Chapter Thirty Eight.
"Eiii!" Ritika squealed, a sound of pure, unadulterated victory that made Ira can't help but beam.
They made quite a pair on the walkway, their hands overflowing with shopping bags that crinkled with every step as they headed toward the rickshaw stand.
The late afternoon sun hit the storefronts, and a group of local kids darted around them, laughing as they played game of tag.
"I think we went a little overboard, Riri.." Ira said, glancing down at the bags. "Actually, I'm sure of it."
Ritika just grinned, giving an effortless shrug.
"Wait, I've been meaning to ask..." Ira slowed her pace. "You wouldn't even let me reach for my wallet. Every time I tried to pay, you blocked me. These brands are expensive, Ritika. I feel terrible that you spent so much." Her brow furrowing with genuine concern.
"Come on, girl." Ritika laughed, "Do I look like the type to throw around my life savings? You know me-I'm the queen of economizing. I can stretch a rupee further than anyone."
Ira frowned, her confusion deepening. It was true.. Ritika was famously careful with her money.
So why the sudden splurge? Why today?
"Then why spend so much now? On me?"
"Oh, hot stuff.." Ritika began, a mischievous glint returning to her eyes. "Let's just say someone-"
Before the name could leave her lips, a terrified screams broke out.
Ira turned around. A blacked-out Jeep had swerved violently onto the shoulder, missing the group of playing children by a fraction of an inch.
The kids scrambled in every direction, falling over one another in the dirt, their laughter replaced by shrill, panicked cries.
Ritika gasped.."What the hell!? Is that driver blind? He almost killed them!"
The Jeep didn't speed off.
Ira was already moving before her brain could process the danger.
She dropped her shopping bags into the floor, the cries of the parents who were now clutching their children to their chests.
The Jeep engine purring with a chilling indifference.
"Ira! Wait!" Ritika scrambled to gather the discarded bags, but Ira was focused on the kids.
She knelt in the dust, helping a small boy to his feet and checking his scraped knees, her heart thudded with protective fury.
"Hey! Who is this fool?" a local shopkeeper yelled, "Can't he see there are children here? This isn't a racing track!"
Ira stood up, her jaw set in a hard, uncompromising line.
She didn't look back at Ritika. She walked straight toward the driver's side of the Jeep.
She reached the door and, without a hint of hesitation, rapped her knuckles against the dark, impenetrable tinted glass.
For a long heartbeat, nothing happened. Then, the window began to slide down with a smooth hiss.
As the face behind the wheel was revealed, Ira's anger didn't just stay hot-it, no..it turned into a fire.
"Hello, Doll." Deepak drawled. A smirk stretched across his lips as he kicked the door open.
His leather boot hit the pavement with a heavy thud as he stepped down.
"Are you blind?" Ira spat, her eyes blazing with a hatred "You almost killed them! What is wrong with you?"
Deepak leaned back against the frame of his Jeep, his eyes roaming over her with a lazy, predatory hunger that made her skin crawl.
"Feisty...Typical Redheads." he mumbled, the words dripping with a dark amusement that suggested he enjoyed her rage more than her kindness.
"Don't you know how to apologize? You almost hit innocent children!" Ira's voice rose, cutting through the murmurs of the gathered crowd.
Her face was flushed, her chest heaving with a fury that didn't leave room for fear.
The mocking smirk on Deepak's face vanished, replaced by a dark sneer.
He didn't like being challenged, and he certainly didn't like being yelled at in the middle of a public street.
"Don't yell at me.." he warned, his voice dropping to a dangerous, low vibrato.
"Do I look like I care?" Ira shot back, her eyes narrowed, "You nearly crushed those kids and you're acting like it was a minor inconvenience! Someone clearly needs to correct you, since you're too dumb to know the difference between right and wrong!"
Deepak's jaw tightened.
He took a step toward her, his shadow looming over her smaller frame. But before he could close the distance, Ritika surged forward, placing herself firmly between them.
Deepak looked down at Ritika, his brow furrowing in a mix of confusion and contempt.
"Listen.." Ritika said, a cold smile playing on her lips. "I might look like a weak girl to you, but touch her and you'll find out exactly what girl power feels like when it's breaking your ribs."
Deepak sneered, his eyes darting between the two of them, but Ira wasn't done. She stepped slightly to the side of Ritika to lock eyes with him again.
