In the dimly lit underground chamber of the Swindon safehouse Rex now called his temporary command post, the faint hum of servers and fans echoed like whispers of secrets being unraveled. Aarav Mehra, cool and composed as ever in a sleek black sweatshirt and jeans, stepped in with his laptop tucked under one arm and that usual, smug confidence dancing in his eyes. Rex sat by the long table, swirling the last sip of his espresso in a porcelain cup, eyes fixed on the corkboard filled with photographs, pins, and red-threaded maps.
"I told you I'd deliver," Aarav said smoothly, flipping the laptop open. "He's not just under surveillance. He's now wide open."
Rex's interest piqued instantly. He leaned forward, lips curling into a slow smile. On the screen in front of him, Kiaan Varma's phone interface was mirrored in real time. Every flicker of text, every scroll through gallery, notes, and chats—live and unrestricted.
"Kiaan's phone?" Rex asked, dark brows lifting as he sat up straighter.
"Tapped, mirrored, untraceable," Aarav confirmed, fingers dancing across the keyboard. "I breached his signal firewall from the Redfish site. When he passed out from that spider panic, his phone synced to a nearby network I hijacked. Child's play. Took me a few hours to dig deep, but now—" he clicked again—"you've got access to his notes, calls, location pings, agent messages, even the camera if needed."
Rex leaned closer, eyes glinting as he watched a message pop up on Kiaan's screen:
> "New CCTV access for Brentwater being processed. Meeting Dev at 3PM."
"Lunch skipped. Focused on port trail."
"Focused little soldier," Rex murmured, the sarcasm in his voice laced with an almost admiring edge. He tilted his head, watching as Kiaan flipped through old documents stored on his phone—snapshots of drug shipment patterns, van numbers, port shift rosters. "He's sharp. Methodical. But obsession…" Rex chuckled darkly, "makes people sloppy."
Aarav nodded, still typing. "He's constantly clearing his call history, encrypting his chats—but he doesn't realize his GPS shares small micro-logs to his cloud every hour. That's my entry point."
Rex leaned back in his chair, arms crossing over his chest. "So now we don't just watch him… we predict him."
He turned toward Aarav, that familiar spark of danger lighting up his voice. "Mark every route he follows. Every call he makes. Especially any mention of Brentwater and Graykey. The moment he finds a thread… we cut it."
Aarav gave a slow nod, pulling up a new tracking tab. "Done. I'll also program an alert—whenever he speaks to Tara, Dev, or that tech nerd Rehaan."
Rex's gaze lingered on the screen as Kiaan typed something into his notes:
> "No matter what… I'll shut this down."
Rex smirked. "We'll see, little lion. We'll see how long your roar lasts… when the whole jungle starts watching you bleed."
________________________________________
In the silent hum of his dimly lit office, Kiaan Varma sat hunched on the metal chair, scrolling through his phone while the fluorescent light above flickered faintly. The cold air from the vent brushed his neck as he absentmindedly read a message that had just popped up:
> "Dinner tonight? Just us?"
It was from Alisha, one of the junior analysts in their HQ team—bright, efficient, a little too flirty lately. Kiaan's brows furrowed slightly as he stared at the message, uncertain how to respond. His thumb hovered over the screen, lost between a polite refusal and awkward curiosity. His chest rose and fell in a slow breath, his white t-shirt loose, the fabric clinging to the slight sheen of sweat over his collarbone after a long day.
What Kiaan didn't know, sitting in that quiet moment, was that his phone—screen, camera, microphone—wasn't entirely his anymore.
Miles away, in a low-lit command base, Rex Malhotra leaned back in his chair, watching the laptop with predator-like focus. The mirrored phone feed showed Kiaan's screen clearly, but now, thanks to Aarav's camera tap, Rex was watching more than just texts. He saw Kiaan through the lens of his own device, saw the young agent fidget, hesitate, his expression subtly vulnerable—an open book to anyone who knew how to read people.
"He's thinking too much over a dinner invite," Rex muttered, one brow arching with amusement. "He's not used to affection unless it's wrapped in duty."
Just then, a voice suddenly called out from behind Kiaan.
"Yo, lover boy! You coming to grab coffee or should I tell Tara you've fallen in love with your screen?"
Dev's voice rang out in his usual teasing tone.
