Thank you so so much for your love!

Today might be your lucky day! I'm thinking of giving two back-to-back updates and one shorter one at the end, as a bonus! :")

Mainly because I cannot wait for MaNan OMGGGG and I'm sure you can't either!

In saying so, I would still love it if you guys continued to support me through these intermediate parts (which I'll put up over the next few hours). I spent most of the weekend typing out these parts for you so please keep it coming :P

𓆩𓆪

Dhruv brought a few tiffin boxes containing cooked rice, some potato fry, a chole masala, some side salad, and two folded rotis to SPACE Academy. "Dhruv, accha hua tum yahan mil gaye, I need you to look into this for me." Saying so, Raghav closed a ring binder with a stack of pages embedded in it and pushed it across the desk. His frown lines had been apparent and had denoted a strain that surpassed physical exhaustion.

Dhruv put the food on the table and swapped it for the binder, looking concerned for his boss. "You seem worried, is everything okay?"

"Since the last two days, money has been bouncing from our donation account. I've used my contacts and requested several of them to try depositing money into SPACE but it isn't going through."

It was usually Cabir's responsibility to go over the bookkeeping. Since dinner the previous night, Dhruv had noticed a change in his friend's demeanour; Cabir, who usually sat next to the Professor and Dhruv, had taken a seat between him and Manik, which had hinted towards a lover's quarrel they didn't openly disclose to the others. No wonder the Professor was stressed.

Although Dhruv was not well-versed in the activity, the current hour required someone to take the burden off the Professor. "I'll have a look, you don't stress." He said politely. The Professor, delightfully relieved, stood up from the bench, thanking him for the food, and headed out to have his lunch.

Dhruv sat in his spot and scanned the binder, looking through financial statements for any defaults or any plausible reasons that could have frozen their transactions. All by himself.

In times like those, he wished he had Alia around to bounce ideas and thoughts off of her. Everything changed two months ago when...

A building, with moss creeping over it from the outside, was thoroughly lit as if its residents were celebrating Diwali all year round. Once inside, it had two front doors that opened into the same lounge area and a deck of stairs shaped in a semi-circle above it, allowing access to the second floor from either side of the receptionist's desk. Instead of curtains, a variety of sheer sarees hung over the tinted windows, hiding the scandals taking place on its premises.

Was the embroidered message on the handkerchief really that important that he had to stake his dignity for it? Then again, Alia had asked for it. For Manik's sake.

He thoroughly disliked that thought.

Outside a room on the second floor, when Dhruv was escorted to the door arch, he met a lady whose back was to him. So this was Rose. Gorgeously dusky and donned in a red bridal-looking saree, the woman revealed her side profile as she sensually unpinned it at a white sequin sleeveless shoulder. "Darwaza band kardo!" She ordered.

Dhruv had complied but felt it was necessary to utter hastily utter, "I... I am not here for this..."

As she perplexedly turned and approached him, her walk had been majestic like she ruled the place. She had that kind of command amongst other women in the brothel too. "I can tell," she joked, seductively placing a hand on his bicep. He jolted in reflex. How the hell was he going to perform in bed if he was this pliant with just a touch? "Now stand still! Guns aren't allowed in the room."

Startled by her touch down his shoulder, he squiggled and lifted his arms in the air in defense. "I'm not armed."

She laughed humourlessly, adjusting the border of her saree at her wrist. "I have fallen for that line twice and was proven wrong, never again." Placing her hands over his chest, she began her scan, tracing every curve and crevice on his body as he twitched and tried to back off. Rose twisted her lips, deducing this was his first time coming to a place like this.

His first; interesting...

Drawing a red nail along his jawline, she took it under his ear and flicked. "That's a charming face you've gotten. If you tried, with those lips and that build, a woman would find it hard to resist. Including me." Because of the low tone and the sly looks she gave him, a series of sweat beads were forming on his forehead.

With a shaky hand, he felt his back pocket and nervously brought out a piece of cloth. She watched as the fabric appeared, first with a smirk as he used it to cover his crotch, and then it turned into a mysterious frown. "Where did you find this?" She growled, snatching the fabric.

