He doesn’t say anything, just walks right out. I stare after him, dismayed. But there’s no point. If he wants nothing to do with me, then all right. Priti’s more important right now, anyway. Squaring my jaw, I gather my skirts and follow him.
“How are we planning to get to the wedding now that the car’s gone?” I slip on my high-heeled sandals as he takes the room key from the holder. “Uber? Ola?”
“There are no Ubers or Olas in Goa,” Rudra says.
I stop short. “What? How are we going to go, then?”
Rudra opens the door and steps out, holding it for me. I hurry out. He closes the door, and it automatically locks. “There was a motorbike parked outside. I saw it last night,” he says, not looking at me as he calls the elevator. “I think it belongs to one of Ms. Fernandes’s helpers. We could borrow it.”
“You know how to ride a bike?” I ask, eyes wide. We step into the elevator.
“Yes.” Rudra presses the button for the ground floor, and the doors shut, leaving us in this closed space. During the ride down, we’re both quiet and standoffish, refusing to meet each other’s eyes. Internally, I’m fuming.
Downstairs, we find the sardar ji instead of Ms. Fernandes this time, and he confirms that the bike does indeed belong to one of the helpers. Luckily, the helper himself is easy to convince, and within minutes, we’re both rushing out into the parking lot, armed with the keys. The bike is parked next to where Rudra’s car was. It’s sleek and black, withHeroscrawled across the engine.
Rudra props open the compartment beneath the seat and takes out two helmets. He hands me one and puts on the other, strapping it under his chin. This is totally going to ruin my hair, and possibly my makeup, but I have no choice. Safety comes first. I scurry to the side as he mounts the bike and kicks up the stand. He twists the key in the ignition, and the bike roars to life.
“Get on,” he says, resting his foot on the kick-starter. He doesn’t even turn to look at me when he says it. I mentally jam a toilet plunger down my throat to unclog the hurt wedged in there, eyeing the kernel of space left on the bike behind Rudra. There’s no way both my lehenga and I are going to fit there. Not unless I sit sideways, the way I’ve seen Indian women in sarees sit behind their husbands.
And the seat—it’s so high. How on earth am I going to get on?
“Is it okay if I—” I can’t even get the full sentence out because I’m practically talking to the back of his helmet at this point.
“If you what?” Rudra asks.
“If I hold on to you? While I’m climbing?”
“Sure.”
His response is so aloof it sends a shudder through me. I ignore it and place my hand on his shoulder. Under the kurta, his muscle contracts, as if he can’t bear the thought of me touching him right now. I grab the rear handle and hoist myself up. But the satiny material of the lehenga slips, and I drop back down to the ground, a sharp pain shooting through my ankles.
I try again. Fail again.
The late-afternoon sun is beating down on me and I’m sweating in my heavy lehenga and under the helmet. I’m embarrassed and angry and anxious and I want to cry.
“Wait,” Rudra says, sighing when I attempt to pull myself up a third time.
“What?”
“Step away.”
I obey as Rudra kicks the stand back down and gets off the bike, pushing the visor of his helmet up. My mouth goes dry when he steps closer to me, his eyes shadowed and challenging under the helmet. I let out a squeak as his hands sharply clamp onto my waist. And right then, I forget the name of every single one of the eight bones in my wrist even though I’ve prided myself in knowing them forever.
My spine presses into the seat, and he’s touching bare skin, fingers digging into my waist. I stare up at him as his body brushes against mine, and my head is fuzzy, starting to spin. I love how he isn’t too tall, just taller than me, because it feels like we fit togethereven better. He doesn’t feel far, far away. If it weren’t for the helmets, or his reticence, I would probably kiss him right now.
Frankly, though, it’s the damned helmet on him making things hot.
He scoops me up so easily it’s almost as if I weigh nothing. My butt plonks on the seat, and I grip his shoulder with one hand and the rear handle with the other, steadying myself.
Of course that’s whatthatwas about: helping me onto my seat.
Rudra steps away, his fingers scraping slow, agonizing lines along my waist before falling to the side. Right about now, my stomach resembles one of those firecrackers we used to burst during Diwali.
Rudra’s hands are shaking as he pushes the visor back down and mounts the bike again.
The ride is torturous.
I’m navigating, so I have to wrap an arm around Rudra’s stomach to prevent myself from flying off and have my lehenga turn into a parachute. It doesn’t help that time is trickling away faster than water from a sieve, and the sun is dipping lower and lower in the sky.
