“And you think that would be wrong?” he snapped.
She took another step forward and reached out to him. Her fingers brushed his arm affectionately. “You have every right to be angry,” she said. “Every right. But listen to me once before you shut me out.”
He did not pull away.
“I went to meet him because he crossed too many lines,” she continued. “I stayed silent when he hurt others. I stayed silent when I learned what he had done. But when he tried to kill you…” She shook her head once, as if even now the thought refused to settle down. “How could I bear that, Karan?”
His eyes flickered.
“If anything had happened to you that day,” she said, her voice almost breaking, “what would I have done then?”
Karan exhaled sharply, shaking his head in disbelief. “And if anything had happened toyoutoday, what would I do, Mishti?” he asked. “I don’t trust him. Not even with his own daughter. Not even with your shadow, Mishti. If he had raised a hand on you, or even tried to… I would have burned that place to the ground. Every law, every consequence, every line I have spent my life not crossing would have meant nothing.”
Her palm flattened against his chest. “I know. Despite being his daughter, even I didn’t feel safe there,” she replied. “I was not afraid of what he might say to me,” she went on. “Even the thought of being anywhere near him made my skin crawl. But I still went there because that man tried to take my life…you, Karan.You are my life.”
Karan went still as she continued.
“I went there asyourwife. To confront and warn him. To make sure he understands that if he comes near you again, he will have to answer to me.”
Karan’s expression shifted. He looked at her for a long moment, as though seeing her from a new distance, a new angle.
“I know,” he finally said. “I heard it all.”
Mishti stilled.
“I reached there just when you stepped inside that room. I saw enough. I heard enough.” He exhaled, running a hand through his hair once. “And for the first time, I did not feel like the man in control.”
Her heart dropped. She searched his face, trying to read what this meant, what was coming next. His anger was still there. Hurt too. But beneath it, something else stirred in his expressions as he went on.
“I wanted to stop you from meeting him. But then I realised if I did, you would never forgive me. You were not walking in as a scared daughter. You were walking in as a woman who had already decided what she needed to do. And I let you.”
He paused, swallowing hard.
“I saw you stand there,” he continued. “I saw you step back when he tried to touch you. I heard you tell him to stay away.” His eyes darkened. “I heard you say you were there asmy wife.”
Her fingers curled into her palms as tears shimmered in his eyes. Karan cradled her face.
“You have no idea what I felt seeing you standing there, listening to you tear him apart without raising your voice, without losing yourself.”
Mishti swallowed.
“Because everything I believed about you so far was wrong.” He admitted bluntly. “I always thought you were weak. I thought you would bend. That you would endure whatever I threw at you because that is what life had taught you to do. I knew your history with Daksh and the way he never cared about you, and that you still never said a word.” His shoulders sagged. “And I had weaponised it when I married you for revenge.”
Her breath trembled, but she stayed silent.
“I hurt you to punish a man who was already rotting in prison. I used your silence as proof that I was right about you.”His voice cracked slightly. “And then I stood there today and watched you become a wall between that man and me.”
Tears rolled down his face, unapologetically. “You did not flinch. You did not beg. You disownedhimto protectme.”
A tear slipped down Mishti’s cheek, too, but she did not wipe it away.
“I have never seen that kind of strength,” he said. “Not in my world. Not in the people I know. And certainly not in myself.”
He stepped closer, shrinking the space between them. “He is your father. Yet, you made him recount his sins. You forced him to face what he had done. You fought with him for me. And that’s when I truly realised how wrong I had been. How blind.”
Mishti moved closer, her hands trembling as they palmed his chest, feeling the frantic beat of his heart beneath her palms.
“Despite me always punishing you for his sins, you still stood up for me today. To protect me and my family. There’s no guilt worse than that, Mishti.”
