Chapter 2
CHAPTER 2
DHEER
H arish Mirchandani wasn’t just a regular, garden-variety scumbag, he was also the meanest son of a bitch I had ever met. A fact that I knew very well. So when he announced that he wanted me to meet someone very special, I should known he was up to no good. Instead, I followed him across his living room like an idiotic lamb with no survival skills.
I don’t know how he knew anything about my history with Diya, but his eyes held a particularly malevolent gleam when he led me straight to her.
Diya saw us coming and began to look like a cornered animal. My sister was shaking her head frantically, silently pleading with me not to approach them. I knew I should have made an excuse and walked away before Harish forced me to speak to her, but it was Diya . I knew I had no right to even look at her after the shameful way I had treated her, but I craved the sound of her voice. I longed to see her smile at me the way she used to all those years ago.
Right now, though, she was scowling at me like I’d drowned her favourite puppy.
“Darling! You get more gorgeous every time I see you,” said Mirchandani, looking mighty pleased with himself. If he had a moustache, I bet he’d be twirling it right now like a comic villain. “How does it feel to be the star of the Paris runway this year?”
Diya kept her eyes on him as she politely shook the limp hand he held out and I kept a little distance from them, wondering if I could slip away after all.
“Long time, Harish,” she replied laconically. “And to answer your question, it doesn’t feel any different.”
“Modest, as always! And how well you look, Isha. You’ve lost that bit of Diwali weight you were carrying last year,” he said snidely.
I stiffened in response, ready to rip him a new one for body-shaming my sister, but Diya spoke before I did.
“Body shaming is so gauche, don’t you think?” she asked gently.
My sister raised her chin and shot Harish a scathing glance.
“I can refer you to an etiquette coach, Harish. You sound like you need a refresher course,” she said coldly.
Harish reddened angrily and flashed them a toothy, mean smile.
“I’ll leave you to catch up with each other. Of course, Diya already knows Randheer,” he announced, taking a step back to include me in the conversation.
Diya met my eyes unwillingly, and although she plastered a glacial smile on her face, her eyes shot fiery little sparks of hate at me.
“Nice to meet you, Your Highness,” she said icily.
“The pleasure’s all mine,” I murmured, and her lips tightened angrily before she looked away.
I was aware that Harish was watching our interaction avidly. I didn’t know what kick he got out of it, but he had always been an unpleasant little snake. If it weren’t for the fact that he was an old schoolmate from Eton, I wouldn’t even acknowledge his presence. But here we were.
“I’ll leave the two of you to catch up,” he murmured before he patted us on our backs and walked away to torture someone else.
Diya gave me a tiny but regal nod and began to move away.
“How are you doing?” I asked, desperate for one conversation with her.
She froze in place and looked anywhere but at me as she shrugged.
“Very well, thank you.”
“And your family? I haven’t spoken to Veer in a while.”
She finally turned to look me in the eyes.
“You have his number. There’s nothing to stop you from talking to him if you like,” she said coldly. “I think Ayush is looking for me.”
Though my jaw clenched involuntarily at the thought of her being around that bastard, I took a deep breath and tried not to say anything. But this was Diya. I couldn’t let her get in any deeper with a shady character like Ayush Goel.
“I would stay away from him if I were you,” I said brusquely and Isha smacked her forehead in despair.
“Idiot,” she muttered.
As soon as the words left my mouth, I knew I had fucked up.
Diya bristled like an angry porcupine before she straightened her spine and looked down her perfect little nose at me. Which wasn’t as effective as she’d have liked it to be since I loomed over her by almost a head.
“Well, since you’re not me, I’ll do what I think is right. But thank you for your concern, Your Highness,” she said, with a fake smile.
I pinched the bridge of my nose as I sought a better way to put it.
“I didn’t mean to…”
“To what? Interfere in my personal life?” she asked drily.
Well, I couldn’t refute that since I had meant to do exactly that.
“It’s just…”
“Just what, Your Highness?” she snapped.
“Okay, first of all, stop calling me that,” I retorted. “Call me Dheer!”
