CHAPTER 54
Later that evening, word had already traveled in the Jogra palace.
By the time Yamini reached her bedroom, the bed had been turned down, the electric fireplace lit, and an extra blanket added.
Savita was still inside.
“Maharani. We weren't sure which room you'd want, so...” She gestured vaguely at the bed and the connecting door. “Just in case.” There was a rosy hue on Savita’s cheeks.
Yamini pressed her lips to keep from smiling at the young maid’s blush. “I’ll be sleeping here tonight,” she said.
Savita’s smile dimmed slightly.
“Goodnight, Savita.”
“Goodnight, Maharani.”
Savita was walking out of the room when Yamini spoke. “Also, please ask Mr. Tikku to have someone bring Sheru back to the palace. Sheru is with the security in the city.”
Savita’s face brightened instantly with a smile. “Yes, of course, Maharani.”
Savita left in a hurry. Most likely to inform the rest of the staff that the Jogra maharani had returned to the palace and was not just visiting for a night.
Yamini stood alone in the room for a moment, shaking her head with a small smile.
Then her eyes automatically went to the connecting door.
She stared at it.
She desperately wanted to push open the door and step into his room. But she stopped herself.
She told herself that the right thing to do was to give him space. To give herself space too, to process everything she discovered in the past couple of hours.
Twenty-two years of paintings, a father who may have jumped from a cliff, a vasectomy at twenty—it was too much to process.
Taking a deep breath, she went for a quick shower. And then, changing into a comfortable nightdress, she lay down.
The room was warm. Outside the windows, the mountains shone under the moonlight.
She slowly closed her eyes. But sleep didn't come. Her mind was too active.
She turned onto her side. She turned on her back. Then her side again.
The bed felt too big, and the room was too quiet.
She let out an exhale.
She missed him.
She missed the weight of his arm across her waist, the way it tightened without him waking when she shifted.
She missed the low sound of his voice in the dark, the commands that made her burn.
She missed his mouth, the steady, controlled heat of him beside her.
She also missed talking to him in the dark, and the way he listened without interrupting while she told him about her day.
She had spent a month in a narrow bed above a pharmacy, telling herself she didn't need any of it.
But she was wrong.
She opened her eyes. The clock on the nightstand ticked toward midnight.
She watched the minutes change. Eleven fifty. Eleven fifty-five.
At midnight, somewhere in the palace, a clock began to chime.
She counted them, the way she always did now. One. Two. Three.
By the seventh chime, she was sitting up.
By the tenth, she was out of bed.
The twelfth chime was still fading when she reached the connecting door. And then, pushed it open.
His room was dim, lit only by the pale wash of moonlight off the snow outside. The bed was empty, the covers barely disturbed.
Bharat stood at the tall windows, his back to her, one hand braced against the frame.
He'd changed out of his shirt; his shoulders were bare, lit silver along one edge by the moon.
He was looking out at the mountains the way he had looked at them a hundred times before, still, unreadable, alone with whatever he was thinking.
He had heard her come in, but didn’t move.
She had stood in his studio surrounded by twenty-two years of evidence that he was never as unreadable as he appeared. She didn't make the same mistake of reading his stillness as indifference.
She went towards him.
He turned.
For a moment, neither of them said anything. The room was cold where the window let in the night air, and warm everywhere else, and Yamini crossed the distance between them.
She stopped in front of him, close enough to feel the warmth of his skin before she touched him.
She placed both palms flat against his bare chest.
His body went rigid under her hands. His breath caught, audible in the quiet.
“You shouldn’t be here,” he said. His voice was low, careful, the same voice he'd used at the start of the evening when she'd first come through this door uninvited.
“I'm exactly where I want to be.” She held his gaze. “I'm your wife.”
He didn't say anything. But his heartbeat beneath her palms began to beat faster.
Yamini tilted her chin up.
“I’ve read the contract,” she said.
She stepped closer. She was now close enough to feel his hard arousal. But he didn’t move.
He was holding back. Not because he didn't want her, but because he thought giving in would take away her choice.
“Article Four, Section Two of the contract,” she said. “Physical intimacy shall be facilitated when both parties are in agreement.”
She had hated the contract for months. Right now, it was the most useful document she had ever read.
His golden-brown eyes darkened with intensity.
Her mouth curved as she deliberately rubbed against his arousal. “Both parties are definitely in agreement.”
His eyes flickered, darkening further. Her heart raced because she knew that look. She had seen it each time she provoked him deliberately.
One moment she was quoting the contract and rubbing against him—the next, his arms swept her off the floor.
She gasped and curled her hands around his neck.
His expression remained composed. Only his eyes betrayed him.
And those eyes promised that he had absolutely no intention of arguing about contracts any further.
He carried her toward the bed.
The moment her back hit the mattress, their mouths met in hunger. A month of being apart made their passion burn.
She heard a rip when he yanked up her nightdress, and then he was inside her.
She gasped. In pain, in pleasure, and the sheer rightness of it.
She dug her fingers into his shoulders and pulled him closer.
Much later, when the room had gone quiet again, Yamini lay against his chest, his arm heavy and warm around her waist.
Nothing was solved yet.
But for the first time in a month, she slept without effort.