Chapter 3 — The Second Signature
1628 Words
The house became unusually quiet after the officers left.
Aarohi remained standing in the drawing room long after the front door had closed. The notice from the Economic Offences Unit was still on the table in front of her.
It was only a few pages.
Yet it had changed everything.
Until that evening, the problem had seemed like a corporate dispute—Project Aster versus Nexora, Aarohi versus Raghav, one company against another.
Now it was something else.
Money had moved.
Documents had been accessed.
A formal complaint had been filed.
And somewhere inside all of it was Contract 47.
Aarohi picked up the notice again.
Her father, Rajiv Kapoor, walked into the room.
“They've left,” he said.
“I know.”
“They're conducting a preliminary inquiry. That doesn't mean they've decided you're guilty of anything.”
Aarohi looked at him.
“I know that too.”
Rajiv stopped.
“You're thinking about something.”
“I'm thinking about the fact that they mentioned transactions from Aster Innovations.”
Her father said nothing.
Aarohi noticed.
“Dad?”
“What?”
“You knew about those payments?”
Rajiv's expression changed only slightly.
“I knew there were professional payments being processed. I didn't know every transaction personally.”
“Northbridge Advisory?”
He looked toward the table.
“Yes.”
“Why were they being paid?”
“I'll have to check.”
Aarohi's eyes narrowed.
“You're telling me you don't know?”
“I am telling you that I don't want to guess.”
That answer bothered her more than a denial would have.
Before she could continue, her phone vibrated.
A message.
Unknown Number:
The second signature is more important than the first.
Aarohi stared at the screen.
Her father noticed her expression.
“What happened?”
She locked the phone.
“Nothing.”
But this time, she did not believe that herself.
The Next Morning
At 8:15 a.m., Aarohi entered the Aster Innovations headquarters.
The office was functioning normally.
Employees were working. Meetings were taking place. Screens displayed charts and operational data. Assistants moved between departments carrying files.
But Aarohi noticed something immediately.
People were looking at her.
Not openly.
Just enough.
She walked straight toward her office.
“Good morning, ma'am,” her assistant said.
“Good morning. Has Vikram arrived?”
“Yes. He's waiting inside.”
Aarohi entered.
Vikram was sitting across from her desk with a laptop open.
He looked exhausted.
“You didn't sleep,” Aarohi said.
“Neither did you.”
“I asked you a question.”
Vikram looked down.
“No.”
Aarohi closed the door.
“Show me the Argentis contract again.”
Vikram opened the file.
The document appeared on the screen.
ARGENTIS RISK SOLUTIONS
Controlled Vulnerability Assessment — Project Aster
Aarohi read the first page carefully.
Then the second.
Then the authorization section.
Her finger stopped.
“Go back.”
Vikram scrolled upward.
“There.”
Aarohi leaned closer.
The authorization number was clearly visible.
KP-47/19
“Contract 47,” she whispered.
“Yes.”
“Who signed this?”
Vikram pointed toward the digital authorization.
“This is where things become complicated.”
“Explain.”
“The first authorization came through an executive channel connected to Kapoor Private Holdings.”
“My father's company.”
“Technically, yes.”
“Technically?”
Vikram hesitated.
“The account belonged to the corporate network. But the actual authorization wasn't signed directly by your father.”
Aarohi looked at him.
“Then who signed it?”
Vikram enlarged the document.
A digital signature appeared.
Aarohi recognised the initials.
M.K.
Her expression hardened.
“Mr. Kapoor.”
Vikram nodded.
“That's what it looks like.”
Aarohi leaned back.
“Looks like?”
“There is a problem.”
“What problem?”
“The digital signature isn't the complete authorization.”
He opened another page.
“There are two signatures.”
Aarohi looked at the screen.
The first was M.K.
The second was almost hidden beneath a scanned approval stamp.
She enlarged it.
For several seconds, neither of them spoke.
The second signature belonged to someone else.
A.S.
Aarohi frowned.
“Who is A.S.?”
Vikram shook his head.
“I don't know.”
Aarohi stared at the initials.
Then something occurred to her.
“Search the internal authorization records.”
Vikram did.
The system returned several results.
Aarohi read them carefully.
Most were ordinary.
Then one result caught her attention.
A.S. — Temporary Executive Authorization
Date:
Seven months earlier.
Aarohi's face became serious.
“Who had this authorization?”
Vikram opened the access profile.
The name appeared.
Aarohi stopped breathing for a moment.
It wasn't an employee.
It wasn't a director.
It wasn't even a current executive.