"Why did you leave this behind with my – with... with Alia?"

"I thought the Romano men didn't share. Are you sure you want her, knowing your friend's been inside her before?" She nonchalantly asked, noticing a stiffened jaw.

"What nonsense are you talking about?"

"Struck a nerve, have I?" She laughed again, almost to an inside joke that Dhruv was completely unaware of. "Wow! She managed to score all the straight guys in the clan, impressive indeed!"

Dhruv neither responded nor looked in her direction. He seemed to be internally battling thoughts of that sort for a long while. Sympathetic towards the innocent man who was not her type at all but whose silent, mysterious aura was growing on her, she softened her gaze. "Relax. You have nothing to worry about, you're not breaking the code. Do you want to know why?"

Her tone reflected, for the first time since their interaction, something natural; it wasn't a practiced seductive move, she was just a woman talking to a man, Dhruv felt. So he looked at her, trying to believe his eyes.

"Nawab isn't in Romano after all. He's working for the Malhotras."

"Impossible," Dhruv said immediately, scoffing at the absurd claim.

"Really? You have that much faith in your clan mate?" His silence probed her further, and she slyly crossed her arms. "Then how come you're here?"

"I wanted answers."

"You had at least an inkling of a doubt on him, didn't you?"

"No."

Her grin reappeared. "Would you change your mind if I told you he was the one who killed Bharat Dutta on that cruise? Don't believe me?" He frowned at the unexpected information, but then the woman retreated to a desk drawer and opened it. In her hand was a ziplock bag with a bloody bullet in it.

She brought it towards him along with some other things and dropped the bag in his palm. "Here, the bullet that was in Dutta's body. I'm sure you recognise the emblem. There's an audio recording of the phone call Dutta was on while your beloved friend shot him. This file contains the full autopsy report, feel free to leisurely go through it."

Dhruv was skeptical of touching it, so Rose used the handkerchief she had taken back from him, wrapped it around the edge of the file, and passed it to him.

"Why is this not with the police?"

She smiled, having expected that question. "Do you think Mr. Malhotra would put his own men on the line? Someone else has taken the fall for his death."

He shook his head, refusing to believe his ears. The woman worked for their enemies, of course, she was bound to say things against the Professor's clan members.

"That can't be true, Dutta was Mr. Malhotra's right-hand man. Why would Mr. Malhotra use Nawab to have his own man dead?" Thoroughly impressed, she delicately put her arms around his neck.

She was under the impression that his inexperience extended to his line of work too, but Dhruv had been a tough cookie in that regard. Her fingers trailed on his jaw and a moment of heated tension lingered in the air as their focus remained on each other's lips.

Barely a touch away from his lips, Rose muttered with a small smile, "Betrayal is an irredeemable offense, Mr. Vedant." Her mouth charged at his, teeth drawing his smooth supple ones into hers.

Dhruv had blanked out, both unsure and unaware of how to reciprocate. Just a moment ago, there were a multitude of questions on his mind, like what was Nawab to gain out of this proposition, why would Nawab agree to such a thing and most of all, why would he deceive them? All of that flew out the window the second her lips touched his.

Despite his initial desire of not wanting anything to do with her, Dhruv's body was receptive to the rehearsed graze, his nether region throbbing in response.

Until that very moment Rose kissed him, he had not quite known what Alia truly meant to him: it had been highly likely that he misconstrued her company for something more than it should have been.

Several times when the thought crossed his mind as to whether or not to move things to the next level with Alia, he had always backed out. No matter what he tried to do, he could not ignore the devoted attention Alia once showed his friend, and how she had been majorly obsessed with him for months together even before anything had begun with Dhruv.

Had anything even begun, or was it all in his head?

He liked Alia, but what Rose had said was also true. His friend had fucked the woman he currently liked. Nothing and nobody could change that truth, least of all Dhruv. Even if anything were to happen between them in the future, his inexperience would stand out in comparison to Nawab's.

He was currently presented with an opportunity to change that.

Rose realised his reluctance and stepped back, the lips she just claimed gleaming at her eye level. She peeked through her lashes to better understand what was going through his mind and was taken aback by the animalistic gaze that stared back.

