Chapter 58
*****
Later that evening, she sat silently in the living room of her brother’s house, not wanting to talk or eat or do anything for that matter.
She couldn’t get herself to go to bed and sleep through the night, especially knowing that the man she was going up against had deep pockets and a high influence on the judicial system.
She was lost in the details as she looked through the newly submitted evidence, when she heard Ashok clear his throat and that made her look up.
“You wanted to know why my knuckles were bruised?” Ashok’s voice was playful.
She knew he was trying to distract her from the analysis paralysis she was going through in her mind. “No, I don’t,” She winked. “I want to be worried sick about what’s going to happen with the case.”
He snickered. “I’m still going to tell you. And if you don’t pay attention, I won’t answer any of your follow up questions.”
She wanted to know but she didn’t want to discuss that particular topic at that point. She only shook her head and went back to looking at the files that had the new evidence that was submitted by the great Mr. Saini’s defense lawyers.
“Did you know there is a new manufacturing unit that Randeep Corp has set up in Vietnam?” Ashok’s voice was casual but it sent tremors through her as she looked up at him.
Randeep Corp was Aman’s family business and she could not figure out why Ashok was mentioning them. “What?”
He shrugged. “What? I thought you were busy reviewing the evidence.”
Isha put away the file and turned to face him. “Why are you talking about Aman’s family business?”
“Because that’s the only way I can explain the bruises on my knuckles.” He let out a laugh.
Isha’s mind was spinning. “Ashok, what happened?” She took his hand to look at the bruises that were still raw. Like his skin got scraped that day.
He leaned closer to her. “No one gets to be disrespectful with my wife.” The intensity in his eyes shook her to the core. The words were what she heard but the inference behind the simple statement shook her to her core.
“Ashok…what…did you meet Aman?” Her mind was swirling and yet that was the only conclusion it could come to.
He nodded in response. “I felt the need to introduce myself as your husband.”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “And? You punched him? For what?” It was a wild guess but what else could it be?
Ashok leaned closer in his seat and reached out his hand. “Come here.”
If Ashok’s goal was to keep her from looking through the documents over and over again, he had succeeded. She walked over to where he sat and like it was so natural, he took his hand and tugged on it and she literally fell into his lap.
Her face was level with his and he repeated, “No one gets to be disrespectful with my wife.” His hand went to her cheek. “No tears for anyone or anything.”
The intensity in his voice made her throat dry. She remembered the time she was emotional about being away from him and instead of confessing to that, she had given a different reason for her sadness. She did not expect Ashok to do what he did.
She suddenly felt guilty about lying to him and not being open about her feelings. There was also joy around Ashok confronting Aman for what he did. She wanted to come clean but she was worried it would complicate the crap out of their situation.
“Ashok,” she started to say and lowered her eyes, not able to look at him as she began to speak the truth. “I…I wasn’t being entirely truthful about why I was upset the night I told you about Aman.”
She felt his finger on her chin. He made her look at him but did not say anything. He waited like he knew she needed the time to speak and instead of pressing her for the details, he took the back of her hand and laid a series of kisses.
“Ashok,” her breath hitched when she realized what she was going to tell him would be an admission that she had not made to herself and that she would put him in a bind that he did not sign up for.
“I’ve been…,” she said struggling to find the right words and it frustrated her to the point where she let out a sob.
Like he read her mind, he ran his fingers into her hair and pulled her into a soft kiss as if he was coaxing her to talk.
“I want you,” she whispered against his lips, her voice breaking on the words. “I want to be with you all the time and it terrifies me; it terrifies me so much that I dread the thought of going back to San Francisco.”
The confession tore from her throat, raw and bleeding. There was no controlling the torrent of emotions anymore, no dam strong enough to hold back the flood of the need and desperation that consumed her.
“I know this is not how it’s supposed to be,” she pulled back, her hands trembling as they framed his face, memorizing how his face felt against her palm.
Her eyes were wild with panic, with an emotion so fierce it felt like she was dying on the inside.
“You were the unwanted husband, the burden I had to bear, the situation I had to endure. But now...”
Her voice shattered completely, reduced to fragments of pain and longing.
“Now I can’t think of going back. The thought of leaving you makes me feel like I’m being torn in half. What was home for so long, doesn’t feel like it anymore. Nothing does, except here, except this, except you and wherever you are.”
Tears streamed down her face, each one carrying the weight of her shattering reality.
“I don’t know what I’m feeling and worse I don’t know how to deal with it.
I don’t know how to do anything when every fiber of my being is screaming that leaving you would be a bad idea.
I’m lost in how much I need you, and I hate myself for it because this adds complications and a situation that you may not want. ”
He didn’t say anything, like he couldn’t or didn’t want to say anything in the face of her devastation. Instead, he kissed away her tears with infinite tenderness, his lips tracing the salt tracks of her anguish along her jawline. Each kiss of his was both comforting and agonizing at the same time.
She was coming apart in his arms, crumbling like sand on those beaches where she had developed those feelings for him. The intensity of her need, of these overwhelming emotions, of her terror at potentially losing him, all crashed over her in waves that left her gasping.
“Make me yours,” words ripped from the depths of her soul. “Please…make me so completely yours that even when I’m gone, even when distance tries to keep this from us, some part of me will always belong here, with you.”
Her plea hung in the air between them, desperate and beautiful yet heartbreaking at the same time. Isha was surrendering not just her body, but every guarded piece of her heart to feelings she never saw coming, never wanted, but now couldn’t live without.
For a moment as time stretched into eternity, he simply looked at her, as if he were trying to memorize everything about her, every tremor of her lips and every flicker of vulnerability in her eyes. His hands came up slowly, cupping her face with a gentleness that made her breath hitch.
When his lips finally found hers, it wasn’t just a kiss, it was an answer to her desperate plea.
His mouth moved against hers with aching slowness, as if he were savoring every second, every breath they shared.
One hand tangled in her hair while the other traced down her neck, his thumb brushing over her racing pulse.
She melted into him completely, her hands fisting in his shirt as if anchoring herself to something solid in the storm of her whirlwind emotions. The kiss deepened, became something raw and consuming, filled with all the words they couldn’t say and the promises they couldn’t make.
His lips left hers only to trail across her cheek, before going lower.
She arched her back as she sat on his lap, baring herself to him, finding the confession liberating.
She no longer had to hide what she was feeling for him or how confused she was about them.
It was about taking the moments they shared and memorizing them to eternity.
He pushed aside the thin robe she had on over a slip. The makeshift night clothes she had left behind before they moved to the island came in handy when they decided not to return to the island that night.
She wound her arms around him, her fingers tightening in his hair as he made his way down to her taut nipples. He pushed aside the slip, making fabric rip as he eagerly sucked on the flesh of her chest. She arched her back further, throwing her head back as he devoured her.
Moans escaped her as his hand found her throbbing core to push away the thin fabric that had been soaking up her wetness. In one swift move, he shifted her hips so she was straddling him and a moment later, she felt him enter her.
Her nerve endings were already on edge and the sensations now mixed with raw emotion amplified the moment, setting her being on fire.
He pulled her lips to him when one had tangled in her hair while the other hand guided her at her hip to ride him so they could both blast through all doubt and take in each other’s longing and desires.
When a peak rippled through her, she knew in that moment, there would never be another man in her life. Ashok had ruined her for everyone and the situation may demand them to choose different paths . But he had marked her soul forever and she would be his, always, no matter what.