"You're jealous I found love and you didn't!" Tanisha's voice rose. "You're jealous because my mother loves me and yours barely acknowledges you—"
"Tanisha, enough!" Saroj's sharp voice.
"I pity you." Nimisha stood, and something in her stillness made the room go quiet. "You're blind. And you're going to keep being blind because it's easier than facing that the man you love has been lying to you."
Tanisha crossed the room in three steps and slapped her.
The crack of the impact was obscenely loud in the silent room.
Nimisha's head turned with the blow, her cheek immediately reddening.
No one moved.
Then Bruno, who had been lying quietly in the corner, rose to his feet.
The sound that came from him was unlike anything anyone in the room had heard before—a sound from deep in his chest, building and building until Tanisha staggered back, knocking into Saroj.
The dog's eyes were fixed on Tanisha with absolute, unequivocal threat.
"Bruno—" Saroj's voice shook.
"Oh my god," Kritika breathed from the doorway where she'd apparently been listening.
Bruno advanced one step. Just one.
Tanisha turned and ran from the room.
Bruno stopped. His ears turned back toward Nimisha.
Samarth crossed the room in seconds.
"Touch her again," he said, his voice carrying down the hallway after his sister, "and I will not call him off. Sister or not."
He turned to Nimisha.
She was standing perfectly still, one hand raised to her cheek but not touching it. Her face was composed, her eyes dry.
Always fine. Always composed. Even now.
He reached out and gently moved her hand away from her face, replacing it with his own palm. The mark was vivid, her skin already warming with the beginnings of a bruise.
"Are you alright?" he asked.
"I'm fine."
"You're always fine," he said, and his voice was rough with something complicated.
"That's the role," she said, her composure finally cracking, just slightly, at the edges.
He looked at her for a long moment. Then he pulled her against his chest, his arms wrapping around her completely. Not sexual, not possessive.
Just holding.
Like she was something precious that had been damaged and he was the only thing between her and further harm.
She felt his lips press to the top of her head.
"Not with me," he said quietly, fiercely. "Not anymore. You don't have to be fine with me anymore."
