"What are doing? Um? Pretty boy?"
Her petite fingers were poking his scruff abdomen, playful and cautious all at once.
"Um, cleaning my gun", he responded without looking. "Why isn't he looking my way?" she thought. Maybe it was because he didn't want her either. Better she abandon him before he did. "Alright move your arse!" she pushed him lightly. The sheets barely covering him essentials slipped off his back and he bared it all in front of her.
"What? Never seen a man in your life?" he moved toward her wearing a sly smile and the fresh scent of gunpowder. "No. I lived with one. We even had a child together but they said it was all in my head. Everything I believe to be true really isn't. Apparently, I have been living a lie. I bet someone will try to convince me you're unreal too. That you're another one of the bas***ds I made up. Those little f**kers with an MD think they're all that! f**k them all!" she declared.
He was about to climb on top of her but chose a seat on the side instead. His fingers were strung around her hair, his heart intently listening to her sweet nothings.
"By the way, how many men have you killed?"
So this was going to be their pillow talk.
"Me? I am a monster. 10 in total, one woman and her grandmother too. Are you okay with that?"
"Mmm. Not bad for a night's fun".
"What?" he almost choked on his own saliva. "I am the king pin of Mumbai. You know what that means right?" His actions became aggressive. It was no longer his hand carving figure eights on her waist but his gun tracing her jaw line, up and down in an effort to intimidate her.
"No", she played ignorant. "All I know is that I get what I want and you're no different from one of my many conquests".
Now she was asking for trouble. His hands caged her wrists, pushing her wriggling frame to a standstill. "I want you now!" was the last thing he said before diving in for a tipsy kiss.
"No", she blocked him with a turn of the head. He didn't listen.
"No means no". She repeated in a stern tone. He paused for a minute and stared straight into her commanding eyes.
"But..."
"Get off and go but me a decent pair of clothes".
He was dazed like a deer in the headlights but obeyed nonetheless. She was dressed and ready to head off within minutes.
"May I know your name? A phone number?" this had got to be the first time he acted remotely close to the filmy stereotype of a gentleman.
"Why?" even her teasing was sultry.
"I need a way to see my girl".
That only made her burst into splits of laughter.
"I am the one in charge here. If I want you, I'll get you. Stay alive for me, pretty boy", she ruffled his collar and took her leave. Just as she made her way out, Chottu and gang declared their entrance.
"Boss! She's quite the looker", he winked.
"Chup be, teri bhabhi hai!" he didn't mean it but he words instinctively came out.
"Ooohhh. Accha, bodyguard bhej dein kya? Bhai ki chamiya, I mean bhabhi ke liye".
Rishabh scratched his head trying to find the words to articulate his humiliation without sounding like the loser. Eventually, he decided against it all. "Just keep two men to keep tabs on her. Get me everything- naam, pata, what she did for the years she was alive, who she met, who she slept with, who she is planning on sleeping with- everything".
"So she isn't our bhabhi afterall?"
"When I set my sights on a thing, I get it. She's mine and you're to make sure that doesn't change".
"Bhai.." chottu interrupted Rishabh's claiming of territory and pointed to a video on his phone.
-----------
He spotted her in the corner nightclub grinding against a rich boy. His crotch was pressed against her arse, creating the most obscene of scenarios he'd witnessed in public and he'd witnessed plenty. She turned toward the boy, pulling on his chin until her lips could reach his. Then, they started wildly making out with her tongue doing unmentionably things to his. He was watching in a corner disgusted at the very sight in front of him. She placed one of the boy's hands on her breast and the other on her hip, continuing the aggressive kissing all this while. RK's patience reached its divine end. He rushed over to tear apart the unfortunate idiot who got involved in a lover's quarrel from his woman.
"What the f**k Madhu?" he glared at her like today was the day of judgement.
"What the f**k indeed!" she crossed her arms and tapped her foot, somehow shifting the blame to him instead. He pulled on her wrist and kept walking without looking back until they were well outside the club premises.
"You think one night in your bed and I'm yours? You're mistaken Mr. Kundra, gravely mistaken".
"f**k you!" he retorted having nothing substantial to say in this irrational argument.
"I will f**k whoever I want. I don't go around wearing a tag saying sold to Rishabh Kundra".
"Well you do now. I am THE RK. The whole town knows that and if I say you're my woman, no living soul would dare come ten feet in your vicinity. From today on, your lips are mine, your body is mine, you are mine!" his lips hovered over her neck, raining kisses as his emotions stormed from anger to possessiveness to a desperate cry for love, "so, stay by my side".
She head butt him until he was pushed far off her. "Make me!" she screamed before walking away.
He thought she was gone but she came back. "By the way, how do you know my name?" Her strange query made him smile sub-consciously.
"I have my ways".
She bit her lip, scoffing at his smug remark. "Alright, get me a key to your apartment, I'll drop by sometime. But that's all you're going to get. If you think you can wife me down, you're mistaken. After living like a crazy woman all my life, I can tell in a second and a half when you have a tail on me. You're men are very talented at making themselves obvious. Next time, you need to train better spies".
She pulled him closer to her neck until he was buried in her scent.
"Until next time", she said and pushed him off. He could only watch as she climbed on the back of a strange man and walked away, leaving him alone in the silence of a dead night.
Seher Hone Ko Hai
