the devil's star (Completed)

chapter 2- the star belongs to the firefly

*NANDINI'S POV*
"No!! Mani!!" I woke up sweating because of yet again nightmare after I was adopted by my so called parents. I quickly pulled out a photoframe of me and mani just before he went for the London trip.

And what I heard there, made my life do a full 360 degree flip.

FLASHBACK
Today is the second day of mani not coming here. I really miss him. When I asked about it to the caretaker, she told me that he has gone with his mother to London for a week for some official work that his dad couldn't do.

I was sulking the entire day. I missed my firefly. He used to feed me one meal of the day everyday. We would play princess and her prince charming where he would be my prince charming and I her princess.

He used to say "nannu you're my princess  you belong to me. Tum meri ho. Tumpe sirf Mera haq hai."

(Nannu you're my princess. You belong to me. You're mine. Only I have the right on you.)

That time I used to smile and say "I only belong to you mani. You're my firefly. And I am your star. So the star belongs to the firefly."

The whole day I was sitting on the swings looking at the orphanage entrance as if mannu will magically come and play with me.

Since it was getting dark, I decided to go inside the orphanage. When I was passing through the orphanage owner's office, I heard her weeping.

I peeped inside to know if she was okay or not and when I looked inside I had to hold my mouth to not let her hear my sob.

There on her table were two laptops. On one laptop was a live camera of the owner's 3 year old daughter tied to a chair with bruises on her whole body held at gunpoint.

And on the other laptop there was Manik's so called loving mother smirking and chuckling sadisticaly.

After that the owner said "please mam leave my daughter alone. She is just 3 years old. What have I ever done to you?"

That bitch of lady didn't say anything just smirked. After a bit more of a pleading, she said "I want that nandini out of Manik's life. She will ruin all my plan. Arrange a couple to adopt nandini.  Make sure where she went and all information related to her is not Leaked then only your daughter will be able to see the next daylight."

I immediately ran to my room and thought of informing manik. I called him up but the number was unavailable. Seems like someone has destroyed the Sim. Must be that neyonika.

I then thought that it was good he didn't pick up. Because if I would have told him, he wouldn't have believed me. He blindly trusts his mom. Wait a minute. It was neyonika only who told manik about his mom's cheating thing. That can be a lie too.

I didn't realize when I fell asleep thinking of a plan to expose neyonika in front of manik.

The next day a couple came and adopted me. And from then my name was changed from nandini murthy to pari singhania.

As soon as I set foot into my new house. I was abused and was made to do all the work.

FLASHBACK ENDS

from that day I did all the work of thus house and received all the beatings. For the outer world, I was a spoilt princess who were loved by her foster parents. No one knew the reality.

My parents were drunkards so they used to go to the club everyday for the whole night. During that time I was left alone. So I consumed that time to find what was exactly Neyonika's plan.

But to my bad luck, I couldn't find anything much. I just was able to find out that neyonika had faked his father's death and faked the story of his mom cheating on his dad.

This was basically to make manik believe in her in which she succeeded.

Now back to present, I looked at the time and saw it was 6am. Shoot! I have to make breakfast for them.

----×----

"Nandini come here" I was doing the dishes after they had their breakfast when Mrs. Singhania called me. I don't call her mom because she doesn't deserve it.

So I went towards her and said "yes Mrs. Singhania?" I could have swore that I saw hurt flash on her face when I called her Mrs. Singhania but as soon as I saw it, the same emotionless face came and she said "you're going to do a contract Marriage with Mr. Malhotra for 6 months. And yeah even though we were the ones who asked him to give us 6 crore but we have put your name so yeah. Noe go get ready."

As soon as she said Mr. Malhotra, I had this gut feeling that he is my mani. So I got ready in a yellow suit and Mrs. Singhania gave me makeup to cover up my bruises and we were off to the court.

---×---

As soon as we entered I saw that bitch neyonika welcoming Mr. And Mrs. Singhania.  She won't be able to recognize me because 1. I am 24 now and she had last seen me 10 years back and 2. Due to lack of food and nutrition I am way to slim.

After a little bit of talking, we went inside the court and saw Mr. Malhotra there siting and sending me a hard glare. Huh! What have I done?

My gaze went to his bracelet clad wrist and what I saw made me wanna cry happy tears. He is my mani. My firefly. I had given him a bracelet which had manan written on It so that we can recognize each other if we lose contact.

I looked up at him and saw him giving me even harder glare. I quickly turned my face emotionless and we went to sign our contract.