"May I come in," she asked, nervousness was evident in her voice. "You already came in, Ms. Sheharzaad," he said with a smile, "what brings you here?" he asked and pointed towards the chair for her to sit. A ghost of smile was apparent on his lips. Sheharzaad sat on the seat just infront his table and fiddled with her fingers out of nervousness. "Speak," he commanded. She looked up and then down towards the table. She was feeling utterly anxious. "I don't know how you will take it as," she started. "Don't beat about the bush," his tone clipped. She looked up at him and gathered the courage. After the last meeting she had with him she was afraid of him. Often at nights his words that he had whispered near her ears would play in her mind like a tape making her sleepless.. "Sir, I am in a dire need of loan. Its very important, my friends life is at stake. I assure you I'll try my best to return the loan asap." She breathlessly said it all. Her eyes were filled with hope and expec
The next day in the office, after contemplating alot she decided to address Shehryaar directly. The whole night she had been gathering courage. His words at one hand kept on increasing her fear of him and at the other hand gave fuel to her rage. She was never the person to go down. Or go down without a fight. Until when she would be afraid of him and keep on running away from him? This needed to stop. She was of the thought if she talked to Shehryaar then he would back off or atleast his rigidness would break to some extent. She so needed to talk directly to him. What did he consider himself? What did he think of himself? Why this arrogance? And why this obsession with her? She needed answers. Standing up on her feet, she began to walk towards his office with quick steps. His secretary tried to stop her from entering his office, saying he was in a meeting but she glared her before violently turning the handle and barged into the office with his secretary standing behind. "Sir, I t
"It is as simple as that, Sheharzaad. You were on my mind and I want to fuck you out of this brain. Regardless of the text, I would have you in my bed. Unknowingly you have became a new obsession of mine and I want to get rid of it as it is an unhealthy infatuation. And there is only one solution to that. You in my bed," he said straightforwardly. Anger condensed in her heart. In a fit of fury she spoke, "you are nothing but a bastard, Shehryaar!" she bellowed. "That I am," he said and stood up from his position. Her heart skipped a beat. He began to come closer towards her. And her brain registered the grave error it had done again. "And you know what I do with one who run their mouth on me?" he questioned, stepping closer and she felt as if the death was approaching her. Anger and fear were two alternate emotions she felt under his presence. She was a hot head by nature but this emotion of fear was something she discovered in herself upon meeting him. He had made her introduce to
She watched him slowly getting up from his large swivel chair and walking towards her. His striking eyes giving her a perusal from head to toe, making her heart beat wide. She wanted to hide from him. With each step, he was taking towards her it was making her legs tremble more and more. The anxiety building up in her mind was evident through her eyes. His face was expressionless and so were his eyes. Dark and cold. Just like every other time. Blinking in her fear, she matched his gaze as he stood infront him. "Agree?" His grave voice asked. "Yes. I agree to your condition," she uttered, "I agree to-to spend a night with you," The sentence alone made her look down with shame. He perched her chin between her hands but she pulled her face away from his grip. "Don't touch me!" she gritted but his hand moved and this time around he dugged his fingers in her cheeks, pulling her face towards him. "Now, I can do more than just touch you. Can't I?" he asked, raising his brows. "Yes, y
"Hello, Sheharzaad," his dark voice came from the other side of phone making chills run down her spine making her breathless within seconds. She stood up from her chair. Her hands that held the phone began to shiver. His voice alone was making her tremble. After that night, She had began to fear him so much. Him, His presence, His voice. Everything. "Why did you call?" She demanded, trying not to show her fear through her voice but her voice shook in the middle. "Don't get breathless, sweetheart," he stated. Smugness exuding from his voice. "I'm not," She denied. "I can feel that. Your breathless voice is instilled in my ears," he tried to remind her of that night. "Say what you-you want to-to say or I'll c-c-cut the c-ca-all," "I dare you," his voice got deep and serious, getting void of the previous playfulness it had. "You can't..... you can't threat me," she made a failed attempt to warn him. "Oh baby. I can do more that just mere threats," She didn't answer, feeling str
She was halfway closing the door when he pushed the door open and entered her room. She took a few steps back hurriedly, creating a safe distance between them before swiftly taking a hold of her dupatta and wrapped it around herself. "What are you doing here?" She spoke in her panic-stricken voice, her eyes looking anywhere but him while he was busy analysing her room and then her. "Sit," he pointed towards the chair. His voice stoic and grave. "I will but....first get-g-get out of my house," She stammered. He frowned. "Are you running that pretty little tongue on me?" He lowered his tone in a threatening yet questioning manner that made her take two more steps backwards. His eyes gave her a penetrating look, daring her to utter something against him. Her form got rebellious as she opened her mouth to speak something. "I swear, I will cut it for you, rather make you cut your own tongue if you uttered as much as a word unless I allow you to speak," he stated. She immediately
