And eating them.
“Did I tell you your father invited Raj’s family?” her mother said casually just as she was about to scoop out the second lot of samosas.
Nayna’s nipples grew into hard little bullets. Pavlov’s dogs had nothing on her. “What?” she squeaked out past the thumping of her heart.
“Don’t let the food burn.”
Nayna worked automatically. “Ma.”
“I knew you’d blush!” Her mother grinned—though Nayna wasn’t blushing and even if she had been, no one would know. “It’s fine. You don’t have to worry. They’re hosting their own family today or they’d have come—they were so disappointed to turn us down. But we don’t have New Year’s plans and they don’t either, so we’ll do something then.”
Nayna felt a sudden constriction in her chest, a large weight settling on her shoulders. It was happening, the inevitable closing of the cage. Their families were already starting to make plans together while indulgently “letting” them “decide.” It didn’t matter that she liked the man in the cage with her—it was still a cage.
And it panicked her.
* * *
When Nayna didn’t respond to his Happy Christmas message, Raj didn’t worry about it—if her family was anything like his, it was probably organized chaos right now while the preparations were going on.
Then his father started talking about the New Year’s Eve gathering he and the Sharmas had planned. “Just casual,” he said. “No stress. Relax and eat and drink.”
Raj’s muscles went rigid. He’d known when he made his move at the wedding that he was declaring his intent, but he’d made his “no interference” requirement clear to his parents. He needed more time to get under Nayna’s skin, more time to assuage her doubts, more time to show her that he could give her the adventure and freedom she craved.
He, a man who’d been old even when he was young, was falling hard for a brilliant wild butterfly. Nayna might not describe herself that way, but that’s what he saw—a bright, lovely woman with so much life and joy and love inside her. Raj was trying to learn to give her what she needed, but one thing of which he was fully cognizant was that the parental involvement would only push her away.
Since he had no desire to add to the pressure, he didn’t message her again. His gut twisted as the hours passed, as he waited to see if Nayna would run.
Aditi, meanwhile, giggled as she exchanged messages with Harlow around the food prep in the kitchen. “Don’t worry, bhaiya,” she said with an impulsive hug when Raj raised an eyebrow. “We’re not doing anything naughty. Harlow’s sending me dumb knock-knock jokes.”
A minute later, she snapped a selfie while pretending to bite into an entire cake and sent it off. As long as his sister kept the images she sent Harlow Chan G-rated, Raj wouldn’t have to find the boy and smash his phone to smithereens.
His own phone finally pinged with an incoming message around five: Hope you’re having a good Christmas Day.
It was a message that told him nothing, made him feel as if she was distancing herself. Raj’s abdomen tensed, his jaw tight. About to reply in an effort to break through her self-defensive walls, he thought of Aditi sending her crush photos, and he thought about how Nayna had touched him that night at the party—and in the park.
Ducking into his flat for a little privacy, he took a photo just for her.
It took him three tries to get it right.
He’d never in his life done anything like this, but the current cock-up called for desperate measures. I got you a gift, he wrote, trying to figure out if he was flirting right—he wished she was in front of him so he could kiss her and melt her and remind her that the promise of what they had was worth a little risk.
Oh, you didn’t have to do that, she wrote back.
Raj sent the photo of his upper body, adding, From Santa, to the message at the last minute.
2.7/10 she replied.
Raj’s grin spread slowly across his face. It sure looked like he was doing the flirting right, because her response fairly demanded he avenge his honor. Maybe he’d send her a photo a day. No, one in the morning, one at night so she couldn’t forget him even if she tried. More, he’d do everything in his power to throw a wrench in their parents’ New Year’s Eve plans. He would let no one make Nayna feel hunted.
* * *
Having stolen a moment of privacy, Nayna fell back in her bed, her phone clutched to her chest and a surely goofy smile on her face. Lifting up the phone, she stared at the photo again, at gorgeous ripped abs and smooth brown skin. He had a small scar on his upper left pectoral that she wouldn’t mind licking, and the sprinkling of crisp hair on his chest made her fingers curl into the sheets as her breath caught.
She couldn’t help rubbing her thighs together in a vain effort to assuage the ache he’d aroused. “You’re a fiend,” she whispered to the man who was playing with her again, then carefully made a new folder in her photos just for him.
