“So don’t give me lectures,” Daksh finished coldly. “Your foolishness. Your blind loyalty to Karan is what brought me to this state. I am left with nothing. This is all because of you.”
He grabbed her arm and dragged her toward the door.
“Get out of my house,” Daksh barked.
Mishti did not struggle or plead. The fight had drained out of her the moment Karan had revealed their bitter past. She was too hurt by what she had heard today, too shaken by the truth about her family, her father, and the devastation they had inflicted on Karan’s life.
Divya rushed forward in panic. “Daksh, stop,” she pleaded. “Don’t do this. You can’t throw her out like this. She is your sister.”
But Daksh was beyond reason. He shoved Mishti out of the door with force and screamed at her.
“It’s over,” he shouted at Mishti, his eyes burning with fury.
As Divya tried to reach for Mishti, he caught her arm, gripping it hard, not letting her move.
“She means nothing to me. And nothing to you either from now on. Remember that.”
Before Divya could put some sense in him, he dragged her back inside and slammed the door shut.
Mishti stood there, stunned, staring blankly at the closed door. Tears spilt down her face as she touched the door one last time. She always believed this was her home. The place where she was always welcomed, even after her marriage to Karan. But now, after the truth of Karan and their twisted past had come out, and with Daksh bhai also breaking all ties with her, she felt homeless.
Mishti turned around, wiping her tears, wondering how life had twisted so cruelly in a single night.
****************
Wadhwa Mansion
Karan returned to the Wadhwa mansion alone.
The gates had barely shut behind his car when he was already striding inside, impatiently. His body moved on instinct, straight toward the bar counter, toward the one place where he did not have to think.
He reached for the bottle of scotch. The glass filled halfway before he stopped, lifted it, and swallowed the liquid in one hard gulp. The burn slid down his throat, and he welcomed it. He deserved that pain tonight.
After fifteen years of waiting, of building patience, shaping his anger into strategy instead of impulse, he had finally taken his revenge. The Goels had fallen. Their power, their money, their carefully protected luxury, all of it ripped away piece by piece. Everything Dilip Goel had built on his mother’s blood was now crumbling.
For the first time since his childhood had been torn apart, Karan felt close to satisfied and a dark sense of rightness settled in his chest. He could already picture it, walking back into that prison, standing in front of Dilip Goel again, reminding him ofthe promise he had made six months ago. The promise to meet him again when he had ruined his children.
In the last fifteen years, every decision he had taken, every sacrifice, every ruthless choice, that had led him here, should have felt complete and victorious.
But it did not.
The memories he had forced himself to relive tonight had cracked his heart again. His mother’s voice. His father’s presence. The warmth of a home that had once been whole, his safe haven, untouched by betrayal and bloodshed. The family he had lost before he had even understood its value…these thoughts only made the ache in his chest heavier.
Karan poured himself another drink, his grip tightening around the glass as if he could crush the past out of it, and downed it again without pause.
That was when he sensed movement behind him. The front door had opened. Karan turned slightly, just enough to see Mishti step inside. She had taken a cab back. Of course, she had. He had not waited for her, not even looked back.
Karan froze mid-motion, the glass suspended in his hand as he reached for another drink, seeing Mishti standing there for a moment. Her shoulders slumped, her face drained of colour, exhaustion and guilt were written into every line of her body. When her eyes met his, they immediately dropped away, as if she could not bear the heaviness of what lay between them.
There were tears in her eyes, unshed but trembling, the kind that demanded forgiveness and thick with guilt. Guilt for a father she had never truly known. Guilt for a past she had never been allowed to understand. Guilt for a pain that was never hers, yet now wrapped itself around her like a curse.
His mind dragged him back to that very morning, when Mishti’s voice was bright with excitement. The way her eyes had lit up at the news of Divya’s pregnancy. How she had spokenabout meeting her brother and sister-in-law, about celebrating this good news with them.
And now she stood here like this.
All that joy reduced to silence, shame, and grief in the span of a single day.
He felt a flicker of pain for her before he could stop it. But it was gone just as quickly.
