Chapter 3: The Gilded Cage
The heavy oak doors of the master suite clicked shut, sounding like a gavel in a courtroom. I was officially a prisoner of the Malhotra name.
The room was vast, smelling of expensive cologne and the cold scent of rain still clinging to our clothes. I stood near the door, my breath hitching as Advik unbuttoned his soaked white shirt, his movements fluid and terrifyingly calm. The tattoos on his chest were a map of a violent life I was now tethered to.
"Sit," he commanded, not looking at me.
"I'm not a dog, Advik," I snapped, though my knees were shaking.
He stopped, his dark eyes snapping to mine. He walked toward me until I was pressed against the door, his shadow swallowing me whole. He reached out, and for a second, I thought he was going to strike me for my defiance. Instead, his fingers hooked under my chin, forcing me to look at the predator in front of me.
"You're a Malhotra now," he whispered, his voice vibrating through my skin. "And in this house, you follow my rules. Rule number one: don't test my patience when I'm tired."
He let go of me and gestured toward the massive king-sized bed. It was draped in black silk, looking like a midnight sea.
"The bed is yours," he said curtly.
I blinked, stunned. "And you?"
Advik threw his wet shirt onto a chair and walked toward the long, charcoal-grey leather sofa by the window. He grabbed a spare pillow and a throw blanket.
"I don't share my space, Ananya. And I certainly don't sleep with women who have daggers hidden in their waistbands." He sat down, his long legs barely fitting the length of the couch. "Sleep. Tomorrow, the world finds out you're mine. You'll need your strength for the lies we have to tell."
I didn't move. I watched him lie down, his back turned to me, his broad shoulders tense. For a moment, the "Architect" looked almost... human.
"Why didn't you take the bed?" I asked, my voice a small thread in the dark. "It's your house. You're the one who forced this."
Advik didn't turn around. "Don't mistake my distance for kindness, Jaan. I'm giving you the bed because I want you rested for what comes next."
"Which is?"
He finally looked back over his shoulder, a lethal glint in his eyes that made my blood run cold.
"The Hunt. Your father isn't the only one who owes me, Ananya. And you're the bait that's going to bring the rest of them out of the shadows."
I crawled onto the bed, the silk feeling like ice. I was safe for the night, but as I watched Advik's silhouette against the Mumbai skyline, I realized the bed wasn't a gift. It was a vantage point. He wasn't sleeping; he was watching the door.
He wasn't just my husband. He was my guard. And I was the only thing standing between him and a war.
I lay on the edge of the silk sheets, every muscle in my body coiled tight. The silence in the room was louder than the storm outside. Across the room, Advik was a dark silhouette on the sofa, his breathing heavy and rhythmic, yet I knew he wasn't asleep. Men like him didn't sleep; they just waited.
"Stop thinking, Ananya," his voice sliced through the dark, sandpaper-rough and low. "Your heartbeat is echoing off the walls. It's annoying."
"I can't exactly turn it off," I whispered, pulling the duvet tighter around my chest. "Especially not when I'm in a room with a man who destroyed my life before dinner."
I heard the leather of the sofa creak. Suddenly, Advik was standing. He didn't walk; he prowled. He crossed the distance between the sofa and the bed in three long strides. Before I could scream, he leaned over me, his hands planted on either side of my head, pinning me into the mattress.
The scent of sandalwood and danger overwhelmed me. Up close, his eyes weren't just dark—they were a storm of suppressed fury and something else... something that looked dangerously like hunger.
"You think I destroyed your life?" he hissed, his face inches from mine. "Your father destroyed it the day he gambled with the Malhotra name. I'm the only reason you're breathing in a silk bed instead of rotting in a cellar tonight."
"Is that supposed to make me thank you?" I felt the heat of his body radiating onto mine. My hand instinctively went to where the dagger had been, but it was gone. I was defenseless.
Advik's gaze dropped to my lips, and for a terrifying second, the tension in the room shifted. It wasn't just fear anymore. It was a suffocating, electric pull that made my breath catch in my throat. He saw it—the way my pulse jumped in my neck—and a dark, triumphant smirk ghosted his lips.
He reached out, his thumb slowly tracing the line of my lower lip, pulling it down just enough to reveal my teeth.
"Don't look at me with those defiant eyes, Princess," he murmured, his voice dropping to a hypnotic, lethal purr. "Because if you keep pushing, I might forget that I promised to stay on that sofa. And we both know you aren't ready for what happens when I stop being patient."
He let go of me abruptly, the cold air rushing back into the space he had occupied. He turned his back, walking back to the shadows of the sofa without another word.
"Advik?" I called out, my voice trembling.
"Sleep," he commanded, his tone now ice-cold. "Or I'll give you a reason to stay awake that you'll regret by morning."
I rolled over, my heart hammering a frantic rhythm. I was the Mafia's Princess, marked by his hand and trapped in his home. But as I stared at the door, I realized the most dangerous thing in this room wasn't the lock on the outside—it was the man sitting in the dark.