AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Excuse me?”
“Why are you needling Dheer? Especially about Raksha?”
I couldn’t believe she was asking me that when she knew what I had gone through nine years ago.
“I’m not needling him exactly. I’m just poking holes in the happy ever after that he’s trying to construct,” I replied.
“But why? You guys are meant to be together. You know that as well as I do. Fate has given you a second chance, and Dheer wants to make amends for what he did nine years ago. Why are you making it more difficult?”
“And what about what I want, Isha?”
“What do you want, sweetie?”
I struggled for words because I had no idea what I wanted.
“What I don’t want is to be forced into this marriage. I don’t want to feel like I’m at Dheer’s mercy just because he’s sacrificing his future to save my life. I don’t want to be his rescue project.”
“He’s doing it happily,” she began, and I snorted in bitter amusement at her words.
“Really? Did you miss the part where he said he didn’t want to marry me any more than I want to marry him?”
“I didn’t miss anything. Not the fact that you were both unwilling this morning. Not the fact that something seems to have changed between you since then. And not even the fact that for all the animosity between the two of you, you can’t keep your eyes off each other,” she replied tartly.
“Bullshit,” I retorted, but Isha just rolled her eyes at me.
“Fine! Don’t tell me if you don’t want to, Meena Kumari, but don’t write off your chance at happiness yet. You never know, this marriage might be the best thing that happened to the two of you.”
“Fuck tragedy queen, I’m going to be a bandit queen,” I said, with a laugh. “Ask Ayush Goel if you don’t believe me.”
“You’re a queen in my eyes, no matter what,” she replied, throwing an arm around my shoulder. “The great Delulu queen, who will probably do the most unfashionable thing in the world and fall in love with her own husband.”
I shot her a mock glare.
“Bite your tongue, peasant. I’m fully planning to dump your brother after all this blows over.”
She ground to a halt and turned to me in surprise.
“What?”
I looked around to make sure we were alone before I leaned forward to whisper in her ear.
“It’s going to be temporary, fake marriage, Isha. But don’t tell my mom or she’ll disown me.”
Isha stared at me worriedly.
“Does Dheer know this?”
“Of course, he does. He might not like it, but I will not be tied to a man I hate.”
“You say it like it’s so easy, Diya. But you’re forgetting something very important.”
I crossed my arms over my chest and stared at her defiantly.
“And what’s that?” I asked.
“This is Dheer,” she said pointedly. “The man you’ve loved ever since you learned the meaning of the word. And you can say what you like but I know you’re still not over him. If you were, you would have moved on by now. But you’ve stayed single for the past nine years because try as you might, you couldn’t find a man to replace him in your heart.”
“It’s not his love that kept me single, Isha. It was the memory of his betrayal,” I scoffed. “And you know how they say that love and hate are two faces of the same coin? Well, I hate Dheer as much as I used to love him. I might need him now but it doesn’t erase the past. It doesn’t erase the fact that he threw me away like a used tissue when he found another woman.”
