The conference room felt different when they returned to it. Raghav sat on one side of the table, Aarav on the other, and between them lay the particular tension of a man who's just learned that his family might be connected to a serial crime.
"Nitin worked here for three years," Raghav said, his voice careful. "He was a system administrator. Good at his job. Quiet. He left two months ago — voluntarily. Said he wanted to do freelance work."
"And you didn't find it strange that a deactivated account was still accessing patient records?"
"I — no. I didn't know. Admin accounts are supposed to be deactivated completely when an employee leaves. But Nitin set up his own access during his time here. He created backup pathways. Hidden admin credentials that survived the deactivation."
"Your brother built a backdoor into your company's patient database."
"It appears so."
"And used it to access the records of four women who subsequently disappeared."
Raghav put his head in his hands. "Inspector, I don't — Nitin is not a violent person. He's quiet, introverted. He spends his time coding and reading. He doesn't even raise his voice."
"Where is he now?"
"I don't know. He moved out of our parents' house six months ago. He has a flat somewhere — Noida, I think. He doesn't share his address."
"Your brother disappears, uses a hidden backdoor to stalk women through your database, and you don't know where he lives?"
"We're not close, Inspector. We haven't been for years."
Aarav left the building with Nitin Saxena's employee file, his Aadhaar details, his last known phone number, and a photograph — a thin face with deep-set eyes and the kind of expression that was either thoughtful or empty, depending on what you already believed about the person behind it.
He also left with a question that nagged at him on the drive back to Noida. Raghav had cooperated — quickly, fully, without needing to call his lawyer first. That was unusual. People with nothing to hide were usually the most cautious. People who cooperated too eagerly were sometimes doing so because they wanted to control what the police found and how they found it.
Was Raghav pointing him toward his brother because Nitin was guilty? Or because Raghav needed someone to point at?
Aarav filed the question in the back of his mind, where he kept all the things he wasn't sure about yet, and called the cyber cell.
"I need a full digital trace on Nitin Saxena. Phone, email, bank, social media, everything. And cross-reference his movements with the dates of the four disappearances."
He was driving back through Noida traffic — that particular hell of auto-rickshaws, Boleros, and e-rickshaws that moved like a school of fish on sedatives — when his phone buzzed.
Unknown Caller.
Second call. Same time — 11:47 PM hadn't been the pattern for him. The calls to him came at random hours. This one was at 2:15 PM, in broad daylight, in the middle of traffic.
He answered.
Silence. Then — the tapping. Metallic, rhythmic. He counted.
Nine taps.
Then a voice. Not distorted, not disguised. A real, human voice. Male. Young. Calm.
"You're getting warm, Inspector. But you're looking at the wrong brother."
The line went dead.
Aarav pulled over. His hands were shaking — not with fear, but with the adrenaline of a hunter who's just learned the prey is watching him from the bushes.
The wrong brother.
He looked at Nitin Saxena's photograph on the passenger seat. Then he picked up his phone and pulled up Raghav Saxena's LinkedIn profile. The face of a CTO. The face of a man who'd helpfully handed over his brother's information within minutes of being asked.
The face of a man who might be running a much older, much darker game.
