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Evening came faster than they had thought, as the air grew chilly so did the tension in their chest. His throat dried and the collar of his shirt choked him to the point he had to adjust it every other minute.
The black of his tux reminded him of the nights he had spent questioning if it was all his fault, it reminded him of the dark that loomed over them, the blindfold he had put up on his own eyes to never have noticed her.
In a matter of mere months he had found the one he had been looking for since ages and now that he knew she was there he didn't know what to make out of it.
Zahan failed to accept the fact that Zoya was really there, right there In Front of him. She was everywhere and he couldn't notice.
The party was in full swing, people had come to greet him, Ahmed had given him a tour of the old mansion that was buzzing with life and glamor, his eyebrows rose up at the mention of Mahtab being the owner of this grand place. The place weirdly reminded him of his grandfather's haveli that had similar hallways, huge pillars and exquisite art work but it also deeply saddened him that this place stayed abandoned for most part of the year.
He had just returned to the ballroom when the camera flashes turned wild as the door opened, he could barely see past the swarm of reporters who were held back by the insane amount of bodyguards.
"You made it" his view was blocked by a very excited Talia, he tried to look past her but she kept talking and getting in his way. Frustration seeped through him and he glared at her, it did make her go quiet but by that time the doorway was empty and every reporter had left.
"Ladies and gentlemen" the host cleared his throat in the mic and every person in the room turned towards him.
"Ms. Mahtab Usman" he announced and every eye in the room stayed stuck on the stage where a woman in maroon stepped forward. Her face was covered with a black mask as always but the way she stood before the crowd it seemed as though the mask was the least of her worries.
"I hope you all have been doing well in your lives, it's an honor to have you all as my guests. With great pleasure I welcome you to Usman corporations official dinner—" the speech went on and the crowd clapped once she stepped off the podium, her gown glamorized her every movement as the silk danced around her ankles.
A wave of emotion overtook him and his eyes burned from the rush of their memories.
She's alive.
She's here,
She's okay.
The part of him that wanted to hate her suddenly couldn't keep him from shedding a tear in delight that she was okay, she had been okay all along. She was here in his reach, he wasn't alone.
His eyes stayed stuck on the woman who nodded at something another man in a blue suit had said and his jaw clenched at how easy it was for her to be in the same room as me and not be affected.
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It sometimes made me wonder if maybe she isn't who I'm taking her for, maybe she's really some Mahtab and not the woman who I've been desperately looking for.
The only person who can ease my aching heart and make it easy for me to breathe. Her heels clicked on the marble floor, her footsteps a rhythm I cannot forget, her eyes narrowed ever so slightly as she made her way to the left side of the ballroom that led to a hallway.
It was moments like these when I was undone, when I didn't feel myself moving towards her, after her to see where she goes to have her in my sight to be able to calm the anxious beating of my heart.
My heart dropped when Hadiya and her family came into view, she hugged them and bent down to meet Hameen. Hadiya, Zaryab, Ahmer… each one of them was a traitor.
They all lied to me.
Hadiya had seen me getting torn into pieces everytime the reports came out empty, Zaryab always shook his head when it was time for him to update me on the matter. How was I to know he had been deliberately erasing all data from the system.
"Are you sure about this?" Hadiya asked and the woman nodded her head.
"I'm a hundred percent sure Ahmer blew out on us" Zaryab sighed and my jaw clenched, so he hadn't made up a story.
"I shouldn't have trusted him with this—"
"Zee dont—"
"She. Is. Dead, Hadiya get over her" the woman in the red dress gritted and my hatred for her grew. She was really dead then.
"Lies" Hadiya scoffed and so did I. They all are liars.
"Hadiya we've had this discussion before, I'm not going to ruin my night for some man. Go enjoy yourself and looks for Hameen i don't see him around" she dismissed her and by the looks on Hadiya's face she was hurt.
But so was I.
Some man.
I turned around the corner to hide behind a pillar as Hadiya and Zaryab walked away from the scene, I looked over from when I was standing to see her back facing me, her shoulders were rigid and her gate was defensive. She brushed a hand through her hair and turned around only to stop in her tracks when her eyes fell on me.
