Chapter 13 : The Crimson Vow

The silence that followed Khushi’s hand against Arnav’s mouth was heavier than the freezing Shimla wind. Her palm was a fragile barrier between his rage and her heartbreak, a small patch of warmth in a room that had become an icebox of resentment. Arnav’s eyes, dark and turbulent, bored into hers, searching for the defiance that usually fueled their battles. But he found only a weary, jagged love.

Slowly, Khushi lowered her hand. The red sindoor he had smeared across her forehead had stained her thumb, a vivid mark of the struggle that had just transpired. She looked up at him, her silhouette framed by the jagged Himalayan peaks outside the window, her white saree fluttering like a distressed flag.

"It’s still not too late, Arnav," she whispered, her voice barely audible over the whistle of the wind. "The world saw a ceremony, yes. They saw a man protecting a woman. But look around you. There are no papers. No signatures. This marriage... it hasn't been legalized. In the eyes of the law, you are still free."

Arnav’s grip on her shoulders tightened, his knuckles turning white. "What are you saying, Khushi?"

"I’m saying you can end this," she said, a desperate strength entering her tone. "You don’t have to carry this burden forever. I cannot wake up every morning and see you looking at me with that... that haunting hatred. You deserve the laughter I saw tonight. You deserve a partner like Simran—someone who matches your world, someone who makes you smile without a shadow of death hanging over the conversation. You deserve a marriage that doesn't feel like a prison sentence."

"A prison sentence?" Arnav repeated, the words tasting like ash in his mouth.

"Yes!" she cried, the tears finally breaking free and carving paths through the red powder on her cheeks. "This marriage will not be considered legal in any court. You can walk away tomorrow, tell the world it was an impulsive act of protection, and no one would blame you. You can move on, Arnav. You can find the life you were supposed to have before I... before I ruined everything."

She took a gasping breath, her mind racing, searching for the final argument that would make him see reason, to make him realize that she was setting him free for his own sake.

"We are strangers living under the same roof," she pushed on, her heart thundering against her ribs. "There is nothing binding us but a few grains of powder and a thread. We haven't... we haven't even consummated this marriage, Arnav. There is nothing real about us."

She stopped abruptly, her face flushing a deep crimson that matched the sindoor. The word hung in the frigid air, heavy and intimate, a boundary she had never intended to cross out loud. She looked away, unable to meet his gaze, her chest heaving with the weight of her declaration.

The temperature in the room seemed to plummet even further. Arnav stood perfectly still, his breath coming in short, ragged bursts. The word "consummated" echoed in his mind, stripping away the last of his carefully constructed distance. He looked at her—clad in that cursed white saree, her neck adorned with his diamonds, her face stained with his mark—and something inside him snapped. It wasn't the cold rage he was used to; it was a white-hot, possessive fire that leveled every wall he had built over the last three years.

"You think this marriage is not real?" he asked, his voice dropping to a terrifying, vibrating low.

He took a step toward her, his presence looming over her like a dark cloud. Khushi backed away until her spine hit the cold stone of the window frame, her eyes wide with a sudden, visceral fear.

"You think," he continued, his words clipped and sharp, "that I am the kind of man who stakes his name in front of the entire world just to treat it as a temporary arrangement? You think I applied this sindoor as a joke? That I tied this mangalsutra around your neck just to have you throw it back in my face the moment the lights go out?"

"Arnav, I only meant—"

"I know exactly what you meant!" he roared, slamming his hand against the window frame beside her head, the wood groaning under the force. "You think I can just walk away as and when I want? You think you can dismiss me, dismiss us, because of a lack of paperwork? You think the law defines what you are to me?"

He grabbed her waist, his large hand spanning the small of her back, and yanked her flush against his chest. The contact was jarring. The heat of his body through his wool suit seared her through the thin cotton of her white saree.

"You want a legal marriage, Khushi?" he hissed, his face inches from hers, his eyes burning with an infuriated intensity. "You want to talk about what makes a marriage 'real' in your eyes? If the mark on your head isn't enough, if my name isn't enough, then let’s make it real. Let’s remove every doubt you have about who you belong to."

Before she could scream, before she could even draw breath to protest, Arnav’s mouth crashed onto hers.

It wasn't the gentle, romantic kiss of a storybook wedding. It was a bruising, desperate claim. It was an explosion of three years of repressed longing, a decade of childhood memories, and a week of blinding fury all compressed into a single, devastating contact. His lips were hard, demanding, and tasted of the whiskey he had drunk and the salt of her tears.

Khushi’s mind went blank. The world shifted on its axis, the biting Shimla wind and the flickering candles disappearing into a void. There was only the heat of him, the smell of his cologne, and the crushing pressure of his mouth. She tried to push against his chest, her hands fisted against his lapels, but he didn't budge. He was a mountain of solid muscle and unyielding will.

He shifted his grip, one hand tangling into her hair, his fingers grazing the red powder he had just applied, while the other arm held her so tightly against him that she could feel the frantic thud of his heart against her own. It was a kiss that sought to erase Simran, to erase the white saree, to erase the three years of silence.

Arnav pulled back for a fraction of a second, his forehead resting against hers, both of them gasping for air that felt too thin to breathe.

"Don't you ever," he panted, his voice ragged and broken, "ever tell me to go to another woman. Don't you dare tell me that what I feel for you—even if it’s hatred—isn't the most real thing in my life. You are mine, Khushi. Legally, spiritually, physically. And tonight, I will make sure you never forget it."

He didn't wait for her to answer. He picked her up in one fluid motion, her white saree billowing like a cloud around them. He didn't look at the dark room or the open windows. He only looked at her—at the woman who was no longer a widow, no longer a ghost, but his wife.

