It was 3:14 a.m. in the heart of Delhi’s Biotech Research Center. While the city slept under a sky drowned in smog and silence, the west wing of the lab buzzed faintly with low-frequency humming—the sound of genius at work.

Aira Verma didn’t notice the time. Or the emptiness of the corridors. Or the growl in her stomach that hadn’t been fed in twenty-one hours.

Her hands moved with mechanical precision under the cold white lights, tightening the final screw on a tiny, spider-like device the size of a coin. The X7-Nanorover, as she’d labeled it, blinked to life in her palm, its black titanium legs shifting with eerie lifelike grace.

She allowed herself a rare smile.

“Beautiful,” she whispered, brushing a strand of black hair from her face with her sleeve, smudged with oil and dried blood from an earlier test on synthetic flesh.

The lab was cluttered—papers stacked like towers, half-empty mugs of tea scattered like landmines, and a hologram board covered in coded equations, which only she could understand. She hadn’t been home in three days. Hadn’t replied to a single message from her parents. Again.

Her tablet vibrated.

> [MOM]: Aira. Please eat. Please come home. Even once a week. Just once.

She sighed and dismissed the message.

Her world wasn't made for ordinary things like “home” or “food” or “friends.” She was twenty, with two doctorates and her name whispered in medical communities like a myth. Dr. Aira Verma — the ghost genius who revolutionized micro-invasive surgery before she was old enough to legally rent a car.

And yet, no one outside the research and hospital circle even knew what she looked like.

She liked it that way.

Meanwhile...

In a penthouse three miles away, Aceon Rael sliced a throwing knife through the air, watching it embed itself into the wall exactly where he’d imagined her face to be.

“Blind date?” he scoffed.

He was shirtless, a glass of whiskey dangling from tattooed fingers, his phone vibrating with notifications that he ignored. Thousands of fans adored him. Millions. The face of a god, the charm of a devil, and the secrets of something far, far worse.

He hadn’t slept in 48 hours. Too many enemies, too many problems. His most recent hit had left a trail that needed cleaning.

And now his mother was dragging him to another useless “marriage meeting.”

He grabbed the file his brother Damian had thrown at him earlier.

> Dr. Aira Verma, age 20. Researcher. Neurosurgeon. Reclusive. Family friends. Blah blah blah.

Aceon snorted and tossed it aside.

“Next,” he muttered, stepping onto his balcony.

But something tugged at him. The name... the face in the file... the photo was grainy, but—

“No way,” he whispered.

It was her.

The brat who once built a tiny flamethrower to light his hair on fire when he teased her in science camp.

The only girl who ever hit him in the face with a wrench and didn’t flinch.

He grinned slowly.

“Now this... might be fun.”

Back in the lab,

Aira had just finished uploading the AI interface when the doors to her lab burst open.

“Aira Verma!” her brother Dev’s voice thundered. “You’re coming with us. Now.”

She blinked. “Dev? What—”

“Change your shirt. Brush your hair. You have a dinner to attend.”

“I have surgery in the morning!”

“You have a life you're forgetting.”

Before she could protest, her mother and father entered with determined expressions. Her mom was holding... makeup?

Aira stood frozen, horrified.

“No.”

“Yes,” they all said in unison.

One hour later,

Aira sat in a high-end restaurant, still in black jeans and a clean lab coat—because she refused to wear anything else—scowling at a bouquet of roses on the table.

This was ridiculous. A blind date? She’d rather dissect a cadaver.

And then she heard it.

The velvet voice.

“Wow. You haven’t changed.”

She looked up—and froze.

The man standing before her was tall, too perfect, too symmetrical to be real. Tousled dark hair, lean muscles under a silk shirt, mischief glowing behind unnaturally striking grey eyes.

He slid into the seat across from her, legs stretched, posture lazy. Like he owned the place. Like he owned her time.

She frowned. “Do I know you?”

He grinned, that devilish curve of his lips unmistakable.

“You used to call me Rael the Rodent.”

Her mouth dropped slightly.

“No…”

He winked. “Hello again, Doctor Wrench.”

Aira blinked.

She looked from the man’s annoyingly perfect face to his infuriating smirk. She wanted to launch the metal spoon on the table at his forehead. Preferably at high velocity.

“Aceon Rael,” she said flatly, finally connecting the name to the face.

He put a hand on his heart, mock-wounded. “I’m surprised you even remember. I figured you’d erased me along with other insignificant life forms.”

“I did. You just crawled back like a stubborn parasite.”

He laughed. Loudly. “God, I missed this.”

She frowned. “You’re… an actor now?”

He gave a lazy shrug, sipping his wine. “They pay me to lie with style and wear tailored suits. Not very different from being a mafia prince, honestly.”

She blinked. “Excuse me?”

“Nothing,” he said quickly with a grin.

Her glare sharpened. “What did you just say?”

Aceon grinned wider. “You’re still fun when you're suspicious.”

Across the restaurant, waiters whispered and pointed discreetly. Phones were lifted. Pictures were being taken. The most famous face in the world, sitting with a girl no one recognized.

Aira didn’t even notice.

She was too busy glaring at the menu like it had personally offended her.

Aceon leaned closer.

“You still have the same concentration face. Remember when you tried to rewire the class fire alarm to play Beethoven and set off the sprinkler system instead?”

She cracked the tiniest smile before catching herself and flattening it into a frown.

“Stop talking. I’m only here because my family threatened to revoke lab access.”

He sipped his drink. “That’s harsh. I’m here because my mother told me you’d be a disaster and I had to see it for myself.”

Aira raised an eyebrow. “You didn’t say no?”

“I never say no to chaos.”

