‘Wear something suitable. We will be leaving at around eight,’ he said autocratically, an eyebrow raised in imperious command.

‘You can’t force me to go, or to do anything that I don’t want to,’ Meethi said pugnaciously.

She wouldn’t be browbeaten this time. She would live life on her own terms. Her time away had matured her, made her stronger, and she would not be bullied.

Veer felt as if she had struck him. She was shamelessly defying him! He looked at her in burning fury.

‘And what will you do?’ he asked dangerously, a flash of rage crossing his face.

‘You can’t guard me all the time. As soon as I find a chance I’ll run away,’ Meethi said defiantly, her eyes shooting sparks.

Her mutinous expression inflamed him further. He pulled her to him and his mouth swooped down on hers with pent-up fury and desire, silencing further protests. He wanted to punish her, kiss her senseless and douse the fire that she effortlessly ignited in him.

The touch of her lips was like ambrosia, sharpening his thirst, and his tongue swiped at her luscious lower lip, nibbling at it in tiny bites. Parched after the long absence, they drank thirstily from each other, not pausing even to breathe. He hadn’t forgotten how good she always tasted and was pleased to know that she too wasn’t immune to the inferno that blazed whenever they touched.

Dear Reader

My editor’s letter of approval had an incendiary effect and I still have trouble catching my breath at times!

As a child I loved reading and my imagination was peopled with love stories. When I eventually sat down to write a love story I came up with a clichéd romance with wooden characters. The empathy was missing because as an Indian I found it difficult to identify deeply with a Greek hero and a British heroine.

I decided to write about Indian characters, and by the time I submitted my manuscript to my delight I found that Mills & Boon® had begun publishing Indian writers.

Harlequin Presents® has always been my favourite series, because the one truth that it holds up is that wealth, riches, lineage and beauty alone cannot ensure happiness. A human being’s quest for happiness is eternal. Everyone wants to be happy and everyone has different ideas of what can make them happy.

I write romances because I feel that love leads us to abiding joy and happiness. Love for one’s soul-mate, one’s children, parents, friends, and all those who inhabit one’s immediate world. Love which is deep and at the same time detached, because it has zero expectations. The missing piece in life’s puzzle is love, which gives a spiritual dimension to human life.

I hope, dear reader, you will enjoy reading the story of Meethi and Veer as much as I enjoyed writing it. I would love your feedback at tanurja@yahoo.com

Sincerely

Tanu Jain

‘And then he kissed her!’ is the line that used to run like a litany through TANU JAIN’s mind whenever she sat down to laze and relax. For years handsome hunks haunted her imagination and stunning strong-willed heroines clamoured to come out. She knew it was the effect of reading countless Mills & Boon® romances (she started in Class 8).

She tried scratching the itch and came up with the story of a strong Greek male and a suffering beauty. It was sure to be accepted, she thought naively. It was a disaster! The rejection slip opened her eyes to a few pertinent facts and her next work was written straight from the heart, with familiar local settings. Add an editor who believed in her voice and guided her—and voilà!

Strength, kindness, honesty, optimism and love were drilled into her as a child by her parents, and the first Mills & Boon® that she read made her realise that these were exactly what romance novels were about! So writing a romance novel was both emotionally and morally satisfying!

Tanu’s interests are wide-ranging. (Too wide, she feels at times!) She has done her doctorate in English Literature and occasionally teaches English language and literature.

She currently lives in Gwalior, India, with her businessman husband who, for her, epitomises the qualities of a typical Mills & Boon® hero. Her daughter and son are proud of her, but are embarrassed when she uses their names for characters in her books!

Recent titles by the same author:

HIS CAPTIVE INDIAN PRINCESS

His Runaway Royal Bride
Tanu Jain

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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To the catty girls who add so much colour,

Parul, Jaya, Priya, Rashmi, Ekta, Hemangini and Bhavana.

To the centre of my universe,

GJ.

And, last and importantly,

to an avid romance-reader and daughter of my heart,

Vasundhara.

Table of Contents

Cover

Excerpt

Dear Reader

About the Author

Title Page

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Epilogue

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

THE RUMBLE OF a helicopter sounded in the distance. Meethi looked up, her hand stilling and her heart thudding violently. It was an alien sound. Helicopters were never heard here.

Her neck began prickling dangerously, and a hunted look entered her eyes.

Had he finally traced her? It had been a long time now—three years, to be exact—and she had begun to hope that he had finally accepted the facts that she had been at pains to scatter around.

But she trusted her instincts. They had stood her in good stead.

The paintbrush she had been holding fell from her nerveless fingers, and she sprinted inside her modest house. She couldn’t afford to wait and see who was in the helicopter. She wouldn’t risk staying. Not when it could be her husband or his men.

Hurriedly collecting the bag she always kept ready and dragging on her sports shoes, she locked the house and vanished into the adjoining forest.

HH Maharaj Vidyamaan Veer Singh of Samogpur jumped out of the helicopter he had been flying with a grim face. His back ramrod-stiff, he flexed his palms and stretched his powerful shoulders to loosen his tensely knotted muscles.

The bodyguards accompanying him exchanged nervous looks. They had known him long enough to sense that he was furious.

Veer tried to control the murky anger swirling inside him.

He was at breaking point. He wanted to give vent to the tidal waves of fury that were threatening to get out of hand. Anger rolled through him again as he thought of how his errant wife had deceived and betrayed him.

She had made a fool of him. A royal fool! he thought with dark bitterness.

She had feigned her own death and disappeared. He dragged his thoughts back to focus on the matter at hand.

He followed his bodyguards, who had gone forward to check out the house. One of them went inside while the other went to the small garden that stood in front of the house.

‘The house is locked, Hukum!’ one said. The other came with the news that there was a canvas with wet paint in the garden.

Canvas and paint. It had to be her. Wet paint meant that she had left in a hurry. But where had she gone? There were no vehicle marks and the nearest house in this small little village was at least three kilometres away.

He turned and looked at the forest. He nodded to his bodyguards, who spread out and began trawling the thick undergrowth silently and quickly.

Suddenly, Veer sensed a movement in the forest farther ahead. Adrenalin pumping, he increased his speed and, soon enough, espied a slight figure in shirt and jeans running silently.

His long legs ate up the distance and, reaching her, he grasped her from behind. She tried to evade his grip but he held her fast.

