CHAPTER 7 The Reclamation of the Sun #2
Before she could fully register the pain, Rudra stepped forward. He didn’t speak. He simply placed a large, warm hand against the small of her back. It was a grounding touch, a solid anchor against her anxiety.
“Let’s go home,” Rudra said softly, his deep voice sending a shiver down her spine.
***
The ride back to the penthouse was quiet, but the silence was different now. It was no longer heavy with avoidance; it was thick with anticipation. The armored Maybach hummed against the coastal highway, sealing them in their private cocoon.
When they stepped out of the private elevator into the foyer of the penthouse, the vast silence of the massive space wrapped around them. It was just the two of them. No Aryan to buffer the tension. No family to hide behind.
Rudra dropped his keys on the marble console table. He didn’t take off his suit jacket. He turned to face her, the air in the room suddenly crackling with electricity.
“Mihika,” Rudra said, his voice low, commanding, and determined. “Come with me to the study. We need to talk.”
Mihika’s heart hammered against her ribs. This was it. This was the moment he was going to ask her why she left. This was the moment she would have to explain the blackmail, the dossier, the old shame of her mother’s past. She felt a cold sweat break out on the back of her neck.
She followed him down the long hallway, her steps feeling heavy and disjointed.
Rudra’s study was a massive room overlooking the ocean, paneled in dark wood and filled with leather-bound books. He walked over to the heavy oak doors, pushed them shut, and turned the brass lock until it clicked.
The sound of the lock sliding into place made Mihika flinch. She stood in the center of the room, her arms wrapped defensively around her own waist, staring at the floor.
Rudra walked toward her, stopping only when he was mere inches away. He was so close she could feel the heat radiating from his large frame, so close she could smell the familiar, intoxicating scent of ozone and sandalwood.
“Look at me,” Rudra commanded softly.
Mihika slowly, agonizingly raised her head. When she finally met his dark eyes, the breath was completely knocked out of her lungs.
There was no anger in his gaze. There was no accusation. There was only a deep, unguarded adoration that bordered on religious fervor.
“I went to the estate on Saturday night,” Rudra said, his voice vibrating in the quiet room.
Mihika gasped, taking a step back, her eyes widening in sheer, unadulterated terror. “Rudra... no. You shouldn’t have. If Kanta knows I am here... the dossier... the press...”
“There is no dossier,” Rudra interrupted smoothly, his voice a lethal, calm blade slicing through her panic. “There is no blackmail. There is no press leak.”
Mihika froze, completely paralyzed. “What do you mean?”
Rudra reached out, gently taking her trembling hands in his. He held them firmly, anchoring her to the ground. “I mean I know everything, Mihika. I know what they did to you the morning after I proposed. I know what they threatened you with. Ahana broke. She told me everything.”
A tear spilled over Mihika’s lower lashes, her chest heaving as the secret she had guarded with her life was suddenly exposed.
“They found my mother’s records, Rudra. They...
she was a dancer. A prostitute. They told me if I stayed, they would leak it to the press.
They told me the scandal would destroy your company. They told me you would be humiliated.”
“Do you honestly think I care about the company?” Rudra asked, his voice cracking with raw emotion, stepping even closer, his thumbs gently wiping the tears from her cheeks. “Do you think I care about a stock price? I would burn the entire empire to ash before I let them use it to hurt you.”
Mihika sobbed, shaking her head. “It wasn’t just the company.
It was Aryan. Kanta said... she said if the press dug into my past, they would inevitably dig into Revaa’s.
They would find out how Aryan was born. She said he would be bullied.
She said he would be the bastard son of a...
of a whore’s daughter. I couldn’t let them do that to him, Rudra!
I couldn’t let them drag his name through the mud! I had to leave to protect him!”
Rudra felt a physical pain in his chest so intense it felt like a heart attack. He pulled her flush against his body, wrapping his massive arms around her completely, crushing her against his chest. He buried his face in the crook of her neck, his own eyes burning with unshed tears.
“My beautiful, selfless, foolish girl,” Rudra whispered brokenly against her skin, holding her so tightly she could barely breathe. “You absorbed their venom to protect a legacy I despise. You let them break your heart to save my son.”
