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She must slowly be going crazy, because she easily convinced herself that he needed her too.
Naina joined him at the small balcony, leaving enough distance between them just to prove she could.
Vikram cast her a look of surprise. Those eyes didn’t miss the distance she’d put between them. His mouth twitched. “Not into the club scene?”
“I’m not into it, no, and Ajay’s working late anyway,” she replied, somehow managing to sound rational.
He frowned.
She wondered if he found her company that distasteful. “I didn’t mean to intrude. I’ll say good-night—”
“Stay, Ms. Menon.”
She bristled at the way he invoked her last name. As if it was an incantation that immediately imposed distance between them.
“You were in a bit of a strange mood earlier tonight. On the call with Mrs. Ahmed,” she said, as if it was the reason she had sought him out.
He held her gaze and again, she knew she was just finding excuses to be near him. Even that knowledge didn’t send her on her way. He sighed and looked back at the ocean. “I’d forgotten that little tidbit she mentioned. That Daadu had been rejected at least fourteen times before he got his first role.”
“You miss him,” she said, full of a giddy relief that he was talking to her. That he was sharing a private moment with her. That despite the game they were playing, he still considered her close to him.
God, she was going mad, if him just talking to her was making her this happy.
“I never got to know him that well before he died. All I remember is the rows he and my father would have, the disappointment in his eyes afterwards. One time, though, when things were really bad with my parents and I went to live with Daadu and Daadi for the summer, every night after dinner, we would lie on this handwoven cot in the courtyard, oldgazalsplaying on the gramophone, look up at stars and he would tell me stories of brave kings and courageous queens and clever poets, and cunning spies in our history...he was a magnificent storyteller, with a true love for theater and cinema.”
Just like that, everything that made this man into Vikram Raawal clicked into place for her. “I owe you an apology,” she said, aware now that she’d deeply wounded him the first time they’d met. The shame of her judgmental words stung her.
Brows raised, he turned to her. Focused that intense gaze on her for the first time in days. “This should be good.”
She shook her head at his lighthearted tone. “I was wrong. It’s easy for the likes of Mrs. Ahmed and me to sit atop our judgmental horses and call you a sellout.
“But you never had the luxury to make the movies that met the vision of the company that your grandfather established. To simply take over and walk in his footsteps.” She didn’t have to mention the calls with his parents, the constant back-and-forth over finances, the better understanding she now had of his reign over the Raawals after only ten days. He constantly juggled a million responsibilities in addition to his own acting career and being the creative head of Raawal House. “You had to dig the production house from a financial hole really quickly, and then salvage its reputation when you took over. Have I got it right so far?”
He shrugged. “It wasn’t simply the prestige of the company I was saving. Daadi would have lost her bungalow, the house Daadu built for her. We’d have lost the studio and gone into bankruptcy. So many livelihoods depended on me. All our employees—both at the studio and all the various mansions, they’d have been on the streets. Virat and Anya would’ve had to give up their higher education.
“My father sank all their personal fortunes into unwise investments and my mother lost hers on three huge movies that were supposed to give her career a second wind but then were major flops.
“They would have had to sell their cars and their mansions and everything. They’d have lost their entire way of life, and believe me, they wouldn’t have survived it. They do not possess the strength of character to retire to simpler lives.” She could still see the weight of that decision in his eyes.
“My first movie was my first and final gamble, with everything riding on it. I used everything I knew about mass appeal and made sure I created the most commercial blockbuster I could. And I never looked back.”
“Why doesn’t Virat get that?” she asked with a frown. “Why doesn’t he understand that you’ve spent the last fifteen years of your career righting the mighty ship of Raawal House? What right does he have to call you a sellout when he’s reaping the benefits?”
He studied her face with bemusement but she was far too gone. “Such anger on my behalf, Ms. Menon?”
“It’s so unfair that you’ve carried this burden for so long.”
“Virat simply thinks I should have walked away from the mess my father and mother created. That the prestige of the Raawal family didn’t deserve to be preserved. Virat, you must understand, had a childhood that was eons different from mine. Mine was child’s play compared to the...challenges both he and Anya faced with them, as they were quite a bit younger than me.”
“Did you ever consider walking away? From the studio and your...family?”
“I did, for all of five minutes. But those long summer nights with my grandfather, the vision he had built into a reality with nothing but hard work, his love of family above all else...it didn’t sit well with me. Walking away would have been cowardly.”
“And you never regretted it?”
“Not the choice I made. For what it’s worth, Raawal House stands as a symbol of one man’s vision of cinema. My fortune is a hundred times what my grandfather ever made. If I say I regret building an empire and being rich, then I’m lying through my teeth. But...”
“But what?”
