Private India Read online

  Connections, he told himself. Look for connections.

  Moving over, he gazed at the name Lara Omprakash. Her tattoo made her the only victim with a direct connection to the goddess Durga. The fact that she’d had a baby—this Aditi Chopra—might or might not be significant.

  Double lives. Victims with double lives.

  He moved the name Lara Omprakash to one side, placing it at the top of the right-hand side of the board.

  What if Lara Omprakash had her child, Aditi, but for whatever reason had given the girl up? Where might she have taken the girl?

  To an orphanage? He reached for the name Elina Xavier, taking it out of the victims’ order and adding it to the new one on the right-hand side.

  But the orphanage had been gutted during the Mumbai riots, and the orphans presumably turned out onto the streets, where they would have been easy prey for pimps and human traffickers. People like …

  Ragini Sharma, perhaps?

  He stood gazing at what was looking less like a roll-call of victims and more like the beginning of a life story, wondering if he was on to something or if it was just the workings of a tired and overactive imagination—

  “Ahem,” came a voice from the door.

  Santosh snatched for his cane as he whirled, seeing Rupesh in the doorway.

  “Rupesh,” he said, carefully, “you surprised me.”

  “So it would appear,” said Rupesh. His hands were thrust into his trouser pockets as he stepped into the office. “Your man Mubeen let me in. That boy needs his beard trimming.” He stopped. “Hard at work, I see,” he said, gesturing with his chin at the magnet board.

  “Working on some ideas,” said Santosh, waving a hand as though it were nothing, when in fact his brain simmered with possibilities. He stepped over to his desk. “What can I do for you?”

  “You could start by giving me the promised case updates,” smiled Rupesh, looking carefully at the magnet board. He glanced out of the open door. “Is the lovely Nisha not here?”

  “She’s chasing a lead.”

  “Is she?”

  “I think we’re close to cracking this, Rupesh. If you could just wait a day or so for the status report.”

  “How about you tell me who your number-one suspect is? And please, Santosh, don’t say the Attorney General.”

  “It’s the Attorney General,” said Santosh, enjoying the look that passed across Rupesh’s face.

  Chapter 86

  NISHA RETURNED TO the yoga studio, passed Fiona the receptionist, saying, “Just one more minute of her time if I could,” and ignoring the protests, knocked quickly on the door of Devika Gulati’s office, waited for “Come,” then let herself in.

  Devika, who had been expecting Fiona, looked startled to see the investigator return. “Did you forget something?”

  “No. Did you?”

  “I’m quite sure I have no idea what you mean.”

  “What I mean is, why didn’t you tell me you’d spent time in prison on drug charges?” asked Nisha brightly.

  Devika gave a short dry laugh. “You never asked,” she replied. “Why on earth would I volunteer information like that?”

  “But now it’s out in the open,” said Nisha, “why don’t you tell me about it?”

  Devika’s eyes were hard. “You seem very well informed. Why do you need me to tell you?”

  “I could pull the file,” fibbed Nisha, “but I think I’d like to hear it from you.”

  Devika’s smile widened. “I don’t think so. I don’t think you could ‘pull the file’ just like that. That, after all, is the sort of thing policemen do, and …” she gave Nisha a look of fake sympathy, “you’re not a policeman. So be a good girl and leave my office.”

  “Sure,” said Nisha with a grin, “I’ll do that, go home, log on to social media, start spreadin’ the news …”

  Devika’s face flared, a look in her eyes that made Nisha glad of the pressure of the Glock at her hip. And then, as quickly as it had appeared, the yoga guru’s anger died down and she gave a quick, gracious nod, as though defeated by a superior opponent. She waved Nisha to a chair opposite.

  “I was young. And a fool,” she began. “A terrible combination. I left home and joined a psychedelic rock band. Headzone, they were called. Drugs, booze, and sex were all part of the territory. So much so that I was busted for possession.”

  “Possession of what?” said Nisha.

  “Smack.”

  Nisha made a surprised O with her mouth.

  “A kilo of it,” added Devika.