“I was frightened, Rudra,” Mihika cried, clutching his lapels, burying her face against his chest, completely surrendering to the overwhelming relief of finally sharing the burden.
“I never stopped loving you. Not for a single second. I didn’t blame you.
But they had so much power, and I was so terrified of causing harm to you or Aryan. I thought I was doing the right thing.”
“Listen to me,” Rudra said, pulling back just enough to look fiercely into her eyes.
The raw intensity in his gaze made her breath hitch.
“I have completely severed the family from the Chauhan fortune. I have frozen their accounts. I have stripped them of their power. They have nothing left to threaten you with. If they breathe a word to the press, I will personally see to it that they spend the rest of their lives destitute on the streets of Mumbai. They are nothing now, Mihika. The threat is gone.”
Mihika stared at him, her mind struggling to comprehend the magnitude of what he had done. He had destroyed his own bloodline, he had fractured his entire history, all for her.
“I’m begging you, Mihika,” Rudra whispered, his voice cracking, the formidable billionaire completely brought to his knees by his love for the woman in his arms. “Give me another chance. Let me protect you properly this time. Because I promise you... not being with you would have killed me slowly. Another year, and I would have been nothing but a ghost. And Aryan... Aryan would have lost his laughter forever. Your leaving didn’t save us, Mihika.
It was the only thing that could have destroyed us. ”
Mihika looked into the dark eyes of the man she had loved since she was fifteen years old. She saw the unshakeable truth in his words. She saw the fortress he had built just for her.
“Rudra,” she whispered, her voice breaking on a sob of pure, overwhelming joy.
He didn’t wait for another word.
Rudra’s hands tangled in her dark hair, tilting her head back, and after a year of agonizing, starving separation, he finally crushed his mouth against hers.
The kiss was not gentle. It was an explosion.
It was a desperate, violent collision of grief, relief, and an agonizing, pent-up desire that had been simmering beneath the surface for twelve months.
Rudra kissed her like a man dying of thirst who had finally found the oasis.
His lips were demanding, punishing, yet incredibly reverent, tasting her tears, groaning deep in his chest as she instantly, breathlessly opened to him.
Mihika’s hands flew up to his shoulders, her fingers gripping the lapels of his expensive suit, pulling him closer until there was no space left between them.
She kissed him back with equal desperation, her tongue sweeping into his mouth, pouring every ounce of her unspoken love, her year of loneliness, and her complete surrender into the kiss.
Rudra’s large hands swept down her back, gripping her waist and lifting her effortlessly off the floor.
Mihika gasped into his mouth, instinctively wrapping her legs around his waist as he carried her backward. He moved with a blind, predatory focus, not breaking the kiss for a single second as he navigated out of the study and down the hallway toward his master bedroom.
He kicked the heavy bedroom door shut behind them, plunging them into the dim, intimate light of the massive room. He walked them toward the king-sized bed, gently laying her down onto the silk sheets, following her down immediately, covering her body with his massive frame.
The frantic, desperate energy slowly shifted into something deeper, something deeply intimate.
Rudra broke the kiss, resting his forehead against hers, both of them panting heavily, their breath mingling in the quiet room. He looked down at her flushed face, her swollen lips, the trusting vulnerability in her dark eyes.
“I love you,” Rudra whispered, his voice rough and deep, his thumb gently tracing the line of her jaw. “I love you more than my own breath, Mihika.”
“I love you, Rudra,” she breathed, reaching up to gently cup his cheek.
He moved with agonizing, deliberate slowness then.
He unbuttoned the cream silk blouse, his fingers trembling slightly as he revealed the pale, delicate skin beneath.
He kissed every inch of exposed flesh, trailing his lips down her collarbone, the hollow of her throat, worshiping her body with a reverence that made Mihika’s spine arch off the mattress.
Mihika’s hands found the knot of his tie, pulling it loose, pushing the heavy suit jacket off his broad shoulders, desperate to feel the heat of his skin against hers.
When they were finally bare to each other, the air in the room felt supercharged. Rudra poised over her, his dark eyes burning with a possessive, consuming fire. He traced the curve of her hip, the dip of her waist, committing her to memory again.
“You are mine,” Rudra growled softly, a vow etched in stone. “You have always been mine.”
“Always,” Mihika whispered, pulling his head down to hers.