𝖉𝖎𝖘𝖎𝖑𝖑𝖚𝖘𝖎𝖔𝖓 | ✓

𝔱𝔴𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔶 𝔫𝔦𝔫𝔢

I installed the fear of claustrophobia and nyctophobia in her.

Shivaay stared at the man in front of him.

Had Gauri not been digging her nails into his arm, he would've rushed forth and strangled that man, screaming at him like there was no tomorrow.

"You——" Shivaay halted, closing his bloodshot eyes and breathing in deeply.

"What do you mean you installed her fears?" Gauri glared at Atharv.

The older man shrugged. "I mean that I installed that fear."

"What did you do?" Shivaay grit out.

"I did what I had to do." Atharv grinned.

"You had to torture my sister?!" Gauri asked in disbelief. "It was you!" Her eyes widened as she whispered. "You were the one who took me away that day to play near the lake after hours. You pushed me in there."

Atharv chuckled, "Ah, I see your memories are coming back."

"You tried to kill me," she trembled.

"No," Atharv clicked his tongue. "I had to show Annika that you were gone for good so she would stop searching about Kalyani Mills." He turned to look at Shivaay, "Your wife was a sharp one, even as a child. She suspected fishy events connecting to her parents' deaths."

"And my family sent you to keep her traumatised," Shivaay closed his eyes in disgust.

"Well, they wanted me to keep her quiet and if needed, dead," Atharv's words made Shivaay sick. He couldn't believe just how low his family could stoop for wealth and power. "I did it in the kindest way possible."

"Kindest?" Shivaay asked bitterly. "She still suffers from it to this day. It's beyond my ability to help her," he whispered, leaning against the wall.

"My mercy is what saved her, Shivaay Singh Oberoi," he mocked.

"Mercy?!" Gauri rushed forward and pushed him back. "You separated her from her only family! She was a child!"

"Oh please," Atharv pushed her back lightly. "It was either me installing a certain type of trauma, or someone else doing exactly what Daksh Khurana had intended to do with your sister."

"S-S-S-She," Gauri placed a hand on her abdomen and put pressure on it, as she felt her throat clogging up. "Y-Y-You."

"I didn't do it," Atharv rolled his eyes. "Geez Chutki, I'm not that evil."

"No, you're a saint," Shivaay remarked sarcastically.

"I did what I had to do," Atharv said shortly. "And I have no regrets. We can rehash the past, or you can do what you came here to do and save your pyaari wife."

Shivaay and Gauri exchanged glances. "Why would we trust you?" Gauri arched an eyebrow.

"Because you have no other option," Atharv grinned wickedly.

<>•<>

Shivaay rushed forward, sighing in relief as he watched Bhavya's team arrest the senior Oberois as well as Sameer Raichand. His relief dissolved in a second as he spotted his wife's swaying figure.