Chapter 2

I could barely move. My heart was pounding so hard it echoed in my ears. My fingers felt numb. My breath came in quick, shallow gasps that hurt my ribs.

And then the door creaked wider.

Zayne stepped out. His sharp eyes immediately locked on mine. His expression shifted so fast it almost made my head spin—surprise, panic, then that calm, cold mask he always wore when he needed to lie.

I stood there frozen, my hands empty, the tray of food at my feet, the spilled rice and sauce staining the floor. My knees threatened to buckle. I could barely hold myself upright.

"Amira," he said smoothly, the same gentle tone he always used when he was covering something up. "What are you doing here?"

I swallowed hard. My throat burned. My chest ached. I forced my lips into a small, shaky smile. "I… I brought you dinner," I whispered, my voice barely audible. "You were working late, so I thought—"

"That's sweet," he cut me off gently, stepping forward, blocking the door with his body, his hands stuffed casually into his pockets. But his eyes—they were sharp. Watching. Calculating. "But you shouldn't have. I told you I had a lot to handle tonight."

I hesitated, heart still racing. "I—I just wanted to help." I shifted, pretending to glance past him. "Can I just put it inside?"

His hand shot out, grabbing my wrist. Not hard. But firm enough.

"No need," he said, voice tight, too tight. "I’ll take care of it later."

I looked at his face. His eyes were cold. Guarded. And suddenly, everything felt wrong. I blinked back the tears stinging my eyes. I let out a shaky breath. "Zayne… is everything okay?" I asked softly, my voice trembling despite my efforts to sound normal.

He softened his expression, giving me that familiar gentle smile. The one he always used to hide the truth. "Of course. Just tired, baby. Go home, okay? Get some rest."

I nodded slowly. "Okay," I whispered. My hands were still shaking. My heart still pounded painfully in my chest.

But I forced myself to turn around. Forced my legs to move. "Goodnight," I murmured, my voice barely there.I heard him sigh behind me.

He pressed a kiss to my forehead. It was soft but empty, cold in a way that made my skin crawl.

“Goodnight, Amira,” he murmured.

A faint wave of nausea rose in my throat. I forced myself not to flinch, not to pull away. The air between us felt heavy, poisoned. His touch used to make my heart race, but now it only made my stomach twist.I walked away. Each step felt heavier than the last. My mind was spinning so fast it made me dizzy. My stomach twisted with nausea. My whole body trembled.

I barely made it to the car. I sat there, gripping the steering wheel so tightly my knuckles turned white. My breath came in shaky bursts as hot tears streamed down my face.

I remembered everything.

The past crashed over me like a tidal wave.

I was twenty-one. I had one dream—to be a ballet dancer. I had trained my whole life. The audition was days away. I was happy. In love. Engaged to Zayne, who always told me I was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen when I danced.

And then it happened.

I was walking home from the studio. It was raining. The streets were empty. I never even saw them coming.

I was grabbed. A cloth pressed to my mouth. Darkness.

When I woke up, I was in a freezing, dark room. My hands were tied. My legs—oh God—my legs were broken. The pain was so blinding I couldn’t even scream. I was left there. Alone. Bleeding. Begging.

I thought I would die there.

When they found me, I was half-dead. Bones shattered. My body ruined. My dreams destroyed.

It comes back to me sometimes—like a film that won’t stop playing.

The sound came first. A scream of metal. Tires screeching. Then the crash. My body hit the ground before I even knew what had happened.

And then came the pain.

A sharp crack tore through my legs. It was loud—so loud I thought the world had split open. The sound echoed inside my head. Then came the heat. White-hot, burning, blinding. It crawled up my legs, burst through my spine, tore its way out of my throat as I screamed.

I screamed until my voice gave out. Until my breath caught and all that came out were dry, broken sobs.

The road was cold under me, rough and wet. I tried to move, but my body didn’t obey. My legs—God—my legs were twisted at angles no human body should ever bend. My skin was slick with blood. The pain pulsed with every heartbeat, so fierce it blurred my vision.

But worse than the pain was the terror.

Because even through the haze, I knew. I knew what it meant.

My legs. My career. My dancing.

Gone.

Just like that.

The life I’d built from the time I was five, the stage lights, the applause, the feeling of flight—all gone in one single, shattering moment.

I clawed at the ground, trying to crawl, trying to drag myself toward the faint glow of headlights in the distance. But my body wouldn’t move. My legs were dead weight. I could feel the bone grinding when I tried to shift, the pain exploding again, so sharp I thought I’d go blind.

I remember sobbing, begging the air, begging the night to give me one more chance. I would have given anything just to stand again, just to dance one last time. But the world didn’t listen. The world never listens when you beg.

Then everything started fading.

The cold crept in slowly. My body trembled, but I couldn’t stop it. My fingers went numb. My breath came out in short, shallow gasps. The pain was still there, but it began to sound far away, like it belonged to someone else.

I remember thinking, this is it.

This is how everything ends.

The dance. The stage. The dreams. All of it slipping through my blood-stained fingers.

Then—blackness.

