Dhruv's POV

The drive home was a vacuum of sound.

Katha sat beside me, looking out the window, seemingly lost in thought. But I could feel the change in the air. The terrified girl I had dragged to the registrar's office was gone. In her place sat a woman who had pinned me against a wall, looked me in the eye, and dared me to kiss her.

How dare she, I thought, gripping the steering wheel until the leather groaned. She challenged me. In my own office.

The car rolled to a stop in front of the manor. The rain had stopped, leaving the driveway slick and black.

"Go inside," I ordered, staring straight ahead. "Rest. I have business to attend to."

Katha hesitated. She looked at me, her lips parting as if she wanted to say something—maybe another challenge, maybe a question. But she saw the darkness in my eyes and decided against it.

"Okay," she whispered. "Goodnight, Dhruv."

She opened the door and stepped out. I watched her walk up the steps, her spine straight, that beige dress clinging to the curves that had driven me insane just hours ago.

As soon as the front door closed behind her, the mask fell off.

I pulled out my phone.

"Patil," I spoke into the device, my voice low and lethal.

"Sir?"

"I want full surveillance on my wife," I commanded. "And on Meera. I want their call logs, their location history, and audio from inside Meera’s car."

"On... Meera Ma'am as well, Sir?" Patil sounded confused.

"Did I stutter?" I snapped. "They were whispering in a cafe this morning. I don't trust sudden friendships. Find out what they are plotting. If they so much as sneeze, I want to know."

I hung up.

I wasn't done.

I looked at the driver in the rearview mirror. "Get out."

"Sir?"

"I said get out. I'm driving."

The driver scrambled out of the car. I climbed into the driver's seat. The engine purred—a beast waiting to be unleashed.

I needed answers. And I knew exactly where to get them.

Location: The Old Tenement Time: 8:45 PM

I parked the Maybach in the middle of the narrow, filth-ridden street. People stared—men in vests, women washing dishes on the roadside—but they scattered when I stepped out.

They smelled the money. And they smelled the danger.

I walked toward the peeling blue door. I didn't knock.

Bang!

I kicked the door open with the sole of my shoe. The lock splintered with a satisfying crunch.

Inside, the room was dim and smelled of stale oil. Ramesh and Vimla were sitting on a cot, counting a stack of cash—my cash.

They jumped up, the money flying everywhere.

"Who the hell—" Ramesh started shouting, grabbing a cricket bat.

Then he saw me.

The bat clattered to the floor. The color drained from his face so fast he looked like a corpse.

"Mr... Mr. Rathore?" Ramesh stammered, his knees knocking together. "Sir! What... what a surprise! Please, please come in!"

"Sit," I said. It wasn't a request.

Ramesh and Vimla collapsed onto the cot, huddling together. They looked terrified. Good.

I kicked a plastic chair toward them and sat down, leaning forward, resting my elbows on my knees. I looked around the squalid room.

"You lied to me, Ramesh," I said softly.

"No! No, Sir!" Ramesh cried, sweat breaking out on his forehead. "We never lie! We are honest people!"

"Honest people don't sell their nieces," I pointed out dryly.

I stood up and loomed over them, letting my shadow engulf them.

"You told me she was quiet," I hissed. "You told me she was obedient. You told me she was a simple girl who would keep her head down and do what she was told."

I grabbed Ramesh by the collar of his dirty vest and hauled him up. He choked, clawing at my hand.

"She is not obedient," I growled, shaking him. "She talks back. She challenges me. She thinks she has rights."

"Sir... Sir, I swear!" Ramesh wheezed. "She was always quiet here! We... we kept her in line! I don't know what happened!"

"You sold me a defective product, Ramesh," I whispered, tightening my grip. "She is doing too much. She is getting too close. She is digging into things she shouldn't."

I threw him back onto the cot. The cheap frame creaked dangerously.

Vimla was sobbing now, hands folded. "Please, Sir! She is a bad girl! We told you! That's why we gave her to you! Beat her! Discipline her! Do whatever you want, she is yours!"

I looked at them with pure disgust. These were her family. These were the people who were supposed to protect her. And here they were, telling me to break her.

Ironically, their cruelty made me hate them more than I was annoyed with Katha.

"Listen to me closely," I said, stepping on the cricket bat and snapping it in half with a loud crack.

"If she is plotting something... if she learned to be this manipulative from you..."

I leaned down, my face inches from Ramesh’s sweating nose.

"I will burn this slum to the ground with you inside it. Do you understand?"

"Yes! Yes, Sir! We know nothing! We haven't spoken to her!" Ramesh cried.

"Keep it that way," I ordered. "If she calls you, you tell me. If she comes here, you tell me."

I straightened up, dusting off my suit.

"I own her," I stated cold, to them and to myself. "And I don't like it when my property acts out."

I turned and walked out of the hovel, leaving them shaking in the dark.

I got back into the car and gripped the steering wheel. My heart was still racing with adrenaline.

