Chapter 4: The Confirmation

The business card sat on my kitchen table like a loaded gun, its edges soft with age and handling. Professor Rajesh Gupta, Computer Science Department, Delhi Technical Institute. My old mentor from college, the man who'd guided me through my first serious programming projects and helped me land my first internship.

If anyone would remember Bitsah Verma from our hometown, it would be him.

I'd been staring at the card for twenty minutes, my phone in my other hand, trying to work up the courage to make the call. It was past midnight now—early morning in Delhi—but Professor Gupta had always been a night owl. During my college years, some of my best conversations with him had happened at this exact hour, when the world was quiet and minds were sharp.

But this wasn't about algorithms or career advice. This was about confirming that the man making my professional life hell was the same person who'd been haunting my phone for a decade.

I dialed before I could change my mind.

"Alex?" Professor Gupta's voice came through clear and warm, tinged with surprise. "My boy, it's been what—two years since we last spoke? How are you? Still conquering the American tech world?"

Despite everything, I smiled. He'd always had that effect on me. "Hello, sir. I'm sorry to call so late. I hope I'm not disturbing you."

"Nonsense! You know I keep strange hours. I was just grading some particularly creative attempts at data structure implementation. What can I do for you? You sound... troubled."

Professor Gupta had always been perceptive. Even through an international phone connection, he could read the tension in my voice.

"Sir, I need to ask you about someone from back home. Someone from our area who might have... caused some problems before leaving."

There was a pause. "This sounds serious, Alex. What's going on?"

I took a deep breath. "Do you remember anyone named Bitsah Verma? He would have been a few years older than me, probably involved in some kind of business ventures before disappearing."

The silence that followed stretched so long I wondered if the call had dropped. Then Professor Gupta made a sound that was half laugh, half groan.

"Bitsah Verma," he repeated slowly. "Now that's a name I haven't heard in years. Alex, why are you asking about that charlatan?"

My heart started racing. The casual dismissal, the immediate recognition—this was exactly what I'd hoped for and dreaded in equal measure.

"You know him?"

"Know him? Beta, half the town knows Bitsah Verma. Or knew him, before he vanished like smoke." Professor Gupta's voice carried a mixture of disgust and resignation. "That boy was trouble from the day he could walk. Smart enough to be dangerous, charming enough to fool people who should have known better."

I grabbed a pen and started taking notes, falling back into old habits. "Tell me about him."

"Where do I even start?" Professor Gupta sighed. "He was always running some scheme or another. Started small—selling counterfeit software to local businesses, promising website development that never materialized. But he got bolder as he got older."

"What kind of schemes?"

"Oh, the usual progression. Investment opportunities that existed only on paper. A revolutionary new app that would make everyone rich—he collected advance payments from dozens of investors for that one. Wedding planning services where he'd take deposits and disappear weeks before the ceremonies."

My stomach clenched. This matched perfectly with the calls I'd been receiving over the years. The wedding vendors, the software customers, the would-be investors—all pieces of the same elaborate con.

"When did he leave?" I asked.

"Must have been about twelve, thirteen years ago now. The whole thing came crashing down at once. He'd been juggling too many lies, and they all started unraveling simultaneously. One day he was driving around in that flashy car of his, acting like the successful entrepreneur. The next day, he was gone."

"What happened? What made him run?"

Professor Gupta was quiet for a moment, as if deciding how much to share. "There was an incident with the Mehta family. Old Mr. Mehta had saved for years to pay for his daughter's wedding. Bitsah convinced him to invest the wedding money in some get-rich-quick scheme, promised to double it within a month."

"Let me guess—the money disappeared."

"Along with Bitsah himself. The wedding had to be postponed indefinitely. Mrs. Mehta had a nervous breakdown. The whole community was in an uproar." His voice grew harder. "That's when people started comparing notes, realizing how many of them had been taken for a ride. The local police got involved, but by then he was long gone."

I was scribbling furiously now, filling in details that connected perfectly with the angry voices that had been calling my phone. The timeline matched. The methods matched. The sudden disappearance matched.

