Fitoor

complications

(Maya's POV)

I pushed against the door of my house as I entered. Rejecting Sahir's proposal for Dubai was something I should've gotten an award for doing. My mind only knows how badly I wished to say yes to him. I wanted cherished moments away from the illusion that my life was. But I wasn't stupid. Those three nights in Dubai would be euphoria but in reality, nothing was going to work. There were no humanly possible way things would ever be the same between us if we went on that trip together. Whatever was going brewing between us was best kept at a minimum. My life was meant for revenge and I didn't need distractions to prevent me from completing my job again.

Lost in my own thoughts I didn't even realize when I was pushed against the wall, the door slamming behind me.

"Where. Were. You?"

It was Arjun. We had been avoiding each other like the plague despite living in the same home. I couldn't bear his presence and I am sure he didn't have much interest in bearing mine. But his demeanor surprised me today. I knew he was waiting for a moment to fight back but I hadn't expected this physical confrontation.

"Why do you care?" I spat back.

Two could play at this game.

His hold on my arms tightened as he pushed me against the wall. His fingers seeping into my skin and bruising them. It was so painful as if someone was burning my skin.

"Get off of me!" I yelled, using all my force to try to undo his hold on me. I hated how close he was. There was once a time where I wanted nothing but to be close to him and now it just felt as if his closeness disgusted me. Using all my force I pushed against him. In doing so, he stumbled back as he lost his balance. Taking advantage of his imbalance, I raised my hand and slammed it against his face. The impact of the slap left an open wound as blood started to pour out of the small bruise next to his lip. He looked at the blood on his fingers before moving his eyes to me. He looked at me with an expression I had never seen before. Arjun was never one to scare me. The only time he made me weak was when I was trapped in the foolish clutches of his bogus love. But the look in his eyes made my insides twist. Sometime gravely wrong was about to occur.

"You think I don't know about your dirty tricks." He spat. "How you slept your way into getting Fashion and City."

His palm encircled my neck as I began coughing and choking. I used my fingers to try and undo his hold but to no avail. It was painful, I felt my breath captured in my lungs and the inability to breathe made my body heated and gave me an instant headache. I felt sick to my stomach. I needed him to stop. Why was he doing this? Yes, revenge was on the table. We hated each other but I never imagined in my wildest dreams he would physically abuse me. I wasn't weak, no...I could fight back too. But he was physically so much stronger than me, the more I tried to release myself form his hold the more sadistic pleasure he got in hurting me and seeing me in pain.

His hand released as his jaw clenched. He punched the wall next to me as he brought his face down to my height. "I've too kind with you. Now you are going to learn the hard way...Maya baby."

I trembled at the sound of that. No one had addressed me by that in years. That name alone was enough to send shivers down my spine. It felt as I was incapacitated and couldn't walk. Arjun knew how much that name sent me into a meltdown and he was using it against me. I felt my heartbeat increase traumatically as beads of sweat poured down my forehead. I was losing sensation in my hands, as if the blood had been sucked out of it. My heart was thumping against my body so loudly I felt as if I would faint in the next moment. I thought I was over this. I had gotten better. Hearing 'Maya baby' wasn't supposed to affect me the way it did. But as I heard that, all I could remember was the years I spent locked in the storeroom alone to suffer as Ashwin, my own father, beat me mercilessly, tortured me.