The sudden impact made them lose their balance and they both fell down, rolling a short distance.

Gritting his teeth as the dry undergrowth scratched his bare arms and small sharp pebbles dug into him, Veer tried to cushion her with his body, protecting her as much as he could, and they came to a stop when they crashed into a huge boulder. Jarred by the collision, they lay stunned for a moment.

Veer felt her heart fluttering like a tiny bird’s against his chest. The feel of her in his arms after so long sent tremors through his body. Filled with self-contempt at the betraying weakness, he got to his feet, holding her by her arm.

What would she do now? There was no escape. He had discovered her deception. Meethi bent her head, trying to stop her fear from showing. Her head seemed to be spinning and she could barely hold herself upright.

‘So, my dead wife is alive and kicking!’ Veer said with barely disguised fury.

Meethi felt a roaring in her ears and sweat trickling over her entire body.

‘You cold, heartless liar! You let us believe in your death and left us mourning and grieving for you whilst you ran away. You made fools out of us!’ he bit out ferociously.

After all that he had done for her, she had turned on him and betrayed him. She had made a mockery of their marriage vows and played with his emotions in the worst possible way.

Veer sensed his wife’s fear and felt a moment’s hesitation. She had hurt him, but he would never do the same to her. He knew he must hold back the fury rolling through him and control himself.

But when Meethi bent her head, refusing to even meet his gaze it infuriated him.

His burning eyes bore into her and he watched his beautiful young wife turn white before fainting in his arms.

Veer looked at her slumped body in shock and panic as he suddenly felt something wetting his fingers. Removing his hand from her hair, he saw that his fingers were red with blood. She had hurt herself, but how?

He looked down and saw that the boulder that they had crashed into had a sharp jutting edge; she must have cut herself on it. His heart constricted for a moment as he feared that she had hurt herself badly. He froze.

His bodyguards had caught up with them and stood there, hovering. One of them took out a clean handkerchief and held it to the wound, trying to staunch the flow of blood. He turned over her limp figure gently to ascertain how deep the cut was and discovered a gash; the bleeding hadn’t stopped and it would need to be looked at by a doctor.

Later, he stood looking down at her as she lay unmoving on the hospital bed. He had immediately flown her to the nearest town, where her cut had been bandaged. The doctor had said that she would have a few painful bruises but had assured him that there was nothing to worry about. The cut to her head was minor, but the doctor did express concern that his wife seemed underweight and suffering from slight stress.

Slight stress! Her stress was nothing compared to his since she had fled three years ago! Her purported death had brought his world crashing down and he had spent sleepless months, feeling miserable and guilty.

And all the time she had been alive.

His bitter eyes roamed over her pale, beautiful features. Over her closed doe eyes, her aquiline nose and her Cupid’s bow lips. Her perfect features still had the power to make him catch his breath.

Though the glow had dimmed and her skin no longer gleamed with lustre.

She looked wan and listless. Holding her in his arms, his body had registered her extreme thinness. His eyes traced over her slight figure and he noticed that she had lost her curves and seemed almost emaciated now.

The disquieting thought that running away had taken a toll on her physical well-being occurred to him. But his anger did not abate. She had broken her marriage vows, betrayed his trust and behaved treacherously.

And he couldn’t forget or forgive her lies and deceit—two things he could not abide.

Born with the proverbial silver spoon, in the important and wealthy royal family of Samogpur, Veer had been an only child. Though not particularly close to his parents, he had been the much pampered and cosseted scion with a phalanx of retainers at his beck and call, till he had been sent to The Scindia School, a boarding school where the children of most royals studied, at the age of seven.

Here he got a rude shock. Boys avoided his company and would fall silent when he appeared in the common room. His seniors passed scathing comments and treated him like a pariah. Amidst hushed whispers and asides, he became aware that his family name was dreaded and feared.

He remembered enduring four long and lonely months before going home to his father, HH Maharaj Arham Shakti Singh and asking him why the boys in his school wouldn’t be friends with him. His father had looked at him with sad regret and explained that their dynasty had a tainted history. Their forefathers had been on the wrong side of the law and had acquired their immense wealth by indulging in nefarious activities such as smuggling, opium trading, extortion and racketeering. There was a long history of infighting between the various branches of the family, and their family record was peppered with gory instances of sons who had overthrown their fathers and brothers who hadn’t shied from slaying each other in their quest for power.

After Independence, the royal titles and much of their power had been abolished, but their ancestors had remained embroiled in property disputes and legal and political controversies.

That day, as he watched his father recount their family history clinically with an expressionless face, something fundamental changed for seven-year-old Veer. The unshakeable confidence and sense of invincibility his childhood had endowed him with was cruelly shattered. He felt ripped out of his privileged cocoon and hurled into deep ignominy. He had spent his holidays feeling humiliated and ashamed of his heritage.

A month later it had been time to return to school but Veer had refused to go. His father had summoned him to his study and asked him the reason for his refusal, and Veer had told him he couldn’t face the boys at school who would make fun of him.

His father had sternly told him to behave manfully befitting a ‘Rajput’. Rajputs, he said, faced things head-on and did not run away from them like cowards. His father’s unyielding stance had forced Veer to go back to school and it had been as unpleasant as he had feared. Though he had gradually been accepted by his peers and had made friends, the experience had hardened him and made him tough.

As he grew older he realised an important fact. His father was also ashamed of the legacy he had inherited. And, over the years, his father had begun the process of righting the wrongs committed by their ancestors, cleaning up the dirty deals, giving up property acquired unlawfully and legalising the various family businesses.

As head of such a vast legacy, his father’s life was one big cycle of endless obligations, unending demands and never-ending duties. His distant, formidable father drove himself hard and had little time for his wife and son.

The rest of the family, especially his father’s two younger brothers, hadn’t taken too kindly to his attempts to cleanse the family coffers and tried their best to undermine his efforts. Veer had been aware of his uncles’ vociferous opposition and the underhand tactics they had indulged in. Their actions had put his father under terrible strain and pressure, so much so that it had brought about a major heart attack and caused his father’s untimely demise.

