INVOLVED
Few days later…
It’s been a few days since all the chaos happened.
Her brother didn’t leave her side even for an hour. He stayed in the hospital like a guard dog, watching every nurse, every doctor, every machine that beeped near her bed. When she was finally discharged, he asked her to come with him to their home.
For a moment… I actually felt relief.
If she went with him, my life would return to peace. Silence. Freedom.
But no.
Of course not.
She refused.
And now she was sitting right in front of me.
On my bed.
Drinking the apple juice her brother bought for her like a queen who had just returned from war.
He had left just a few minutes ago, but before leaving he had practically turned the room into a grocery store. Snacks, fruits, juices, biscuits, dry fruits… everything was piled on the table like he was preparing her for a six-month survival mission.
I leaned against the wall, staring at the scene in front of me with pure disbelief.
She was sitting cross-legged on my bed, her injured shoulder wrapped in a bandage, casually sipping juice with a straw.
Like she hadn’t been shot a few days ago.
Like she didn’t just destroy my life.
She noticed me staring and raised an eyebrow.
“What?”
“That’s my bed,” I said flatly.
She looked down at the mattress slowly… then looked back at me.
“And?”
“And you’re sitting on it.”
“Yes,” she replied calmly, taking another sip of the juice.
I rubbed my forehead.
She ignored me completely and grabbed a packet of chips from the pile her brother had left.
I stared at the mountain of food again.
“Did your brother think you’re a squirrel preparing for winter?”
She opened the packet and started eating calmly.
“He thinks I will starve here.”
I looked at the pile again.
Then at her.
Then at my empty kitchen.
She smirked slightly.
“Relax,” she said lazily. “I might share.”
I folded my arms and stared at her.
I looked at the time. It was almost dinner.
For a moment I stood there doing nothing… then I walked into the kitchen.
I served food onto a plate slowly, the sound of the spoon hitting the steel plate echoing in the quiet room. Every movement felt strange. Wrong.
It felt awful that I was doing this for her.
Shit.
If someone had told me a few weeks ago that I would be serving dinner for her, I would have laughed straight in their face.
Yet here I was.
I carried the plate back and stretched it toward her.
Then I sat on the chair beside the bed and opened my phone, pretending to scroll through it like I had something very important to look at.
She blinked at the plate.
Only then it hit me again.
She had been shot in her right shoulder.
She couldn’t move that arm.
For the last four days her brother had been feeding her like she was a child.
But now…
Now it was just the two of us.
I swallowed the strange feeling rising in my chest and kept my eyes fixed on my phone.
She slowly reached for the food.
The moment she tried to move her right arm, her face tightened in pain.
She winced.
Her fingers trembled and fell back weakly.
She tried again.
Another sharp wince escaped her lips.
I clenched my jaw but kept staring at my phone screen even though I wasn’t reading a single word.
She could eat snacks with her left hand. Chips. Biscuits. Things that didn’t need effort.
But this… rice and curry… it wasn’t that easy.
She tried again.
And again her face twisted with pain.
Something inside my chest tightened.
“Eat with your left hand,” I muttered quietly.
She looked at me strangely.
I immediately looked away, pretending to be interested in my phone again.
For a few seconds there was only silence in the room.
Then I heard the spoon fall softly back onto the plate.
She didn’t try again.
I don’t know why… but that sound made my chest feel heavier than before.
I sighed and stood up. I put the phone down and took the plate in my hand. Without looking at her, I picked up the spoon and wiped it clean with the edge of the plate. I scooped a small portion of rice and moved it slowly toward her mouth.
Not once did I look at her face.
But I could feel her gaze on me.
Heavy. Silent. Confused.
“Open your mouth,” I muttered, my voice flat, like I was forcing the words out of my throat.
She didn’t move for a second.
I tightened my grip on the spoon. “Don’t make this dramatic. Just eat.”
Finally, she opened her mouth slightly and took the food.
I immediately pulled the spoon back and scooped another bite, still refusing to look at her. The room was quiet except for the soft clink of the spoon against the plate.
Every time I brought the spoon near her lips, I could feel her eyes still on me like she was trying to read something from my face.
It was irritating.
Uncomfortable.
I frowned slightly. “If you keep staring at me like that, the food will get cold.”
She still didn’t say anything.
I finally glanced up for a split second.
Her eyes looked… different. Not sharp like usual. Not arrogant.
Just quiet.
Almost like she didn’t know what to do with this version of me.
I immediately looked away again and shoved another spoonful toward her mouth.
“Don’t misunderstand,” I said coldly. “I’m not doing this because I care.”
“Unlike you, I am a human. And I used to feed my patients in hospitals,” I muttered.
She remained silent.
I suddenly felt like I was speaking too much to her. I should stop. I am actually very talkative… just selectively extroverted. With the wrong people I become quiet. With the right ones I don’t shut up.
I gave her another spoon of food.
Suddenly William’s words from that day flashed through my mind.
You turned the whole hospital case on me, saving your brother…
My hand slowed.
Viyana had shouted that William tried to put all the blame on her brother. If that was true… then she wasn’t involved in that corruption.
I swallowed slowly.
That day in the hospital corridor I overheard the conversation between our manager and Vihaan. That was when I found out about the cheap medicines… the expired batches… the profits…
Seven people died because of it.
Seven.
I thought it was their fault. Her brother’s fault. Her fault.
That was the reason I decided to expose them.
The spoon hovered in the air before I brought it back to her mouth. She ate quietly.
My chest felt strangely heavy.
“Viyana,” I called.
Calling her by her name felt unfamiliar on my tongue, like I was using someone else’s voice.
