Chapter 1 - The Woman in the Study
It was the wind that first alerted Mrs. Desai.
At sixty-seven, she didn't trust her knees, but she trusted her ears. And the shatter of glass, followed by the shriek of a woman, was unmistakable. The noise came from next door - from Radhika Malhotra's villa.
By the time she reached the garden gate, her trembling hand clutched around a rusting umbrella, the maid was already running barefoot down the gravel path, her white uniform stained with something dark - wine or blood, no one could tell.
"She's? dead," the maid whispered. "Madam's dead."
.....................
Detective Aarya Sen didn't believe in peaceful places.
Every small town had its sins buried under hospitality and gossip.
She arrived in Mandvi by noon. The town had already begun to sizzle under the weight of a murder. The victim's name was already trending in Twitter circles in Mumbai.
Radhika Malhotra. Entrepreneur. CEO of Elixir Cosmetics. Mother. Alleged tyrant. Now - victim.
The house was cordoned off by local police, poorly. Reporters leaned over hedges. Children stared. The air smelled of brine and burning paper.
"Clear the press," Aarya said as she walked in, glancing at the scene. She didn't stop at the body. Not yet.
.....................
The study room was large, but suffocating.
A fire still smoldered in the fireplace. Not roaring - but deliberate, recent. On the mahogany desk lay a shattered wine glass, red drops staining the floor like petals from a murdered rose. A leather diary lay open but scorched at the edges. The last page had ink smeared across it.
But one sentence stood out:
"Tonight, I confront the one person I fear the most."
Aarya pulled on gloves and carefully bagged it.
"Who found her?" she asked.
"Uma. The maid," said the constable. "Said she came in early. Found the body like this."
Aarya raised an eyebrow. "And the door?"
"Locked from inside. We had to break in."
She turned to the maid, who stood nearby, wringing her hands. "You had a key?"
Uma nodded. "Yes, madam. But I - I haven't stayed the night since last week. Madam let me go. But she called me back this morning."
"Strange," Aarya murmured. "You get fired, then summoned the next day?"
Uma looked down. "She said she needed to talk. About? things."
"What things?"
The woman swallowed. "Things she couldn't trust her own son with."
.....................
Later, Aarya sat in what was once Radhika's pristine kitchen, flipping through preliminary files.
Autopsy pending. Time of death: estimated between 11 PM and 1 AM.
Cause: Blunt force trauma. No visible weapon found. No signs of forced entry. CCTV disabled.
Suspects:
1. Kabir Malhotra (Son)
- Age 27
- Conflicting alibi: claims to have returned from Mumbai at 2 AM, but no flight records confirm it.
2. Vikram Shah (Business Partner)
- Had legal disputes over a failing joint venture.
3. Uma (Housemaid)
- Fired days before murder. Re-entered using her spare key.
4. Neha Rao (Therapist)
- Close friend. Spoke to Radhika daily. No known visit logs last night.
Strange detail: One set of wine glasses was washed and left to dry. One was shattered. Two people had been drinking. Or maybe one person wanted it to look that way.
.....................
At 4:30 PM, Aarya visited Kabir Malhotra.
He sat in his late mother's art room, painting - of all things - a blood red tree.
"She was my mother. You think I'd kill her?" he asked, not looking up.
"I think you left town the day before she died. No boarding pass, no cab record. Just a claim that you 'needed air'."
"I stayed with a friend," he said.
"Which one?"
He hesitated. "Sanjana."
"And where is she?"
"She? doesn't like the police."
Aarya stared at him. "You don't look very upset."
He sighed. "We weren't close. She wanted control. I wanted out. She said if I didn't agree to sign away my share of the business, she'd cut me out of her will entirely."
"Did she?"
"I don't know. Ask her lawyer."
"I will," Aarya said, standing. "And for what it's worth, Kabir? grief looks different on everyone. But so does guilt."
As she left, she noticed something odd. On the shelf behind him were three copies of a book titled "Ethics of Truth: Psychology and the Mind." A sticky note poked from one.
"Neha says I'm too damaged to love. But what does she know?"
.....................
Flashback: Case File #1082 (5 years ago)
Entry: Aarya Sen
Location: Pune, India
Case: "Unsolved disappearance: Priya Sen (sister)."
"Case went cold after six months. Last seen at 11:37 PM near railway crossing. Witness statements inconsistent. Journal found. Last entry mentioned meeting someone for closure. Suspect remains unknown."
Aarya closed the file. She always brought it with her. Not to solve it. Just to remind herself why silence was never to be trusted.
