It started as a whisper.
A name.
A shadow that moved where she could not follow.

Siya Kapoor.
The secretary who never looked her in the eye unless it was to measure her, strip her dignity thread by thread, and leave a smirk behind.

She had the kind of beauty that knew it could destroy—red lips, sharp heels, and the confidence of someone who had already won the war before the other side even realized a battle existed.

"You're a charity case," Siya once murmured in the corridor, her perfume lingering long after she was gone.
Aarika had stopped in her tracks. "Excuse me?"

Siya's smile didn't reach her eyes. "Armaan married you to clean up your father's debts, not because he... wanted you."
Then she'd walked away, the sound of her heels like a gavel delivering a sentence.

Aarika told herself it wasn't true.
Armaan may have been cruel, controlling, unpredictable—but surely, he wouldn't...

Still, the words dug under her skin like splinters. And when she saw Armaan's phone left on the bed one morning, unlocked, the temptation swallowed her whole.

The messages were short, but they cut deeper than any slap.

Siya: Miss you already. Last night was perfect.
Armaan: You're mine. Always.
Siya: When will she be gone for good?
Armaan: Soon.

Her breath caught. Her fingers trembled as though they knew this discovery would change everything. She reread them, hoping she'd misunderstood, but the truth was unrelenting.

For the rest of the day, her chest felt too tight. She couldn't eat. Couldn't think.

By evening, she couldn't hold it in anymore.

She decided she would confront him—calmly, privately, maybe even plead for an explanation. Foolish hope told her there could still be a misunderstanding.

But hope died the moment she walked into his office without knocking.

There they were.

Siya, perched on his lap like she belonged there, her manicured fingers tracing the edge of his jaw.
Armaan, smiling—a smile Aarika had never seen directed at her.
Their laughter was intimate, easy, like a song they both knew by heart.

The sound was a knife that slid between her ribs.

Siya noticed her first. She didn't move. Didn't even look guilty.
Armaan turned his head slowly, his gaze locking on Aarika with the calm of a predator who knew its prey had nowhere to run.

"You were never supposed to see this," he said. No anger. No panic. Just cold certainty.

Aarika's lips parted, but no words came.

Armaan's arm tightened around Aarika 's waist as he added, almost lazily, "But now that you have..."

That night was the beginning of her end.

They didn't scream at her—they didn't have to. Armaan's punishments were rarely loud. They were deliberate, designed to strip away pieces of her until she couldn't recognize the girl in the mirror.

Aarika's whispers became sharper. Armaan's touches became bruises. The walls of their home closed in until the air felt poisoned.

They took her dignity first, then her voice. And finally, the will to keep fighting.

And yet... she lived.

Barely.