"Sir," I said carefully, "do you remember anything about his family? His parents?"

"Oh yes, poor people. Ramesh and Sunita Verma. They ran a small electronics repair shop near the main market. Decent folks, completely mortified by their son's behavior. They tried to make good on some of his smaller debts, but they couldn't possibly cover everything he'd stolen."

My pen stopped moving. Ramesh and Sunita Verma. I knew those names. They were in my notebook—not as creditors, but as people the creditors had mentioned. "Have you seen his parents?" some of the callers had asked. "Do they know where that son of theirs is hiding?"

"The parents," I said, my voice barely steady. "Are they still in town?"

"They moved away maybe eight, nine years ago. Too much shame, too many angry neighbors. I heard they went to live with Sunita's sister in Lucknow, but I'm not certain." Professor Gupta paused. "Alex, you're starting to worry me. Why this sudden interest in Bitsah Verma? Please tell me you haven't had any business dealings with him."

I almost laughed. Business dealings. If only it were that simple.

"Sir, I think... I think he might be my boss."

The silence that followed was deafening. When Professor Gupta finally spoke, his voice was sharp with concern. "Your boss? Alex, are you absolutely certain?"

"The name, the age, the background—it all fits. And there's more." I told him about the phone calls, the decade of wrong numbers, the gradual realization that my professional tormentor and the phantom from my phone were the same person.

"My God," Professor Gupta breathed. "After all these years, someone finally found him. Though I suppose he found you, technically."

"I need to be sure, sir. Completely sure. Is there anything else you can tell me about him? Anything that would confirm it's the same person?"

Professor Gupta was quiet for a long moment, thinking. "He had a distinctive way of speaking when he got angry. Very controlled, but with this underlying viciousness. Like a snake coiled to strike."

That was exactly how Bits behaved in meetings when someone challenged him. The same cold fury, the same calculated cruelty.

"And he was obsessed with status symbols," Professor Gupta continued. "Always had to have the most expensive clothes, the flashiest car, even when everyone knew he couldn't afford them. It was all about the image, the perception of success."

The expensive suits that didn't quite fit. The designer watch that looked slightly off. The constant need to project authority and wealth. It was all there.

"There's one more thing," Professor Gupta said slowly. "He had a small scar on his left hand, between his thumb and forefinger. Got it in childhood, something about broken glass. His mother used to worry it would never heal properly."

My breath caught. Tomorrow, I would look for that scar. It would be the final piece of evidence, the absolute confirmation that would remove any lingering doubt.

"Sir, thank you. This has been incredibly helpful."

"Alex, please be careful. If this man is capable of what he did here, if he's desperate enough to keep running after all these years..." Professor Gupta's voice carried genuine worry. "Don't underestimate him. And don't try to handle this alone."

"I won't do anything stupid," I promised, though even as I said it, I wasn't sure what constituted stupid in this situation.

"Stay in touch," he said. "And Alex? Whatever you decide to do, make sure you can live with the consequences. Revenge has a way of consuming the person seeking it."

After we hung up, I sat in my kitchen staring at the pages of notes I'd taken. Everything fit. Every detail aligned perfectly with the man I'd been working for, the man who'd been making my life miserable for months.

Bitsah Verma wasn't just my boss. He was a career criminal who'd been hiding in plain sight, using corporate structure and geographical distance to escape the consequences of his actions. He'd reinvented himself as a project manager, but underneath the business suits and management jargon, he was still the same predator who'd destroyed lives back home.

The anger I'd been carrying for months crystallized into something harder, more focused. This wasn't just about workplace harassment anymore. This was about justice that had been delayed for over a decade.

I opened my laptop and pulled up the employee directory again, staring at his smug headshot next to his full name. Bitsah Verma, Project Manager, hiding behind corporate respectability while his victims continued to search for him.

But they didn't need to search anymore.

I knew exactly where he was.

And tomorrow, I would look for that scar.