Days blurred into each other inside the mansion.
The world outside faded, as though it never existed. For Ananya, there was only one reality now: Rael. Her captor. Her husband. Her enemy.
And, to her own horror, her addiction.
---
At first, she watched him quietly.
Where he went. Who he called. How long he stayed out.
Rael noticed — he always noticed.
"You don't speak," he said one evening as they dined in silence. "But your eyes track me like a hawk."
"I want to know what kind of man I married," she replied coldly.
He smiled, sipping his wine. "A dangerous one."
"Good," she whispered. "So am I."
---
It started small — a call log she checked when he left his phone unattended. A search through his closet. Reading the back of business cards stuffed in his drawers. Notes scribbled on files.
She needed to know everything.
Who was he meeting? What was he hiding?
One night, he returned home smelling faintly of perfume that wasn't hers.
"Where were you?" she asked casually, seated on the couch like a queen waiting to interrogate her court.
"Dinner with an investor."
"A woman?"
His brow arched. "Jealous, Mrs. Valtor?"
Her smile was sharp. "No. Possessive. There's a difference."
He took a step closer. "I don't belong to anyone."
"Wrong," she said. "You're mine. Just like you said I was yours."
The tension cracked like glass. He pulled her up roughly by the arm, their faces inches apart.
"You think you can control me now?" he growled.
"I don't think," she said. "I know."
Her lips crushed into his before he could argue.
---
After that night, something shifted.
She followed him to the office. Demanded updates. Sat in on meetings, uninvited. Questioned every unfamiliar female name. Threatened staff who looked at him too long.
Rael was shocked. Amused. Then slowly… aroused.
He liked her this way — sharp, jealous, dangerous.
But what he didn't realize was: she was building a mirror.
Becoming the very monster he'd tried to mold her into.
And she was beginning to like it.
---