  “A kilo?” said Nisha. “Why so much if you were just a user?”

  Devika stood and walked behind Nisha’s chair. Nisha felt herself tense, grateful that she was able to see Devika’s reflection in a picture that hung opposite. On the pretext of shifting in her chair she brought her hand to the waistband of her trousers, reassured by her gun there.

  “I was smuggling it for my lover—the singer in Headzone.”

  Nisha watched in the picture’s reflection as Devika threw up her hands at her own naive stupidity.

  “So why didn’t you tell the authorities that the stuff did not belong to you?”

  “Headzone’s management had contacts with a man named Munna. I expect you know him.”

  Oh, Nisha knew Munna all right. The rather few cops in Mumbai who wanted to see Munna behind bars were those not on his payroll.

  “The management told me that they would ensure the police recorded the quantity as less than a kilo, in which case I’d serve less than six months. They also assured me they’d get Munna to have a chat with the police to suspend my sentence. I went along with it.”

  “But that’s not how events played out, right?”

  “Precisely,” answered Devika. “The consignment was more than a kilo and I was given the maximum sentence. Headzone cut off all communication with me—apparently I left the band because of creative differences. I’d been tricked by them: Headzone, Munna, Nimboo Baba … they hung me out to dry.”

  “Nimboo Baba?” said Nisha. “What on earth does he have to do with it?”

  “He works for—or with—Munna. He’s Munna’s money man.” She chuckled at the alliteration.

  “How much time did you get?” asked Nisha. She watched Devika carefully in the reflection.

  “I was awarded the maximum sentence under the Act—ten years. A stupid mistake had cost me a decade of my life,” said Devika softly.

  “And that’s why you’re telling me this, is it?” said Nisha. “You want payback?”

  “Maybe,” replied Devika airily. “Maybe if you chose to act upon the information I’ve given you the outcome would be satisfactory for me, yes.”

  “Why now? Why not years ago?”

  Devika fixed her with a look. “I expect you have heard the rumors that Nalin D’Souza has a fondness for making wild bets.”

  Nisha spread her hands. Hadn’t everyone?

  “Well, those rumors are true,” said Devika. “Nalin D’Souza owes Nimboo Baba millions. And I am in love with Nalin D’Souza. The downfall of Nimboo Baba would be my gift to him.”

  Nisha nodded. “One more thing,” she said. “I have a name. I wonder if it might mean anything to you?”

  “Yes?”

  “Aditi Chopra.”

  Chapter 87

  “SHE TURNED WHITE, boss, I swear,” said Nisha excitedly, back in her car. “Denied all knowledge of Aditi Chopra. But it was written all over her face. She was lying, I swear it.”

  “Excellent,” said Santosh. Rupesh had taken a seat on the other side of the desk. With his arms behind his head, he listened to Santosh’s side of the conversation with interest. “What else did she have to say?”

  “Very interesting stuff indeed,” said Nisha. “The jail time was drugs-related, and mixed up in it all were Munna and Nimboo Baba.”

  “Right,” said Santosh carefully. He looked across the desk at Rupesh, who smiled back.

  Was that it? In the car, Nisha pull
ed a face. She’d been expecting a better reaction at the mention of Munna. Some kind of reaction at least. “And Nimboo Baba,” she added, for emphasis.

  “Right,” said Santosh, who was thinking that the rumors were right, that Munna and Nimboo Baba were partners. Across the desk, Rupesh was keeping his face blank. Who else could Munna and Nimboo Baba count as a business partner? Santosh wondered.

  In her car, Nisha frowned. Then, glancing to her left, she saw the door to Yoga Sutra open and Fiona exit. By the look of her bag she was leaving for the night.

  Next, the Yoga Sutra signage, a pastel yellow, blinked off. No doubt about it, Devika Gulati was shutting up shop early for the day.

  “She’s closing,” she told Santosh.

  “Early?”

  “Oh yes.”

  “Perhaps we’ve spooked her. Wherever she goes, follow her.”

  “Right.”

  They ended the call.

