text:
_For Medha, Malli, Ritu, Khomi, Clara, Sue King,
Madhu... my M&B gang!_
CONTENTS

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

EIGHT

NINE

TEN

ELEVEN

TWELVE

THIRTEEN

FOURTEEN

_Epilogue_

_Acknowledgements_

_About the Book_

_About the Author_

_Copyright_
ONE

IT WAS INFATUATION, PURE and simple. _Or, on second thoughts, neither pure nor all that simple_ , Nina reflected wryly. She had seen the man just a few times, they hadn't exchanged more than five sentences, yet all it took was one intent look from those smouldering eyes for her to go up in flames. _Me and quite a large contingent of fans in the India! office_ , she told herself with an inward smile.

What was Samar Pratap Singh doing down here in the dungeons, as the paper's sales, marketing and accounts section was labelled?

'Nina!' Her boss Rohan cut into her reverie, 'Are you listening?'

She gave him a rueful smile and brought her attention back to the spreadsheet on the table. She'd been with the _India!_ newspaper for over a year now and liked the job a whole lot. What's more, she liked India, especially this southern bit of India, Bangalore, a whole lot, too. During an earlier brief stint at the Mumbai office of the paper, she'd made two business trips to Bangalore. Sure enough, the city had cast its spell and she had asked the paper's executive editor if she could work for a while in the branch office at Bangalore. And here she was.

Balmy days and cool pleasant evenings almost all the year round, pubs which served a mean chicken tikka along with draught beer down almost every road and a people whose laid-back attitude totally belied the industry that had propelled the city to the status of India's Silicon Valley; Bangalore was just Nina Sabharwal's kind of city. And she wasn't about to blot her copybook because of a man with chocolate-brown eyes.

However, Rohan was nothing if not sharp and he had followed the direction of her errant gaze. 'Aha, HB has honoured us with his presence, has he?' he remarked before raising his voice to call, 'Samar! Over here when you're done, I've something that will fog up your camera lens.'

Rohan Varma was an incurable gossip, and the salacious snippet he was itching to tell Samar now took precedence over pulling Nina's leg about her unguarded reaction to Samar. Thank god for small mercies. 'HB' was Rohan's supposedly clever version of 'Heartbreaker' and as far as Nina could make out, Samar remained unmoved by the moniker.

From across the room, Samar Pratap Singh raised one mobile eyebrow good-humouredly at the man who hailed him, nodded and turned back to the accountant. Back in the cabin, Nina muttered to herself, 'This will be Encounter Number Five, let's see how well you handle it,' even as she leaned forward and asked Rohan about the numbers in the last quarter, neatly inked in the document on the table. Having carved an unassailable niche up north, _India!_ had decided it was time to take over the south. For a relatively new kid on the news block, the paper __was doing a good job in Bangalore, circulation had more than doubled in just a couple of years. They had overtaken the stolid local daily which hitherto had been the number one newspaper in the Garden City but the sales and marketing team knew there wasn't room for complacency; not for a minute, not in the keenly competitive world of print media.

What the public didn't know was that within the three-storeyed building that housed _India!_ , marketing and editorial were locked in fierce battle, with the former pulling out all stops to ensure sales and the journalists seething at what they termed, with some amount of truth Nina thought, the tabloidization of what had been a feisty newspaper firmly committed to exposing the weak flanks of the government. Now, even if Nina did wince once in a while on seeing three-column pictures of nubile and vacuous models on Page One pushing more serious news to second and third spots, no way was she going to tell the edit people that. All over the world, newspapers were increasing the pages in their entertainment sections to increase sales. It really was a case of shaping up or shipping out.

Numerous surveys and graphs revealed that, dumbing down or not, this was what the reading public wanted in the age of breaking news television, and if one of India's top dailies wanted to go the same way, well, she was on hand to help _India!_ achieve just that.

She knew the exact moment when Samar Singh entered Rohan's cabin because the fine hairs on her nape actually rose. This is a sexual reaction, nothing more, nothing less, she acknowledged, willing herself into some semblance of her usual self-composure. Slowly, she lifted her eyes to drink him in. Samar Pratap Singh was _India!_ 's star photojournalist-at-large, and fast becoming one of the country's most perceptive lensmen. The eye of his camera seemed to look beyond the obvious, and the results were both startling and deeply moving. Today, he was clad in yet another variation of his regular well-worn jeans topped by a rust-coloured shirt in soft cotton, sleeves rolled back to reveal sinewy forearms.

'You know Nina Sabharwal, our S & M director, don't you?' asked Rohan slyly, waiting for her to flare up at the twist to 'sales and marketing' that he used once in a while just to get a rise out of her. Nina gave him a token glance but kept quiet while he chortled, then she smiled at Samar in what she hoped was a casual friendly manner. 'Hello, Samar,' she murmured trying very hard not to fix her eyes on those sculpted lips which had now quirked in amusement. This mouth had captured her imagination from the first time she had set eyes on it. She wondered idly whether it would stiffen with surprise if she leaned forward and pressed her mouth to it. And then she wondered just why that thought had slipped into her mind!

'Hello, Nina,' he replied easily. He had a voice that sounded like molasses poured over granite, and she knew he knew just what effect that voice had on most people. She had seen girls all over the _India!_ office suffer immediate meltdowns when he spoke to them. Samar went on to ask her about the Girl Child project the marketing team had put together. Nina hurriedly collected her wayward thoughts and told him that the project was making dolefully slow progress.

Rohan Varma shifted impatiently. 'Guess what I heard about The Man Who Must Not Be Named?' he asked Samar and immediately launched into an outrageous and probably totally untrue story about the big white chief, the owner of the newspaper. He had related the spicy bit of gossip to Nina first thing in the morning, and she had refused to believe it. Samar sat back and grinned while he listened.

_Why is this man immune to me?_ Nina thought with a dash of frustration. She knew she was something of a sensation in the office and it had as much to do with her being the only _firang_ on staff as it did with the way she looked. Nina was a good-looking girl, her rather dramatic looks beautifully balanced by an air of calm serenity. She'd been hit upon, chatted up many times here and in Mumbai, and had learned to fend off advances gracefully, sometimes inventing a special someone back in London so she could let the interested man down gently. Once in a while, she'd gone out for a movie or dinner with a particularly persistent admirer, but no sparks flew for Nina and she turned down further invitations in a friendly but inoffensive manner. And then she had laid eyes on Samar Pratap Singh.

She did not think she had an outsized ego but all the same, it piqued her that Samar was the only man who didn't react to her in any way whatsoever. _Maybe he's not into half-blood girls_ , she thought, involuntarily channeling a good old Harry Potter term, somewhat to her own amusement. Nina's mother, Ann, was a Cotswold girl from Armscote while her father Prem was Indian, Punjabi through and through. This was a fact every male in the many-storeyed office of the newspaper had made it his business to discover. What just a handful of people knew, however, was that though Nina favoured her mother in her appearance, she was her father's daughter, and being in India was so good, it felt like being at home.

Samar watched that delectable mouth purse itself and idly wondered how it would taste under his. Nina Sabharwal was a knock-out: tall, with a figure that faithfully emulated an hourglass. Add to that masses of hair the colour of autumn leaves, usually caught up at her nape, blue eyes fringed with impossibly long lashes ( _they have got to be false_ , he thought cynically), and the end result was nothing short of stunning. That was his evaluation as a photographer and as a man. Very much as a man.

Oh, she was sexy as hell, he acknowledged, understanding just why the men in the office found reasons to pop up in the marketing section at least once a day. _Poor suckers_ , he thought dryly. They didn't know what he knew. That Nina Sabharwal, not to put too fine a point upon it, was the property of the resident editor in Bangalore and had asked to work in this branch of _India!_ just so she could be with Alan Pereira. Her lover. _Her married lover_ , thought Samar with a sharp note of distaste.

Nina watched Samar push back his chair abruptly and get up to go, puzzled about the sudden tension she felt emanating from him. He was speaking to Rohan, and she let her eyes roam over the rangy figure with skin the colour of honey, a narrow waist that only served to emphasize the breadth of his shoulders and the length of his legs. He exuded power, virility, an earthy charisma, and he wore it all lightly but no one could miss it.

_What would it be like_ , thought Nina suddenly feeling breathless _, to be this man's woman, to have those mesmerizing eyes glaze over with passion for her, to be clasped tight to that incredibly sexy body_? To have that mouth come down upon hers, drawing her very soul out? Instinctively, she knew Samar would be a seasoned lover, one who would fulfil every woman's wishes. _Every woman but me_ , she thought, fighting down a feeling of despondency. _I somehow can't even manage to hold a casual conversation with the man._

Later that night, in the small and cozy apartment not too far from the office which Alan Pereira had so kindly helped her choose, Nina sat at the dining table and gave herself a talking-to. She couldn't, she wouldn't, lose her head over some colleague, and especially one she did not see all that often. He wasn't even conventionally handsome, come to think of it. He stood just under six feet, his whipcord slim frame was nut-brown, his nose looked like it had been broken sometime in a definitely misspent youth, and as for his hair, it was eternally rumpled. But there was that deep dimple, and that was a definite talking point among his fans! But, protested some part of Nina's brain again, what Samar Singh had was sex appeal, tonnes of it. He just had to walk into a room for all eyes to be immediately drawn to him. His brows winged their way to his temple in satanic fashion and below them was a pair of expressive eyes the colour of sunlight upon burnished gold. Those eyes were his most arresting feature. That, and his mobile, sensuous mouth which had a permanent half-smile playing on very sexy lips.

More to the point, however, Nina was here in India on a two-year contract and one year was already up. After her stint with _India!_ was over, she planned to return to London, to start work on a long-planned book. London was where she belonged, in the Chelsea apartment she shared with her sister Sue. She had it all planned out, her future: she'd work for one of London's dailies while she wrote her book, visit her mother at her farmhouse in the Cotswold countryside every weekend, and in due time, she'd meet that special man who was also somewhere out there. All in good time, and Nina Sabharwal was in no hurry.

Actually, for all that she loved being here, India had not called out to Nina. This stint was pure happenstance, at least in the beginning. Prem Sabharwal had been a second-generation British of Indian origin and though the Sabharwal family were inordinately proud of their Punjabi roots, he had shown no interest in visiting India, in taking his family 'back home.' It was an interesting dichotomy. Though Nina and her sister Susan had grown up with the most superficial of India connections – mainly involving food, dress and festival rituals – they had always been aware and even proud of their Indian heritage. The two girls did not look too Indian since both of them heavily favoured their mother, who was a classic peaches-and-cream English beauty. However, as time passed, both Sue and she had become very interested, very involved in the country their father's roots lay in. And given that she was now here, it was as if providence had played a part.

Anyway, India would soon be just a page out of time for Nina, a collation of cherished memories, a learning experience in how a newspaper in another country functioned. This was only a borrowed if enchanting environment for her; at times she felt like she belonged, at other times she felt totally the outsider.

