Chapter 1 – The Bookstore and The Ghost
The monsoon had arrived in Mumbai without warning.
Fat droplets of rain raced down the cracked windowpanes of “Chapter & Verse,” the tiny independent bookstore nestled between a closed tailoring shop and an aging café on Hill Road. The scent of old pages and petrichor filled the air—comforting, familiar.
Aaravi Mishra sat cross-legged behind the counter, her glasses slipping down her nose as she flipped through a tattered copy of The Count of Monte Cristo. She’d read it dozens of times, but today the words blurred. Her fingers paused on a sentence she knew by heart: “How did I escape? With difficulty. How did I plan this moment? With pleasure.”
It had been three days since her younger brother Dev had vanished.
Three days of unanswered calls.
Three days of police indifference.
Three days of a gnawing pit in her stomach.
And then that morning, the envelope arrived.
No stamp. No name. Just a single sheet of cream paper tucked under her door.
> "Ask the Red Ghost about Dev. You know where to find him."
Aaravi stared at the note again, its ink smudged slightly at the edges as if touched by damp fingers. The name meant nothing to her at first—Red Ghost? It sounded like something from a novel.
But a call to her estranged cousin Rhea, the only one in their family who still whispered about underworld dealings, gave her more than she expected.
“There’s only one Red Ghost in Mumbai,” Rhea had said, voice hushed, afraid. “Matteo Leone.”
The name hung like smoke in the air.
“He doesn’t show up in newspapers. No photos. But everyone in the criminal world knows who he is. Half-Italian, half-Indian. Raised in New York. Owns a chain of legal import businesses… and a dozen illegal ones. He deals in weapons, art, blood, whatever pays. But they say if he wants you dead, you don’t see it coming.”
Rhea had taken a shaky breath. “If Dev crossed paths with him, Aaravi, you need to be careful. People like him—people like us—don’t play fair.”
Aaravi hung up without answering.
Because Rhea was wrong about one thing.
She wasn’t like them.
Yes, her late father had once worked for a laundering ring before turning over a new leaf, dying in debt to men who never forgot. Yes, she’d grown up listening to gunshots in the distance, whispering prayers in the dark. But Aaravi had built a different life.
A quiet one.
Safe.
Orderly.
Until now.
And now—now, she was standing in front of an iron gate taller than her dreams, in a part of the city even GPS didn’t like to navigate. Rain dripped off her umbrella as she looked up at the towering mansion behind it—white stone, guarded windows, roses growing like blood along the walls.
She was here.
To meet the man they called the Red Ghost.
The guards let her through without a word.
Someone had been expecting her.
—
The drawing room was like a museum married a battlefield. Cold marble floors gleamed beneath her feet. Massive oil paintings, too expensive to be replicas, hung beside modern glass sculptures shaped like broken wings. Everything was either white or black.
Like him.
He stood by the window, tall, motionless. A cigarette burned low between his fingers, smoke curling toward the ceiling. His back was to her, but she felt him the way prey felt a predator.
Matteo Leone.
He turned slowly. And her breath caught.
He wasn’t handsome in the way romance novels lied to you. He was something sharper. Something carved from ice and tempered steel.
Olive skin, hair blacker than night, and eyes the color of dying embers—red-brown and unreadable. There was a scar near his jaw, a thin line that only made him look more lethal. His suit was tailored to perfection, no tie, the first few buttons undone like he couldn’t be bothered.
He didn’t speak for a moment.
Just studied her.
"You’re shorter than I expected," he said finally, voice deep, slow, American-accented.
Aaravi raised an eyebrow. "You’re colder than I imagined."
His lips twitched. Almost a smile. Almost.
"Why are you here, Ms. Mishra?"
"You know why."
"Do I?"
She held up the note. "You left this."
He didn’t deny it.
Instead, he crushed the cigarette, walked toward her, and stopped just close enough that she could smell smoke and some expensive cologne beneath it.
"Your brother," he said, voice dropping a notch. "Dev Mishra. He made some bad choices. Cost me a shipment worth twenty million. Now he’s missing, and you’re here asking questions."
Her throat tightened. “So you do know something?”
"I know everything. But information isn’t free."
Aaravi stared at him. "What do you want?"
He smiled. This time, it reached his eyes—but it wasn’t kind.
“I want you.”
Silence.
“I need a fiancée. For one month. To deal with a particular business alliance. Be seen at events, wear a ring, smile pretty. Pretend. No real strings.” His gaze dragged over her like a blade. “You’re perfect. Innocent. Pretty. Not connected to any syndicates. And you need me.”
Aaravi shook her head, blood draining from her face. “You want me to—what? Be your fake arm candy for a month in exchange for my brother’s location?”
“No,” Matteo said, voice colder now. “I want you to be mine for a month. Fake title, real consequences. You step into my world, you wear my name. You obey my rules. In public and private.”
Her cheeks burned. “And if I say no?”
He leaned close, breath brushing her skin.
“Then Dev stays missing. Or worse.”
—
Aaravi walked out of the mansion hours later with a diamond ring heavier than guilt on her finger and a contract in her bag.
One month.
Four public events.
Two charity galas.
No outside communication.
No questions.
No lies.
And one rule above all:
Do not fall in love with Matteo Leone.
Too late, she thought as she looked back at the mansion and the man watching her from the window above.
Because something inside her had already begun to unravel.