He laid her on the bed, the white sheets a stark contrast to the black shadows of the room. The moonlight spilled over them, illuminating the red stain on her forehead and the diamond glinting at her throat.

"Is it real enough now?" he whispered, his voice a low promise as he leaned over her, his eyes locking onto hers with an intensity that promised no escape.

The silence that followed was no longer the freezing, jagged quiet of the Shimla wind. It was a heavy, profound stillness, broken only by the synchronized, ragged rhythm of their breathing. The moonlight, indifferent and cold, spilled across the bed, illuminating the wreckage of their resistance.

Arnav lay there, his heart thudding a slow, heavy beat against his ribs, the heat of the moment beginning to recede and leave behind a terrifying clarity. As he shifted slightly, the tangled silk of the sheets fell away, and the reality of their union hit him with the force of a physical blow.

There, stark against the pristine white linen of the hotel bed, was a small, unmistakable crimson stain. It was a vivid, singular mark that mirrored the dark red sindoor he had smeared across her forehead only an hour before.

The air seemed to leave his lungs.

The realization was a tidal wave that leveled every remaining wall of his anger. For three years, he had lived in a self-inflicted hell, fueled by the conviction that she had shared her life, her body, and her heart with his brother. He had envisioned their wedding night in a thousand different ways, each version a fresh torture to his ego. He had called her a tease, a gold-digger, and a widow who had "consumed" her husband.

But the evidence before him spoke a truth that no lie could survive. She had never been Ankush’s wife in the way that mattered. She had carried the burden of that marriage, the stigma of the white saree, and the cruelty of his own hatred, all while remaining untouched. She had been a widow to a man she had never truly belonged to.

Arnav looked down at Khushi. She was curled into his side, her small frame still trembling. Her eyes were closed tight, her long lashes wet with fresh tears. Her fingers were still clutching the fabric of his shirt, her knuckles white as she tried to navigate the lingering, sharp ache of her first time.

"Khushi," he breathed, his voice breaking. The word was no longer a command or a curse; it was a prayer.

He felt a crushing weight of guilt settle over him. He had taken her in a fit of possessive rage, driven by a need to prove she was his, only to find that she had been waiting for him all along. Even when she was "Mrs. Ankush Raizada," she had been his.

Khushi’s breath hitched as she felt his gaze. She opened her eyes, the honey-brown depths filled with a mixture of vulnerability and a strange, quiet peace. She saw the shock on his face, the way his eyes were fixed on the stain on the sheet, and she instinctively tried to pull the duvet higher to cover herself.

"Arnav, I..."

He didn't let her finish. With a tenderness that felt alien after years of ice, he reached out and cupped her face. His thumb, still stained with the red powder from her maang, brushed a tear from her cheek. He leaned down, pressing a soft, lingering kiss to her forehead, right over the mark he had forcefully applied.

"I didn't know," he whispered against her skin, his voice thick with emotion. "I thought... I believed..."

"It doesn't matter," she whispered back, her voice raspy.

He moved his lips to her cheeks, kissing away the salt of her tears. He felt her flinch slightly, her body still tight with the shock of the transition. He slowed his movements, his large hands stroking her arms, trying to pour all the apologies he couldn't yet vocalize into the touch.

"Does it still hurt?" he asked, his voice a low, worried murmur.

Khushi took a deep, shaky breath, her chest heaving against his. She looked at him—really looked at him—seeing the boy from the garden and the man from the ballroom finally merging into one. The bruising intensity of their encounter had faded, leaving behind something far more dangerous: intimacy.

"I am fine now," she said between her pants, her voice steadying. She managed a small, fragile smile that reached her eyes for the first time in years. "The pain... it’s going away."

Arnav pulled her closer, tucking her head under his chin. He wrapped the duvet around them both, creating a cocoon against the Shimla winter. He felt her heart beginning to slow, matching his own.

“She waited,” his mind kept repeating. “Through the hospital, the funeral, the taunts, and my own cruelty... she waited.”

The hatred he had nursed felt like a lead weight he was finally allowed to drop. He realized that the "betrayal" he had used as a shield was a fiction. Khushi hadn't moved on; she had been frozen in time, just like him. They had both been ghosts haunting the same house, unable to reach out until the fire of tonight had burned the shrouds away.

"You should have told me," Arnav murmured into her hair. "In London, in the garden... you should have said something."

"Would you have believed me?" she asked softly. "You were so sure of my guilt, Arnav. You wanted to hate me because it was easier than loving the woman you thought had betrayed you."

He didn't have an answer because she was right. He had clung to his anger like a life raft, afraid that if he let go, he would drown in his own longing for her.

He shifted, looking at her bare shoulder where a stray lock of hair rested. He reached out and tucked it behind her ear, his fingers lingering on the diamond stud.

"No more white," he said, his voice firm, a new vow taking shape. "Tomorrow, we go back, and you will never wear that saree again. You will wear red, and gold, and every color you ever loved."

Khushi leaned into his touch, her eyes fluttering shut. "The colors don't matter as much as the man who gives them to me."

As the first hints of dawn began to grey the edges of the Himalayan peaks, Arnav held her with a fierce, quiet protectiveness. The "Broken Bangle" was no longer a symbol of her shattered destiny; it was a reminder of a strength that had endured through the dark. He knew the path ahead wouldn't be easy—there was still the truth about Ankush, the shadow of Dadi, and the wreckage of their past to navigate.

But as he felt Khushi’s breathing even out into the steady rhythm of sleep, Arnav knew one thing for certain. The marriage was legal in the only way that mattered now. She was no longer a name on a paper or a widow in a mansion. She was his wife, his Chutki, the woman who had survived his hate to find his love.

He kissed her one last time, a soft promise against her temple, before finally allowing himself to drift into a sleep that, for the first time in three years, wasn't haunted by the dead.