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“Sit with me, please,” he’d said, desperate to learn more about her. Even then, he’d known there was something special about her. “We don’t have to talk.”
She had let him walk her to a bench in the very same garden where her character got killed. They sipped their coffees in quiet and he had found more than a measure of satisfaction that she’d let him share the moment.
“I refused to let my skirt blow up when I fall to my death here,” she said finally, lifting her head and looking at the concrete slab where she’d fallen earlier for practice, “flashing my underwear to the entire world. Isn’t it enough that the girl’s death is nothing but gratuitous violence to create shock and sympathy, to justify the hero’s violence toward the villain? Do we also have to add the indignity of my bare thighs and pink underwear to it?”
That night, Virat had asked a favor of his brother for the first time in his life. And to give him credit, Bhai had listened when Virat had said it looked incredibly gross to have the victim’s bare limbs and underwear splashed about in that scene, just to cater to the audience’s baser instincts.
Since it was a movie being produced by Raawal House, Vikram’s word to the director had held sway.
The next morning, after the shoot, Zara had come to see him. Hugged him just long enough for him to feel the warm imprint of her body on his, and whispered, “Thanks.”
He’d told her she owed him coffee this time and she’d smiled so gloriously back at him that Virat had felt like a hero. Had felt as if for the first time in his life he could be something more, something other than a stain on the Raawal legacy.
Zara had always had the uncanny knack of bringing out the best in him. Of making him give voice to the dreams he’d denied admitting to himself. Of giving him the safe space he’d needed by listening to all the many story ideas that had been building up inside him for so long.
She had helped him see that for all that he’d mocked the film industry, his heart and soul were already deeply entrenched in it.
Now he knew he’d simply been lacking the kind of affection and acceptance Zara had shown him, all his life. She’d been the first one to see and acknowledge him as a man with potential.
“I know the entire world thinks your brother is your grandfather’s true legacy. But I see it in you,” she’d said once after he’d related an idea he’d had for a movie. “Storytelling is in your blood, Virat. Why run away from it?”
They had been together for three months, even after that movie had wrapped up, but they’d not seen as much of each other as Zara traveled around, attending more and more auditions.
Other than mentioning the fact that her husband had died the previous year, she hadn’t wanted to speak about her past. And while he had been thirsty for knowledge of her, he’d never pressed, because he hadn’t wanted to hurt her. The fact that she’d begged him to keep their association private had grated on him.
With her meager funds running low, she’d been desperate for something other than a role that gave her more than a minute’s screen time.
And he...he had fallen for her—hard and fast—his emotions centering almost unhealthily around her. Only now did Virat realize that he’d used their clandestine relationship as an anchor in his life. But even then he’d had the sense to not pour his feelings out to her. To not let her see how much she affected him.
He’d continued partying with his usual fast and loose crowd, keeping up the appearance of being the useless scion of the Raawal family. Gathering interest and investors for a low-budget slapstick comedy he’d written himself.
Until one day...he’d heard that Zara had landed a role as the heroine in Vikram’s next multi-star intergenerational saga. That she’d already left the country for a shoot.
And his mother had been the messenger.
Not seven months later, she’d been linked romantically with his own brother.
The burst of applause from the dance master and his assistants pulled him out of the spiral of the past.
Virat stared, transfixed at the lovely smile on Zara’s face as the kathak master and his team gave her and the dancers an uproarious applause. And then, he asked himself the question he should have ten years ago. The question he’d even been incapable of seeing because he’d simply thought Zara was rejecting him.
In the three months they’d spent with each other, Zara hadn’t, not once, asked him to help her land a role. Not once had she pried information from him about his brother—whose productions had already started raking in money at the box office—or his upcoming projects. Never even hinted for an introduction to his powerful family or their numerous contacts.
Even a small nudge from his brother would have saved her months of heartache at losing out to another star’s sister or daughter or cousin.
She could have asked, knowing that Virat absolutely would have done anything for her.
She hadn’t.
Then why use their relationship to move up in the world? Why make a bargain with his mother of all people, knowing what a contentious relationship he had with the woman? Had she thought he’d hate to be used for his influence? Had she...?
Thoughts crowded inside his head as Virat stayed against the wall. For so many years, he’d shut the past off. He’d made himself chase after shallow women and relationships with a limited shelf life, convinced more than anything that Zara had betrayed him.
But now, now that they were working together again on this biopic, now that he’d kissed and held and made love to her, he wasn’t sure of anything that he’d thought had happened in the past.
Did the past even matter anymore?
He wasn’t that emotional, rebellious youth who didn’t know what he wanted from life. He was Virat Raawal now—a man who’d built his reputation and wealth outside of the umbrella of his family’s reputation and power. He’d invested every rupee he’d made into real estate and luxury hotels and multiplied it until he could fund his own projects.
