CHPATER:4

Five nights. That was the deal.

And now, it was the last one.

I should’ve walked in cool. Like I didn’t care. Like I hadn’t thought about her every damn hour since the last time I left her bed.

But I walked in burning.

Kaira opened the door barefoot, wet hair clinging to her neck. No makeup. No lingerie. Just a long silk robe in deep emerald that kissed her curves with every movement.

“You look different,” I said.

“I didn’t feel like pretending tonight.”

She turned, walking toward the kitchen. “Whiskey’s on the counter. I poured yours.”

No kiss. No teasing. Just space and silence.

I followed, grabbed the glass, sipped.

She leaned on the marble, arms crossed, watching me like she was memorizing the way I stood. Her lips parted, but she didn’t speak.

“I thought tonight would be... filthier,” I joked, trying to cut the tension.

She smiled faintly. “Maybe I’m tired of fucking without feeling.”

I set the glass down.

That hit different.

“Are you saying you feel something now?” I asked, voice low.

She didn’t blink. “Are you?”

I walked toward her. Slow. Careful. Like she’d shatter if I moved too fast.

I stopped inches away. “Yes.”Her breath caught.

I touched her cheek, soft and slow. “I feel everything I wasn’t supposed to.”

“You promised,” she whispered. “No falling.”

“Then let’s both break the promise.”

She closed her eyes, exhaled. “I don’t know how.”

“I’ll teach you.”

She didn’t answer.So I kissed her.

And she kissed me back like it was goodbye.

That terrified me.

I lifted her onto the counter, pulled the robe open. No bra. No panties. Just bare skin and trembling breath.

I worshipped her slowly.

No rush. No roughness.

I kissed every inch of her, undressed her like unwrapping something precious, and laid her on the kitchen island under the soft light of her pendant lamps.

I made love to her.

For the first time, it wasn’t just sex.

It was need, yes. But also ache. Wanting. A kind of quiet desperation that neither of us dared to name.

She clawed at my back. Bit my shoulder. Looked into my eyes as I moved inside her—slow, deep, intimate.

She cried out when she came, her voice shaking like her body. I held her, still inside her, and whispered, “Stay.”

She looked away.

“I’m serious,” I said. “No more contracts. No more pretending this is just heat.”

“I can’t—” she began.

“You can,” I said, brushing her damp hair back. “I want all of you. Not just your body. Your scars. Your ambition. Your anger. Your silence.”

She blinked fast, like her eyes were stinging.

“No one’s ever said that to me,” she whispered. “They want the success. The story. Not the cracks.”

“I want the cracks. I want the mess.”

She laughed weakly, voice breaking. “You’re not supposed to be this honest.”

“Yeah, well. I’m not supposed to love you either.”

Silence.Heavy.Real.

Then she did something I never saw coming.

She climbed into my lap, straddled me, took my face in both hands, and whispered, “I’m terrified of how much I want you.”

I swallowed hard. “Then let me be the thing that doesn’t break you.”

She kissed me.

Slow,Wet,Messy ,Desperate.

Like she was choosing me.

That night, we didn’t stop after once. Or twice. We made love again—on the floor, in the shower, on her bed as dawn crept through the blinds.

And in the morning, when I reached out to touch her…

She was gone.

Just her side of the bed—cold.

No note.

No goodbye.

Just silence.

The last night... had ended.

But something told me her running wasn’t the end.

It was the start of the real story.

The next day when I woke up,she was gone.

No message. No trace. No scent left on the pillow.Just emptiness.

I searched every corner of the apartment as if she might be tucked somewhere between the sheets or folded into her sketchbooks.

But kaira was a woman built for vanishing. Like smoke. Or silk. Or pain.

And still—I wasn’t ready to let her slip through me.

I dressed. Drove like a demon through the Mumbai rain. Straight to the gallery where it all began.

The butterfly painting.

It was gone. Sold. Like her.

I paced the glass floor of the auction house, jaw clenched, shirt half-wet from storm. The curator recognized me. She offered me coffee, concern, but I didn’t want caffeine—I wanted her.

I pulled out my phone. Dialed her number for the fifth time.

Switched off.

I didn’t know where she lived before Bandra. I didn’t know her full name. No family. No emergency contact. Just the burn of her mouth and the sound of her voice when she said, “I’m terrified of how much I want you.”

That had to count for something.

I called Mira.

She picked up on the first ring. “If you’re calling about kaira—”

“Where is she?”

Pause.

“You sound wrecked.”

“I am. Tell me where she is.”

“She asked me not to.”

“Mira—”

“She left Mumbai, Veer. She needed space. Said she was scared. Not of you but of herself.”

I gripped the wheel, knuckles white. “I need to talk to her.”

“Give her time.”

“I don’t have time. I had her.”

Mira sighed. “You should know… she’s been hurt before. Not in the cliché way. In the real, rip-your-heart-out kind of way. Her first gallery partner—he stole her art, her savings, everything. She built her success on the ashes of betrayal. She doesn’t trust.”

“She trusted me.”

“Yes,” Mira said softly. “And that’s what scared her most.”

I ended the call.

The rain got heavier. The world looked like it was crying.

I spent the night driving aimlessly. Through Colaba, then Juhu, then Marine Drive. I watched the lights blur on the glass. I thought of her body. Her laugh. Her silence. The way she kissed me like she was afraid to forget how it felt.

She said we had five nights.

I wanted forever.

Next morning, I found myself outside her building again. Hoping. Stupidly.

The guard waved. “She left two days ago. Gave up the lease.”

And that was it.She was gone.

All I had were memories—hot skin under my fingers, her lips gasping my name, the way her walls came down just for a moment... and then slammed shut again.

I returned home.

Empty penthouse. Cold marble floors. The same luxury that used to feel like power now felt like a prison.

I walked to the liquor cabinet. Then paused.

Instead, I went to my studio—the room no one ever entered. The one filled with canvases I never showed.

I hadn’t painted in months.

But tonight?

I picked up the brush.

And painted her.

Every line. Every shadow. The softness of her jaw, the heat in her eyes, the mess of her hair after sex. I painted her on her knees, looking over her shoulder, mouth parted, as if asking me to chase her.

I stayed up all night. Finished three canvases.

She had become my obsession.

And I realized something:

If she was art,

I was the fool who fell in love with the gallery.

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