PROLOGUE

VIKRAM'S POV

I never loved my wife.

At least… that’s what I told myself.

When my father forced me to marry Smriti, I looked at her the same way businessmen look at contracts — necessary, temporary, emotionless.

“She’s a good girl,” my father had said. “From a respectable family.”

Respectable.

Simple.

Middle-class.

In my mind, that translated to one thing.

Gold digger.

I thought she married me for my surname.

For my money.

For the Raichand empire.

I didn’t see the way her hands trembled during the wedding rituals.

I didn’t see the innocence in her eyes when she entered my house for the first time.

I only saw inconvenience.

Because I loved someone else.

Maya.

Wild. Modern. Confident.

The woman I chose.

Not the one chosen for me.

I resented Smriti from the very first night.

She tried to talk.

I ignored her.

She tried to cook.

I criticized her.

She tried to understand me.

I punished her.

Every day.

Not always with hands.

Sometimes with silence.

Sometimes with words sharper than knives.

Sometimes with doubt.

Sometimes with humiliation.

I made her feel small in her own marriage.

And she never left.

That angered me more.

Why wouldn’t she fight back?

Why wouldn’t she scream?

Why would she just stand there with tears in her eyes and still call me “Vikram ji”?

I convinced myself she was pretending.

Acting innocent.

Waiting for my father’s property.

Maya fed that belief.

“She’s trapping you,” Maya would whisper.

“She wants your wealth.”

And I believed her.

I chose Maya over my wife.

Over my father.

Over my own conscience.

I destroyed Smriti piece by piece.

And the worst part?

I felt powerful doing it.

Until the day I realized…

She was never after my money.

She was after my love.

And I had none left to give.

By the time I understood her silence…

It was too late.

By the time I saw her innocence…

It was too late.

By the time I loved her…

It was too late.

This is not a love story.

This is a confession.

Because I loved her.

I just loved her too late.