Chapter 21
The scent of sandalwood teased Rohit awake the next morning as the first notes of daybreak crept through the window. Cocooned in some very nice, high-quality bedsheets, he turned onto his side, ignoring the pleas of his lazy, sated body that would happily welcome another hour of sleep.
But, for Rohit, there was no better reward than a glimpse of the most impressive woman he’d ever met lying beside him, fast asleep.
Even now, peacefully at rest, Cynthia projected strength.
She lay on her back, one arm curved over her head, her hand in a loose fist, the other flat on the mattress, a few inches from his own.
He was careful not to brush against it, or do anything, really, that would rob him of the opportunity to watch her like this, unguarded and peaceful.
He’d always found her beautiful—even when she had seemed to hate his guts—but he realized now that she might always be a bit of a mystery to him.
He’d seen her hard and he’d seen her soft, had witnessed her uncompromising will as well as her shy vulnerability.
He’d been on the receiving end of her blunt impatience, but he’d basked in her warmth and humor, too.
Cynthia was that undefinable moment between the tentative, hazy dawn and a bright, bold morning.
In the year they’d worked together, she’d always been too damn smart for her own good—except when it came to him. She was completely unaware that he couldn’t keep his eyes off her. That, despite her antagonism, she was a force to be reckoned with, one he didn’t want to stay away from.
She was unpredictable and he’d be content just trying to keep up for the rest of his life.
Carefully, Rohit rolled to look over the side of the bed and reached into the pocket of the pants he had discarded right before falling asleep.
Pulling out his phone, Rohit hunched his shoulders to shield Cynthia from the glare of the screen and was greeted by two unwelcome realizations: one, it was only five fifteen in the morning; and two, he had three missed video calls—one from his mother and two from his sister.
Damn it. Counting back, Rohit tried to recall the last time he’d talked to them.
The last few weeks were a blur of introducing new changes at work, analyzing the outcomes, and, well, spending time with Cynthia.
It was all too easy to forget his obligations when Cynthia’s smile had become a recurring gift in his life.
Rohit placed the phone on the mattress, screen down, and tapped his fingers on the back of its case.
Missed calls from home were not usually jarring, even during sleeping hours.
His family was more likely to call him whenever the mood struck rather than according to time zone etiquette.
But uneasiness nettled against the back of Rohit’s neck and he picked up the phone again, unsure of what to do.
“Everything okay?” The question was thick with sleep and satisfaction, and the better part of Rohit’s brain felt the immediate tug toward more pleasing things like buttery, sandalwood-scented sheets wrapped around a luscious, sandalwood-scented woman.
Leaving his phone behind, Rohit turned and almost groaned at the perfection awaiting him. Propped on her elbow, head in her palm, Cynthia was watching him, her hair soft and tangled, sheet pulled just high enough to offer a glimpse of cleavage that Rohit unabashedly enjoyed, much to her amusement.
“Rohit?”
“Yeah?” he asked, scooting closer.
“Is everything okay?” Cynthia asked again.
Rohit stopped midscoot, rolled onto his back, and palmed his phone again.
With a little shake of his head, Rohit held the screen up to show Cynthia. “Three missed calls from my family.” When he noticed Cynthia squinting against the glare of the phone screen, he winced. “Sorry,” he said before tossing it farther down the bed between their bodies.
“You can call them back if you want to,” Cynthia said, again burrowing under the covers, and Rohit forlornly eyed the disappearing expanse of soft, tawny skin.
“Nah, I’m sure it’ll just be the usual rundown of what am I doing and what am I eating from my dad followed by Mom’s detailed report about each of her three sisters, filling me in on the gossip and their passive-aggressive behaviors.
Then my sister will grab the phone and tell me about school and complain about the hardships of living at home even though she’s still a teenager.
And just when I think the call is almost done, Maisa will then ask about my job, and my parents will run back into the room because they love hearing about their big, important son who is living the dream in America. ”
Although the last little bit sounded bitter in Rohit’s ears, Cynthia didn’t seem to notice.
