🖤 Author's Note 🖤

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Now grab your coffee, turn on your dark romance playlist, and enjoy the chaos...

— The Inked Lotus ✒️🥀

The lighter was warm.

That was the first thing Sia noticed.

Not cold metal.

Not abandoned.

Warm.

As if it had only just left someone's hand.

Rain hammered against the towering windows of the hotel gallery while Sia stood frozen in the empty corridor, her pulse still racing from what had just happened.

Or what she thought had happened.

Because surely it hadn't been real.

The stranger.

The storm-grey eyes.

The strange conversation.

The touch.

Especially the touch.

Sia stared down at the antique silver lighter resting in her palm.

Heavy.

Old.

Expensive.

The kind of craftsmanship that belonged to another era.

Intricate carvings wrapped around the metal while a single initial sat engraved in the center.

P.

Just one letter.

Yet something about it felt wrong.

Familiar.

Dangerous.

A shiver crawled down her spine.

She looked up immediately.

The corridor remained empty.

No footsteps.

No movement.

No trace of the man.

Nothing.

Only rain.

For a brief moment, Sia wondered if she'd imagined everything.

It wouldn't be the first time lately.

The thought unsettled her more than the stranger himself.

Because strangers could be investigated.

Memories could be recovered.

But her own mind?

That was becoming increasingly difficult to trust.

"You disappeared."

Yuvraj's voice broke through her thoughts the moment she returned to the ballroom.

Sia immediately slipped the lighter into her clutch.

Hidden.

Safe.

Yuvraj approached carrying two glasses of champagne.

His smile was annoyingly confident.

"People were looking for you."

"No," Sia corrected smoothly.

"You were."

A few nearby socialites laughed politely.

Yuvraj grinned.

"Maybe."

God.

He really thought he was charming.

Sia accepted the champagne anyway.

Not because she wanted it.

Because predators often accepted gifts before devouring prey.

The rest of the evening passed in calculated conversation.

Yuvraj boasted.

Sia listened.

Yuvraj flirted.

Sia smiled.

Yuvraj revealed information without realizing it.

And Sia collected every piece carefully.

Because beneath the expensive suit and practiced confidence, Yuvraj possessed a fatal flaw.

He desperately wanted her approval.

That made him vulnerable.

And vulnerable people made mistakes.

Exactly as she intended.

Yuvraj swirled his whiskey lazily.

"You know what fascinates me about old artifacts?"

Sia smiled politely.

"Men who steal them?"

He laughed.

"No. Men who can afford them."

Perfect.

Because arrogant men loved talking when they thought they were impressing women.

Sia tilted her head.

"You collect?"

"Occasionally."

Lie.

She already knew he collected aggressively.

"What was your last purchase?"

Yuvraj smirked.

"A seventeenth-century royal lighter."

That caught her attention immediately.

"A lighter?"

"Not just any lighter."

He took a sip of whiskey.

"Belonged to an old royal family. Impossible to obtain."

Interesting.

"Yet you obtained it."

His expression darkened slightly.

"No."

The admission surprised her.

"Someone outbid me."

His ego clearly hadn't recovered.

"Who?"

Yuvraj laughed bitterly.

"Nobody knows."

"That's useful."

"It isn't."

His jaw tightened.

"Because whenever something rare appears on the market, he gets there first."

"He?"

"Prakhyaat."

......................

The lighter sat on Sia's desk for three days before she allowed herself to become interested.

Not curious.

Interested.

Curiosity was emotional.

Interest was strategic.

And Sia Malhotra had spent seven years teaching herself the difference.

Rain drummed against the floor-to-ceiling windows of her penthouse office while Mumbai disappeared beneath layers of storm clouds. Screens glowed across the room displaying market reports, acquisition summaries, and intelligence files.

Yet her attention kept returning to the silver object resting beside her laptop.

The lighter.

Heavy.

Ancient.

And completely out of place.

She picked it up again.

The engraved letter stared back at her.

P.

One single initial.

Nothing more.

Nothing less.

Still, something about it irritated her.

Objects did not appear from nowhere.

People did.

Mistakes did.

Artifacts always had a history.

And history left fingerprints.

"Screw it."

She pressed the intercom.

"Send Vikram in."

Five minutes later, the head of intelligence for Malhotra Global entered carrying a tablet.

Vikram was one of the few people Sia trusted.

Not because he was loyal.

Because he was competent.

"What do you need?"

She slid the lighter across the desk.

"Everything."

He examined it for several moments.

Then frowned.

"Where did you get this?"

Interesting.

"Why?"

"Because this isn't modern."

Now she had his full attention.

"What is it?"

Vikram turned the object over carefully.

"The outer casing was modified recently, but the core structure is older."

"How old?"

"A few centuries, maybe."

Sia leaned forward.

"You're serious."

"I think so."

The room grew quiet.

Finally, something useful.

"Trace it."

Vikram nodded.

"Give me a few days."

"No."

Her eyes sharpened.

"Give me a few hours."

Three hours later, the report arrived.

And it was far stranger than Sia expected.

The lighter wasn't originally a lighter at all.

It had once been a ceremonial fire capsule belonging to a forgotten royal mining dynasty that operated across northern India generations ago.

Most surviving pieces from that collection had vanished decades earlier.

Sold.

Stolen.

Lost.

Destroyed.

Every investigative trail led into private auctions.

And every private auction eventually led toward the same name.

Prakhyaat Suryaveer.

Sia read the report twice.

Then a third time.

Mining.

Rare antiquities.

Private acquisitions.

International shipping.

The man seemed to exist at the center of every network she had been studying for years.

That alone would have interested her.