'Reality check over, girl,' Nina muttered to herself as she went to bed. And then she fell into a restless sleep, dreaming about a shadowy figure who chased her endlessly through casuarina groves by the seaside but when he finally caught her, looked intently into her upturned face and then abruptly let her go. As he walked away, the setting sun caught the sharp slant of his brow and cheekbone and highlighted it. Nina moaned in her sleep.

She woke up to a sultry morning with no recollection of the dream, the wind whooshing in the flame-of-the-forest tree outside, scattering her small balcony with vibrant red blossoms. Spring had come upon Bangalore and the city's avenues were fringed by swathes of canary yellow laburnum, the soft lavender of the jacaranda and the bright orange flowers of the gulmohur tree. She also woke on a thought: _just why is Samar Singh called Mr Heartbreaker?_

She got her answer later that afternoon. Sitting in the plush office café with Mini and Leena, dipping into a plate of steamed idlis served with the spicy coconut sauce she had become virtually addicted to, the conversation veered around almost inevitably to Samar Pratap Singh and stopped there. Well, Nina hadn't set the ball rolling, Mini, a Page Three reporter, had. Samar Singh was regularly, if irritatingly, featured in the Page Three gossip columns, which was, funnily enough, rather irregular given that he was some kind of a staffer at the paper. He ignored it, lesser minions grumbled and Mini's boss, a large-built woman who very obviously carried a torch for Samar, said his lifestyle was so flamboyantly removed from that of the run-of-the-mill journalist, it aroused curiosity and interest in readers. Some of this was undeniably true; journos were a grounded lot, carrying their lack of glamour like a pennant. However, to have it pointed out in such a deprecatory fashion had irked them not a little. Which made for yet another inter-office running skirmish.

'Just why is he called Heartbreaker Singh, Mini?' Nina asked.

Mini rolled her eyes expressively. 'You need to be told, woman? Why, women just take one look at him and keel over, whether he looks back at them or not. And most times he does not, our Mr Heartbreaker. Because...'

'Because?' Nina asked before she could help herself, then realized Mini's eyes were fixed on someone or something beyond Nina's left shoulder. Resisting the temptation to turn around, she asked softly, 'What is it?'

' _It_ is the reason why Samar doesn't respond to all our none-too-subtle invitations, dearie,' supplied Leena. 'And it is called Karishma Jhala. Old money, old lineage and old family friend, or at least her parents are; from what we hear, she has been hand-picked by Samar's mama for the man.' Catching the look in Nina's eyes, Leena said, 'Samar is, to use the antiquated terminology favoured by our dear paper, the scion of an old aristocratic family from Rajasthan. So, of course, nothing less than a Rajput princess will do for him.'

Leena threw Nina a wink. 'So just why is he working for _India!_ , you ask.'

Nina grinned equably and murmured, 'Well, I didn't ask but since you brought up the topic...'

Leena made a moue and said, 'Six words. Best photo lab in the country.'

Nina was eaten up with curiosity but decided she wouldn't turn around. In the event, she didn't have to because Karishma passed by, wafting some elusive perfume, and chose to sit facing Nina at the next table. Karishma Jhala was a vision all right, of that there could be no doubt. Petite, with a thick curtain of raven black hair falling to her waist, she had the smoothest complexion Nina had ever seen and almond-shaped dark eyes set in a perfect oval of a face. She wore a long silk tunic over cigarette pants and a whole lot of gold bracelets on both her arms. Personally, Nina thought Karishma was rather overdressed for the morning but maybe that was her thing, who knew?

Mini picked up the thread of conversation again. 'She is Samar's constant companion du jour.' At Nina's enquiring look, Mini said, 'Karishma is a neurologist working in the prestigious National Institute of Mental Health. Though that is an arguable fact, given the time she spends in our offices! Rumour has it that she's just waiting for things to be finalized on the marriage front before she asks for a transfer to New Delhi. Or wherever her swain will go eventually.'

She caught the other girls' eye and all three burst out laughing. 'Swain?' choked Leena. 'I love that word.'

Somewhat sulkily, Mini said, 'Well, my boss loves it, too. We use it almost like an article on Page Three.' And they fell about laughing again, catching the appreciative eye of not a few people in the café. Laughter in the open space offices of _India!_ was usually of a derisive, cynical nature; pure unbridled amusement naturally attracted curious attention.

Then Leena said, 'Actually, Heartbreaker Singh is the cheesiest nickname ever, isn't it? It's so cheesy, one uses it just to see if it gets any reaction from the man.' She put down her coffee cup and added, 'No reaction whatsoever. So people keep trying!'

So that was that, Nina told herself and contrarily enough, felt a slight lifting of her spirits. She'd been dreaming about another woman's man and now that she knew he belonged elsewhere, life could go on. On the heels of this thought came Samar Singh, striding into the café from the door facing Nina and to her utter consternation, she felt her heart give its customary somersault. She'd definitely have to work on that resolution, of letting life go on. Today, he had on a Madras check shirt that moulded itself lovingly to his lean body, the errant lock of raven hair falling as usual onto his brow.

Samar stopped, looked around till he located Karishma and then walked up to her table, pulling out the chair beside her. Sitting down, he looked across and directed a slow, warm smile towards the three girls. Mini and Leena carolled, 'Hi, Samar,' while Nina stared down at her plate of idlis, noticing that she hadn't finished eating them. All of a sudden, she lost interest in the food; now all she wanted to do was to leave. Mini and Leena soon got into their favourite pastime, arguing over the choice of movie they were to see this evening, along with Mini's husband Raj and Leena's boyfriend Rohan Varma. Usually Nina went along with them, mostly for the English movies but for the occasional Hindi film, too; this evening, however, she was due at Alan's house for dinner.

Another resolution crept into her mind: I will not look at him. Except she had the distinct feeling that she was being watched. So she looked up, only to lock eyes with Samar. He was looking at her intently but quite expressionlessly, his eyes glittering like agate. She gave him a tremulous smile and he quirked one eyebrow at her in response.

_I wonder if that satanic look becomes more pronounced when he is making love to a woman_ , Nina thought, then caught herself up short. Now where had that come from? But she knew where that had come from; the way her body reacted every time she saw Samar, it was clear she was in sexual thrall to the man. _I badly want to jump his bones_ , she thought wryly to herself. _Maybe I need exorcism._ Then as Mini and Leena rose to leave, she got up too.

Samar watched Nina walk away, his eyes on her shapely bottom and made a sudden unwelcome discovery... he was aroused. _Yeah, like you are back in high school_ , Singh, he derided himself, bringing his attention back to what Karishma was saying. And trying to banish all thoughts of blue-blue eyes set in a heart-shaped face. Not an easy task, which was another unwelcome discovery he made.
TWO

LATER THAT EVENING, NINA drove the slightly beat-up but sturdy Chevrolet Beat which was on loan from Alan up the flower-edged driveway of his eighteenth-century bungalow. It had taken her a while to discover that in India, guests invited to dinner were expected to turn up well after 8 p.m. Tonight, though, there were several cars parked along the drive already and from the sounds emanating from the house, it was clear the party was happily under way.

She rang the doorbell and was met by Alan Pereira and his wife Sita. It was their anniversary, and Nina handed over the gift she'd brought for Sita, kissing the older woman's cheek. She liked Sita, whose dry wit and often brusque manner concealed a caring heart. Sita took under her wing just about anyone she felt needed looking after, from the gardener's son, the milkman and the cleaning woman, to a motley collection of geese, dogs and cats. Alan, though, hated animals so the geese, dogs and cats were housed in the outhouse. The rest of her charity cases he put up with simply because Alan adored Sita.

Sita was a reed-thin woman with huge eyes that dominated an elfin face, and always wore her thick hair in one fat braid that went well past her hips. She also wore handloom saris all the time, bright swathes of green, teal, gold and orange. Paired with outsized earrings and stacks of brightly coloured bangles on both wrists, Sita Pereira made a very striking picture.

'How many years down, Sita?' Nina asked teasingly, and Alan answered for his wife, in a tone of mock horror, 'Ask me! I've had to put up with this woman for twenty-seven years, would you believe it?'

Even as Nina opened her mouth to reply, a deep voice from behind Alan said, 'You mean Sita has had to put up with you for twenty-seven years? You poor thing, Sita.' And Samar Pratap Singh came up from behind Alan, shooting Nina a look full of hostile meaning, a meaning which was totally lost on Nina.

His animosity was hard to ignore. _Now what have I done_ , thought Nina, in some confusion, then decided Samar was just having a bad day. Maybe Karishma Jhala and he had had an argument. Except, if that was the case, she didn't know why he chose to take his ill temper out on her, Nina. To her horror, Sita said, 'Samar, take Nina inside, give her a drink and introduce her to whoever she doesn't already know.' Samar stepped forward, unsmiling and offered his arm in a distinctly mocking way. She stared at the arm like she was facing a snake. _I can't touch him_ , she thought frantically. _I can't_.

Alan and Sita had moved on to greet other guests. The silence stretched, became fraught and then Samar asked in a puzzled voice, 'Nina? Shall we go in?' Nina stood immobile till he took her arm to guide her inside the house.

The moment his hand touched her, it was like an electric charge hit them both. He breathed in sharply, audibly, then dropped Nina's arm like it was a burning shard. Nina looked up, her heart pounding so hard she thought he could hear it. Bright blue eyes locked with brown for a long minute, then he seemed to snap out of it and repeated, 'Shall we go in?' And both of them noticed that his voice was unsteady.

A while later, it seemed to Nina that the wretched evening would never end; her jaws were beginning to ache with all the smiling and meaningless chatter she was forcing herself to indulge in. Usually, she enjoyed parties and quite liked the paper's frequent get-togethers where everyone talked shop as hard as they discussed politics. Food and drink appeared at these dos with almost clockwork precision, and was wolfed down at an incredibly rapid rate.

Samar had retreated to the bar with the paper's political bureau chief and they seemed immersed in deep discussion. But Nina knew better, she sensed those amber eyes frequently on her, literally burning into her. She had no explanation for what had happened. She had known that when he touched her, she would go up in flames. And that was what she had done. But then, he had gone up in flames too, she could not have just imagined that. They were both still reeling from the shock.

Samar Singh watched the woman in the russet dress broodingly. He had no explanation for what had happened by the front door. Or rather, he had one. It was purely sexual – he had been attracted to her ever since he had first met her some months ago. He had tamped it down but touching her had stoked the embers. _Dammit_ , he thought savagely, _just take her to bed and be done with it._

'What are you scowling about, Singh?' asked the bureau chief in mild surprise, and Samar ground out, 'Exorcism.' Which of course led the other man to believe he was on a witch-doctor special feature and he immediately demanded all details. _Can't let a girl addle your brains, even one so lovely as this one_ , Samar thought savagely to himself before swallowing his impatience and giving his full attention to the other man.

Meanwhile, Nina moved towards the dining table which groaned under a delectable mix of seafood from Mangalore, the nearest coastal town, and local vegetarian fare, prepared by the cook under Sita's eagle eye. A south Indian Brahmin, she had created quite a scandal in her orthodox family by marrying Alan, who was a Mangalorean Christian.

