Chapter 1
The smell of warm parathas and brewing tea filled the narrow kitchen as the morning sunlight filtered weakly through the cracked window. Vedika stood barefoot, hair tied up in a messy knot, flipping through the files on the dining table while her mother hummed softly by the stove.
“Eat first,” her mother scolded, without turning. “Those papers can wait.”
Vedika smiled faintly, but her fingers tightened around the file. It couldn’t wait. Nothing ever could, not in her world.
“Maa, I have a meeting today. Big one,” she said, closing the file reluctantly and moving towards the kitchen. She kissed her mother’s temple — the same way she had done every morning for as long as she could remember — and picked up a steel plate.
Her mother, Shanta Sharma, was a small woman, worn thinner by grief than by age. Yet her hands were steady, her spirit iron-clad.
It had to be. After everything they had survived.
From the bedroom, a loud crash echoed, followed by a sheepish “Sorry, Maa!”
Vedika laughed under her breath. “Kabir!”
Her younger brother — all of fifteen, with the same stubborn jaw as their father — came skidding into the kitchen, his school bag half open, textbooks spilling out.
“You’re late!” Vedika said, tossing a roti onto his plate.
“I know, I know!” he groaned dramatically, shoving books back into his bag with frantic hands. “The alarm didn’t ring.”
“It did,” their mother said calmly. “You just didn’t listen.”
Kabir grinned, flashing dimples, and wolfed down a bite. Vedika watched him for a moment, heart tight.
He was growing so fast.
Too fast.
Sometimes, when the house was silent late at night, she caught glimpses of the boy he might have been — a boy with laughter untainted by fear — if fate hadn’t stolen their father from them.
The thought coiled like barbed wire in her chest.
⸻
It had been seven years, but Vedika remembered every detail of that night as if it were carved into her bones.
Her father — Inspector Rajeev Sharma — had been the kind of man stories were written about. Honest to a fault. Fierce in his pursuit of justice.
And too brave, far too brave, in a world that punished good men.
He had uncovered a nexus between the local mafia and the police department itself — a network of extortion, kidnapping, and murder masked under fake reports and blood money.
He was ready to expose them.
Ready to rip the rot out by its roots.
Vedika had been seventeen. Kabir just eight.
She remembered standing by the window, waiting for his headlights to sweep across the driveway.
Waiting for the familiar sound of his boots on the porch.
Waiting for the door to creak open and his voice to fill the house with warmth.
But the night had stayed silent.
And then — flashing red and blue lights.
Strangers at the door.
The hollow voice of a senior officer, speaking words that made no sense.
“Encounter,” they had said. “Shootout.”
“Wrong place, wrong time.”
“Regrettable casualty.”
All lies.
The truth surfaced slowly, like a corpse refusing to stay submerged.
His own colleagues had set him up.
Fed his location to the mafia in exchange for silence and survival.
They had shot him in the back.
Left him bleeding in the dirt like an animal.
And no one — no one — was ever punished.
The system buried the evidence.
Witnesses disappeared.
Records were altered.
And Vedika — seventeen years old, trembling with fury and helplessness — stood at her father’s funeral, clutching Kabir’s hand and promising herself that she would never, ever let the rot win again.
⸻
“Moti soch mein duba hua hai, didi,” Kabir teased, snapping her back to the present.
Vedika blinked, realizing she had been staring at her tea without drinking it.
“Just thinking about how irritating you are,” she said lightly, flicking a piece of roti at him. He caught it midair with his mouth and grinned.
Her mother smiled too, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes.
They all knew there were ghosts in this house.
They just learned to live around them.
⸻
After breakfast, Vedika helped Kabir pack his bag properly and pushed him out the door towards his school bus. She stood on the porch, arms crossed, watching him disappear down the street, too aware of how fragile everything was.
One wrong step.
One wrong case.
And she could lose him too.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket, yanking her back into her other reality — court dates, client meetings, deadlines stacked like ammunition.
Unknown Number.
Frowning, Vedika answered.
“Ms. Sharma,” a deep voice said on the other end — calm, smooth, and somehow unsettling. “You’re expected at The Imperial Hotel. Noon sharp.”
She hesitated. “Who is this?”
“You’ll find out soon enough,” the voice said with a chuckle that made her skin crawl. “Don’t be late.”
The line went dead.
Vedika stared at the phone, a cold knot forming in her stomach. She didn’t scare easily — not anymore — but something about the man’s voice made her feel like she was standing at the edge of a cliff.
She squared her shoulders.
She had walked through hell once already.
Whatever this was, she could handle it.
She had to.
For Kabir.
For her father.
For herself.
Vedika turned back into the house, the rain starting to spit against the roof.
She gathered her files, her keys, her armor — and stepped out into the storm.