Page 18 of Trapped By the Maharaja

Sanjana woke up to heat.

The velvet couch felt too hard and hot beneath her cheek. The material felt coarse and ticklish against her nose. Her brow furrowed when she felt the slow, steady rhythm of a heartbeat under her ear.

Feeling confused, she opened her eyes, only for realization to hit her.

She wasn’t on the velvet couch. She was in bed. And her head was resting on Ram’s bare chest.

It was Ram’s chest hair tickling her nose and his heartbeat under her ear.

Her breath caught and she froze as fragments of memory rushed back.

She was sitting on the velvet couch with her files, fighting exhaustion, and eventually drifting into sleep. She must have gotten up at some point in the night and gone to the bed. And because she was a restless sleeper, she must have rolled onto Ram.

Dammit.

Her pulse thundered as she slowly tilted her head upward.

Ram was awake.

His eyes were on hers, dark and unreadable.

He hadn’t moved, hadn’t pushed her away, but the weight of his gaze pressed down on her like fire against her skin.

For one dizzying heartbeat, she couldn’t look away.

The morning light brushed across his features, highlighting the hard line of his jaw, the shadows beneath his eyes, the curve of his mouth that gave nothing away.

Heat rushed to her cheeks. Her entire body flushed.

She jerked upright, scrambling to put space between them. “I—I must have…” Her voice faltered. “I move in my sleep sometimes.”

He didn’t say anything. But there was a flash in his eyes.

She wasn’t sure if it was annoyance, amusement, or something else.

Feeling flustered, she looked away from him.

“I have to get ready for work,” she muttered.

She didn’t wait for his reply.

She got out of bed and nearly ran across the room. The sound of her bare feet against the marble was embarrassingly loud in the silence. She went into the bathroom and shut the door with a sharp click, leaning back against it as her breath came fast.

Her reflection in the mirror stared back at her, cheeks burning, eyes wide. She pressed her palms to the cool marble counter, trying to steady herself.

It was ridiculous.

It was just an accidental touch that meant nothing. She had been exhausted and needed rest. That was all.

But what if Ram thought she was throwing herself at him?

It wasn’t the first time she had thrown herself at him. Even in the past, she had thrown herself at him over and over, nearly begging for his kisses and touch.

Her face burned brighter as she recalled the past.

“Why can’t we kiss or do things that other couples do?” she demanded.

Ram looked at her, his eyes burning with heat and desire. “Because you are going to be my queen.”

She frowned, not understanding. “Queen?”

“Yes, queen of my heart. Until I make you my queen, I can’t touch you.”

She hadn’t understood until much later that it was a royal decree that the Devara queen is to give herself to the maharaja only after taking the sacred vows.

For a long while, she hadn’t even known that Ram was the Devara maharaja.

To her, he had been Ram, the handsome boy with a rusty jeep she had fallen madly in love with.

Pushing away the past memories, she stepped into the shower.

She turned on the water, and deliberately showered with cold water.

But the memory of the hard, muscled chest beneath her cheek, the steady beat of his heart, and the dark flash in his gaze when she looked up flashed behind her eyes, making her body throb with heat.

Stop it!

Taking a deep breath, she stepped out and dried herself before dressing hurriedly.

She wore a comfortable cotton dress from her previous wardrobe that she usually wore to the hospital.

Then, tying her long hair into a ponytail, she looked into the mirror.

Her face was still flushed, and her heart was still racing from the brief encounter that morning.

She stepped into the bedroom cautiously, only to see that Ram wasn’t in the bed. He had left the master suite.

Relief at his absence was followed quickly by anger at his cold indifference.

If he can’t bear to touch me or even be around me, why did he force me to marry him?