Bound to the Cold Billionaire

Three days left

Aisha Sharma stared at the crumpled final notice in her hands and tried to breathe. Three days. That was all the landlord had given them. Three days to find the money, or he would throw her family and their belongings out onto the street.In the next room, her younger brother was practicing exam questions by the dim light of a flickering bulb. Every few seconds he coughed, the sound thin and tired. Their mother slept on the narrow bed by the window, her medicine bottles lined up on a plastic chair beside her, half of them already empty.Rent. School fees. Medicine. The words spun in Aisha’s head like a storm she could not escape. She had sent out dozens of applications in the last month. Some companies had rejected her politely. Others had simply never replied. A few had offered “opportunities” that turned out to be unpaid internships or shady “modeling jobs” that made her skin crawl.Her phone buzzed with a new notification. For a second her heart jumped, but it was only a reminder from the school: pay the overdue fees or her brother would not be allowed to sit his exams. Aisha swallowed the lump in her throat and forced herself to stand. Sitting and crying would not change anything. She needed a job—any real job—now.She grabbed her worn‑out folder of certificates and stepped out into the narrow corridor of their building. The landlord’s voice floated up from the ground floor, loud and impatient, as he argued with another tenant. Aisha hesitated at the top of the stairs. If he saw her, he would start again: reminding her of the money, making comments about “responsible daughters” and “families who live for free.”Instead of going down, she slipped out through the back door and walked quickly toward the bus stop. The morning air smelled of dust and frying snacks from the stall on the corner. She checked the time. If she hurried, she could still make it to the city center and try to follow up on a few applications in person. Maybe someone would finally say yes.The bus ride was long and crowded. Aisha clung to the overhead bar, her folder pressed to her chest, while advertisements for luxury apartments and new cars flashed past the dirty windows. In another life, she thought, she might have been one of the people inside those cars—well dressed, relaxed, not constantly calculating how many rupees were left in her purse.By the time she reached the center, her feet already ached. She spent the next few hours going from building to building, leaving CVs with bored receptionists and listening to the same empty promises: “We’ll contact you if there’s an opening.” Each time she forced a polite smile, but inside, panic was building.It was almost evening when she finally stepped out of yet another glass tower, rejected once more. The sky was turning orange, and the wind between the tall buildings felt colder. Aisha leaned against a wall for a moment, closed her eyes and whispered, “Please… just one chance.”When she opened them, she saw the poster.