Soulmates ✓

18 | A Game Of Deception

"How many girls do you offer that to?" Shay leans against the door jamb and watches him disappear inside the closet. Shay doesn't dare to peek inside. But from the rustling, she knows he is changing. Shay steps inside the room, unconsciously moving her eyes towards the half-open closet, and can only see his carved muscles in the mirror. She turns away when his gaze collides with her in the mirror.

He comes out in only sweatpants, with his head hung low and his hands on his hips, a sign of his annoyance with her question. But what Shay can't stop staring at is his exposed upper body. "If you need anything, just let me know."

"You're not going to tell me about your girls, but at least tell me if you're dating someone." Shay tries to sound neutral. Her mind goes back to the woman he was with on the night of their reunion. Has she been sleeping on the bed Shay is about to sleep tonight? It shouldn't matter who sleeps on his bed.

"Why?" He wings up a brow.

Shay gapes at him, trying to gather some answer, but the only thing that keeps flashing in front of her eyes is him pulling away from the kiss. "We kissed, Ryan, and I don't want to turn your world upside down or ruin any possible relationship you have."

He releases a haughty laugh, poking the inside of his cheek and shaking his head. "You must really think of me as an asshole. Don't you, Shay?"

"I don't." She blinks at him, her fingers pause at the last button of the shirt, halfway through the hole. The faint smell of detergent and Ryan's familiar scent lingers around them.

"Good, because nothing is getting ruined in my life." He steps back into the closet and closes the door, blocking her view completely this time.

Way to piss him off when he has been nothing but nice to her since the day they met here in New York.

Shay strips off all of her clothes and steps into the shower, obsessively washing away Arnab's touch and her messy makeup. As her nerves relax under the warm jets of water, she reviews everything that happened tonight, and her fingers pause on her cheeks where a deep line of scar splits her skin.

Shay feels Ryan's gentle caresses over her skin, the fevered sweeps of his lips, and the teasing touch of his fingertips. She knows he is holding back and can't stop anticipating what it would feel like if he wouldn't. A shiver runs down her spine, and she quickly finishes washing off the sinful desire burning across her skin.

She pulls on the white shirt, buttons it up to the very top, and when it feels too uptight, she leaves the neck wide around her chest. It doesn't make sense to feel this much discomfort around someone who has known her since she was a toddler. The pajama pants need to be rolled up several times around the waist to fit her small frame. She takes in a whiff of the lemon and sandalwood scent on the fabric, knowing it's not the detergent but the smell of the man himself.

Ryan is crouching near the fireplace when she enters the room. Shay notices the sacred verses from Bhagavad Gita on his back tattooed in Sanskrit.

'नैनं छिन्दन्ति शस्त्राणि नैनं दहति पावक: | न चैनं क्लेदयन्त्यापो न शोषयति मारुत:|| (Weapons do not cleave the soul, fire does not burn it, waters do not wet it, and wind does not dry it.)'

Just below that there's another verse. And damn her but she can't stop herself from reading the lines of ink on his skin, suddenly making so much sense of everything they have been going through.

'जातस्य हि ध्रुवो मृत्युर्ध्रुवं जन्म मृतस्य च:। तस्मादपरिहार्येऽर्थे न त्वं शोचितुमर्हसि:॥ (Death is certain for the born, and re-birth is certain for the dead; therefore you should not feel grief for what is inevitable.)