However clichéd it came off as, Nina was in equal parts fascinated and puzzled by India. It was the mix that stumped her. On the one hand, vintage Bella Freud sweaters could be found in shops discreetly tucked off the shop-lined Commercial Street. On the other, large slum tenements virtually dotted the city. As in most developing countries, here too the wealthy were seriously wealthy and the poor were dreadfully poor, and Nina was still struggling to come to terms with this dichotomy.

The beautiful Kashmiri carpets had been rolled back in the parlour to allow for dancing. Couples were already on the floor when Rohan came up. 'Come on, Nina, let's dance,' he said, pulling at her hand. Nina moved onto the makeshift dance floor with him, trying her best to lose herself in the techno beat pounding through the room.

She was conscious that from the dungeons, only a couple of people from personnel, and Rohan and she herself had been invited; Alan obviously respected the editorial crowds' none-too-warm sentiments towards the sales lot. 'Sharks in sharp suits,' she'd heard a journalist growl once. 'Better that than being a bagwalla,' someone from the marketing team had riposted, making a scornful reference to the cloth bag that had once been the mandatory accessory of all newsmen and women.

Rohan Varma was uncomplicated, fun to be with and had been seeing Nina's friend Leena Nair, who was part of the sales team for a while now; what's more, Rohan and Leena simply adored each other. He was also a marketing genius, someone Nina found it a pleasure to work with. _Okay, time to let go_ , thought Nina, throwing herself into the spirit of having fun. If she worked at it hard enough, she wouldn't feel a pair of eyes the colour of molten amber on her.

She thought she had succeeded in having a good time and, a good many dances later, decided to go say her farewells to Alan and Sita. The music was now a languorous slew of slow numbers and many people were in clinches on the floor, with the lighting strategically darkened... _that would be Sid's work_ , she thought with amusement. Siddharth was the crime reporter, a gentle soul who had a perpetually pained expression when returning from covering the city's daily dose of drunken misdemeanours, burglaries and murders. His overweening passion was music and theatre, and he was forever pestering Alan for a transfer to the culture beat. Alan, however, was an expert in ignoring what he didn't want to hear, as well as being a closet chauvinist, or so Nina suspected. And so Sid continued to record the city's rocketing crime rate while a couple of girls did the round of cultural activities, art shows, fashion shows and restaurant debuts.

Samar Singh was nowhere to be seen and Nina wasn't sure whether that was good news or bad news. She said her byes and moved onto the patio, her hand going into her purse to search for the car keys, just as a figure stepped into the light from the shadows near the railing. Even before she saw him, her body knew who it was. Every cell in her body tightened as she looked at Samar Pratap Singh. There was something different about him, his customary sangfroid having fallen away from him. 'Leaving already, Nina?' he asked, the lazy smile in his voice intertwined with something else, something undefinable. 'I was just about to come find you and ask you for a dance.'

Nina fought for composure and won. 'Too late now, Samar,' she managed to say in a calm tone.

He walked right up to her and leaned forward, his handsome face just inches from her own. 'Afraid, Nina?' he asked, a distinct rasp in his voice. 'Were you afraid we'd have a repeat of what happened earlier?'

Nina stared at him, momentarily at a loss for an answer. Samar's eyes glinted like caramelized gold as he stared at her, his body taut as a bowstring. She sensed he was fighting some battle with himself. Then he groaned, 'Let's put it to the test, shall we?' and pulled her hard against him. So hard, Nina felt the breath slammed out of her. She didn't mind, she didn't want to breathe, she didn't feel the need to breathe.

Samar drove his mouth down hard on hers and as their lips fused, it was as if they were born for this moment. His mouth tasted of cigarettes, of whiskey and of him, a musky, tangy taste that filled her mouth and her senses. The way he had grabbed her had been decidedly lacking in finesse; his kiss more than made up for that. It was a deeply sensual kiss, a complete kiss. Gently placing his mouth on hers, coaxing her lips open, he slid his tongue into her mouth even as he clamped her closer to him. As their tongues mated in an erotic dance, Nina slid her arms almost convulsively around his neck, her fingers feeling the shape of his head beneath the silky hair.

Samar's hand moved up to cup her taut silk-covered breast, his thumb probing a nipple which had sprung to life, and Nina groaned. He was aroused; she could feel him hard against her. If he took her there, right there on that dimly-lit patio, she would have given herself to him without a whimper. The kiss went on and on and on, neither of them breaking contact, ignoring the very real danger of asphyxiation. And then Alan's voice was heard, telling Sid to go check if the liquor supplies needed replenishing, and Samar tore his mouth from Nina's with an expletive.

And Nina Sabharwal, her composure in shreds, her mouth swollen from Samar's kiss and her heart beating like it was about to burst from her body, fled into the night.
THREE

ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT, Nina tossed and turned in her bed, contorting her linen bed sheets into one tangled mess. Samar Singh and she had kissed like there was going to be no tomorrow! Where did they go from here? She needed to be cool about what had happened, given his own cool quotient. Of course, what little Nina knew about his 'cool quotient' came from those Page Three snippets. Samar had gone to university in England, he owned a house in Belgravia, and he travelled inside and outside India a great deal. This was a man who dated many women – sophisticated, soignée women. And then, there was Karishma Jhala.

_Well whatever_ , Nina thought gloomily as she turned over in a desperate attempt to sleep.

She was definitely not looking or feeling her best the next day and was positively dreading the next meeting with Samar Singh. She was also mortified at a fate that earlier had let weeks go by before she caught a glimpse of him and which now threw him into her path virtually every day. However, when she did come face-to-face with him, it was almost a week after Alan's party and Nina had enough work on her plate not to sit around brooding much; so, it was not half as bad as she had thought it would be.

She was in the conference room upstairs, waiting for Alan and the news editor to come for a sales-editorial meeting. Rohan was busy and she was there in his place, carrying all the facts and figures in a fat folder. Alan was going to throw a fit when he heard about the planned advertising campaign that required a Page One slot for the next six weeks. The slot was for an ad which ostensibly discussed public issues but was actually a far-from-subtle plug for the paper, by the paper, and it would take up a quarter of the front page. For forty-two days. As for the news editor, he was going to get hysterics... Mr Murthy was a stiff and starchy man, not the most popular news ed but Nina kind of liked him. Time and again, he'd told Nina bitterly that the sales people were under the impression that a newspaper existed to carry less news and more ads. She had the feeling that the man was under the impression that Nina was behind this blasphemous behaviour of newspapers, particularly of this newspaper. She didn't have the heart to tell him that management all over the world as well as at _India!_ was, alas, more concerned with sales figures than with meaningful editorial content. This was a sad fact, but a fact nonetheless.

Idly flicking through a magazine she'd picked up from the pile lying on the conference table, she came upon a series of photographs that arrested her attention. These were black and white exposures, far removed from what Nina's Indian friends ruefully called the 'bare brown bottom' perspective, which was all about poverty glorified through the camera lens, meant exclusively for the edification of the Western observer. These photographs were taken in a desert-fringed village in Rajasthan, celebrating life in a harsh but evocatively beautiful environment.

The snapshots showed women in voluminous skirts which billowed against the sand dunes, women with pots on their heads as they made the miles-long walk towards water, gaunt hawk-eyed men, children with serious eyes and tall, lissom women sitting beside their tents, leaning against camels. The photographs were so vivid, they transcended their black-and-white format. The suggestion of colour was so strongly captured that Nina could almost see the gold of the sunlit dunes, the azure of the relentless skies, the vermilion of the skirts, the terracotta brown of the pots, the glistening tan of the camels' saddles.

The photographer, she read from the breathless prose of the blurb, was young, handsome Rajput royal Samar Pratap Singh, and the series had won him a prize from the nation's top photography magazine. She read that he was thirty years old, played a mean game of tennis and liked rock music, the old-fashioned kind.

'Me, too,' she said aloud.

'Me too, what?' asked Samar lazily from behind her. She hadn't heard him come into the room but now that familiar scent, part him and part something subtle from a designer bottle, drifted across to her, affecting her as it always did. He walked on past her to pull out a chair a few seats ahead, settling himself into it, stretching lazily in a very feline gesture. The thin linen shirt he wore did nothing to hide the tautening of his abdomen, and Nina felt her mouth go dry. She stared hypnotized at the rippling interplay of muscles. _God, he is so sexy_ , she thought. At the moment, she would give almost anything to go over to him, slip her hands under that shirt and run her fingers over his torso, feel the muscles clench under her touch.

Their eyes met and an indefinable message passed between them. Strangely enough, Nina found herself relaxing, imperceptibly letting go of some hidden tension and said, 'I like old-fashioned rock. Pink Floyd, The Who, CCR, CSNY...'

'Really? That's rock slightly off the beaten track, isn't it?' Samar asked on a note of interest and Nina threw him a sweet smile, refusing to go into explanations. 'I grew up on that music and never really grew out of it,' he said with a grin. 'Roger Waters, the former Pink Floyd frontman, played here in Bangalore last year. What a show! Were you around?'

'No, I was back in London taking a brief vacation then, but I did see the photographs you had taken for _Rolling Stone_ mag; that set of snaps got you some award, didn't it?' Nina asked. He nodded, then leaned back, angling himself so he could look at the magazine in her hand. 'These are superb,' Nina said rather shyly.

He grinned. 'It was on home turf. I shot them when I was visiting my mother in Jaisalmer. I don't know if you know this, but Jaisalmer is a fortress town, sprawled on the outskirts of the Thar Desert. Beautiful place but too dashed hot to live there all the time. My mother stays in New Delhi but keeps the family home functioning. Says it's her home and she'll take it heat, sand, desert storms and all.'

'Do you often go back to Jaisalmer then?' Nina asked, stumbling a little over the pronunciation of the city's name. She was getting better at most Indian names and, always good with languages, had acquired more than a passing knowledge of Hindi. But the occasional word still stumped her.

'Not so much anymore. My mother moved after my father died – six years ago. And my sister also lives in Delhi.' As Samar spoke, he looked at Nina's smiling mouth and suppressed a sharp pang of hunger. He didn't want to talk about Jaisalmer, much as he loved the place. He wanted to lean forward and capture that mouth, to find out if it tasted as sweet by morning as it did by night. He wanted to pull her out of the chair and into his arms, thrust his hands into the heavy weight of her curls, to mould her to his body, to feel those breasts grow taut and heavy against him...

And then Alan Pereira walked in, with the news editor behind him. He walked up to Nina, bent down and kissed her cheek by way of greeting. Nina smiled up at Alan, then caught Samar's gimlet eye on her and the smile withered. Alan asked jovially, 'And what are you doing here, Samar Singh? Planning to join our meeting?'

Samar gave him a level look, then moved to the door saying, 'Nope. I was keeping Nina company. Just till you got here to do the job yourself, Alan.' The air suddenly turned tense and Nina shot Alan a quick look, but the editor was already shuffling papers and hadn't heard a word. The news ed had, though, and he raised a questioning brow at Nina.

_Oh great_ , thought Nina savagely, _now that's the buzz which will do the rounds_. The office, she knew, still indulged in random speculation as to whether she was having an affair with Alan Pereira and now they would talk excitedly about how Samar was vying for her favours, too.

