Sati

Present Day

"Take it back."

"No."

Shivaay is so angry he can't think straight. All he can see is Annika, all he can hear are those three words she blindsided him with when they were supposed to be working, and all he can feel is this overwhelming urge to destroy.

"I'm warning you Annika." He bites out as he backs her up to the poolside, his toes touching hers with every step. "If you don't take it back..."

"I won't!" She yells. "That's not how love works." He covers his ears at the mention of the word that has ruined everything but he can't stop hearing it. He can't stop hearing her. "You can't threaten me and then forget I said anything." She gulps when he strides closer and his gaze fixates on the soft skin of her throat. "I love you." Her voice wobbles precariously. "I don't expect you to say it back. In fact I know you won't. But that doesn't mean you get to disrespect my feelings. You have to..."

"I don't have to do anything," and then within a blink of an eye Shivaay loses control and Annika flies backwards into the pool. Shivaay doesn't even realise when he follows but as she rises up to the surface he twists her wrist behind her back and pulls her hard against him. "This is your last chance, Annika. Take it back."

"No!" Water makes the baggy clothes she wastes her money on cling to her curves in ways that make his blood boil. She looks like she stepped out of his filthiest dreams. "What will you do about it?"

He can't help himself. He pulls Annika even harder and closer against him, animal instinct taking over when she immediately arches her body into his — crushing her soft breasts against his chest.

"I think you know exactly what I will do," he growls darkly before thrusting his hips brutally against hers feeling a thrill when her eyes widen. He's harder than he has ever been in his life. "If you don't take it back," he warns in a voice like gravel, "I will take you. Right now. Whether you want it or not."

"I'm not scared of you," Annika raises her chin proudly and the thin thread of control that Shivaay has been clinging to finally snaps. Within the space of a heartbeat the hand not twisting her wrist grabs the meat of her thigh, hooking it over his waist, and he's kissing her brutally, furiously, in ways he has never kissed another woman. In ways he didn't even think he was capable of.

Shivaay has always been considerate in bed, gentle, generous; but that was before. When he was with women who didn't matter. "Shh." She strokes his face between kisses smoothing her thumb across the plane of his cheekbone and he is just as shocked to see evidence of his tears as she isn't. "It's okay. You never need to say the words back to me." She kisses his jaw. "I will say them enough for the both of us."

"You always have been willing to do anything to become my wife," he sneers even as her face falls, "but you aren't even fit enough to be my wh..."

She kisses him desperately before he can finish and he bites instinctively into the plush lips that have haunted him for years. Kissing her feels like a dream (and a nightmare) come true but he can't stop no matter how hard he tries. Then Annika rakes her fingernails through his hair to yank him closer and there isn't a need to.

He lifts her into his arms while kissing her, carries her through the pool while kissing her, thrusts against her on the pool wall while kissing her. He kisses her while undressing her, kisses her through every gasp and half-begged utterance of his name. He kisses her until his anger fades and then keeps kissing her because without it he has nothing.

"Ab main nahin reh paaonga..." he whispers into her mouth as they lay entwined at the poolside, hands interlocked over Annika's head. "Tere saath...Tere biger..." He gulps back tears. "You ruined me Annika."

"It's only fair," she whispers with glittering eyes, "you ruined me first."

-/-