Page 45 of Trapped By the Maharaja

Ram stirred awake, his body instinctively alert even though the palace was steeped in silence. The faint morning light spilled through the tall windows of the master suite. Sanjana was asleep on his chest.

Her dark lashes rested against her cheeks, the faintest crease marring her brow as though she were in the middle of a bad dream.

He remembered the way she had touched him last night, trembling, shaken by her nightmare. She had made love to him in desperation and fear. Even while she submitted to her need, it had awakened something primal in him, a need to protect and possess her.

Once again, he realized how much power Sanjana had over him. She tormented him, and yet consumed him in a way that he was willing to die for her and kill for her.

His mind returned to the darker truths of the night before.

Ram was in the interrogation room inside a jail in the city.

The attacker had sat in the metal chair, his wrists chained, sweat slicking his brow. He had already withstood hours of questioning from Ram’s men, but his silence was a shield. Until Ram stepped in.

Ram hadn’t spoken at first. He had simply removed his jacket, rolled up his sleeves, and struck—one clean punch to the man’s jaw that sent blood spattering across the floor. Then another, to the ribs, hard enough to make the attacker grunt in agony.

Blood stained Ram’s knuckles, but he hadn’t felt it.

He crouched low, his voice cold, lethal. “You’ll break eventually. Let me save us both the time.”

Still, the man kept silent, his swollen lip trembling but his eyes defiant.

Ram’s jaw clenched. He leaned closer, his voice like steel dragged across stone. “You have a family, don’t you?”

The man froze.

“My team is already tracking them,” Ram said softly, cruelly calm. “Your wife. Your children. Your aging parents. Their names, their routines—it’s all in my hands now. Unless you tell me the truth, I will see them ruined. And when I say ruined, I mean nothing will remain of them. Nothing.”

The blood drained from the attacker’s face.

Finally, the man broke, his words stumbling out in panic. “It—it wasn’t supposed to be me. I was hired. Paid. To—” He swallowed hard, his voice shaking. “To kill the woman. Sanjana Shetty, the Devara Maharani.”

The cold clarity of those words had burned into Ram.

The man hadn’t stopped trembling, his voice cracking as he begged Ram to spare his family. Ram hadn’t replied, only given his men a look. They dragged the man away to a cell, leaving him to his fear.

Ram’s hand curled into a fist against the sheets. His instincts had been right. It wasn’t a random attack during the charity event or at the temple pond. Someone wanted Sanjana gone.

His gaze fell on Sanjana’s sleeping form. She shifted slightly, a stray lock of hair slipping across her cheek. Almost without thinking, his hand twitched with the urge to brush it back. He clenched his jaw instead, forcing the impulse away.

She had no idea of the danger surrounding her. She believed the attacks were aimed at him because in her mind, no one would bother targeting her.

He leaned back against the headboard, silent, watching her as the sun climbed higher, his mind already racing with the next steps. He would protect her. He would hunt whoever dared touch her. And he would make them pay.