Episode 9 : "The Ghost don't die"
870 Words
Sanchit’s POV
The note felt heavier than paper should.
It wasn’t the weight of ink or folded fibers—it was the weight of a ghost.
The words were short. Almost casual.
But the handwriting…
That damned handwriting.
Precise. Slanting. Confident. Each stroke biting into the paper as if the pen itself had a vendetta.
It was the kind of hand that didn’t just write—it carved.
And only one man I had ever known wrote like that.
A man who had been erased from our lives five years ago.
Aarav Malhotra.
The name alone was poison in our circle—uttered rarely, and only in whispers. We didn’t speak of him not because we feared him, but because we buried him—along with everything he’d taken from us.
Now, standing at the bar, I let my whiskey burn down my throat while the memory sharpened like jagged glass.
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Flashback – Five Years Ago
Rain hammered the deck of the ship, turning the wood into slick, treacherous terrain. The sea roared beneath us, black and endless.
I’d arrived too late to stop the deal in motion. Rhea was there—bound, her wrists raw from the ropes. Her eyes—God, her eyes—were wild with terror, her breath ragged. The man holding her wasn’t some stranger.
It was Aarav.
Rhea’s first love. Denver’s business partner. My friend.
And yet, here he was, ready to trade her like a piece of property to a European mafia boss in exchange for control of the Knight Empire.
When Denver burst in, I thought the storm had shifted inside the ship. His fury wasn’t loud—it was lethal. The kind that made the air hard to breathe.
“You’ll regret this,” Aarav had smirked, even with Denver’s gun pressed to his forehead.
What followed wasn’t just revenge. It was obliteration. Gunfire, shouting, the stench of burning fuel. By the time we made it out, the ship was a floating grave. We left him to the flames and the sea.
No body was ever recovered. We took that as a gift—no body meant no funeral, no closure. Just a quiet hope he was gone for good.
---
But the note in my hand tonight said otherwise.
If Aarav was back, he wouldn’t start with the empire.
He’d start with us.
With revenge.
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Rhea’s POV
The house was silent now. The last guest had left, and Pari was upstairs, her tiara still clutched in her tiny fist. I watched her sleep for a long moment—the innocence in her breathing, the way her small chest rose and fell without the weight of the world pressing on it yet.
I kissed her forehead, tucked the blanket closer, and shut the door.
Downstairs, the library lights glowed like a sanctuary, though I knew the mood inside would be anything but peaceful.
Denver was already there.
Veer stood near him, arms folded, face carved from stone.
He didn’t ask questions when I approached—just stepped aside to let me in.
Denver paced the length of the room, his jaw flexing with every turn. The air around him felt… sharp.
“Talk,” he said the moment I entered.
I pulled the note from my pocket. The paper was warm from my hand but cold in meaning. I placed it in his palm.
His eyes scanned it once. Twice. The moment recognition hit, his expression hardened into something lethal.
“You recognize it,” I said, though I already knew the answer.
“I prayed I’d never see this again,” he said quietly, but there was nothing soft in his tone. “It’s him.”
The silence that followed was a heavy, living thing between us.
“We need to lock the estate down,” I said. My voice was calm, but my pulse wasn’t. “Pari, Ruhani, everyone—no one leaves without clearance.”
“He won’t reach them,” Denver said, each word edged in steel. “I’ll make sure of it.”
I stepped closer. “This isn’t just about us, Denver. He wants to finish what he started.”
“Then let him try,” he said, taking another step toward me. His presence wrapped around me, not just protective but unyielding. “I’m not the man he betrayed before. And you’re not the woman he left behind.”
His arms came around me—not gently, but with the certainty of someone who would burn the world before letting it touch me again.
“He’ll regret ever surviving.”
And in his voice, I heard no empty promise.
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Veer’s POV
From my place by the library door, I watched them—Rhea with that quiet fire in her eyes, Denver with that cold command in his voice.
My mind was already running through protocols. Security perimeters. Guard rotations. Lockdown drills. Routes for extraction.
But my heart…
My heart was with the letter.
Because I felt it too—like the air before a monsoon. The static. The weight.
Aarav’s return wasn’t just a threat.
It was a reckoning.
And whether we were ready or not, the storm had already started.
- Writer