I felt satisfied when I caught a flash of soft panic in her gaze as she took a minute to collect herself and took that time to notice everything that had changed about her.
Her hair was longer than she had ever kept them, long black waves that bounced whenever she ran a hand through them, her tall figure covered in red silk filling the dress just fine and the mask.
The black mask on her face that hid half of her face from the public eye made me narrow my eyes at it.
"Long time no see" I said, making her stop right beside me this time, her head turned a little to her right to let me know she was listening. I turned towards her and stared at her blankly as she turned to face me.
"We saw each other this afternoon Mr Zahan" she said and I fisted my hands.
It's been seven years I haven't seen you, felt you, held you. Seven years I hadn't been able to hear your voice, your chatting. Seven years I hadn't been able to pull you to my chest to fill the void in my heart.
It's been seven years, Zoya.
"Ah… yes… i forgot" i said smiling sheepishly, the grin hurts me more than anything ever could.
"Are you enjoying yourself tonight?" She asked, nodding her head towards the party that's started to get comfortable, food was served, drinks were opened and the dinner was in full swing.
"I don't know." I whispered and then looked into her curious eyes. The green warmth of them felt so cold now, these eyes used to melt away my sorrows with their innocent gaze, their lively glints but now they looked as though they belonged to a corpse not a living human.
Why?
"Anxious?" She asked, leaning on the wall opposite to me, making me mirror her stance. Why is she here? Isn't this her party?
"Why are you here? Isn't this your party?" I asked and all I got was a dry chuckle.
"It is. But it certainly doesn't amuse me anymore" her voice was a cold whisper and her gate was defensive, as if waiting for someone to jump out of the shadow and pounce on her.
She ran a hand through her hair and the gold bracelet on her wrist caught light, it was encrusted with blue zircon.
Shaking my head I looked ahead at the crowd that was seemingly busy with everything that was going on around them and my heart raced when I felt movement across me, i was ready to flinch at any given point but when the woman silently nodded and left I couldn't help but clench my jaw and wonder if this really is what I think it is or if I'm in delusion.
I can't explain why I feel the way that I do, it's frustrating and agonizing when all I want is to get away from her, her shadow. Everything that belongs to her. This contract, this city, this party.
I hate her.
She left me.
And she's happy here, without me.
Maybe it had only been me who stayed hooked onto the memory of her, to the love i had for her and maybe to the hope of finding her again but what was i even expecting.
For her to run into my arms and tell me what had happened in all those years? If that was the case I believe she would've come back home to me earlier than this.
"Zahan"
I blinked and stopped staring at the ground when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I lifted my head and was met with the sight of zaryab standing in front of me and my mood soured.
"Where are you lost? I've been calling you for the past five minutes" he complained.
"What are you doing here?" I asked him and he scrunched his eyebrows.
"What do you mean?" He asked, tilting his head to the side as she leaned on the counter behind us.
"I mean I wasn't expecting you here" I whispered , taking a sip of my mocktail.
"Half of the Turkey is here and you weren't expecting me?" He scoffed, shaking his head a little and only then did my view expand. The venue was huge, there were guests in and outside of it, the whole place was packed with government officials to business tycoons, anyone of power you name it and they were here.
"Hadiya and the kids are over there by the way" he said and I looked over to where he was pointing and I furrowed my eyebrows.
"Why are the kids here?" I asked and he shrugged.
"Couldn't find a nanny at the time" he replied.
"What about the neighbor who's always over? She couldn't take them in for the night?" I asked and this man didn't take a second to answer my question like it was normal talk for him.
"She had work"
His eyes though momentarily flickered to the woman in red.
"What does she do?" I asked to fix my gaze and he turned his head away momentarily.
"Kill people" he muttered something to himself and I wanted to believe I misheard him.
"What?"
"She's a nurse" he replied and I took in a final swig of his drink before running off to grab a hold of a wild Asad.
"Hey" was the last of his voices that I heard. Asad really saved his dad from an interrogation.
"We haven't caught any movement so far, the Karims are laying low and haven't been seen causing any trouble"
"It's better if we stay tight on security, you never know"
"Correct"
"Ma'am—"
"Ma—"
She held her hand up to stop the worried man from stuttering any further, her eyes were fixed on the painting that hung in all its glory on the wall before her and as the party downstairs reached its full potential but Mahtab was waiting.
