"Last week we hauled in an ex-boyfriend camped outside some girl's door, wouldn't leave her alone."
"Day later, she shows up at the station to drop the charges. Files a complaint against *us*—excessive force, hurt her fiancé."
"Yours is trickier. You've got a family elder here. Best case, this is a domestic dispute, and all we can really do is talk it through."
My aunt gave me a triumphant shove.
"Hear that? The police themselves say you're blowing this out of proportion! Bow your head and apologize before you dig yourself in deeper."
The edges of my vision went black.
I looked up. The two security guards were leering at me, pointing and muttering between themselves.
I swung toward the officers and pointed straight at the guards.
"Fine. Then I'm filing a report. Someone tampered with my property registration records to take my home."
"That's not a family dispute."
Both officers' expressions sharpened.
Sebastian, his mother, and the two guards all went pale at the same time.
The officer's face was grim. "That's a criminal matter. We'll need everyone to come back to the station for questioning."
Some of the pressure in my chest loosened. I was about to exhale when my aunt grabbed me and yanked me behind her.
"Officers, don't listen to her nonsense. I'm the one who had the property office update the records. It's not that serious."
"Women get married and have babies—that's how it works! What kind of girl sits on a property like she's never giving it up?"
"You tell me—every family out there, isn't it the man who runs the house?"
She turned and glared at me. "Even if you won't transfer the title right now, this place will end up being Sebastian's sooner or later. I had his name added. What's the problem?"
Every word out of her mouth left me more stunned than the last. None of it made sense—none of it was supposed to make sense.
She read my shock as surrender and rolled her eyes.
"And you keep saying you've only met him once. I can't even be bothered to call you out on that!"
"The security footage is crystal clear. Sebastian's been staying the night here every few days."
"I was trying to save you some face. If you don't want it, don't blame me."
"You're lying!"
My own voice came out so shrill it hurt my ears.
"I've always lived here alone! When did I ever let him through my door?"
One of the guards stepped forward at my aunt's signal, holding up his phone.
On the screen: a man keying the code into my front door. The door opened. A girl came out of the apartment and threw herself into his arms, and the two of them kissed as the door swung shut.
"Nothing to say now, is there? He comes by every few days. Even the building security knows him."
"And you said you'd only met him once!"
"Ava, don't make me say this as your aunt—an unmarried girl who's let her reputation rot this badly."
"I haven't even blamed you for disgracing the Bennett name, and here you are turning it around on us!"
My aunt's voice dissolved into noise.
I stared at the grainy footage on the guard's phone, cold crawling down my spine, vertebra by vertebra.
How was this possible?
He'd been walking in and out of my home—and I never knew.
And the woman clinging to him. Who was she?
"This video is fake! That's not me!"
"You made it with AI!"
Sebastian looked at me, bored. "Enough. Things have gone this far. Can you just stop lying?"
"I never wanted to show these. You're the one who had to push it this far."
He swiped open his phone gallery, and a spread of obscene photos jumped off the screen.
The face on that screen, eyes unfocused and glassy, was unmistakably mine.
Like someone had blown a whistle, the people around me pounced all at once, voices crashing over each other.
"A worn-out piece of trash like you—my son's willing to marry you and you should be thanking your lucky stars!"
"I've worked this building three years. Seen plenty of women like her."
"Oh, she puts on a real good show during the day, but past midnight those delivery boys just keep heading upstairs, one after another. You think they're bringing food?"
"I always wondered how a girl that young could buy a place here. Now it makes sense—she laid her way to every last penny."
"Couple weeks back, she came downstairs in a little spaghetti-strap dress to pick up a delivery and smiled right at me. You tell me that's not flirting. I knew right then she wasn't the decent type."
Sebastian's lips curled into a smug grin. "Well, the evidence speaks for itself. Nothing left to discuss."
"Ava, filial piety comes first. Start by kneeling and apologizing to my mother."
"Then wire me eight hundred thousand as a dowry and two hundred thousand for emotional damages. Maybe then I'll still consider making you my wife."
"Oh—and make sure you get yourself checked out, head to toe, down there. Who knows what kind of filthy diseases you've been picking up."
Cold seeped through my entire body. My fingertips wouldn't stop shaking.
I opened my mouth, but I didn't even know where to begin.
Seeing me falter only made Sebastian look more pleased with himself.
He stepped forward, his yellowed fingernails reaching for my cheek.
"Quit playing innocent. Do what I tell you, or I'll destroy you and your father both—see how either of you shows your face in this city again."
"Really. I'd love to hear exactly who you think you're going to destroy."
