Aiden pulled his arm out of Ivy's grasping hands. The memory of her touch felt like a stain, a clammy residue of her calculated performance. "My grandfather does," he said, the words clipped and final, a door slamming shut on her theatrics. "And whether or not I like her is irrelevant. She's still my fiancée." The title felt foreign on his tongue, a label he'd never wanted but now carried a surprising, unwelcome weight. He had accepted the engagement to Aurora as a business transaction, a necessary move in the grand chessboard of corporate alliances his grandfather commanded. He had never bothered to look at the piece itself, only at the square it was meant to occupy.
Jain returned, his presence as quiet and efficient as the man himself. "Sir, I've sent the security footage to your phone." His voice was a low hum, devoid of judgment, a perfectly tuned instrument in the symphony of Aiden's life.
