Arjun's pov
They always say monsters look a certain way. Sharp teeth. Wild eyes. Shadows stitched into the shape of a man. But the truth sits quieter. A monster is the one who can stand in a room full of light and still feel the urge to break the neck of the first person who looks too long at the woman he wants.
I knew exactly what I was.
And I also knew exactly who she was.
Sona.
My little storm in soft skin.
The only thing in this whole bleeding world that could make me feel rage and devotion in the same breath.
After Nikhil… after we ended that chapter by burying him like the dirt he was… everyone assumed the story was over. Evil had been defeated. Justice served. We were the heroes now. The campus whispered our names like we'd survived a horror movie together.
But heroes don't tie a man to a chair and silence his screams.
Heroes don't clean blood off their hands in the moonlit lake before carrying the girl they love back to bed.
Heroes don't stalk the one they love just to be sure she's breathing, safe, theirs.
So no… I was never a hero.
And she my Sona never needed one.
She needed me.
Graduation week looked like the universe trying too hard to pretend we were all normal. Caps, gowns, glittering lights, and parents with proud watery eyes. Professors shaking hands like they weren't secretly relieved that we wouldn't be haunting their hallways anymore.
Sona stood in the courtyard, sunlight pouring on her like it was made for her only. Wearing that tiny little black dress that made my pulse jump. Laughing at something Kabir said, hair bouncing, emerald eyes shimmering like she was finally free.
She had no idea.
No idea that someone else had been watching her for months.
Before Nikhil.
Before any of us even knew.
She thought the case was closed.
Silly girl.
Riya caught me staring too intently. She had that knowing look, the one that said You better keep her safe or I'll kill you myself. Kabir smirked, nudging my shoulder.
"She's happy now, Arjun," he murmured. "Let her breathe."
I didn't answer.
Breathing was the problem.
Her happiness made her glow, and her glow pulled attention like gravity. Every passing guy, every stranger in the crowd, every man with hands… I tracked them all.
You call it obsession.
I call it vigilance.
Our Paris plan wasn't an accident. I suggested it first. Sold it as romantic getaway graduation celebration new life new beginning.
But the truth was uglier.
I needed distance.
Space from the university.
A city too big, too noisy, too crowded for a predator to hide easily. Whoever had been watching her would either reveal themselves or retreat.
Either way, I'd be ready.
And Paris was a good hunting ground.
I pretended to be excited like the others. We shopped. Packed. Teased each other. Sona threw clothes around the room while complaining she had "nothing to wear" despite owning half the damn city's wardrobe.
She was so blissfully unaware.
Of everything.
Or maybe just pretending to be unaware.
Either way.
Bliss suited her. It softened her edges. Made her glow brighter. But every beat of her laugh pushed needles under my skin, because I knew someone else was listening to that laugh too.
I felt the eyes before Paris.
Somewhere between the library and the campus gates.
A shadow that didn't feel like an accident.
During graduation rehearsal, Sona was practicing her walk on stage, twirling a little. Cute, smug brat. And when she turned, I saw it… a man at the far end of the hall, phone angled wrong, body too still, eyes locked on her.
By the time I pushed through the crowd, he was gone.
Kabir noticed my jaw ticking.
Riya caught me clenching my fists.
But Sona? She was humming some stupid tune, spinning like a drunk fairy.
She had no idea her life had started sliding back into danger.
The night before our flight to Paris, I barely slept. She lay curled into me, her head on my chest, legs tangled between mine, breathing soft and steady. I watched the windows. The door. The reflection on her phone screen.
Every hour, I checked the hallway.
Every sound made my muscles tense.
Every shadow looked like the watcher.
And still… she slept. Safe. Warm. Unbothered.
My girl.
My pretty little oblivious chaos.
I brushed her hair back, kissed her forehead, and whispered a promise only darkness deserved to hear.
"No one touches you except me."
Morning brought sunlight and chaos. Riya shrieked because she lost her passport (she didn't; Kabir sat on it). Sona tripped while packing chargers. Kabir lectured all of us like a disappointed dad.
If anyone saw us, they'd think we were just four friends excited for a vacation.
But I kept my senses sharp. Watching every stranger at the airport. Every camera. Every man who stared too long. I held Sona close, fingers looped around her waist like she'd disappear into the crowd otherwise.
Sometimes she teased me for being "clingy."
Cute.
She'd stab me with that compliment now if she knew it wasn't affection. It was strategy. A leash disguised as love.
She doesn't run when she's held close.
And yet, even as we boarded the plane, even as she leaned against my shoulder humming softly, even as Kabir cracked jokes and Riya planned our Paris itinerary…
I felt it.
A prickle.
A stare.
A silence too heavy to ignore.
Someone else booked a ticket too.
I could feel it in my bones.
Sona sighed dreamily.
"Arjun… we're really going to Paris."
Yeah, baby.
We were.
But the predator stalking her wasn't left behind.
He was with us.
Close.
Clever.
Quiet.
And I refused to let her find out the hard way.
Because this time, if anyone tried to touch her…
I wouldn't bury them.
I'd make a shrine out of their bones.
Paris should've drowned my instincts. A city humming with lights, art, music, lovers kissing on every bridge. A place where people forget their scars for a while.
But predators don't forget.
Our skin remembers danger the way a scar remembers the blade.
From the moment we landed, that feeling clung to me like fog.
The first day looked deceptively perfect.
Sona made us stop every ten steps because something was "cute" or "pretty" or "aesthetic." She bought macarons, dragged Riya into every perfume shop, tried on sunglasses just to ask me if she looked "hot enough to cause crimes."
