The Addiction of Love

IV

Inaya spent the entire day in the office restless. She had never been this scared ever. She contemplated if she should tell Razia about it.

At 7 in the evening, she packed up her stuff and left the office. She took the lift and reached the ground floor. Just as she was about to exit the building to hail an auto, her eyes fell on Murtaza. He stood beside his car just outside her office. Her heart stopped beating for a second, and she turned around in a jiffy to hide herself. She stood behind a pillar and carefully looked towards the street again to check if he saw her. He was busy staring at his phone and she was sure that he'd not seen her.

Zain was in the lift, going to the underground parking, when the lift stopped at the ground floor. Some people got off. The lift doors were about to close when he saw Inaya standing in the corner of the main gate of the building. Her expressions looked weird to Zain. Subconsciously, he moved out of the lift, towards her.

"Why are you standing like that?" Zain spoke when he reached her.

For the second time that day, her head snapped towards him. An irritated expression adorned her face. "Why do you always have to come where I am?"

"Believe me, I ask myself the same question!" He murmured under her breath.

"Huh?" She asked as she didn't understand what he said.

"Nothing. Tell me why are you hiding here?" He asked again.

"I am not hiding." She lied and looked back again to see if Murtaza was still there. And he was.

Zain followed his eyes and found her looking at a man standing outside the building. Who was he and why was she trying to hide from him? He wondered.

"You know you're not good at lying, right?" He commented.

"Ugh, why do you care what I am doing and what I am not." She threw her hands in the air in frustration.

"Inaya,.." He started to speak but she panicked and shut her up.

"Shhh, don't take my name so loud." She whispered and looked back at Murtaza yet again. He wasn't standing very far from them and could hear them. But thankfully, he was still engrossed in his phone.

Zain was really perplexed with her strange behavior.

Inaya's phone received a text from Murtaza saying he was waiting for her downstairs. He also asked her to come down in five minutes or else he'll barge in her office to get her himself.

Inaya's demeanour changed while reading the text. Zain could see her taking deep breaths.

"What's wrong?" He held her palms and asked with concern.

She just stared at him blankly. She opened and closed her mouth a few times, but nothing came out of it.

"Naya, tell me! What's going on?" Zain was losing his patience.

"I-I need to get out of h-here." She barely got these words out.

Without asking any question, he entwined their hands and pulled her with himself. Instead of waiting for the lift, he took her towards the staircase. They reached the underground parking, which was just one floor below the ground level. Zain's black BMW was parked there. He opened the passenger seat and made Inaya sit inside, then walked towards the driver's seat.

"Address?" Zain asked while buckling up his seat belt.

Inaya told him and he zoomed the car out of the building. Inaya could see Murtaza walking inside the building as they sped past them. And she released a sigh of relief. She had been successful in dodging him this time. But the only thought that disturbed her throughout the ride was for how long would she be able to ignore him?

Zain stopped the car in front of her home. She mumbled a small thank you to him before getting out of the car. He waited till he saw her getting inside home safely before driving away. His mind had many questions, and he would get his answers soon.

Inaya had decided that she would tell her mother everything, but chickened out at the last minute. She knew it would break Razia's heart to know that her own brother's son was doing something so vile. Also, it would put her in a lot of stress, and it was not good for her health.

She also thought that Murtaza might come home again like last time, but thankfully he didn't. She felt petrified while leaving home to go to the office the next day, but she had an important meeting which couldn't be ignored. But before leaving, she made sure to keep her pepper spray in her bag.

Zain, on the other hand, was restless to no end. He couldn't sleep even for a second the entire night, and that soured his mood further. He knew that he needed to talk to Inaya soon. One thing that he was sure of was that whatever the matter was, it was related to that guy who stood outside the office. His mind had thought of numerous different scenarios and each one was worse than the other. He couldn't sit there doing nothing. But to do something, he first needed to know that whole matter. And there was only one person who could tell him that.

__________

"Hello, Inaya."

She looked up from her laptop and found Aditya, Zain's assistant in front of her.

"Hey." She said with a frown. "What are you doing here?"

She was confused as to what he was doing in her office.

"Actually, Zain sir had asked you to meet him in his office." He explained the reason for his presence.

"What do you mean by Mir has asked me to meet him in his office. Am I his employee whom he can order around?" She snapped.

Aditya cleared his throat in nervousness. The only person he was intimidated by, after Zain, was Inaya. "What I meant was he wanted to talk to you about something."

"If he wants to talk to me, ask him to come and meet me in my office." She narrowed her eyes and said in a tone filled with attitude.

"You both can have privacy in his cabin. Please." Aditya tried to convince her.

Inaya worked in a cubical since she was still a junior designer. Her promotion would take about a month. While Zain had his personal cabin as he was the Chief Marketing Officer of the company he worked for.

There was logic in Aditya's words. Inaya thought about what she should do. In the end she decided to go and see what he wanted to talk about. She owed him that much after he dropped her home yesterday.

"Fine. Tell your boss I'll be there in fifteen minutes."

Aditya gave her a smile of gratitude and went away, while Inaya replayed yesterday's incidents. How he had come to her to see if she was okay, and how he had given her a lift without asking any questions.

Maybe, just maybe, he wasn't as bad as she thought he was.

🔸🔸🔸🔸🔸🔸🔸

I've nothing to say today. Weekend laziness got the best of me.

But yeah, don't forget to vote.