Aayna’s POV
The hospital walls were suffocating.
Sterile. White. Empty.
Just like I felt.
Rudra had left the room. I’d made sure of it. Told the nurse I needed space. Told her I couldn’t breathe with him near me.
It wasn’t a lie.
Every time he entered the room, my chest tightened. Not because of love. Not because of guilt. But because somewhere in me, a scream still lived.
And I didn’t know how to quiet it.
I stared at the IV in my hand. The bandages on my wrist. The slow beeping of the machines beside me. They all felt louder than the silence I’d lived in for weeks.
I’d written a letter.
I’d meant every word.
"I can’t carry this anymore."
"I hate this child I never asked for."
"I want to go somewhere where it doesn’t hurt."
But I was still here.
Alive.
Trapped in a body I didn’t ask to survive in.
And worst of all—he was still part of my story.
Rudra Pratap Rathore.
The man I’d once called "sir" with a nervous smile. The man who watched me too closely, spoke too coldly, hated too loudly. The man whose words could crush, whose silence could freeze, whose presence could suffocate.
And now?
Now he said he loved me?
I let out a bitter laugh.
Was that supposed to fix everything?
Because no matter what he felt…
I still hated him.
Not for loving me too late.
But for turning me into someone who couldn’t love herself at all.
---
The door creaked open again.
I didn’t have to look. I knew it was him. The weight in the air shifted. That quiet tension only he brought with him.
“You shouldn’t be here,” I said flatly, without turning.
“I know.”
Silence.
I could hear him standing there. Still. Breathing shallowly like he was afraid to break me with sound alone.
“I’m not here to beg for forgiveness,” he said. “Or to pretend that anything I say can erase what happened.”
“Good,” I snapped. “Because it can’t.”
He nodded, even though I wasn’t looking.
“I just needed to say… I’m sorry you ever felt alone. Even in my house. Especially there.”
My throat tightened.
“I wasn't alone,” I said quietly. “I was invisible. That’s worse.”
He stayed quiet. For once.
I turned to face him. Slowly. Carefully. My body still felt foreign to me. My soul, even more so.
Our eyes met.
And for the first time… I didn’t flinch.
“You hurt me in ways you don’t even understand,” I said, voice low but sharp. “Not just with your silence. But with your stares. Your judgment. Your games. You made me feel like nothing. Over and over.”
His eyes filled with something like shame. But I didn’t want his sadness. I didn’t want his guilt.
I wanted my power back.
“So whatever you feel now—love, guilt, regret—it’s yours to carry. Not mine.”
He nodded again. Slower this time. Like he understood.
Maybe he did.
Maybe he didn’t.
But it didn’t matter.
Because I wasn’t his problem to fix anymore.
I was mine.
---
YOU ARE READING
Only His✔️
RomanceI thought monsters lived in nightmares. Then I met him. Rudra is powerful, feared, and impossible to defy. When he took me into his mansion, I thought it was to save me. I was wrong. His kindness hides chains. His touch burns like fire and freezes l...