She challenged me. She thought she could handle me.

I looked at the rearview mirror, my eyes hard.

Fine, Katha. You want to play house? You want to test the husband?

Let's see if you can handle the consequences.

Katha's POV

The clock on the wall ticked. Tick. Tick. Tick.

It was the only sound in the massive, freezing room. I sat on the edge of the bed, my fingers twisting the fabric of the beige dress I was still wearing. I hadn't changed. I couldn't. It felt like armor, and tonight, I had a feeling I would need it.

Dhruv hadn't come home immediately after dropping me off. He had driven away into the rain, his eyes dark with a turbulence I couldn't name.

I looked at the nightstand. The platinum bracelet—the "bonus"—sat there in its velvet box. It glittered under the lamp, cold and sharp. It was an insult. A twenty-five lakh rupee muzzle designed to shut me up.

He wants me to hate him, I realized, tracing the pattern of the duvet. He tries so hard to be the villain. He throws money, he barks orders, he builds walls.

But I had seen the crack in the armor. I had felt his lips hovering over mine in the car. I had felt the desperate way he held me during his nightmare.

Suddenly, the heavy oak door flew open.

It didn't creak. It slammed against the wall with a violence that made the crystal vase on the dresser rattle.

I jumped, standing up instinctively.

Dhruv was there.

He looked... wild.

His suit jacket was gone. His white shirt was unbuttoned halfway down his chest, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His hair was wet, plastered to his forehead as if he had walked through a storm. But it was his eyes that terrified me. They weren't the cool, detached eyes of a CEO. They were burning with a chaotic, raw fire.

He smelled of rain, sweat, and something metallic—like ozone.

He kicked the door shut behind him. Click. The lock engaged.

He didn't speak. He just walked toward me.

"Dhruv?" I whispered, taking a step back until my legs hit the mattress. "Where were you?"

He didn't answer. He stopped two feet away from me, his chest heaving. He looked me up and down, his gaze raking over the dress, over my legs, over my face. It wasn't a look of admiration. It was a look of possession.

"You think you're clever, don't you?" he rasped. His voice was rough, like gravel grinding together.

"I... I don't know what you mean," I stammered.

"The challenge," he said, taking a step closer, invading my personal space. "In the office. You wanted to know if I own you. You dared me."

He reached out and grabbed my upper arm. His grip was firm, bordering on painful, but not quite crossing the line. He pulled me toward him until our bodies collided.

"You think because I stopped in the car, I am weak?" he hissed, leaning down into my face. "You think because I bought you a bracelet, I am soft?"

"I didn't say that," I breathed, my heart hammering against his chest.

"You thought it," he accused. "You looked at me with those big, defiant eyes and thought you had won. You thought you tamed the beast."

He laughed, a dark, humorless sound.

"You forgot who I am, Katha. You forgot where I come from."

He walked me backward. I stumbled, my knees hitting the bed, and I fell back onto the mattress. Dhruv didn't let go. He followed me down, looming over me, trapping me between his arms.

"You want a husband?" he growled. "You want to play house? Fine. Let's play."

He wasn't trying to seduce me. He was trying to scare me. He was trying to prove a point—that he was dangerous, that he was bad, that I should run away screaming.

"Dhruv, stop," I said, putting my hands on his chest. His heart was beating furiously under my palms. "You are not like this."

"How do you know what I am like?" he shouted, the control finally snapping.

He grabbed my wrists and pinned them above my head into the pillows. He wasn't hurting me, but the dominance was absolute. He wanted me to feel helpless.

"I am the man who bought you!" he yelled, his face twisted in a snarl. "I am the man who treats people like assets! I am cold! I am cruel! I am exactly what everyone says I am!"

"No, you're not!" I yelled back, struggling against his grip.

"Yes, I am!" he roared. "So hate me! Hate me, Katha! Why don't you hate me? I treated you like garbage! I made you sleep on the floor! I threw money at your face! Hate me!"

He was begging. Beneath the rage, beneath the shouting, he was begging me to despise him. Because if I hated him, it would be easier. If I hated him, he wouldn't have to worry about hurting me. If I hated him, he wouldn't have to feel the terrifying warmth of my care.

I stopped struggling.

I went completely still beneath him.

I looked up into his frantic, tortured eyes. I saw the fear. He wasn't afraid of me. He was afraid of himself. He was afraid that he was unlovable.

"I can't hate you," I whispered.

Dhruv froze. His grip on my wrists loosened slightly. "What?"

"I can't hate you," I repeated, my voice steady, cutting through his noise. "Because I know why you do it."

He stared at me, his breathing ragged. "You don't know anything."

"I know," I said softly. "I know you aren't the heir."

Silence.

Absolute, suffocating silence descended on the room.

Dhruv went rigid. It was as if I had turned him to stone. The anger in his eyes vanished, replaced by a hollow shock. He slowly released my wrists. He pulled back, sitting up on his knees, staring at me as if I had just stabbed him.

