Raghvi TS: Mutually Assured Destruction (2/2) - Complete

Hi everyone - new here but wanted to contribute in exchange for the gifs and commentary that make my day :)

Thanks for reading and hope this first attempt doesn't miss the mark. 

Mutually Assured Destruction

After Raghav, time seems to move differently. The seasons still come to pass as they always do. But she finds herself at his door again and again, unable (or unwilling, some would whisper) to break free from his orbit.

A bead of sweat trickles down the back of her neck in the oppressive May heat that lingers even as the sun has long since set. Despite her best intentions, she can’t help but pause as she enters his home for the first time, needing a moment to take in the grandeur that surrounds her. Her eyes fall on his larger-than-life photograph, clearly meant to intimidate all who enter his abode. She meets the menacing gaze of The Raghav Rao and straightens her posture in response.

She clutches her lease as she exits the auto, the recent July rains making each step treacherous. But she is slowly finding her footing when it comes to dealing with the ruthless despot in this palace. Each day reveals that there is no bottom to his greed, no limit to his persistence. His fearsome reputation has been earned off the backs of those who have had the misfortune of crossing his path. Her own livelihood is insignificant next to his wealth. But she is not afraid – not of him, not of his power. Not when she means to use it to save her family business.

She shivers in her wet sari, a sudden September downpour earlier in the day catching her by surprise. He gives her a disinterested glance before offhandedly calling for a towel and some hot tea, leaving her standing there fuming over his latest volley in their war game. The towel comes first, and as he offers it to her their fingers brush against each other, once, twice. His dark eyes meet hers and she can’t quite read their depths, doesn’t realize that she’s holding her breath as she tries. His gaze shifts and lingers on the exposed skin of her chest before slowly sliding down. Oh, she thinks, partly in surprise and partly because all other coherent thought has left her. An unfamiliar spark skitters up her spine.  

 There is a slight chill in the air on the night that she finds him in his makeshift gym. Yet she can see sweat glisten on his bare back as he hammers away at his demons. Despite the brute force on display, there is a certain grace to his body in motion, his swings almost hypnotizing as they slice through the air. He moves as would a caged lion, a formidable beast reduced to peering at his freedom through iron bars that do not bend with even the loudest roar. But any sympathy she may feel is fleeting when he growls at her intrusion. Her pulse quickens as her vision narrows to his wild eyes, his unkempt hair, his heaving chest. And when he prowls towards her she finds herself rooted to the ground, easy prey for the hungry hunter. “What do you want?” he grinds out. She doesn’t realize his feral grin means that he can read the answer in her eyes.

The ancient Greeks spoke of the myth of Icarus, a cautionary tale of a young man who failed to heed his father’s warnings and flew too close to the sun.

But when she tilts her head just so, leaning just a fraction closer, she is not thinking of Icarus, or his father, or hers. And when his eyes drop to her lips, she knows—her world will never be the same. 

TBC

Wow! I didn’t want to stop reading. Please continue soon.❤️

Thank you so much! Means a lot 😊

I have read it somewhere.

Originally posted by: Joyness

Superb keep writing

Thank you! Will try :)

Part 2 - In my mind the wedding still happens for the wrong reasons, but without the blackmail. Thanks for reading.

Her eyes remind him of the stormy sea, gray and turbulent and dangerous. He watches as they flutter closed. He can smell her perfume, can count the goosebumps that trail his fingers as they travel up the impossibly soft skin of her arm. It would be so easy to close the gap between them, to finally (finally) taste her lips and satisfy the urge he has had for months, ever since she marched into his life with her ideals and her dreams and her stubborn refusal to yield to his whims.

He steps back, clearing his senses of her. Her eyes snap open and color suffuses her cheeks. She is looking anywhere but at him. “Pallavi,” he says finally, but it is too late. She has turned and fled, and he is left there sure he must have imagined her into being, if not for her subtle scent that still lingers in the air.

Months later they are standing at the mandap, tying themselves to each other for not just this lifetime but the next one and the one after that and the one after that… She refuses to meet his gaze as they wordlessly complete the rituals that make them husband and wife. He sees his mother beaming at them out of the corner of his eye but even the long-sought approval written on her face is not enough to draw his gaze away from his wife. She is beautiful even in her sorrow, even when she flinches as he applies the sindoor he had once cynically mocked. He is grateful at least, that she doesn’t seem to notice his hands shake slightly as he ties the mangalsutra around her neck.

She tells him later that she is a widow (was a widow)and he suddenly feels the full weight of their sham sitting heavy on his chest. But there are no accusations in her eyes when she greets him every morning at breakfast, no hesitation in her hugs with Amma. Even though he tries he doesn’t quite understand her, this lioness who once refused to budge an inch against his heavy-handed tactics and now leaves the light on so he doesn’t hurt himself when he eventually stumbles into bed after a drink or two.

He drinks so he can stop thinking for a while, mostly about her. It works until he is lying there next to her in the darkness, mere inches between them. These are the nights he thinks about his promises to keep her safe (even from himself). It’s more pleasant to remember instead the way Pallavi slid past him this morning in a sweet cloud of jasmine, hair still wet from her shower. How she hums during her morning prayers, some nameless melody he should probably know if only so he can see her smile when it’s played. Blue has always been his favorite color but he has a new appreciation for how it brings out her eyes, those eyes that are oh so patient with his moods and sometimes…

Sometimes her eyes are telling him something else entirely, and it’s those moments he comes back to in the quiet night. Again he thinks it would be so easy… But it’s late and the alcohol has dulled his senses. He can’t be sure what would happen if he were to close the distance between them, if he were to coax her sighs against his skin, if he were to let her hair cascade over him and welcome the darkness.

Instead he turns away and waits for sleep to mercifully overtake him.

END

Awww...I hope he just goes and hugs her...beautiful you should continue 

This was such a sweet read

It was well written

It is a soothing piece....👍🏼

Wow... it's been a while since I've read such a hooked-to-the-screen piece. Kudos to your writing, its really powerful and I look forward to reading more of it.