December 2019: Bengaluru

"No... stop..."

Those broken words were all her ocean-blue eyes managed to plead, their damp sheen the only voice left to her parched throat.

She had been running for hours-or what felt like hours-legs burning, lungs screaming, until fate trapped her in a dead-end alley. A towering wall rose ahead, the narrow brick flanks mocking her desperation. Every breath rasped in and out, shallow and frantic, while her trembling frame betrayed her last strands of strength.

And then, he stepped out of the shadows.

"You know I can't," he murmured, his obsidian eyes fixed on her, glinting with a predator's amusement. Not a bead of sweat touched his forehead, not a single breath quickened. He had chased her through the night and yet looked as though he hadn't moved at all. He wasn't human-he couldn't be. He was the devil incarnate.

Tears welled hotly in her eyes, burning with fury and hatred, but even that couldn't disguise her fear. She knew she was caught. Still, she refused to yield. Her gaze hurled curses, her tears spat venom. She fought with the only weapons left to her.

Please... anything... save me from this devil, her mind begged, though she knew Heaven never answered when it came to him. God seemed to look away, or perhaps even God feared him. The alley was lifeless, silent-no dogs, no passersby, no witnesses. Only his darkness, wrapping the night in suffocating silence.

Her resolve ignited. She screamed.

"Help!"

Her raw throat scraped with every cry, but she screamed again, defiant. His smirk deepened. Amused, he closed the distance between them, each step deliberate, confident, inevitable.

Her heart hammered. Panic clawed her lungs. She stumbled backward until her spine struck the cold, merciless wall. Before she could dart sideways, his arms caged her in-hands braced on either side, body closing in like an executioner's shadow. She pressed trembling palms against his chest, desperate to keep him from touching her. That resistance only thrilled him more.

He leaned down, lips brushing her ear, voice a husky whisper of menace.

"You can run as far as you like, but you'll never escape me. I'll always find you. You were born to be mine."

A shiver of dread bolted down her spine as his lips grazed her earlobe.

"Never, you monster!" she spat, her voice cutting like steel despite the tremor in her body. Her eyes blazed with hatred, wishing herself anywhere but trapped under the weight of his desire. She shoved at him as though his touch burned her like acid.

"We'll see, sweetheart," he muttered darkly.

His grip clamped like iron around her delicate wrist, crushing her resistance. With ruthless ease, he dragged her toward his car-black as midnight, black as his hair, black as his soul. The sight of it filled her with fresh terror.

"No! Leave me, brute! Don't touch me!" she shrieked, thrashing, fighting against the doom she knew awaited her.

He didn't spare her a glance. Pressing her against the car door, his body pinned her fragile frame. His face descended, lips hovering a breath away-

Thunder cracked across the sky.

She jolted awake.

"No!"

Sweat clung to her skin as her chest heaved, as though she had just relived it. Same dream. Same nightmare. The same hunt that had once been real. A night carved into her soul forever.

Her gaze shifted left. Her four-year-old son lay curled beside her, sleeping peacefully, lips curved in an innocent smile. The sight alone anchored her. He was the reason she still breathed, the only reason she endured.

Thanking God that her scream hadn't woken him, she slipped quietly into the living room of their cramped one-bedroom flat. She dragged a plastic chair to the window, flung the shutters open, and drank in the night air as if it could cleanse the suffocation inside her chest.

Silent tears slid down her cheeks, mingling with the rain outside.

Four years had passed, and still the memories cut sharp as glass. His face. His touch. His cruelty. Would she ever be free? Would peace ever find her?

She sat there, weeping quietly until the skies themselves grew tired of crying. Only when dawn painted the horizon did she stop, staring at the sunrise with weary, hollow eyes,

wondering what new struggles awaited her today.

___