Veer had been in his last year of college in London. He had excelled academically in school and had elected to study law, determined to help his father and ease some of his burden. But his father’s sudden death pushed him to the helm. Veer was anointed the head of the family and at twenty-one years of age was saddled with the weight of his heritage and a heavy load of responsibilities. His uncles tried their utmost to wrest control of the vast, lucrative family holdings by first trying to sweet-talk him into signing some papers and, when that didn’t work, trap him in a web of lies and deceit, slapping fabricated cases against him and dragging him to court.

But Veer worked tirelessly, day and night, with remorseless resolve to consolidate his position and gain complete control. With gritty determination, he completed his degree, managing to fit in his studies within the hectic schedule of college attendance and a slew of court appearances. He was forced to mortgage his ancestral property and most of the family jewellery to meet the financial requirements of running his palaces and paying his employees their salaries because the bank accounts had been frozen. He employed the best legal brains to fight all allegations of dishonesty.

His hard work paid off and, over the next five years, he had erased the stain of being on the wrong side of the law, brought the family business within the legal framework and brought respectability to his name. Thereafter, he had expanded his father’s legacy and created a vast empire with varied interests ranging from property development, portfolio management and owning and running a chain of heritage hotels.

The large extended royal family which had mocked him and scoffed at his efforts now regarded him as the unchallenged supreme head, vied for his attention and begged his presence at their functions. His uncles who had dragged him to court now fawned over him obsequiously and bent over backwards to flatter him.

But though he fulfilled his duties as the head and put up with the never-ending demands on his time, he maintained a frosty distance from people. His childhood had conditioned him to be independent and alone. His bitter experiences after his father’s demise had made him wary and distrustful and snuffed out his capacity for emotion and deep feelings. He preferred being alone and keeping his guard up at all times. Everyone looked up to him and idolised him but their respect was tinged with trepidation and fear.

But this chit of a girl had merrily walked all over his pride and trampled it beneath her treacherous feet.

His mouth tightened and he sat down to wait.

Meethi opened her eyes, feeling disorientated. She found herself lying on a bed, and as her eyes ran through her surroundings they alighted on the grim-faced man sitting in the chair. She sat up with a jerk.

Memory came crashing back. Terror and misery, which were eerily familiar, inundated her. He had found her. He would take her back.

Controlling the sob that swelled in her throat and almost left her mouth, she valiantly tried to silence her anguish.

Veer stood up, dark and menacing. ‘How are you feeling?’ he asked grimly.

Meethi lowered her eyes and, her voice a mere husk, replied, ‘I am all right.’

He came towards the bed and held out his hand, adding brusquely, ‘Let us go then.’

Meethi baulked. ‘Where are we going? I don’t want to…’

Veer didn’t bother to reply and gripped her arm to help her stand up. She looked at his implacable face in desperation.

The touch of his hand on her arm sent tremors running through her, and she tried to shake it off, but he tightened his grip and propelled her outside.

Meethi tried to ignore the weakness spreading through her limbs and protested, ‘Please, I don’t want to go anywhere. I… I want to go back to my house.’

Veer said forbiddingly, ‘We certainly are going, but we’ll go to our house.’

She replied tremulously, ‘I won’t go!’

The next instant, he lifted her up effortlessly and strode out of the room, down the corridor and outside, where a car stood waiting, his bodyguard holding the door open.

Meethi tried to struggle but his arms were inflexibly clasped around her body, crushing her to his strong chest. Her breathing became shallow in such close proximity to his body and her heart began beating rapidly. She tried not to notice his lean jaw and the slight stubble which covered it or his aquiline nose, slightly indented in the middle as a result of a childhood brawl. A feeling of dizziness engulfed her as she felt long-buried embers of passion begin to sputter.

She felt light-headed with relief when he placed her inside the car. It had been torture being held so close. She moved to the far end of the seat and tried to still her beating heart.

Veer got in silently.

Meethi wanted to say something but the words died in her throat at Veer’s coldly ferocious look.

She felt cold and scared inside. And tired. Very tired. The relentless pressure of being on the run had taken its toll. She hadn’t had a peaceful night’s sleep since she had fled. Had forgotten what it was to slumber dreamlessly.

She hung her head and tried to control her shaking hands, afraid he would see her weakness. And he would be quick to pounce on it and turn it to his advantage.

Suddenly, the car stopped. Meethi sat stiffly, unsure what to expect.

The chauffeur opened her door, and she stepped out fearfully. They were on a helipad. A helicopter stood waiting. He was taking her back to Samogpur.

Cold dread filled her, and her legs threatened to collapse. She swayed and would have fallen, but Veer scooped her up again and sprinted to the helicopter, which took off with a whirring of blades.

Images from her tormented past rose, mocking her cruelly, choking her breath in despair. But there was no way out.

Veer wouldn’t let her escape now. He would fling her back into the prison his home had been. She sat there, defeated and spent, huddled into a miserable heap.

What did he want? How had he found out that she was alive? Why had he traced her? He should’ve been happy at being rid of her, surely? He could have married a suitable girl this time around.

Veer looked at her downbent head and a sense of satisfaction filled him. She was in his clutches now. He would make her pay for her betrayal.

He saw her chew her lower lip and lust shot through him with devastating speed. He had loved kissing her luscious mouth, teasing her lower lip with his tongue, biting it playfully. Even her treachery hadn’t dulled his physical response to her beauty.

But then his glance alighted on her ashen face and a host of emotions gripped him. An unwanted anxiety pulsed through him. She didn’t look well. The head injury must be paining her. He would have the family doctor look at her when they reached home.

Dusk was falling when the helicopter touched down and Veer stood up and held out his hand to help her.

Meethi couldn’t stand. All strength seemed to have deserted her. She remained collapsed in the seat. Veer bent his big powerful body and lifted her slight form effortlessly. She was too drained to react; a fog of misery had enveloped her.

Veer looked at Meethi, perplexed. She was behaving strangely.

Eyes shut, she lay listlessly in his arms, seeming terrified. The Meethi he knew would have been struggling and protesting at being carried in such a manner.

She opened her eyes when he reached the stone steps that led to their palace, and he felt her stiffen.

‘Where…? What…?’ Her voice tapered off.

‘This is where I live now,’ Veer said inflexibly.

He had moved out of the huge Rajmahal that had been the ancestral home and had begun living in the smaller Jal Mahal that had traditionally belonged to the younger son. Chacha Saheb, his father’s youngest brother, had sold it off to settle his debts, and Veer had bought it for his personal use.

