Katha's POV
The water in the bucket had turned the color of charcoal, but I dipped the rag in anyway. My hands were numb. The skin on my knuckles had rubbed raw hours ago, stinging every time the soapy water touched them, but I didn't stop. I couldn't.
Stopping meant thinking. And thinking was dangerous tonight.
Outside, Mumbai was drowning. The rain hammered against the tin roof of our tenement like a thousand angry fists, rattling the thin window panes. Thunder cracked so loud it shook the floor beneath my knees, but the storm inside this house was far more terrifying.
"Faster, girl! Do you want to ruin us?"
My aunt's voice screeched from the kitchen, cutting through the humidity. Vimla Mami waddled into the room, wiping sweat from her forehead. She was wearing her best sari—a garish pink silk that looked ridiculous against the peeling yellow paint of our walls. Her eyes were wide, darting around the room with a look I knew well: greed mixed with panic.
"He will be here any minute," she hissed, kicking my leg lightly. "Look at this floor! It's still filthy. If he sees dust, Katha, I swear I will throw you out on the street myself."
"I'm cleaning it, Mami," I whispered, my voice hoarse. I kept my head down, scrubbing a stain that had been there for ten years.
He.
They hadn't stopped whispering that name for three days. Dhruv Rathore.
I didn't know who he was, not really. I knew what the newspapers said—that he was a billionaire, a shark, a man who owned half the city. I knew he was dangerous. But I didn't know why a man who lived in palaces would step foot in the slums of Dharavi.
Why was he coming here? Why had my uncle spent the last of his savings on expensive snacks that sat untouched on the table?
"Ramesh!" Mami shouted. "Is he here?"
"Quiet, woman!" My uncle, Ramesh Mama, was pacing by the window. He looked like a man marching to the gallows. He kept wiping his sweaty palms on his trousers. "The convoy... I see lights. Three cars. Black SUVs."
Three cars. For a visit to a two-room house?
My heart gave a painful lurch. A cold, sinking feeling settled in my stomach—the kind of instinct a prey animal gets right before the predator snaps its jaws.
"Get inside," Mama barked at me, not even looking in my direction. "Hide in the kitchen. Don't come out until I call you. And fix that dupatta! You look like a beggar."
I scrambled to my feet, my knees popping from being on the floor for so long. I grabbed my bucket and rushed into the tiny, dark kitchen, pressing my back against the cold wall.
I closed my eyes and listened.
The sound was unmistakable. Even over the rain, I heard the heavy, expensive crunch of tires on the gravel outside. Then, the slam of car doors. Solid. Final.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
The silence that followed was suffocating.
The front door didn't knock. It simply groaned open.
"Sir! Welcome!" That was my uncle's voice—high-pitched, shaking, pathetic. "Please, please come in. We are honored—"
"Enough."
The single word cut through the air like a blade. The voice was deep, smooth, and terrified me instantly. It wasn't a voice that asked for things; it was a voice that commanded them.
"I dislike theatrics, Mr. Ramesh," the voice continued. "And I detest waiting. You said the girl is ready?"
Girl?
I stopped breathing. My hands clutched the fabric of my worn kameez. Me?
"Yes, Sir! Of course!" Mami's voice was syrupy sweet now. "Katha! Come out here! Now!"
My legs felt like lead. I forced myself to move, stepping out of the shadows and into the dim light of the main room.
The first thing I noticed was how small our house suddenly felt.
He was standing in the center of the room, and he took up all the space. He was tall—impossibly tall—with broad shoulders clad in a suit that probably cost more than this entire building.
Dhruv Rathore.
He was younger than I expected. Maybe twenty-four or twenty-five. But his face... it held no youth. His jaw was sharp, his eyes dark and empty, like two abysses. He wasn't looking at my uncle. He wasn't looking at the cheap plastic flowers.
He was looking straight at me.
I froze. His gaze felt heavy, physical. It traveled from my messy hair, down my faded clothes, to my bare feet. It wasn't a look of lust. It was the look a butcher gives a piece of meat before deciding if it's worth the price.