Dhruv's POV

"I know you aren't the 'true' Rathore heir."

The words hit me like a physical blow to the chest. The air left my lungs.

I stared at her. Katha was standing in front of me, looking small and fragile in that beige dress, but her words had just stripped me naked.

My vision blurred at the edges. A high-pitched ringing started in my ears.

She knows.

The one thing I had hidden behind expensive suits, billion-dollar deals, and a facade of ice. The dirty little secret that I was just a bastard child brought in from the cold.

Panic, hot and acidic, clawed at my throat.

She is looking at me with pity, I realized, seeing the shine of tears in her eyes. She knows I’m dirt. And she feels sorry for me.

I hated pity. I hated it more than hatred. Hatred I could respect. Pity was for the weak.

"Who told you?" I snarled. My voice didn't sound like mine. It sounded like a wounded animal's.

I took a step back, hitting the dresser. I needed distance. I needed to get away from her eyes.

"Who told you?" I roared, grabbing a crystal vase from the dresser and hurling it at the wall.

CRASH.

The glass shattered into a thousand pieces, glittering on the carpet like diamonds.

Katha didn't scream. She didn't run. She just stood there, watching me with those unbearable, knowing eyes.

"It doesn't matter," she whispered.

"It matters!" I shouted, turning on her. I walked toward her, letting the rage take over. I needed to scare her. I needed to make her fear me so she would stop looking at me like I was a broken toy.

I grabbed her shoulders. Hard. My fingers dug into her flesh.

"You think you know me now?" I hissed, shaking her. "You think because you know who my mother was, you understand me? You think this makes us equal?"

I leaned down, my face inches from hers, spitting the words out.

"I am still the man who bought you, Katha. I am still the Master of this house. And you? You are just a wife on paper. Don't think for a second that knowing my secret gives you power over me."

"I don't want power," she said, her voice trembling but stubborn.

"Then what do you want?" I demanded. "Money? Is that it? You want hush money to keep your mouth shut about the bastard son?"

"I want you to stop," she cried out.

She reached up.

I expected her to push me away. I expected her to claw at my face.

Instead, her hands landed on my cheeks.

Her palms were soft. Warm. Gentle.

"Don't," I warned, trying to pull my head back. "Don't touch me with those hands."

"Why?" she challenged, stepping closer, pressing her body against mine. "Because I know? Because I know that you aren't a monster, Dhruv? You're just a boy who was left alone?"

"Shut up!" I growled.

The shame was burning me alive. She was seeing right through the cracks. She was touching the raw, ugly wound I had spent twenty years bandaging with money.

I tried to push her away. I grabbed her wrists to rip her hands off my face.

But she held on. She dug her fingers into my hair, pulling my head down.

"Look at me," she commanded.

"No," I gritted out, squeezing her wrists until I knew it hurt. "Let go."

"I won't," she whispered. "You want to assert dominance? Fine. Break my wrists. Throw me out. Do it. But I am not leaving."

She looked straight into my eyes, searching for the soul I didn't have.

"You try so hard to make everyone hate you," she said, her voice cracking. "Because you think if they hate you, it won't hurt when they leave. But I see you, Dhruv. I see you."

My throat constricted painfully. It felt like I was swallowing glass.

Stop it, I screamed internally. Stop being kind. Stop looking at me like I matter. I am defective. I am the spare heir. I am nothing.

"I hate you," I gasped, the lie tasting like bile. "You are annoying. You are clingy. You are too much."

"I know," she sobbed, tears finally spilling down her cheeks. "I know."

She didn't back down. She launched herself at me.

She wrapped her arms around my neck and buried her face in my shoulder. She hugged me tight, pressing her small, soft body against my rigid frame.

I froze.

I stood there, arms hanging at my sides, hands clenched into fists. My entire body was vibrating with the urge to shove her away, to destroy the moment, to prove I was cold.

But the warmth... God, the warmth.

It seeped through my shirt. It seeped into my skin. It was suffocating and addictive all at once.

"Let go," I warned, my voice shaking. "I am warning you, Katha. I will break you."

"Go ahead," she mumbled into my neck, wetting my shirt with her tears. "Break me. But I'm holding you while you do it."

I squeezed my eyes shut.

A ragged breath tore out of my chest. My resolve shattered.

I couldn't fight it. I was too tired. Too lonely.

My hands moved on their own. They came up and slammed onto her back, grabbing the fabric of her dress, pulling her closer with a violence that was bordering on painful.

I buried my face in her hair. I inhaled her scent—vanilla and rain—and it felt like drowning.

"You are a fool," I rasped against her ear, my voice thick with unshed tears. "You are a stupid, foolish girl. You should run from me."

"Too late," she whispered.

I hated her in that moment. I hated her for stripping me of my armor. I hated her for making me feel this desperate need to be held.

But I didn't let go. I held her tighter, crushing her against me, standing in the wreckage of my own pride, taking the comfort I didn't deserve.