And the fourth? Well, he’s walking straight towards me now. Are they here for me? Or did someone unlucky enough cross their path tonight? I hate probabilities. But I can’t tick off the thought that these men could be huntingme.
I may have buried Raghav Khurana… the name, the legacy, the son who killed his own father to sever ties with the underworld. But ghosts have a way of being persistent. And enemies don’t forgive. So, if these men really did come looking for me, they’ll know soon enough what a grave mistake they are about to make.
Because the truth is simple. You can’t kill what was born in darkness. You can only cage it.
And… this cage is starting to crack.
I study the men again, more carefully this time and notice the slight bulge under their coats. A flash of a nozzle is carelessly hidden. They’re armed.And they’re closing in.
Quietly, I slide the fork off my table and curl it into my palm, adjusting it in my fingers until it sits like a weapon. Crude, yes. But in the right hands, it can do enough damage. If they’re here for me, then tonight will end in blood. And it won’t be mine.
I finish the last of my whiskey in one gulp, the burn of it anchoring me for the storm I know is seconds away. My grip tightens on the fork as the man reaches closer. But just as his shadow falls across my table, he keeps walking… right past me. He doesn’t even glance my way. His eyes continue to scan the room, searching for someone else.
They are not here for me.
Slowly, I place the fork back on the table, but the tension inside me doesn’t loosen yet. And then, I see it. The faint silver embroidery on the man’s cuff that glints against the dark fabric. It’s an emblem of a fierce stallion. Rearing high, regal and ruthless.
I know that emblem. The Silver Stallion.
The mark of theVardhaan Mafia Syndicate.
So, these men belong to Vardhaan?
My jaw clenches, though my face remains calm, revealing nothing. In my old, mafia life, the world had been cleanly divided into territories and syndicates. The Bat Syndicate had been my father, Tej Khurana’s, empire, my inheritance. And for years, I’d ruled alongside him. He was a man feared by many and respected by none.
Since those days, our sworn enemies have always been the Vardhaans. The mere sight of their crest, the rearing stallion, had once been enough to ignite bloodshed. The hatred between us ran deep, carved into our bones like an ancestral curse. Wenever shared ground, never tolerated even the whisper of peace between us. If they existed, then by rule, we had to destroy them.
But that was in the past. The night I killed my father was the night the Bat Syndicate crumbled. Not because he was dead. Empires like ours do not collapse with the death of one man. They collapse when the blood meant to inherit the throne chooses to walk away.
I was next in line.The heir.The one groomed to rule the shadows he built. But the moment I pulled the trigger, I did more than just end his life. I ended my own claim to that empire. I vanished from the world I had once ruled. No one knew where I had gone or why. To them, theDark Prince, as they called me, simply faded into smoke and myth, just as quickly as he had risen. And with my disappearance, the Vardhaans stepped in andseized what was left behind. They thrived and ruled, expanding their power and their empire.
Even after distancing myself from that world, I never truly let it go. Old instincts, old habits… they never fade. I kept watching from afar, quietly tracking the movements of the underworld. I always knew who was pulling the strings, who was rising, who was falling. It was a game I no longer played, but one I still watched from the shadows.
But the question clawing at me now burns sharper than the whiskey in my veins:What the hell are Vardhaan men doing here in Mumbai?
They run their operations from South Africa. The very land l once called home during my reign as the Dark Prince. They have no business here, no need to set foot on Indian soil unless the matter was serious.Unless the matter was personal.
At least I know they didn’t come looking for me. I’m glad I’m not their prey.But if I’m not the one they’re hunting… then who is?
My curiosity rises when I watch two of them exchange a brief, silent signal before motioning the others towards the far end of the club. Whoever they came for, they’ve found him.
They move fast, effortlessly slipping past drunken patrons. None of them have drawn their guns yet. The security here is notoriously tight. No man with guns could have walked through those doors without clearance. The fact that they did only means someone let them through. Someone on the inside fed them information. Someone told them their target was here tonight.
But who?
This isn’t my war. And yet, I cannot stay seated. Something tugs at me, a pull I can’t explain. Without a word, I rise and slip a note beneath the rim of my glass, settling the bill without waiting for the server to notice. And against my better judgment, I quietly follow these men into the secluded wing of the club. The corridor narrows as I enter it, the lights dimmer, but I don’t stop.
My instincts warn me to turn back. But something inside me refuses to let me walk away. It’s as though whatever, orwhoever, waits on the other side of that door has already wrapped invisible chains around me, pulling me closer without even knowing my name.
And for the first time in years, I feel the storm of my old world stirring again, as though the past I have spent so long running from is finally catching up.
Suddenly, the loud crash of shattering glass splits through the air like a gunshot. I pause. My gaze snaps forward just in time to see twoof the Vardhaan men crumple to the floor, clutching their chests as they groan in pain.
What the hell!
Curiosity takes over as I move closer, keeping low, needing to see who they came for. And then, a little ahead, I finally see it. The source of the chaos. It’s not a broad-shouldered mercenaryor some gun-wielding assassin who brought these dangerous men to their knees.
It is a woman.