The panic that had held her captive all day receded a little, but it wasn’t gone. She still had the feeling of having boarded a runaway train, and every so often her heartbeat would spike, her skin burning in a way that had nothing to do with pleasure. It didn’t help that Madhuri flitted around the Christmas party, carefree and without worries once more.
As if the past had never been.
But it had been and it had left scars on all of them. Her father, who patted her on the shoulder and called her a good girl for making sure the food table was never empty but who never hugged her. Gaurav Sharma had stopped being affectionate with her after Madhuri’s defection, as if he blamed his occasionally indulgent parenting for having set Madhuri on the wrong path.
Her mother, who smoothed her hair and whispered, “You’ll have your own home soon, Ninu, your own family” in a way that told Nayna that, on some level, Shilpa Sharma was aware of her younger daughter’s need to break free of this inhibited and stifling existence full of people she loved.
Her aji, who was dressed in a glorious gold-and-pink caftan for this event and who smiled at Nayna and said, “I know I can rely on you, beta,” when all Nayna had done was bring out a chair so she could rest her feet. “I know I never have to worry about you not being there if I need you.”
And even Madhuri, who hurt one day a year… and who couldn’t commit to any man now, though the entire time they’d been growing up, being married and having “tons” of babies had been all she’d talked about.
By the time Nayna turned in that night, she was exhausted both in the body and in the soul.
When her phone vibrated, she picked it up, looked at the message, and moaned. Raj had sent her another photo, this one focusing on his flexed arm, part of his naked chest visible along with half his face.
He was smiling.
Nayna traced the line of that smile, utterly and totally demolished, her heart mush.
3.2/10, she wrote back, and her fingers, they trembled. This man, he was dangerous to her. He could seduce her into abandoning her dreams of freedom to live life in the predefined world that had been chosen for her. And yet she couldn’t just walk away. Couldn’t give up this serious, often-unsmiling, and rock-solid man who was cracking his shell bit by bit to let her in.
19
Half-Naked Raj (No Further Enticement Required)
Nayna ended up out of town the next day when Aji suddenly asked if she wouldn’t mind driving her to the small coastal town of Raglan. “My old friend, Parvati, is visiting her younger son there and then going straight back to Wellington. I haven’t seen her in, oh, twenty years!”
“Did I tell you your father invited Raj’s family?” her mother said casually just as she was about to scoop out the second lot of samosas.
Nayna’s nipples grew into hard little bullets. Pavlov’s dogs had nothing on her. “What?” she squeaked out past the thumping of her heart.
“Don’t let the food burn.”
Nayna worked automatically. “Ma.”
“I knew you’d blush!” Her mother grinned—though Nayna wasn’t blushing and even if she had been, no one would know. “It’s fine. You don’t have to worry. They’re hosting their own family today or they’d have come—they were so disappointed to turn us down. But we don’t have New Year’s plans and they don’t either, so we’ll do something then.”
Nayna felt a sudden constriction in her chest, a large weight settling on her shoulders. It was happening, the inevitable closing of the cage. Their families were already starting to make plans together while indulgently “letting” them “decide.” It didn’t matter that she liked the man in the cage with her—it was still a cage.
And it panicked her.
* * *
When Nayna didn’t respond to his Happy Christmas message, Raj didn’t worry about it—if her family was anything like his, it was probably organized chaos right now while the preparations were going on.
Then his father started talking about the New Year’s Eve gathering he and the Sharmas had planned. “Just casual,” he said. “No stress. Relax and eat and drink.”
Raj’s muscles went rigid. He’d known when he made his move at the wedding that he was declaring his intent, but he’d made his “no interference” requirement clear to his parents. He needed more time to get under Nayna’s skin, more time to assuage her doubts, more time to show her that he could give her the adventure and freedom she craved.
He, a man who’d been old even when he was young, was falling hard for a brilliant wild butterfly. Nayna might not describe herself that way, but that’s what he saw—a bright, lovely woman with so much life and joy and love inside her. Raj was trying to learn to give her what she needed, but one thing of which he was fully cognizant was that the parental involvement would only push her away.
Since he had no desire to add to the pressure, he didn’t message her again. His gut twisted as the hours passed, as he waited to see if Nayna would run.
Aditi, meanwhile, giggled as she exchanged messages with Harlow around the food prep in the kitchen. “Don’t worry, bhaiya,” she said with an impulsive hug when Raj raised an eyebrow. “We’re not doing anything naughty. Harlow’s sending me dumb knock-knock jokes.”