However, Nina had learned to smile noncommittally whenever some gossip was relayed to her; and when she was the hub of the gossip – something she could pick up on instantly – she knew better than to react. A few days and this too would blow over.

Disturbed at the anger she felt emanating from him, she watched Samar walk away and realized he too was clearly under the impression that she was involved with Alan. How could she let him know... and even before she completed that sentence in her mind, she felt a burst of anger: _how dare he jump to the first obvious conclusion?_ If he preferred to deal in stereotypical thinking, let him. Nina wasn't going to disabuse him. And having decided that, she was actually able to focus on the meeting.

Samar, meanwhile, stormed out of the room in a foul temper. Damn, the woman had him lose his cool each and every time. So, what was his strategy to be: steal her from under Alan's big red nose? If he did that and he could, though it might not be all that easy, Samar knew he would be doing Sita, whom he quite liked, a big favour in the bargain. But was Nina Sabharwal worth the effort of muddying hitherto clean waters? Alan was a grown man and if he wanted to wreck his marriage over a pair of eyes as blue as a clear sky, that was his problem.

Samar Singh brought a laid-back attitude to his work that belied the sharp eye and keen gaze so necessary for a photojournalist. That's how editors trusted him and let him push the boundaries; that's how politicians dropped their guard and let something vital slip into their hitherto impassive faces; that's how he got past most people's unseen but very much present picket fences to click pictures that revealed a new angle, a new facet. Sometimes, his 'victims' would be deeply chagrined, annoyed, even furious after the pictures ran, revealing to all and sundry what they had not wanted revealed. Of course, it helped that Samar Pratap Singh was impervious to both blandishments and threats.

Nah, Samar now decided, no woman was worth that much of an effort. As for the way his body reacted to Nina, well, he'd have to work on some measure of self-control. _That's the trick, Singh_ , he told himself and flashed a huge smile at the receptionist in the lobby as he passed by on his way out, causing her to drop a sheaf of papers and sigh audibly, wistfully.
FOUR

BARELY TWENTY-FOUR HOURS LATER though, Samar was looking at Nina with almost all traces of that self-control gone. He was in Alan's cabin, discussing a story idea with the resident editor. Alan was a shrewd journalist, Samar respected his nose for news, his ability to scoop and then fix focus on the main event. This was going to be a short-term conflict rather than a war, said Alan of the story under discussion; it was going to show how, in a year the government had officially declared the Year of the Girl Child, little girls were still very much the second sex. Far from being favoured, out in India's villages, they still came a poor second to their brothers when it came to being given an education or any kind of opportunity in life; the urban reality wasn't all that drastically different. They were trafficked with impunity. They were raped and strung from trees out in the villages. They were falling through the cracks. Alan wanted _India!_ to document that reality through Samar Pratap Singh's camera eye.

Samar agreed with the editor that the best way to run this series would be through a photo feature, to give prominence to pictures that spoke for themselves. The series was going to ruffle up feathers in New Delhi, that was for sure; both Alan and Samar knew the paper's bosses preferred 'safe sensationalism' (which was what it was, irrespective of the more profound and pretentious terms they came up with, thought Samar cynically) to taking on the establishment. Commenting on a visiting president or prime minister's fondness for curry was always a safer bet than a piercing analysis of what India could hope to gain from the visit. The average reader apparently had all the attention span of a capricious four-year-old, though it was a moot point whether editorial really believed that, even for a minute. The Girl Child series meant there was a battle on the anvil for Alan. While the editor did not relish such skirmishes, deeming clashes with marketing a big waste of time, he could fight like a tiger if the cause was worthy enough to move him. Hopefully this would move him; everyone on the second floor of the _India!_ offices was counting on just that.

'Let's go to Delhi and make a formal presentation of this to the Ivory Tower,' Alan now said, referring to the paper's top brass at HQ. 'Try and play it safe in the pilot pictures,' he continued, then caught himself up short and chuckled. Samar joined in, the laugh dying when Nina walked in with just a perfunctory knock on the door. She was wearing a tailored jacket in deep blue and Samar recognized the designer to be a Bangalore-based friend of his. He also recognized the tightening of his body and shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

Nina had not noticed him; she went straight up to Alan, saying, 'Sorry for barging in like this, but I just had to tell you...' Then she saw Samar and she said, 'Oh, I didn't know you had someone here. I'll be along later.'

The editor looked up at her and grinned. 'If you came in to tell me what I think you came in to tell me, Beauty, then I have to tell you I already know.'

_Beauty_. Samar pushed his chair back and got up in one fluid motion and ground out, 'I'll see you later, ed.'

Alan looked startled and interpolated, 'We still have to work out the format for the story.'

But he was talking to thin air, Samar Singh had left the room.

Alan Pereira sank back into his comfortably large chair and chuckled, looking up at Nina. 'That man fancies you like mad and thinks the two of us have something going.'

'I know,' said Nina through her teeth, then went pink. 'I mean, I don't know about him fancying me but yes, he thinks you and I...' She petered out and Alan said, 'So, shall I put him straight or will you?'

'I'll speak to him, don't worry,' Nina said and wondered if she really had any intention of doing so. Or if she had the inclination to do so. She ignored the voice in her head that went, _Well, once you clear the air with Samar Pratap Singh, who knows what the future may hold for you, for him?_

Alan said, 'Actually, I'm not sure it's a good idea, putting Samar straight. You are a lamb, sweetie, and he's a wolf. And why would I send a lamb in for slaughter? I'm a man with ethics.'

'You are also a man who falls back on a lot of clichés,' Nina told him gravely. Both of them dissolved into laughter. Nina decided what she had come to talk to Alan about could wait.

She left the room and walked straight into Samar, who was lounging against the wall outside, talking to Sid. Once again, a distinct frisson ran through both of them at the contact, blowing Nina's mind. If an accidental touch had her reacting like this, she thought shakily, she'd go up in one big blaze if he made love to her, this man with the usually smiling mouth now drawn into a straight line, those demonic eyebrows swooping down into a frown. Unnoticed by both of them, Sid looked from one to the other, then quickly slipped away.

'Will you have dinner with me? Tonight?' Samar asked with all the polish of a teenager asking his crush out on a date. Nina gaped at him and Samar took a deep breath, smiled a slow smile and started again. 'Are you free tonight, Nina? There's a new Italian place on Lavelle Road which I hear does some great pasta. Do you like Mediterranean food? Or should be it "when in India, eat Indian"...?'

Nina's characteristic serenity had again deserted her, and now she felt like a schoolgirl whose object of desire had deigned to ask her out. _If you smile at me like that_ , she thought dreamily, _I would walk to the ends of the earth with you_. She realized Samar was looking at her quizzically and hurried into speech. 'Well, I love Indian food but if the Italian place you are talking about is Biscotti, I'd like to check the place out. The reviews have been great.'

'Then check the place out we shall,' said Samar, giving her one of those toe-curling smiles, a dimple flashing deeply in his left cheek. 'Will seven-thirty be convenient? I could pick you up from your place...'

Later that evening, Nina dabbed some Rive Gauche, her favourite perfume, in the hollow of her collarbones, checked her reflection in the mirror and went to answer the doorbell. Framed in the soft light as she stood in the doorway, her floral muslin curtains billowing in the slight breeze that blew in through the French windows, she looked almost ethereal and Samar felt his pulse speed up before he reflected cynically that she had probably stood at just that spot for pure effect. _And boy, were you affected_ , he derided himself before telling her in all truth, 'You look lovely, Nina. The outfit suits you.'

She had gone ethnic tonight and was wearing a raw silk tunic over a churidar, both a golden shade of mustard. The colour of the outfit served to deepen the blue of her eyes while simultaneously brightening the halo of curls which framed her face. The only concession she had taken was in dispensing with the dupatta, the inordinately long stole that made up the outfit. It was warm and Nina didn't want to spend the evening trying to keep the soft fabric from sliding off her shoulders. Leena, Mini and most Indian women she'd seen, knew how to move about gracefully without dislodging the dupatta from their shoulders but Nina knew her limitations in that direction.

She thanked Samar for his compliment, trying very hard not to devour him with her eyes. He was wearing a white shirt that showed off his burnished skin to perfection. At the restaurant, it was clear many women felt drawn to him too, judging from the looks that were thrown his way. He was hailed by a few of the diners and waved a casual hello to them while escorting Nina to their table.

The restaurant was done up vibrantly in bright blues, yellows and greens. The food, when it came, was delicious. Nina chose escalope milanese as her main dish and on Samar's recommendation opted for an Indian wine, a mellow rose, that went perfectly with the meat. Increasingly, most people were trying the new fusion cuisine, Indian food with Western wines and vice versa, and there were those who swore a biryani pulao went best with a bottle of Sauvignon blanc from France's best vineyards. If what Nina was having was an example of this felicitous fusion, well, then she understood what the buzz was all about.

Samar proved to be a smooth conversationalist, deftly steering the talk to the other new eateries that had opened in town, the upcoming theatre festival that was hosted annually by their paper and the new Bond film now running in town.

'Daniel Craig makes a great James Bond but nothing can beat Ranveer Singh's energy on the big screen,' Nina told him and watched that mobile eyebrow shoot up.

'You—' began Samar but Nina interjected smoothly, 'Yes, Samar, I watch Hindi films. It gives me a clear idea of what my potential client is thinking of right now...'

Samar said solemnly, his eyes dancing, 'Ah, all in the line of duty, I see,' and then started to laugh. His dimple really was the deepest one she had seen.

Nina smiled sweetly at Samar. 'Not really. I suspect I am getting hooked onto Hindi films with their songs, dances, the emotional see-saws everyone has to go through before everything comes out right, in the end.'

'Mmm, we are an emotional people,' Samar told her. 'Then again, not all the English people I know are models of restraint.' And immediately, Nina had this vision of him bending over some blonde who was anything but reserved in his arms as she drew his dark head down to hers. She blinked as if to banish that vision and said, 'But I'm not English. At least, I'm only half-English.'

'Hmmm,' he assented, not bothering to disguise the fact that he knew, and then asked, 'Tell me, how has Bangalore been treating you?' even as he raised his glass in a silent toast to her.

'I love this city,' Nina replied, her eyes shining with enthusiasm. 'The tree-lined avenues, the parks, the juxtaposition of old gracious bungalows down one road, gleaming high-rise buildings down the next, the vibrant nightlife. Sometimes it reminds me of London, at other times it is so very Indian.'

Samar smiled but did not say anything.

'I find the people incredibly hospitable, too,' she continued. 'The only thing that still tends to throw me is being asked personal details within minutes of meeting someone...'

'Ah, that's an old Indian tradition, mining everyone one meets for information: are you married, how many children do you have, if you aren't married, why aren't you married,' Samar supplied dryly.

'Yes, and you forgot the last one. If you aren't married, you must meet my cousin's brother-in-law – he's single, the CEO of a Fortune 500 firm and is looking out for a bride. And you'd fit the bill very well.'

'You're kidding,' said Samar and Nina watched that eyebrow do its upward climb again. It really was the sexiest thing.

'No, I'm not,' she told him serenely. 'At least three friends have tried to fix me up with eligible men, I'll have you know.'

