What the bloody hell? Aaliya is in town and she hasn’t called me! We chatted via text messages last night and she didn’t mention even once that she was here. In fact, she said she’d be here soon. How could she do that? When did she return? And what the fuck is going on between Gabe and her? My mind swirls and swirls as a red haze settles on my eyes.

“Have you not noticed the closeness between Gabe and that girl? You’re one of the sharpest people I know and yet you let them fool you? Don’t you know that Gabe visited India several times in the last years for business? Haven’t you seen how fond he is of her? And why has he brought her here now, just when you are back? Why not before? Why has he kept her hidden?”

Her words are like acid to my brain. All the doubts and insecurities I have regarding my lost memory flow like a current through me. Is this something I’ve forgotten? Was Aaliya involved with Gabe at some point? Why did they lie to me? Did they lie to me? My eyes drift to the pictures. The boy has the same dark hair like Gabe, the same coloring, but he looks like Aaliya.

“I hope you see the truth and come to your senses, Damien,” Celia says, quietly walking away, leaving me alone in the study.

Aaliya

“HE’S SLEEPING SO SOUNDLY. The little scamp has tired himself out,” Jonathan says from my side. “He is truly adorable, Aaliya.”

I give Jonathan a wan smile and turn to Gabe as the three of us stand around my son’s cot.

“I’m going to tell Damien. I have to. There is no choice now.”

I returned late evening yesterday from Mumbai along with Rian. That day when Jasmine had called to tell me Rian had high fever and they might have to admit him to the hospital, my world had shattered. Nothing else mattered in that moment more than me reaching him. That journey back home to India was one of the most difficult experiences of my life. I couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep, not until I held my baby in my arms.

Rian’s health improved speedily the moment he laid eyes on me. He clung to me for a long time and his fever came down within hours. In two days, he was fit as a fiddle. It was quite miraculous and the doctors put it down to tremendous separation anxiety from both his parents. He clings to me more than ever now. I did not have the heart to leave him again and I couldn’t stay with him either so I brought him to London with me. I wasn’t going to be separated from my son again.