That’s true.
For the first time that night, even Singhal looks uncomfortable. And I enjoy every second of it. Neither of them speaks for several moments as the tension fills the room… until Singhal breaks it.
“Fine.” Singhal leans back in his chair, his expression unreadable. “You got what you wanted. The empire. The throne. The power. So why the hell are you telling us all this now?”
I hold his gaze before turning away and walking towards the bar counter. Pouring myself another drink, I watch the amber liquid settle in the glass before I pick it up and return to the table.
“Because from this moment onwards,” I say, swirling the whiskey once, “the rules have changed.”
The room falls silent again.
“We’re not friends. We never will be. And I’m not foolish enough to call either of you my allies.” My eyes move from Parag to Singhal. “But whether we like it or not, we share the same enemy now...Raghav.”
I take a slow sip of my drink.
“He has messed with all three of us. You. Him,” I nod towards Parag, “and me.”
My jaw tightens. “And men like us do not survive by accepting defeat.”
I place the glass on the table with a soft thud.
“So before he decides how the future unfolds, before he decides which one of us he will kill first, before he decides to rule the underworld again...” I lean forward, my gaze moving between them. “We kill him. But not before we strip him of everything he has taken from us.”
They both nod. None of us in this room wants the Dark Prince alive. But none of us is stupid enough to underestimate him either. We all know what the Dark Prince is capable of, and that’s precisely why this alliance exists.
“All of that sounds impressive,” Singhal says, tapping ash into the tray. “But do you really think getting to Raghav is going to be that easy? The man spent years pretending to be dead while still keeping one hand wrapped around the throat of the underworld. We were all staring at his grave while he sat in the shadows, watching every move we made. Had it not been for Siya, he would have remained exactly where he wanted to be. Dead to the world and untouchable.”
He’s right. If it hadn’t been for Siya, Raghav would never have stepped out of the shadows. But now that he has, he’s no longer untouchable.
The moment Raghav took Siya away, I started digging into his life. Through Michael, I already knew he was running RK Estate. But what interested me was something else… the people he met, the ones he trusted, every ally, every weakness, and every person he would willingly burn the world down to protect. And investigation led me to something interesting. Tej Khurana had two of his closest friends in India: Kailash Shergill andPratap Walia. One was a respected social reformer, and the other was the Chief Minister of an entire state.
More importantly, their families had become Raghav’s family. They had taken him under their wing, and they were now the only people he truly cared about. The Shergills, especially. They became my next targets because anyone close to Raghav was worth hurting. And hurting them meant hurting him.
My gaze shifts to the projector screen mounted on the wall, where Raghav’s photograph is displayed. It was taken from the CCTV footage of Vardhaan Mansion on the day he showed up with his army and married Siya. Holding a rifle, he stares directly into the camera as though daring the entire world to come after him.
For a moment, nobody speaks.
Then Singhal finally breaks the silence. “I’ve never met him or had any connection with the Bat gang over the years. But every time somebody talked about him...” His gaze moves to the photograph. “...they described him like some kind of a myth. A man with many aliases.”
“He’s just a man. Don’t make him sound immortal,” Parag scoffs. “He’ll bleed too. He shot me twice, took away Siya, and humiliated me before the entire underworld.”
Parag’s eyes burn with rage as he leans forward. “I want him to witness everything he built falling apart. His men. His family. His RK Estate. Everything.”
Singhal nods slowly. “But how?”
The question silences the room because all three of us already know the answer.
Singhal had sent his men after Raghav’s family to keep an eye on them.
They failed.
I tried to plant my own people inside RK Estate. I tried to turn his staff against him. Tried to buy information from his suppliers. Tried to create cracks in his security from the inside.
I failed too.
Every move I made somehow reached Raghav before it even began.
“It’s not that easy,” Singhal adds. “The b*stard has eyes and ears everywhere. For all we know, his men are already buried deep within our organisations, wearing our colours, taking our money, pretending to be loyal while feeding him every piece of information we have. And that’s the worst part. We wouldn’t even know who they are. Every word we say, every plan we discuss, Raghav could already know about it through them.”
