Ch42 The Secret in the Soil #4
Seeing this fierce, newfound self-confidence in Rivanya's eyes filled Dhara's heart with immense comfort.
After a brief pause, her expression turned gentle yet serious as she nudged her sister playfully.
"Rivu, now tell me the real story... how is Jiju treating you? I mean, how are things between the two of you?"
Rivanya blinked, momentarily caught off guard. "What do you mean, how is he with me?"
"I mean, how is your actual relationship progressing, Rivu?" Dhara clarified, peering closely into her face. "Is there any development between you two?"
Rivanya let out a long, heavy breath, looking back down at the shimmering river waves.
"The only development taking place is within my own heart, Dharu. My feelings for Rudra are growing deeper with every passing second, but from his side... I don't think anything is happening at all. Sometimes,
the way he protects me makes me feel like he would willingly burn the entire world to ashes if a single scratch touched me. But then, the very next moment, he distances himself so completely, acting as if I am an absolute stranger who means nothing to him. I want to build a real home,
a real family with him, Dhara... but he refuses to even acknowledge me as his home. I honestly don't know what I'm going to do."
"Don't lose hope, Rivu!" Dhara countered instantly, squeezing her hand reassuringly.
"Only an absolute fool would ever dream of rejecting a girl as wonderful as you. Jiju clearly has no idea that half the guys out there would go completely crazy just to have someone like you by their side, yet he sits there being totally oblivious!"
A soft, defensive smile touched Rivanya's lips, her eyes softening as she defended him.
"That's not entirely true, Dharu... he does cherish me. In his own silent way, he cares for me immensely. You have no idea if even the slightest thing happens to my health, he completely loses his mind. He will literally flip the entire household upside down just to ensure I'm safe."
Dhara raised an eyebrow, a knowing smirk playing on her face. "And despite all that chaotic madness, he still has the audacity to claim he doesn't love you, right?"
When Rivanya nodded silently with a bittersweet smile, Dhara wrapped her arm around her shoulders, her voice ringing with absolute certainty.
"Don't you dare give up on him, Rivu. Just watch one day, the sheer power of your love will drag Jiju right into your arms. His heart will have no choice but to finally succumb and realize exactly what it wants. A day will surely come when you will become his entire universe, his absolute necessity,
and after that, no force on this earth will ever be able to separate the two of you. Just mark my words."
Tears of hope welled up in Rivanya's eyes at her sister's beautiful prophecy, a radiant smile breaking across her face. "May your favorite kaju katli fill your mouth for saying that! I pray to Mahadev that everything you just said comes true."
"It absolutely will, don't take any tension," Dhara laughed warmly, pulling her up from the stone step.
The two sisters laughed together, the heavy dark clouds completely lifting from the atmosphere.
Realizing it was getting quite late and the family would be waiting anxiously at the mansion, they locked their fingers together and began walking back up the steps of the ghat.
Hidden seamlessly within the moving crowd, Rudraksh's plainclothes security operative discretely raised his long-range lens, captured a candid shot of the two sisters smiling together, and instantly transmitted it across the secure underground network straight to Mumbai.
Miles away, inside the sleek, soundproofed boardroom of the Vardhan Head Office, Rudraksh was locked in a highly critical, multi-million dollar corporate meeting.
The atmosphere in the room was incredibly tense, with high-level executives sitting straight-backed, terrified of making a single error before their ruthless boss.
Suddenly, the silent, encrypted phone in Rudraksh's breast pocket vibrated against his chest.
Recognizing the specific, customized vibration rhythm assigned exclusively to his Kashi security detail, he held up a single, commanding hand, freezing the ongoing executive presentation instantly. He pulled out the device and unlocked the secure channel.
The high-resolution image of Rivanya opened on his screen.
He stared at her face, watching the pure, uninhibited happiness reflecting in her smile as she held Dhara's hand against the backdrop of Varanasi.
The sight hit his system with a sudden, overwhelming warmth.
Against his own rigid will, a soft, incredibly rare smile slowly graced the rugged, stern contours of his face.
A collective, breathless gasp silently rippled through the boardroom.
Every single corporate executive and board member sat frozen in absolute, paralyzed shock.
In all their years of operating under him, they had never seen the cold, unyielding, and ruthless Rudraksh Vardhan display a single trace of an actual smile during an active business meeting.
It was an unprecedented glitch in his terrifying matrix.
Meanwhile, back in Kashi, Dhara and Rivanya walked through the front doors of the Rathore mansion.
The exact second they crossed the threshold, Vasudha met them in the central hall, her hands on her hips as she put on a strict expression.
"Where on earth have the two of you been wandering around until this hour, huh? Do you not care about your dinner at all? Are you both not hungry even a little bit?"
Rivanya and Dhara quickly exchanged a swift, knowing glance.
Operating on pure childhood instinct, the two of them instantly lunged forward and wrapped their arms tightly around Vasudha's waist, burying their faces into her shoulders.
It was their classic, foolproof strategy to escape any maternal scolding a trick that had worked flawlessly for fifteen years, and it didn't fail them tonight either.
Vasudha's forced strictness vanished instantly.
She let out a soft laugh, wrapping her arms around both her girls, melting completely under their combined affection.
"Alright, alright, enough with the dramatic buttering. Go wash your hands and face properly and come straight to the dining table. I have prepared every single one of Rivanya's favorite dishes tonight. Move along, my children."
A short while later, the entire family gathered around the large wooden dining table.
Beneath the warm surface, Sandeep and Nanaji carried deeply restless hearts, but they meticulously masked their tension, refusing to let even a fraction of their worry slip into their expressions to trouble Rivanya.
As she sat down, Vasudha lovingly prepared her plate and began to personally feed her with her own hands.
Rivanya leaned into the familiar affection, a deep sense of contentment washing over her; after months of sheer isolation, being reunited with the people who truly cherished her brought an uncontainable joy to her soul.
Her sudden marriage to Rudraksh had been completely unexpected and chaotic, stripping her of the crucial time she needed to mentally prepare herself for moving away from her roots.
In the beginning, the sheer distance had made her survival agonizingly difficult, but now that she had gradually managed to embed herself into the fabric of the Vardhan Mansion, the initial ache had receded yet, as the timeless truth goes,
nothing can ever truly replicate the sacred comfort of one's own home and one's own people.
While everyone was smoothly finishing their dinner, the sharp, continuous vibration of Rivanya's phone cut through the chatter.
Glancing down at the screen, she noticed a completely unknown, unlisted number flashing.
Assuming it was a random telemarketing or business query, she decided to ignore it for the moment.
However, the phone began to ring relentlessly, back-to-back, refusing to quiet down.
Sensing an urgency, she slid the panel to accept the call and pressed it to her ear.
Before a single syllable of a greeting could form on her lips, Naresh Bedi's venomous, thunderous voice exploded directly through the speaker, echoing harshly into the quiet dining space.
The line instantly went dead as the call disconnected from his end.