Chapter 3( For you Tin)
,Stiff as a small statue, Bani quite deliberately averted her gaze as the limo stopped. The other woman slid out but not without many regretful mutterings and an attempt at a lingering and physical goodbye that had car horns screeching in protest as the lights changed. Of course they were lovers. Bani's fine features were clenched as she witnessed their blatant intimacy.
Viewing a house together..were they getting married? She felt sick as she contemplated that thought. The door slammed again sealing her into unwanted isolation with Jai.
" It's been a day for unpleasant surprises," Jai commented grimly.
Bani finally got up the courage to look at him again, her strained eyes unguarded. " Is that why you felt you had to take it out on me?"
" " You are not one of my happier memories. What did you expect?" Hard eyes regarded her pale face without any perceptible emotion at all
" I don't know…' Bani whispered unevenly. " I just thought I'd never see you again."
" Look on this as a once-in-a-lifetime coincidence," Jai urged with chilling contempt. " As greedy bitches go, you're still top of the list in my experience! I would go some distance to avoid a repeat of this encounter."
In the silence that ensued Bani turned bone –white. Her appalled gaze clung to his hostile face. He made no attempt to hide his emotion. Shock rolled over her in a revitalized wave. He really despised her!! But why? Hadn't she let him go free? Hadn't she given him back what he'd wanted and needed and what she should never have taken? Hadn't that single unselfish action been sufficient to defuse his resentment?
" I don't understand what you're getting at…how can you call me a greedy bitch?" Bani lashed back at him, shock giving way to angry defensiveness.
Jai laughed. " Isn't that what you are?"
" In what way was I greedy?" Bani asked in bewilderment. " I took nothing from you or your family."
" You call 10 crores nothing?"
A furrow formed between her delicate brows. " But I refused the money. Your father tried very hard to make me accept it but I refused."
" You're a liar. You made the demand and he paid up."
" I didn't demand anything…and I didn't accept anything either!" Bani protested heatedly.
Jai dealt her a look of complete indifference that cut like a knife. " I don't even know why I mentioned it. The pay off was the tacky but merciful end to a very sordid little affair."
Bani was terribly hurt by his damning words. Jai's father Uday Walia had obviously lied. Clearly he'd told Jai that she'd accepted the money. And why should that lie surprise her? The Walia clan had loathed her on sight. His parents had tried hard to hide the fact when Jai was around but his twin sister Jigyasa had shown her hostility openly. Bani stared into space her whole being engulfed in a wave of remembered pain and rejection.
In the swirling oblivion of that tide of memory, she relived the heady scent of lush grass bruised by their lovemaking, the passionate weight and urgency of Jai's body on hers. Broken dreams and lost innocence. Why had nobody ever told her that loving could hurt and destroy? A 'sordid little afffair'? No, for her it had been so much more and it was in the divergence of outlook that the seeds of disaster had been sown…
The clink of glass dredged her back from her dangerous passage into the past. " You look as though you are about to pass out." Jai remarked as he handed her a glass of orange juice. She watched him help himself to a drink from the cabinet, every movement calm and precise. He did not look as though he was about to pass out. Although if he ever found out about Siya, he might well make good the oversight. Hurriedly she crushed that disturbing thought. Jai had never wanted their baby. At nineteen Jai had wanted an awful lot of things but they had not included a baby. Knowing that why on earth had she let him marry her? And yet the answer to that was simple. She had honestly believed that he loved her.. even though he hadn't been showing it any more. It was amazing what a besotted teenage girl could persuade herself to believe, she conceded painfully.
" And you are wearing odd shoes," Jai remarked in a curiously flat tone.
A feeling of unreality was starting to enclose Bani but she also sensed that Jai was not as in control as he wanted to appear. She surveyed her feet and saw one black shoe, one navy. It didn't bother her. In the midst of a nightmare encounter unmatched shoes were a triviality. " I wasn't supposed to be working today..I left home in a hurry"
" You've cut your hair"
Bani lifted an uncertain hand to the sleekly cut bob of shining black hair, connected with gleaming eyes and wondered why they were having this stilted conversation when barely a minute ago they had been arguing. " Yes, its easier to manage."
Jai was running that narrowed gleaming gaze over her petite frame in a manner that made her feel hot and uncomfortable. " You don't seem to have much to say to me…"
" You're still full of yourself." Bani told him helplessly. She laughed bitterly." But then why shouldn't you be?"
" What's that supposed to mean?"
Anupamaa
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