DEVEN SINGH RAJPUT'S POV:
Bending a little forward, I moved my right hand in fast erratic strokes as I tried to sketch out the portico of the hotel for the nth time in the last five hours. After going at it for another few minutes I tore the sheet of paper and crushed it between the palms of my hands.
It has been five hours since I left Adhweta's apartment but it seems like she is not ready to leave my god damn mind! That woman ,she is so stubborn in every aspect of her life even as she stays in my thoughts when I 'm trying my best to think of anything but her. She's the kind of woman to whom you cannot turn a blind eye to. With all the madness, vibrancy and chaos which seems to follow in her wake she makes your breaths count.
Being the crown prince who is someday expected to take over the mantle and lead people towards a bright future, the virtue of staying calm under distress has been ingrained into me right from the very beginning. But today when I saw the bedraggled, injured figure of Adhweta stumbling towards me only to fall unconscious in my arms ,it made me lose my marbles. So much that I ended up shouting at my assistant to drive us to the hospital forgetting about the confused and trembling driver standing beside my car.
And if you think that I stopped at that then you are wrong,
because as soon as I reached the hospital I caught hold of the nearest available man, who happened to walk around in a white coat with a stethoscope around his neck. And clapped his back with all my strength, twice, scaring him so much that he ran around to arrange everything despite being one of the senior surgeons and continued to hover around Adhweta's room till the time she got discharged. I think I made him question his decision of taking up medicine as his career option!
As I kept going through the recollections of the last night a thought stood out to me. Pulling out my phone from my pocked I called up my assistant.
" Shlok I need you to get hold of someone who could deliver an Indian breakfast at miss Singh's residence. Preferably something light, like upama. And inform the person delivering it to not to reveal the fact that I am the one who is having it delivered at her place."
For the past two weeks ,during which she was working for me I somehow avoided any kind of meeting with her but just one look at her bruised body had me running towards her like a mad person. When the disposal room caught fire the manager had called me to inform me about it and as a precautionary measure I went there to have a look at it, only to get a shock.
Till now I have seen the sassy in-command women, the astute and hardworking businesswoman but today I got a glimpse of the naughty yet vulnerable child hidden underneath the armour of sarcasm . I could see the flare of anger which lit up her eyes when I talked about her family and the loneliness and longing which enveloped her when she talked about having a sense of belonging. It almost felt like as if she was looking for some kind of justification, to answer some of her questions to somehow lighten her burden which she seemed to be carrying around. And I did try to comfort her in my own way.
The buzzing of the intercom pulled me from my thoughts. Pushing the answer button I sat down on my chair.
" Sir I have asked miss Joshi to go to miss Singh's place with the requested order."
"Ok thank you."
Food, it seems to work like a charm on her. I remember the way that she ravished that chocolate when she came to my office for the first time and how she lost her sense of surrounding when she ate with me at the café and then on her terrace. But damn those laddoos and papdi were mouth-watering. I swear I could have eaten an entire box full of them all by myself and still be left wanting for more!
Shaking my head at my thoughts I took out a fresh change of clothes from my chest of drawers and headed towards the attached bathroom in my cabin. Seeing as it was already eight o' clock, heading back to my penthouse would be useless as the office hours have already begun.
Typing up another email , I looked up as Shlok entered my cabin. Walking over to my table he handed over his tablet to me which showed an incoming video call from Arjun.
"Sorry for not knocking sir but this is the third call in the last five minutes. I think it is urgent."
Nodding at him I watched him go out and finally accepted the call.
" Oh your highness finally got the time to pick my call. I think the proverb 'out of sight, out of mind' is very true because till the time you were with us you would pick our call in the first ring but now I have to call your assistant to reach you. I have raised you like my own baby Devi only for you to abandon me like this?...
Leaning back in my chair, I continued to stare at him as the man child continued to rant about my misdeeds while pacing his room.
.....don't you care about me ?"
Finally after having enough of his antics, I gave him a stern expression and said, "Arjun"
Heaving a sigh, he slumped on his bed and covered his eyes with his hands rather dramatically. "Nobody loves me."
"If you are done with your drama, can you come to the point?"
