Taken As Reward (The war of politics and love BOOK 2 )

21. Khelwad

ZEHRA

My eyes went to the box in his hand, my eyes blurred, cheeks heating up, as I stepped back immediately from him, my eyes travelling in the whole house before they rest on his face,

I was here to ask him something, but I watched the words and my voice running miles from where I was standing,

And a new question gripped me, I was ashamed, I shied away, turning around, as I traced my steps back into the bedroom, to behave unaware of whatever happened there.

I was unsure if the box was still before my eyes, or is it I couldn't shake it out of my head. I have seen these boxes and the unchaste ads on television, but I was not a cavewoman. I know where and when they are used,

The question I had starting to deflect me, I stopped at the threshold of his bedroom, turning around, my eyes blinked at him, who hadn't taken his eyes away from, or my open back that he just unzipped.

Did he ask Devakshaya to take Divya and Maa away?

"Did you-"

"I didn't, Dev did it and it was surprising to me too, and this box he did it as a tease!" He was straightforward, maybe he saw the discomfort behind my red face.

I gave a slow nod before I shut the door in his face.

I rested myself on the door, staring at the ceiling,

He wants me to love him, accept him, want him, trust him. And I have been standing at a place, where I have forgotten how to do all these things.

Love was the word, I lost when I was sitting in front of the drape and waited hours for him to show up and take me away from that misery.

Accept him? I had accepted so many things, I don't have the power to accept something else, something new.

Trust? He lost it once, and I lost my heart. I don't have it to give him again to break or keep.

And I have learned my lesson early in life. You don't get what you want. You never do.

But if I remove the pressure of these words from our life? I am ready to live my life the same way I have been living for almost a month now!

If he forgot that we are not married, it's nothing new, because days went by and I forgot that we have a fake marriage.

I heard the nod, stirring out of my mind, "You did not eat or drink at the party, I will and bring some take out?" He asked me,

"Why unnecessarily! I will cook!" I said when he groaned on the other side,

"No, you will not." He said, as I felt something by my feet, he shoved the phone to me, at his perfect time.

I took the phone, changing in, I dialled the number,

"Zehra!" Ammi was so cheerful on the other side, her words on and on, her usual concerns in the middle.

She doesn't know where I am, she doesn't know what I have been through. All she was told is my husband died, my in-laws married me to someone else, and I am living with that someone else.

My in-laws did not bother to tell her who I was married off to, what he does or his photo at most, and completely shunned them from my life, it is no doubt to me that my in-laws and old man made the pact and distributed the money of my soul with each other.

I sent her money from the brothel every month, something that my husband promised to Murshad when he married me. And now, they think the money was my now-husband's doing but, it was the penny of me breaking my soul every day behind closed doors.