The Road Ahead.
"How long have you been following my car?" Danuj asks menacingly. His grey eyes piercing through the bulky guy's eyes, searching for clues. He is holding the guy against the tree trunk as his right hand is wrapped around a scorpion dagger that is plunged through the guy's palm and sticking it to the tree trunk. Danuj gives one cold glance towards his bleeding palm and then looking at the guy he comes back to his nonchalant self.
"Our men are spread a-all.. aah.. all over the town. This time you won't get the chance D'." The man says struggling miserably. What he gets in return is a bitter scoff.
"Ask Ekansh to face me himself or stop already. Knowing the weakling he is, he'll keep attacking unarmed people, that too from the back. Pathetic. These small attacks can never gain him what he wants. No matter how small the jungle is, it has only one king. The one who deserves, gets it. A coward will never." His deep voice utters as coldly as possible.
"Who is the coward here? He or you? The one who never dared to show his face." The bulky man throws. Danuj's face keeps the same nonchalant expression.
"See, did that stop you from finding me and installing some useless men here and there? No. Why? Because you and your weakling of a boss knows I won't stop until I achieve the last remaining source of power. And what does that mean? That means your boss is gonna lose his chair soon. Aah..The mere thought of him losing his sound sleep perks up my mood. So that means, you show people who you are only by your abilities and not by your face. You should change your team pal, it's high time for you. Otherwise, all of you have to settle for something even meager than what you're already earning. And about my face, if you're lucky enough to survive this bleeding hand amidst this secluded road, I promise you'll get to see me pretty soon." Saying so he harshly pulls the knife out, following by an earth shattering cry on the man's part. The man falls on the ground but immediately gets pulled up by his collar.
"Now go, and tell him, if he has the spine, he should have it man to man. I don't play well with cowards. They bore me." He retorts, throwing the man back to the ground.
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It has been long enough since Danuj left her locked inside the car. She feels claustrophobic and also a little nervous. "Did he finally trick her? Was it all a part of his whole huge evil plan? Did he truly abandoned her midway?" These are the questions she keeps thinking about, when the door to the car opens and out of instinct she grabs the torch as tightly as possible. Who knows if it's a robber or something? She'll straight away throw it to their head. That should knock them out. Yes. She's all set when Danuj peaks inside, just about to be attacked. That's when he immediately brings one hand forward and holds the torch out of self defense.
"What's with you woman?!" He shouts startling her.
"It seems I am going be murdered by you before my arch enemies get to do the holy job themselves." He adds as he takes the seat eventually and stares at Vasudha. Who has placed her right hand over her heart and panting. She is looking straight out of the front glass.
"It's 12.30 in the night. You left me here at 11.40 with these godforsaken food packets. I thought.. I thought.." She mumbles, breathing heavily.
"Let me guess. You thought I left you, so that the wild animals here get to have the dinner of a lifetime. Clever Sudha. Because, that's what my initial plans were, but then I thought about the poor animals out there. A dangerous woman like you can influence their digestion in many ways, after all. So I changed the plan." He responds, stifling a laugh, more so as he sees her eyebrows furrow in what he thinks in a "Is this man for real" way .
"If this was a joke then you should really work on it. It was awful. I freaked out because you took too much time to search for a source of water, even if you needed to pee, you know? And then again.. wait.." Her eyes narrows at his wrist and his face immediately loses its color. She's staring at his wrist, that got a small cut from that guy's digging nails and is bleeding.
"What is that? Oh my God, is that blood? What happened outside?" She asks worriedly as her eyes scan his whole body.
She almost moves out of her seat and places both of her hands on his shoulders moving his body from side to side, to inspect if he has any other injuries. Failing to realize that the space is quite small for them to move, that her hair is all over him, that his chest has started heaving up and down, also that his eyes have closed and his face keeps inclining it towards her shoulder inch by inch.
Her words finally manage to bring him out of his trance. Clenching his jaw he looks everywhere but her.
"What is this?" She says holding onto his wrist. His intense stare is fixed at where her hand is holding it.
"Danuj! I am asking something?!" She shouts startling him.
