He kissed her.
Deep and claiming and different from every kiss that had come before—because those had been need and possession and hunger, and this was all of those things and also something else. Something that had a future built into it. Something that knew it wasn't going anywhere.
She kissed him back with everything she had.
When they pulled apart, they were both breathing unevenly, her hands fisted in his lapels, his arms fully around her.
"I want to show you something," he murmured, and before she could ask, he'd lifted her and set her on the thick railing, his body between her and the drop, his arms bracketing her completely.
"Someone could see—" She glanced down at the city.
"Let them." His mouth found her jaw, her throat, the place below her ear that made her shiver. "Let them see I love you. Let all of Mumbai see."
"You're insane."
"About you? Completely." His hands slid up her thighs, pushing the fabric of her dress up. "I've been insane about you for months. I'm done being quiet about it."
Private Balcony - Later
The city was spread below them, indifferent and vast and beautiful, and she was in his arms with her face against his neck and she could feel his heartbeat.
He held her like she was the most important thing he'd ever held.
"I'm sorry I made you wait," he murmured against her hair.
"You're worth waiting for." She pressed her lips to his throat. "Every terrible, stubborn, infuriating part of you."
His arms tightened. "I'll spend my life making it up to you."
"I'll hold you to that."
He pulled back enough to look at her face—to see what she looked like now, after all of it, after the confession and the tears and the love that had finally found its words.
She looked like the answer to a question he'd been asking without knowing it.
"What are you thinking?" she asked.
"That I should have done this a year ago." He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "That I wasted a year being afraid."
"We needed the year," she said, and she meant it. "We needed to learn each other. Even badly. Even painfully." She met his eyes. "I wouldn't know how much this means if I hadn't spent a year waiting for it."
He kissed her again, slower now, like he had all the time in the world.
He did, he was realizing.
He had the rest of their lives.
CHAPTER 22
Three Weeks After the Balcony
The house had changed.
Not structurally. The marble floors were the same, the chandelier in the entrance hall still threw the same patterns of light across the same walls. The gardens were maintained by the same staff, the kitchen produced the same meals at the same hours.
But the air was different.
Nimisha noticed it in small increments, the way you notice a season changing—not in one dramatic moment but in accumulation, day after day, until you realized that what had been cold had become warm and you couldn't pinpoint exactly when the shift had happened.