It was an old corporate authorization account.
An account that had supposedly been deactivated years ago.
ASHER SYSTEMS — LEGACY ADMINISTRATION
Aarohi looked at Vikram.
“What is Asher Systems?”
“I don't know.”
“You've worked here for three years.”
“I've never seen it.”
“Then why does it have authorization access to my company?”
Vikram didn't answer.
Aarohi stood.
“Find out.”
The Old File
By noon, Aarohi was sitting in the company's archive room.
The room was rarely used.
Old contracts, incorporation documents, acquisition papers and discontinued project files were stored there.
She asked the legal department to retrieve every document containing the words:
Asher Systems.
The first file was almost meaningless.
The company had once provided enterprise software services.
The second contained an old acquisition proposal.
The third was different.
Aarohi opened it.
It was a document dated twelve years earlier.
At the top was the name:
ASHER SYSTEMS PRIVATE LIMITED
Below it was a list of former directors.
Aarohi scanned the names.
Then stopped.
One name was familiar.
Arman Sethi.
She immediately remembered Vikram's statement.
The Argentis contract manager was Arman Sethi.
Her fingers tightened around the file.
“That can't be a coincidence.”
Vikram, standing behind her, looked at the document.
“Maybe it is.”
Aarohi turned toward him.
“You really believe that?”
“No.”
“Good.”
She continued reading.
Asher Systems had been acquired by another corporate entity years ago.
But one clause caught her attention.
The company's legacy authorization infrastructure had not been immediately dissolved.
Instead, certain administrative credentials had been transferred to a private corporate management system.
Aarohi read the final paragraph twice.
“Who owns the management system?”
Vikram checked the document.
He looked uncomfortable.
“Kapoor Private Holdings.”
Silence filled the room.
Aarohi slowly closed the file.
“So Contract 47 wasn't created inside Aster.”
“No.”
“It came through the Kapoor network.”
“Yes.”
“And the person connected to Argentis was once associated with a company that had access to that network.”
“Yes.”
Aarohi looked toward the shelves.
The pieces were beginning to connect.
But something still didn't fit.
If someone wanted to steal Project Aster, why create such a complicated trail?
Why leave Contract 47 behind?
Why allow the police to find the financial transactions?
Unless—
Aarohi stopped.
Vikram noticed.
“What?”
“Maybe we're looking at it backwards.”
The Real Purpose
That evening, Aarohi returned to her office alone.
She opened the original Project Aster feasibility report.
The same document Vikram had accessed at 2:13 a.m.
She read it again.
The report contained technical projections, market estimates and operational models.
Nothing seemed extraordinary.
Then she noticed a footnote.
A tiny reference at the bottom of page 38.
ASTER — Predictive Supply Risk Architecture: Internal Classification B-47.
Aarohi stared at it.
“B-47.”
She searched the company's database.
Nothing.
She searched archived emails.
Nothing.
Then she searched the old corporate system.
A result appeared.
B-47 — Legacy Strategic Infrastructure Classification
Aarohi opened it.
The document was restricted.
Very restricted.
It had been created before Project Aster existed.
Before Aster Innovations had even been founded.
Her eyes moved across the screen.
The document described a much older system.
A predictive business network designed to connect suppliers, logistics providers and financial institutions while identifying disruptions before they became visible.
Aarohi whispered:
“This is Aster.”
But the document was twelve years old.
Project Aster had been her idea.
She had designed its architecture independently.
Or at least—
That was what she had always believed.
A sound came from behind her.
Aarohi immediately closed the file.
She turned.
Nobody was there.
The office door was still locked.
Her phone vibrated.
Another message.
Unknown Number:
You finally found B-47.
Aarohi's face went cold.
Another message arrived.
Now ask your father why Project Aster already existed before you created it.
She stared at the screen.
For the first time since the investigation began, Aarohi had no immediate response.
Then she noticed something else.
The sender had attached a photograph.
It showed an old conference room.
Several people were standing around a table.
The photograph was dated twelve years earlier.
Aarohi zoomed in.
Her father was there.
Mr. Kapoor was there.
Arman Sethi was there.
And on the table was a presentation folder.
Across its cover were two words:
PROJECT ASTER
Aarohi stared at the photograph.
Her phone slipped slightly from her hand.
The project she had spent years believing she had created herself...
had apparently existed long before she ever knew about it.
And someone had just made sure she found out.
She looked at the locked office door.
Then back at the photograph.
This time, the question was no longer whether someone had stolen Project Aster.
The real question was much more dangerous.
Who had given it to her in the first place?
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