“You mean Canada,” she corrected with a yawn.
“It’s all the same to them,” Rohit joked with forced cheeriness that masked the sudden hollowness in his chest. “Land of tall people, dry weather, and unseasoned food.”
Cynthia’s smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. “That’s nice, though,” she said in a quiet voice.
“Their stereotyping?”
“That they check in with you. That they care enough to ask you about your life.”
At the pensiveness in Cynthia’s tone, Rohit contemplated what his life might’ve been like had he never left India.
As a bachelor, he’d probably still be living at home in his family’s small two-bedroom flat.
And even though he was thirty-one years old, he knew his father would still go to the market every morning to buy jackfruit—because it was his son’s favorite—and his mom would insist on tidying his room for him because he “worked too hard.” And near the end of the week, Maisa would start bugging him to treat her to a movie on the weekend, always a rom-com because it was their thing.
Homesickness washed over Rohit, surprising him.
Ever since Cynthia had asked him about his career goals, he’d never felt so grateful to be living in Canada.
Sure, he had a mountain of responsibilities keeping him in limbo between two very different countries, but at least they weren’t staring him in the face every time he sat down at the breakfast table or returned home from work.
And yet, he was so lucky to have a family like that.
Sure, they were nosy, loud, and financially stressed, but they cared about him and never stopped showing him they did, even when he failed to answer or return their calls for days at a time.
“Yeah,” he said, eyeing his phone guiltily, “I take them for granted. I should do more for them.” And stop whining about their financial needs , he added silently to himself.
“I don’t think any kid living overseas who sends money back every month to help his family is taking anything for granted,” Cynthia said.
It was as if she’d read his mind; her voice was so matter-of-fact that Rohit blinked in surprise.
When he shot her a questioning glance, her lips quirked apologetically. “My dad mentioned it once.”
“Your dad talks about me with you?”
Cynthia snorted in response. “He talks about you to everyone.”
“I owe your dad a lot, too,” Rohit said.
“No, you don’t. You’re smart, driven, and good with people. That’s all you.”
The words were complimentary, but there was an edge to Cynthia’s voice that made Rohit turn on his side again so he could study her face.
What he saw there was yet another mystery.
Cynthia was staring at the ceiling, her lips pulled down in a slight frown.
Not displeasure, necessarily. Troubled, maybe.
A quick, sharp but unobtrusive pain, like a paper cut.
He couldn’t be certain nor was he sure he could ask, but Rohit knew he would do anything to wipe that expression from her face.
“Are you complimenting me?” Rohit joked, hoping to alleviate the tension. “Should I write down the date and time?”
The corners of Cynthia’s lips lifted. “Don’t make me answer that. Saying the words was soul-destroying enough.”
Under the covers, Rohit slid his feet closer to hers and playfully nudged her ankle with his toes. The way she immediately swatted back with her feet was a new but interesting form of seduction.
“There’s also that MBA of yours,” Cynthia pointed out wryly. “That opens a lot of doors, too.”
Rohit’s feet froze mid-footsie. It had been a while since anyone had brought up those nauseating three letters, but when he heard them from Cynthia’s mouth, his stomach reeled and he abruptly flipped onto his back again.
He couldn’t be lying next to her, body and soul bared after last night, and not tell her.
She needed to know all of him if he was ever going to be able to love her the way he wanted to. And, possibly, earn her love in return if he was so lucky.
“About that…” Rohit cleared his throat.
“Yeah?” As if it were the most natural thing in the world, Cynthia moved closer and rested her head on his chest, her leg wrapping over his. The hug was almost enough to chase away the chill seeping underneath his skin.
Almost.
“Rohit?” Cynthia prodded when he didn’t answer. “Are you about to tell me you’ve been headhunted by another company?” Her arm tightened around his torso, as if bracing herself for the punch line.
Rohit wanted to grab Cynthia’s wrist, keep her anchored to him as he delivered the blow, but he forced his arms to lay still where they were.
“I never actually finished my MBA,” he said.
