Chapter 3 - Angel Voice | The Heir's Obsession Web Novel By Aimi Hikaru

Inside the club.

The booth was in the back corner. Facing the entrance. Facing the stage. Facing every door. Old habit. Family habit. The kind of thing that gets taught, not chosen.

Four men sat there.

They weren't laughing.

They weren't drinking.

They were watching.

Raffa Fathurrahman had been staring at the stage for forty-five minutes.

He’d spoken to her before. Twice, actually. Once a year ago and again six months later. Both times, he’d stayed at the back of the room, never getting close enough to truly know her. He’d talked to her, but he’d never really gotten close.

But tonight, he'd come for a reason.

Because his crew had told him she sang here. Because one of the men on his payroll had mentioned "the girl from your campus sings at The Vault every Friday." Raffa had spent two years watching Qistina from a distance. He'd seen her in the library, the cafeteria, and the lecture halls, yet he'd never managed to figure out where she went whenever she disappeared.

Now he knew.

She came here.

She sang.

And she was good. Better than good. Better than anyone he'd ever heard.

He saw her on the stage. And then he heard her voice. Fuck.

But that wasn't why he was still sitting there an hour after her set had ended. He was still sitting there because he'd seen her.

Not the singer. Not the student.

Her.

The girl who walked off the stage and let her smile drop the second the curtain closed. The girl who scanned the room like she was looking for someone. The girl who kept her head down as she walked out, like she didn't want anyone to recognize her.

Raffa knew that walk. He'd invented that walk.

It was the walk of someone who was hiding something. Someone who was in something. Someone who was doing something they shouldn't be.

"So you were right." Raffa's voice. Low. Flat.

"Yeah."

Raffa didn't look away from the curtain she'd disappeared behind.

"She's here." Raffa continued. "All this time."

"Yeah."

Eddie leaned forward, elbows on the table. "The Angel Voice."

Farid let out a low whistle.

"And she's a student. At Al-Fath."

"She's a scholarship student," Zack corrected. "Dean's List every semester. Same course as Raffa."

"That's insane."

"No." Zack shook his head slowly. "That's not insane. That's intentional."

Silence.

Raffa finally turned his head. "Say that again."

Zack met his eyes.

"She's been working at a family-owned club for two years. Same night every week. Same city. Same world. That's not an accident. That's a pattern."

"She's hunting something."

"Yeah."

Raffa looked back at the curtain. "So am I."

They sat like soldiers.

Not like party boys. Not like heirs who'd come to drink. Not like the sons of powerful men who spent their evenings in clubs because they could.

Backs to the wall. Eyes on the room. Hands loose but ready.

Every few minutes, one of them would scan the entrance, the bar, the VIP section, and the back door. Nobody announced what they were doing. Nobody had to. They'd been trained to stay alert since childhood.

Other people in the club noticed.

They didn't stare. Nobody stared at men like these. But they noticed everything. A server hesitated before approaching the booth. A girl at the bar looked over and then looked away, fast. A man at the corner table shifted his chair.

Because everyone in this room could feel it. These weren't normal guys.

Nothing was normal in this world.

A girl approached the booth.

She was blonde and tall, dressed in something short and expensive. She stopped beside Raffa with the ease of someone who knew exactly what she was doing, standing a little too close before leaning in with a practiced smile.

"Hey. You looked lonely."

Raffa didn't turn. "Who sent you?"

Her smile flickered.

"What?"

He turned his head. Slowly. Just enough to look at her.

She went still.

Raffa's face wasn't angry. It wasn't cruel. It was nothing. The kind of nothing that made people step back.

"You heard me."

She swallowed. "I don't-"

"You didn't pick this table by accident." His voice stayed flat. "You didn't walk over here because I looked lonely. Someone told you to. Someone paid you to."

Her face went pale.

"I-"

"Was it one of my father's men?"

Silence.

"Or was it someone from the other side?"

She didn't answer. She didn't have to.

Raffa looked at her. Not with anger. Not with pity. Just... recognition. "Go home."

"But-"

"Go."

She left.

Fast.

Zack watched her go. Then looked at Raffa. "You could have been nicer."

"I could have."

"You know she was just doing what she was told."

"I know." Raffa picked up his glass, the one he hadn't ordered but the bar had sent over, and set it down untouched. "I don't care."

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The Heir's Obsession Web Novel By Aimi Hikaru.