Meethi froze, paralysed with shock, looking at him in disbelief.

He had moved out of the palace of his illustrious ancestors! He had broken the royal tradition. She had begged him once to live in a smaller bungalow because she had hated the lack of privacy and the overpowering presence of servants, but Veer had always been a stickler for tradition and propriety and had categorically refused. So why now had he taken such a step?

And what about her mother-in-law, Maaji Saheb? She also must be here then. She would never leave her beloved son alone.

Her stomach hollowed out with dread at the prospect of meeting Maaji Saheb again. She was the one who… but she wouldn’t think about her.

Forcing her thoughts back to the present, Meethi looked towards the phalanx of retainers lining the entrance, their heads bowed respectfully, dreading seeing familiar faces—faces displaying thinly veiled contempt. But they all looked new and unfamiliar. Her breath escaped in relief, and she struggled to be put down.

Veer lowered her watchfully, keeping a vice-like grip on her arm.

They entered the Jal Mahal.

Meethi had been here earlier in her marriage to Veer and had always liked it better than the palace they had lived in. The Rajmahal was flamboyant and ornate and had always seemed cold and forbidding; this one was smaller, airy and elegantly built.

Meethi felt the eyes of the retainers on her and mortification filled her.

They must be looking down their noses, wondering why their Maharaj Saheb had married her. She wanted to run away but knew she could not; Veer wouldn’t let her. The throbbing in her head intensified.

One look at her pasty complexion and with a muttered imprecation, Veer picked her up and strode off again, his long legs moving purposefully. Entering his suite of rooms, he put her down on the huge four-poster bed in the master bedroom.

Meethi sank down on the bed, trying to ignore Veer’s searing gaze. He told the hovering maid to fetch a glass of water.

‘Have this medicine,’ he said, his tone expecting instant compliance.

Meethi wanted to ignore his grim command but the throbbing in her head made her do as he requested.

She sat up straight. What would he do now? She didn’t want to answer the numerous questions she knew he would throw at her.

Veer looked at her, sitting stiffly, and the tension of her posture screamed out at him. She was apprehensive. Good. She had betrayed him. He wanted her to feel worried and tense.

‘Now, start answering some questions! Why did you run away? You didn’t for a moment think how we would all feel,’ he thundered.

Meethi almost let out a hysterical laugh. She knew how everyone would have felt—relieved at getting rid of her.

She had always been a source of embarrassment to the venerated royal family, and they must have rejoiced. Maaji Saheb would have begun making a list of suitable brides for her beloved son, she thought bitterly. But she didn’t voice her thoughts. Veer refused to hear anything against his family and she didn’t want to get into one of those fruitless arguments again.

Her silence inflamed Veer and he burst out, ‘And to run away in such a manner! Pretending to have drowned in an accident! Not content with merely fleeing, you hatched a treacherous plot with callous disregard for those you left behind!’

The world had tilted on its axis when he had learnt that the wife he had been mourning was actually alive and living happily. He remembered with cruel clarity how devastated he had felt at her heartless treachery. And then anger had filled him. Never before and never since had such anger consumed him. But that day an elemental fury had coursed through his veins, beating at his insides, and he had blindly picked up and smashed things in his study, trying to get rid of the demonic feelings plaguing him. After which he had mounted his horse and gone for a punishing ride till the rage inside him had dissipated a little.

Meethi kept silent with a great effort of will. She had just wanted to disappear; hadn’t cared how. But wise counsel had prevailed and she had realised that, for the break to be final, she needed to have a convincing story. She couldn’t have just simply disappeared. Veer had married her and in his book that meant that he owned her. He wouldn’t have let her simply escape. He would have tracked her down and found her. As he seemingly had done….

But she couldn’t say any of this. Ever since the miscarriage she had suffered, she had felt cut off from her surroundings, enclosed in a bubble of aloneness. She had given up on Veer and their marriage.

Seeing her silence as an admission of guilt, Veer tore into her. ‘You played with our emotions in the worst possible manner! And you didn’t once think what would happen when you were found? I would be made a laughing stock when it became known that my wife had run away, pretending to be dead! You have tarnished our family’s name and honour and shamed your father’s memory! But all this wouldn’t matter to you, would it? You only know how to behave selfishly, to think about yourself, your feelings and your convenience.’

‘What do you want from me?’ she asked in a subdued voice, ignoring his diatribe.

Veer looked at her in shock. She hadn’t uttered a word of explanation and neither did she seem a whit ashamed or regretful of what she had done. Far from apologising for her deception, she was skating over her wrongdoing, acting like a victim.

‘I want answers. Will you tell me why you ran away like this? You had everything a girl wants—a life of comfort, wealth, riches, jewellery, clothes and a titled family! But clearly this wasn’t enough for you—what else did you want?’ he rasped, feeling tightly wound up inside.

Meethi was quiet. He would never understand her reasons. He never had and he never would. On the surface her life had been perfect but she had lived through it and knew how the undercurrents had trapped her and almost drowned her.

‘Why does it matter? I thought you would be relieved to be rid of me—an unwanted burden,’ she said miserably, the words forced out.

‘Did I ever make you feel unwanted or treat you like a burden?’ he demanded disbelievingly.

‘You left that day without speaking to me,’ Meethi whispered, her face white.

Veer stiffened. That last day had been burnt into Veer’s memory. He recalled the events clearly.

It had been two months after she had suffered the miscarriage. When six months pregnant, Meethi had tripped and fallen down the stairs, losing their baby. Two months of coping with gut-wrenching loss and seeing his vibrant wife turn pale and wraithlike, a shadow of herself.

After the miscarriage, Meethi had totally withdrawn into herself and become completely unresponsive. He had been at his wits’ end as to how to cope and had gone to consult a renowned doctor.

On his return he had found Meethi in the arms of his younger cousin, sobbing uncontrollably.

The sight of her wet cheeks and his cousin’s consoling hug had maddened him and something had snapped within him.

He had marched her to their suite of rooms and had turned on her, accusing her of behaving indecently, shunning all propriety and decorum.