It was the first time he’d ever said the words out loud—to himself, never mind in front of someone else—and for an alarming moment, Rohit’s lungs seized, and he felt like he couldn’t breathe.
Cynthia didn’t immediately pull away, but she did raise her head, gently clipping his chin on the way up.
“You never actually finished your MBA,” she parroted back.
Although her voice was flat and emotionless, her thick black lashes framed wide, startled eyes as she studied his face. “Are you serious?”
He couldn’t meet her stare. “Yes.”
A part of him regretted saying the words out loud—to his boss’s daughter, of all people—but a larger part of him was in a state of shock at the power of his admission.
It had silenced the room, frozen them in time, quite possibly ruined one of the best mornings of his life.
His entire body stiffened, primed for a fight, rejection, disgust, or all of the above.
But she hadn’t pulled away—yet. “So…you lied to my father? To get the job?”
The lump in Rohit’s throat took him by surprise. Admitting the truth to Cynthia had frightened him, but the reminder that he’d deceived the man who was keeping him and his family afloat was worse. Shame flushed through him and he tried to roll away.
But Cynthia’s arm tightened around his torso, holding him captive. In this, too, she was stubborn and strong, and Rohit wasn’t surprised in the least. “Why?” she asked.
In a low monotone, Rohit walked Cynthia through the sequence of events that had led him to abandoning his MBA program early in its second year.
There was no emotion in his voice, no bitterness or sadness, not even as he described the gravity of his grandmother’s stroke.
He felt like a tired patient describing his medical history to the seventh doctor in two months.
He’d revisited the events too many times in his own head already, turning them this way and that, looking—unsuccessfully—for a cure that might alleviate his burdens and soften the sharp edges of what Rohit was beginning to fear was resentment.
Cynthia pulled her arm away to prop her head on her hand, and Rohit held his breath. Would she throw him out, never speak to him again? Would she threaten to tell her father?
“If your family needs access to healthcare and government programs, why don’t they immigrate like you did?” she asked.
Rohit exhaled shakily. It was far from a sigh of relief, but, at her curiosity, hope curled inside his chest. “I can’t afford to sponsor them.
Besides, I’m not sure they’d want to.” It was a thought Rohit, too, had mulled over before.
His sister would likely jump at the opportunity to come to Canada, but his parents had never broached the topic—their entire extended family resided within walking distance of where they lived now.
And his frail, aging grandparents? He couldn’t imagine them hobbling through the snow or navigating public transportation with their broken English.
“You don’t have any other family members who could help?”
Behind closed eyelids, Rohit could practically see the black edges of his resentment growing, slinking inward like whisps of smoke. “My uncles and aunts back home help with physically caring for my grandmother, but…” He swallowed. “My parents worked so hard to send me abroad—I owe them everything.”
“Is that what they told you?”
“They didn’t need to.” Rohit could feel Cynthia’s gaze on the side of his face, but he didn’t dare turn his head to look into her eyes, fearful of what he might find in their amber depths.
Probably judgment, maybe pity. His heart squeezed painfully.
He wouldn’t blame her if there was regret given that she was now skin to skin with a man who had built his career on a lie.
Who had, for over a year, lied to her and her father.
“There’s no one else that could help you?” she asked.
Now Rohit did meet her eyes, unsaid words between them. He would never ask her father, could never. His mouth was dry but his words were firm: “No,” he said. “I can’t.”
Something unreadable clouded Cynthia’s eyes, and Rohit’s brain flashed forward to what would happen next. He should pull away, gather his clothes, and leave. Beg her to keep his secret, at least until he could find another job. He prepared himself for her anger and disgust. He deserved it.
But she laid her head back on his chest, her arm around him tighter than ever, anchoring him to her . “You were in an impossible situation,” she said softly, her lips whispering kisses against his chest, inches above his racing heart. “Sometimes I hate the world.”
The words were said so quietly, half-muffled and completely unexpected, and yet they were everything. Rohit squeezed her back and let Cynthia drive some of the dark, curling smoke away.