.....................
Back at the villa, Aarya re-examined the study room at dusk.
The fire had long since been extinguished. But in the ashes, she found something metal.
She pulled it out with tweezers. It was a watch. Damaged, still faintly warm.
Engraved at the back: "To R. With vengeance, N."
.....................
She called in her tech specialist. "Run prints on this. And get me Neha Rao. In person."
.....................
Neha arrived looking composed. Too composed.
She wore black, but no sign of tears. Therapist. Calm. Smooth voice.
"I spoke to her the evening before," Neha said. "She was scared. Not of death - but of being exposed."
"Exposed how?"
"She had secrets. Secrets about everyone around her. She kept a diary. Always wrote in it after fights. She liked to keep leverage."
"She mentioned you in her last entry."
Neha's face didn't move. "She liked drama. Thought she was in a film."
"Was it you she feared?"
"She feared herself. Her own loneliness. Don't make this poetic, detective. It's a tragedy. Not a riddle."
Aarya stood. "And where were you last night?"
"At my clinic. I have security cameras. You're welcome to check."
"I will."
As Neha left, Aarya looked down at the charred diary.
One corner had been torn - likely before the fire. Whoever tore it knew it had something worth hiding.
She checked with evidence. No torn pages found nearby.
.....................
Flashback: Audio Recording, Night Before the Murder
"If you do this, I'll destroy you," Radhika's voice crackled on the recorder.
"You forget who I am. I don't fear you."
The second voice was male. Cold. Familiar.
"You should have burned this long ago."
Then a loud crash. The audio ended.
.....................
By nightfall, the sky over Mandvi turned ink-blue. The town slept, but Aarya sat in the living room, playing the recording over and over.
She looked at the watch again. "To R. With vengeance, N."
Neha's name started with N.
But so did Nitin, Radhika's estranged younger brother.
So did Namit, her first husband.
And even Niharika, the PR manager she had once fired after a scandal.
The letter meant nothing without proof.
.....................
Aarya stared at the half-burned diary one last time. A single phrase in the margin - written sideways in panicked ink - jumped out now that the ash had settled.
"The real enemy knows how to stay invisible."
She closed the file. One question clawed at her:
.....................
If the killer never entered? was the killer already inside?
It was the wind that first alerted Mrs. Desai.
At sixty-seven, she didn't trust her knees, but she trusted her ears. And the shatter of glass, followed by the shriek of a woman, was unmistakable. The noise came from next door - from Radhika Malhotra's villa.
By the time she reached the garden gate, her trembling hand clutched around a rusting umbrella, the maid was already running barefoot down the gravel path, her white uniform stained with something dark - wine or blood, no one could tell.
"She's? dead," the maid whispered. "Madam's dead."
.....................
Detective Aarya Sen didn't believe in peaceful places.
Every small town had its sins buried under hospitality and gossip.
She arrived in Mandvi by noon. The town had already begun to sizzle under the weight of a murder. The victim's name was already trending in Twitter circles in Mumbai.
Radhika Malhotra. Entrepreneur. CEO of Elixir Cosmetics. Mother. Alleged tyrant. Now - victim.
The house was cordoned off by local police, poorly. Reporters leaned over hedges. Children stared. The air smelled of brine and burning paper.
"Clear the press," Aarya said as she walked in, glancing at the scene. She didn't stop at the body. Not yet.
.....................
The study room was large, but suffocating.
A fire still smoldered in the fireplace. Not roaring - but deliberate, recent. On the mahogany desk lay a shattered wine glass, red drops staining the floor like petals from a murdered rose. A leather diary lay open but scorched at the edges. The last page had ink smeared across it.
But one sentence stood out:
"Tonight, I confront the one person I fear the most."
Aarya pulled on gloves and carefully bagged it.
"Who found her?" she asked.
"Uma. The maid," said the constable. "Said she came in early. Found the body like this."
Aarya raised an eyebrow. "And the door?"
"Locked from inside. We had to break in."
She turned to the maid, who stood nearby, wringing her hands. "You had a key?"
Uma nodded. "Yes, madam. But I - I haven't stayed the night since last week. Madam let me go. But she called me back this morning."
"Strange," Aarya murmured. "You get fired, then summoned the next day?"
Uma looked down. "She said she needed to talk. About? things."
"What things?"
The woman swallowed. "Things she couldn't trust her own son with."
.....................
Later, Aarya sat in what was once Radhika's pristine kitchen, flipping through preliminary files.
