Her gaze lifted reluctantly and caught on her reflection in the full-length mirror. For a moment, she didn’t recognize the woman staring back.
The short black skirt Kimi had bullied her into buying clung to her hips, ending several dangerous inches above her comfort zone. The smoke coloured sequinned tank top from her reckless shopping spree caught the light with every small movement, making her look like she belonged somewhere loud, expensive, and…sinful. The black stilettos lengthened her legs but made her feel uncertain, unsteady…like a newborn fawn still finding her feet.
Her hair fell in soft, styled layers around her face. The smoky eyes and bold red lips were a disguise she hadn’t fully grown into yet. She felt like she was wearing the face of someone braver.
Despite the aggressive chill of the air conditioning, a thin sheen of sweat gathered on her brow and beaded her upper lip.
Vedika sank slowly onto the edge of the bed, pressing a hand against her stomach as it twisted violently. Nausea rose sharp and sudden, her nerves fraying thread by thread as doubt began its familiar, merciless whisper.
What the hell was she doing? What was she thinking?
But then his voice echoed in her head, low, steady, and devastatingly sincere.
You have my consent, Vedika. For anything and everything you'd like to do with me, to me, for me… Name it and it's yours.
Her throat tightened.
This had been her idea. Her decision. Her moment of courage. Her Vedika becoming Not Vedika moment. She was going to take this moment, this sliver of life, for herself.
So why did it feel like she was about to step off a cliff?
She swallowed hard, forcing air into her lungs. Her fingers curled into fists at her sides before she pushed herself to her feet in one abrupt movement. She grabbed her phone and her room card.
It was now or never.If she waited even one more minute, she knew herself well enough to know she would retreat back into safety, into overthinking, into fear. She would never be able to pull this off.
She walked out before she could change her mind. She left the safety of her room before she could become the old Vedika again.
Daksh’s room was a floor above hers. She’d booked herself into the same hotel because she had no way of accessing his room without him finding out otherwise. And she hadn’t had the audacity required to call and ask him to let her up to his room.
The elevator doors opened and she breathed a sigh of relief that it was empty. She didn’t need witnesses for her impending humiliation. She got off on the eighth floor and followed the sign boards to the end of the corridor. Far too fast, she found herself in front of Room 816.
For one reckless second, she considered turning around and running.
She could leave the city. No, the country! Fake her own death. Start over somewhere in Europe. Become mysterious. Unreachable. Possibly own a bookstore by the sea and refuse to discuss her past.
Her lips pressed into a thin line.
No. She was doing this.
She could always run away and reinvent herselfafterhe rejected her.
She squared her shoulders, squeezed her eyes shut and knocked on the door. She heard a shuffling sound and then it opened a short second later. And Vedika found herself staring at a stranger.
The man’s eyes widened as his gaze took in the entirety of her outfit, or rather what little there was it.
“Umm, I-I-I-“ Vedika stammered, backing away. “I think I have the wrong room.”
“Hold on there, gorgeous,” the man said with a smile. “Daksh!” he called out. “There’s someone here to see you.”
Vedika stopped trying to run at the sound of Daksh’s name.
“I’m his friend, Harsh,” he said, his smile friendly though the curiosity in his gaze was rampant.
Daksh appeared behind him a second later, his hair still damp from the shower he’d clearly just stepped out of. A white towel was slung low around his waist, water still tracing slow paths down his shoulders and chest. Surprise flickered across his face as he took her in.
Vedika’s gaze betrayed her immediately. It dropped to his bare chest where droplets of water clung to the light scattering of hair over taut, muscled brown skin. A single drop slid downward, disappearing into the towel at his waist. Her brain seemed to short-circuit, thoughts dissolving into static.
She forgot how to breathe.
