Tiara's Pov
The antakshari ended after a while when most of us got bored with it. Suddenly suchi sits in between me and Shruti and asks me, "Will you teach me dancing?" I was dumbfounded. First by her request and then by how confidently she asked, almost as if ordering me to. I chuckle and smile at her and reply, "Why not? But before that tell me your name. She frowns and then replies, "Suchika Arora. And what's your name?" This little girl had more confidence then me. My smile grows bigger and I reply, "Tiara Sharma." She studies me for a second and replies, "So what should I call you? Tiara ma'am?"
I laugh at her response but before I could respond, Akshit interjects with, "No. You can call her mani like the way you call Shruti maasi Shri Mani. She is one of us suchi." My eyes widen for a moment but soon get locked with his eyes. 𝘚𝘩𝘦 𝘪𝘴 𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘶𝘴 𝘴𝘶𝘤𝘩𝘪. The words struck on my heart. We stay like that for a moment until suchi interrupts us with, "So she is like your sister Mamu?" My eyes lands on her immediately and my cheeks burn hot. Shruti, megha dii, Arjun jiju, Nitya bhabi and everyone else except elders, present there, laughs out loud.
Akshit looks shocked but he replies with hurry, "No no not like that. Okay it's better you call her something else." He looks towards me. Suchi looks between us. I look towards her and reply, "You can call me Tiu, okay suchi?" She frowns once again and says, "You are elder then me na?" Shruti chimes in and says, "It's okay suchi. That's like a nickname and she gave you the permission to call her that. Otherwise mamu will have a heart attack now." Akshit glares towards her while she laughs with others. Suchi smiles and says, "Okay Tiu." With that she sits on my lap. Such a cutie.
She then asks, "Mumma can we stay please? I want to learn dance from Tiu." Megha dii shooks her head and replies with a no. Suchi makes a face and pleads. Akshit and Shruti insists megha dii too. After a lot of pleading and no's she asks Arjun jiju if he wants to stay, to which he replies, "Whatever you want." Everyone insists megha dii altogether. Atlast She says, "Okay okay but after we visit maa baba. Okay suchi? After you visit Nani and Nana we can come here." She cheer with a big 'yes' and hugs me. I was taken aback by the gesture but I hugged her back. My eyes tear up but somehow I managed to smile and contain it.
Everyone else was cheering too when Shruti shifts closer to me and says, "Suchi doesn't warm up to anybody in such a little time. It's really surprising but I get it. You know she hates bua even and says 'She is like the evil queen'," we both laugh at that and then she smiles at me and hugs me. What is happening today? Everyone wants to make me cry. I hug her back. After a while we all return to our rooms to get fresh and clean and join the lunch later. Nitya bhabi and Dhruv bhaiyya leaves as they have to go somewhere.
Megha dii decides to clean up in my room as khushi decides to be with Shruti. I ask her to get cleaned up first while I wait and remove my earrings. My hairs were messing up with my earrings. I was struggling when someone knocks on the door. I glance around the door to find Akshit leaning into it. He asks, "Do you need any help?" A whirlwind takes place in my stomach. What's that called? Yes, butterflies erupting in the stomach. He walks toward me with slow moves and I am a mess. He kneels and helps me with my earrings while smiling. How I am not a puddle in the ground yet. My heart starts beating fast.
He struggles with the earrings too but he is too careful to not hurt me and gracefully calm. The control this man has. I am still but not uncomfortable. I don't help him but I also don't want to mess this up anymore. My eyes were on his face when he frowns, fumbling with the earrings. I chuckle. He stops for a second and looks toward me and smiles. He resumes with my earrings. Finally one gets off my ear and my hair, thankfully.
He turns to the other side when megha dii returns from the bathroom saying, "What is going on? I shouldn't be here or what?" Akshit causally removes his hands and sit up, calmly while I panic and hurriedly look back. He replies, "I was just helping her with her earrings. It's upto you if you should be here or not dii," while smirking. Megha dii smiles and says, "Have some shame, you shameless." He smiles but soon recovers from that and says, "I was not stealing something so why should I be ashamed of this." I glare at him and signs him to shut up. Megha dii laughs and he says, "Wow. Jiske liye chori Karo wo hi bole chor(The one for whom you steal is the one who calls you a thief)" Megha dii leaves while laughing at us and I was sitting there dumbfounded.
He then starts on helping me once more when I look towards him and asks, "What was that?" His eyes looks up to me and he says, "What? We don't need to hide anything from them." I reply immediately, "What are we hiding or revealing?" He smiles and says, "Us." My cheeks heats up and I say, "What about us?" He stops his work and replies firmly, "Don't Tiara. Don't push us to square one. After what you did, I won't let you." He looks into my eyes, pinning me into my seat. I choose to act dumb. I manage to reply, "What did I do?" He signs and says, "Just answer my questions I asked you before. If you haven't already." I breathe slowly and try to leave but he places his hands near my seat, caging me in.
