The Unwanted Wife (Published)

Chapter 6

Home Sweet Home, Uday thought with a tired smile as he entered Rajvansh Vilas after almost a month and a half. His previously planned one-month trip had taken almost two weeks extra to culminate but the thunderously positive response he had gotten in the pre-election campaign from every corner of Rajasthan had made his spirit soar. Hope was bursting inside him. All their hard work had paid off it seems. The upcoming elections will be a far cry from the humiliation his party had to endure in the last elections, he was very sure of it.

Gulal Singh greeted him at the foyer, "Khamma Ghani, Hukum. Welcome back home."

"How are you, Gulal?"

"Fine, Hukum."

"I just got off the phone with Ma. She is missing you. You took very good care of her," Uday smiled.

"Accompanying her was my pleasure, Hukum. Ma Saheb was looking much better when I left."

That reminded Uday of the person who was one of the reasons why she was not well in the first place. Who had given her hope and then snatched it away. He hadn't dared call Gulal Singh back earlier as he had planned when Ma had truly begun to recover in a calm environment and Gulal Singh's devoted care. His mother considered Gulal her son. He knew these two loved to place various bets with each other on a daily basis. Gulal not only provided care but a diversion to his mother as well. Also, he was the only one apart from him who could have made sure that his mother didn't contact Niyati herself. That was the reason Gulal too had returned only three days back from Kasol, after making sure that his mother wouldn't lapse back into depression.

"What news on Niyati? Servants tell me she doesn't come out of the room much and goes out every day from morning to the evening for the last ten days."

"Yes, Hukum. She doesn't eat at the dining table anymore..."

Uday cut in, "I know. I asked her not to."

Gulal Singh frowned. Hukum asked her to cook in her room? Because that was what she was doing. With the master key he'd had, he had looked into the room from which she didn't come out these days and had found that she had set up a small functional kitchen in one corner of the room itself and was making do with it.

"Where she disappears to every day is what concerns me more? Have you found that out?" Uday asked impatiently. He had put Gulal Singh on Niyati's trail as soon as he had returned. It made him feel helpless that due to all the media attention on election candidates now he couldn't freely spy on the girl he had married. And the only person he trusted for the job had been doing another important job for him.

"Niyati Madam has got a job now. She is working as a receptionist in A2Z Advertising Agency for the last ten days."

"WHAT? WHY?"

Gulal Singh shrugged. How was he supposed to know why she wanted to work? But he had done some discreet digging around the agency in the past three days that he had returned. "From what I have asked around, Hukum, nothing looks fishy. No one at her workplace seems to be aware of her connection to you. She keeps a low profile, uses Mishra surname, her home address is of that of a women's hostel here in Jaipur and the permanent address in her file is that of Mr. D'silva's in New Delhi. She got this job on her own merit because I looked and Mr. D'silva has no connection with this agency in any way or form."

"What the hell is she up to?" Uday snapped.

"If you ask me, Hukum, I would say nothing. Everything is just fine. Maybe she was getting bored and wanted to pass her time more constructively?"

Uday very much doubted that. Why would this girl go and work everyday nine to five on a pittance when she could get an amount she couldn't dream of earning by herself by just staying ensconced in all this luxury? Luxury, he was sure, she had never seen in her life before and doubtfully ever see again. Why? Something wasn't adding up here. And he cannot take the risk of letting this discrepancy slip by. Too much was at stake at present. If anyone got the wind of his wife working as a lowly receptionist in some advertising agency, disowning her connection with him... he didn't even want to think of what kind of press that would generate.