Chapter 11 Kiara #2
I couldn’t bring myself to open my eyes. I couldn’t breathe! The clattering of falling items finally stopped, leaving the kitchen eerily quiet except for the sound of our breathing—mine was shallow and panicked, his ragged and deep. Slowly, I dared to peek through my lashes.
Manav’s arms were still wrapped around me, his grip was protective but controlled. His chest rose and fell rapidly, and his usually composed face was drawn tight, his eyes closed like he was processing… something. Maybe relief. Maybe irritation. Maybe both.
Then, as if sensing my gaze, he opened his eyes slowly, and they locked onto mine with a force that made my heart stutter. His usual frown was there, etched deeply into his features. “You okay?”
I nodded slightly, unable to form actual words because my brain had decided to go on vacation. And then, we just… stayed there. Frozen.
Seriously, where do I even begin to understand this chaotic nervous system of mine?
Is it because he smells so ridiculously good? Or maybe it’s those eyes—so deep, so intense, like they hold entire galaxies, and here I am, free-falling into them without a parachute.
Then there are his biceps. Dear Lord, those biceps. The way they flex subtly under my hands makes my ability to breathe feel like an optional skill.
And that frown. How can a frown—a literal expression of displeasure—be so… endearing?
Oh, and his hair. Can we talk about his hair? No, let’s not. Just looking at those strands falling casually over his forehead is enough to make me want to reach up, run my fingers through them, and maybe never stop.
And my ovaries? Forget it. They’ve given up on any semblance of restraint and are outright begging me to touch those full, perfect lips.
This is fine. Everything is fine. Nothing is fine.
“Kiara?” He said softly, his voice breaking through my inner monologue of doom.
Oh right. Reality. Great.
I finally spoke, “Yeah,” even though every nerve in my body was on high alert. My eyes betrayed me, flicking between his lips and his eyes, unable to settle.
He didn’t move. His gaze was still locked on mine, unblinking, as if searching for something.
Did something hit his head? Oh my God, so many things fell on him. What if he’s lost his memory?
Wait—what is he looking for in my eyes?
Is he having a heart attack?
Do I need to call a doctor?!
“Manav…” I whispered.
He blinked, snapping out of whatever trance he’d been in. He bent down silently and began picking up the mess on the floor, moving with his usual annoying composure, as if the last 60 seconds of intense eye contact hadn’t just happened.
Oh. My. God.
Is this blood? Dripping down his back, soaking through his shirt, each crimson stain sent a jolt of panic through me. He must have gotten hurt when all those sharp-edged boxes and packets came crashing down as he tried to protect me.
Yes… he shielded me from every falling object, but he got hurt in the process. And yet, he didn’t even seem to notice—his entire focus was on gathering the scattered boxes and packets from the floor.
“Manav!” I rushed toward him, my voice trembling as I reached out to stop him.
____________
“Where the hell did you go?” I blurted out, my frustration spilling over the moment he opened the door. “I’ve been ringing the bell for the last thirty minutes! Your phone is switched off, and I—” I stopped, taking a deep breath to rein in my tone. “I was worried about how badly you got hurt…”
Manav’s brows furrowed in genuine surprise as he looked at me, his gaze flickering down to the first aid box in my hands.
“Hi?” He said, running a hand through his still-damp hair, droplets glistening on his forehead. “Sorry… I was in the shower.” He stepped aside to let me enter.
Of course. My eyes couldn’t help but trace the faint redness around his collar where the blood had been.
While he poured water into glasses, I set the first aid box down on the table, glancing back at him. He was already seated on a stool, watching me quietly, his eyes tracking my every move.
“I don’t need this,” he muttered, glancing at the ointment in my hand like it was a waste of time.
“Yes, you do…”
“Kiara…”
“Now… be a good boy,” I said, motioning for him to turn around.
He flinched slightly when my fingers brushed against his back, revealing deep scratches etched across his skin.
They looked fresh and angry, as though something sharp had clawed into him.
My gaze drifted over an old scar, faint but unmistakably there, standing out against the smooth expanse of his skin.
When I reached out and traced the scar with the tips of my fingers—curious, unthinking—his entire body stilled.
He didn’t flinch.
