Cold dread filled her, and her legs threatened to collapse. She swayed and would have fallen, but Veer scooped her up again and sprinted to the helicopter, which took off with a whirring of blades.
Images from her tormented past rose, mocking her cruelly, choking her breath in despair. But there was no way out.
Veer wouldn’t let her escape now. He would fling her back into the prison his home had been. She sat there, defeated and spent, huddled into a miserable heap.
What did he want? How had he found out that she was alive? Why had he traced her? He should’ve been happy at being rid of her, surely? He could have married a suitable girl this time around.
Veer looked at her downbent head and a sense of satisfaction filled him. She was in his clutches now. He would make her pay for her betrayal.
He saw her chew her lower lip and lust shot through him with devastating speed. He had loved kissing her luscious mouth, teasing her lower lip with his tongue, biting it playfully. Even her treachery hadn’t dulled his physical response to her beauty.
But then his glance alighted on her ashen face and a host of emotions gripped him. An unwanted anxiety pulsed through him. She didn’t look well. The head injury must be paining her. He would have the family doctor look at her when they reached home.
Dusk was falling when the helicopter touched down and Veer stood up and held out his hand to help her.
Meethi couldn’t stand. All strength seemed to have deserted her. She remained collapsed in the seat. Veer bent his big powerful body and lifted her slight form effortlessly. She was too drained to react; a fog of misery had enveloped her.
Veer looked at Meethi, perplexed. She was behaving strangely.
Eyes shut, she lay listlessly in his arms, seeming terrified. The Meethi he knew would have been struggling and protesting at being carried in such a manner.
She opened her eyes when he reached the stone steps that led to their palace, and he felt her stiffen.
‘Where…? What…?’ Her voice tapered off.
‘This is where I live now,’ Veer said inflexibly.
He had moved out of the huge Rajmahal that had been the ancestral home and had begun living in the smaller Jal Mahal that had traditionally belonged to the younger son. Chacha Saheb, his father’s youngest brother, had sold it off to settle his debts, and Veer had bought it for his personal use.
Meethi froze, paralysed with shock, looking at him in disbelief.
He had moved out of the palace of his illustrious ancestors! He had broken the royal tradition. She had begged him once to live in a smaller bungalow because she had hated the lack of privacy and the overpowering presence of servants, but Veer had always been a stickler for tradition and propriety and had categorically refused. So why now had he taken such a step?
And what about her mother-in-law, Maaji Saheb? She also must be here then. She would never leave her beloved son alone.
Her stomach hollowed out with dread at the prospect of meeting Maaji Saheb again. She was the one who… but she wouldn’t think about her.
Forcing her thoughts back to the present, Meethi looked towards the phalanx of retainers lining the entrance, their heads bowed respectfully, dreading seeing familiar faces—faces displaying thinly veiled contempt. But they all looked new and unfamiliar. Her breath escaped in relief, and she struggled to be put down.
Veer lowered her watchfully, keeping a vice-like grip on her arm.
They entered the Jal Mahal.
Meethi had been here earlier in her marriage to Veer and had always liked it better than the palace they had lived in. The Rajmahal was flamboyant and ornate and had always seemed cold and forbidding; this one was smaller, airy and elegantly built.
Meethi felt the eyes of the retainers on her and mortification filled her.
They must be looking down their noses, wondering why their Maharaj Saheb had married her. She wanted to run away but knew she could not; Veer wouldn’t let her. The throbbing in her head intensified.
One look at her pasty complexion and with a muttered imprecation, Veer picked her up and strode off again, his long legs moving purposefully. Entering his suite of rooms, he put her down on the huge four-poster bed in the master bedroom.
Meethi sank down on the bed, trying to ignore Veer’s searing gaze. He told the hovering maid to fetch a glass of water.
‘Have this medicine,’ he said, his tone expecting instant compliance.
Meethi wanted to ignore his grim command but the throbbing in her head made her do as he requested.
She sat up straight. What would he do now? She didn’t want to answer the numerous questions she knew he would throw at her.
Veer looked at her, sitting stiffly, and the tension of her posture screamed out at him. She was apprehensive. Good. She had betrayed him. He wanted her to feel worried and tense.
‘Now, start answering some questions! Why did you run away? You didn’t for a moment think how we would all feel,’ he thundered.
Meethi almost let out a hysterical laugh. She knew how everyone would have felt—relieved at getting rid of her.
She had always been a source of embarrassment to the venerated royal family, and they must have rejoiced. Maaji Saheb would have begun making a list of suitable brides for her beloved son, she thought bitterly. But she didn’t voice her thoughts. Veer refused to hear anything against his family and she didn’t want to get into one of those fruitless arguments again.
Her silence inflamed Veer and he burst out, ‘And to run away in such a manner! Pretending to have drowned in an accident! Not content with merely fleeing, you hatched a treacherous plot with callous disregard for those you left behind!’
The world had tilted on its axis when he had learnt that the wife he had been mourning was actually alive and living happily. He remembered with cruel clarity how devastated he had felt at her heartless treachery. And then anger had filled him. Never before and never since had such anger consumed him. But that day an elemental fury had coursed through his veins, beating at his insides, and he had blindly picked up and smashed things in his study, trying to get rid of the demonic feelings plaguing him. After which he had mounted his horse and gone for a punishing ride till the rage inside him had dissipated a little.
Meethi kept silent with a great effort of will. She had just wanted to disappear; hadn’t cared how. But wise counsel had prevailed and she had realised that, for the break to be final, she needed to have a convincing story. She couldn’t have just simply disappeared. Veer had married her and in his book that meant that he owned her. He wouldn’t have let her simply escape. He would have tracked her down and found her. As he seemingly had done….
But she couldn’t say any of this. Ever since the miscarriage she had suffered, she had felt cut off from her surroundings, enclosed in a bubble of aloneness. She had given up on Veer and their marriage.
Seeing her silence as an admission of guilt, Veer tore into her. ‘You played with our emotions in the worst possible manner! And you didn’t once think what would happen when you were found? I would be made a laughing stock when it became known that my wife had run away, pretending to be dead! You have tarnished our family’s name and honour and shamed your father’s memory! But all this wouldn’t matter to you, would it? You only know how to behave selfishly, to think about yourself, your feelings and your convenience.’
‘What do you want from me?’ she asked in a subdued voice, ignoring his diatribe.
Veer looked at her in shock. She hadn’t uttered a word of explanation and neither did she seem a whit ashamed or regretful of what she had done. Far from apologising for her deception, she was skating over her wrongdoing, acting like a victim.
‘I