“Protect my daughter, Vedika. And protect the woman who gave her life.”
Mrinalini’s voice broke as she read those words.
I stared at the photograph in my hands.
The young woman lying in the hospital bed had dark eyes, a delicate nose, and a small mole above her left eyebrow.
My fingers moved instinctively toward my own eyebrow.
I had the same mole.
“Aaji,” I whispered, “who is she?”
Mrinalini pressed her trembling fingers against her lips.
“Her name was Anagha.”
I looked again at the photograph.
“Was she related to my father?”
Mrinalini nodded.
Then she whispered something that made my entire world collapse.
“She was my daughter, Vedika.”
I could barely breathe.
“Your daughter?”
Tears streamed down her cheeks.
“And she was your mother.”
The room fell silent.
I looked at Raghavendra.
He was staring at the floor.
Then I looked at Avinash.
My husband seemed as bewildered as I was.
“No,” I whispered. “My mother was Kaveri Kulkarni.”
Mrinalini reached for my hand.
“Kaveri raised you, beta. And she loved you with her whole heart. But Anagha gave birth to you.”
I stepped backward.
For thirty-one years, I had believed I knew my own story.
I remembered my mother braiding my hair before school.
I remembered my father carrying me on his shoulders.
I remembered sleeping between them during thunderstorms.
And now someone was telling me that the woman who sang me lullabies was not the woman who had given birth to me.
“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”
Mrinalini began crying harder.
“Because your father promised Anagha something before she died.”
My stomach tightened.
“She died?”
Mrinalini nodded.
“Three days after you were born.”
I lowered myself onto the sofa.
The baby inside me moved.
I placed both hands over my stomach.
Suddenly, I imagined another young woman lying in a hospital bed, holding her newborn daughter and knowing she might never see her grow up.
I began sobbing.
Mrinalini knelt beside me.
“Beta, please don’t upset yourself.”
I looked at her through my tears.
“You’ve lived next door all my life.”
She nodded.
“You watched me grow up?”
“Yes.”
“You knew I was your granddaughter?”
“Yes.”
My voice rose.
“Then why did you let me call you Aaji like you were some stranger?”
She covered her face.
“Because that was the only way I could remain close without breaking the promise I made.”
I stared at her.
“What promise?”
She opened the letter again.
My father’s handwriting continued beneath the words she had read.
Anagha was only twenty-two when she died. She had been abandoned by the man who promised to marry her, and her final days were filled with fear.
Before she passed away, she asked that her daughter be raised without shame, without questions about legitimacy, and without a father who might someday return merely to claim what belonged to her.
I looked toward Raghavendra.
His face had turned grey.
I suddenly understood why he had wanted us to leave.
“Who was that man?” I asked.
Nobody answered.
I rose slowly.
“Tell me who abandoned my mother.”
Mrinalini looked at Raghavendra.
Then she whispered, “His younger brother, Mahendra Malhotra.”
Avinash staggered backward.
“My uncle?”
I stared at my husband.
Then at his father.
The room seemed to spin.
“Are you saying Avinash and I are related?”
Mrinalini shook her head.
“Mahendra was Raghavendra’s business partner and the younger son of his father’s closest friend. The families called them brothers, but they were not related by blood.”
Avinash pressed his hand against the wall.
“Papa, is this true?”
Raghavendra sat down heavily.
“Yes.”
I stared at him.
He had known my biological father.
He had known my mother.
And he had helped arrange my marriage to Avinash.
“Did you know who I was before the wedding?”
He nodded.
My heart turned cold.
“Then why did you never tell me?”
He looked at the leather folder.
“Because your father left certain financial arrangements that complicated everything.”
I almost laughed.
Even now, money was the first thing he mentioned.
Mrinalini stood.
“Tell her the rest, Raghavendra.”
He shook his head.
“It’s unnecessary.”
“Unnecessary?” she repeated. “Your son abandoned a pregnant woman because of a lie you helped create!”
Avinash looked at his father.
“What lie?”
Mrinalini turned toward me.
“Vedika, your mother Anagha inherited property and investments from her grandfather. When she died, those assets were intended to benefit you.”
My breath caught.
“What assets?”
“A share in a commercial property partnership and the proceeds from land your great-grandfather had owned.”
I stared at her.
“My father told me we were ordinary people.”
Mrinalini smiled sadly.
“You were. Your parents lived carefully because much of the property was tied up in disputes.”
She placed a second document on the table.
