Slowly, I lift my hand and place my palm against the middle of his back. I don’t force him to face me, and I don’t ask questions. I simply move my hand in slow, gentle circles, feeling every tense muscle beneath the soaked fabric of his T-shirt. For a long while, nothing changes. His breathing remains ragged, and his body remains rigid beneath my hand. Gradually, one deep breath leaves him. Then another. The violent trembling that had gripped his entire body finally begins to ease. Only then do I walk around until I’m standing in front of him.
He still doesn’t lift his head. The water continues to cascade over both of us as I carefully reach for his forearm, my fingers curling around it with the lightest touch.
“Raghav...” I whisper again, guiding him until he finally looks at me.
But the moment I see his face, my heart breaks. His eyes are bloodshot, and tiny droplets of tears cling to his lashes.He’s crying.Without thinking, I lift both my hands and cup his face.
“Talk to me...” I plead, my eyes stinging with tears too.
For several long moments, he says nothing.
“Leave it, Siya,” he mutters hoarsely. “Just... leave.”
“No.” I immediately shake my head. My grip on his face tightens just a little, forcing him to look at me again.
“I’ve never seen you like this before. Not even on the day you regretted blackmailing me into this marriage. That was guilt. But this... this is something else.” I slowly stroke the damp stubble along his jaw with my thumb. “I can’t just walk away after seeing you like this.”
Another silence follows.
“I’m your wife,” I whisper. “Whether we reached here the right way or the wrong way... I still am. So let me be here tonight.”
His eyes remain glued to mine, conflicted, as though he’s fighting himself far more than he’s fighting me.
“It was just a nightmare, Raghav.”
“No.” He slowly shakes his head. “It stopped being a nightmare the day I learned the truth.”
“What truth?”
There’s so much pain in his eyes that my own chest tightens.
“My father...” His voice cracks. “...is the reason my mother died.”
What?
My entire body goes still. Tej Khurana killed his own wife?
“But…” I swallow, too stunned to even process what I’ve just heard. “Kailash Uncle told me your mother died the day she gave birth to you and Ayaan. So how could your father…?”
Raghav closes his eyes briefly and lets out a shaky breath. “Because that’s only half the truth.”
My brows knit together in confusion.
“Before settling in South Africa, my father supplied weapons to one of the rebel groups in Mumbai,” he explains, his jaw tightening. “Those weapons fuelled riots across the city. The dayMaa went into labour... those very riots reached the hospital where she had been admitted.”
His voice falters. “When the police finally traced everything back to him, they surrounded the hospital where he had come to see her.”
I swallow as he opens his eyes again. “It seems Maa never told him she was carrying twins,’ he continues, lost in the past. “She wanted to surprise him. Throughout her pregnancy, she kept it a secret because she wanted to see the look on his face after we were born. But he was hardly around during those months. He never went with her for a single check-up. Never looked at her reports. Never even knew she was carrying twins.”
He exhales painfully.
“When she delivered us, Ayaan was born underweight and was taken straight to the NICU. I was beside Maa when my father entered that room. He didn’t even know he had another son. All he saw was me... and his wife, who had already suffered severe burns when the hospital was set on fire.” His entire body grows rigid. “He could have saved her, Siya. But he chose not to. Carrying her out would’ve meant getting caught by the police waiting outside.”
His jaw clenches so violently I can almost hear his teeth grinding.
“A wife covered in burns would’ve become a burden, so he chose his freedom instead. He picked me up, jumped out of the hospital window, and left her behind to die.”
His eyes glisten with tears he refuses to let fall.