She knew I hated being addressed by my title. It was one of those meaningless affectations that our families clung to, even when they knew that our titles meant nothing today. And I especially hated when Diya did it because she only called me that when she was upset with me.
“Never,” she spat, taking one step closer to me. “And I’ll speak to whomever I want, Your Highness , so keep your nose out of my life.”
Her eyes flashed as she poked a pointy finger into my chest angrily.
I grabbed it before she could pull it away, and just for a second, her finger curled around mine. Just for a second, though. She pulled her hand away as if scalded and took a horrified step backwards.
I held out a hand placatingly.
“I’m sorry, Diya. Of course, you’re free to be friends with whomever you like,” I said, ignoring the way her face tightened at my words. “But everyone knows that Ayush Goel is trouble.”
“I’ll decide that for myself, thank you very much,” she replied coldly.
“It won’t be much use to you if you find that out the hard way,” I reasoned. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.”
Her eyes shuttered and she seemed to recede into some place within herself.
“Nothing he could do to me could even compare to the way you hurt me, Dheer. If I could survive that, I can survive anything,” she said starkly.
Her words were like shards of glass cutting into my heart. But I persisted because Ayush Goel was bad news in a very scary way.
“I might have broken your heart, Diya, but Ayush is the kind of poison that can destroy your life,” I said desperately.
She shot me a bitter smile.
“There is nothing left to destroy, Your Highness,” she said bleakly before she turned and walked away from us.
Ayush came up to her and shot me a suspicious glance as he put a possessive arm around Diya’s shoulder.
I wanted to rip that arm off and feed it to him, but I couldn’t justify such violence yet. I had hope, though. I was sure he would do something creepy enough in the course of the evening to justify it, and I was going to grab that opportunity with both hands.
“Leave her alone, Bhai Sa,” scolded Isha, and I scowled at her.
Why was everyone saying that to me tonight?
“I’m not doing anything,” I replied defensively.
“I know that look, Bhai Sa. You’re dying to jump in and rescue her from the big bad billionaire, but she doesn’t need your help,” said Isha drily.
I forced the tight muscles in my jaw to relax and nodded shortly. She was right. Diya was an adult. Besides, I could always find a way to scare off that prick if he got too close to her. I kept that thought to myself because my sister was capable of kicking me in the shins if she thought I was being too bossy.
I tried to stay away from Diya for the rest of the evening, but my eyes kept seeking her out. She seemed to have forgotten all about me as she worked the room on Ayush’s arm, smiling politely at everyone who stopped to greet them.
Isha dragged me to the buffet arranged in the dining room and I stared disinterestedly at the spread. I wasn’t in the mood for food when all I could think about was Ayush’s arm around Diya. Was she serious about him? How long had this been going on, I wondered.
I could ask Isha, but I ran the risk of getting ripped to shreds by her sharp tongue. My sister was very clear that her loyalty belonged to Diya, and I had never tried to sway her because I knew Diya needed her.
After torturing myself for a while, I reminded myself that nine years ago, I had made a choice. For a reason. And if that choice meant that I had to suffer in silence as Diya dated other men right under my nose, then suffer I would.
"I can't stand this anymore, Isha. I'm leaving," I growled. "I'll send another car for you if you want to stay a while longer."
“That’s okay, Bhai Sa. Diya will drop me home," said Isha, and I walked out of the ballroom.
The next day, at the breakfast table, I waited for Isha to tell me something… anything about Diya and Ayush. But she was silent as she buttered her toast absently and proceeded to crumble it to bits on her plate.
“Why aren’t you eating?” I asked gruffly.
“I’m not hungry,” she replied, without meeting my eyes.
“Is it about what that moron said last night?”
“He wasn’t wrong, Bhai Sa. I was overweight, even if I’ve lost most of the excess weight now.”
“You were fine, Isha. You were and still are beautiful from the inside out. Your weight is not going to make any difference to that beauty,” I scoffed.
She shook her head sadly.