Waiting for something that could keep her occupied for the next week or so. Her enemies had gone quiet and she had no prey to hunt. It was a sad, sad month and she craved violence.
Her foot tapped on the wooden floor, her fingers running through her hair and her eyes shifting from the painting to the man who had been staring at her, waiting for response and a flicker of doubt.
"Henderson" she whispered in the silence of the room and Henderson leaned closer to her.
"How long will you keep up the act?" She whispered in his ear and his ears turned red.
Two men caught the men from his shoulders and made him kneel before her, the moment she unabled the safety on her gün was when a loud scream erupted in the ballroom and a satisfied smirk settled on her covered mouth.
Ahmed had told her that Hadiya, her family and Zahan had left the venue about half an hour ago and it was now her time to wait.
"There isn't much that i may know, but I do know a mole when I see one"
The door bursts open, too much noise all at once. She wondered if her craving for violence was too much to ask for, after all the room was shaking, bullets were flying and an unfortunate man had laid his hand on her.
"Hoşgeldin"
(Welcome)
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The man in the black suit had been wandering on this empty road for about half an hour for no reason, something wasn't letting him go far and the anxiety in his veins had made him get out of his car and pace around on the road.
Little droplets of rain fell on his cheeks as he tilted his head to look up at the sky and a faint smile spread on his face as he closed his eyes feeling the chill seep into his bones.
For a moment he wondered if this all was even worth fretting over and just how peaceful life had been when all he had was the serene beauty of nature to look forward to.
The peace he felt around him was short lived when he felt the ground rumble and the air be filled with the sound of gunshots and possibly… bombs?
It didn't take him long to reach his car and to start driving it away from the terrifying sound that was awakening something that made him weak, something that terrified him.
The heart that had been racing a minute ago had started slowing down as a thought struck him still, the car came to a halt and with his battered breaths he got a hold of his phone.
His hands shook as he dialed Ahmer's number, the phone rang and he flinched as a loud bang rang behind him.
"H—"
"Is she still there?" He asked in a whisper of his voice and the man on the other hand frowned.
"Wh—"
"Zoya? Is she still at the venue?" Zahan yelled and Ahmer flinched.
"I— I don't know I just left a few minutes ago.. hel—" Ahmer was cut off as the call ended and Zahan started breathing heavily.
"Do— do I— do I go back?" He questioned himself and for what seemed to have been the longest second of his life Zahan stayed there.
There was no thought, no reasoning and definitely no sensation in his body as God knows how he drove back to the war zone and blindly ran inside.
There were men hiding and shooting, his surroundings were a blur and in this panic he ducked his head as something exploded beside his head.
It was like he was watching a movie, scrammed to hide behind a pillar, his ears rung and the only thing he could recognize now was the familiar shade of maroon that was splattered on the wall, dripping on the ground as another man fell to his feet with a bullet in his head.
"Zo— Zoya" he whispered, shaking his head to get his sense of sight back, he gulped down his saliva to wet his dry throat and inhaled deeply only to cringe at the smell of blood that clouded his senses.
He covered his ears as the shooting got closer, with his shaking hands he grabbed the dead man's gun and checked if it was loaded, keeping his breathing in check he lowered himself to search the man from extra bullets and he sighed in relief when he had found spares in his belt.
Loading the gun he ran to find a proper shelter before running his eyes around the empty, broken and bloodied ballroom. No one could say this was the same room full of people and life.
His eyes scanned the room for anyone who could be a threat and the one he was acting stupid for again.
"You!" Someone yelled and the next was a bullet that grazed his bicep, Zahan groaned and bent forward clutching his bleeding arm.
He could hear the man coming closer and he knew he had to do something soon, his hands wouldn't lift, the pain wasn't much but the thought of what this weapon in his hand could do dawned on him Zahan stopped.
"I— I can't kill someone" he muttered with a broken voice. He chose the next best thing he could do. Hide.
"I need to find her, soon" he sprung to his feet and ran away from the heavy footsteps, turning around the corner he found the flight of stairs that took him to the room upstairs.
