Ruin beginning to show in desperate couple (9)
I believe the answer is:
disrepair
'ruin' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'beginning to show in desperate couple' is the wordplay.
'beginning to' suggests taking the first letters.
'in' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'desperate' becomes 'dire' (I've seen this before).
'couple' becomes 'pair' (synonyms).
The initial letter of 'show' is 's'.
's' placed within 'dire' is 'disre'.
'disre'+'pair'='DISREPAIR'
(Other definitions for disrepair that I've seen before include "Poor working order" , "poor state" , "Degradation" , "Ruin, dilapidation" , "Poor condition" .)