“It makes a difference to how I see myself, Bhai Sa. And how others see me. Do you know how people used to look at me when I was fifteen kilos heavier? They treated me as if I was less of a person just because I didn’t fit into their idea of an attractive size. And now, I’m suddenly more acceptable to people,” she said bitterly.
I could understand her anger. I had grown up hearing the comments and taunts she had to face from people who weren’t even good enough to look at her, forget speaking to her rudely.
“Look, it’s your body. If you want to get fitter and healthier, work out and watch your diet by all means. But please don’t drive yourself nuts to please people who are just looking for a reason to put you down.”
Speaking of said people, I wondered why our grandmother wasn’t present at the breakfast table.
Her mornings were incomplete without trying to ruin Isha’s and my mother’s days. Ma Sa had stopped coming down for breakfast since my father died just so she could avoid some of the conflict with my nasty grandmother.
“Where’s Dadi Sa this morning?” I asked.
Isha shuddered as she took a sip of her green tea.
“She’s plotting, Bhai Sa,” she predicted gloomily.
“Plotting what? My downfall?” I enquired drily.
“She gave up on that long ago. Now it’s my turn. She wants to find me a groom, especially now that Diya’s family is trying to fix her up with Ayush Goel. According to Dadi Sa, we can aim even higher. The last I heard, she was trying to gauge if any of the Ambani relationships were on the rocks because she wanted nothing less than an Ambani boy. You need to reign her in before she starts a feud with the richest family in the country, Bhai Sa.”
I slammed my cup on the table and ignored Isha’s wince.
“Diya’s family can’t be serious about getting her married to Ayush Goel. He’s a creep, Isha. I wouldn’t allow you to be in the same room as him,” I snarled.
“Stay out of it, Bhai Sa. Diya doesn’t need your advice. She has judged Ayush already and found him lacking.”
I relaxed my hold on the cup and exhaled sharply.
“So it’s over?”
“Well, not exactly. You know how persistent her mother can be. She’s agreed to meet Ayush one last time for her mother’s sake before she says no.”
“Where is she meeting him?”
“I’m not telling you that,” snapped Isha. “Stay out of it, Bhai Sa, because if you poke your big nose into the matter, you will drive Diya into his arms and you’ll lose her forever. Is that what you want?”
“This isn’t about me,” I said gruffly. “Diya and I can never be together. But I don’t think Ayush can make her happy, either.”
“Don’t even,” said Isha, rolling her eyes. “Don’t even try to tell me that you don’t want her back. That you don’t regret your decision every single day.”
“I do. I regret it every minute of every day and have done so for the past nine years. But Diya can never be mine, Isha. You know that,” I said bleakly.
She shook her head slowly.
“I don’t know that at all, Bhai Sa. And neither do you.”
I threw my napkin down and pushed my chair away from the table with an angry screech.
“I don’t want to talk about this again,” I snapped, as I walked away from the breakfast table.
“Coward,” called my sister, and I chose to ignore her.
I buried myself in work and tried not to think about how Diya had looked last night in her red saree. She was the picture of elegance in her chiffon and pearls, and I had longed to muss up that perfection.
Her long, curly hair called to me like a siren. I wanted to dig my hands into it to see if it was still as soft as I remembered it to be. I frowned as I realised that she looked thinner than before. She had always been lean, but now she looked even more waif-like. I knew supermodels were expected to be skinny, but I wondered if she ate properly.
I had no idea how or when she became an international supermodel because Veer had distanced himself from me after I announced my engagement to Raksha. That was natural, I supposed, but I couldn’t help missing the man who was more a brother to me than a friend. In one shot, I had alienated both Diya and Veer, the best friends I’d ever had. Isha was still close to Diya, but we never spoke about her. I knew I’d lose my sister forever if I so much as mentioned her best friend after what I did to her.
It had come as quite a surprise to see her face staring at me from the cover of Vogue at a newsstand. It was her face, and yet, it wasn’t. She looked the same, but her gorgeous, almond-shaped brown eyes were different. They were cold and angry as they stared back at me from the cover.
Diya was now the face of a famous French perfume called Devi - the embodiment of a fierce, feminine goddess. She was also the muse of an eccentric French designer who had come out of retirement to design clothes especially for her. It was safe to assume that she was one of the most successful Indian models to hit the international runway.
