The Color of Smoke
In the restless night streets of Jaipur, where old pink-stone havelis meet modern neon, gangster Vikram “Vicky” Shekhawat rules the shadowy strip of Ghat Gate Road. A tall, scarred man in his late twenties, he controls an underworld disguised as a legitimate marble and textile business.
One late night, while waiting in his matte-black Fortuner outside a small juice centre called Gulab & Gangour, Vicky first notices a young girl (around seventeen) working behind the counter. She has long hair the colour of burnt jaggery, a single thick braid, symmetrical dimples when she smiles, and moves with calm, deliberate grace. When she hands him a hot coffee and warns him gently that it’s hot, something about her quiet seriousness and careful manner lodges deep inside him.
From that moment, he begins returning night after night—ordering different drinks each time just to watch her wipe the counter in slow circles and interact softly with customers. He speaks to her in only a few clipped words; she never asks his name.
On this particular night, he watches a college boy flirt with her and make her laugh. The small, surprised sound of her laughter triggers a quiet, possessive reaction in Vicky. He taps the armrest twice—a signal to his driver Lalla that a decision has been made.
As the girl looks up and briefly meets his gaze through the tinted glass (without knowing who’s watching), Vicky feels absolute certainty: she already belongs to him—not romantically in any gentle sense, but as territory he claims the way he claims the city after dark.
He instructs Lalla to find out everything about her tomorrow. The Fortuner pulls away into the pink-and-blue night.
Unseen by him, the girl murmurs to herself that she has seen that car before, a faint unease settling in her stomach.
The chapter ends on the note that she will soon learn why the black SUV keeps appearing—and what it truly means.