Samar leaned towards her, fixing her with an intent look. 'It's not all that improbable an idea when one considers it,' he told her. 'I can see you in traditional Indian bridal wear, with masses of gold jewellery on your neck, ears and wrists, your hands all covered in henna...' His voice trailed off as he picked up one of her hands from where it lay on the table top and smoothed open the palm.

That old sexual charge immediately fired up. _Don't react_ , she told herself even as she felt a searing shaft of longing racing like liquid fire in her veins. If anyone had told her that having her hand held was such an overtly sexual gesture, she would have laughed. She didn't feel much like laughing now, though, as his long lean fingers caressed her palm, sending incredibly strong jolts shooting through her. Almost absently, he moved the back of his fingers to and fro across her wrist and she actually felt her toes curl.

_I give up_ , thought Nina on a sudden note of decision. If this was purely sexual attraction, well, she was going to go with the flow and see where it took her. She wouldn't fight, couldn't fight it any longer.

And then the spell was broken by a voice that enquired in dulcet tones, 'Telling her fortune, Samar?' Nina looked up into Karishma Jhala's perfectly made-up face, into cold eyes that belied the smile on her lips. Samar stilled, then let go of Nina's hand lazily, got up and made the introductions. 'Oh yes, I've heard so much about you from Alan Pereira,' said Karishma, her smile purely per functional, her tone on the verge of being patronizing.

_She may be beautiful, but I'm the one with Samar and the evening isn't over yet_ , thought Nina, and she gave Karishma an easy smile. 'Alan and I are old friends,' she said and felt Samar shoot her a look, which she ignored.

Karishma's dinner companion had caught up with her, a handsome young doctor who had all the grace of a deer caught in and blinded by the glare of a car's headlights. He kept fiddling with his belt buckle with all the finesse of an awkward adolescent, and Nina was hard put not to laugh. She smiled a kindly smile at him, and he immediately went purple.

'Are you just coming in to dinner?' Samar asked them, to which Karishma replied, 'No, actually, I spotted you just as we were leaving. We are going on to the Rain Dance,' naming a popular disco in another part of town. 'Why don't you join us?' she asked him, her kohl-lined eyes full of promise and persuasion. She was wearing a flame-red chiffon sari tonight, and the fabric curved lovingly around her voluptuous figure.

Samar looked at Nina, who shrugged. Karishma Jhala had not included Nina in the invitation, and she wasn't going to reply. 'Some other time, Karishma,' Samar said with an easy smile. 'I need to talk to Nina.'

Karishma looked disappointed, her escort looked relieved and Nina hoped she didn't look as bemused as she felt.

_He wants to talk to me_. _What about_ , she wondered, not daring to take the thought further, not daring to indulge in any kind of hope. But Samar kept the conversation light for the rest of the meal. He had invited Nina out tonight with a fixed purpose in mind, though the sexual tension that always reared its head between the two of them had nearly derailed him. And the moment he touched her, all he wanted to do was to get her out of the restaurant and take her to his place, lock the front door and make love to her, hard, fast, urgently. And continuously, for the next three days at the very least.

He wanted her scented body trembling under his, he wanted her moaning under him, those curls which turned him on so spread out on his pillow, her long legs wrapped around his waist. Samar Singh wanted this woman badly, and he was finding frustration a tough emotion to live with.

But that was before Karishma had come by; now he was back in control and that was the way he wanted it. This woman with the loveliest blue eyes he'd ever seen was gorgeous, but he had known many beautiful women. Not one of them had made him lose control and no way was he going allow Nina Sabharwal to do that. She looked incredibly innocent, that was obviously her modus operandi. But he was onto her and she needed to know that he knew.

So Samar wined and dined, charming his companion effortlessly with an easy flow of conversation, solicitude and interest. Nina flowered under his attention. It were as if a spark had been lit inside her. The man seated opposite felt his blood sing just watching her. _If she had been free and unattached_..., thought Samar grimly to himself, not letting himself complete that thought.

_Will he kiss me goodnight_ , Nina asked herself, suddenly feeling breathless, as he took her back to her place much later. But Samar just smiled down at her as he got out of the car and walked her to her door. Nina turned the key in the door, then paused, took a deep breath and turned, 'What did you have to say to me, Samar?' she asked, her voice husking slightly.

_Ah, she finally took the bait_. Samar leaned against his sleek silver Mercedes, draining his face carefully of all expression. Then he said, gently but clearly, 'I want you to leave Alan Pereira alone, Nina. If it's not already too late. I am very fond of Sita and won't stand by and watch her get hurt.'

Whatever Nina had expected, it had not been this. Or maybe it had, maybe she had known the whole time that Samar Pratap Singh had not invited her out just for the pleasure of her company. Fighting for a calm she did not feel, she looked him in the eye and asked, 'And what makes you think Alan and I...?'

Samar laughed, and it wasn't a pleasant sound. 'Oh, anyone with eyes can see just how it is between the two of you, Nina,' he said, not quite disguising the sneer that threaded his words.

'And how is it between Alan and me, Samar?' Nina asked evenly. Boy, she was one cool customer, he thought grimly; she wasn't going to dissolve into a flood of tears but neither was she going to back off from the affair, that much was clear.

Well, she had asked for it. 'The air is thick with sexual tension when the two of you are together,' he said. 'Alan is like a man possessed, he can't take his eyes off you when you are in the room. And when he looks at you, it's as if he is undressing you, his eyes run over you like his fingers probably do when the two of you are alone...'

She spoke then, inwardly filled with a cold fury but her oval face calm as the Madonna's. 'Are you talking about Alan or yourself, Samar?' she asked and Samar gave a sharp intake of breath, almost like she had slid a knife into his guts. Stifling an oath, he dragged Nina up against him. And then he did what he had been aching to do all evening – he kissed her.

He kissed her like a famished man and in his kiss was a pent-up, searing hunger. He coaxed her lips apart, his tongue doing a supplication on its own, begging for entry. A furious Nina bit his lower lip and he lifted his head with a sharp exclamation. She then made the mistake of opening her mouth to speak, and Samar brought his mouth on hers again, gently but firmly this time.

The kiss caught fire, growing more urgent, more intimate, its tenor changing rapidly as their mouths fused and clung. Even as one sinewy arm held her locked to him, he moved a hand down her back, to cup and then caress her firmly rounded bottom. Nina could feel the ridge of his arousal hard against her as he pulled her between his legs. She felt like she was melting in a puddle of molten lava. 'Samar,' she moaned low in her throat.

When Samar abruptly let go of her, she almost fell against the car. He ran his fingers through his hair, and asked in a low tone made rough with need, 'Yes?'

'What is between Alan Pereira and me is none of your business,' Nina managed to say. Then before he could react, she turned the key in the lock and was inside her apartment. Her heart thundering like she'd run a marathon, she leaned against the front door and after a few moments, heard the car outside purr to life.

And that was that, Nina told herself later, as she sat by her bedroom window watching the moonlight play hide and seek with the fronds of the tree that grew outside her balcony. The one man who turned her on like no one had in all these years, and she had blown it. However, when she finally went to bed, it was with the comforting thought that she had acquitted herself with dignity.

It was not a reflection shared by the man who was staring into the amber liquid in his glass, on the other side of town and wondering how on earth he had let himself behave like a prize-ass. Before this evening, before what happened had happened, if someone had suggested that Samar Singh could have been so ham-handed, he would have laughed that suggestion to hell. But ham-handed was exactly how he had played it with Nina Sabharwal, damn it.
FIVE

BANGALORE HAD RECEIVED A pre-dawn shower of rain and when Nina drove to the office, the leaves on the trees had a freshly minted look about them. Some roads were thickly carpeted with sunshine-yellow laburnum petals from the trees overhead and there was a slight breeze blowing in the air. The locals tended to moan that their Garden City, which just a couple of decades ago had had a climate salubrious enough to rival that of a hill station, was now slowly and inexorably becoming a concrete jungle. Nina, though, had travelled to enough hot and dusty cities in India to value the unique charms of this southern one. She had also realized, however, that the Bangalorean thoroughly enjoyed dissing his city and did a thorough job of it too but closed ranks the moment an outsider offered an unbiased opinion.

She found Rohan in a grumpy mood and reticence not being one of Rohan Varma's qualities, was quickly let in on the reason. 'The ed and Samar Singh have, between them, thought up this series on the woes of girls in the officially declared Year of the Girl Child,' he told Nina disgustedly. 'They've gone up to Delhi to run the idea by the big boss.'

'Well, it does sound pertinent,' began Nina, only to have Rohan cut in. 'Wake up, Nina,' he ordered. 'What do we have to do with pertinent or obsolete ideas? It's the potential for controversy that affects us. Remember how some of our biggest advertisers complained when the paper ran that series on the neglect of heritage buildings? We had our hands full trying to soothe a thousand ruffled feathers, right? We turned into PR people overnight and that's something I don't want to do again.'

'That's right,' conceded Nina. 'But since when does editorial have to take us into confidence about the stories they intend to run?'

The statement didn't go down well with Rohan of course, and he immediately launched into a diatribe on how editorial did any dratted thing they wished to do and left marketing to face irate advertisers. Didn't the foolish journalists realize it was the ads that paid for their salaries, had they forgotten the adage about today's scoop becoming the morrow's wrapping for fish and chips...

'That's in London, here it becomes wrapping for roasted chickpeas,' put in Nina and then seeing Rohan's face turn red, hastened to calm him down. 'Look, maybe we're getting all steamed up needlessly. Maybe IT will shoot it down.' IT stood for both Ivory Tower as well as the big white chief who occupied that sanctum sanctorum.

Rohan shot her another one of his looks, which Nina privately thought made him look exactly like a disgruntled seal. 'Those in the Ivory Tower will buy anything Samar Pratap Singh sells,' he told her. 'They know Singh is doing them a favour by working for the paper.'

'He is?' asked Nina, all her intentions not to show overt interest in the man flying out of the window.

'Hey, you don't think Samar Singh works for the money _India!_ pays him? You don't think he runs his Merc or rents his penthouse apartment on his monthly salary now, do you?' Rohan asked with a crack of laughter. 'The man's rolling in the stuff, his family owns property virtually all over north India and he's an Only Son, you know what that means in this country. _India!_ is Singh's creative outlet for the moment, before he packs up his many Hasselblads and goes home to run the family business.'

'Which is?' asked Nina and realized she had come to the end of that particular road when Rohan grinned. 'You mean you didn't ask him when the two of you went out last night?'

'How did you...' she began to ask but stopped, giving an unladylike snort when Rohan said smugly, 'Oh, I have my sources. But tell me Nina, doesn't Alan mind? Or was it a one-off, last night's date?'

He'd been baiting Nina about Alan for virtually all of the last year and she didn't react to it now except to smile sweetly and say, 'That really is none of your business now, is it, Rohan?'

Sure enough, at lunch with Leena in the office cafe, Nina discovered that she was back in the speculative limelight, the current flavour of the voracious grapevine.

