SHANAYA’S POV

The rain hadn’t stopped all night.

It whispered against the tall glass windows of my penthouse like it was trying to tell me something. Begging me to listen. But I didn’t. I couldn’t.

Sleep never came.

Not after that call.

I’d smashed the phone. The decanter too. My hands still had faint red lines across the skin from where the glass had cut me, but the sting was almost welcome. It reminded me I was still here. Still bleeding.

Still alive.

I had already spoken to Vansh bhai. To Rohit. They both insisted it couldn’t be real—that the number couldn’t be traced, that I was just tired, maybe even slipping. But I wasn’t.

That voice… I knew it.

Even if I hadn’t heard it in years, I knew it.

Kabir.

But Kabir was never supposed to come back.

He wasn’t supposed to exist anymore in my life.

---

The next morning, I walked into the Aureum Enterprises with my head held high, every step as calculated as a chess move. The lobby was buzzing, polished and perfect, the world spinning like it always did—unaware that mine had cracked open again.

The elevator doors slid closed behind me, my reflection fractured in the mirrored walls.

Steel spine. Frozen heart.

You’ve come too far to fall now, I reminded myself.

I reached my office, pushed the doors open—

And froze.

He was already inside.

Leaning against the edge of my desk, casual in his expensive grey suit, sipping from my coffee cup like he owned the damn place.

Vihaan Oberoi.

I didn’t even need to ask how he got in. He always did things like that—smooth, invasive, unapologetic.

He looked up at me, eyes gleaming like mercury—cold, sharp, unreadable.

“Good morning, fiancée,” he drawled, placing the cup down like we weren’t being watched by ten security cameras and half the floor.

I shut the door behind me, quietly.

“You’re not funny,” I muttered, tossing my coat aside. “And that’s not your cup.”

He shrugged, straightened, and crossed the room to me with that signature lazy arrogance only men like him could carry.

Vihaan Oberoi wasn’t soft. He wasn’t warm. And he wasn’t mine.

But he had been there when everything else had burned.

Our engagement was a headline. A statement. A shield.

The truth was something only the two of us knew: we were business.

He stopped a foot away from me, his gaze scanning my face. “You look like you didn’t sleep.”

“I didn’t,” I replied, my voice clipped. “Not that it’s your concern.”

“It is. You carry my name now, remember?” he smirked. “Even if it’s just for show.”

I rolled my eyes, but he tilted his head, studying me more seriously now.

“What happened, Shanaya?”

Something in his tone shifted.

He wasn’t just asking.

He knew something was wrong.

I hesitated. He saw it.

Vihaan had always known how to read cracks in people. Probably because he had so many of his own.

I stepped away from him, walked to the window, watching the skyline blur behind streaks of rain.

“Someone called me last night,” I said slowly. “Private number. No ID.”

“Okay…” he said cautiously. “And?”

“It was him.”

The silence behind me deepened like a hole in the earth.

I turned to look at him.

His jaw clenched.

“Don’t say it.”

“I heard his voice, Vihaan,” I said sharply. “It was him. I don’t care what everyone else says. I’d know his voice even if I was half-dead.”

He stepped closer, slower this time.

“Do you think it was a trap?”

“Possibly,” I whispered. “But what if it wasn’t?”

He didn’t answer.

For a few seconds, we stood there—two people wrapped in too much silence, too many secrets.

I hated that he was the only one I could tell this to.

I hated that he didn’t flinch.

Finally, Vihaan exhaled.

“Alright,” he said. “Then we find out who called. We dig deeper. I’ll have my people look into it too.”

“I’ve already alerted tech,” I said. “They’re trying to trace the signal. It bounced through five countries in seconds.”

“Of course it did,” he murmured. “If he’s alive… he’s not playing small.”

No. Kabir never did after all he's the head of one of the most powerful mafia.

Vihaan moved toward the table, picked up his tablet, and typed something with calm precision.

I watched him quietly.