Meethi, in turn, had retaliated, accusing him of being insensitive and unfeeling and, before he knew it, he had her in his arms and had begun kissing her hungrily and the fire between them had blazed gloriously as Meethi had kissed him back passionately. After months of abstinence, the feel of her in his arms and her soft encouraging cries had made him lose all control and the doctor’s orders that sex was off-limits had been forgotten by both of them. Tumbling her down onto the bed and egged on by her passionate kisses, he had taken her quickly, furiously.

But afterwards, as he looked at her lying spent in his arms, his shirt askew where she had tugged it off and her clothes torn when in his impatience he had ripped them, he had felt self-disgust overwhelm him.

He had behaved like an animal, intent on slaking his carnal pleasures, not even caring for the well-being of his sick wife. He always lost control whenever she was around and it had happened again.

Overwhelmed with guilt, he had left full of self-castigation for being so weak-willed where she was concerned. And that was the last time he had seen her.

He looked at Meethi now and some of his guilt returned. His behaviour had been despicable.

‘You said that you were going mad and you seemed totally disgusted!’ she said softly, reminding him. Something had died inside her that day when she had seen the disgust on his face. She had never felt so unwanted and useless in her life. She knew then that she would have to leave.

He froze in shock. Had she mistakenly thought that he was disgusted with her?

‘Was that why you ran away?’ he asked grimly.

‘You weren’t happy in our marriage,’ Meethi said, sadness colouring her voice.

She was pretending to have left out of concern for him. Accusing him of being the unhappy one in their marriage. Her duplicity fuelled his anger.

‘So, you are shifting the blame on to me now? You claim to have run away because I was unhappy, but if you really wanted to spare my feelings then why the charade of your death? Did you think I would be happy to hear that my wife had drowned?’ Veer replied.

‘I thought it would be better in the long run…’ Meethi said weakly.

‘Better for whom? You and that old man of yours?’ he said crushingly through bloodless lips. He had had enough of her lies and deception.

‘What old man?’ she asked with a look of incomprehension.

Meethi’s look served like a red rag to his anger. She was an actress beyond compare.

‘Stop acting the innocent! Did you think I wouldn’t come to know? You ran away because you didn’t want to stay married any more. You ran away to your teacher, didn’t you? I had always suspected you were infatuated with him and finally you decided to go to him!’ he said vehemently.

Meethi looked at him, stupefied. Did he really believe that she could have betrayed him with her guru?

As a child, Meethi had loved art and her work had caught the attention of Yogesh Hussein, a renowned artist who had begun tutoring her when she was ten. He’d claimed she had ‘unusual artistic talent’, and Meethi had revered him, looking up to him as another father figure. She was aghast and stunned at Veer’s insinuations.

‘I didn’t run off to be with him!’ she said tightly.

‘Why do you persist in lying? You ran from here straight to him. Didn’t you?’ Veer thundered.

His blood had boiled when the detective had reported that she had gone to Hussein’s house in Delhi and from there to his farmhouse, where she had stayed secretly for about three months before she had gone to Kolkata.

‘I went to him because there was no one else I could turn to,’ Meethi said heavily. Her baba had passed away and she had no other relatives she could go to.

Guruji had been shocked but supportive, and she had stayed with him for the first three months but Meethi had been terrified that Veer would trace her and so she had begged him to send her away somewhere else.

Veer felt as if she had slapped him. The unpalatable fact that his wife considered him ‘no one’ and had preferred to turn to another man and betray him stung his formidable pride.

‘So, even knowing that you had run away duplicitously, he abetted your perfidy? What sob story did you tell him? How did you justify your running away? Is this what he teaches his students? Or is it only you? Did he encourage you to run away?’ he said, words flying out of his mouth with ferocious precision.

‘He didn’t encourage me. In fact, he told me to talk to you but…’ Her voice tapered off.

Guruji had tried to convince her to talk to Veer and iron out their problems. He had even offered to talk to Veer himself but she had been so hysterical in her refusal that he had relented.

‘But you didn’t think my reputation was anything to care about. Family honour, propriety, decorum—all these are foreign words to you. They don’t matter to you at all,’ Veer thundered bitterly.

It had been difficult for him to accept that not only was Meethi alive but that she had meticulously planned her escape down to the smallest detail. She had wanted to leave him.

And she would have been successful at staying hidden if he hadn’t come across her painting at the exhibition.

His eyes grew cold and his face turned grim when he recalled how, a year after her supposed accident, he had gone to a painting exhibition organised by one of the charities he supported, featuring the works of Hussein.

As he’d walked around the exhibition one painting had made his blood run cold. He had stood, stunned, in front of the painting of a puppy sitting atop a car. The car was his Jaguar and the puppy was the one that Meethi had once dived to save as it had run in front of his car.

The painting didn’t bear any initials but he knew that no one apart from Meethi could have painted it. But when had she painted it? How could she have painted it? Questions had inundated his mind but a gut feeling bloomed inside him, filling him with the cold clarity that Meethi was alive.

When he’d asked the organisers about the painting they’d said that Hussein had donated the entire collection of paintings to the charity. He had immediately tried to contact Hussein but discovered, to his frustration, that the man was untraceable. He had visited his office, his house and even his farmhouse, but he seemed to have vanished.

The renowned artist had always exhibited a soft spot for Meethi and he had called Veer a couple of times after their wedding, trying to persuade him to send her abroad for her degree. Veer hadn’t liked the other man’s possessive tone when he’d spoken of Meethi and had kept putting off his request. He hadn’t mentioned anything to Meethi because she adored her guruji and blindly followed what he said. And Veer had always felt irritated and, though he didn’t admit it, slightly jealous.

And so, his suspicions thoroughly roused, Veer had hired the services of a private detective to trace Meethi.

As he’d waited for the detective’s report, questions had plagued him. Why had Meethi fooled him? Why had she feigned her death? What had she hoped to gain? Had it been a sign of her wilful immaturity? Or was there a deeper reason behind her disappearance? Was the reason connected to Hussein?

It took the detective more than a year to gather clues and put them together and then some more months to trace Meethi’s exact whereabouts. She had been in hiding for a full three years before the detective ferreted out her current address, a cottage in Santiniketan, near Kolkatta. And his report confirmed Veer’s worst fears. She had run off to Hussein.

‘It wasn’t like that,’ Meethi protested.

‘Then what was the reason for this deception? And if Hussein was so concerned about you, why didn’t he come and talk to me? I tried to contact him and left innumerable messages at his house but he had disappeared!’

