Leap of Faith

Rotten Reputation

The day after morning was quiet hushed. Shweta not being in the apartment simply could not feel right. Sipping my coffee at a leisure pace, I swiped my glance around her bedroom. It was mute, the colour felt faded as if some of the life was been taken out of it. I sighed and remembered the happy times I had in this closed space, watching movies in the bed with only one headphone, giggling, and dressing up. I missed her terribly. She had moved towards her destiny, I had to accept the fact that it would never be the same again. Though I promised myself that I would take some time out and spend it with my best friend, maybe a short holiday, catching up, just the two of us.

I moved myself to the living room, jumped on the sofa and switched on the television. I was not surprised when I saw the news analysis of my life, different theories floated around me, Aayan and Rahul. I noticed how dramatically the petite anchor with heavy makeup was speculating the future of our relationship. It made me wonder as I remembered the last time, how it had flipped me. But now nothing. Absolutely nothing. I had put on a thick skin as I watched the media jokers plotting against me. It made me laugh heartily at their poor intellectual theories. They called me a female Casanova! First Rahul, then Aayan and Vikram too. Pouncing my claws at those powerful men, hungry for power and money. What a riveting tale indeed! The curious case of Trisha Ray.

I switched off the idiot box calmly and moved towards the important task.

There has been a significant amount of emails for me. First my company mail id, many emails from gossip queen Sonali... delete...Some of the media jokers wanting an interview... delete... more media jokers!

I browsed through some more on my personal mail... Nothing important... delete...Emails from Rahul... delete... Now I got to the most important mail. My ladyholmes ID. Daniel had sent me few emails. I should read this thoroughly.

I took a bowl of cereal, pulled up the chair of my small table. I put my laptop in front of me and browsed through one by one. The first mail contained a link to the server in which he mirrored his laptop, at least what he could manage. As I opened the link, a software installed itself. After a minute or so, a screen appeared which I assumed was the front screen of Vikram's laptop.

One after the other, I browsed through the folders on his hard drive. There were many official documents of his company, Stagmac Inc. holding. I clicked on some of the random word files. It displayed many of his small companies in which he had invested. The companies ranged from manufacturing units to Medium Pharma companies to Service Industries.

The man even though being a psychopath, was indeed an accomplished businessman. I had to admit. He had diverted the money from one business to other time to time as per the market scenarios. Another file showed the net worth of Stagmac Inc. and its yearly trend. The worth millions of pounds decreased at a steady rate, owing to the slow economy.

"Date. Date," I muttered in my mouth as I started to check the file modified date in that particular folder. "From November 2008," I thought aloud. Something was not right.

Wait a minute!

This cannot be. He was still with SpeedEx at that time. What was going on? He left the company a couple of months after Aayan's father died in May 2009.

I pushed my untouched cereal bowl to the other side, went to my bedroom to bring a notepad and a pen. I started scribbling.

Unusual Things

1) Investing in companies before leaving SpeedEx. Date of initial investment Nov' 2008.

2) Tainted wine

I racked my brain one more time to find anything that was suspicious. One by One. Vikram's obsession with wine. Vikram' intentions.

I went through the folders again. However, there seemed to be nothing important until I went to Pictures folder. I opened and shocked to see there were hundreds of pictures of me. I glanced at myself, smiling in the background I assume was boulevard near Hyde Park. It was zoomed only to show my face. It was weird to start with. Why did he take my pictures? There were many pictures clicked in London, especially those that showed me in front of his house, entering and exiting.