A minute later, she snapped a selfie while pretending to bite into an entire cake and sent it off. As long as his sister kept the images she sent Harlow Chan G-rated, Raj wouldn’t have to find the boy and smash his phone to smithereens.
His own phone finally pinged with an incoming message around five: Hope you’re having a good Christmas Day.
It was a message that told him nothing, made him feel as if she was distancing herself. Raj’s abdomen tensed, his jaw tight. About to reply in an effort to break through her self-defensive walls, he thought of Aditi sending her crush photos, and he thought about how Nayna had touched him that night at the party—and in the park.
Ducking into his flat for a little privacy, he took a photo just for her.
It took him three tries to get it right.
He’d never in his life done anything like this, but the current cock-up called for desperate measures. I got you a gift, he wrote, trying to figure out if he was flirting right—he wished she was in front of him so he could kiss her and melt her and remind her that the promise of what they had was worth a little risk.
Oh, you didn’t have to do that, she wrote back.
Raj sent the photo of his upper body, adding, From Santa, to the message at the last minute.
2.7/10 she replied.
Raj’s grin spread slowly across his face. It sure looked like he was doing the flirting right, because her response fairly demanded he avenge his honor. Maybe he’d send her a photo a day. No, one in the morning, one at night so she couldn’t forget him even if she tried. More, he’d do everything in his power to throw a wrench in their parents’ New Year’s Eve plans. He would let no one make Nayna feel hunted.
* * *
Having stolen a moment of privacy, Nayna fell back in her bed, her phone clutched to her chest and a surely goofy smile on her face. Lifting up the phone, she stared at the photo again, at gorgeous ripped abs and smooth brown skin. He had a small scar on his upper left pectoral that she wouldn’t mind licking, and the sprinkling of crisp hair on his chest made her fingers curl into the sheets as her breath caught.
She couldn’t help rubbing her thighs together in a vain effort to assuage the ache he’d aroused. “You’re a fiend,” she whispered to the man who was playing with her again, then carefully made a new folder in her photos just for him.
The panic that had held her captive all day receded a little, but it wasn’t gone. She still had the feeling of having boarded a runaway train, and every so often her heartbeat would spike, her skin burning in a way that had nothing to do with pleasure. It didn’t help that Madhuri flitted around the Christmas party, carefree and without worries once more.
As if the past had never been.
But it had been and it had left scars on all of them. Her father, who patted her on the shoulder and called her a good girl for making sure the food table was never empty but who never hugged her. Gaurav Sharma had stopped being affectionate with her after Madhuri’s defection, as if he blamed his occasionally indulgent parenting for having set Madhuri on the wrong path.
Her mother, who smoothed her hair and whispered, “You’ll have your own home soon, Ninu, your own family” in a way that told Nayna that, on some level, Shilpa Sharma was aware of her younger daughter’s need to break free of this inhibited and stifling existence full of people she loved.
Her aji, who was dressed in a glorious gold-and-pink caftan for this event and who smiled at Nayna and said, “I know I can rely on you, beta,” when all Nayna had done was bring out a chair so she could rest her feet. “I know I never have to worry about you not being there if I need you.”
And even Madhuri, who hurt one day a year… and who couldn’t commit to any man now, though the entire time they’d been growing up, being married and having “tons” of babies had been all she’d talked about.
By the time Nayna turned in that night, she was exhausted both in the body and in the soul.
When her phone vibrated, she picked it up, looked at the message, and moaned. Raj had sent her another photo, this one focusing on his flexed arm, part of his naked chest visible along with half his face.
He was smiling.
Nayna traced the line of that smile, utterly and totally demolished, her heart mush.
3.2/10, she wrote back, and her fingers, they trembled. This man, he was dangerous to her. He could seduce her into abandoning her dreams of freedom to live life in the predefined world that had been chosen for her. And yet she couldn’t just walk away. Couldn’t give up this serious, often-unsmiling, and rock-solid man who was cracking his shell bit by bit to let her in.
19
Half-Naked Raj (No Further Enticement Required)
Nayna ended up out of town the next day when Aji suddenly asked if she wouldn’t mind driving her to the small coastal town of Raglan. “My old friend, Parvati, is visiting her younger son there and then going straight back to Wellington. I haven’t seen her in, oh, twenty years!”
