“Email me the complete file. I will review it again to make sure there are no loopholes.”
Mishti nodded. She had not expected him to praise her. So, she began gathering her things, preparing to leave, when she remembered the thought she had carried with her for two weeks now, one she knew she could not postpone any longer.
“Uh,” she looked at him again. “There’s something else I wanted to talk.”
Karan just looked at her, waiting. Mishti stared at the desk nervously as she said it. “What happened two weeks ago cannot happen again, Karan.”
He stilled for a moment. “What happened two weeks ago?”
Surprised, she met his gaze without flinching, realising he was doing this on purpose. “I did not know the great Karan Wadhwa’s memory was so fragile.”
His ego bruised.
The next moment, Karan reached for her chair and pulled it toward him, closing the already narrow space between them. The sudden movement stunned her.
“I have a selective memory,” he said evenly. “I choose to remember only what matters to me. What is important to me.”
Her gaze unknowingly dropped to his lips before she met his eyes again and swallowed the nervousness she always felt around him. “Perhaps whatever happened two weeks ago was important to you,” he continued. “It wasnotimportant to me.”
Mishti did not like that one bit.
“You kissed your wife for the first time,” she scolded. “A wife you claim to hate. A wife you promised you would never give any wifely rights to. It’s hard to believe that breaking your own words cannot be important to a man like you.”
Once again, her argument left Karan momentarily disarmed. She said it so clearly that he had no real comeback. He wondered if living with him had taught her this skill, of winning arguments, or if she had always been this sharp beneath her innocent exterior.
“It was not a kiss,” he finally said, whatever little excuse he could make up at the moment. “It was meant to be your punishment. For going against my orders that day, for a dinner treat with Rajat and Abhimanyu.”
“Huh! A punishing kiss?” She let out a mocking laugh. “That’s your excuse?”
Karan did not reply.
“The kiss we shared was anything but meant to punish.”
Now he looked intrigued. Before he could stop himself, he pulled her chair closer, reducing the space between them until it felt almost intimate.
“How can you say that?” he asked with suspicion. “You told me the other day that no other man has ever touched you before. Was that a lie?” he asked, glaring.
Mishti recalled that day he was talking about. He had been drunk, lost his control and had brushed his fingers over the bruise on her neck with gentleness. He had asked her the same question that night, and she had answered him truthfully then, just as she would now.
“I never lie,” she replied, managing to keep her voice calm even as her heart pounded. “I may not have been kissed before, but it’s not rocket science to know what a kiss likethatis supposed to mean.”
The moment the words left her lips, he exhaled slowly, as if he had been holding his breath without realising it. She noticed how the stiffness in him eased the moment she confirmed that it was her first kiss.
Just like always, he confused her even now. He claimed she did not affect him, yet everything about her clearly did. Pushing those thoughts aside, she continued. “I am a simple woman, Karan. I need feelings, an emotional connection, and complete trust before I can give myself physically.”
He did not interrupt, only watched her, his eyes darkening with every word she spoke. What she did not see was the way his body reacted to her honesty. The restraint he prided himself on was beginning to strain again.
Unaware of the impact she was having on him, Mishti continued, “I know I lost control that night too and… kissed you back. But until I see feelings growing in you for me, until I see you wanting to give this marriage a real chance, until you truly want me as your wife, this cannot happen again.”
That was when something inside him snapped. He could not tell what angered him more, her belief that she could set boundaries between them, or the fact that she would not let him come close again unless he faced his unresolved resentment and accepted her as his wife.
In one swift movement, Karan grabbed her arm and pulled her closer.
“And that day will never come,” he whispered angrily in her ear, then pushed his chair back, stood up, and walked out of the conference room. Not because he wanted to have the last word, but because staying even a moment longer would have exposed him. Her simple, heartfelt words about feelings had affected him more than they should have. And he could not allow her to see that, as it had no place in his carefully constructed plan of revenge.
CHAPTER 19
A week later