"Chin up," he said.
I flinched. The command was soft but absolute. Slowly, terrified, I lifted my head.
"Name?"
"K-Katha," I whispered.
"Age?"
"Twenty-one."
He didn't blink. He just held out a hand to the side. A man in a suit instantly placed a file in it. Dhruv flipped it open, his eyes scanning a piece of paper.
"Anemic," he read aloud, his voice flat. "Malnourished. She looks like she will break if the wind blows too hard."
"Oh, Sir!" Mami jumped in, desperate. "She is strong! She does all the work! She just... eats less. You know how girls are."
Dhruv snapped the file shut. The sound echoed like a gunshot.
"The deal," he said, turning his back on me to face my uncle, "is simple. I need a wife. Tonight."
The world tilted on its axis. A wife?
"I don't need a partner," Dhruv continued coldly. "I need a prop. Someone with no voice, no connections, and no spine. An orphan is perfect. If she disappears inside my house, no one will come looking for her."
He looked back at me then. His lips curved into a cruel, mirthless smirk. "And she looks like she knows how to follow orders."
I wanted to scream. I wanted to run. But my feet were glued to the floor. He is buying me.
"The price," Dhruv said, pulling out a checkbook.
My uncle and aunt leaned forward, their eyes bulging. They looked like hungry dogs waiting for a bone.
Dhruv wrote something down. He tore the check out with a sharp rip.
"Five Crores."
A gasp filled the room. Five crores. It was a fortune. It was enough to buy a mansion, to leave this slum forever.
"But," Dhruv pulled the check back just as my uncle reached for it. "Once she leaves with me, she is dead to you. She never visits. You never call. As far as the world is concerned, Katha has no family."
My uncle didn't even look at me. He didn't hesitate for a single second.
"Done," Ramesh said, snatching the check. "Take her. She is paraya dhan anyway."
Whatever remained of my heart shattered right then. I knew they hated me. I knew I was a burden. But to be sold? To be erased for a piece of paper?
"Pack," Dhruv ordered, checking his watch. "You have five minutes."
"Go!" Mami shoved me. "Don't keep Sir waiting!"
I stumbled into my room. I didn't pack clothes. I didn't pack shoes. I grabbed the only thing that mattered—a small plastic bag with my mother's photo and her old broken comb.
I walked out of the room, my vision blurred by tears. Dhruv was already at the door. He didn't offer to carry my bag. He didn't offer a kind word.
"Let's go," he said.
I walked past my uncle and aunt. They were holding the check up to the light, laughing. They didn't even say goodbye.
I stepped out into the rain.
The cold water hit me instantly, soaking my clothes, but I didn't feel it. I felt numb. A bodyguard opened the door to a massive black car.
"Get in."
I climbed into the leather interior. It smelled of expensive leather and air conditioning. Dhruv slid in beside me. The door slammed shut, cutting off the noise of the rain, the slums, and my entire life.
Silence.
Dhruv pressed a button, and a black partition slid up, separating us from the driver. We were alone.
I pressed myself against the door, shivering violently. I was wet, cold, and terrified.
Dhruv opened a laptop. He started typing. He didn't look at me. He didn't offer me a towel. He acted as if I didn't exist.
"Three rules," he said suddenly.
I jumped.
"One," he said, his eyes on the screen. "You do not ask questions."
"Two. In public, you are the perfect wife. In private, we are strangers."
I gripped my dupatta, my teeth chattering. "A-And three?"
Dhruv stopped typing. He closed the laptop slowly.
He turned to face me. In the dim light of the car, his eyes looked like black holes. He leaned in close—so close I could feel the heat radiating off him.
"Three," he whispered, his voice dropping to a terrifying purr. "Do not fall in love with me, Katha. I have money. I have power. But a heart?"
He smirked, and it was the coldest thing I had ever seen.
"I don't have one."
He leaned back, closing his eyes.
"Welcome to hell, Mrs. Rathore."
The car sped forward into the darkness, taking me away from the demons I knew, and straight into the arms of the monster I didn't.