"Th-this is nothing, just a branch of a tree. I had to go inside the wood to get the water." He says coldly but she doesn't seem convinced.
"Now eat. Why didn't you eat it earlier?" He adds subsiding the discussion.
"How could I? I.. I was worried." She says turning her face towards the food packets.
"Now you know that we both are safe and I am not feeding you to the wild animals. What are you waiting for? I guess now is the right time to finally eat." He says and looks at her face that gives away her uncertainty over the previous matter. He needs to be more careful around her, he thinks.
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"Why do you keep smiling like this creep all day?" Maya asks Nihal, who has just come back from the hospital. But for some reason whenever his eyes are falling on Maya he fails to hide this creepy smile. He knows the reason, being the naughtiest sibling. But he just can't give away the details to his sister, that will spoil the fun. Don't take him wrong, he loves her, but sometimes seeing someone breaking her snobbish nose is all too enjoyable.
"Oh, that's nothing. I am just happy." He responds moving towards his room.
"You're always happy. That's irritating and that also means you don't really have a personality. Can't you learn some of the ways from D'. Even Ojas seems to have more of a personality than you do. Disgusting. "Happy"." See mocks.
"I don't need one sissy. I am better off without one you know. What have you acquired with this intolerable personality of yours? Yes, money.. a lot lot of it. But tell me what else do you have?" Nihal asks, coming out of his room in a sweat pant and white t-shirt.
"At the end of the day, that's everything one needs. Nothing more nothing less. You'll see it someday. Time is everything brother." She responds typing on her laptop.
"I hope to learn that Maya. I am open to learning but are you? I hope you learn to see outside this money mindedness one day. I truly hope." Nihal says walking to the kitchen when his phone vibrates. Bringing it out of his pocket he sees Ojas's name on the screen.
"Tell me Ojas?" He says.
"I can't reach him over phone. Might be somewhere where the network coverage is poor. Ekansh's men are all around the road and Vasudha is also travelling with him. I don't want to freak out obviously, I would have not if he was alone, but with Vasudha, the scenario is totally different." Ojas says, worry visible in his voice.
"Why so? He'll handle it Ojas. He had done it many a times. Don't worry. I'll inform the men over here. You, out of everyone, should know him better." Nihal replies.
"Yes, I do. And that's why it's freaking me out. Since you have left the things have taken a totally different route here, sir. Trust me when I say boss acts totally different around her, he.. he is way too vulnerable around her. And also gets distracted very easily. That's no problem for him to handle some random goons but Vasudha, how would she.." Ojas gets interrupted.
"You said vulnerable? Dan? Are you sure Ojas?" He asks furrowing his eyebrows.
"Yes sir." Ojas answers. Nihal releases a deep breath.
"If that's the case then we have more than one reason to worry. Even if not today then for the coming days. Remember, that's what they are looking for. We can't let them know about this Ojas. We can't." He responds.
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"I said you have to." Danuj says coldly.
"But why?" She whines.
"Because you're wearing it the whole day and also this will keep you warm." He responds.
"Are you seriously offering me 'the hoodie'?" She asks, suddenly feeling happy. Danuj's lips twitch a little upwards at her reaction.
"Yes, you can wear my red hoodie, if that's what gets you to change this one." He responds shaking his head, pointing at her white jumper.
"Okay then. Wait outside. I'll change into it." She says smiling sheepishly. For some reasons she likes wearing his hoodies, specifically the red one. It's warm and smells like him, that actually gives her a feeling of safety, no matter how conceited she herself finds the fact.
He stands outside inhaling the much needed smoke. It takes him some time to return back to the car and when he finally gets inside he finds her curled up into his hoodie, asleep. He tilts his head looking at her sleeping figure and his eyes reflect an alien emotion. One can call it adoration. He slowly takes his seat beside her, careful not to wake her. Then his fingers move to her face tucking a small strand of hair behind her ear and keeping them connected to her skin for a little longer. He very slowly pulls the hood properly over her head, almost covering her face.
Yes, that's what he needs, to hide her. He knows the road ahead is going to be more dangerous for her.
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Love, Puja. 😇