Vihaan Oberoi—my supposed fiancé. The man with a blood-stained empire of his own. Secrets darker than mine. A past I didn’t fully know, and a future I wasn’t sure I wanted to share.

But right now?

He was the only person who didn’t look at me like I was insane.

“You’ll let me in on this fully?” he asked.

I didn’t answer right away.

Then I met his eyes.

“I’ll let you in, Oberoi. But only as far as I trust you.”

He smiled slightly.

“That’s more than most ever get.”

---

FLASHBACK — 2 YEARS AGO

Geneva, Switzerland.

It had started in the most ridiculous, extravagant way imaginable—

At a secretive, invitation-only auction buried in the marble heart of Geneva, under chandeliers worth more than most city blocks.

I wasn’t even supposed to be there.

But then again, people like me rarely went where we were “supposed” to.

The room was filled with ghosts in tuxedos—old money, oil kings, arms dealers, politicians with too many passports.

It was one of those events where the champagne never stopped flowing, but every smile hid a blade.

I was there for a sculpture. Minimalist. Brutal. Cold—

Just like the life I had built from the shards they left me.

The bidding had started. I was calm, confident. I knew the game.

But then…

He entered.

Vihaan Oberoi.

The name alone could still pull blood from stone.

Sharp suit. Sharper jaw. A presence that didn’t just command the room—it rewrote its rules.

And then, out of nowhere, he bid on a completely different piece.

A painting I had zero interest in. Abstract. Chaotic. Drenched in red.

I let it pass until the number hit a ceiling that made even the Russian oligarchs flinch.

Ten. Million. Dollars.

Over my last bid.

My jaw clenched. I turned, met his gaze across the aisle.

And he… smirked. That slow, deliberate tilt of his lips like he knew exactly what he’d done.

I found him later—outside, leaning against a matte black Bentley like he belonged to it.

"You didn’t even look at the painting," I snapped, heels clicking against stone.

He looked at me like I was the most obvious secret in the world.

"I wasn’t bidding on the painting," he said. "I was bidding for your attention."

I remember going utterly still.

No man had ever dared say something like that to me. Not like that. Not in that tone.

Calm. Certain. Dangerous.

And just like that—

It began.

The game.

---

We crossed paths across countries after that.

Sometimes rivals. Sometimes reluctant allies.

Tech summits in Dubai. Old money galas in Rome. A joint investment in a hotel chain that spiraled into months of legal back-and-forth where neither of us was willing to lose.

He was infuriatingly clever.

Always five steps ahead, like he enjoyed watching me catch up just enough to almost win.

But what unsettled me the most?

He never tried to take control.

Vihaan wasn’t like the others who wanted to dominate me, compete with me, “tame” me.

He simply watched. Listened. Calculated.

And in rooms filled with power and poison, he became a shield I didn’t ask for—but somehow learned to lean on.

---

When the media started hounding me—

Digging into my past, trying to spin headlines out of scars I still hadn’t healed from—him. Vihaan helped me.

The "engagement" story was a calculated move.

We announced it over espresso in Milan, with no ring, no press conference.

Just one signature on a PR release that turned the wolves silent.

“Strategic,” I told him. “Temporary.”

He nodded once.

“Whatever you need,” he said.

But sometimes… in the quiet moments between deals and dinners, I’d catch him looking at me.

Like he wanted more than headlines.

Like he saw me, not the mask I wore.

And that terrified me more than any scandal ever could.

---

AUTHOR'S NOTE :

This chapter introduces Vihaan Oberoi—a name that echoes power, silence, and shadows.

To Shanaya, he’s never been more than a calculated ally. A shield in brutal boardrooms. A business move in a world that punishes women for walking alone.

But power recognizes power.

And even if Shanaya’s heart remains untouched, Vihaan’s presence is a storm that won’t go unnoticed.

You’ll see him again.

Maybe in these pages.

Maybe in his own story.

Because some men carry too many secrets to stay in the background forever.

See you all soon. xxxx

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