Her breath hitched. Her heart began to pound loudly in ears. Her shoulders hunched as she tried to shrunk away from him but his hand didn't let her. She began to shake like a leaf as her body almost froze. Her teeth clattered with each other. She was in a tight corner. In a blind alley. At a dead end. She knew if he had asked her then that was bound to happen. Nobody would stop and could stop him. That included her as well. The single night that she spent with her was enough to engrave a deep trauma in her mind. It was enough for her to know who he was. And what he could do if something does not go his way. How barbaric he could get. His every word becomes a law. Unless whatever left his mouth won't become the truth, he won't rest in peace. One lesson he taught her within that short span was never to challenge him. She still had the will power and the courage to stand against him in her but the wound to her mind was fresh, that it had her locked her own self in a shell. And the
The fear had settled within her. Deep within her mind. Coursing through her veins. And it was all instinctive. It wasn't in her control. Even if she tried to encourage herself that she could fight him but when his eyes would flash infront her eyes, it would break her morale. She didn't know what was happening with her. She had never experienced such a situation before. She was terrified of him. Just like now. She was in a dilemma. She wanted to defy him by not going to the office so she could make the message clear that she wasn't afraid of him at all. But her mind would again fill with his warnings. Just a look at her now blue and black finger was reminding her, he wasn't an ordinary man. She always noticed how intense his gaze would become while he would stare her. That night, she just had opened her eyes once in a while but whenever she did, she would find his dark and quiet orbs staring at her making her heart accelerate. The darkness his eyes held was one of the reasons she did
His tongue was too heavy to utter anything. He was still in shock, a state of disbelief had still encompassed him. His grey eyes kept on looking and tracing the cracks on the hardened mud of the grave. Dilemma was hitting him, clutching him in its painful paws and tightening its grip on his heart with every second.To say the least, he was baffled.Grave.It was a grave.Grave of his mother.Mother.Who had died decades ago.But still that day was freshened in his mind like yesterday. Every intricate and minor detail was in the back of hiss head.Often those details took shape of a nightmare in his dreams. The soulless and dead eyes of the lady who hung with the ceiling.Utter helplessness on her face.He thought as much that suicide was her last resort. That was why he considered her weak. Considered womankind weak. Considered womankind manipulative, cunning, untrustworthy.But here he sat, near the one, who was the reason those feelings were born within him but this time he cam
He was in ICU. His guard told her that he was driving the car fastly to home and suddenly the his grip loosened, the tyres slipped and the car crashed. She couldn't stop the tears coming out of her eyes. She knew the reason behind his eagerness to get home as fast as he could.It was because of her request to come home early. She felt utter guilt clipping her heart.That guilt too that she has suppressed within her.She still thought that Haider died because of her. She considered herself as the culprit of Shehryaar. She took his father's life away. If she hadn't given that dary to him, maybe Haider would have been alive today. She took his father's life away.And now he was fighting for his life because of her. Although, Shehryaar had told him numerous times that it was never her fault behind his father's death but she never agreed to him. There was a part of her which still told her that she was the culprit and that part of her was again taking control over her, inciting suici
The evening sky has sprawled. The blue hue was everywhere as the bird chirped, returning back to their respective abodes. There sat Sheharzaad on the sofa of the study reading the same page again, trying to regain her focus. Yet her eyes would move in between the page of the book that read, 'Karachi. The city of lights. Rather previously known as the city of lights....'The book was titled, 'Zaryaab' after the name of the male lead of that book. Sheharzaad's grey eyes again fixed on the sky, witnessing the birds. As the sun reached the horizon, the sky was a mix of orange and blue.Her mind was wondering to Shehryaar. Where was he? Should she apologize? Or should she wait for him?She found herself guilty in this situation. She should have broke it on the very first place to Maaz that she was married instead of going for that lunch. She knew that Maaz was interested in her but she was just finding the right time to reveal it to him and to everybody that she was married that too t
