“Good morning Amaan!” Talia smiled, forwarding his schedule, “what can I do for you today?
“The girl in the blue dress,” he mumbled, looking at his schedule.
“What about her?” she asked, locking her hands before her.
“Make her busy. Do whatever you want with her but make her useful,” he said, giving back the schedule to baffled Talia.
“What?” she blinked.
Talia was his secretary since he started his career and, apart from Raina, was the only one to understand his temperaments. She was in her early thirties with a sharp eye for detailing, which was what Amaan liked her for. She was an efficient, fierce woman famous for her no-nonsense att
“Can I leave too?” Asmaira asked, seeing Talia packing her stuff.“Amaan is still working. He asked you to stay back,” the latter didn’t raise her head and continued with her packing. Asmaira’s stomach grumbled on cue, making Talia halt in her action. Embarrassed, Asmaira was about to walk away when the latter offered her a box.“It’s a homemade sandwich. I had a lunch meeting so I couldn’t eat it. It should be good since I kept it in the fridge. Or if you not o—”Asmaira interrupted her, “No. I don’t mind eating.”With another low growl from her stomach, Asmaira sat on the chair and opened the box. With Amaan’s morning stunt, she lost her appetite and couldn’t eat her breakfast. And during lunch, she could hardly swallow food with time constraints. Being an introvert with zero social skills, she hid on the fire staircase. By the time she could muster up the courage to go to the cafeteria amidst the curious stare, order the food and sit, it was past her lunchtime. Thinking she would
With last night’s incident still fresh in her mind, Asmaira was on her toes the next day. No matter how often she was forced to make the coffee, she made it with full attention. She remained silent when Talia finally let out her frustration on her. She remained silent when Amaan mocked her about her phobia. She kept her gaze lowered even when Talia threw the file she had drafted in the dustbin.Swallowing the hurt, she worked like a mule under the tyranny of Amaan. Not able to sleep a wink with last night’s terror or eat a morsel because of the bothering throat, Asmaira was lethargic. Yet she didn’t leave any stone unturned whenever Amaan ordered her.With her breathing turning heavy and her body unusually hot, she closed her eyes and leaned over the wall.“I hav
Asmaira stirred, and a sigh left her feeling soft and silky under her. She smiled in contentment as if she had been sleeping on a bed after a long time. A muffled sound of the door or the scraping on the floor made her frown. It was disrupting her peaceful sleep, and she wanted nothing more than to tuck in the bed forever. Her body felt strange, making her stir again to fit into another comfortable position.However, the sound of the draw being pulled too close made her eyes snap open. Her face turned in the direction only to sit up with a jolt. On the other side of the bed sat Amaan with his back to her. What frightened her were the flashes of him confronting her in the file room and the change of her clothing. Amaan, who came to find his phone’s charger on the nightstand, gave a side glance before opening the next drawer.“What….” she trailed off before shrieking in panic. He would have ignored her uncalled reaction if he hadn’t noticed the saline attached to her hand, which she
“Is she the one?”Chad replied with disdain, “Yes.”“Looks ordinary to me. Why would someone like Amaan be riled up by her?” Samuel asked, observing Asmaira from the elevator bank. Chad had narrated how the presentation last time turned gloomy once Asmaira arrived with the coffees. Amaan, being riled up by her clumsiness, targetted everyone and even warned him about Saunders’s quality of work. Hence the reason why Samuel, head of the project from Saunders, joined him for a presentation that was disrupted brutally by him. Filled with indignation at receiving Amaan’s wrath for her mistake, Chad has held a grudge against her since then.Samuel’s eyes didn’t miss how Asmaira stood with a lowered head while Talia lectured her for spilling coffee in her recklessness. Amaan didn’t even spare her an ounce of attention and walked past them. “Interesting,” Samuel smirked in amusement. “Samuel, don’t,” Rick intervened, finding a familiar glint in his eyes.“Of course, Rick. I’m going straight
“I know this is not what you expected, but for now, this is all I can do.”Feriha said to which Asmaira nodded in understanding. Standing on the balcony, they looked at Amaan playing with Kabir on the lawn from a distance.“Salar is charmed by Amaan, and anything I say about you, he assumes I’m being biased towards you for no reason,” Feriha sighed. “You are doing more than I could ask,” she waved the phone with a small smile. “I told Amber, you will video call her whenever you want to talk to Kabir. But we need to be careful with Mehwish,” when Feriha said, Asmaira faced her in question, “Didn’t she go back?”“She left for a few days and will return before the annual ball.”“But…why be careful with her?” Asmaira asked.“Amaan is not the only one who changed. Mehwish did too. I know my daughter. Her silence is like a ticking bomb that could burst at any time. If she is around, she will try to sniff around,” her mother-in-law replied, glancing back at Kabir, whose loud laugh melted h
