CHAPTER 28
ISHIKA
The sunlight hits me straight in the face like it has personal issues with me.
I groan loudly and try to turn away from it, dragging whatever blanket is over me higher.
My head pounds instantly in protest. Not a normal headache.
This feels targeted. Specific. Like someone opened my skull in the night and replaced my brain with a brick.
What the hell did I do yesterday?
I shift again and realize something else. This bed is extremely comfortable. Too comfortable. Soft mattress. Thick blanket. Pillows that feel expensive. Sheets that don’t scratch. The kind of bed that belongs to someone who has opinions about thread count.
My eyes remain shut for another few seconds while my brain tries to load properly.
Then panic nudges through the pain. I don’t recognize this bed.
I force one eye open. Light blurs everything at first. Then shapes begin to settle.
Neutral walls. Large room. Clean lines. A ceiling I have definitely never seen before.
I open the other eye.
And freeze.
Aryan is sleeping with his head in my lap.
I stare down at him for a full five seconds, certain my hangover has started producing hallucinations.
His head is tilted sideways awkwardly, one arm folded under him in what has to be the worst sleeping posture known to man.
His hair is messy, falling over his forehead.
His mouth is slightly parted. He looks annoyingly peaceful.
He also looks like he belongs in a shampoo advertisement.
Why is he in my lap? Why am I in his room?
Why am I wearing—I look down. A black oversized sweatshirt.
Not mine. Very much not mine. I go still.
My heartbeat kicks painfully against my ribs.
I look around again. Unknown room. Unknown bed.
Aryan. His clothes. My head hurting like punishment.
Oh my God. Did we—My eyes widen so fast it physically hurts.
No. No no no no.
I poke his shoulder with one finger. Nothing. I poke harder. He grunts and shifts but doesn’t wake. I poke him again, now aggressively. He finally inhales sharply, yawns, and opens his eyes slowly. For one very confusing second, he looks as startled to see me as I am to see him.
Then memory—or whatever version of memory he has—returns, and he smiles. “Morning, Sunshine.”
His voice. Deep. Rough with sleep. Warm in a way that should be illegal before breakfast. My brain briefly abandons all current emergencies to acknowledge that his morning voice is extremely hot.
Then panic returns. “Where am I?” I ask immediately. “What are you doing here? Why am I wearing your clothes?”
He pushes himself upright, stretching slightly before looking back at me with too much amusement. “Sunshine—”
“No. Answer in order.”
He laughs softly. “You are at my place,” he says. “Because I got a call last night saying you were wasted.” I close my eyes.
Oh God.
“I didn’t want to take you to yours considering you were…” He pauses, grin widening. “Really wasted.”
I hate him.
“This is my home,” he continues helpfully, gesturing around us. “Hence my presence.” I glare. “And you couldn’t exactly sleep in that.”
He points toward a chair in the corner. My clothes are draped there in a heap. I stare at them. Then back at him. Then at the clothes. Then back at him. “You changed me?” I ask in a dangerously calm voice.
His eyebrows shoot up. “Absolutely not.”
I narrow my eyes. “You changed yourself,” he says quickly. “And before you ask—no, nothing happened.”
“I know,” I say instantly.
My voice comes out two octaves too high. His smirk deepens. “I wouldn’t sleep with…” I wave vaguely at the whole of him. “You anyway.”
He tilts his head. “You found my biceps very interesting, Ishika.”
I freeze. Slowly. Horribly. He leans closer. “You might recall complimenting them.” My mouth falls open. I want the earth to split. I want it to swallow me whole. I want to be reborn in another country under another name. Before I can speak, the door opens.
“Great, you two are awake.” I jump so violently I nearly leave the bed.
Aryan also startles. “Maa!” He clutches his chest dramatically. “You scared me.” His mother stands in the doorway smiling like she just walked into her favorite television show. She ignores him completely and walks straight to me, holding out a glass.