She was glowing.
Blissful.
Weightless.
And she had absolutely no idea someone's eyes were on her the whole time.
I didn't know who.
I only knew the pattern.
A reflection wrong in a glass window.
A figure that turned away too quickly when I looked.
Footsteps that matched our pace a little too often.
A car that slowed at corners even when there was no traffic.
I kept a hand on the small of her back the entire day, guiding her gently but firmly. Anyone watching wouldn't understand the message.
But predators do.
She's mine.
Not yours.
Back away.
Kabir felt it too; I could see it in the way his posture shifted after noon. Riya was too busy being bossy to notice at first.
She dragged us from the Louvre to the river cruise to a stupid bridge covered in love locks. She bullied Kabir into posing for pictures, shoved her sunglasses on his face, declared him "unphotogenic but acceptable," and kissed his cheek.
Sona teased her.
Kabir laughed.
Riya threatened to throw them both into the Seine.
And I…
I hunted shadows.
Everywhere.
That night, we went for dinner in Montmartre. A little bistro lined with fairy lights. Sona sat beside me, legs over mine, leaning into my arm like the world couldn't harm her.
She fed me a bite of her dessert.
"Arjun, try this. Promise you'll love it."
I didn't taste sugar.
I tasted the metallic worry sitting on my tongue since India.
I pressed a kiss to her cheek anyway, because she relaxed when I did that. My girl's body melted into me like she was made from warmth and trust.
Trust I didn't deserve.
But would kill to protect.
Kabir caught my eye across the table.
"You feel it too, right?"
I nodded once.
Riya looked between us, suspicious.
"What're you two idiots hiding now?"
"Nothing," Kabir lied.
She gave him a glare that could peel paint. "You're such a useless liar."
She wasn't wrong.
Later, in the hotel, Sona showered first, humming under the water like she was in her own fairytale. I checked the door lock twice. Peered out the window. Watched the street below.
A man leaned against a lamppost. Hoodie up. Head lowered.
He wasn't doing anything wrong.
But he wasn't doing anything at all.
Just… standing.
Still.
Too still.
My jaw tightened.
Kabir texted me from the room next door.
You see the guy outside?
I typed back:
Yeah.
Another message:
He's been there since we checked in.
My pulse darkened.
Sona padded out of the bathroom in shorts and one of my shirts that she'd stolen without asking. Maybe when she use to stalk me and leave those pretty little blue roses yeah i knew but leave it her Hair dripping. Skin soft. Completely unaware of the world burning around her.
She climbed onto the bed, tugging my arm.
"Arjun… come here na."
Her voice was honey-sweet, sleep-heavy, full of trust.
I lay beside her, arm under her head, fingers tracing the curve of her hip even as my eyes kept drifting to the window.
She whispered, "You're tense."
"I'm fine."
"Liar."
I kissed her forehead instead of answering.
She sighed into me, warmth curling around my ribs.
And when she fell asleep, wrapped in my arms, breathing slow, I stared at the shadow outside until dawn.
The man left only when the sun rose.
The next day, Riya finally picked up on our tension.
She cornered me and kabir while the girls were shopping for "Paris outfits."
"What's going on?" she demanded.
Kabir exhaled sharply.
"We're being followed."
Riya's expression hardened like steel dipped in ice.
"Since when?"
"Indian campus," I said. "Maybe before."
She swore under her breath, muttered something about burning an entire continent if anyone touched Sona again.
Best friends
Good.
We'd need her fire.
But Sona?
She stayed blissfully unaffected.
She twirled in front of boutiques.
She made us buy berets "just for aesthetic trauma."
She ate crepes at midnight.
She danced with street musicians like she didn't have a single enemy in the world.
It made me want to lock her away in a room where no shadow could reach her.
Where I could guard every breath she took.
She'd probably stab me for trying.
And i would gladly let her.
Cause.
She'd look cute doing it.
By the fifth day, Kabir and I were done pretending we were calm. Even Riya admitted something felt… off.
We were being circled.
Slowly.
Patiently.
A predator doesn't rush the hunt.
He waits until his prey thinks she's safe.
And my girl?
She felt safer than ever.
Maybe that's why the late-night road trip felt wrong from the second riya came suggested it wirh sona beside.
They came bounding into the room, eyes shining like they'd swallowed stars.
"Let's go on a night drive in an open jeep! Midnight Paris. Wind. Music. Chaos. Let's goooo!"
Sona whined
Kabir shot me a look that said We're definitely going to die.
Riya immediately said, "Absolutely not, you tiny disaster."
Sona pouted.
One of her dangerous pouts.
And suddenly Riya folded.
Kabir folded.
The universe folded.
I wanted to say no.
Every instinct screamed it.
But then she climbed onto my lap, fingers brushing my jaw, whispering, "Please? I want to see the city with you."
And I…
I lost.
"Fine," I growled.
Her whole face lit like sunrise.
She kissed my cheek, then my jaw, then smiled, wicked and soft.
But as she ran off to get ready, as Kabir muttered something about writing his will, as Riya grumbled about "romantic idiots"…
My gut twisted.
The worst part?
It wasn't jealousy.
It wasn't paranoia.
It was certainty.
Someone would follow us tonight.
Someone would get close.
Someone wanted her.
And this road trip was a terrible idea.
A beautiful, stupid, Sona idea.
I grabbed the keys anyway.
Because if death wanted to meet us tonight…
I'd greet him first.
And I'd make damn sure he never looked at my girl again.