Assuming Amaan would believe Samuel’s story, she whispered, “I s-swear on Raina.”No matter how much he hated her, but that moment, he forgot about his revenge or his vow to make her life miserable. A strong urge to hide the innocent woman inside him took over, and he raised his hand to Talia, “My jacket.”Talia, who was gaping at the scene ahead, was brought out of her thoughts. She immediately passed it to him, contemplating what went around in her absence. They had hardly left for a few minutes, and something like that had happened.Covering Asmaira, Amaan stared at Samuel but instructed Talia, “Take her inside.”When Asmaira’s hold tightened, he looked down at her only to see her brown orbs di
“You could have handled it properly. Because of your impulsive decision, we are the next headline,” Salar said.“He hurt my wife. How do you expect me to react?” Amaan said, annoyed.With everyone gathered in the living room, Salar, surprised at Amaan’s recklessness, questioned him.“What I meant is, introduce her as your wife on the first day itself. No man would have dared to approach her in the first place,” Salar tried to reason with his furious son.Mehwish sat quietly, witnessing the scene. Her observing eyes didn’t miss how he addressed Asmaira as his wife or the fury he was still holding on to point to one thing—Amaan had softened towards Asmaira. At first, she thought, lighting a spark and fanning it into a fire would be enough to get Asmaira out of Amaan’s life. But with the tides turning, she had to devise another subtle plan.“Your father is right. Why didn’t you introduce Asmaira as your wife? Look what she had to go through because of that,” Feriha was upset when she saw
Amaan was brought out of the painful memory when his phone buzzed. His face was marred with a stoic shadow with the blast from the past, making him realize Asmaira doesn’t deserve his sympathy or any kind of emotions. She treated Raina worse than an enemy instead of listening to her. She hurt Raina at the moment of her death, and for that, he would never forgive her, no matter if she had strong morality. “Ross,” he answered the call when his friend’s name flashed.“What’s up, Captain? Do you still remember your friends?”He squashed the cigarette under his shoes and asked, “When will you stop calling me that? We are not in school anymore.”“I’m glad you finally decided to answer my call.” Ross was surprised when Amaan answered the call instead of disconnecting, which he had been doing since Raina’s death. Amaan knew what he meant. “where are you?”With the background buzzing with noise, Ross replied, “Our usual. Boys are here for our monthly meetup.”Ross was Amaan’s school friend,
“Asmaira,” Amaan sighed. “I can’t do this, Amaan.”“You have faced a more difficult situation than attending a college mid-semester,” he said, taking Kabir from her.Amaan came home early to surprise Asmaira with the news of her admission into another college. Another one on the list of sacrifices she had to make because of him and Raina. Finding Asmaira playing with Kabir on the lawn, he passed her the document to sign.“I still would have said no if it was my old college. I lost one year and would look like a fool to take a semester again with juniors,” she replied, bile rising at the thought of people gawking at her.“I knew you would say that. That’s why I transferred you to a new college. You have already learned the subjects but couldn’t take the exams. It will be a piece of cake. Just a few months to spare, and then you will be busy with your thesis in your last semester. Don’t have to go to the college,”What he was asking her was way more difficult than facing Mehwish. Sudde
“I have never been to such places,” Asmaira’s soft murmur caught Amaan’s attention.Giving his car keys to the valet, he reached Asmaira and held her by her arms, “if you are not comfortable, we can leave. I will make some excuses. Ross and Natalie will understand.”Although he said that, deep inside, he wanted Asmaira to break free of her reservation. He didn’t expect her to become an extrovert, but her level of introversion wasn’t healthy for her. He cannot let her live only for Kabir and not for herself. She moved closer to Amaan, lowering her head when a group of people walked by. The gesture was enough for him to wound an arm around his waist, ready to call Ross, but Asmaira stopped him.“I want to meet them. I-I,” she swallowed, ‘want to get to know my sister through Natalie. How Raina lived after her marriage.’She wanted to say but ended up saying, “I didn’t get to say my thanks to Ross.”Before he could ask why thanks, Ross’s voice interrupted them. “Asmaira, you are here.
Amaan glanced at Asmaira, who was busy entertaining Kabir with the outside view of the car and shook his head at her lack of questioning. On the other hand, Asmaira was happy to see Amaan putting in the effort to spend as much time as possible with Kabir. It was as if he was doubling the effort to compensate for his one-year absence. As long as Kabir was happy and would get to grow up in a complete family, she was willing to do everything, including sharing the bed or a meal. Her smile dropped, noticing a familiar route but she didn’t ponder over the thought. However, the closer they got, the more worried she was. It was not that she was afraid, but she didn’t want to open the can of worms.“Where are we going?” she couldn’t help but ask, to which Amaan smiled. They both knew where they were going. He didn’t want to expose her, but it was also true that he didn’t want her to run away. Things she had to let go of to keep one promise to her dead sister. He wanted to return it to her.
