It has been two weeks, two weeks and three days to be precise since Mishti has entered Samrat’ house as his personal chef and got to know him as much as she could externally because there is still a long way to get to know his heart.

Apart from the usual demand from extremely complex dishes that Mishti has to watch the recipes for on YouTube for hours straight, there is nothing that he does that is remotely close to unpleasant. As opposed to whatever her friends had said about the divorced man or the articles had written about him, Mishti doesn’t find any resemblance between the real-life Samrat and Samrat of the tabloids. He’s snarky, yes, but not cruel. He takes his time to get impressed but gets to it eventually. He’s polite with his staff, especially with Vivek but Mishti doesn’t mind because she too is somewhere in the queue. Recently Samrat and her have found a new way to converse – through banters. Healthy banters that erupt after the lunch when he subtly has to say the food was good but doesn’t quite want to put it out like that, and so he’d say, “You’re learning day by day, aren’t you? Can’t say the food was too salty this time’ to which Mishti would reply, “Had it been some Michelin star chef, they would expect a fully worded compliment, it’s good that I don’t!” she’d sass.

“Don’t you?”

“No.”

“Not at all?” Samrat’s lips would quirk up at that while Mishti squints her eyes.

“No!”

“Well, it was fine, I guess. The food.” 

And he’d end that with a teasing glint in his eyes, both the gaze and the words making Mishti preen under them though she’ll still maintain her nonchalant façade.

So, the fact that it is already time to get on with the second task and complete it, hurts her like nothing else. 

Mishti doesn’t want to do it. She doesn’t think she’ll once again be able to see suspicion or doubt in those eyes ever again when she’s already seen that teasing glint or better, the serenity in them. 

The work is pretty simple for someone like her who has carried out riskier tasks; she has to transfer all the funds, a total of four crore rupees that Samrat had kept aside to buy Singhania’s shares, to her account that she has further will send to the agency by hacking his mobile and back account.

It’s worse than last time, so much worse, not only because the amount is massive but because she doesn’t know how to help him this time. Last time, her brother to protect her had unknowingly saved Samrat from any potential sorrow that he could’ve faced because of his stolen watch, it was a different thing that he wasn’t so much bothered about the watch as much as he was with the thought of Mishti stealing it and lying to him about it. 

This is another thing that gnawing inside her chest. 

She doesn’t want to lie to him. He hates it. He hates liars and Mishti doesn’t want to be someone he hates.

A thought occurs in her mind, but as soon as it comes, it has to go, because no, there won’t be any good in talking to her brother about it. Sure, he would understand if she told him that she doesn’t want to do this task, she can’t do it, because he’s one amazing brother but that won’t stop the task from happening. It’ll probably be Ruhi who’ll come in her place and carry out the task. If not her then someone else. 

She has no choice. She’ll have to do it.

And so Mishti finds herself entering Samrat’s room at two in the morning, the sound of him snoring audible to her ears as she tiptoes, closing the door behind her. She chose this time not because Samrat sleeps so late, no, like a systematic man he is, he sleeps at 11 every night, and before 12 if he has some work to do. It’s his valet, that Vivek who doesn’t sleep and plays temple run on his phone till late, all the while practising some singing for the concert he presents in his dreams. Mishti knows all this because her room is right beside the valet’s, the walls not being as soundproof as they should be for such a luxurious villa. 

Though it’s the least of her concern right now. The point is that Vivek is asleep now, and so is Samrat and now she just has to do what she’s here for.

However, before she can take a step towards Samrat’s side table to get to his phone, her gaze lands on his sleeping finger, unable to stop the train of thought that takes her back to all those years ago when the man had been laying just like this whining and complaining about how everyone leaves him. She wonders if it’s true for him even now if he still doesn’t have anyone to stay, to trust.

Mishti wants to stay, wants him to trust her.

It seems laughable though considering how she’s going to hurt him only a few seconds later, will transfer his hard-earned money to the agency, something that they’ll probably use to convert parentless children into criminals.

It makes her want to hate the life that has been destined for her. 

Why did her parents have to go away like that? Had they not gone, Mishti would’ve been living a different life right now, an ethical one where she wouldn’t have to rob others to survive, where she wouldn’t have to follow anyone’s orders, where she’d not have to hurt the person, her heart had decided to protect if she ever found him again.

Mishti picks up Samrat’s phone, unlocks it by using his fingerprint that she had safely transferred on a glass sheet this morning, her own hands gloved. Hacking the accounts comes as a challenging task to her with the agency wanting them to use technology to steal only recently leaving her and her friends to learn and execute it all on their own.

Dumb bastards.

Within quick five minutes, she completes the task, though her hands tremble as she puts back the phone in its original spot, turning to go out of the room.

“What are you doing here?” 

Mishti stiffens in her steps as she hears those practically growled words, blood draining from her face.

She gulps before finding back her voice, too terrified to turn and face the man.

“N-Nothing, sir. I was just checking – I wanted to –”

“You’re lying. I – I don’t like liars.” The next words come a bit slurred, but Mishti shakes in her boots because she knows this. Knows that he doesn’t like liars, that he doesn’t like her.

“You – you always intended to betray me, d-didn’t you? F-From day one that was your motive, you wanted to see me cry!” 

Mishti’s rendered speechless at those words, not having it in herself to deny the obvious truth by another lie. Yes, she has been lying to him all this time, has betrayed him for her group’s sake but she never wants to see him cry.

She didn't then, she doesn't now. However, before she can clarify her part, the man speaks up again, cries, making Mishti freeze all over again on the spot.

“I’m saying the t-truth…... Sakshi, you liar! Why did you ever m-marry me?”

It’s then when she understands it.

It’s then that she realises that he isn’t in the present dimension, at least not his mind and that he has travelled back to the spot that his mind still lingers on, the place and time that his heart can’t seem to let go off. That he is talking but not to her.

He’s sleeping. He’s dreaming.

He’s talking to his wife.

The realisation somehow hurts her more than the accusation.

Mishti turns towards him with her own aching heart, and sees him writing on his bed, eyes closed, a deep-seated frown on his temple, and beads of sweat rolling down the sides of it.

Samrat looks agonised and the thought that in the morning the reason for his agony would be her doesn’t sit well with her.

With a hesitant breath, Mishti reaches out to smooth her now ungloved hand over his temple and his hair, stroking them gently as she had done all those years ago. The frown leaves his face immediately, and so does the furrow between his brows and his raging, quivering lips.

With expert stealth, she gets up from the bed, leaving her sinful heart to mourn some other time. She tiptoes around the room and picks up a pillow in her hand and with just as much silence, she brings it to his bed, keeping it beside the sleeping man, and then hesitantly  stroking her hand at his back once which makes him shift on his bed, his weight now balanced on one side, with both his arms cuddling the pillow.

His body goes lax, pearls of sweat drying on his forehead, a drop of tear still clinging to his lashes.

Mishti leaves the room with a guilty conscience and helpless heart.