The Betrayal I Chose

Suresh warned the dealer about me and still handed me his daughter’s phone. I keep turning that trick over in my mind. The humiliating part is not that he distrusted me. I understand distrust. The humiliating part is that I took the case anyway because Anika sounded frightened, and fear is harder for me to resist than pride.

I started separating the private rentals in Indiranagar into people worth checking and people who merely collect money to keep their mouths shut. When I wrote the names, I found myself ranking Suresh’s betrayal below my own curiosity. I was angry with him, but I was even more angry that I wanted to prove him wrong. If I solve this, I can pretend I was better than the man who sent that warning.

On the family call, I kept my voice warm and ordinary. Every question about the missing woman felt like a door being opened too close to my desk. I steered them away and hated how easily I could do it. They still see the engineering dropout who wandered off after exposing a fraud. They do not know I spend my nights making liars answerable, and tonight I nearly enjoyed knowing more than the people asking me questions.

I listened to Anika’s voice note again. She said she was safe, but safety sounded like a word someone had taught her to say. The fear was in the spaces between her breaths. I wanted to hear what she did not name, what she had been afraid to tell Suresh.