CHAPTER 48
Wadhwa Mansion
The car rolled through the gates of Wadhwa Mansion. Karan was out of the car before Mishti could gather herself. He walked into the house without waiting. The staff sensed it immediately and stayed out of his way.
But Mishti followed him upstairs, into their bedroom. As soon as the door shut behind them, Karan moved away from her, crossing the room, heading straight to the dresser where he kept his phone.
“Karan,” she finally said, breaking the silence.
He did not turn.
“Karan, please,” she said again, softer now, but in desperation. “Say something.”
He finally turned to her. Their eyes met, but for a long moment, he said nothing.
“You lied to me.”
Mishti did not pretend or deflect. She stepped closer. “I didn’t want to,” she said immediately. “I swear I did not. But I had to meet him.”
“And you decided that on your own?”
“Yes.” She nodded. “Because you would never have let me do this.”
“And you think that would be wrong?” he snapped.
She took another step forward and reached out to him. Her fingers brushed his arm affectionately. “You have every right to be angry,” she said. “Every right. But listen to me once before you shut me out.”
He did not pull away.
“I went to meet him because he crossed too many lines,” she continued. “I stayed silent when he hurt others. I stayed silent when I learned what he had done. But when he tried to kill you…” She shook her head once, as if even now the thought refused to settle down. “How could I bear that, Karan?”
His eyes flickered.
“If anything had happened to you that day,” she said, her voice almost breaking, “what would I have done then?”
Karan exhaled sharply, shaking his head in disbelief.
“And if anything had happened to you today, what would I do, Mishti?” he asked.
“I don’t trust him. Not even with his own daughter.
Not even with your shadow, Mishti. If he had raised a hand on you, or even tried to…
I would have burned that place to the ground.
Every law, every consequence, every line I have spent my life not crossing would have meant nothing. ”
Her palm flattened against his chest. “I know. Despite being his daughter, even I didn’t feel safe there,” she replied.
“I was not afraid of what he might say to me,” she went on.
“Even the thought of being anywhere near him made my skin crawl. But I still went there because that man tried to take my life…you, Karan. You are my life.”
Karan went still as she continued.
“I went there as your wife. To confront and warn him. To make sure he understands that if he comes near you again, he will have to answer to me.”
Karan’s expression shifted. He looked at her for a long moment, as though seeing her from a new distance, a new angle.
“I know,” he finally said. “I heard it all.”
Mishti stilled.
“I reached there just when you stepped inside that room. I saw enough. I heard enough.” He exhaled, running a hand through his hair once. “And for the first time, I did not feel like the man in control.”
Her heart dropped. She searched his face, trying to read what this meant, what was coming next. His anger was still there. Hurt too. But beneath it, something else stirred in his expressions as he went on.
“I wanted to stop you from meeting him. But then I realised if I did, you would never forgive me. You were not walking in as a scared daughter. You were walking in as a woman who had already decided what she needed to do. And I let you.”
He paused, swallowing hard.
“I saw you stand there,” he continued. “I saw you step back when he tried to touch you. I heard you tell him to stay away.” His eyes darkened. “I heard you say you were there as my wife.”
Her fingers curled into her palms as tears shimmered in his eyes. Karan cradled her face.
“You have no idea what I felt seeing you standing there, listening to you tear him apart without raising your voice, without losing yourself.”
Mishti swallowed.
“Because everything I believed about you so far was wrong.” He admitted bluntly.
“I always thought you were weak. I thought you would bend. That you would endure whatever I threw at you because that is what life had taught you to do. I knew your history with Daksh and the way he never cared about you, and that you still never said a word.” His shoulders sagged.
“And I had weaponised it when I married you for revenge.”
Her breath trembled, but she stayed silent.
“I hurt you to punish a man who was already rotting in prison. I used your silence as proof that I was right about you.” His voice cracked slightly. “And then I stood there today and watched you become a wall between that man and me.”
Tears rolled down his face, unapologetically. “You did not flinch. You did not beg. You disowned him to protect me.”
A tear slipped down Mishti’s cheek, too, but she did not wipe it away.