He froze.
Every muscle went taut beneath my touch, like I’d brushed over something that wasn’t meant to be touched. A memory still alive under the skin.
“How did this happen?” I asked softly, my fingers grazing the line of damaged tissue again.
His shoulders dipped slightly, tension unraveling just a little.
Then, after a long pause, he murmured, “Old wound. A knife tore through some muscle.”
My breath caught. “Someone stabbed you?”
“It was a long time ago,” he said, voice clipped. Controlled. Like each word had to pass through a filter of pain before reaching the surface.
I let my fingers linger over the scar, slower this time. A deliberate gesture.
“Why would someone stab you?” I asked gently.
“I was trying to protect someone.”
“A girlfriend?” I asked before I could stop myself, the word tasting unsure on my tongue.
“Ex-girlfriend.”
I hesitated. “Do you… Still love her?”
“I was an assignment for her.” His voice was quiet. Fractured. Like he’d rehearsed this confession in his head a thousand times, but never let it out loud.
I blinked. Assignment?
“A job… that she did really well. Too well, actually. I was her eighth.” He let out a dry laugh—more air than amusement. “Seven before me. Powerful men. CEOs. Politicians. All vulnerable in just the right places.”
My stomach twisted. Every instinct screamed to reach for his hand, to tell him it wasn’t his fault. But I didn’t. Because this wasn’t the kind of pain you fix with a touch.
“She played the part perfectly. The charm. The fear. The vulnerability—it was all scripted.” He looked away, voice splintering. “I fell for a scam. Not a woman.”
“Manav…” The name tasted like heartbreak on my tongue.
“She disappeared the night I got stabbed—vanished like she never existed. No real name. No trail.” He looked like stone—but his voice was all shrapnel.
“Interpol’s after her now. She’s apparently in charge of a Russian cartel’s surveillance arm. Assigning new businessmen as… study projects.” His jaw clenched. “Guess I was just another lab rat.”
“Oh my God…”
“It doesn’t matter anymore.” But it did. I could see it in the way his shoulders stiffened, in how his eyes refused to meet mine—as if looking at me meant remembering how deeply he’d once trusted… and how wrong he’d been.
“You were just trying to love someone.” My voice cracked—soft, helpless.
“And she was just gathering intel.” He gave a shrug, empty and hollow. “The world thinks I had something to do with her disappearance. That I snapped. Or covered it up. I’ve heard it all.”
No wonder he was always guarded. No wonder his silence felt heavier than most people’s screams.
“That’s insane.”
“Not to the media,” he said, pressing his fingers to the bridge of his nose like he was holding back something sharp. “Not to the investors. Not to the board. To them, I’m the cold, calculated Oberoi who loved the wrong woman… or made her disappear.”
His voice cracked—barely. But enough to shatter the air between us.
I stepped closer, my words barely above a whisper. “She doesn’t belong in your story anymore.”
He turned away slightly, shoulders angling like he was slipping back into his armor. Back into the version of himself the world knew—untouchable. Sharp-edged.
But then… His eyes opened slowly. And when they met mine—finally—for a fleeting second, I saw it.
Not the rage.
Not the mask.
Just a man. Broken. Brave. Still standing.
“No,” he said. His voice steadier now. “She doesn’t.”
He blinked slowly, like he was finally laying that ghost to rest.
“Thanks,” he said quietly, the words weighted with more meaning than he could explain.
I offered a small, crooked smile. “Thank you for saving me. If Dadi had found out I died in the kitchen, she would’ve followed me to heaven just to scold me. And then bring me back down just to kill me again.”
He let out a soft laugh, the sound rough and short-lived—but real.
“You’re not exactly low-maintenance, are you?” he said.
“Shocking, right?” I said, raising an eyebrow. “And yet, here you are. Voluntarily listening to my nonsense.”
His lips curved just slightly at the corner, but something in his eyes lingered—dark and quiet.
There was still more he wasn’t saying.
But maybe that was okay.
“Where is your grandma?”
“Dadi is in India,” I replied, my voice thoughtful but tinged with sarcasm. “On an unyielding mission to find a ‘suitable match’ for me. The day I return, she’ll probably invite all the eligible bachelors from around the world and have me married by the very next day.”