'I hear you've been dating Samar P. Singh,' said Leena with a teasing smile coupled with a speculative look, as they settled at a corner table with their food. Today Nina had opted for a full thali meal. She had become hopelessly addicted to just about any and every kind of cuisine that this country had to offer; and fully subscribed to the theory that India had colonized the West with its food. She also realized just how much of a convert she had become only when she caught herself liberally spicing up the shepherd's pies or soufflés she would bake once in a while at her apartment. Again, this was pure irony considering that she had happily eaten bland English fare while growing up, even as every street in London was sprouting a curry house.

Now she turned her attention to an amused Leena. 'Leena,' Nina told her patiently, 'one evening out does not mean we are dating.'

'Well, that's not what Mr Patel thinks. He lives in that area and saw Samar and you at a table near the window in Biscotti. He said the two of you looked... what was the word he used, it cracked me up, real cosy! Except he said ''cojy''!'

Mr Patel was HRD manager for the paper, dry as dust and as old as the hills, and Alan Pereira's good friend. 'And of course, he said this to you, to Rohan and to all the office of _India!_ , I expect,' said Nina in a resigned fashion. She had realized that the only way to douse all rumours was to adopt a laconic air. The moment the office discovered they couldn't get a rise out of whoever the current victim was, they lost interest and dropped the issue. _Pretty much like an impatient terrier with a large intractable bone_ , Nina thought. She had learned to play as it went.

Nothing excited the people at _India!_ more than a political scam or an office romance. And if there were quite a few of the former, there were quite a few of the latter, too. While arranged marriage still ruled, increasingly more and more people – mostly those who lived in the bustling cities – dated and entered into relationships that entailed moving in together; however, Nina had noticed that most of these relationships still ended up in marriage.

In any case, arranged marriage had been converted into what was more snappily known as the suggested marriage. The parents of the couple suggested the youngsters meet and get to know each other and marry if they felt they could forge a life together.

Leena Nair and Rohan Varma were part of the suggested marriage system, and happily part of it, too. Leena's father and Rohan's uncle were golfing buddies. Rohan's uncle had been singing the praises of his nephew long and loud before Leena's father took the bait and invited them over for tea.

Rohan had then taken up the cue and invited Leena out for a movie. They had clicked big-time, and a year of dating had resulted in the couple celebrating their formal engagement. If anyone tried telling them their relationship had had its beginnings on the arranged platform, they would have got their heads bitten off; Leena and Rohan knew that they were irrevocably, deeply in love. Quite a win-win situation all around, Nina reflected with amusement.

Now Leena was saying in a concerned tone, 'You know what you are doing of course, Nina, but Heartbreaker Singh? He didn't come by that name just sitting at home watching cricket re-runs on TV.'

Happenstance or not, the sentiment was echoed by Jenny Hamilton later that evening. On an impulse, Nina had driven to the leafy borough where her old school friend lived, in a lovely one-storeyed house with red oxide floors, gleaming teak furniture and a lush green garden. Jenny had been Nina's senior in school back in England, and they had recognized each other immediately when they met at a party many months ago and had, in the intervening period, become close friends. Jenny's American husband, Hugh, headed the Indian branch of a multinational corporation and the couple had two sons, both of whom were studying at a residential school in the hills to the south of Bangalore.

After she had settled Nina down with a cup of tea spiked with cardamom and brewed to perfection by her maid, Mary, Jenny asked with all her customary forthrightness, 'Something troubling you, Nina?'

Nina looked up and grinned. 'Well, yes. Every time I look at you, Jenny, I keep wanting to ask how you manage to stay so slender. Aren't you affected by the TT bogey?'

'The TT bogey?'

'The Tandoori Tikka bogey,' Nina informed her in all seriousness.

Jenny gave her a look that said she wasn't fooled by such lame red herrings. 'That's an easy one. I eat what I want to eat, then head to the gym for a three-hour workout.' It was Nina's turn to throw Jenny an old-fashioned look and the older woman grinned. 'Actually, it's just my constitution, I guess. Hugh says I burn up more calories than I consume, with all the running around and the hyperventilating I do.'

Jenny was an active member, as were most of the expatriate wives, of half-a-dozen charities which kept her, she said, from missing her boys too much. In contrast to his live wire wife, Hugh Hamilton was a large grizzled man with an unflappable air and a booming laugh. The workers at his office had inevitably changed the Hugh to Huge; Mr Huge they called him, a moniker he happily answered to. 'Well, as long as they don't call me Mr Small,' he would say with one of his rumbling laughs.

'Okay, now that we have the vital question of my weight control out of the way, tell me, is all okay with you?' Jenny asked.

Nina sighed. 'Oh, I don't know, Jenny. Fact is, I'm getting rather tired of the continuous speculations about Alan and me.'

Jenny shot her a searching look. 'That's old news, Nina. And you haven't been too bothered by such talk all this while. Is there someone specific you want to put straight regarding Alan and you?'

Trust Jenny to get to the point, thought Nina ruefully. 'Samar Pratap Singh,' she told Jenny, simply, succinctly then on an afterthought asked, 'Do you know him?'

'Very well; he rides occasionally with Hugh,' Jenny told the younger girl. 'Man plays a mean game of polo. Rajput prince and all that, I believe. Samar P. Singh... hmm. You do know they call him HB Singh hereabouts, don't you? HB for Heartbreaker, would you believe the asinine label? Not just hereabouts, actually, I have heard him called that even in Delhi,' she added artlessly.

'He took me out to dinner last night,' Nina told her. 'To warn me off Alan,' she added, cutting in on Jenny's satisfied, 'Well then.'

'Ah,' said Jenny, her voice carrying a wealth of meaning. 'Either the man wants you for himself or he's looking out for Sita,' she finished with all the air of one making an inescapable point.

Nina laughed. 'Well, I want him and I want him bad,' she confessed, pink running under her cheeks. _This is the Indian part of me talking_ , Nina thought, _the hot-blooded desi girl_. Then again, Nina had always been able to say just about anything to Jenny Hamilton.

'I don't blame you, girl,' Jenny said chuckling. 'Most women take one look at him and want him bad. He's got a trademark on sex appeal, our Samar Pratap Singh. But Nins, he also has a reputation with a capital R, and I happen to know it's not all gossip.'

At Nina's enquiring look, Jenny continued, 'There is this Karishma woman now but a while ago, I think he was dating a friend of a friend, Meera. Event manager with hair to die for and a Jessica Rabbit figure. When the break-up happened, she took it bad. Asked for a transfer out of Bangalore rather than face him at all the parties and shows.'

Nina felt her heart plummet. Was she crazy to think she could have some kind of a relationship with Samar Singh? She was relatively inexperienced and definitely so when it came to playing the sort of games that Samar was used to. Nina played it straight; with her what you saw was what you got. The locals had a term for short-term activities, 'time-pass' they called it. Well, even if Nina and Samar indulged in some time-pass, she was going to get hurt. Picking up the pieces and moving on was not something Nina visualized doing with much sanguinity.

'Samar is a great chap,' Jenny was now saying. 'The problem is, he's had it too easy for words. Most women fall like ninepins for him. And you aren't the type to play pretend games, Nina. If you're looking for something quick but intense, then go for it. Because my reading of the situation is, Singh will play the field and then marry just where his mother wants him.'

'What his mother wants, or so the buzz goes, is Karishma Jhala,' Nina said, trying to keep her voice level.

'Well, Karishma or whoever else, Mrs Singh will do the choosing, that's for sure. I've met her – crusty woman, very conscious of her background. Her snobbery is so concealed you won't realize you've been patronized till she finishes with you and moves away! But that's the way it is with most of these aristos. You know the scenario, Nina; men like Singh have pressure on them to return to their roots in more ways than one, and that includes the choice of wife: beautiful, tamed now if wild before, girls who know the score and are fully capable of running a handful of large manor houses with an army of servants, heading a dozen charities, inaugurating a host of functions, presiding over innumerable banquets... and of course, producing one son and heir and a few spares, too, all male preferably. The format never varies.'
SIX

THE VISIT TO JENNY'S gave Nina enough to think about but thankfully she found she wasn't given too much time to think, what with the rush of new projects that came with deadlines attached. Rohan, Nina and their whole team were kept busy. Not too many evenings went free either; there was a fashion show one evening, on another rainy night, Nina, Leena and Mini went to see the latest Hollywood offering – a racy film on an F1 competition. Mini often managed complimentary tickets for such shows and film previews, and the three of them would usually go; some evenings, Rohan would join them, as would Mini's husband, Raj.

On the evenings she was alone, Nina tried to work on an article. She didn't really have much time to indulge in her writing hobby. _India!_ had carried a couple of her pieces, and she wrote for other papers and magazines, too, mainly in the UK. She preferred to steer away from political issues and do feature pieces instead. India was a treasure trove for feature writers; all it took was a perceptive eye and an inquisitive mind. Now Nina was working on a piece about the dwindling Chinese community in Bangalore who faithfully carried on with their traditional industries. The best handmade shoes in town were made by an old Chinese shoemaker who had a team of expert Indian cobblers working for him; the best beauty parlours and noodle joints were almost exclusively Chinese. The next generation though didn't seem to be too keen to carry the same baton, and thus a legacy was slowly fading.

However, the article seemed irrevocably stuck now because every time Nina sat down to key in her notes, a lean brown face floated through the pages, one eyebrow raised mockingly, eyes gleaming like lava on brown rock, deliciously shaped lips quirked in gentle mockery. _Maybe I should go to bed with him and then I'll find myself cured of this addiction_ , she thought and then laughed. 'Wait until you are asked, Nina Sabharwal,' she told herself mock-severely. And pragmatist that she was, Nina decided the article too could wait even as she waited.

It was a long wait, and she realized Samar was back only when Alan Pereira appeared at the weekly meeting looking smug and announcing that Delhi had given them the green light on the girl child exposé. Samar had been back for three days and had not thought to call her, Nina realized in a wave of dismay. 'Yeah right, and you were the first on his to-call list in Bangalore,' she could hear Jenny's dry voice in her ear.

Later that evening, Sita called. Nina had just finished an al fresco dinner with some of her sales team colleagues at a pub down the road. Back home, she had a bath, changed into loose cotton drawstring pajamas and a string vest, and settled down to read Tolkien's trilogy. This was the second time she was reading it; the first time was in high school and she judged it was high time to go back to Middle Earth and its inhabitants.

'Nina, how have you been?' asked Sita. She called often and whenever they could, they met for lunch; this time round, Nina realized, she had not heard from Sita since the party at the latter's place.

After the exchange of news, Sita said, on a note of amusement, 'I think the rumours linking you to Alan are finally going to die down, much to Alan's secret dismay, of course.'

Nina's heart thudded in her chest. What did Sita mean? Had Samar Singh said something to Alan when they'd gone up to Delhi together?

'Oh, why is that?' she asked Sita now, in a cautious tone.

'Because Roma, Alan's secretary, has left to have her baby and in her place has come the newest femme fatale in town. I met her today and believe me, if Alan had been younger, slimmer and sexier, I'd be a very worried woman. The girl's a stunner.'