She blinked. Something about the way he said that—it wasn’t a joke. It was a confession.

Flashback:

Aira, age 9.

Hair in twin braids. Metal frame glasses slipping off her nose. A tiny prototype spider bot crawling across her palm.

Aceon, age 11.

Taller. Arrogant. Flicking a lighter with fascination as he watched her from behind the science camp dorm window.

He threw a paper plane at her head. “Hey, Mad Doctor!”

She didn’t look up. “Your brain’s smaller than my spider’s eye sensors.”

He grinned. “I’m gonna marry you someday.”

She hit him with a wrench.

Back at the table, Aceon noticed her fingers twitch slightly.

“You remembered,” he said, watching her carefully.

“No,” she lied.

“Yes, you did. You always do that thing with your hand when you remember something stupid.”

“I do not.”

“You just did.”

“Are you always this annoying?”

“Only with you.”

She stood up abruptly. “I’m leaving.”

He didn’t stop her.

But as she walked past him, he said casually, “You’re working on the X7-Nanorover again. Impressive improvements to the spine sensors. But I think your surface micro-lattice still generates too much heat under magnetic fields.”

She froze mid-step.

Slowly, she turned.

“…How do you know about that?”

Aceon met her eyes calmly. “I read your paper. And the draft you didn’t publish. Your friend Reya’s firewall isn’t as solid as she thinks.”

“Are you stalking my research?”

“I’m investing in it,” he said smoothly. “Or I will, if you let me.”

“I don’t need funding.”

“No. But you need freedom. The kind your institute will never give you. And I can offer that.”

She squinted. “What’s the catch?”

He smiled darkly. “Marry me.”

Aira stood outside the restaurant, arms folded, lab coat fluttering lightly in the night wind.

Her brain was firing a hundred calculations per second—but none were equations. They were all questions. Like:

“Why would the most wanted face in the world ask me to marry him?”

“How does he know about my unpublished research?”

And most importantly:

“Why does part of me actually want to say yes?”

She hated that thought. She filed it away under "Temporary Brain Glitches."

Then the devil himself appeared, stepping out after her like he had all the time in the world.

“Still thinking about my offer?” Aceon asked, shoving his hands into the pockets of his custom black coat.

“I’m still thinking about calling security,” Aira muttered.

He smirked. “You're smart. Too smart to pretend you didn’t consider it.”

“Consider what?” she snapped. “Let me get this straight: You want to sponsor my entire lab, give me access to equipment even the government restricts, and in exchange, I marry you?”

“That’s right.”

“...Are you mentally ill?”

“Yes,” he said without hesitation. “But I’m also incredibly rich, legally single, and interested.”

“You’re insane.”

Aceon leaned in slightly, the space between them charged.

“You build weapons that can fit in a thumbnail and fly through a ventilation shaft. You operate on neural systems while your patients are still conscious. You forget to eat for three days because your code loop hit a bug.”

He tilted his head, eyes narrowing with something darker now.

“Darling, if I’m insane... then what are you?”

Aira didn’t answer.

Because the truth was… she did crave freedom. Not fame. Not luxury. But autonomy. Unrestricted research. No funding delays. No red tape. No bureaucrats questioning her ethics every time she wanted to test something.

She could use Aceon.

And she hated how much she didn’t hate the idea.

But marry him?

She turned sharply and began to walk away. “You’re ridiculous.”

Aceon called after her, voice calm.

“I’ll give you access to my private black lab in Zurich. No oversight. No limits.”

She stopped mid-step.

“I’ll fund your project for five years. Full independence. No ownership claims.”

Aira slowly turned, glaring. “You’d really tie yourself to me just to watch me solder microchips all day?”

“I’d tie myself to you because no one else has ever been able to make me feel anything,” he said quietly. “And watching you lose yourself in your work? That’s the closest thing I’ve seen to perfection.”

She stared at him, stunned.

No sarcasm. No smirk. No performance.

Just truth.

Twisted, unhinged, but truth.

She should have walked away.

But instead, she whispered, “You're seriously offering me a marriage contract in exchange for funding and freedom?”

“Yes,” he replied. “Three years. Private arrangement. No press. Just signatures and results.”

She crossed her arms. “No emotional obligations?”

“None.”

“No public appearances?”

“I’m an actor. You’re a ghost. Perfect match.”

She hesitated. Then said dryly, “I want a clause: I get to walk away if you try to murder anyone in front of me.”

He smiled, just a little too wide. “You drive a hard bargain.”

Five Years Ago — The First Time Aceon Killed

> A 17-year-old Aceon stood drenched in blood in a Paris alleyway. His hands were trembling—not from fear, but from relief. The man on the ground had deserved it.

The cold in his chest that had haunted him since childhood... was gone.

For the first time, he felt alive.

That night, he realized something horrifying.

He wasn't afraid of the dark.

He was the dark.

Back in the present:

Aceon pulled out a sleek black folder from inside his coat and handed it to Aira.

A full contract. Signed by his legal team. With her name already printed.

Aira blinked. “You had this prepared?”

“I had hope,” he said with a shrug.

She flipped through the pages. The terms were absurdly generous.

“I want a private weapons vault, secured access, and absolute control over my blueprints.”

“Done.”

“I want your family to think it’s a normal engagement.”

“Let them plan a wedding. We’ll sneak out the back door.”

“I want complete silence about my identity.”

“Already arranged.”

She stared at the paper.

Aceon stepped closer. “Say yes, Aira.”

“I don’t believe in love,” she muttered.

“I don’t either,” he replied. “Let’s not fall in love, then. Let’s fall into madness.”

She took the pen from his hand.

And signed her name.