"Apologize to the kids. Now.." Ira commanded.
Deepak let out a dry laugh that sounded like dead leaves skittering on pavement.
"Apologize? To kids I could crush under the heel of my boot?"
"And remember.." Ira's voice turned cold, "you were a kid once too. Or did you forget how to be human along the way?"
The laugh died instantly in Deepak's throat. His face went pale, then a deep, mottled red.
"Shut up!" he yelled, the sound making the nearby shopkeepers flinch.
"I'll shut up when you do the right thing!" Ira yelled back, matching his volume. "You almost killed them! Does this look like a driveway to you, or are your eyes as broken as your soul?"
Deepak gritted his teeth so hard it sounded like bone grinding.
He lunged forward again, his fist clenching as if he were ready to strike, but Ritika didn't budge an inch. She stood like a stone wall, her gaze steady and lethal.
"She said Apologize.." Ritika said, "Not step forward"
Deepak halted. He looked at the surrounding crowd-the shopkeepers with their crates, the parents with their phones out-and then back at the two women.
Even the children were huddled together, looking at him like he was a monster from a bedtime story. He gulped, his pride warring with the realization that he was making a scene he couldn't control..
"Fine! I'm fucking sorry, you low-lives!" he bellowed. The kids flinched as if he'd slapped them, and the parents pulled them back further into the shadows of the stalls.
"Stop cussing.." Ira snapped.
Deepak froze. He hated this-hated the way he was letting this girl command him in front of a bunch of nobodies. He was a man who took what he wanted, a man who answered to no one. Yet here he was, obeying her like a kicked dog.
"I'm sorry.." he muttered, the words sounding foreign and clumsy as he directed them toward the kids.
He looked dumbfounded, as if he couldn't believe his own mouth had formed the words.
Ira watched the children nod tentatively, their eyes wide with lingering fear.
She didn't blame them for being terrified. Deepak was a stain on the world, and even though her family's debt to his people was finally settled, seeing his face again made her skin itch with a deep-seated revulsion.
"Let's go, Riri.." Ira said, turning her back on him.
"Ira!"
His voice was desperate. She stopped and looked back, her eyebrow arched.
"Ahem..Come on. Let me drop you..home." he said, gesturing vaguely toward the leather interior of his Jeep.
Ira didn't even hesitate.
"No thank you." she said flatly. She turned and walked away, with Ritika.
Deepak stood there... running a shaky hand through his long hair.
He swallowed hard, his heart hammering against his ribs. This had started off a disaster.
He hadn't meant to hit those kids, he blame the cocaine he took..he had simply been driving when he caught a glimpse of her-Ira... who had driven him to the very edge of his sanity for over a month!.
In that one second of distraction, his hands had slipped, the Jeep veering off the road and onto the pedestrian walkway.
He watched her retreating figure, his obsession twisting into something even darker. He didn't just want her; he needed to explain himself, even if he had to hit people to make her listen and walk back to him, he would.
Deepak didn't let them go. He walked forward, his long strides eating up the distance between them until he was blocking their path again.
"Wait! I said I'm sorry, alright?" he rasped, his voice sounding raw and unhinged.
Ira and Ritika stopped, with twin looks of exhaustion.
"Yes, I know you are.." Ira said, as if she were talking to a difficult patient. "You told the kids. That's good. Now, goodbye."
She turned walked passed him and toward the rickshaw stand.
Ritika lingered for a split second, her eyes scanning Deepak. She watched the way his fists clenched and unclenched at his sides, the way his gaze was glued to the sway of Ira's back, and the frantic, nervous way he kept raking his fingers through his hair.
"Please tell me it's not what I think it is," Ritika mumbled to herself, a cold pit forming in her stomach.
She hurried to catch up with Ira, who was already waving down a passing yellow-and-black rickshaw.
"Ira, wait-that's Deepak.." Ritika whispered urgently, pulling her friend close. "How do you two even know each other? You're from two completely different worlds. You aren't supposed to even inhabit the same zip code as a guy like him."
Ira let out a heavy, weary sigh. "Long story short..My father... he borrowed money from Deepak's father. A long time ago."
Ritika's eyes widened. In their world, a debt to a family like that was a life sentence.
"But it's all cleared now." Ira added quickly, "The debt is paid. We're done with them."
Ritika nodded slowly, but the unease didn't leave her.