“Drink this,” she says gently. “It will help your headache.” I look from the glass to her, then to Aryan, then back to the glass. My cheeks are burning so hot I’m surprised the room hasn’t caught fire. This woman has met me professionally. Now she is seeing me hungover in her son’s clothes.
Excellent.
I take the glass carefully. “Thank you,” I whisper. I drink. And instantly regret being alive. It tastes disgusting. Sharp, bitter, aggressively medicinal. I make a face so involuntary it probably belongs in cartoons. She laughs softly.
“You two continue talking,” she says, looking between us with suspicious brightness. Then she winks.
Winks. Oh my God.
“I’ll call you when breakfast is ready.” And then she leaves. The door closes.
Silence. I turn slowly toward Aryan. He is flushed. Actually flushed. Which makes me feel slightly better. “I am sorry about that,” he says, now standing several feet away like distance can save him.
I press my fingers to my temples. “Was I too…”
His smirk returns immediately. “Oh, you were so fun.”
I hate that look. “You danced,” he says, counting on his fingers. “You called me a mood killer. You yelled at me. You said you hated me.” My stomach drops. “And so much more.”
“I will punch you,” I say out loud.
“You can do that.” He shrugs casually. Then lifts his phone. “No.”
He presses play. My own face fills the screen. I watch in horror as I dance wildly in the car, hair flying everywhere, yelling lyrics with complete confidence and zero rhythm. “No.”
Aryan is laughing so hard he can barely hold the phone steady. “That cannot be me.”
“It is deeply you, Sunshine.”
I leap off the bed. He reacts instantly, jumping backward onto the mattress and holding the phone away. “Give me that!”
“Never!” I climb onto the bed after him, reaching across, nearly grabbing it—My foot catches in the blanket.
I pitch forward. He drops the phone and both his arms come around me automatically—one around my waist, one behind my head.
We hit the bed with a heavy thud. The air leaves my lungs.
For one suspended second, nothing moves.
I’m half sprawled over him. His arm is still around my waist. My face is inches from his.
Too close. Way too close. His hair is messy beneath my fingers. His eyes are bright and startled and green and entirely too beautiful at this distance. There’s a tiny scar near his jaw I’ve never noticed before. His breath touches my cheek. My heart goes feral.
I push myself off him immediately and sit upright, putting distance between us before my traitorous organs do something humiliating.
He sits up too.
“Sorry,” he says quickly.
“Fine,” I reply too quickly.
Neither of us looks at the other for a second. The room feels warmer now. Or maybe that’s me. I clear my throat. “Sorry for the trouble yesterday.”
He turns toward me immediately. “It was not trouble at all.” There is no teasing in his tone. No grin.
Just sincerity so gentle it hurts. “Bailing you out of dangerous situations,” he says, smiling softly now, “is exactly the duty I signed myself up for.”
Something in my chest twists painfully. No one says things like that casually. No one means them either. And yet with him—I can never tell where the joke ends and the truth begins. He stands. “You can get changed,” he says. “I’ll meet you in thirty minutes.”
I nod. Still not trusting my voice. He reaches the doorway, then pauses and turns back. “And Ishika?” I look up.
“Next time you feel lonely,” he says carefully, “or want to go to a bar for whatever reason…”
He hesitates. Then finishes quietly. “Please let me know.” He stands there looking almost hopeful.
Like my answer matters. Like I matter. I nod again.
He gives me one last small smile and leaves.
The room falls quiet. I look down at the oversized sweatshirt hanging off my frame.
At the bed where I woke with his head in my lap.
My phone lying abandoned near the pillow.
At the place in my chest that feels too full.
I came here drunk. Embarrassed myself. Cried, probably. Complimented his arms. And somehow the worst part of all this is not the humiliation. It’s that I liked waking up here. Liked him being the first thing I saw. Which is dangerous. Because now I know what this feels like.
And wanting something once you’ve felt it—That’s how ruin begins.