Sitting up with a jerk, he said, "Yaar tu na bilkul apni hone wali Bhabhi jaisa hai. Arre saamne wala kuch bol raha hai to uske emotions to samajh. Na ki "come to the point"." ( you are just like my would be wife, at least try to understand the emotions of the person speaking to you, instead of asking them to "come to the point.")
When I continued to give him my death stare without replying , he made a face and finally came to his point.
"Bani had given me the task of getting our wedding invitation cards printed. I swear I had spelt both of our names correctly when I had given it to the person responsible for printing them but somehow he ended up printing ' Arjun weds banu'. And the first copy of those cards got delivered to her yesterday. And after looking at them she is now thinking that I have just been playing the field with her and now I am going to run off and marry some Banu."
"How is it possible that you run such a big company so efficiently yet fail at getting your cards printed correctly?"
Thrusting his fingers at the screen he started jumping on his bed and said, " This ,this is exactly what I am talking about, she asked me the same question. Arre bhai, mein bhi pehli baar shaadi kaar raha hu, ho gyi galti maaf kaar do."
( I am also getting married for the first time. I am sorry that I made a mistake, kindly spare me.)
"Even if this would have been your third time getting married you still would have managed to screw something up, perfectly."
"Leave all this first help me. I am planning on taking her on a surprise date. Everything has been planned the only problem is that I am not able to decide upon a dress for her. And you are going to help me with this. I have ten dresses with me, you tell me which one will suit her the most."
Raising my left eyebrow, I moved my pointer finger towards the red icon for declining the call only to have a loud howl pierce my ears.
"Devi apne jun jun ke saath aisa karega?" (devi will you behave like this with your jun-jun.)
Glaring at his puppy face, I shook my head in a defeated manner.
"Great, now let's start."
And for the next half an hour he pestered me with the various dresses before finally deciding upon two dresses.
"Okay dev , the left one or the right one. Both of them look good."
"Both of them will look good on Bani but I think the green one will suit her more. This pink one will suit more to someone like..."
"like ?"
"Adhweta."
This thought simply shocked me into silence for the next few minutes. Why do I have to imagine her in this dress? Why, god why?
The loud voice of Arjun broke my chain of thoughts as I tried my best to focus on my friend. " Dev where are you lost? Okay, anyway so this green dress is decided. Thank you for helping me."
Nodding my head I gave him a forced smile.
" By the way Devi, who is Adhweta?"
Gesturing my hand to a non-existent person I acted like someone was in my cabin and then focussed on Arjun and said, "I have to go, take care and all the best."
" But Deven, Adhweta....." Cutting his call, I wiped my forward with my hands and blew out a cold breath.
Don't think about her. Don't think about her. She would have looked very pretty in that dress.
"God damn it!"
A soft knock on my door was followed by the bulky figure of Shlok entering my room.
"Sir all the legal papers are ready for the new project. And I have booked the bus for all the employees who will follow us for the sight inspection."
"Good. See to it that there are no last minute delays. I want to finish with this project as soon as possible."
"Okay, sir. One more thing, sir, Miss Joshi whom you had sent to Miss Singh's place wants to meet you."
"Okay send her in."
Running my hand through my hair I tried to compose myself. To look like the boss I am instead of a teenager getting nervous about having an eye-lock with his crush.
A knock on my door caused me to sit up straight as soft footsteps broke the silence of my cabin.
"Good morning, sir. I had delivered the food as per your order. It's just that Miss Singh had asked me to give this box to the person who had ordered the food for her."
Standing up I took the box from her hands and looked at it curiously. "How is she ?"
"Oh she is good sir. Well on her way to recovery. Only if..."
"If ?"
"Sir actually Mr. Mishra from our finance department has been blasting her phone with calls and messages since morning and it has been irritating her a lot."
"Hmmm. Thankyou for delivering the food. You may go now."
As soon as she walked out, I took a seat on my chair and started twisting the lid of the plastic box to open it up.
As soon as the lid got off a familiar aromatic scent invaded my olfactory senses and the beautiful and delicious laddoos from last night came in front of my eyes. I picked one of them and immediately started relishing their taste.
