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“Same old,” Ram said easily, shoving his hands in his pockets and rocking back on his heels. “I-“ Whatever he’d been about to say disappeared into the ether as he stared at the girl who’d appeared in the doorway to the room.
“Hey!” Harsh exclaimed. “Aadhya! Over here!”
Aadhya, his brother-in-law’s sister and someone he considered a friend, grinned at him and waved. Her smile dimmed a little at the sight of his companions but Harsh didn’t have time to puzzle that out before she arrived at their little group.
“Hi everyone. Good party huh?” Aadhya beamed generally at them, her long curls cascading down her back like a waterfall, almost to the hem of her very short dress.
“Yeah.” Harsh said, when it looked like neither of the Gaddes were going to respond. Raashi looked like she thought this party was anything but good and Ram…well, the muscle ticking in his jaw looked like it was going to pop. He clearly wasn’t enjoying the party either.
“Are Akka and Aarush Anna here too?” Harsh asked looking around to see if he could spot them.
“Not yet. They may come by later,” Aadhya replied. “How are you enjoying your vacation in India so far, Raashi?” she asked the other girl with a friendly smile.
A short beat of silence and then the Viper mumbled, “It’s not a vacation. I’m back for good.”
Why God Why? Harsh looked up to where he presumed the heavens were. What had he ever done to deserve this? Hell was supposed to be down under, not right here in the middle of his life, presided upon by the Queen of Evil herself.
“Don’t look so constipated, Kodela. I would have thought you wouldn’t give a shit if I were here or not.”
And with that, she sauntered off into the crowd, not bothering to look back at him. Not that he wanted her to look back, he thought angrily. The woman was a fucking menace. No, she was a disease. A horrible, wasting disease.
It was only as he watched her stiff back retreat through the crowd that it struck him. He was no longer exhausted. The fatigue that dogged him, every second of every day, in recent times seemed to have sloughed off.
Instead, he felt…exhilarated.
His gaze went to that petite frame lined with poison and snark. Fuck his life. Exhilarated was not on the agenda. Not with a woman who was far more vicious than one with pencil sharpening vaginas.
Eight
RAASHI
“Amma, I want to go home,” Raashi grumbled as she trudged behind her mother into yet another high-end boutique.
“Shhh,” her mother shushed her absentmindedly.
The gold embroidery in the salwar kameez’s and the lehengas in this store hurt her eyes. Raashi shoved the sleeves of her sweatshirt up to her elbows in a vain bid to cool off. They’d been tromping from one boutique to another all day. Shopping was exhausting, not to mention, mind numbingly boring.
“Do you like this?” Amma held up a maroon and gold bling central kurta.
“No!” Raashi said, horrified. “I’d never wear that.”
Amma held it up to herself and looked at her reflection in the store’s mirror. “Not for you, for me.”
Oh. Raashi sagged in relief. “Very nice,” she murmured noncommittally. It wasn’t her style but her mother, Dhanvantri Gadde, could pull anything off. She was one of those rare beauties who aged both naturally and gracefully. She was also rather perplexed by the soda bottle glasses wearing, science and coding loving, fashion despising daughter she’d produced.
“Bitch.”
For a second, Raashi thought she’d imagined the muttered curse. She glanced around but saw only absorbed shoppers milling around. Amma had now moved on to a powder blue saree and was letting the salesperson drape it around her to get a better picture of how it looked.
Raashi pulled out her phone and saw a whole bunch of unread messages and missed calls. She frowned. Her phone was pretty much permanently on silent, so this wasn’t unusual but the numbers staring at her certainly were.
“Fucking whore.”
Startled, she glanced up. She certainly hadn’t imagined that! Her gaze clashed with a group of young girls hovering to the right of her mother. They had some outfits clenched in their hands as they waited their turn in the queue for the trial rooms. The sheer vitriol in their gaze had her taking a startled step back.
What the hell was that all about? When the girls continued to glare at her and mutter filthy curses beneath their breath, she raised an eyebrow at them and asked, “Are you talking to me?”
“We wouldn’t talk to you!” One of the girls practically spat the words out at her. “No one wants to talk to you!”