Autopsy pending. Time of death: estimated between 11 PM and 1 AM.
Cause: Blunt force trauma. No visible weapon found. No signs of forced entry. CCTV disabled.
Suspects:
1. Kabir Malhotra (Son)
- Age 27
- Conflicting alibi: claims to have returned from Mumbai at 2 AM, but no flight records confirm it.
2. Vikram Shah (Business Partner)
- Had legal disputes over a failing joint venture.
3. Uma (Housemaid)
- Fired days before murder. Re-entered using her spare key.
4. Neha Rao (Therapist)
- Close friend. Spoke to Radhika daily. No known visit logs last night.
Strange detail: One set of wine glasses was washed and left to dry. One was shattered. Two people had been drinking. Or maybe one person wanted it to look that way.
.....................
At 4:30 PM, Aarya visited Kabir Malhotra.
He sat in his late mother's art room, painting - of all things - a blood red tree.
"She was my mother. You think I'd kill her?" he asked, not looking up.
"I think you left town the day before she died. No boarding pass, no cab record. Just a claim that you 'needed air'."
"I stayed with a friend," he said.
"Which one?"
He hesitated. "Sanjana."
"And where is she?"
"She? doesn't like the police."
Aarya stared at him. "You don't look very upset."
He sighed. "We weren't close. She wanted control. I wanted out. She said if I didn't agree to sign away my share of the business, she'd cut me out of her will entirely."
"Did she?"
"I don't know. Ask her lawyer."
"I will," Aarya said, standing. "And for what it's worth, Kabir? grief looks different on everyone. But so does guilt."
As she left, she noticed something odd. On the shelf behind him were three copies of a book titled "Ethics of Truth: Psychology and the Mind." A sticky note poked from one.
"Neha says I'm too damaged to love. But what does she know?"
.....................
Flashback: Case File #1082 (5 years ago)
Entry: Aarya Sen
Location: Pune, India
Case: "Unsolved disappearance: Priya Sen (sister)."
"Case went cold after six months. Last seen at 11:37 PM near railway crossing. Witness statements inconsistent. Journal found. Last entry mentioned meeting someone for closure. Suspect remains unknown."
Aarya closed the file. She always brought it with her. Not to solve it. Just to remind herself why silence was never to be trusted.
.....................
Back at the villa, Aarya re-examined the study room at dusk.
The fire had long since been extinguished. But in the ashes, she found something metal.
She pulled it out with tweezers. It was a watch. Damaged, still faintly warm.
Engraved at the back: "To R. With vengeance, N."
.....................
She called in her tech specialist. "Run prints on this. And get me Neha Rao. In person."
.....................
Neha arrived looking composed. Too composed.
She wore black, but no sign of tears. Therapist. Calm. Smooth voice.
"I spoke to her the evening before," Neha said. "She was scared. Not of death - but of being exposed."
"Exposed how?"
"She had secrets. Secrets about everyone around her. She kept a diary. Always wrote in it after fights. She liked to keep leverage."
"She mentioned you in her last entry."
Neha's face didn't move. "She liked drama. Thought she was in a film."
"Was it you she feared?"
"She feared herself. Her own loneliness. Don't make this poetic, detective. It's a tragedy. Not a riddle."
Aarya stood. "And where were you last night?"
"At my clinic. I have security cameras. You're welcome to check."
"I will."
As Neha left, Aarya looked down at the charred diary.
One corner had been torn - likely before the fire. Whoever tore it knew it had something worth hiding.
She checked with evidence. No torn pages found nearby.
.....................
Flashback: Audio Recording, Night Before the Murder
"If you do this, I'll destroy you," Radhika's voice crackled on the recorder.
"You forget who I am. I don't fear you."
The second voice was male. Cold. Familiar.
"You should have burned this long ago."
Then a loud crash. The audio ended.
.....................
By nightfall, the sky over Mandvi turned ink-blue. The town slept, but Aarya sat in the living room, playing the recording over and over.
She looked at the watch again. "To R. With vengeance, N."
Neha's name started with N.
But so did Nitin, Radhika's estranged younger brother.
So did Namit, her first husband.
And even Niharika, the PR manager she had once fired after a scandal.
The letter meant nothing without proof.
.....................
Aarya stared at the half-burned diary one last time. A single phrase in the margin - written sideways in panicked ink - jumped out now that the ash had settled.
"The real enemy knows how to stay invisible."
She closed the file. One question clawed at her:
.....................
If the killer never entered? was the killer already inside?
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