunt

Location: Gully opposite to Café Coffee Break Parking Lot

Aryan adjusted the collar of his shirt that did not seem to want to stay in place. He was dressed like a street ruffian and couldn't wait to get off the bizarre shirt that seemed at one point to have been a green color before some idiot had decided to include an explosion of large orange flowers. The material was a cheap polyester that made his skin itch and the scratchy pants did not help.

When he had initially conceived of the idea to disguise himself and send Arshad in his place, he had thought of stationing himself and a couple of policemen in plain clothes as backup. If there was trouble, he and his team could act as backups to Arshad and team. Now it looked like the backup team, including himself would expire not from bullets but from the ridiculous clothes they were wearing.

It was all the fault of Constable Shinde he decided. Shinde in an effort to curry favor with his boss had come up with the idea of disguising the back up team and contacted some cronies of his who worked in the theatre business. Aryan had gone along thinking it was a decent idea and would provide his team some measure of security. The result was four policemen including an ACP dressed like they were going to perform in a circus versus a drug bust.

He swore he would make Shinde wear the fake large mole he was currently wearing on his left cheek, for a whole week and see how he liked it. When he had seen himself in the mirror after the so called transformation, he had uttered a few choice swear words that would have made his mother wash his mouth out with soap. He had vigorously protested at the kajal used to line his eyes and the rouge used to redden his lips to give the impression of being a habitual paan chewer. Heck the make up man had even done something to his hair so that it now fell in unkempt waves over his forehead almost to his eyebrows. All in all, he looked like a vagabond and he doubted even his mother would recognize him.

Forcing thoughts of retribution against Shinde out of his head, he scanned his surroundings once again. The café was tucked away from the main road in a little gully flanked by tall residential buildings. Muted sounds of traffic flowed from the direction of the main road but the street they were in was relatively quiet with the occasional car, motorcycle or pedestrian passing by. Good location for a bust he thought, rubbing his palm over the handle of his revolver residing his pant pocket. He wouldn't have to worry too much about civilians getting caught in between if there was firefight but just incase he had requested additional hidden police presence in the area.

He lifted up his hand to glance at his leather Cartier watch, the only thing he had refused to take off even for the disguise. He knew that the others had not understood his insistence on wanting to keep the watch, but it was his father's and he refused to part with it. 7.55 pm read the time and Aryan sighed. He mentally flipped through the details the team had gathered before arriving here. Coffee Break Café was owned solely by a Ms Jyoti Sandhu, a 35 year old divorcee with no priors and no history with the police. The café had recently turned the corner and started bringing in profits, but there were no irregularities in its running that would indicate it would be a drug spot.

The other information that Aryan had been waiting on i.e. the imposter aka Manjari Sharma had been disappointing. The phone was prepaid and registered to a Pankaj Tripathi, a businessman who owned a couple of car dealerships in the city. Again Pankaj had no history with the police either. Another dead end thought Aryan, running a hand frustratedly through his hair. Once this operation was over, he was going to have a chat with Ms Jyoti he decided, and get to the bottom of the mystery of Manjari Sharma once and for all. Perhaps then this unhealthy obsession he had formed would end.

A van pulled up into the parking lot of the café and Aryan tensed before slightly titling his head in a motion for his team to be on alert. He watched as a tall lanky man and his two companions got out of the van and approached the visibly nervous Ms Sandhu. Suddenly out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a movement. Shifting his head he focused on a figure dressed in red stumble and then right herself before continuing to walk while being engrossed in what looked like a phone.