When I woke up, it was to the harsh glare of hospital lights. The air smelled of antiseptic and metal. Machines beeped somewhere near my ear. My mouth was dry. My body felt heavy, strange, foreign.

I looked down. My legs were wrapped in white casts, pinned and still.

For one wild second, I thought I was still dreaming. Then I tried to move my toes—and felt nothing.

That’s when it hit me,the nightmare wasn’t over. It had just begun.

I spent months in the hospital. Surgery after surgery. My parents drained everything they had to pay for doctors from all over the world. I couldn’t walk. I couldn’t dance. I couldn’t breathe without pain.

At first, they didn’t tell me the truth.

They smiled when they came into my room, holding flowers and takeout meals, pretending everything would be fine. My mother would sit by my bed and stroke my hair, her eyes red but her smile steady. My father would pat my hand and say, “The doctors said you’ll dance again, sweetheart. It just takes time.”

I believed them. I needed to.

So I pushed through it—the pain, the needles, the endless therapy sessions that felt like torture. I cried, screamed, but I kept trying. I told myself every stretch, every burn, every tear was one step closer to the stage again. I pictured myself back in the spotlight, spinning across the floor, the audience on their feet. I whispered it like a prayer. You’ll dance again. You’ll dance again.

But hope can only blind you for so long.

One afternoon, everything cracked.

The room was quiet. I was sitting in bed, staring at the gray light on the wall, when I heard voices outside my door. Two nurses. A man’s voice I didn’t know. They spoke softly, but the words slid right through the crack and into me.

“That girl in there,” one of them said. “The dancer. Her legs will never fully recover. She’ll walk, but dance? Never. Poor thing.”

The world stopped.

My heartbeat slowed, then vanished completely, replaced by a sharp ringing in my ears. My hands went cold. For a long moment, I just sat there, staring at nothing, the words echoing over and over inside my head.

Never.

I would walk, but I would never dance again.

I don’t remember crying at first. I remember silence—the kind that pressed down on me until I couldn’t breathe. Then I remember laughing, a soft, broken sound, because it felt unreal. Because if I didn’t laugh, I’d shatter completely.

That night, my parents came in smiling again, telling me how the new doctor had “a wonderful plan.” I nodded and pretended to listen, but I didn’t hear a word. Something inside me had already gone quiet.

After that, I stopped trying.

The nurses came with food, and I turned my face away. The therapists came to stretch my legs, and I stared at the wall. I stopped talking, stopped smiling, stopped hoping.

The room became smaller every day. The walls seemed closer, tighter. The sunlight that once gave me comfort now hurt my eyes.

When they told me to lift my leg, I didn’t move. When they begged me to try, I just lay there.

What was the point?

The body I’d trusted, the body that had carried me through every leap, every turn, every standing ovation—it was gone. It belonged to pain now. To medicine. To pity.

My future wasn’t waiting for me anymore. It was buried somewhere in that crash.

Each day, I felt myself sinking a little deeper. Hope drained out of me, slow and steady, like blood from a wound that wouldn’t close. Until there was nothing left—no light, no fight, no dream.

Only the quiet hum of hospital machines and the hollow sound of my own breathing.

But Zayne… Zayne was there.

He never left my side. He held me when I cried, kissed my forehead, whispered that they caught the woman who did this. That she was in prison. That I was safe now.

And I believed him.

Because Zayne didn’t just promise to make things right—he made it look real. He flew in specialists from all over the world. Orthopedic surgeons from Switzerland, physical therapists from Japan, experimental treatment teams from the U.S. He made calls at all hours, pulled strings, moved mountains.

He was tireless. Always at my bedside, dark circles under his eyes, phone pressed to his ear as he argued with hospitals and arranged flights.

Everyone whispered about him—the devoted husband who would do anything for his broken wife.

And I believed every word.

At night, when the world went quiet, he’d hold my hand and whisper, “Rest, Amira. I’ll fix this. I’ll fix everything.”

I didn’t know then he wasn’t fixing it for me.

He was fixing it for her.

I believed him, so I married him. I thought I was safe. But it was all a lie.

The memory made me gag. I pressed my forehead against the steering wheel, sobbing quietly. My whole world felt like it was collapsing in slow motion.

I wiped my tears roughly. I needed proof. I needed to see it with my own eyes.

I drove home on autopilot. My hands were still shaking when I unlocked the front door. The house was silent. My breathing was loud in my ears.

I went straight to his study.

I searched everything. Drawers. Files. Cabinets. My fingers trembled with every paper I touched. My breath came sharp and fast.

And then I found it.

Tucked under a pile of old receipts.

A photograph.

I pulled it out with trembling fingers. My eyes burned as I stared at it.

It was Sasha.

Smiling. Happy. Her hair gleamed in the sunlight. She was standing on what looked like a beach. The date was right there in the corner.

Recent.

My legs gave out. I dropped to my knees, clutching the photo so hard it crumpled at the edges.

She was never in jail.

The entire thing—every tear Zayne shed, every word of comfort, every kiss, every promise—was all built on this lie.