I frowned even harder and tried to focus on the document on my screen, but I was plagued by a strange restlessness. When I glanced out of the window, I realised that it was close to dusk. It was the perfect time for a ride. The sands would be cooler now and I knew Pasha, my Arabian horse, was waiting to be exercised. None of my stable boys could handle him for too long because - to put it bluntly - Pasha was a brat. He was more snooty about his pedigree than even my grandmother and wouldn’t tolerate being ridden by anyone but me.
I rang for the butler and asked him to have Pasha saddled and ready for me, and fifteen minutes later, I was galloping across the Thar desert, trying to outrun my demons.
By the time I brought Pasha to a halt on the crest of a dune, we were both out of breath. I panted heavily as I stared into the beauty of the white sands at dusk. I had travelled all over the world, but no other place called to me as the desert did. I could never settle in Europe like so many other Indian royals had done because I was a desi through and through. I needed to see the vast expanse of the desert from my window each night to know that all was right in my world.
It had taken blood and tears to hold onto the view in front of me, and I could never give it up for the pleasures of the French Riviera.
Pasha tossed his head to let me know he was bored of standing in one place, but I held him steady because I could see something moving in the sand in the distance. It could be nothing, but I knew from experience that anything that moved stealthily in the dusk across the desert towards my land had to be bad news. And I knew how to get rid of unwelcome guests.
As I watched, the figure - a woman - scrambled across the sand, fell and forced herself to get back on her feet. She was running from something, that was for sure because she kept looking back as she ran. And to my surprise, I spotted a couple of quad bikes chasing after her.
They had come from the direction of Ayush Goel’s mansion. It was ironic that his land bordered mine, but that thought spurred me into action. From what I had heard, Ayush liked to hunt his women. He preferred the thrill of the chase to a more classic seduction. Not on my watch, I swore, as I tapped Pasha in the flanks to signal him to go faster.
The bastards on the quad bike had surrounded the woman and were dismounting slowly.
I was too far to see her expression, but she had to be terrified.
Pasha and I galloped to her rescue, but we were still too far to do anything.
One of the men reached out his hand to grab the woman who was standing very still as the men circled around her. She slashed at him wildly with her free hand. It was the act of a cornered animal, with no skill or technique, but it worked.
I was too far away to see the blade in her hand, but I knew it had to be sharp and deadly because he fell to the ground clutching at his neck as his body convulsed. The rest of the attackers backed away as she swung her blade around wildly, heading back to their quad bikes.
To my horror, they pulled out swords from under the seats of their quad bikes and advanced on her again. Her wild hair flew across her face as she stared down the four men coming at her with their swords raised.
With no time to lose, I kicked Pasha in the flank and he set off towards them.
They stopped and turned around at the sound of his hoofbeats. I tugged on his reins and Pasha rose on his haunches, bringing his front hooves down on the man standing closest to us. The men cursed loudly as they scattered, but they regrouped and came at us with their swords.
I jumped off Pasha’s back and knocked the first man out with a swift kick to the head. Pasha moved to stand in front of the woman, protecting her from the attack, harrumphing and kicking out at anyone who got too close to them. Once I was sure she was safely out of the way, I gave all my attention to the three men who were swinging their heavy swords at me.
They came at me one by one, and I whipped my scarf off my face and used it as a lasso to disarm the first guy who was shocked when his sword slid out of his hands neatly.
Before he could understand what was happening, I kicked him hard in the chest and followed it up with a hard punch to the jaw. He grunted as he went crashing to the ground.
The man behind him took one step forward and I braced myself for the attack, but his companion pulled him back.
“It’s him. The beast of Trikhera, ” he whispered.
Clearly, he had recognised me. The two men backed away, leaving their friends groaning on the sand.
“Walk away now if you value your lives,” I growled softly and they bowed hastily as ran to their bikes.
The woman stepped out from behind Pasha hesitantly after they rode away on their bikes and I realised that the woman I had just saved was Diya!