‘Why did you try to contact him?’ Meethi asked hesitantly. How had Veer discovered her deception? She knew that Guruji would not have contacted him because he knew how adamant she had been about not returning to Veer. But why hadn’t Guruji mentioned anything to her about Veer trying to contact him?

‘Because I saw your painting of the puppy,’ he said searingly.

So that was what led him to her. But how could he have seen the painting? It was with Guruji. After she went to live at his farmhouse, Guruji had compelled her to begin painting again. And, once she began, it had been the only thing that had kept her sane and afloat, saving her from drowning in a morass of despair. She had poured out her anguish on canvas and it had helped her achieve a sense of closure. But she had painted mostly abstracts or figures that in no way revealed her identity. The painting of the puppy was, in fact, the only one that was in any way connected to her past and she had left it with Guruji because it was too painful to face the memories it roused.

‘How did you find it?’ she asked.

‘He donated it to a charity I patronise. He must’ve been ecstatic when you ran to him. It is, after all, what he always wanted. He always had a vested interest in you,’ Veer said condemningly.

Meethi looked at him with dismay. ‘How can you even think such thoughts about Guruji? He has always been unselfish in his support and encouragement.’

After high school, Guruji had helped Meethi win a scholarship to a prestigious art college in London, and she had been thoroughly excited at the prospect.

But, to her dismay, her ever-supportive father had put his foot down, saying he wouldn’t let her stay abroad alone. She had been trying to convince him to let her go to college when her marriage to Veer had come about.

Veer had promised he would let her go to art college but she’d gradually realised that he hadn’t wanted her to go either. He had spoken to the college authorities and they had agreed to hold her place for a year but, as the months rolled by, there was always some excuse why she could not take her place. And her duties would keep her so busy that she found no time during the day to paint.

A few times when, late at night, she painted at home Veer would find ways of distracting her. Low heat coiled deep down inside when she remembered how he had often carried her off to bed in the midst of painting.

Guruji had been disappointed at her inability to go but he would bracingly tell her to continue painting. He had, in fact, been the only one who had supported her passion unstintingly.

Veer looked at Meethi with dark scorn. ‘His support was never unselfish. He wanted the fame of being known as your teacher, the one who spotted your talent and trained you. He encouraged you to the extent of ignoring your responsibilities and vows of marriage. And so you spun your web of lies and ran away. How you must have laughed at fooling me! I have never in my whole life come across such a duplicitous person. You have besmirched my honour and the family name!’ he castigated her.

Meethi listened to his diatribe, and bitterness filled her. He hadn’t once mentioned his feelings on losing her. It was only about his loss of face, his honour, his reputation. It would always be the same.

Family name and honour were the only codes he lived by and that still remained unchanged. He simply considered her another of his possessions, an object he owned that would be relegated to a back corner the moment she outlived her usefulness.

And she had proved a failure. She couldn’t provide the heir that he wanted. A heart-rending cry almost left her throat as painful memories of her miscarriage threatened to inundate her, but she ruthlessly pushed the door shut on them.

There was no point trying to sort out the convoluted mess of their relationship. Let him rave and rant and say what he wanted to, but when the time came she would run away again. She let his acrimony wash over her, wiped all expression from her face and turned away slightly.

She was dismissing him. She had run off. Fooled him. Her betrayal had blown a hole in his soul. And she didn’t care! The heartless manner in which she had tricked him by concocting the story of her fatal accident slammed into his memory and his fury reached mammoth proportions.

Veer wanted to demand further answers but he didn’t trust himself around her any more. He walked out of the room, leaving her alone. He had always been clear-sighted and decisive but Meethi managed to disturb his cool and left his thought processes completely tangled and in disarray. His formidable control always deserted him when she was around and she had managed to do what no one else had ever managed to do—hurt him where it mattered most. His head was spinning and he needed to put things in perspective.

CHAPTER TWO

MEETHI CURLED UP on her side, utterly drained and trying to stifle the sobs rising in her throat. She had been so happy when they got married. It had seemed as if she had found her sapno ka rajkumar—the prince of her dreams.

She remembered their first meeting, when she had saved a puppy from being run over by his car.

When he’d alighted from the car, his dark, smouldering looks had taken her breath away. He’d stood there, broad-shouldered and so tall that she had to crane her neck to look into the midnight-black eyes staring out of a chiselled face. He had been the most handsome man she had ever seen and, for a moment, her voice had threatened to desert her.

But his haughty, disdainful expression and regal air had angered her. She had sensed he was royalty by the way he carried himself and by the subservient attitude of the three men who had jumped out of the car with him. She had dismissed him as a typical royal, full of swagger and self-importance. And, not being kindly disposed towards royals in general, despite her thudding heart she had lambasted him.

Later, when she’d encountered him at a wedding she had gone to, she had felt his eyes following her and had tried her best to ignore him, feeling breathless and nervous. Inexperienced though she was with men, her senses had been aware of his dark sex appeal and the charged heat which seemed to shimmer whenever their glances met.

He had approached her the next morning when she was out early jogging and, striking up a conversation, had apologised for the car incident. Floored by his sincere apology, she had acquiesced to his invitation for breakfast and, before she knew it, they had driven down to a nearby heritage resort.

He had proved an interesting conversationalist and, over a sumptuous breakfast, they had talked about a variety of subjects. Though there was a difference of nine years between them, they had discovered a common love of music and cricket and there had been humorous bickering over favourites.

She had so thoroughly enjoyed herself that time had flown and she had been aghast to realise that it was already afternoon when they returned.

On their return, Veer had met her father and asked for her hand in marriage.

Her father had been ecstatic. Veer’s impeccable lineage and spotless reputation had bowled him over. He had approved wholeheartedly of the match.

But Meethi had felt piqued at what she considered Veer’s high-handed, archaic behaviour. The entire morning, he hadn’t given a single hint of any such interest and then he had suddenly gone behind her back to talk to her father.

She was also upset because she didn’t want to get married at nineteen.

Since she’d been seventeen her father had been inundated with proposals from well-meaning relatives. But her father had withstood the pressure from family and relatives and remained firm that she would complete her studies first.

Meethi had wanted to go to college and graduate with a degree in Fine Arts and Baba had always supported her desire but, worryingly, he had recently started hinting at finding a suitable match for her. And now he was serious about Veer’s proposal.