His strained breaths were a symbol of an intense implication – one that she sparked.

In a split-second, he pulled her onto him, slamming himself onto the door as he clutched her bare waist, pressing his boner in the curve separating her thighs. She victoriously smiled. Doused in lust, she unbuttoned his shirt from the bottom, her urgency growing with each button until she restlessly stripped the garment with force. Small binding bits of plastic tumbled in the room.

He spun her around and pinned her to the wall, her loud gasp echoing in the room as she naughtily smiled; she'd unleashed a shade of him she hadn't expected to witness and that was an accomplishment, even for Rose's stature.

Wildly driven by his hormones, he dipped into her shoulder, kissed every inch of exposed skin, and fiddled with her blouse hooks behind her – imagining she was Alia.

Two months ago, he had gotten all his answers, he concluded. Basically Bharat Dutta tried to barter one of Malhotras' chips for a huge sum and Harshad had been the rich recipient willing to spend a fortune on it. Nawab had wiped out Dutta for Mr. Malhotra to get rid of the rat, but in doing so, Nawab had known too much – both that Harshad had the chip and that Dutta was the one who had handed it over.

If news got out about the most valuable chip swapping hands, the risks of stowing something in the safety of the Malhotras would be repeatedly pointed out within the underworld. With Harshad in prison, and Bharat out of the picture, the only one that remained out and about knowing the full truth was Nawab.

Hence, the Malhotras had lured him to the firework factory and had tried to kill him.

Unfortunately, he had escaped, brewing bad blood between the two clans.

There was nothing more Dhruv was unsure or confused about. Nawab had lied when he said he was negotiating the chip for a fair price, that lie was to avoid suspicion on his involvement with the Malhotras. Rose's handkerchief had been a warning for the clan to be more aware and safe when it came to Nawab.

All the clues had come together, and the mystery had been solved, but he had not discussed the information he had gathered with anyone.

Talking about it would involve revealing what transpired with Rose, an alliance of the Malhotra clan. Dhruv's guilt prevented him from indulging in that.

How could he point fingers at Nawab for being a traitor when he himself had been drawn to the enemy's woman?

𓆩𓆪

Nandini had not gotten a blink of sleep all night. Tossing and turning continuously had scrunched her bedspread, and the discomfort of it sprung her to sit upright. She had gone back to the mindmap that was now stuck to one of her room's walls.

Something in the whole story was not adding up, ever since her second assumption had been proven wrong. How had Smaran seen a ship that the entire naval army overlooked?

Inquisitive for more information on that front, she unlocked her phone, entered her staff login details and browsed internal articles she could find about the search operations soldiers from the Ahmedabad camp were sent on.

Many of the missions involved seizing of some goods, some shipments containing weapons, sometimes low-level pharmaceutical drugs, and sometimes gold and precious metals of that sort.

Those operations were all somewhat criminal level – not terrorist level – so they should have fallen under the jurisdiction of the state police; why was the military involved? Then again, with the amount of corruption and under-the-table operations the cops were involved in, it was only fair that they could not be entrusted with such matters.

A shiver ran down Nandini's spine as she thought about the reckless manner in which the cops handled her parents' accident case.

Her head began to spin at the myriad of problems she felt herself sinking into, ever since signing up to be Smaran's counsellor. The threshold she had inherently built over the years was being time and again tested by her profession and her desire to take matters into her own hands.

Was she sure she wanted to delve into the world of crime or the injustice surrounding it?

She was warm with respect to the information though, some womanly intuition she had told her that the truth was at arms' reach.

Just one more step, one bit more of information, and everything would come clean in front of her eyes.

Tomorrow, tomorrow would be the day.

𓆩𓆪

What do you guys think about what Rose told Dhruv – playing on his insecurities and hurting him exactly where it hurts... all this for what?

Nandini is going to have to wait until tomorrow for her answers but you guys... just a few minutes more :")

Please forget to drop your votes and comments below! I'll respond to them once I've edited all my upcoming updates.

Lots and lots of love <3