“Sounds like a plan,” he said, breaking the intense stare and moving toward the kitchen counter.
“I don’t want to get married.”
“Are you gonna break Dadi’s heart?”
“I have to go back for her ninetieth birthday, and she’s summoned the entire Randhawa family—like, everyone.”
I’ll have to face a disaster: my dad and his rejection, my stepmom and her ‘perfect’ life choices, my cousins with their endless teasing, my aunts who live for gossip, my friends with their sickeningly romantic soap-opera lives—and top it all off, the millionaires and billionaires my Dadi has handpicked as potential suitors for me.
He tilted his head, his smirk softening into something more thoughtful. “I think you’d survive.”
And why, why is he laughing?
“Marriages are not that hard…” He was scratching that stubble- cute stubble.
“I don’t want an arranged marriage—I’m a romance writer!”
“Romance writer, huh?” he said, stepping closer.
I barely had time to blink before he leaned in, caging me between the counter and his body. His hands planted firmly on either side of me, his warmth enveloping the small space like a storm front I didn’t see coming. His eyes locked onto mine—steady, unreadable, dangerous.
“Yes…” I managed, though it came out more like a squeak than a word.
“So…” he murmured, voice low and lethal, “how many romance writers exist in this world who don’t know how to kiss?”
God. Why does he have to look this hot while being this infuriating?
“I already apologized for that night,” I muttered, looking down, pretending to be fascinated by my own fingers, which were now fidgeting with the edge of my shorts like they had a purpose. They didn’t. Neither did I.
“You never had enough boyfriends to teach you?”
“No,” I whispered. My cheeks burned. And I still couldn’t look at him.
“Why?” he asked, his voice softer now—but no less intense. The proximity, the way he hovered just inches from me, his presence folding over mine like heat—my thoughts were fraying fast.
“I just… I was a busy girl.”
“Doing what?” he asked, amused. “Writing about kisses without ever having one?”
“Manav…” I warned—or tried to. It came out breathless, more plea than protest.
“How do you explain something in your books if you’ve never experienced it?”
“My books are doing just fine, thank you very much,” I snapped, trying to cling to the last shred of my dignity.
“I know,” he said with a half-smile. “But I’m curious.”
“Oh? Do crime and thriller writers commit murders for research?”
He tilted his head. “How would I know? I don’t know many.”
“Then don’t waste your time thinking about them now,” I grumbled, and pushed at his chest gently, meaning to create distance.
Big mistake.
My palms landed square on his chest, right over his heart—steady, rhythmic, maddeningly calm.
Of course, he was calm. He was probably enjoying this.
“That ship’s already sailed, Ms. Randhawa,” he said, glancing down at my hands still resting on him.
My throat went dry.
“Are you flirting with me?”
The words fell out before I could catch them.
Kill me now. Bury me here.
His eyes gleamed. “Do you want me to?”
This man was dangerous in all the ways I didn’t know how to protect myself from. And the worst part?
I wasn’t sure I wanted him to stop.
“I’m sure you have better things to do, Mr. Oberoi.”
“Better things like giving you private kissing lessons?”
His eyes dropped to my lips. He licked his own absently, and I swear I blacked out for a second.
“I said sorry,” I choked out. “Now, if you’ll excuse me—I have to prepare for an interview.”
“Where?”
“Don’t act like my bodyguard.”
“I’ll be waiting in the car outside,” he said, finally easing back just enough to let me breathe again.
“There’ll be mosquitoes,” I said as I adjusted my posture, trying to pretend I hadn’t just had an out-of-body experience. “Wouldn’t want them ruining your flawless skin. That’s bad for business, isn’t it?” I rolled my eyes.
The corner of his mouth twitched. “My beautiful skin can handle it,” he replied with an insufferable smirk. “But just out of curiosity—are mosquitoes usually your interview subjects, or is this a special edition?”
And then—just like that—he walked away—leaving me breathless, aroused, and one hundred percent sure I was completely screwed.
A mix of frown, dimples, flexing arms, and that smile? Someone, please write this down. I may need to present it to a medical professional very soon.
Diagnosis:
Death by Manav Oberoi.