Startled, Kiaan jolted, almost dropping his phone. Reacting fast, he awkwardly shoved it beneath his t-shirt like a guilty teenager caught texting in class, and turned sharply to Dev.
"I—I wasn't—shut up," Kiaan snapped, cheeks tinged with a slight flush, whether from embarrassment or the sheer ridiculousness of the moment. Dev laughed, not buying the innocence for a second.
Rex, watching, tilted his head with eerie calm. The awkwardness. The flushed reaction. The defensiveness. All noted. All filed. His smirk deepened.
"Flustered. Interesting…" he murmured, drumming his fingers on the table. "So that's how to rattle the untouchable Viaan Verma."
Behind him, Aarav returned with a fresh printout of CCTV footage from Brentwater.
"We're in his pockets now," Aarav said without needing to ask what Rex was watching.
Rex didn't respond right away. His gaze remained locked on the frozen frame of Kiaan standing, clearly annoyed with Dev, brushing his fingers through his hair while the phone remained tucked close under his shirt—guarded. Defensive.
"It's always the quiet ones," Rex said at last, voice calm and low. "They break the loudest."
The rhythmic tapping of Aarav Mehra's fingers against the desk as he zoomed in on the live feed. The mirrored camera angle from Kiaan's hacked phone gave them a direct, uncensored view—clearer now as the device had shifted slightly under his shirt when he reacted to Dev's sudden voice.
For most observers, the image would've seemed incidental. A flustered agent caught off guard. But Rex Malhotra was no casual observer.
He had already noticed it—long before Aarav commented.
His eyes were trained, not just in tactics and warfare, but in human behavior, in pattern recognition, in the small details most men would miss. And that moment—when Kiaan shoved the phone beneath his shirt instead of just tucking it in his pocket—was telling.
Rex didn't smirk. He didn't speak. He only leaned forward, his elbows on the desk, face shadowed by the dim lighting above him as the screen glowed with the slow rise and fall of Kiaan's chest. The young agent's body language was protective, guarded. Even in private, there were layers to him—layers Rex was determined to peel away.
Aarav glanced at him, hesitant. "I, uh… I think the phone's under the shirt now. It's not in his pocket."
"I know," Rex replied quietly, eyes never leaving the screen.
Aarav shifted awkwardly in his seat. "It's a bit… personal now. Should I disengage the camera for a while?"
Rex shook his head slowly. "No. Keep it running. This isn't about watching him… it's about understanding him. The way he reacts under pressure. Who he hides behind that calm."
He leaned back, thoughtful now.
"He hides even from his own friends," Rex said, almost to himself. "That's not shame. That's trauma. That's someone who grew up never being allowed to exist freely—not at home, not anywhere."
The image faded as Kiaan moved, standing near the window now, the soft glow of the setting sun outlining his silhouette. Dev was beside him, joking, unaware they were being watched.
Rex's expression darkened slightly—not with lust, but with obsession. The kind that comes when a predator finally finds a puzzle that doesn't come apart easily.
"Crack a man's mind," he muttered, "and you never need a bullet."
________________________________________
Kiaan stared at the message for a moment longer, the screen still glowing in his palm. His thumb hovered over the reply box before he finally typed a short, blunt "No." No explanations, no emojis, just a sharp refusal that matched the storm of restlessness brewing in his chest.
He slipped the phone into his pocket with a sigh and grabbed his black jacket from the back of the chair in one smooth motion. "Let's go," he said without looking back. His voice was brisk, clipped—commanding.
Dev, Tara, and Rehaan exchanged glances, sensing the sudden change in him, but didn't question it. Rehaan shrugged with a playful grin, Tara quietly collected her tablet, and Dev tossed his coffee into the bin like a soldier following orders. As the four of them stepped out of the HQ building together, the evening wind brushed past them, cold and cutting.
The sky above was cloudy, brooding like the storm building in Kiaan's mind. He moved ahead quickly, jaw clenched, fists buried deep in his pockets—driven not just by duty, but by something deeper. Something he couldn't shake. He didn't run from danger—but he always ran from closeness.
Behind him, Dev caught up, walking by his side. "Skipping dinner dates now? Harsh," he teased. Kiaan smirked faintly but didn't respond. He just kept walking—into the field, into the case, into the shadows he knew better than light.
Watching from a silent monitor far away, Rex leaned back, eyes narrowing. "Keep running, Agent Verma," he murmured. "Eventually… you'll run straight into me."