Not knowing whether to be relieved or disappointed, Nina laughed. 'Sita, Alan could be ten years younger, slim as a reed and surrounded by a flock of drooling femme fatales, and even then you wouldn't be worried one bit,' she teased Sita, who laughed with all the confidence of one who loved and was loved.

She then said, 'Alan's got the two of us silk scarves from that new boutique in Delhi which got so much publicity recently. I know you prefer blue, so I've kept the cream one. He didn't want to give it to you at the office; I'm sending it round to your place now, okay?'

Asking Sita to thank Alan, though she guessed it was the former who had thought of the gift, Nina put the phone down with a sense of anti-climax. Had whatever Samar and she had going between them ended before it had even begun, she wondered bleakly. And suddenly, she found her usual pragmatism deserting her.

Making herself a large cup of strong coffee to drown her woes in, Nina settled down to watch a news programme where the noisy anchor was shouting down each and every panelist systematically. 'Answer me,' he'd demand peremptorily and then interrupt the hapless person who had begun to answer him. 'The nation wants to know,' he would announce threateningly, then proceed to harangue all the talking heads at one go. Willy-nilly, Nina found herself quite entertained by the spectacle. A little while later, the doorbell pealed. It would be Sita's messenger with the gift, thought Nina as she went to open the door.

Samar Pratap Singh stood on her doorstep, looking absolutely devastating in formal clothes. He had on a grey suit, a silk shirt the colour of Nina's eyes and a tie flecked with a gold and grey pattern. He quirked one eyebrow and smiled. 'Hi, Nina,' he said, his voice a swathe of honey over granite. Nina shivered.

She took a moment to gather herself. Samar watched her put a hand up to the hair she'd gathered carelessly at her nape and felt his body clench with longing. He'd stopped to say hello to Sita on his way home from dinner, and she had asked him to deliver something to Nina Sabharwal. Sita had pointed out in a matter-of-fact manner that Nina's place fell on his route home. And Samar hadn't said 'no'. He hadn't wanted to say 'no'.

Samar Singh had been doing some thinking while he was away from Bangalore and away from Nina Sabharwal. He'd had a short but illuminating talk with Alan Pereira. He didn't need this complication in his life, he reasoned, even while acknowledging wryly that Nina could indeed prove to be a complication. And so he hadn't bothered to get in touch when he returned to Bangalore.

Then he had made a discovery. He found Nina invaded his thoughts constantly. Tonight, she looked even more beautiful than he remembered, dressed down as she was. The pale pink tank top she wore exposed creamy shoulders and the beginnings of a cleavage that Samar decided could make his thoughts spin totally out of control if he dwelt on it; he could already feel his body reacting to it. The nape of her neck looked both vulnerable and sexy; he wanted very badly to bend towards it and nibble at her neck, feel the hot shudders run down her body.

Taking a deep breath, he said, 'Sita sent this for you,' and proffered the parcel. Nina took it and found herself inviting him in for coffee. Even as he started on a polite refusal, Samar looked into Nina's eyes, which had turned a shade deeper with emotion, and was lost.

In her parlour, he did not sit, choosing instead to prowl restlessly, picking up stuff, staring at the collection of lithographs of temples by the banks of the Ganges she had hung on her wall, scanning her bookshelves and finally coming to the little marble-topped table on which Nina kept photographs of her family. Picking up a framed snapshot of Nina and her mother outside her parents' farmhouse, he remarked, 'You favour your mother, don't you? She's beautiful.'

Nina coloured. 'Well, I do look like her,' she replied. 'I think I have inherited my father's temperament, though. He was a pragmatic Punjabi.' Their eyes met, his eyebrow shot up and they both started laughing. 'No, it's true. He really was a calm man, unruffled by anything life threw at him.'

'It's the other way around for me,' said Samar. Slanting a grin at her, he said, 'I have my father's nose and eyebrows but it's from my mother I have inherited this restlessness and quick temper.'

Nina went into the kitchen to make the promised coffee and Samar followed, propping himself against the doorjamb with characteristic grace. He had shrugged himself out of his jacket, loosened his tie and was now watching her with an unusually serious expression. It was as if he was in the throes of some silent tussle within himself. There was an undefinable tension in the air. Flustered, Nina poured hot water into the mugs, splashing some on her hand in the process and giving a sharp exclamation of pain.

Immediately Samar was beside here, taking the scalded hand and plunging it in running water from the tap he turned on. After a moment, Nina found her voice and said, 'It's okay now, thanks.'

Samar didn't let go of her hand, holding it tenderly, examining it under the light. An errant lock had fallen over his brow and Nina itched to push it back with her hand. The long, sensitive fingers were smoothing her palm, his thumb almost absently caressing her wrist and Nina felt the familiar need surge to life deep within her. She could imagine those fingers moving over her body, cupping her eager breast, scouting out the hollows and indentations of her torso, moving across the soft skin of her thighs, exploring the core of her womanhood. Despite herself, she couldn't help letting a moan escape her.

Samar looked up, concerned. 'Does your hand still hurt?' he asked.

Nina shook her head but couldn't trust herself to reply.

Samar looked into her eyes, then asked in a low voice, a muscle working in his cheek, 'Shall I kiss it better?'

The air immediately grew thick with desire. Nina looked at his mouth and shivered. However, to her intense disappointment, he released her hand and took over the making of the coffee saying, 'Let me make it, you could use a hot drink more than me right now.'

'Can you make coffee? I mean, do you cook?' asked Nina, making a concerted effort to calm down.

He grinned. 'Don't tar all Indian men with the same brush, Nina Sabharwal. Some of us can manage very well in the immediate absence of fond mothers to cook us delicious meals, thank you.' Relenting at her look of chagrin, he said, 'Actually, I've been cooking since I've been on my own and that's many years now.'

His coffee was delicious all right and Nina told him so, at which he sketched a mocking bow. 'You must come and taste my spinach chicken sometime,' he said. 'I like to cook, but my mother belongs to the generation of Indian women who believe that men must stay out of the kitchens unless they are qualified cooks. The irony is, the qualified cooks who run our family kitchens are usually all men.'

'Is your mother very conservative then?' Nina asked, then wished she hadn't. Would Samar think she was showing more than a casual interest in his family, in him?

Samar answered easily, 'Inside Ma, I suspect there's a rebel waiting to be released, one who wants to just let go and have fun. Unfortunately, what's keeping that spirit down is layers and layers of stiff starch. She never ever forgets the dignity owed to her position and never lets us forget that, either.'

Was he being sarcastic? Nina searched his face but could read nothing. He was smiling, his features relaxed.

He put his coffee mug down, got up with lithe grace, went to the small table and picked up a photograph of Nina with Sue. 'Who is this?' he asked.

'My sister Susan,' said Nina. 'She's doing her masters in business administration. In London.'

'Is she now?' asked Samar, 'So is Alan's son. In London.'

'Adam,' Nina nodded. This was it, she decided and continued, 'Yes, they are at the same university. Sue is engaged to marry Adam.'

Now she had Samar Singh's full attention. He slowly replaced the frame and looked at her, silently, intently, his eyes unfathomable, his face unreadable. Nina said, in a low clear voice, 'I'm not having an affair with Alan Pereira, Samar. It's just that my sister is going to marry his son, and Sita and Alan being the people they are, have already co-opted me into their family.'

Samar walked slowly up to Nina. When he was mere inches away, he stopped, smiled and said, 'I know.'

She squeaked, 'You know?'

'Mmm. Alan told me while we were in Delhi.'

Oh god. What else had Alan told him? Now Samar was even closer. Their lips were just a breath away, she could smell the aftershave he habitually used, alongside that distinct smell which was uniquely his.

He said in a low voice, looking at her lips, 'This rather changes things, doesn't it?'

Nina did not pretend to misunderstand just what he was getting at. 'What about Karishma?' she ground out.

'What about her?' The eyebrow was doing its rapid ascent again. Shooting her a look of amusement, Samar said, 'You haven't been listening to the _India!_ gossip, now have you? Karishma is my mother's godchild, I've known her since she was a toddler and I'm very fond of her.' Here he paused and then said, 'But she is not my girlfriend. What do you have to say to that, Nina?' he ended, his deep voice dropping an octave or two.

Nina couldn't reply, she wouldn't have been able to utter a word if her life depended on it. Samar was still looking at her mouth, and there was no disguising the hunger in his gaze. Nina swayed towards him, her heart hammering inside her chest.

And then, incredibly, Samar stepped back and shook his head, almost as if he was trying to clear his thoughts.

'It's been a long evening for me. I was at a formal do for South East Asian photojournalists,' he said. 'I ought to be heading back home now.'

Nina stood still, held immobile by waves of sheer frustration. 'I'll see myself out,' Samar said, moving away.

At the door, he turned, threw a long unsmiling glance at Nina and said, 'I'll be seeing you.' It sounded more a threat than a promise and Nina shivered but with anticipation.

And then he was gone. 'Damn and blast,' swore Nina, then gave an unwilling smile. So he liked to play games, did he? Well, this game wasn't going to be played out the way he wanted it. It was time to start the stalking of Samar Pratap Singh, decided Nina. She wanted him, and like the Canadian Mounties, she would get her man. Giggling at the thought, she took herself to bed.

In the car, driving through streets which had fallen silent, Samar smiled to himself. What was that old adage his grandmother used to repeat so often? Something about the dish becoming all the sweeter with anticipation, if he remembered right.

And it didn't, it couldn't come more delectable than Nina Sabharwal. He recalled the way she had looked just now as he left her, her mouth tremulous, her eyes deep pools of sensual promise, her fingers worrying the curls at her neck. Fingers he wanted on his body with an urgency that startled him.

'All right, Singh, that's enough,' he told himself out loud now, his voice sounding strangely loud over the music that was playing on the car stereo. Tomorrow, after all, was another day and Samar could wait until tomorrow and all the tomorrows to follow.
SEVEN

TOMORROW TURNED OUT TO be a rain-laden day. Nina's car wouldn't start, there were no auto rickshaws in sight, and by the time she walked into office, the sales meeting was well under way. Rohan Varma shot her an impatient look, Nina smiled apologetically and decided explanations for her tardiness would have to wait.

'We,' declared Rohan ominously, 'are hitting a plateau. No, make that we _have_ hit a plateau. So, okay, we're still number two in circulation, still number two in sales, but our competitors are increasing the gap between us and them. Worse, those behind us are fast catching up. This is NOT a good place to be at.' He paused for effect and scowled.

His team knew the score; marketing the paper called for equal amounts of ingenuity and genius, editorial content be damned. In any case, the best journalists now worked for small independent dailies, weeklies and excellent online magazines and thrived on presenting a different point of view. The rest, which was pretty much the majority of their tribe, worked a routine day at the big newspapers and magazines and toed the establishment line. Those who worked for the establishment developed a healthy respect for it. Trouble was, oftentimes marketing thought _they_ were the establishment.

Someone mentioned the girl child campaign and got an earful for her pains from Rohan Varma. 'What has that stupid idea got to do with us?' he demanded of the petrified young thing. 'Editorial thinks it's some hugely meaningful thing they have dreamed up.'

