The sound of the waves had lulled Aashika into a soft dream, but Riaz wasn’t asleep.

He stood shirtless at the edge of the balcony, the moon casting silver over his scars. His mind wasn’t in the present. It was five years back.

Back in the campus library.

Back to her.

College. Year Three.

She always sat in the corner chair near the tall windows. Always with a poetry book.

Back then, he never said a word. Just watched.

He remembered one rainy evening, the sky dark and her umbrella forgotten. She waited at the gate, frustrated, soaked.

He walked by, offered his hoodie silently.

She took it with a smile that ruined him for life.

In her notebook that day, she wrote:

"He gave me silence, but it echoed louder than words. I wore his hoodie and it smelled like something forbidden. Maybe it wasn’t rain that made me shiver."

He’d found it once, accidentally, left behind in the library.

And he kept it.

Now, years later, she stood behind him, barefoot on the balcony.

"You’re thinking again," she said, slipping her arms around his waist.

"About you," he admitted. "That night in college when you called me arrogant but kept staring."

She laughed. "You acted like the world bored you. But your eyes followed me like I was the only page in your book."

He turned. Lifted her effortlessly onto the railing.

"You were."

She kissed him. Deep, slow, like they were rewriting every moment they missed.

Later that day, they returned to the city.

Trouble waited.

A fire had broken out in one of Riaz’s warehouses.

Sabotage.

Aryan met them at the gates, tension written all over his face.

"There’s a new player in town. Someone with reach. Someone not scared of your name."

Riaz’s jaw clenched. "Then let’s make sure they never forget it."

Aashika gripped his hand. "We fight this together."

But Riaz’s eyes darkened.

Because deep inside, he feared this wasn’t just a rival.

It was someone with history.

Someone who knew their past.

And wanted to use it.