He had wanted her to feel something one day, but the moment he truly saw how far she had fallen, the victory did not taste the way he had expected.
Nora turned toward Imani and smiled faintly, not yet understanding the depth of the silence between them.
Imani forced herself to step forward and do her job.
“Good evening, sir,” she said, but her voice almost betrayed her.
Chidi leaned back in his seat. “Good evening.”
Nothing in his tone suggested they had once been in love. Nothing in his face suggested he had ever known her deeply.
Then with deliberate calm, he glanced at Nora and said something low enough to sting and public enough to wound.
He referred to Nora as his fiancée.
Imani felt it like a blow, but she held her face steady. “Would you like anything else?”
“That will be all.”
She nodded and turned away before her expression could break.
For the rest of the night, she moved like someone in a dream. She could feel him in the room even when she was not near him. Every time she glanced toward that section, Nora was still beside him, smiling, relaxed, close.
By the time her shift ended, Imani was too shaken to think clearly.
Meanwhile, Chidi did not look as calm as he wanted Nora to believe. He had pictured this meeting differently in his mind many times. He had imagined anger. He had imagined satisfaction. He had imagined finally looking down on the woman who once made him feel small.
Instead, seeing her in that uniform—tired and thin, with quiet struggle in her face—unsettled him. Part of him wanted her to feel the insecurity he had once felt. Another part wanted to pull her out of that place immediately.
That confusion was where his revenge began.
The next day, Imani arrived at her office and sensed tension before she even reached her desk. People were whispering. Managers were moving too fast. Files were being carried in and out of offices.
Not long after, the news spread.
Their company had been acquired by CI Tech.
Imani’s blood ran cold.
An hour later, she was called into a meeting room. When she entered and saw Chidi seated there in a dark suit, calm and unreadable, her stomach tightened.
He looked up as if this were a normal business morning.
“Sit down.”
She did.
The manager spoke with careful excitement, explaining restructuring, new expectations, new opportunities. Imani barely heard half of it. Then came the part that mattered.
“Mr. Bello has personally requested that you work directly under him as his personal assistant.”
Imani looked at Chidi in disbelief.
His face did not change.
By afternoon, her new role had begun.
It was not the role itself that hurt. It was the way he used it. He gave her work far below what someone in her position should have handled—errands, unnecessary scheduling tasks, repeated changes, tiny humiliations wrapped in professional language. Nothing so obvious that others could challenge it. Just enough to make her feel it.
Imani said little. She did the work because she needed the salary.
Every meeting between them was tense. Every silence carried years inside it. Every glance felt like old history pressing against the present.
Then Chidi began noticing things.
He noticed how tired she looked in the mornings. He noticed how often she rubbed her wrists when she thought nobody was looking. He noticed that she sometimes left the office only to return hours later with that same strained face, as if one job was flowing straight into another.
It did not take long for him to understand the truth.
She was working multiple jobs.
One night, after leaving his office later than usual, he saw her outside by chance. She was hurrying through the wet street, exhausted, clearly trying to get somewhere else.
Then her foot slipped.
She fell hard.
By the time he reached her, she was trying to stand as if nothing had happened.
“Leave it,” she said quickly, embarrassed.
But Chidi had already seen the bruise forming and the skin scraped at her palm.
He looked at her for a moment, fighting himself. Then he said, “Get in.”
She wanted to refuse, but she was too tired and too hurt.
He took her to his house.
That night was quiet in a way that made both of them uncomfortable.
He brought out a small first-aid box and cleaned her bruises with careful hands. His face stayed stern, but his touch was gentle. Imani watched him without understanding what she was feeling.
Then she noticed small things. He still had the same hand cream brand she used years ago. When he handed her a drink, it was the same one he used to buy when he wanted to calm her down. And even through all the anger in him, he still watched her with that same deep, unreadable look.
For one dangerous moment, Imani wondered if his coldness was not the whole truth.
But she pushed the thought away.
Too much time had passed. He had moved on. She had seen Nora with him. As far as she knew, Nora was the woman in his life now.
What Imani did not know was that the truth was far less simple.
Nora and Chidi were not truly together. Their closeness was only a public arrangement. It protected his image, kept curious women away, and gave him a clean answer whenever people asked about his personal life.
Nora agreed because she wanted more.
She had always wanted more.
But even she was beginning to see something she did not like.
Imani still lived somewhere in Chidi’s heart.
And Chidi, for reasons he did not fully admit even to himself, was not ready to tell Imani the truth. Part of him wanted her jealous. Part of him wanted her confused. Part of him wanted her to feel, even for a little while, the same insecurity he had carried years ago.
That was where the revenge began to show clearly.
But even now, it was not clean.
Because every time Chidi tried to punish her, his heart kept getting in the way. And every time Imani told herself Chidi had moved on, something happened to shake that belief.
It was in the way he cleaned her bruised hand without carelessness. It was in the silence between them, which felt less like indifference and more like pain that had learned how to dress itself in control.
That was what made her afraid.
If Chidi ever saw how much she still loved him, he would have too much power over her, and Imani no longer trusted her own heart enough to place it in his hands again.
So she lied.
It happened two days after the night he took her home.
She had just finished arranging some files in his office when Chidi asked without looking up, “Do you always go from here straight to the club?”
“Most nights.”
“That kind of life will break you.”
She forced a small smile. “Not everyone has a choice.”
His jaw tightened slightly, but he said nothing more.
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