“I have never seen that kind of strength,” he said. “Not in my world. Not in the people I know. And certainly not in myself.”
He stepped closer, shrinking the space between them. “He is your father. Yet, you made him recount his sins. You forced him to face what he had done. You fought with him for me. And that’s when I truly realised how wrong I had been. How blind.”
Mishti moved closer, her hands trembling as they palmed his chest, feeling the frantic beat of his heart beneath her palms.
“Despite me always punishing you for his sins, you still stood up for me today. To protect me and my family. There’s no guilt worse than that, Mishti.”
His head bowed slightly, hands dropping to his sides. It was an unconscious gesture to ask forgiveness from her, yet it sent a sharp ache through her chest.
She shook her head faintly. “Karan…”
“No,” he said, stopping her gently, looking up at her again.
“Let me say this.” His voice steadied, but the emotion did not fade.
“I have done many things I cannot undo. I have said things that still haunt me when I look at you. But today, watching you choose me over him…despite everything… it broke something in me.”
His hands cupped her cheeks again with awe rather than possession. “You are not a weak, submissive woman that I thought you were.” His thumb brushed her skin tenderly. “And I am ashamed that it took me this long to see it.”
Mishti’s tears flowed freely now, but she did not pull away.
“I am proud of you,” he said, almost smiling in tears. “Proud that you are my wife. Proud that you are my better half.” His lips pressed briefly to her forehead, lingering. “You proved Karan Wadhwa wrong. And I have never been happier to be proven wrong in my life.”
She leaned into him, her hands sliding to the back of his palms, stroking them gently.
His anger had faded, but the guilt remained as Karan rested his forehead against hers.
“I am sorry,” he said. The words came out slowly.
His hands then slid to her waist as he went on. “I am sorry for every night you cried silently. For every time I made you feel small in a house that should have felt safe. For making you question your worth in this marriage when the fault was always mine.”
She shook her head, but he stopped her gently, his thumb brushing away a tear.
“Let me finish,” he whispered. “Because if I don’t say this now, I will regret it for the rest of my life.”
Mishti’s lips trembled.
“I broke you in the name of revenge,” he continued.
“And you still chose kindness. You still chose love, chose me, even though I do not deserve that grace. And through all this, somewhere along the way, without my permission, without my control, you became my home. My weakness and my strength. And I fell in love with you.”
Mishti’s heart stuttered as he pulled back his head, but his arms were still wrapped around her waist.
“I love you, Mishti,” he said again, softer this time, as if tasting the truth of it.
“Not as a husband bound by vows. Not as a man trying to compensate. Not even because you stood between me and the man who destroyed my world. I love you because you are you, and I’ve never felt this feeling for any other woman before. Only you.”
For a moment, Mishti could not breathe. Her mind pulled her backwards through time, through all those moments she had tried so hard to forget.
The early days of their marriage, when he had always said to her coldly, brutally, that he hated her.
He had said it so easily back then, as though it cost him nothing.
As though her presence in his life was an inconvenience he could not wait to erase.
And now… now he stood here, holding her as though she was something precious, confessing with a vulnerability she had never imagined he possessed.
Those three words Karan just confessed to her, without anger, without any restraint, shattered something deep inside her.
It felt so intense, so overwhelming, like her heartbreak was healing itself all at once.
A sob escaped her then, as she pressed her forehead into his chest, clutching his shirt tight.
“I love you too,” she whispered finally. “I have loved you even when it hurt, Karan. Especially when it hurt. And I was waiting for you to love me back someday.”
His arms tightened around her, holding her as though the world could not touch her anymore, only he was allowed to do that.
Only him. Karan kissed her hair, her temple, her forehead slowly, taking his own sweet time to feel her up.
Even Mishti stayed wrapped against him for a long moment, her cheek pressed to his chest, listening to his heartbeat slowly steady beneath her ear.
After a beat, she drew back just enough to look at him.
“You are not angry anymore?” she asked. “About me not telling you… going there?”
“I am.” His lips curved, just slightly. “And my fingers are already twitching.”
She frowned faintly. “Twitching?”
Before she could process the meaning, Karan leaned in. His mouth brushed close to her ear.