A rickshaw pulled to the curb with a sputter, and Ira climbed in first, settling onto the worn seat. Ritika paused, glancing back over her shoulder one last time.
Deepak was still there, standing like a dark sentinel beside his idling Jeep. He wasn't moving; he was just staring at them, his silhouette framed by the dusty afternoon light.
Ritika frowned, a bad feeling crawling up her spine, and ducked into the rickshaw, they pulled away into the chaotic flow of traffic.
Deepak finally turn and climb back into his vehicle.
~??~
Ritika stood with a silver eyeshadow brush between her lips, her brow furrowed in intense concentration.
After one final, delicate sweep of shimmer, Ritika's eyes lit up.
She snatched the brush from her lips and let out a triumphant gasp, a wide, dazzled smile spreading across her face.
"Oh my God... Ira. I have outdone myself. I am a literal genius!"
Ira giggled, she stood up slowly, her legs feeling long and unfamiliar, and turned toward the full-length mirror.
The breath hitched in her throat.
The woman staring back at her was a stranger.
Her usual soft, accessible look had been replaced by a fierce, smoky eye that made her gaze look deep and mysterious.
Her copper hair, usually pulled back in a practical boring style, had been transformed into a waterfall of rich waves that caught the light with every movement.
But it was the dress that tied it all together. It hugged her frame like a second skin.
A knock at the door made them turn heads.
"Ira? Beta, Kunal is here..." Her mother's voice trailed off as she pushed the door open.
She took one step into the room and froze, her eyes bulging.
"Ira?!" The word came out as a strangled whisper. Her mother's gaze traveled from the smoky eyes down to the curves accentuated by the body-con dress.
"How... how did you-"
"I know, right?" Ritika chirped, leaning against the vanity with a proud smirk. "Doesn't she look incredible, Aunty?"
"You look beautiful, Ira." her mother breathed, finally finding her voice, though her eyes were still wide.
"Almost... not like yourself at all. Like a different person entirely."
Ira offered a small, shy smile and stepped toward her mother.
"Thank you, Maa.." Ira said, shifting her weight slightly and wincing. "Although these heels are absolute torture, I think I'm surviving."
Her mother let out a soft giggle, her eyes crinkling with warmth.
"The price of beauty, beta. Now, don't keep Kunal waiting. He's downstairs, he seems to be a bit..nervous."
"Oh, that man is many things, but patient isn't one of them when it comes to Ira!" Ritika chirped. She snatched Ira's phone off the vanity and held it up. "Wait! Hold on, girl."
Ira turned toward the camera, offering a radiant smile that looked like it belonged on a magazine cover.
Click.
Then, as Ira reached up to tuck a stray copper wave behind her ear-a moment of pure, unconscious grace-Ritika snapped another.
Ritika's grin "Got it. The unaware shots are always the deadliest."
"I was just as striking as this when I met your father." her mother remarked, her gaze turning misty as she looked at Ira.
"I used to dress exactly like this-bold and full of life."
"I bet Uncle couldn't keep his hands off you." Ritika teased, wagging her eyebrows.
The three of them erupted into laughter.
"Oh, he certainly couldn't.." her mother said, her laughter flowing easily. "And nine months later, I gave birth to your brother, Raghav. Before your father and I did our wedding."
The laughter in the room died instantly. It was as if someone had sucked all the oxygen out of the air.
Ira and Ritika froze, their eyes widening as they exchanged a panicked, wide-eyed look.
Her mother simply smiled-a knowing, serene expression-and patted Ira's cheek.
"Kunal is waiting, my dear." With that, she turned and glided out of the room, leaving a heavy, suffocating silence behind.
"Um... I... Ritika?" Ira's voice was a tiny, high-pitched squeak. "Can I just... maybe I should change? Maybe the–"
"Nope. Absolutely not. Kunal is here, and you are going out." Ritika said.
Ira swallowed hard, a visible gulp working its way down her throat.
Her mind was racing. She looked at her reflection-the curves, the smoky eyes, the womanly silhouette-and suddenly it felt like a trap.
Her mother's words ringing in her head..
Will Kunal want to touch me tonight, because i dress like this? she wondered.
She wasn't ready for that. She wasn't ready for a Raghav of her own just yet.
The nervousness she felt wasn't just about the party anymore-it was about the man waiting downstairs.
???