Touch Her And... (Completed)

Chapter 45

Her eyes were fixed on the floor, right from where the canvas was looking back at her.
She felt suffocated. As if the air was leaving her lungs slowly.
Why would Pratap paint her picture? Yes, he drew her. Her eyes were tearing up. She was frightened because she knew this could never end well.

She was under a trance but it broke when Ashok's voice boomed from behind her.
"Enough, stop there both of you!"

Her eyes fell on Aditya who was lying on the floor standing beside him was Pratap, who kept kicking him in the stomach. Aditya's nose was bleeding and his lower lip was busted.

"That was your day brother, but today's is mine." Pratap was shouting at him. He straddled him and kept punching on his face.

"You made her feel guilty, you made her ignore me.You want to take away the only person who genuinely cares for me but trust me I won't let you." He said through gritted teeth. His eyes were displaying an emotion which was impossible for her to pinpoint.

"Please stop!" She shouted but none of them heard her.

She was about to run to them when suddenly within a blink of an eye the whole scenario changed.

Now Aditya was straddling Pratap the only difference was that he wasn't punching him. He was choking him to death. His eyes were murderous and bloodshot. He had an evil smirk plastered on his bloodied face. And the first thing he uttered sent chills through her body.

"Oh, how many times..how many times I dreamt of doing this. How many times I controlled myself from not poisoning the foods she kept sending you." His face held an inhuman satisfaction.

Pratap on the other hand was trying really hard to get rid of his deadly grip with one hand and throwing some weak punches here and there with the other.

Her whole body started getting numb.
Who was this man? Did she ever know him? He was unrecognizable. He looked like a psycho path if not anything. His eyes were becoming even redder,every vein and muscle in his  body were on the verge of bursting out.

Ashok was trying frantically to pull him off Pratap. Finally his grip on his throat loosened. But he elbowed Ashok in his ribcage, causing him flinch and pounced on Pratap again. This time he was punching on his jaw.

"She cares for no one else but me!" He screamed.

PUNCH.

"She loves me and I love her!"

PUNCH.

"Every breath she takes, every move she makes, her everything is claimed by me. There is only one person who has the right to think about her, care for her, fancy her, love her and paint her.

THAT WAS, IS AND WILL ALWAYS BE ADITYA DEV BARMAN!"

PUNCH.

"Do you hear me?!.. Do you....?!"

PUNCH. PUNCH. PUNCH.

They all were too occupied to notice that the whole commotion drew the attention of every other staff and every member of the family. So by then practically everybody got to understand what was happening between the two brothers and who, without any doubt, stood out to be the reason.

And they were all too occupied to even process the hard slap that stung Ambika's cheek and she gasped.

It stunned her and everyone else. But she couldn't get the chance to feel the pain because what happened next was even more painful.

The aged man who slapped her was now hanging mid-air with his throat within the inhumanely tight grip of the man she decided to spend her whole life with.
She looked at the aged man's face, the man who was her father. His eyes were on the verge of popping out. He was shaking. He was opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water.

"SLAP. HER. AGAIN!" Aditya growled at her father. His eyes, they were insane. As if he was possessed by something. And then his voice became softer.

"I dare you Purohit ji." He said. His voice held an unspoken challenge. But he was not ready to release him yet.

"Leave my father.. right now!" Finally she managed to yell at him.

His whole body tensed up. Finally the realization started hitting him hard. His grip on Purohit ji's throat loosened. His limp body fell on the floor.

He stood there like a wooden statue. His head was hanging low enough to prove that he knew that he messed up big time. He was panting.

She very slowly started moving towards her father's direction when Savitri ji called out to the staffs to move Purohit ji to his room and inform a doctor as soon as possible.

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On the other end of the floor a still struggling Pratap sat up. He moved towards the wall to support his back. His face was filled with bruises, his mouth was bloody, his kurta was torn from here and there. Then his eyes fell on the canvas and his face lit up in a tiny smile but they immediately changed and shifted towards Aditya and Ambika. He was observing them minutely. As if deducing a sort of conclusion. His eyes showed a hint of tears. But he closed them before the drops could make their way out.

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"I'm coming. Just give me a minute." She said to Ashok, who didn't even bother to look at Aditya's face.

"Make it fast." He turned around and left.
She took a deep breath, made a straight face and looked at Aditya, who stood there still with his head hung as low as possible.

"I hope you know what you did today." She started.
"You hurt your own brother like an animal. You almost killed my father. You hurt your best friend."
She paused.
Her eyes welled up with tears, her voice started shaking.

"You always feared loneliness. Now look around you, there is no one Aditya. Your own demons overpowered you." She started sobbing.

"You destroyed the future that we always dreamt of building together." To this he finally snapped up his head.

"No!" He uttered. The fear,the heartbreak was visible on his face.

"Yes!" She firmly stated looking straight into his eyes.

"Never in my wildest dreams!" He yelled and slapped on the wall right beside her head. She didn't even flinch. Her hurt was stronger than his rage.

"I love you, but if my presence in your life becomes the reason of your inhumanity then I would rather not encourage it anymore. You will stay away from me and that's final." Her teary eyes not meeting his ones anymore. She kept looking at his chest.

"No.." His voice started shaking with nervousness. His breathing became uneven.

"Please.." he pleaded trying hard to stifle a sob. He took her hands in his and held them tightly.

"Please don't do this to me Amu. I'll behave. I'll do anything and everything you want me to do. Hell, you can treat me as a dog for all I care. I'll bear everything. J-Just don't do this to me. You're all I want." And his eyes couldn't control the tears anymore. They kept flowing out like a broken damp.

She was aware of the pain she was causing him and also aware of the fact that she might lose her happiness forever. But she knew it was necessary. She saw what took him over. His obsession. His dominance. His own demons. And she would never let those win him over. She was patient enough to see him become the man everyone loved. And for that she needed to give him a hard time.

She placed both of her hands on his chest to which he released a shakey breath and looked at her with child like anticipation. But then she pushed passed him and walked away.

"N-no..NOOOO.....!"

She could hear him cry out in pain. But she decided not to turn around even though her heart kept aching.