She was sitting in her cabin, going through a file but repeatedly her concentration was breaking as her mind kept on shifting to somewhere.The memory made her bite her lips and take a deep breath. She was at work!She needed to focus.Why was she feeling that way?She could feel butterflies flipping in her stomach. His intense stare again came over in her mind that had her shook her head away. They both sat together, in that starry night, under the shade of moon, with their hands in hand."Isn't moon looking so beautiful today?" she had whispered dreamily as her head rested on his shoulder. "Which one?" he asked making her puzzle."The one in the sky,""Not as beautiful as the one sitting beside me," "You're cheesy with your dialogues, Mr. Shehryaar,"His eyes flickered from the stars on the sky to her face, "Dialogues ain't the only thing I'm cheesy at, Ms. Sheharzaad,"Sheharzaad averted her gaze, looking away. She was grateful that it was night because her cheeks were turning
Every eye was full of tears.Cries and wails rose from the haveli when the janazah was risen from the home.Haider has passed away. Leaving his mother-less children now father-less. Eyes were sad.Yet his grey eyes stared at nothing just the eye-catching verses that he recited. He was silent. Quiet. Unable to produce any response. Placing her head on his shoulder, his wife sat beside him, with tears propelling from her eyes as her hand held rosary reciting tasbeeh for the departed soul.Sheharzaad was crying.But Shehryaar was silent. It was just those eye-catching verses that had his complete attention. His father used to teach him the Quran in his childhood but he never got the chance to finish it because his practice sessions with his grandfather awaited him so he always used to leave without finishing his recitations. Last he read these verses was decades back and then he did not touch the holy book again. When he was set to made his first murder. He considered himself too
The wiltering flowers at his beloved's grave stood out as an evidence of the abandonment by her own family. Haider sat near the grave. As tears slowly cascaded down his eyes."You've endured enough. I wish... for once you'd have expressed your love for me. For once. Then my whole life wouldn't be so bleak. The reciprocation for which I waited finally came after decades," he played with the mud of the grave, "For once, you could have told me... what Agha did. What my father did. I wish... after your demise even for once you'd have come in my dreams and apprised me how you were brutally killed," Another tear dropped from his eye and landed on her grave, "I read... what you wrote in those pages. Where you expressed your love for me. I freed you from myself only because I wanted you to be happy and be with your lover. I've never hated you. Despite you were caught with another man.... I loved you regardless of every circumstance. My love for you was conditionless, my Jahan" (IN URDU JAHAN
"She didn't commit suicide. She wanted to live for her children. But you know what? She was hanged and it all appeared as suicide. This whole idea was of Agha, Shehryaar. Your mother wanted to live," Sheharzaad finished. Her voice has turned into a soft whisper till the end of her dialogue. She could see the enrage slowly developing in Shehryaar's eyes but he was controlling. He was really controlling himself so the monster won't break free. Zahra came running into the study followed by Haseeb. As soon as Zahra's eyes landed on Irtaza, she went in his arms and hugged him, very well aware that she needed him the most in these moments. And as soon as Dua's eyes fell on Haseeb, she rushed into his arms and hugged him. The previous talk they both had in her room was enough for her to trust him completely. He had gained her partial trust when he had convinced her before their nikkah that he will give her all the love of the world. As well as the time and space she needed for this relati
Tears were slipping down their eyes. The whole study has turned upside down. The glass table, smashed and broken. Books from the bookshelf were torned and rested on the floor. The glass pieces of vase were scattered. The place depicted of an utter apocalypse.And among all these broken and torned things, there lied a safe in the middle of the room. Bullets pierced through it and was now tattered and battered. Sat there on the sofa were three siblings, with nothing but tearful eyes.And a piece of paper in their hands. Written to them in her last moment by their mother. The letter which reached them after twenty five long years.Each word pierced through their soul. Every breath they took was heavy, filled with sighs and unattained wishes. The unattained wish to meet their mother one last time.Shehryaar's hand shivered as he still held the old worn out letter. Tears silently slipping out of his eyes. He rather wished he could have died than knowing this truth. After Sheharzaad na
Dua had immediately taken Sheharzaad to another room once her eyes had landed on her. She did not talk to her family or anyone. She wanted to say the words that have been long overdued on her mind.As soon as she entered in the privacy of the room, Dua hugged Sheharzaad and tears slowly slipped out of her eyes."I-I'm sorry, Sheharzaad. I-I-I," her voice croaked, "I wronged you.... I wronged you... I'm sorry, Sheharzaad. I'm sorry," she kept on repeating. Because she just had this word on her mind. The crime she committed was unjustifiable. It didn't matter Sheharzaad would forgive her or not, but in that moment, Dua just wanted to apologize. Apologize for the crime she committed five years back. Apologize for the crime that stayed in her mind for five long years and it kept on haunting her. The guilt kept on eating her. What she did with Sheharzaad broke her more than anything else. Sheharzaad slowly raised her hand and caressed Dua's back, "stop crying, Dua. I... forgive you," sh