Page 49

“You know I have a perfectly comfortable bed in my room, right?” He reached one big palm out and shook her head before running away from her swat.

Avantika kicked away the duvet, stretching to get a better look at him across the open connecting door.

Was he really planning to sleep in his bed? What was this Sati Savitri behaviour?

The rattle of things, unzipping and zipping of the suitcase, pouring of water in a glass.

It was so quiet in the rooms that she could even hear him gulping.

Or she was so crazy in half-sleep that her senses were extra sharp.

She was also out of tact now so she hollered out point-blank — “Are you coming to sleep here or sleeping there?”

“So bossy,” he came, tugging a threadbare cotton T-shirt down his torso. He wore a pair of loose black night shorts and was running his fingers through his damp floppy hair. Before she could scowl to her heart’s content he dimmed the lights in both their rooms and slipped in beside her.

“I like the lights on during sex,” she sassed, turning her back to him.

“Remind me again, when did you last have it?” He pushed closer to her.

“In my dreams.”

His mouth landed in the crook of her neck and his scent attacked her full force.

Leather was subdued now, it was all soft blossoms and lemons.

Citrus. Fresh. His damp hair dampened her cheek.

She moved her side closer into the cradle of his hips.

His leg came over hers and with one hand he pushed a pillow between her legs. She stopped moving.

“Samarth…” she whined.

“Sleep, Ava. We are both tired. I am exhausted,” he pulled the duvet over them.

“Mmm.… Wait! Are you in pain? Shit, I didn’t even think that before attacking you…” she turned to face him. “I’m so sorry…”

“I am not in pain. I sat in a cold bath.”

“That’s what took you so long?”

He nodded, his fingers pushing the strands of hair away from her face. Instead of tucking them behind her ear, he caressed them slowly with his fingers.

“What’s your recovery thing like?”

“It’s usually an ice bath immediately after a match but everything went for a toss today. Tomorrow I have a massage session early morning followed by physio and stretching.”

“At Villa a Sesta.”

“Hmm…” he let her hair go and traced his knuckles down her jaw. She loved it, melted into his touch.

“You came all the way to Arezzo just for me…”

“Not just for you, for you. Period.”

Her eyelashes fluttered, between wanting to stay awake and needing to doze off.

“I should be telling you to not stress yourself physically like this but I love this.”

“I know.”

“When will you finish tomorrow?”

“Two in the afternoon at the latest. I am all yours for the weekend then,” his knuckles caressed her chin, reaching the corner of her lip.

“Hmmm…” she sighed.

“Two little indents pop here,” he poked the edges on either side of her mouth. “When you smile a certain way.”

“I know.”

“I have only seen you smile like that at me. And once at Cherry.”

“Cherry, our dancing horse.”

He smiled.

“Our apple and peanut butter fan,” her eyes popped open.

“Your first horse friend,” he reached down and gently took her lips between his. It wasn’t a stimulating kiss, not pulling her for more. It was one of sweet reminiscence, comfort, one that said — ‘I was there, and I am back. I will be here from now on.’

She pushed her fingers into the hair at his temple. It triggered the wet strands on the top of his head to tumble on his forehand.

“I always wondered how your hair remained up and set all the time. It used to keep flopping down in school…”

“Product.”

“Doesn’t look like it.”

“Natural finish or something like that.”

She combed her fingers through his hair.

“Your upper lip now has a birthmark,” he observed, his thumb skimming over the bow of her lip.

“It popped up a few years ago.”

“It’s very faint.”

“It’s mostly covered with lipstick or invisible in the shine of my lip balm.”

“Still peppermint,” he licked his lips.

“Always peppermint.”

“I saw this,” he rubbed on the birthmark.

“When?”

“That night in the plane. You wouldn’t stop talking and I couldn’t take my eyes off it. I wasn’t even sure for the longest time if it was a birthmark or a trick of light. Then we were reprimanded for being too loud.”

She snorted. “We weren’t that loud.”

“We were.”

“That baby was louder!”

“Uhhmm, yes, Ava. Babies. That’s what they are known to be.”

“You like babies?”

“I just finished with one at my palace. He still acts like one from time to time.”

Avantika found her knuckles tracing his eyebrow, her hand turning to let the pads of her fingers ghost over his cheekbone.

It was so surreal, to rediscover a man so intimately, like you knew the bone structure beneath his skin but not his skin.

The pores were larger, the jaw rough, the skin itself feeling a little softer and thinner than before.

“You said about your kids wanting to usurp Sharan’s throne… or something like that.”

He nodded.

“That means you have thought about kids?”

“Not in the literal sense. But that’s one of the reasons I swore off settling down.

When we met again here, in Paris… I saw how your goals were different.

I no more felt like I would be doing an injustice to you by not giving you that palace, that extended family, that heritage.

I did not feel like I was cheating you out of something you did not crave in the first place. Tell me, do you crave it?”

“No.”

“Truth?”

“Complete truth.”

“You were always a bubbly, extrovert girl.”

“So?”

“So I always saw you as the life of a palace, any palace. The princess, then the queen. You were born to light up palaces and people’s faces, Ava. How could I do this to you?”

“Shhh…” she stapled his lips between her fingers. He chuckled. “Decision has been made. You know my answer now. And I can be bubbly and extrovert anywhere. Give me people, I am happy.”

He shook his head, grabbing her hand from his mouth and pressing a kiss to the centre of her palm. “You are also an introvert at heart.”

“No!”

“You are. Or explain why you have colleagues, new friends and everything in Paris and yet spend more time at your apartment than outdoors?”

She fell silent. Was he right? He was. She had spent more time texting him from home in the last few months than she had exploring the nightlife of Paris. And it was a happening nightlife on a daily basis.

“I am ambivert?” She frowned, trying to chew over that thought. “Or maybe I am on a spectrum. More phases of extrovert than introvert? I am extro-ambivert?”

“Whatever you are, you are mine,” he pulled her body into his, letting her head relax on the bulge of his bicep. “Light up our home one day, wherever it is.”

“And your pretty face,” she kissed his bicep. Samarth laughed, pushing her around until she lay on her side, her pillow between her legs and his leg over hers. His mouth pressed into the back of her head.

“Go to sleep now.”

“Not so sleepy anymore.”

“Count sheep.”

“I’d rather count the debt of kisses I owe you,” she sputtered. And for the first time Avantika discovered that she could laugh to sleep. As could he.