Swasan – Captivated Forever Chapter 14 – By Anjali

SWASAN – CAPTIVATED FOREVER!
Heyy, It’s Anjali back with the next chapter!!!
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Swara breaks down
CHAPTER 14
Swara really didn’t remember the trip back to Kolkata. As much as she could, she kept herself cocooned deep inside her frozen grief so that she would not have to deal with the rawness of it alone—or in an inappropriate manner again, as she had done with Sanskaar Maheshwari. She felt deeply mortified that she had forced him into kissing her.
She didn’t want him to feel the compulsion that he owed her something. This was the 21st century, For God’s sake, but she couldn’t deny the emotion behind the kiss.

Sanskaar had arranged for a cab until Shimla. Though they were supposed to go to Amritsar and then take a chopper from there, They had been advised to go until Shimla as Amritsar was currently overrun with people who had escaped Jammu and Kashmir.
It wasn’t easy travelling 600 kilometres by car. However, Sanskaar had made sure that she was comfortable. They mostly drove around silently. Sanskaar had hired a driver with whom he chatted softly from time to time. Occasionally they talked on topics she could not afterward remember. The trip took more than 2 days as the roads were completely filled with cars and lorries, most of them with supplies that would help get the affected town back to normal.

Once, when they had stopped at a small dhaba and Swara had observed a boy and a girl laughing and enjoying together. She had smiled at them until she realised that they were brother and sister. She had turned pale in an instant and her body was so cold. Sanskaar had seen it ofcourse, and he kept his arm comfortingly about her. They sat thus for an hour or more.

Even through the self-imposed numbness of her heart she was very aware that she now knew him in a different way than before. But he did not refer to it at all, for which she was grateful. She was simply glad that they had somehow found it possible to revert to the friendship they had shared.
It occurred to Swara that her travelling alone with a man might cause tongues to wag. Their society would speculate and even criticise her for her choices. But she had never cared much for the stupid tongues anyways.

She was no one’s concern but her own—and Shivaaay’s, and he would understand once she had explained.
More than anything else in this world she wanted to be home—at their country home in Parna, at Oberoi Mansion in Kolkata, anywhere where her sister and brothers were. Anywhere where Shivaay was. Shivaay would take the burden from her shoulders. He would know what to do. And yet going home was also what she dreaded more than anything else in this life. How would she face them? What would she say?

They finally reached Shimla after two days and 5 hours of travelling. Sanskaar paid for the cab for which Swara protested but he reassured her that she could pay him back later. He checked in two rooms for them at a respectable hotel until he could make arrangements for a flight or train to get them to Kolkata.

Swara : Thank you, Mr Maheshwari. You have been so kind these past few days. Even thank you seems so less compared to what you have done for me. I mean… (gasping) Oh damn! I was so selfish with my intentions that I never realised that you have come back to India after five years. And now you are accompanying me to Kolkata.

Sanskaar (smiling) : That’s true. But somehow, I’m getting used to going back.
For the first time it struck her that this journey, this arrival, must be almost as great an ordeal for him as for her. He had to meet people he had not seen in nine years. Somehow he had to pick up the reins of a life he had been forced to abandon when he was a very young man.
Had she forced him to come before he was quite ready? She looked at him with deep remorse. She could have been speaking to him about these things during those silent hours in the car. Instead, she had been self-absorbed. She would make him the topic of their conversation on the chopper or anytime they sat down for conversation. She would make sure of it.

Before Sanskaar went to go inquire about the tranportation choices available, He had decided that the biggest hotel in Shimla would be far safer for Swara if she was alone. Also, It was likely that someone they knew might already be staying there. So, once they had freshened up, Sanskaar escorted Swara to THE RITZ PALACE, the snazzy hotel that was quite near the airport.
They entered the lobby and Sanskaar went to go check themselves in once more while Swara observed outdoors aimlessly.

She turned her head to watch him make arrangements for their night’s stay—and found herself gazing at a gentleman who was striding across the hall in the direction of the outer doors.
Shivaay!
For a moment she was so overwhelmed by shock and disbelief that she could neither move nor cry out.

He had not seen her. But he had seen Sanskaar Maheshwari. He stopped abruptly, his face a mask of narrow-eyed coldness, his nostrils flaring.
But Swara did not really notice. She had found both her feet and her voice.
Swara (her voice shrill with relief) : Shivaay! Shivaay!
Shivaay was not the sort of man into whose arms one would normally think of dashing. But at that moment he posed for her all that was solid and safe and dear. She hurled herself into his arms and felt all the reassurance of his presence as they closed about her.
It was a moment that was soon over. He took her firmly by the upper arms, set her away from him, and glanced briefly down at her before looking over her head at Sanskaar Maheshwari. His expression would have made icicles shiver.

Shivaay spoke in a soft voice which was laced with danger.
Shivaay : What is happening here?
He had clearly heard a thing or two, a part of her mind told her. The Singhanias had doubtless been busy talking. But it was not that thought that was uppermost in Swara’s mind. She did not even think to wonder what he was doing here in Shimla. Panic was clenching her stomach, threatening to make her puke.

Swara (tears streaming down her face) : Shivaay, Listen to me. Listen! Rudra… Rudra is dead.
She pawed at his shirt to hold on to him as he processed the information.
Swara (her voice urgent, like she had to get the words out) : I got the information two days ago. The general said a letter would be dispatched soon to you. I don’t know if it would have reached you. But I had to tell. I… I had to tell.
Shivaay stood, looking at his youngest sibling. His cold eyes changed. Something—some light—went out behind them, leaving them flat and opaque. His hands felt like iron shackles about her arms. Then he nodded his head once, twice, and again and again, slowly, almost imperceptibly.
Shivaay : Oh!

