Chapter 2

Chapter 2

**Riya**

I didn’t open it in the elevator.

I didn’t open it in the cab.

I didn’t even open it when I got back to the apartment and locked the door behind me like someone might follow.

I just stood in the middle of the kitchen with the black folder clutched against my chest, breathing too hard, staring at the floor like the answer might be written there.

Dad’s machine was still hissing from the bedroom.

Same rhythm.

Same soft, wet sound.

I set the folder on the counter next to the unpaid hospital bills and the eviction notice and the letter that had started this whole mess. Then I washed my hands. Twice. Like that would somehow clean whatever had just happened on the forty-eighth floor.

My phone lit up with a new email.

Subject line: **Rajvansh – Proposed Settlement Terms**.

Of course.

I didn’t open that either.

Not yet.

I walked into Dad’s room instead.

He was asleep, or close enough. The oxygen mask sat crooked on his face. I fixed it gently, the way I always did, and sat on the edge of the bed for a long minute. His hand was still too cold. I held it anyway.

“I’m going to fix this,” I whispered.

He didn’t answer.

I went back to the kitchen, sat down hard on one of the cheap chairs, and finally flipped the folder open.

Marriage contract.

My full legal name.

His full legal name.

A wedding date three weeks from now.

And then the line that made the whole room tilt:

*In consideration of the full and final settlement of all outstanding debts owed by Dev Kapoor and Kapoor Imports LLC to the Rajvansh Group, the undersigned parties agree to enter into a legal marriage of no less than three years’ duration.*

Three years.

I kept reading.

There were more clauses. Joint assets. Spousal rights. A non-disclosure agreement so thick it could choke someone. A section about residency — I would live in his primary residence. A section about public appearances. A section about heirs that made my stomach turn.

And then, near the end, a short paragraph that wasn’t even trying to hide itself:

*This arrangement is entered into with full knowledge of the historical and financial injuries sustained by the Rajvansh family as a direct result of actions taken by Dev Kapoor and affiliated parties approximately ten years prior.*

There it was.

Revenge.

Not even dressed up.

I laughed once. It came out ugly and too loud in the quiet apartment.

Of course.

Of fucking course.

I shoved the folder away so hard it slid off the counter and hit the floor. Papers scattered. I didn’t pick them up.

My hands were shaking again. I pressed them flat against the table until the trembling slowed.

Seven million dollars.

A dying father.

An eviction notice.

And a man who wanted to own me for something my father did a decade ago.

I pulled my knees up to my chest on the chair and stared at the mess of papers on the floor.

Midnight tomorrow.

That was the deadline he’d given me.

I could refuse.

I could tell him to take the apartment, the warehouse, whatever was left of Kapoor Imports, and go to hell.

And then what?

Dad would lose the bed he was dying in. The oxygen tank. The last scraps of dignity he had left. The hospital would start calling about unpaid bills even louder. The landlord would change the locks. I would be twenty-six, unemployed, and watching the only family I had left die in a place that didn’t belong to us anymore.

Or I could sign.

Marry a man who looked at me like a debt he was collecting.

Live in his house.

Smile for cameras if he told me to.

Spend three years as the living reminder of whatever my father had done to his family.

I picked the papers up one by one and stacked them neatly again. My hands were steadier now. That almost scared me more than the shaking.

I opened the email.

The full contract was attached, just like he’d said. Same language. Same cold precision. At the bottom was a single line from Kabir Singh:

*Please confirm acceptance or rejection by 11:59 p.m. tomorrow. No extensions will be granted.*

I stared at the screen until the words started to blur.

Then I did the only thing that made any sense in a situation that made no sense at all.

I opened a new message.

To: the same email address the contract had come from.

Subject: Acceptance.

I typed three words.

Then I deleted them.

Typed them again.

Deleted them again.

My cursor blinked at me like it was waiting.

Outside, the city kept moving like nothing had changed. Cars. Sirens. Someone yelling on the street three floors down. Normal life, happening to other people.

I looked toward the bedroom door.

The machine kept hissing.

I put my fingers back on the keyboard.

**I accept the terms.**

I hit send before I could stop myself.

The message left with a soft whoosh that felt way too quiet for what it meant.

I sat there in the darkening kitchen, staring at the sent confirmation, and felt something cold settle under my ribs.

It was done.

I had just sold myself to Aryan Rajvansh.

And the worst part was that some small, exhausted part of me already knew I would have done it again.