Page 71 of Born in Sin (Phoenix #3)

Chapter Thirty-Seven

VIRAT

The mansion in Malabar Hill was one Virat had avoided all of his adult life. The imposing house had never been home. As a child he hadn’t been welcome and as an adult, he’d wanted nothing to do with the house or the people who lived in it. And yet, today, here he was.

He stood outside the large, wrought iron gates and watched as his father’s manager, Sharan Chaudhry, the man who’d been thrust unwillingly into the role of de facto father to him, approached.

The manager signaled to the security guard to open the gates and the man ran to do his bidding.

The gates trundled open and Virat stepped through, his feet touching the grounds of his family home for the first time in his life.

“Virat,” Sharan smiled, tiredly. “It’s good to see you.”

Was it? Virat wasn’t sure about that but for now, all he did was nod politely. This man and his family had, after all, tolerated him over endless school breaks.

“Sharan Chacha,” he murmured. “It’s good to see you too.” The lie rolled off his tongue with ease. He looked up at the impressive facade of the home and he wondered if everything his father had done to secure his empire had been worth it.

Virat followed the other man into the house. A male nurse hurried down the expansive hallway, bowing once to Sharan before disappearing in the direction of what Virat knew were the staff quarters. He didn’t have to have come here to know the exact layout of the place.

“I’m glad you’ve come,” Sharan said now, leading Virat up the curving staircase in the middle of the hall.

“Why?” Virat asked, genuinely curious. What exactly did Sharan Chacha think was happening here? A reconciliation? He almost laughed out loud at the thought.

“Because…” Sharan seemed to think better of it and checked himself. “You’ll see.” They stopped outside huge double doors that clearly led to the master bedroom.

Virat stared at the ornate, gilt-edged pattern of the doors. “Where is his family?” he asked quietly.

Sharan Chacha looked around like he expected them to pop out from behind a pillar or something. “They are in their rooms, I suppose. They don’t really come to visit him. It must be hard for them to see him like this.”

Right. Virat wasn’t sure what reaction Sharan Chacha expected from him.

Was he supposed to burst into tears that Raghuvansh Jha wasn’t loved by his family?

You had to give love to get love. Although to be fair, his family had certainly gotten more of his attention than Virat ever had.

So, in all honesty, they had suffered more.

“Shall we?” he asked Sharan Chacha, wanting to get this over with and get out of this house before he suffocated from the complicated vibes floating around.

Sharan pushed the door open and led Virat inside the darkened room.

A solitary table lamp burned, illuminating the large space.

At the far end, a king size bed was pushed up against the wall.

In the center of the bed, he could make out his father’s frame.

He was propped up against the headboard, his shriveled, emaciated body covered with a sheet.

He had an oxygen mask on his face, the tank by the bed and nothing else.

A nurse hovered by the bedside and scurried out at Sharan’s gesture to do so. Virat heard the door close behind him and knew Sharan Chacha had left, giving them the illusion of privacy.

“Virat,” he said, his voice surprisingly strong for someone who looked so unwell. “Why are you here?”

Virat stepped closer to the bed, stopping at the foot of it, and meeting his father’s red, watery eyes. “I’m here to meet you, Andanatha,” he said formally.

A mean, spiteful yet gleeful smile lit up his father’s face. “How did you find out?”

Revulsion swept through Virat at his father’s smug face. “Why?” he asked, his voice not betraying his thoughts. “Why start something like the Sons of Andhaka?”

His father sneered at his idiocy. “Why not?” he asked, raising his frail arms in the air. “Business,” he mused. “Big business doesn’t happen in the boardrooms. Legacies are built off the backs of relationships, friendships. But do you know what cements it?” Again, that ugly smirk. “Blackmail.”

Virat listened silently, letting his father ramble on.

“Once you enter the Sons of Andhaka, you never get out. As long as you stay, your business will grow and prosper, because the Sons only bolster and trade with each other’s firms. If you try to leave,” the evil smile on his face grew, “We have enough on you to ensure you can’t.

You stay, you fall in line and reap the rewards of our combined success.

A fist is always stronger than an individual finger. ”

“And the women?”

For the first time since Virat had walked into the room, his father looked confused. “What about them?”

“Why ruin their lives like that?”

The old man waved a dismissive hand in the air.

“Pah. Like it matters. They were just the entertainment of the evening. And helpful in blackmailing the members to stay in line. Some of the men loved it, the women’s submission, their domination, the rape fantasies they played out.

The men who didn’t…they played along so they didn’t look like pussies. ”

“You destroyed those women.” Rage burned through Virat, a searing fire that sought to purge his very DNA, the genetics this monster had passed on to him, from his veins.

“Why are you going on about those women?” His father looked like a confused old man as he blinked blearily at Virat.

“What do they matter? Who cares? This is about business, contacts and networking, the old-fashioned way. Men being men. This is about legacies and the generations of wealth we are the gatekeepers to.”

“It ends now,” Virat said, his voice cold as the icy fire spreading through every inch of him. “The Sons of Andhaka are going down as we speak, every last one of them being rounded up and arrested.”

For a moment, his father just blinked at him. “Why?” he asked, genuinely bewildered. “Who is going to say we did anything wrong? We were just doing business, our way.”

Virat shook his head. This was pointless.

“The police will be here soon,” he said quietly. “I advise you to cooperate with them.”

“The police can’t do anything to me.”

Virat rolled his eyes. “I guess we’ll see,” he said, turning away from the man who’d sired him and heading for the door.

“The doctors say I won’t make it past the next day. The police will have to lock up my ashes.”

Virat glanced over his shoulder at him.

Raghuvansh Jha smiled. “I guess I win, after all.”

Virat pivoted on his heel and faced him.

“No, you don’t. I will bury your legacy with those ashes.

We may not be able to lock you up, but I will burn the empire you built on the backs of the pain and terror of those women down and dance in the ashes.

Everything you did, everything you gained, I’m going to flush it all down the toilet and let the rats in the sewage do the rest. Go ahead and die, old man.

I promise you the afterlife waiting for you is going to be everything you deserve. ”

He walked out to his father’s sputtering curses, and he didn’t look back. Not once.