Though his dark good looks had mesmerised her and her heart beat loudly when he was around, she was deeply scared of giving up her life as she knew it. She knew life changed for a girl when she married. She had seen her friends married off young, freedom curtailed, circumscribed within the four walls of their sasural—their marital homes. Their lives revolved around their husband, in-laws and huge joint families and they had no independence or say in the running of their own lives.

And, most of all, she hadn’t want to leave her father alone. So she had refused, even though her father was being stubborn and adamant that she agree to Veer’s proposal.

Then Veer had stepped in.

With her father’s permission, he had taken her out for a drive and stopped the car in a quiet copse across the main road. He’d opened her door and held out his hand to help her step out.

Meethi had looked at him with beating heart and stepped out.

‘Why don’t you want to marry me?’ he asked her gently.

‘Why do you want to marry me?’ she asked through thundering beats of her heart.

His eyes crinkling at the corners, Veer smiled in amusement. ‘Life with you will never be dull, I guarantee! Well, I want to marry you because I think you’re extremely suitable for me,’ he said with gentle mockery.

Meethi saw red. ‘Don’t be patronising! Aren’t there any other suitable girls? Surely parents must be queuing up at your door in hordes!’ she hissed angrily.

Veer couldn’t contain his amusement and burst out laughing. ‘My dear girl, much as I hate to disappoint you, there is no horde or even a queue at my door. You are the girl I want to marry, and I think we’ll be very happy together,’ he added softly.

‘What about what I want? I don’t want to get married!’ she snapped, angry at his domineering attitude.

‘You don’t want to get married at all or you don’t want to marry me?’ he asked, suddenly serious.

‘I don’t want to get married right now,’ Meethi said truculently.

‘Why?’ Veer asked tautly.

Meethi remained silent.

‘Is there someone else?’ he asked with a strange expression on his face. ‘A boy you study with, perhaps? Does your father know?’ he asked with cold suspicion.

‘Of course not! What do you think I am? I wouldn’t go behind Baba’s back and do something underhand!’ Meethi was aghast at his fertile imagination.

Veer prodded her. ‘At least let me know the reason for your refusal.’

‘Well, sorry to let down your wild imaginings, but I don’t want to get married because, firstly, I want to go to art college and, secondly, I don’t want to leave my father alone,’ Meethi said stiffly, the words forced out of her.

‘Well, you can go to college even after marriage. No one will stop you. These are not the Dark Ages, you know! And, as for leaving your father, one day, sooner or later, you will have to get married. Do you think your father would be happy if you never married or if you stayed with him for ever? It is every father’s dream to see his daughter well settled. And your father is so happy with the idea of our marriage!’ Veer was all persuasion.

‘But he will be all alone!’ Meethi said through the lump in her throat.

‘I will ask him if he would like to come and live with us. And if he doesn’t I will take you to meet him as often as you want!’ Veer said easily.

Meethi looked at him in surprise. He was making short work of all her objections. Why was he so keen to marry her? He could have his pick of any girl. So why her?

‘But why me…?’ she began, but the words died in her throat at the look in his dark eyes. She felt feverish and chilled at the same time and couldn’t tear her gaze from him.

She stared at him, mesmerised, as he tugged at a lock of her hair, pulling her towards him, and lowered his head, capturing her mouth gently.

Meethi closed her eyes in shock and felt his lips move over hers tenderly, softening them, caressing them and coaxing them open.

Despite her sheltered and protected upbringing, Meethi had a fair idea of the physical intimacy between men and women, thanks to the knowledge passed on amidst giggles by her married friends. But the actual reality of being kissed blew her mind.

His lips slid over hers, nipping her lower lip gently, pushing and prodding seductively and then deepened as he kissed her possessively. One hand moved to clasp her head closer while his other hand slid over her waist, cupping her bottom and pulling her into a snug fit.

Meethi went up in flames. All thought was erased from her mind, her body became a mass of dizzying sensations and she began trembling and shaking in his arms.

Feeling her tremble, Veer broke off the burning kiss and, placing a tender kiss on her forehead, said, ‘Now you know how suitable we are for each other.’

Meethi was red with embarrassment and couldn’t meet his eyes.

But her heart did a strange flip-flop when he pulled her close in a tight embrace and said softly, ‘Don’t worry! I will always ensure your and your father’s happiness. You will never regret marrying me.’

Meethi stilled in his embrace, held in the thrall of inexplicable, mysterious emotions. She felt as if she were walking on air.

They returned to her home, and her father’s ecstatic expression was Meethi’s undoing. She stifled her fears and accepted his proposal.

But her fears had eventually come to roost, and Veer had come to resent their hasty marriage.

She had thought that by running away she would set them both free.

She slid into an uneasy slumber but woke all of a sudden, catapulted up, perspiring heavily, her breath coming in gasps.

Her eyes alighted on unfamiliar surroundings and then it all came back. Veer had found her and brought her back to Samogpur.

A sudden movement beside her, she saw the maid, a young girl, hovering solicitously, bowing down low in greeting. ‘Namaskar, Maharani Saheba!’

Her breath sticking in her throat, Meethi asked her, ‘Maharaj Saheb?’

‘He has gone riding, Maharani Saheba,’ she replied deferentially.

Some things never change, Meethi thought, feeling old wounds buried deep down begin to tauten. He had always preferred the company of his beloved horses to her. She recalled numerous occasions when, after a disagreement, he would simply storm off to the stables and go for a long wild ride.

‘And Maaji Saheb! Where is she?’ Meethi asked haltingly, dreading the answer.

‘Maaji Saheb is at the haveli in Haridwar. She has been living there for the past two years,’ the girl said confidingly.

Meethi looked at her incredulously. Maaji Saheb was no longer at the Mahal! How was this possible?

Seeing Meethi’s confusion, she said in a low voice, ‘Maharaj Saheb had a huge row with her and he ordered her to go to Haridwar!’

Meethi felt a slight easing of the clenched-up feeling inside. She wouldn’t have to face Maaji Saheb. Though one part of her mind clamoured to know the details, a nameless dread, familiar and omnipresent, kept her silent.

What would happen now? she thought dispiritedly. Where did she go from here? She couldn’t relive the terrible ordeal that their married life had been.