Just then a bright pink note attached to the lid of the box caught my attention. Opening it up, I read through it.
Thanks for the delicious breakfast. You were a god send for my injured hands. And as a token of gratitude I sent you these delectable treats. You can have them while working like a machine. Enjoy !
p.s. I know that you stole the remaining laddoos from the box while winding up last night. Take care.
p.p.s. The next time you want to be an anonymous sender take care that the bill is not in your name your highness!
I could not help but spread my lips into a full blown smile as I caressed the note. Keeping it inside my personal drawer I picked up another laddoo.
"She's crazy."
"Shlok arrange all the important papers in a separate folder and see to it that you have a hard copy of those documents with you as well. And tell all those who are coming for inspection to gather in the lobby. I'll reach office in the next fifteen minutes and then we can leave."
"yes sir."
Keeping down my phone I sprayed some cologne on my neck and after giving myself a last glance in the mirror I took off for my office.
Parking my car in my designated parking space I got out and started advancing towards the office lobby. As I moved in through the doors , the two figures standing under the staircase caught my attention specially the petite figure of someone very familiar.
In a bright yellow top with complementing white jeans stood Adhweta looking as fresh as a flower. I could read the tension in her posture and the little wariness in her eyes. Her entire weight was supported on her right leg while a crepe bandage was wrapped around her left foot and wrist.
Shifting my eyes to the other person I took in the average sized man with a pot belly and a sneer on his face. Moving a little forward I eavesdropped on their conversation.
Rubbing his palms together, the man came a little closer to Adhweta and gave her a smile.
"Your two days absence made me feel like writing a shayari for you. Aarz kiya hai
Yu to raat bhar peekar bhi,
Mere kadam nhi ladkhadhaye.
Lekin saase takt ham gyi meri,
Jab, jab mere saamne tum aaye.
(even after drinking all night, my feet did not stagger. But one look at you and I even lost my breaths.)
Hearing his words , made me want to punch his teeth and make him swallow all of them. Just before I could start walking towards them, the fierce lioness placed her hands on her waist and cocked her head to one side and gave him a sickly sweet smile.
"Today even I have written something for you Mr. Mishra. Listen carefully, aarz kiya hai
Saaso ka kya hai,
Wo to kabhi bhi ruk sakti hai.
Apne upar thora dhyaan diya karo
Kyuki kisi ki patang kabhi bhi kat sakti hai.
(don't fret about your breaths, they may stop at any given moments . take care of yourself because you never know which moment will be your last.)
It seems like I am not the only one who is often found on the receiving end of her sarcasm!
Grabbing a hold of her hand that filth brought his face close to hers."Don't get too ahead of yourself. If I want I can get you thrown outside this office in an instant. Whom do you think they will try to retain in the company ? Me their loyal employee or you who is here for a one time show."
And before he could spew some more of his venom. I strode towards Adhweta and catching a hold of her uninjured arm softly jerked her body towards me and away from that bastard.
Bending near her ears , I spoke in a soft yet stern tone.
"Go to the lobby and wait for me."
Twisting around her head she looked, at me with defiance but she must have seen something in my eyes because after giving me a reluctant nod she turned around and walked away.
When I was sure that she was out of sight and hearing. I turned towards the man who was currently shivering like a leaf. Pocketing my hands I moved closer towards him till the point I stood towering over him.
"Mr. Mishra it seems like you have been very loyal towards my company. And loyalty should always be rewarded so...."
HEY GUYS, I know it's been a long time since I last updated. And I am very sorry for that. And thank you for all the love that you guys have showered on my book.
I have a sad news my study pressure is too much and therefore I can't promise regular updates to you guys. I will try my best to squeeze in as much time as I can for giving you guys new updates. I am really very sorry. But don't worry I will never leave this book uncompleted even if I ever feel that I don't want to write anymore (which is never happening by the way) I will give you guys a closure for this book and then end it.
Thanks for holding on for so long. I love you guys
Your question for today is: Which is your most favorite stationary item?
Can you guys suggest some cute romantic moments between adhu and dev
Do vote and comment. Untill next time.