He says, almost growling, "You are not leaving, Tiara." I once again take my seat and looks forward. I stutter but manage to say, "Yes." He asks, "Yes what?" I get annoyed and blurt out, "You..... Yes I like you. Happy? Enough?.....," while almost shouting at him. He smiles which grows into a full blown grin and then he does something so unexpected. He kisses my right cheek. I stoped my rant immediately. I was so still in the moment. My eyes widen. What the hell just happened?
Akshit's Pov
After her confession, I kiss her cheek. She looked so adorable. All pink and red, even covered with colours. My heart was beating at a speedy pace with all the happiness and excitement. But before we could talk anymore Maa calls me downstairs. I reach there only to find Aarav and when I approach him he says, "I assumed you were busy with something or someone so I insisted aunty to call you." I glare at him. I reply, "You asshole. Now spit out what's the matter?" He simply states, "I am calling him, you like it or not. The phone number is still not tracked and it can't go on forever." I sign him to sit down and I let him in with all the information.
"It is untraceable because of continuous change of location. It's like the owner set this up like that." He says, "Then we know the man who can still come up with the solution." I sigh and reply, "You know Aarav he is not someone we can trust and you know his reputation." He simply ignores all of it and says, "I don't care. I am calling him. If he is useful, he is great to me." I was thinking the same for sometime but dealing with the man can be dangerous because we think twice before taking an action while he takes an action and I don't know if he even thinks later or not.
I agree with Aarav atlast and signs him to get to the lawn with me to call. I have always hidden the nasty works we need to do behind a case, from my family. He dials his number and I tell him to put it on loud speaker. He recieves the call after some ringing. He starts with, "What a pleasure. And what did I do this time?" Aarav starts with, "Dev?" He replies, "You don't check the number before dialing? Yes it's Dev." I am already getting annoyed. I snatch the phone from Aarav and reply, "Let's talk about buisness and save both of our time." He replies chuckling, "Arey arey Akshit Babu. Let me in with your tactics and plans and I will decide if I can help you."
My grip on the phone tightens. But I calm my racing pulse and reply with, "We need your help with a phone number. Our department couldn't trace it. The number is untraceable because of it's continuous change of location. But we need to trace it anyhow." I don't share why. He doesn't need to know. He replies with, "I am glad. And i think I can help you people with this but don't come to meet me. I will let you know when I will meet you people, at your choosen place."
I already know something is going on with him so I asks, "You did something wrong once again. Didn't you?" He replies, "Did I ask you why? Then it's none of your buisness too, Akshit Babu." I was getting frustrated and angry and I was going to retort but before I could do that Aarav snatches the phone and says, "Thankyou Dev for helping us on such a short notice. I am hanging up and I will delete the number but let me know the new one soon." I glare at him. He hangs up and return my glare with one of his and says, "Your anger will ruin things for you one day Asshole. We are meeting him that's it and you will co-operate."
I was shocked by the retaliation but I know Aarav. I reply with, "Only if I get to choose where we meet." He signs and replies with a Okay. We retreat back to the living room to find Shri getting downstairs. Tiara no where to be found. Suddenly Aarav quips, "I will leave." I stop him and asks, "Stay with us for the lunch." Shruti nears us, frowning. He replies, "No, I have a date." I don't force him and he leaves. Shruti asks, "Have you seen Abhi, Bhai?" I reply annoyed, "Didn't he left after the antakshari?" Shruti replies, "He did. But he said he will return soon as Maa invited him for Lunch." I don't know what's Maa trying to do.
Does she wants to get Shri married to that fucker? No way I have to stop her thoughts. I will talk to her later. I asks Shruti to just let the matter go. If he wants to he will. I retreat back to my room to check if Arjun jiju was done so that I can get cleaned up. I get into the room to find it empty. The bathroom was too. I get into the shower to get fresh. After a while I emerge back from the bathroom and get ready. Hairs still damp, I leave it like that. I exit my room to find Tiara near the balcony geting her hair dry with a towel. I stand there, watching her with a smile.
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𝗛𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗼 𝗱𝗲𝗮𝗿 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿 💌
𝗪𝗲 𝗵𝗼𝗽𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲𝗱 𝗶𝘁!!
(If you didn't we understand, I got sick and things went south 😭)
𝗗𝗼 𝘃𝗼𝘁𝗲 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁. 𝗔𝗹𝘀𝗼 𝗱𝗼 𝗳𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗼𝘄 𝘂𝘀 𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝗻𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗺 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲. 𝗔𝗹𝘀𝗼 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗰𝗮𝗻 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝘂𝘀 𝗼𝗻 𝘀𝗰𝗿𝗼𝗹𝗹𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗰𝗸. 𝗪𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗺𝗲𝗲𝘁 𝘀𝗼𝗼𝗻 💌
𝑇𝑎𝑘𝑒𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒𝑙𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑚𝑢𝑎ℎ❤