  “Interesting developments?” asked Rupesh.

  Santosh shrugged, saved from having to explain himself by Mubeen who had just entered his office in a hurry.

  “You have to see this,” Mubeen exclaimed breathlessly.

  “What?” asked Santosh.

  “You remember we recovered saliva from the school principal’s eyebrow?”

  Santosh nodded. He glanced at Rupesh. “Yes.”

  “Well, humans have forty-six chromosomes. They come in twenty-three pairs in addition to some mitochondrial DNA,” began Mubeen.

  “Why are you telling me this?” asked Santosh impatiently.

  “Because twenty-two pairs are irrelevant. It is only the twenty-third pair that threw up this remarkable result,” gushed Mubeen, oblivious to Santosh’s irritation.

  “What result?”

  “There is absolutely nothing in the mitochondrial DNA and twenty-two chromosome pairs that can tell you whether a given sample of DNA came from a male or a female,” babbled Mubeen. “The genetic difference between males and females lies in the last chromosome pair—the sex chromosomes. Women have two X chromosomes, while men have one X chromosome and one Y chromosome.”

  “And?” said Santosh, warming up to Mubeen’s excitement.

  “I tested the sample for the presence of Y chromosome genetic material. I did not find any.”

  “Tell me in simple language what that means,” said Santosh, his face flushed with excitement.

  “The DNA we found on Elina Xavier is female DNA. Your murderer is a woman.”

  “A woman?” repeated Rupesh. “The killer is a woman?”

  “Devika Gulati,” snapped Santosh. He clicked his fingers at Mubeen.

  Rupesh had stood. “I’ll call for backup at once,” he said, and hurried out of the room, his phone to his ear.

  Santosh watched him go then whirled, his hand at his forehead. A woman? But the killer was anti-women. He hated women. His mission was one of destruction of women—the destruction of strong, successful women: a doctor, a pop star, a film director—and not out of envy, oh no, everything about the ritual of the killings, the corruption of the Durga symbols, suggested that his was a mission to desecrate women.

  And all this time it wasn’t a he, but a she …

  How? It didn’t make sense.

  He’d thought the killer was a man. He’d assumed the killer was a man. The figure caught on CCTV looked like a man, the MO was that of a man who had a deep-seated hatred for women, but what if … what if it was a woman?

  Just now he’d assumed that Devika was covering for D’Souza. But what if he were covering for her? What if she were killing on his orders? After all, he had good reason to kill Anjana Lal.

  Or maybe there were two killers. Strangers on a Train-type stuff. One of the killers was Nalin D’Souza, the other was Devika Gulati.

  “There’s something else,” Mubeen was saying, watching his boss carefully. “The DNA from the hair belonging to Nalin D’Souza tells us that he is this particular female’s father.”

  Santosh froze. He glanced out into the main operations room where Rupesh stood at the far side, his back to the office as he made his call.

  “The Attorney General is the killer’s father?” he whispered to Mubeen.

  “It would seem so, sir, yes.”

  Santosh hobbled over to the board. “Okay, let’s think about this. What if Nalin D’Souza was Aditi’s father, Lara Omprakash the mother? But Lara turned her over to the orphanage, where she was brutalized by Elina Xavier.” Santosh was pointing to the magnet board. “That’s motive for two of the murders.”

  “It would make the Attorney General a potential victim,” said Rupesh from the doorway. Santosh grimaced, fearing the worst, but Rupesh was brushing past him to the magnet board, forgetting to strut for once, intrigued by what he was witnessing.

  “It would, wouldn’t it?” Santosh said, looking at his old friend, and for a moment it was as though the two of them had forgotten their differences.

  “Mubeen,” he said, without taking his eyes off the board, both he and Rupesh gazing intently at it now, “run the name Aditi Chopra through PrivateTracker.”

  Mubeen left them and for a few moments Santosh and Rupesh stood, each lost in thought.

  “No,” said Santosh, “I don’t think so somehow—I don’t think D’Souza is a potential victim, not in the way we’re thinking: the yellow garrote, the icons. It’s women—women who are the targets.”