I cleared my throat. “You didn’t have connections with that?”
“With that?” she asked quietly.
“The medicines… the corruption in the hospital. The expired drugs. The people who died.”
She didn’t eat the next spoon I held out.
Her eyes slowly lifted to mine.
“That’s none of your business,” she said.
I closed my eyes in irritation. Of course. I should have expected that answer.
But after a few seconds she spoke again, her voice quieter.
“No. I was not involved.”
I opened my eyes and looked at her.
“Actually… I didn’t even know these practices were happening in our hospital until you showed up.”
My hand froze midway with the spoon.
She continued, staring at the plate instead of me.
“William is my brother’s best friend. We trusted him. Completely.”
Her lips twitched bitterly.
“But he hid everything. The fake invoices. The expired medicines. The profits he was making from it.”
I slowly lowered the spoon.
“My brother only found out after people started dying.”
The room fell silent for a moment.
The sound of the ceiling fan filled the air between us.
Seven people.
Seven lives.
And all this time I thought they were the monsters behind it.
I gave her another spoon of food without saying anything.
She ate quietly.
“But you still threatened me,” I said after a moment, my voice flat. “You threatened my family to keep me quiet.”
She didn’t answer immediately.
Her eyes lifted slowly and met mine.
“Yes.”
No hesitation. No denial.
Just that one word.
Something inside me tightened.
“Why?” I asked.
Her gaze didn’t waver.
“Because if you had spoken that day,” she said softly, “my brother would have gone to prison before we even got the chance to prove William was the real culprit.”
I frowned.
“What?”
“The evidence wasn’t complete back then,” she continued. “Everything pointed to my brother. Every document. Every transaction. Every signature.”
Her voice turned colder.
“William planned it perfectly.”
I stared at her.
“So you decided to threaten me instead?”
“Yes.”
The answer came again without hesitation.
Anger rose inside my chest.
“Do you even realize how insane that sounds?” I snapped. “You threatened to kill my family.”
“I know.”
Her voice dropped.
“And I would have done it too… if it meant saving my brother.”
The spoon slipped from my fingers and fell back into the plate with a soft clink.
“My brother is a single father. If he goes to prison then my niece, Zara, would have suffered,” she said so casually.
Something inside me snapped.
“But what about me?” I asked, my voice rising before I could stop it. “I have a family too.”
She looked at me quietly.
“Just like how you love your brother and your niece… I love my family,” I continued. “My sister. My father. My mother. My grandparents.”
My grip tightened around the spoon.
“You threatened to kill them,” I said slowly, each word heavier than the last. “And you think it’s okay to do that?”
Silence filled the room.
“Are you insane?” I asked, my voice shaking now. “Do you think we are some puppets you can control whenever you want?”
She didn’t answer.
Her eyes lowered to the plate in her lap.
For the first time since I met her… she had no words.
The anger inside me kept boiling.
“Because of you,” I continued, my voice rough, “I am losing myself.”
Her fingers tightened slightly around the edge of the plate.
“They think I married you for your money,” I said bitterly. “They think I’m some greedy, shameless man who sold his dignity.”
I laughed quietly, but there was no humor in it.
“At least they believe I’m a bad person now,” I muttered. “At least they don’t know their son married someone because his family’s lives were at stake.”
The words left my mouth before I could stop them.
The room went still.
Her eyes slowly lifted to look at me again.
There was something unfamiliar in them now.
Not anger.
Not arrogance.
Something heavier.
“What could you have done if I protested against you even after you threatened me?” I asked, my voice tight. “You might have killed my family, right?”
The words tasted bitter in my mouth.
“Yes, you would have—”
“No.”
She said it suddenly.
The word cut through my sentence so sharply that I stopped mid-breath.
I slowly lifted my eyes and looked at her.
She was already looking at me.
Serious. Calm. Not mocking. Not arrogant.
Just… certain.
“No,” she repeated quietly.
I frowned. “Don’t lie.”
“I’m not lying.”
“Then what?” I asked, irritation creeping back into my voice. “You threatened me for fun?”
She didn’t answer immediately.
Her gaze drifted away from me for a moment, as if she was replaying something in her head.
“I needed you to stay silent,” she said at last. “That was the only thing that mattered that day.”
“And threatening my family was your brilliant solution?” I scoffed.
“Yes.”
The honesty in her voice made my jaw tighten.
“But killing them?” she continued, shaking her head faintly. “No.”
I stared at her.
“If you had gone to the police,” she said calmly, “I would have destroyed you.”
My eyebrows furrowed.
“Your career, your reputation, your life. I would have made sure no hospital ever hired you again. I would have buried the case under money and influence until no one believed you.”
Her eyes returned to mine.
“But killing your family?” she repeated quietly. “That was never going to happen.”
I let out a small laugh.
“Wow,” I muttered. “How comforting.”
She ignored the sarcasm.
“I threatened you because fear works faster than explanations,” she said.
My fingers tightened around the spoon again.
“So congratulations,” I said bitterly. “Your strategy worked perfectly.”
She didn’t respond.
The room fell silent again.
I shoved the plate into her hand and left the room immediately.
My throat felt dry and my eyes burned as if the tears were waiting for permission to fall.
My life had turned into something I could barely recognize.
I walked straight to the kitchen, grabbed a glass and filled it with water. My hands were shaking slightly as I lifted it to my lips and gulped it down. The water slid down my throat but did nothing to ease the tightness in my chest.
I placed the glass on the counter and leaned both my palms on the slab, lowering my head.
For a moment I just stood there, breathing.
Slowly.
Heavily.
The house was quiet. Too quiet.