Ajay stepped out of Conference Room B, phone pressed to his ear. Divya's voice crackled through the speaker—something about a fight over a drawing assignment. He handled it quickly, calmly, the way he handled everything.
But his mind wasn't on school matters.
It was on Rohan.
The man's confidence had been wrong. Too measured. Too deliberate. A petty thief caught red-handed doesn't stand there smiling like he's won something.
Unless he had.
Ajay ended the call and walked back toward the executive floor. The corridor stretched before him, glass walls reflecting the amber glow of sunset. Through them, Ahmedabad's skyline glittered—towers of steel and glass, all blind to what moved beneath.
He found Anjali in her office.
Floor-to-ceiling windows framed the dying sun. She stood with her arms crossed, back to him, her silhouette sharp against the burning sky.
"What did the school want?"
"Nothing serious."
"Good."
Ajay closed the door. The soft click echoed louder than it should have.
Neither spoke for a moment. The city hummed below. Then Anjali turned.
"What were you going to tell me?"
Ajay sat across from her desk. "Rohan."
Her expression didn't change, but something in her posture hardened. "What about him?"
"He wasn't bluffing."
Silence.
Ajay leaned forward. "He expected to get caught. When we met him downstairs—no fear, no desperation, no attempt to run. Just a man who'd already done what he came to do."
"He had a camera."
"Exactly."
Anjali's eyes narrowed. The understanding landed like a physical blow. "He wasn't after K2."
"No." Ajay shook his head slowly. "He was after information."
She lowered herself into her chair. For the first time that day—perhaps the first time in years—Anjali Mehta felt genuinely uneasy.
Because Ajay was right.
The flash drive was a decoy. The camera was the payload. The theft was theater.
Someone wanted something from her. Not money. Not technology. Information.
And they were smart enough to use a disposable pawn.
"Do you have any leads?" she asked.
Ajay hesitated. "Maybe."
"Maybe?"
He pulled out his tablet. Screens lit up. "The malware I planted collected more than video data."
Anjali raised an eyebrow.
Files appeared. Call logs. Messages. Encrypted folders. Location pings. A spiderweb of data, harvested from a thief's own devices while he thought he was the one doing the stealing.
Most cybersecurity teams would need days for this. Ajay had done it between meetings.
She tried not to look impressed. Failed.
"You did all this today?"
He nodded. "More or less."
For a moment, she just stared at him.
IIT Bombay. Cybersecurity. Calm under pressure. Good with people. Good with technology. And apparently capable of hacking a criminal's devices while also handling her niece's school drama.
Whoever had fired this man was a fool.
"What did you find?"
Ajay opened a folder. A single name appeared.
V.K.
Anjali frowned. "That's it?"
"That's all Rohan ever used. Initials. No full name. No address. Just... V.K."
"Could be anyone."
"Could be." Ajay's tone suggested otherwise.
Anjali leaned back. V.K. The name meant nothing.
Yet she had a feeling it would.
Soon.
Meanwhile, inside the Mehta Residence.
Divya was exploring again.
The seven-year-old drifted through hallways like a ghost in a palace. Every painting was a mystery. Every vase a potential treasure. Every closed door a dare.
She found herself in the library.
Massive. Cathedral-like. Shelves stretched floor to ceiling, packed with thousands of books that smelled of dust and old paper. Divya forgot every rule about touching things.
She climbed onto a chair. Reached for a random book. Pulled down three more by accident.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
"Ouch."
She scrambled to pick them up. Something slipped from between the pages—a photograph, glossy and faded.
Divya picked it up.
A younger Anjali. Eighteen or nineteen. Standing beside a group of students, all smiling. Everyone looked happy. Carefree. Human.
Divya tilted her head. "Didi can smile?"
The current version of Anjali mostly looked like she was preparing to fire someone.
Curious, Divya studied the picture. A young man stood near Anjali. Tall. Handsome. Similar build. Something about his face tugged at her memory—familiar in a way she couldn't place.
Footsteps approached.
Divya shoved the photograph back into the book.
A maid appeared in the doorway. "Miss Divya, dinner will be served soon."
"Coming!"
The photograph was forgotten.
For now.
Later that evening.
Ajay stepped through the mansion's entrance. Divya barreled into him.
"Papa!"
He smiled, catching her. "How was your day?"
"I found a secret room."
"You mean the library?"
"How did you know?"
"Because every rich person's mansion has a library in the movies."
Divya's eyes widened. "You're smart."
"I know."
"No, you don't."
Both turned. Anjali stood in the living room doorway, still in her business suit, still flawless, still somehow insulting him without trying.
Ajay shook his head. "Good evening to you too."
She smirked.
Divya looked between them, then grinned. "You two argue a lot."
"We do not."
The simultaneous reply made Divya burst out laughing. Even Anjali's lips twitched.
For a brief moment—just a heartbeat—the atmosphere shifted.
Not a billionaire's mansion. Not a CEO and her employee. Just three people sharing the same space, the same strange rhythm.
None of them noticed how quickly that rhythm was becoming comfortable.
And none of them knew that across Ahmedabad, in a room with no windows, a man was staring at a screen.
V.K. watched.
He saw everything.
The call logs Ajay had harvested. The encrypted folders. The crumbs he'd left behind—deliberately, carefully, like breadcrumbs leading deeper into the woods.
Rohan had served his purpose. The photograph had been taken. The malware had done its work.
But not the way Ajay thought.
Because Ajay wasn't hunting V.K.
V.K. was hunting him.
The man smiled, leaned back, and whispered to the empty room:
"Next move."
The game had only just begun.