CHAPTER 5 The Architect of Ruin #2
The penthouse had finally fallen quiet. The emotional exhaustion of the day had taken its ultimate toll.
Rudra stood in the doorway of his own master bedroom. The massive, king-sized bed was occupied.
Aryan was dead to the world, tucked securely under the heavy down comforter. And lying right beside him, still fully clothed in her slightly damp jeans and faded shirt, was Mihika.
She had intended to just lie down until he fell asleep, but her own body had betrayed her. She was lying on her side, one arm thrown protectively over Aryan’s small chest, her face relaxed in the deep, heavy rhythm of deep sleep.
Rudra walked into the room, his footsteps making no sound on the thick carpet. He stood beside the bed, looking down at the two most important people in the entire world to him.
My family, he thought, the words a sacred oath tattooed on his very soul.
He reached down, gently pulling the comforter up slightly higher to cover Mihika’s shoulders. He allowed his knuckles to lightly, barely brush against the softness of her cheek. She didn’t stir. She was safe. For the first time in twelve months, she was exactly where she belonged.
Rudra turned and walked to his nightstand. He pulled out a piece of thick, crested stationery and a silver fountain pen. His handwriting was sharp, jagged, and decisive.
Mihika,
I have something important to do. I will be back before morning. You are safe here. No one knows where you are. Be with Aryan till I get back. Do not leave. Please.
- R.
He placed the note on the pillow beside her head, where she would see it the moment she opened her eyes.
Rudra exited the bedroom, pulling the heavy door shut until it clicked securely. He walked down the hall to the foyer, where his head of private security—a massive, scarred ex-military man named Vikram—was already waiting.
“Sir,” Vikram nodded sharply.
“The penthouse goes on full lockdown,” Rudra ordered, his voice cold and flat.
“No one enters. No one leaves. Do not answer the intercom. Do not accept deliveries. If anyone attempts to breach the private elevator, you have authorization to use lethal force. You protect the people in that room with your life, Vikram. Do you understand me?”
Vikram stood a little taller. “With my life, Sir. It is done.”
Rudra gave a curt nod. He bypassed the main elevator and walked toward a discreet steel door at the end of the hall. He keyed in a passcode, and the door hissed open, revealing a private staircase that led directly to the roof of the skyscraper.
***
The night air at the top of the tower was violent, whipping around Rudra in cold, aggressive gusts. The city of Mumbai sprawled beneath him, an endless, glittering ocean of neon and streetlights.
Waiting for him on the reinforced concrete helipad, its blades already slicing through the air with a deafening, rhythmic thwack-thwack-thwack, was the sleek, black AgustaWestland helicopter bearing the Rathore-Chauhan crest.
By car, navigating the congested highways to reach the old family estate on the outskirts of the city would take well over an hour. Rudra didn’t have an hour. His blood was boiling. The rage inside him was a living, breathing entity, demanding immediate satisfaction.
He ducked his head, jogging beneath the spinning rotors, and climbed into the luxurious rear cabin. The pilot, wearing noise-canceling headphones, gave a thumbs-up from the cockpit.
“The Chauhan estate,” Rudra commanded into the headset. “Maximum speed.”
The helicopter lifted off the pad, banking sharply over the dark expanse of the Arabian Sea before turning inland.
As the city lights blurred beneath him, Rudra stared out the window into the darkness.
The twenty-minute flight felt like an eternity.
His mind was a chaotic storm of memories.
He thought of Mihika, fifteen years old, shivering in the rain after her grandmother died.
He thought of her absorbing Kanta’s sneering insults with a quiet grace, protecting Aryan from the venom of his cousins.
He looked at his hands, curling them into tight, bone-crushing fists.
He had been such a blind, useless man. In his arrogance, he had believed that providing wealth and a roof over their heads was enough.
He had believed that his family, the people who had raised him after his parents died—his uncle and aunt who demanded the respect of parents, and his cousins who paraded around as the privileged daughters of the house—would eventually bow to his authority.
He had subjected the love of his life to a localized, suffocating hostility, ignorant of the psychological warfare being waged right beneath his nose. He had built a corporate empire, but he had left the gates of his own home completely unguarded.
Well, no more, Rudra thought, the realization crystallizing into cold certainty. I am completely awake now.
He would burn this legacy to the ground. He would salt the earth of the Chauhan name before he ever let it touch Mihika or Aryan again.
***
It was exactly 10:03 PM when the heavy, iron-wrought gates of the Chauhan estate swung open to admit Rudransh. He had ordered the helicopter to land on the estate’s sprawling south lawn, the deafening roar of the rotors shattering the quiet, aristocratic peace of the evening.
He didn’t wait for the security detail to escort him. He strode across the manicured grass, a dark, avenging shadow moving with lethal purpose.
When he pushed open the massive double doors of the grand foyer, the house staff immediately shrank back against the walls, terrified by the dark aura radiating from him.
“Where are they?” Rudra demanded of a trembling butler.
“T-The grand parlor, sir,” the man stammered. “They are having post-dinner drinks.”
Rudra didn’t say a word. He walked down the long, portrait-lined hallway, his heavy footsteps echoing like a ticking clock on the marble floor.
He threw open the doors to the grand parlor.
The scene inside was a portrait of relaxed, entitled opulence.
Birendra was sitting in a leather wingback chair, swirling a glass of aged cognac.
Kanta was lounging on a velvet settee, flipping through a fashion magazine.
Ishana and Ahana were seated near the fireplace, quietly gossiping over flutes of champagne.