It was a truly terrifying moment—Shivaay at a loss for either words or actions. She had never seen its like before. He was suddenly a human who might at any moment show a vulnerability she had never suspected him capable of. She did not want him to be a human being. She wanted him to be her eldest brother, Shivaay, the invincible Shivaay Singh Oberoi, Chairman and CEO of the Oberoi Group of Companies. The man who was rumoured to be so cold that he did not have a heart. The man no one could penetrate or extort. She did not want to be twenty years old and a woman at that moment. She wanted to be a child again in the safe orbit of his immutable power.
But the moment of near vulnerability passed. His eyes focused on Mr Maheshwari again and he was Shivaay once more. His hands dropped away from Swara’s arms. She opened her mouth to make the necessary introductions, but Shivaay spoke first.

Shivaay : SM!
There was a slight derision to his tone, which made Sanskaar raise an eyebrow, though he said nothing.
Sanskaar : SSO! I offer my condolences on your brother’s passing. I was accomanying Miss Oberoi back to Kolkata but as for other explanations, maybe we should retire somewhere privately?
Swara darted him a glance. He sounded different, his words more clipped and precise, his lazy American accent almost mocking. He was looking back at Shivaay with hard eyes and hard-set jaw. Shivaay really had heard something, and Sanskaar knew it. And so she was going to be caught between the pride and infernal sense of honour of two men.

Just moments after she had told Shivaay that Rudra was dead.
Shivaay (his voice soft again) : I don’t want any explanation any more. Yesterday, Mrs Singhania paid me a visit and told me many anecdotes that made me leave Kolkata in search of you. I realized that Shimla would be the fastest way to Srinagar at this point of time and so arrived here. But now I don’t need to go on my original errand. I only have to ask for my brother’s remains to be sent home. We will return home, Swara. In any case, We have no need for you, Sanskaar Maheshwari! I can take care of my sister, Swara Singh Oberoi from now on.

Swara looked at him in astonishment. He was not even going to listen to an explanation? He was not going to thank Sanskaar Maheshwari for escorting her home? Or tell him exactly what Mrs Singhania had accused him of? Did these two men know each other? Why did Shivaay emphasise her name? And why was he being so curt that it was almost rude to her friend?
She turned her head to look at Sanskaar. His expression was tight, granite-jawed, hard-eyed. She scarcely recognized him. But he looked back at her and nodded at her slowly.
Sanskaar : Good bye, Shona!

Swara (shocked) : You’re actually leaving? Just like that?
But he had already turned away from them and was moving with long strides toward the outer door. She could not let him simply go like that, she thought. But before she could take one step after him Shivaay took one of her upper arms in his grasp again and she turned her wide-eyed attention back to him.
He soon secured a private hall for them and ushered her in, then shut the door.
Her legs felt weak beneath her then as she realized anew the enormity of the moment. Her dearest friend was gone, so swiftly and unexpectedly that she had not even had a chance to say good-bye to him. But she was home. Shivaay was here and she had already unburdened herself of her terrible secret knowledge.
He was looking at her with his green cat eyes.

Shivaay : Tell me, Swara, How Rudra lost his life?
She looked steadily back at him, ignoring the ringing in her ears, the coldness in her head, and the weakness in her knees. She told him the essential details but at the last moment, when she said that Rudra was dead, the ringing in her ears got so loud that she collapsed.
She fell, thankful for the silence and blackness that engulfed her, knowing her brother would catch her and that she would be safe for now.
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It had started raining when Sanskaar stepped out of the hotel. He didn’t care. Even when it became too cold to stay outside, He walked on without a care, heedless of either danger or discomfort.
He had been dismissed out of hand. Shivaay Singh Oberoi, who had clearly heard enough from Mrs Singhania to send him on his way to Srinagar in person, had first demanded an explanation and then refused to listen to one. He had dismissed his old enemy just as if he were nothing and nobody.
Sanskaar seethed with a hatred that had flared to new life as soon as he set eyes upon Shivaay. It was a hatred he had not yet paused to consider. It blinded him, pulsed in his mind, clouded his judgment. But of one thing he was satisfied—for all his cold control, Shivaay Singh Oberoi was clearly rattled.

Sanskaar (thinking) : We are not done yet, Shivaay Singh Oberoi. Not at all. Not by a long way.
He would be paying the man a visit in Kolkata soon. But not too soon. Even through his hatred he recognized the need for some decency. The Oberoi family must be allowed a short while to mourn.
SHE needed time. Foolishly, he tried not to put a face or a name to the one person who might soften his resolve at the same time as she gave him the opening he needed to cause lasting damage to the family.
Sanskaar (thinking) : How could a cold hearted bas…. man like Shivaay Singh Oberoi be her brother?

Sanskaar thought of the gossip that would follow because of Mrs Singhania’s vindictive and loud mouth.
Sanskaar : God Damn it!

He couldn’t remember the last time he felt this type of fury surging inside him. He had carefully bottled up all the anger and used it to turn it to revenge. But today, The old anger had risen to the surface. Sanskaar took refuge beneath a sun shade and made himself calm down.
He would not go to Kolkata immediately, he decided. It was high time he went home to Maheshwari Villa in Chandipur. It was time to pick up his life where he had left it off five years ago. He wondered if it would be possible, though. He was neither the man he had been then or the man he had been growing into.

He looked around him and felt very aware that he was back in India again. He looked at the pouring rain and the people huddling back to their cars or anything and wondered whether it would be wiser to return to Chicago and make the company’s primary headquarters there.
But he had business here in India. It was time.
Despite himself, He thought of Swara Singh Oberoi, so innocent, so ethereal and so vulnerable beneath her strength. He thought of her smile and their conversations. Their touches and their kisses….

Sanskaar : Damn it all! She is a means to an end.
How could he use her….
He would soon think of something.
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