Asmaira sat at her usual place, where she used to hide from Amaan at the beginning of her marriage. Although she was safe in the mansion, the memory of last night never left her. The thought that there were women who were living a life worse than death and she could have become one of them—if not for her luck—terrified her.She cringed inwardly and recalled how someone tried to force himself on her. She couldn’t stop the shudder in disgust. She sat on the floor without bothering to touch her food, staring aimlessly at a distance: Coco and kitty’s words ringing in her ear. She closed her eyes in despair when a soft mumble caught her attention. At first, she thought it was an illusion, but her eyes snapped open when she heard, “Mumma.”She blinked and heaved a deep inhale when the realization drew upon her. She hesitated, but something inside her compelled her to turn toward the direction of the giggle, breaking the gloomy atmosphere around her. What welcomed her was the sight of Kabi
Aslan glanced at his brother from the driving seat through the rearview mirror. He could read how much he was trying to suppress his turmoil with the way his vein was popping over the side of his neck. He sighs and glances sideways at his father who seemed to notice the same. When they got a lead about Asmaira and were called to identify her, their first thought was to leave Amaan behind, but when he volunteered to come along, Salar couldn’t deny it. Although Amaan was responsible for the mess, one look at his remorseful eyes told him he was broken from the inside. And as a father, he couldn’t let his son suffer by adding more to his misery and denying him the respite. It was one such instance where he went against Feriha, who didn’t want Amaan to be around Asmaira, even around a radius of a few meters. Seeing Amaan’s hand trembling, Aslan took the steering wheel and drove them to the police station. As soon as it came into view, Amaan sucked in a shaking breath feeling shame seepin
It was not Asmaira trying to take Raina’s place. It was you who were looking for Raina in her.Feriha’s words reverberated in his mind. It was as if someone had thrown cold water and brought him back to reality. Being his mother, she read him like an open book when he himself didn’t realize what actually troubled him about Asmaira.The room echoed with the slamming of the door against the wall. Amaan marched to the center only to halt at the condition of it. Everything was kept in its place and looked thoroughly cleaned. He walked backward when the scene of how he manhandled her on the Gala night flashed before his eyes. He stumbled on the vanity when her scream of that night echoed in his ear, and he covered his ears, dropping the phone he was holding in the action.
“Y-Yes,” Mehwish’s stutter confirms Feriha’s suspicion.Rodriguez subtly disappeared from the scene and instructed his team to clear the premises. As a loyal subordinate, he read the room and gave privacy to the family.“And what did Asmaira reply?” Feriha took a few steps towards her, emanating her intense aura. The last fiasco in the Gala hasn’t been sorted, and she found her daughter at the center of another.“S-She….” Mehwish glanced at Amaan only to see realization drawing up on him.“If you
“We have a charity dinner invite from Mr. Shah. I want you to come along with Kabir,” Feriha said.Asmaira’s head snapped in her direction in surprise, “Me?”After getting discharged the next day, Asmaira was relieved that Amaan had left for a business trip. But what had suffice between them that night kept haunting her. That night, he not only unlocked the new fear for himself but also opened Pandora’s box. She couldn’t muster up the courage to meet Kabir in his absence. The guilt she was responsible for his miserable childhood overshadowed her love for him.Noticing her avoiding Kabir, Feriha planned to bring her and Kabir together on the pretext of evening tea. With Hania taking care of the NGO in her mother-in-law’s absence and Ishaal busy designing her new exclusive collection, this was the only way for her to break whatever wall Asmaira had created around her.“Now that people have seen you during the Ga
“Fuck!”Amaan slumped on the bed with his elbows on his knees and clasped hands before his lips. Locking Asmaira away was the only way for him to calm himself down and think through.The fire of hatred that started seeing Asmaira in Raina’s look made him take the drastic step. He had been verbal to her with his warning, but seeing her nonchalant, he had to threaten her in a different way. However, what he didn’t expect was finding her squirm beneath him half-naked would only lead him to lose himself.The anger should have been extinguished after seeing her broken form. If anything, it intensified and irked at his emotions going haywire for a woman who brought agony to Raina in her dying moment. He swatted the night lamp on the ground. With his chest heaving with untamed fury, he clutched the duvet and ripped it. The bedsheet and the pillows met the same ending. He doesn’t know what was making him feral, but the thought he was about to force Asmaira made him feel like a sexual predator