  “What about Mayank Patel, the security guy?”

  “True,” said Santosh. “But that was a killing of convenience. To hide his …” he corrected himself, “her tracks. There was no ritualistic element. And I don’t think she’d allow the Attorney General to die in such a prosaic manner, not if our theory is correct. If we’re right,” he waved a hand at the magnet board with its emerging pattern, “and this has something to do with avenging the injustices of the past, then she’d have something special planned for the Attorney General. Something special that won’t interrupt the pattern.”

  Something struck him, and gripping his cane, he hobbled to the other side of the desk, flipping up the lid of a laptop and hammering at the keyboard until he straightened with a triumphant noise.

  “She bought the shoes,” he said. “An ‘A. Chopra’ is on the list of fulfilled orders for the Oakley shoes.”

  Rupesh frowned, though his eyes shone. “Right. Well, I don’t understand what you’re talking about and we’ll have words about that presently, but for the time being why don’t you explain what you mean.”

  “I mean she was trying to set D’Souza up. The shoes, the hair. That’s it,” he exclaimed, and his cane was a drumbeat on the floor as he moved over to the magnet board and raised the stick to point at the names.

  “Lara Omprakash was Aditi’s mother. Let’s say Lara gave her away to the orphanage, where she came into the orbit of Elina Xavier. But the orphanage burned and she was turned out on the street, only to be picked up by Ragini Sharma. Didn’t Nisha say …?”

  Something struck him.

  Something that turned his skin cold.

  “Oh dear God,” he said.

  “Sir.” Mubeen had arrived at the door. “I have a match for Aditi Chopra on PrivateTracker.”

  “It’s an arrest, isn’t it?” said Santosh. He closed his eyes.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And the arresting officer,” said Santosh, “it’s Nisha Gandhe, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  She’d been sent the yellow garrote.

  Nisha was the next victim.

  PART THREE

  Chapter 88

  NISHA SAT IN the Honda, watching the front of Yoga Sutra. She could have sworn that there was a figure standing behind the window, looking out at her, made indistinct by the frosted glass of the frontage. It was little more than a shadow but even so—she couldn’t shake the sense that while she was watching Devika, Devika was watching her.

  “Come on now,” said Nisha under her breath, “make your move.”

  Her ph
one rang and she answered it without taking her eyes off the shadow-figure standing on the other side of the window. It was Ajay.

  “What can I do for you, Ajay?”

  “Plenty, but not right now. There was something I should have told you.”

  The figure—it seemed to melt away from the window. Devika was on the move. Out of the front door? Nisha didn’t think so. After all, the only car parked out here was hers. There had to be a back entrance. And what was the betting Devika was about to use it to give her the slip?

  “What’s that, Ajay?” she said. She was getting out of the car now, clicking it locked, reaching to the Glock at her waist and drawing it. She held it discreetly, close to her thigh, pleased to have the feel of it in her palm as she looked left and right along the near-deserted street, then trotted across the road, back toward Yoga Sutra. She tried the door.

  “Right, well, it was something I should have mentioned before …” Ajay was saying, “maybe nothing important but I thought you’d like to know.”

  She cradled the phone between her cheek and neck, cupped a hand at the glass and tried to peer through the window, seeing nothing inside but the vague shapes of an empty reception area, an open door leading through to the studio. No movement. No sign of Devika.

  No—no, she couldn’t have lost her already.

  “Actually, couldn’t this wait, Ajay?” she said with a touch of irritation. She moved to the side of the building and glanced up a narrow alley that lay between the studio and a picturesque apartment block next door. She looked more carefully at the apartments. Probably had parking at the rear. Probably parking for Yoga Sutra, too.

  “It’s very quick,” said Ajay.

  “Okay, then fire away,” she said, crabbing sideways down the alley, gun still held down at her leg, phone to her ear.

  “It’s that information you asked for about Lara.”

  “What about it?”

  “The system lets you see the last person to access that information.”

  She cocked her head. “Yes?”