What did Veer want? Questions clamoured in her brain till it felt as if her head would burst.

Meethi tried to pull herself together. ‘What’s your name?’ she asked the maid.

‘Simran,’ the girl answered with a shy smile.

‘I haven’t seen you before,’ Meethi said thoughtfully. The girl seemed very young and sweet.

‘Maharaj Saheb appointed me a year back. He said that I was to look after you when you came back,’ Simran offered tentatively.

Meethi was stunned to learn that Veer had been completely sure of finding her a year ago and bringing her back.

‘I think I’ll have a bath,’ she said. Simran’s revelations had confirmed her dread that Veer wouldn’t let her go. Maybe her brain would start functioning better and find a way out of the current predicament.

Simran brightened up and said with a smile, ‘Ji, I will show you the dressing area.’

She went into the adjoining room and Meethi followed. It was a huge double dressing room divided by a thin wooden partition.

‘Maharaj Saheb’s dressing area is on that side,’ Simran pointed out. ‘All your clothes are neatly arranged in the wardrobe,’ she said.

‘My clothes! Where did they come from?’ Meethi asked, stupefied.

‘Maharaj Saheb had them moved here from the old mahal. And I was given the responsibility of arranging them,’ she added with a note of pride.

Meethi opened her wardrobe. It contained all her old clothes. Since she had feigned her death, to avoid any suspicion, she had left all her belongings behind and taken just a couple of old churidaar kameezes, a pair of jeans and some tunics. Memories came rushing in when she looked at the rows and rows of opulent and expensive banarsi saris, antique brocade lehangas and elaborate anarkali churidaar kameezes. The best designers had put together her trousseau, as befitting her position as the Maharani of Samogpur.

Simran bent and took out a silver chest from the bottom of the wardrobe. It contained jewellery—necklaces, earrings, bangles, nose pins, toe rings and anklets that she was supposed to wear every day. There were several heavy jewellery sets that were kept under lock and key but which she had to wear periodically.

As the wife of Maharajah of Samogpur she had to always remain dressed to the hilt in a nine-yard saree or a lehenga, dripping with jewellery, her head demurely covered. She couldn’t leave her chambers dressed otherwise.

She had no say in choosing her clothes. And she hated her wardrobe down to the last piece. The clothes were gaudy, elaborate and cumbersome and she had always felt trussed up in the heavy fabrics.

There were no jeans, trousers or skirts in her wardrobe except for the ones she had owned before marriage. And once or twice when she had tried to wear clothes of her own choice, her mother-in-law had frowned and looked askance before acerbically humiliating her so that she had given in and changed.

Turning away from torturous memories, she rushed to the bathroom in desperation.

Veer was galloping furiously. For a Rajput, pride was paramount, and his wife had insulted him in the worst possible way.

She had played on his weakness for her.

She had seemed so sweet and innocent… Unbidden, his mind went back to the first time their paths had crossed.

He had driven down to Jaipur to attend the wedding of his school friend, Gauravendra Singh. Itching to drive his new Jaguar at full throttle, the Delhi-Jaipur highway had seemed perfect, and he had set off with his driver and bodyguards.

He was enjoying driving the powerful car at a breakneck speed when suddenly a puppy appeared from nowhere. He had braked frantically.

To his utter shock, a wisp of a girl appeared as well and she dived in front of his car to save the puppy. He almost lost control, and the car swerved, but he managed to bring it to a screeching stop.

Aghast and furious, he had jumped out of the car and shouted, ‘Are you blind?’

‘No! You are!’ she retorted immediately, militantly.

He was taken aback. No one had ever dared to answer him back. Even his driver and bodyguards, who had leapt out urgently, were shocked into silence.

The chit of a girl continued her tirade. ‘Fancy car owners don’t own the road, you know! This puppy has as much right to this road as you have! Big car, small heart!’

Veer looked at her, stupefied. She barely reached his chin and she was staggeringly beautiful.

She had a heart-shaped face, almond-shaped eyes with impossibly long eyelashes and a rosebud mouth. A thick long braid that seemed almost too heavy for her swanlike neck lay sideways on her ample bosom.

His stupefaction wore off when he realised that the ample bosom that he was admiring was heaving with indignation. She was spitting fire, hurling insults and berating him.

He held up his hand to silence her. ‘Enough! You could have been terribly injured if I hadn’t braked in time! Have you no sense?’ he asked.

‘You don’t have any sense! If I hadn’t been here, this poor little puppy would have been dead!’ she retorted heatedly. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll see to this poor thing instead of standing here making small talk with you!’ She stomped off, the puppy held securely in her arms.

Veer looked at her diminutive figure, bemused. He felt as if a tornado had just whizzed past him.

He had gone to the wedding, unable to shake off the bemusement that had beset him.

To his astonishment he had run into her there again. She was from the bride’s side of the family and had come with her father for the wedding.

Traditionally dressed in a lime-green ghagra choli, her beauty had stolen his breath away and her vivacious laughter had captivated him totally. He had fallen in instant lust—a lust so powerful and primitive that it had overshadowed all rational thought.

And, for the first time in his life, he had behaved impulsively and thoughtlessly. And had paid the price for his lapse in behaviour, he thought bitterly.

His eyes wintry, he recalled the horror he had felt when he learnt that Meethi had met with an accident while driving the Beetle which he had given her soon after their wedding. He had been away and had been told that she had supposedly lost control and the car had plunged into the river near their mahal.

He had immediately called divers, who had been on the job for two whole days before they admitted defeat. With the last ray of hope gone, he had felt as if he had been hurled down a cliff to lie in a broken heap. For the first time in his life, uncaring of appearances, he had dismissed everyone and spent the night slumped on the riverbank, filled with agonising grief. He had stayed alone, in a stupor, drowning in the hollowness besieging him. The cold misery of that night would remain in his consciousness till his dying day.

Adding to his misery was corrosive guilt because he felt responsible for her accident. If he hadn’t given the car to her and insisted she learn to drive she would’ve been alive.

When he had discovered that Meethi had staged the accident and feigned her death he had felt humiliated and betrayed. After all that he had done for her…

But no more! He would rectify his mistake now. He would make sure that Meethi paid for her heartless betrayal. He would enjoy making her fulfil her duties as his lawfully wedded wife.

He turned to ride back.

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