"Is she even here?" The question was haunting him, what if.. what if I die here?
No! That can't happen. What if she is here? Will you let her— no.
I'll find you Zoya.
I'll make sure to take you with me this time.
He ran upstairs to see if she was hiding there, he opened each door and yelled her name trying to call her. He didn't care if he attracted attention or if he needed to be discreet.
Zahan only wanted his Zoya.
Someone pulled him from behind and something came in contact with his face, his cheekbone pained and as he realized someone had punched him, over and over again.
He was pushed down on the ground despite his effort to fight away the person who it was. He could only think of one thing; he could only scream that name at the top of his lungs with water blurring his eyes.
"ZOYA!!"
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"ZOYA!!"
Zoya had nearly made her way out of the back door setting the building up for self destruction when his voice reached her.
She stopped and turned around to look at the building thinking she had heard wrong but the moment that voice called he'd again, her heart nearly stopped.
"Z— Zahan" she whispered, stumbling back on her torn dress and weak legs.
"Boss hurr— BOSS!" She couldn't care less if Ahmed was screaming at the top of his lungs to stop her. All she knew was that she had five minutes before it all went off to ashes with him inside.
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"Boy, if you couldn't help yourself why did you come here?" The man on top of him mocked him as all the fight slowly left Zahan, his right eye was nearly swollen, his lips were cut open and his left hand had probably bled numb.
"Zoya" he whispered in the only voice he could master, he chuckled at his pathetic self before trying to land a last punch on this man's face.
"Your girlfriend isn't coming boy" the man laughed pointing his gun at his head and Zahan breathed in a weak breath.
A laugh rumbled through the man's chest as he unlocked his gun and positioned the head between Zahan's eyebrows.
"Alvida—"
A gun fired and Zahan's eyes closed.
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The word fury was nothing compared to what Ahmed was feeling at that moment, his hands twitched and he jaw clenched as he paced the corridor, his wounds had been treated and he had woken up to check up on his boss only to find her missing from her bed.
Panic surged through his chest as he ran around the hospital looking for the nurse incharge of her only to find out she had gone to visit the man in her guestroom.
It had been four hours since they all made out of that budding alive, nearly dying in the explosion that was covering the news all over the country.
He wondered what would've happened if he hadn't rushed back inside to be with her, when he had found her hunched over the passed out man, whose head lay in her lap.
He had never seen her shed a single tear, but there she was sobbing while cupping his face.
"We need to leave" he didn't car if he was dragging her or simply pulling her out of the building, with only a few seconds left him and another one of his men had managed to pull the two out of the mansion that blew up that moment they stepped on the last step making them all lay down on the ground hoping to survive.
Something twisted in Ahmed's chest when he saw her torn dress, wild tearful eyes, bruised face and trembling hands. This was not the Mahtab Usman that led him. That put him in his place.
This was Zoya.
The woman his superior Zaryab's wife was fond of and an urge to protect her from any harm made him punch the wall he had been facing all this while.
He couldn't bear that sight of her gazing at this man with such softness it made him glare at the man who was sleeping now.
"If I see you looming around his room with that look in your eyes, you'll not see another day Ahmed" he heard someone speak and it was her, who he bowed to. Mahtab.
Her green eyes were hard and strict and Ahmed held his head high before bowing it slightly.
"That man is to be your first priority from this day onwards, protect as you would with me" she ordered and Ahmed clenched his jaw before giving Zahan a long stare.
"Yes Boss" he said before leaving the woman to heave a sigh of tiredness.
Zoya walked back inside the room and sat beside him, her eyes moistened again as her hand struggled to stay put on his face, her thumb stroked the slit on his cheekbone.
"Why? What would you do that?" She whispered, bowing her head down.
"Because it was you on the line. Again"
Assalamualaikum guys how have you all been?
I know you guys have been waiting for an update since an eternity and trust me I've been working on it since so long but for some reason I can't get anywhere close to finishing even a single chapter.
I really hope you guys like this update and if you do then do let me know what you think of it.
For frequent updates, all I can say I'll have to take my time on it. I can't write if I force myself to write more updates.
Let me know your thoughts and I hope you like how the story is unfolding.
Love,
Hafsa.