Tainted Alliance

40. THE TRAP

THE VILLIAN

The room was thick with shadows, a faint flicker from the single candle on the table casting long, jagged shapes against the walls. A man aged 60 JAYESH BHATT sat at the head of the table, fingers drumming slowly, rhythmically against the polished wood. His eyes, cold and calculating, flickered across the room to the men standing silently at the edges, their faces unreadable in the dim light.

But even with his loyal guards surrounding him, he couldn’t shake the gnawing unease that clawed at his gut.

ARJUN.

The name echoed in his mind, like a curse that wouldn’t leave him. Years had passed since he’d buried the past—since Priya had died. He thought he’d left all of that behind. But Arjun, that boy who had grown into a man with eyes as sharp as blades, was always there, haunting him. Watching. Waiting.

Jayesh leaned forward, clasping his hands together tightly as if that would steady the tremble he felt creeping into his fingers.

“He’s too close,” Jayesh muttered to himself, his voice low, almost a growl. “I can feel him.”

He had built an empire on fear, on power, on blood, and yet… Arjun was the one who terrified him. No matter how much wealth or muscle Jayesh had amassed, Arjun was like a ghost in his nightmares, hunting him down for what he had done to Priya.

Her face flashed before his eyes—his late wife’s face twisted in betrayal in those last moments, but he shook it off, forcing the memory back into the shadows where it belonged.

No. He wouldn’t let that boy—no, that man—destroy everything he’d built.

“I want this done tonight,” he snapped suddenly, breaking the silence that had settled over the room like a heavy blanket. His men shifted uneasily, but none dared meet his eyes.

“Set the trap. He’s been circling too long, thinking he can sniff me out. Let him come to me,” Jayesh continued, his voice growing harsher with each word. “I want him dead before he ever steps foot near my door.”

He could feel the tension in the room, the men silently questioning if he was afraid. And he was—damn it, he was. But fear had kept him alive this long. Fear was his weapon, the blade he wielded to stay one step ahead of everyone, including Arjun.

“Everything he holds dear…” Jayesh’s lips curled into a sneer. “His family, his wife... we’ll burn it all to ash.”

He couldn’t afford to wait any longer. The longer Arjun lived, the closer the hunter came. The closer those cold, unforgiving eyes came to tearing down everything Jayesh had spent decades building.

“He’s not some invincible hero,” Jayesh muttered to himself, leaning back in his chair as if trying to convince himself as much as his men. “He’s just a man. And men can be broken.”

A flicker of fear stabbed at him again, that nagging sense that Arjun would never stop, that the moment he saw those eyes, all his carefully laid plans would crumble. He’d killed before, yes, but Arjun wasn’t like the others. He didn’t care about the power, the money—he wanted revenge. And that made him dangerous.

Jayesh exhaled slowly, his fingers curling around the edge of the table. “Make sure everything is set, invite him as an act of peace treaty,” he ordered, his voice barely above a whisper now, dark and low like the room itself. “No mistakes. We lure him in, and this ends tonight.”

The shadows seemed to deepen, swallowing his words. But even in the darkness, Jayesh felt the weight of something inevitable looming closer. Something he couldn’t outrun forever.