How To Hide A Crime

13. Karan Mehta

"What…….what are you talking about?" He breathes out.

"Let's get straight to the point, shall we?" Vikram says, leisurely going towards the chair and taking a seat. 

Karen's careful eyes follow Vikram's slow but smug movement. The shock is too intense to wear off. In fact, his brain has already started to go haywire.

"What do….you want? Karan asks in a careful voice, afraid to know the answer. 

"Take a seat, Mr.Mehta. You will have to be relaxed before listening." Vikram advises casually as if he didn't just ignite the fire of fear and curiosity in Karen's mind. 

Karan takes a seat in front of him nevertheless. He will have to calm his nerves to know what the man wants from him exactly.

"When I said you didn't even have a family, I was kinda wrong, wasn't I? Because, Mr.
Mehta, you do have a brother." 

Karan feels like the earth under his feet has been replaced by fire. Suddenly, he is feeling too hot, too bothered to hear about his own secretive life from a total stranger. He feels completely naked. As if someone was stripping him of all the lies he has built over the years to save himself. His brother is a total nightmare. Even the mere mention of his name, makes Karan want to run away and hide somewhere. How can Vikram act like he is reading from an open book? How can he know so much about Karan? Karan is creeped out to the core. 

"Don't get too excited, Mr.Mehta ….oops, my bad! I mean Mr.Agarwal. Because you have more things to know and more things to tell." 

Karan isn't even surprised that the man in front of him knows about his real surname. At this point, nothing can surprise him anymore. However, it can make him feel scared. 

"Don't get startled, Mr.Agarwal. I know everything about your secret life. Your father wasn't a police officer who died in a fire accident, he was murdered. You were brought up in an orphanage because your father had to hide your existence. Oh, but you weren't alone. You had a brother with you, your identical twin, Ravi Agarwal." 

"H-How do you know about all that?" Karan stutters out. 

He didn't have to face his cruel reality like that. He was trying so hard to flee from it. His life was a hell in the orphanage. Not because anyone else bullied him there. It was his own twin. His brother was an absolute psycho.

"It's not important how I know rather think about how much I know." 

Karan just stares at him, looking stunned. This man has managed to dig into his past. But why? What does Vikram want from him?" 

"To say your life story is tragic will be an understatement. Your mother was a prostitute with whom Mr.Agarwal had fun for one night. And that's how you two were born. However, Mr.Agarwal couldn't accept you two nor your mother because he didn't have the guts to face the shame of the society. She ended up taking her life, leaving you two at the door of an orphanage. When Mr.Agarwal came to know about it, he secretly took care of you two. He still kept you two a secret though." 

Karan can't decide whether he should lash out at the older man for talking about his life like it's nothing or should he cower in a corner because this has managed to know so much about him, it won't surprise him if the man can do more than that. However, at the end, it's the anger which wins the battle.