The rest made it worse.

She opened another file.

Corporate records.

Prakhyaat Suryaveer.

Founder.

Chairman.

Investor.

Collector.

Billionaire.

The numbers attached to his empire were absurd.

Yet something felt wrong immediately.

Sia opened a search archive.

Nothing.

She opened another.

Still nothing.

No interviews.

No televised appearances.

No conference footage.

No public speeches.

No verified photographs.

Nothing.

Her irritation slowly transformed into fascination.

That was impossible.

A billionaire of that scale should be everywhere.

News channels.

Business magazines.

Financial forums.

Documentaries.

Instead, there were only references.

Mentions.

Shadows.

Article after article repeated similar phrases:

"Mr. Suryaveer declined attendance."

"A representative appeared on behalf of the chairman."

"The founder was unavailable for comment."

"The chairman remains private."

Private?

No.

Hidden.

There was a difference.

And Sia was very good at spotting it.

Hours passed.

The storm outside worsened.

Still, she searched.

Still, she found nothing.

No face.

No voice.

No image.

A ghost controlling an empire.

Her pulse quickened slightly.

Not fear.

Recognition.

Because she knew another ghost.

A man with storm-grey eyes.

A man who appeared in corridors and disappeared before she could understand whether he had been real.

Ridiculous.

She closed the thought immediately.

The two things couldn't be connected.

Could they?

Her gaze drifted toward the lighter.

The engraved P seemed to stare back at her.

Waiting.

Mocking.

Inviting.

By midnight she had reached the oldest file in the archive.

A twenty-year-old auction record recovered from a private database.

Most of the document was damaged.

Several pages were missing.

Yet one surviving note remained.

Sia froze.

Then read it again.

And again.

The buyer requested the artifact be engraved with the initial P before delivery.

Silence filled the office.

Slowly, Sia lowered the document.

Then looked at the lighter in her hand.

The same initial.

The same artifact.

The same mystery.

For the first time since leaving the gala, she felt something she had not expected.

Not fear.

Not anger.

Anticipation.

Somewhere inside the tangled web of the Vardhans, the forgotten past, and the man who seemed determined to remain invisible—

there was a truth.

And Sia had always been incapable of walking away from a mystery.Silence filled the office.

Slowly, Sia lowered the document.

Then looked at the lighter resting in her hand.

The same initial.

The same artifact.

The same mystery.

For the first time since leaving the gala, she felt something she had not expected.

Not fear.

Not anger.

Anticipation.

Somewhere inside the tangled web of the Vardhans, the forgotten past, and the man who seemed determined to remain invisible—

there was a truth.

And Sia had always been incapable of walking away from a mystery.

Her fingers moved unconsciously across the lighter's surface.

Tracing the engraved letter.

P.

The metal felt unusually smooth beneath her thumb.

Too smooth.

Frowning, she tilted the lighter toward the desk lamp.

The silver caught the light differently this time.

A faint line appeared beneath the engraving.

Almost invisible.

Almost erased.

Sia sat up straighter.

"What the hell..."

She grabbed a magnifying lens from her desk drawer.

The office grew quiet.

Slowly.

Carefully.

She examined the metal.

And froze.

There was another engraving beneath the P.

Older.

Deeper.

Deliberately scratched away.

But not completely.

Only one curve remained visible.

One fragment of a letter.

An S.

Her pulse stumbled.

No.

Not necessarily her S.

It could mean anything.

Anyone.

Yet she couldn't stop staring.

S.

The letter from her nightmares.

The letter carved across blood-soaked memories she couldn't fully remember.

The letter that seemed to follow her everywhere.

A chill slid down her spine.

Instinctively, she opened the remaining auction files.

If the lighter had been altered once—

perhaps it had changed hands before.

The search took another hour.

Then another.

Most records were corrupted.

Others had been purchased and sealed.

Several names were blacked out entirely.

Until finally—

one damaged ownership log appeared.

Incomplete.

Burned around the edges.

The screen flickered.

Loading.

Restoring.

Recovering.

Sia leaned forward.

The document displayed a sequence of owners.

Most names were unreadable.

Most.

Except the final one.

Her breath caught.

Last registered owner:

AARAV VASHISHT.

The room went completely still.

The name meant nothing to her.

And yet—

something deep inside her reacted violently.

Not recognition.

Not exactly.

A feeling.

Like hearing a song she couldn't remember but somehow knew.

A sharp pain exploded briefly behind her eyes.

Storm-grey eyes.

Rain.

Blood.

A masculine voice.

Gone before she could catch it.

Sia inhaled sharply.

No.

Not now.

Not again.

Her phone rang.

The sound nearly made her jump.

Unknown Number.

The screen displayed no caller ID.

No location.

Nothing.

The storm outside intensified.

Thunder rolled across the city.

The phone continued ringing.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

Sia answered.

Silence.

For several seconds, neither side spoke.

Then—

she heard breathing.

Slow.

Steady.

Male.

Every instinct in her body sharpened instantly.

"Who is this?" she asked.

Nothing.

Only silence.

Then a voice emerged.

Low.

Calm.

Dangerously controlled.

A voice she had never heard before.

And yet somehow felt she knew.

"Stop looking for him."

Sia's grip tightened around the phone.

"Who?"

A pause.

Then—

"Aarav Vashisht."

The call disconnected.

Dead silence flooded the office.

Outside, lightning split the sky.

Inside, Sia stared at the dark screen of her phone.

Then at the lighter.

Then at the name glowing from her monitor.

Aarav Vashisht.

For the first time in seven years—

the past felt less like a grave.

And more like a door.

One that someone was desperately trying to keep closed.