chapter 14
flashback of 2 years back
“Until Preeti my best friend opened her doors.”
“She didn’t ask questions. Just gave me a blanket, some food, and a little space to breathe.”
My lips trembled into a bitter smile.
“But even then… life didn’t feel like living. I felt like a corpse just dragging itself day to day.”
---
“Then one day…
I got a call.
It was his mother.”
My jaw clenched just recalling the sound of her voice.
‘Come get your divorce papers. Stop dragging our name in dirt.’
I didn’t want to go. God knows I didn’t.
But something in me said finish it.
So I went.
---
And there they were.
His whole family.
Karan.
And of course—his mistress.
They were laughing. Dressed in designer clothes. Surrounded by powerful people.
Living lavishly in the very empire they built on my bones.
I ignored them. Headed straight to the table to collect the divorce papers.
But of course—fate wasn’t done humiliating me.
They didn’t just hand it over.
They laughed.
Mocked me.
Called me names
“Characterless… desperate… used…”
The room echoed with cruelty, and I stood there—alone—dignity slipping through my fingers.
“They had crossed all limits.”
The air in that room was thick with their laughter—every sound digging into my chest like knives.
And then something inside me snapped.
I didn’t think.
I just moved.
I marched straight up to Karan, grabbed his collar with both hands and yanked him forward.
The room fell silent.
Even the mistress's smirk froze.
“How dare you!”
My voice roared through the marble walls, shaking with fury.
“Did you call me here just to humiliate me again? Weren’t you done, huh?”
I shoved him slightly, fire in my eyes.
“After breaking me, shaming me, ruining my name—you still needed more?”
Karan looked stunned. Like he never expected me to speak again.
To fight again.
“You thought I’d stay quiet? That I’d walk in, take the papers, and leave like a ghost? Not this time, Karan.”
I turned to the rest of them—his parents, the mistress, the smirking strangers.
“Let me make one thing clear—you ruined a marriage, you created this mess, but you won't define me anymore.”
My voice lowered but cut sharper.
“Call me names all you want. I’ve already been to hell—and survived. There’s nothing left you can burn.”
“You bitch—”
That’s all he managed to say.
SMACK!
My hand flew across his face before he could finish the word.
The sound echoed like thunder in that suffocating room.
Gasps.
Stunned silence.
Even his mistress flinched.
“Not again!” I shouted, eyes blazing.
“Not this time, Karan. You don’t get to insult me and walk away smirking.”
He held his cheek, shocked—not by the slap, but by the fact that I, the woman he once silenced, had finally struck back.
I stepped closer, my voice sharp and unwavering.
“You called me a bitch? That’s rich—coming from a coward who hides behind his daddy’s money and his mistress’s perfume.”
I looked at his parents, then around the room.
“And all of you—laughing at me?”
“You think you're powerful because you humiliated a woman who already lost everything?”
“No. I didn't lose.”
“I survived.”
Of course, they weren’t done.
His male ego? Shattered. Bruised.
A slap from the wife he thought he had destroyed? That was too much for him to swallow.
But before he could react—
His mistress lunged.
She pushed me hard, venom in her eyes.
But I didn’t fall.
I stumbled—gracefully—like a queen adjusting her crown.
She sneered.
“You bitch! You have no class!”
That was it.
I smirked.
Without a word, I reached for the glass of red wine on the nearby table.
Turned to her with calm, elegant precision…
And poured it all over her face and dress.
Gasps erupted again—now louder.
Her designer dress soaked. Her face stained. Her pride in pieces.
“This…” I said coolly, stepping closer, my voice like silk-wrapped steel,
“This is my class. For your behavior.”
Before I could turn or react, Karan’s hand came crashing down hard across my cheek. The sting was sharp and sudden.
“Bitch, this is your place!” he spat, his voice venomous.
He kicked my legs, and I stumbled, falling hard onto the cold marble floor.
Before I could even gather myself to stand, he grabbed the wine glass from the table and threw it all over me—red liquid soaking my clothes, running down my arms.
The room erupted into cruel laughter.
Powerful men, his family, even his mistress—mocking the me they had just humiliated.
I lay there, burning with shame, anger, and pain.
Their laughter echoed.
The wine dripped down my face, staining my skin and clothes like blood from invisible wounds.
My cheek burned from the slap.
My knees throbbed from the fall.
But do you know what burned more?
My pride.
And that fire? It refused to die.
Slowly, I placed my palms on the cold marble floor.
My fingers curled. My breath steadied.
And I rose.
Not trembling.
Not defeated.
I rose like a woman possessed.
The room fell silent as I stood—shoulders straight, chin lifted, eyes ablaze.
Wine-soaked. Bruised. But unbreakable.
“You think this is my place?” I said, my voice cutting through the thick air.
“On the floor, beneath your foot, drenched in shame?”
I took a step closer to Karan, even as blood tasted in my mouth.
“No. That’s your illusion.”
“And I just shattered it.”
I turned to the others—the vultures in silk and suits.
“Laugh now. Because this is the last time you’ll ever see me down.”
“You hit me, humiliated me, mocked me but I’m still standing.”
“That makes me more powerful than every one of you combined.”
I pulled the wine-soaked dupatta off my shoulder, threw it on the floor, and walked out—bare, proud, and rising.
No shame. No regret. Just the sound of my heels echoing like a war drum.
Just as I reached the door…
THWACK!
A blinding pain exploded in the back of my skull.
“Ahh—!”
I stumbled forward, gasping as everything around me spun. My knees buckled again.
The world turned red. Then black. Then nothing.
They didn’t just want to humiliate me.
They wanted to silence me.
Somewhere in the haze, I heard muffled voices—
“What did you do, Karan?!”
“She provoked me!”
“Idiot! She’s bleeding!”