The Devil's Love

Chapter Eight

Nightmares.

He hated the days when she had nightmares. The days when she whimpered in a pain that could not be explained in words alone, when she screamed, begging someone to make it stop. He felt his heart break anew, every time she woke up lost.

The thing about nightmares is that you can never tell what moment, mundane enough to overlook, would translate into the worst nightmares, leaving one breathless, terrified- lost even.

There were moments when Sidharth felt compelled to blame himself for her situation. She was the queen of Mafia, but her soul was too pure, too precious to be tainted.

There were days when Sidharth couldn't look her in the eye. Then there were days when he had no choice. She didn't have much choice either. He was all she had, if he'd abandon her to wallow in self loathing, where would she go?

Their relationship was not the usual kind. He was her protector, and she was his peace. They both knew what they meant to each-other, they knew the intensity of their relationship. Half a year ago, Shehnaaz couldn't have thought she would trust her husband the way she did. Half a year ago, she couldn't have imagined the amount of dependency she would feel for him.

It was a slow progress by all means, but at least she knew Sidharth's love wasn't conditional.

Nightmares happened before Delhi, but there were no screams. After Delhi, after Tarun's execution their intensity grew, the screams and restlessness started. The guilt creeped in and ate her up on the inside.

Every time she woke up from a night terror, she crawled towards him, standing at her bedside, guilty, worried and sometimes even more distraught than she felt. She would, in her own moments of panic, seek comfort in his warm embrace, in his words- or his silence.

He had always given her what she asked for, whether it was space or proximity, distance or closeness. She knew he loved her a long time before she realised his feelings, whether returned or not, would never fade. At first she felt guilty, taking and taking, without giving him anything. But, the way he looked at her.. the way his eyes begged her to ask for help when she so clearly needed it, made her realise it was hard for him too, seeing her struggle all by herself when he was right there.

By then, she trusted him. If not as a husband, then as a friend she loved him too and breaking his heart, making him feel unwanted was never something she wanted to do.

Besides, she knew he needed her verbal consent this time. She knew she needed to say something to rid them both of this agony. Who knows what might come of it. He was, after all, only thinking of her comfort and peace.

She hated herself for doing this to her husband. She had asked for this, she should've known how to handle herself better. She should have known not to let this get to her. She knew she was not wrong to ask for Tarun to be killed. She knew she had not made a rash, impulsive decision, fuelled by her anger or a desire for revenge. But a part of her felt responsible for snatching a son from his father.

It was not murder. At least not to her, or even her husband. It was justice, something she couldn't have extracted out of him, any other way. She had grown disgusted of the man that Tarun had turned out to be, once her brother, he was nothing but a goon without morals or boundaries by the time he met his death. His death haunted her, not the decision- but the act itself and the actions that had led to it. She had mourned her brother a long time ago, the man she thought he was, had died a long time before his heart stopped.

The man that featured in her nightmares was not her brother. She didn't know who he was, the man who was ready to trade her affection and trust in him for a few bucks. What scared her was the possibility of his deal coming through before she was rescued. What scared her was the scenario where Tarun really didn't deserve any of it being done to him.