Arhi FF |Mohabat Door Jaane Na De| *Complete!* #1 - Page 8

Chapter Four

Shyam flitted from room to room, his eyes darting here and there furtively.

His peace of mind had been shattered unceremoniously. Throughout dinner, he had watched, with anger rolling off of him in waves and tides, Arnav's eyes constantly straying to where Khushiji sat. He barely ate anything, too busy snatching glimpses of her when he thought she wasn't looking. Khushiji eventually could not ignore the attention she was suddenly receiving, and retreated into silence, her eyes fixed onto her plate, a faint red colouring her pale cheeks.

Shyam's nostrils flared. He had sensed the smoke, and he had to put out the fire. The look in Arnav's eyes was not the hatred, the loathing, that he had worked so carefully to breed since the day of the wedding. It was as though the man was possessed. The uncaring, impassive demeanour Arnav usually donned had been shed this evening, and he sat there, looking as helpless as a lost puppy. His eyes brimmed over with a sadness, a sadness so profound that Shyam could almost feel it in the air.

But not for long. Shyam leered to himself as he gave a cursory glance at the empty study before continuing his search. He had had enough of being the ideal son-in-law for the filthy rich Raizada family. He no longer had to tread around them, making sure to say all the right things, flattering them with sugary words that sounded sickening to his own ears. No more bootlicking for him, he thought gleefully. He already had Anjali dancing at his slightest gesture. But now, with Anjali nothing more than a puppet with her strings in his hands, he could control none other than the Arnav Singh Raizada, the man he had always been left cringing in front of, who used to control his own fate, wrote his own destiny, and often that of others. Shyam's grin widened as he relished in his own power. He could make this supposedly indestructible man do whatever he wanted as long as he had his trump card, his dear Rani Sahiba.

His smile diminished slightly as his mind shot back to Arnav's constant gaze on Khushiji at dinner. A small frown scrunched up his features as his thoughts raced, trying to come up with a viable reason for his sudden change in behaviour. But a minute later, that self-confident smile was back in its element. Maybe he simply felt sorry for her; after all, he had treated her like dirt over the past few days. No matter. Once he found his dear brother-in-law, he would set the record straight once more, and be that much closer to getting his ultimate prize- Khushiji.

Just as this satisfying thought took root in his mind, Shyam reached the glass sliding door leading to the poolside. And there he found his victim, standing still as stone, gazing into the night sky.

***

Arnav heard the glass door behind him slide slowly open, disturbing his frantic thought processes. But before he could turn around, he heard an only too familiar voice addressing him.

'Saale Sahab.'

The honey-dripping voice made a mockery out of the words he once used to consider a term of endearment. His hands automatically balled into fists and Arnav shut his eyes tightly, taking in a succession of deep breaths in a titanic battle to force down the fury that was raging like an inferno within him. Instead, he clenched his jaw tightly and turned mechanically around.

The sight of that face, a face he had grown to abhor, with a sickening smile plastered across it, did nothing to cool his rage. If anything, the sight of this man, who was now playing with the lives of the people he held dearest to himself, made his skin prickle with disgust, with an irresistible urge to strike a blow, no, a series of blows, to that face, permanently deforming that fake smile.

This was the same man who tried to kill Khushi's father. The same man who deceived his sister. The same man who had tried to take Khushi away from him.

Arnav felt the blood rush up to his face, steam emanating from him.

'Saale Sahab', the voice simpered yet again, 'Don't you think it's about time you give up?'

Arnav did not respond. He watched, steely eyed, as the creature in front of him warmed up to his own downfall.

'Can't you see', Shyam sneered, 'that it's pointless? Trying to keep up this farce you call a marriage? Khushiji loves me as much as I love her. You can never get in the way of true love'.

It took Arnav all of his years of experience to maintain his stony demeanour, to not betray the scathing, scorching, insane rage that was fighting to get out of him. His fingernails dug into the skin of his palm, his eyes narrowing slightly.

And without warning, for the first time, Arnav noticed something in the way Shyam was speaking, the way he was looking at him, that he had been unable to see before. The sneers and jibes he had become used to, but today, without the millstone of hurt he carried with him from what he had considered Khushi's betrayal, he saw, only too clearly, a manic glint in the eyes of the man standing in front of him. The way his chest was heaving up and down, a muscle twitching above his left eye, his entire body shivering with a kind of nervous excitement...

There was something very, very wrong with this man.

Arnav felt some his anger ebb away to be replaced by a new, even more crippling emotion. Fear overpowered his senses. This man was dangerous. He had resorted to murdering a helpless old man in his quest for Khushi. It only proved that he could go to any extent, do anything at all. Cold fear settled on Arnav's heart as he was visited, unawares, by thoughts of what he might do to Khushi, if Khushi refused him...

He felt the wind knocked out of him, as though he had run headlong into something solid. His lungs seemed to constrict, refusing to let any air in. He seemed to have forgotten the basic, effortless mechanism of breathing. His heart stilled completely.

Even the thought of her leaving you will take your breath away...

Shyam, worked up to a frenzy as he exulted in his own power, did not notice the rigidness of the man in front of him. He did not notice that what he was doing right now was nothing short of digging his own grave.

'Feels strange doesn't it?' he crooned suddenly, changing track all of a sudden, unable to contain himself any longer. 'For you to admit defeat? You, the great Arnav Singh Raizada, who never admits defeat...'

Arnav's thoughts snapped back to reality. Is that what I'm doing? Accepting defeat? Marrying Khushi was accepting defeat?

Yes, a small voice bubbled at the back of his mind, because you did not believe her. You did not save your sister. Because you are letting this scumbag get away with everything.

'You, who always got what he wants...'

What DID I want? What HAD I wanted, before all this went so badly wrong?

The answer was simultaneous. It was a memory. A memory of a night when he had felt his world shatter around him as he ran full tilt after an ambulance, feeling life itself slipping out of his fingers. A memory of a radiant smile, of clinking bangles, of flyaway hair, of big brown eyes averting their gaze...

A memory of a resolution he had made, of a nervousness he had never felt before but strangely enjoyed, of bare control as he tried to keep patient...

Yes, I had wanted that. That's what I had wanted.

Shyam, quite hopelessly unaware of the effect his cutting words were having on Arnav, was not done yet.

'You, who never let anything stop you from getting what you want...'

I always get what I want. It's a rule of life...so why...how come...well, what exactly is stopping me?

'How does it feel then,' Shyam continued in that slippery voice of his, 'to accept defeat to me? A normal, average earning lawyer who doesn't have your power, or position or wealth...'

Arnav was frowning now, annoyed at the jarring voice that was disturbing his frequency of thought.

'If I were you Saale Sahab...I would give up while I'm still ahead. Khushiji is mine, she always was, she always will be. Don't you think you've lost enough already? If you want your sister's happiness... you will take the smart decision...you can't afford to lose more, can you?'

'Exactly', Arnav said quietly, speaking for the first time in that whole encounter. Shyam looked round at him in mild surprise; the last thing he had expected was for Arnav to agree with him, but before he could recover, Arnav added, 'I've lost too much to afford losing anything else'.

And he walked away, leaving behind the quiet determination in his voice hovering in the air behind him.

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