“You will never be happy with her,” Leela hissed, her eyes narrowing to slits.
“Making you unhappy would be worth it.”
“You did not heed my warning with that girl, Kaveri or Kaya, whatever she is called these days. Are you sure you want to ignore me again?”
The small thread of reason holding him back, broke. He rushed up to her, spitting in her face. “Don’t you dare threaten me. Stay away from my friend.”
He recognized a second too late that his reaction was a mistake.
“Ah,” she snickered, honing in on the same weakness she’d exploited in the past. “I know about your friendship well. I saw evidence of it when she was standing half naked next to you.”
“Shut your vile mouth or I will make sure you get thrown out of here.”
Leela threw her head back and cackled, deriving a perverted sort of joy from having torn him down. Whatever happiness he’d been experiencing ten minutes ago was lost beneath the darkness of the ominous clouds she’d drawn over him, surrounding him in a storm that he feared would leave some kind of wreckage in its wake.
“Sure,” she taunted him. “Call someone to throw me out. I will ask my question louder, in a bigger crowd then. This friendship you have with Kaveri—is it the same kind of friendship you have with that girl living in your house, too? Does she know how friendly you are with Kaveri Rathore?”
His hands shook. “Shut up.”
“Does Kaveri’s husband know, too?”
“You disgust me.”
Unwilling to witness more of her nastiness, Rian turned, his heart plummeting when he realised Aditi and Kaya had overheard his argument with Leela.
His gaze rested upon Aditi’s ashen face.
“Doc,” he started, about to walk towards her when she stepped back, stopping him with a single shake of her head. The moment stretched, his feet aching to cover the space between them, his mind in a turmoil. Dread seeped into him as her eyes grew red, watching him like he had betrayed her.
Just when he thought she would finally call for him, allowing him to go to her, to explain himself and make this better, she threw him into an abyss of anxiety and guilt with a single word.
“Bunny.”
36
Respect
Aditi
She had to keepgoing.
She had to keep moving, stay busy and dosomething, whether or not it was useful, she decided, throwing a random scarf into her suitcase. She turned, brushing past the man who’d been standing silently in her room for well over a half hour, waiting for her to give him a chance.
Waiting for her to acknowledge him.
But doing so would mean having to stop, and stopping would mean that the feelings she was running from would catch up to her.
She knew it was inevitable. After all, how could she escape a tidal wave that had been growing at her shore, the warning for which she had not heeded?
She pulled out two shirts from her closet, stepping around Rian, who’d followedher yet again.
“Can we please talk now?” she heard him request, possibly for the fifth time since they’d gotten home. Her response would be no different.
“No.”
The ferociousness with which she zipped her bag made Rian flinch.
“I don’t want you to leave Mumbai with this hanging over us, Aditi. I’ll follow you to Bangalore if I have to.”