He poured some more derision on the campaign, then brightened. 'Anyway, I hear the project has hit a dead-end. After all the interest Samar Singh's photos aroused... now nothing. They don't know how to take it forward.' He gave a sharp crack of laughter and the others joined in feebly. Nina felt a twinge of regret. Now the project would be just another example of how print media had ceded ground to broadcast and online media, when it came to meaningful issues.

'Could we have another real estate blitz?' asked Devaiah in a tentative manner. He was talking of getting realtors to buy the front page of the newspaper for a full page ad that would tout their latest waterfront property or villas inside gated communities. This had been a controversial marketing move back in the day when it first appeared, and had generated much criticism and even confusion amongst readers who liked the day's headlines leaping out at them – bam, bam, bam – rather than poetic paeans to verdant forests, still lakes and nine-hole golf courses, all virtually at your doorstep.

Here, though, _India!_ was just following the country's bigger newspapers; they had been the ones who pioneered this trend, and now virtually every newspaper worth its circulation had quickly fallen into place. The ads came first, and then the news. And that was that.

Rohan dismissed Devaiah's idea with a flick of his wrist. 'No, real estate has bottomed out right now. We need something better, something that will grab the reader by his ba...eyeballs. Ideas, anyone?'

Nina waited for the first storm of utterly impractical though out-of-the-box ideas to fly and then be ruthlessly shot down by the astute Rohan Varma. Then she floated her pothole idea. She was careful to choose her words though, careful not to sound like she was condemning Bangalore's roads which were more craters and ruts on wide dusty paths than well-laid roads. Experience had taught Nina that Bangaloreans did not take too well to criticism, however well-meaning, from perceived outsiders.

Rohan pulled a doubtful face. 'Okay, let me try to understand this. You want _India!_ to run a pothole campaign? I get the interactive part of it but as sales booster? Naaah, I'm not sure.'

Eager to make up lost ground, Dev said, 'Boss, it will work. We are a resigned lot but we are also a simmering lot today. The water shortage, the frequent power outages, the rampant corruption and the abysmal state of our roads: these are our flashpoints. Focus on pushing any of those buttons and focus well, and sales are bound to be boosted.' He flashed a cheeky grin at Rohan.

Rohan ignored Dev and his grin and slowly turned to Nina. 'Nina, I just realized something. Full and final credit for this campaign of yours, if it ever gets on-road, will go to editorial, you know that, right? I mean, who is going to believe sales and marketing came up with such a public-spirited campaign?'

Nina wasn't sure if Rohan was shooting the idea down so she kept a prudent silence. Leena spoke up in the silence. 'Rohan, as long as sales are boosted, do we really care who takes credit?'

Her fiancé slowly turned apoplectic under the interested eyes of everyone in the room. 'How long have you been working in marketing, Leena?' he asked the soft-spoken and shy Leena brusquely. 'Big gains without credit? Really?' Leena turned pink as Rohan clicked his tongue with derision.

Nina quickly spoke up. 'I think we could flesh this out here, then give a presentation to editorial. By then, all the kinks can be ironed out. Well?' She looked around at the table, caught relieved looks all around and hid a smile. Sales and marketing had found a new bakri, a scapegoat; this one had walked into the trap all on her own. Now they could sit back and watch someone other than them take the flak, as and when it came. Nina, though, had no problems with being the bakri.

Since no one came up with a better idea, the deeply skeptical Rohan Varma had to take the call. 'Okay, let it cook for a bit,' he said and ended the meeting. And the room watched with amusement, prudently hidden of course, as Rohan Varma, the boss, became Rohan Varma, Leena's fiancé, and set himself to soothing her distinctly ruffled feathers. It was just another day at the office.

Nina went upstairs to the main reception area. She had a couple of business visits to make right across town and now she looked at the pouring rain with some irritation. This was London weather, not what one would expect of balmy Bangalore. 'Call a cab,' advised Mini, who was standing at the elevator doors and had gauged Nina's dilemma.

'Going somewhere?' asked Samar from behind Nina. She pirouetted gracefully and flashed him such a radiant smile, he blinked. _She really must insure that amazing smile_ , he thought to himself.

'Yes, all the way over to Electronic City. And my car isn't working.'

'Mine is,' he told her equably. 'I'll give you a ride.'

'You are heading that way, are you?' Nina asked, a mischievous smile on her lips. Something told her he wasn't.

Samar stopped in his stride, turned around and inspected Nina's coral pink mouth with undisguised interest. Her heart started hammering.

Finally, he raised his eyes to hers. 'No,' he said. 'But I'll give you a ride.' And then he threw her a smile that made her heart sing.

In the car, he reached for the ignition, then stopped.

'Hello there, Nina Sabharwal,' he murmured, his eyes on her mouth, as he lowered his head to hers with an exquisite slowness.

'Hello, Samar,' Nina managed to say as his mouth captured hers in a thorough kiss that went on and on. It started off with Samar kissing her like a man starved of oxygen, then gentled into a series of small sweet kisses. His mouth was doing crazy things to her equilibrium; she was filled with the mad desire to tear his shirt off and make fast and furious love to him, right there, right then. Suddenly a wolf-whistle sounded outside and they broke apart, startled. Sid, the crime reporter, was peering in, his usual lugubrious expression replaced by what he imagined was a terrific leer.

'Dude,' he said, rolling his eyes at Samar, who laughed as he easily disengaged from Nina. Sid turned to look at Nina and told her, wagging a long finger reprovingly, 'Go get a...?'

'All right, all right,' she mouthed but Samar was already sliding the big car smoothly out of the place. Somewhat to her chagrin, he had his breathing pattern back to normal while she was still trying to calm down.

'Bachcha behaviour,' he told her in mock disgust, and she didn't know if he was referring to Sid or himself. He then firmly took her right hand and placed it on his thigh. She could feel the muscles beneath her palm and, giving in to the moment, ran her hand in a light caress down to his knee.

Samar gave her a look. 'Don't push it, woman,' he said, a muscle clenching in his jaw. However, for the rest of the drive, he kept her hand firmly under his on his leg, his fingers occasionally tracing patterns on the back of her hand. All the while, he made light and easy conversation with Nina, who was striving hard to keep her tone equally light.

_This man is wooing me the old-fashioned way_ , she thought to herself on a note of exhilaration. Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young played softly on his music system. 'Helpless, helpless, helpless,' crooned Neil Young plaintively. _Yes, I know_ , Nina silently assented.

'I want to take a break from photography,' Samar suddenly told her.

She turned in her seat. 'To do what?' she asked, interested. This was the first time Samar Singh was actually telling her something personal, something about himself.

'I want to take up biodynamic farming. It's always been something of a secret passion. Well, not so secret, actually. When I was done with studies, I told my parents about it, and they felt it was something I should keep for my advanced years; they just didn't understand my passion for working the land. Rajasthan, my home state, is not the most green or fertile of areas but we own property just outside Delhi; something can easily be done there. Or somewhere else. The thing is, I drifted into photojournalism, started to enjoy it, and still enjoy it. But I haven't given up the farm dream. One day soon, I'll get there.'

And Nina's mind immediately flashed to a sunny place where a white stone cottage stood, surrounded by green fields, though she didn't know what exactly was growing in the fields. Samar was on a horse at the edge of the land, and she, Nina, stood on the wooden veranda of the house. To one side, there was a little boy on a wooden rocking horse and near him stood his sister, not much older, a Raggedy Ann doll in her little hands.

Nina Sabharwal started to laugh. She'd been reading too many hacienda romances. Samar gave her a curious look. 'What?' he asked. 'You find my dream funny?'

Nina abruptly stopped laughing. 'No, Samar, not at all,' she told him earnestly, and launched into a convoluted explanation which held no truth and which tended to go on and on. Till he put one long finger on her mouth and smiled into her eyes.

At which, she told him, 'I have a dream, too. Well, sort of.' One saturnine eyebrow immediately went up in query. And she told him about the book in her head, the one that would lay bare the relationship and influences between the news content and the advertising in a newspaper. 'It will have loads of grid maps and stats,' she told him, like she was promising him the regulation amount of steamy scenes in a bodice ripper.

But Samar Singh was interested. And he didn't ask why someone in marketing wanted to write a book. 'Sounds good to me,' he said. 'Is it going to be reportorial in content?' The finger moved away from the side of her lips and started to slide lightly over her jawline. Nina's heart thudded, and she lost the thread of the conversation.

The rush hour traffic intruded, forcing Samar to move both his hands back on to the steering wheel. She turned to thank him when he drew up at the patio of the building she had a meeting in, and Samar lazily said, 'Hey, no problem.'
EIGHT

IT WAS ALMOST A week before she met him again. In the meantime, she shot some layout pics of potholes herself. Some were medium-sized, some positively the shape and size of craters; she then did some PP work on them and took what she had to Rohan. This time around, Rohan had been in a very receptive mood and had fired up with enthusiasm the moment he watched the presentation. By the end of the working day, he had shown it to Alan Pereira and it was enthusiastically green-lighted.

'Great work, Nina,' Alan told her. She shot Rohan Varma a nervous look, but he was happy enough to let her take due credit for the idea. Alan was going to assign a brace of newbies to the campaign, newbies who he felt would bring all the necessary intensity and focus on a problem most Bangaloreans sidestepped or accepted with resignation.

'I'll ask Samar Singh to suggest a photographer,' said Alan. 'Only, Samar's away for a bit, he's gone on a shoot to Kanchanaburi; a drug mules story. But he should be back for your big day, Rohan.'

Nina digested that bit of news in silence, keeping an impassive face. Samar had gone away again without a word to her. This was now a pattern. When he was with her, he was totally involved in the moment, in her, in the two of them. And then work would call, and he would leave with the most casual of byes. It hurt but Nina had decided she was going to take whatever she could from whatever it was between Samar and her. Too much introspection and she would have no peace of mind.

Rohan Varma and Leena Nair were getting married on the weekend. It was going to be a Malayali wedding. Nina had been to a few Punjabi weddings both in England and here in India but this was going to be her first Malayali wedding.

'Simple, elegant, classy,' Rohan had told her. 'None of the Punju brashness for us, thank you.'

'Also over in five minutes flat. The ceremonies, that is. Barely time to register the import of such a meaningful day,' Leena had added, with a derisive grin.

Both Mini and Nina were going to be the thalam girls, bridesmaids carrying the ceremonial platters. Clad in the typical off-white with gold border Kerala saris, they would carry brass platters with flowers and a small diya inside a halved coconut, escorting first the bridegroom, then the bride onto the pandal. Nina was going to load both her forearms with thin, bright metal bangles in a deep blue colour to match her blouse while Mini was going to go with blood-red. They'd already attended two rehearsals which had quickly descended into a giggle fest, much to the visible irritation of Leena's wedding planner, Sonia, a woman with a fetish for detail.

'Really? We need to rehearse to carry a platter up a stage twice?' Mini had muttered in an audible aside to Nina who, noticing Sonia was within earshot, kept a straight face and murmured something undistinguishable in reply. 'Of course, if I spot a hot guy, there's no saying what I'll do with the platter or the lamp, or where my steps will take me,' Mini concluded on a note of anticipatory satisfaction wholly unsuitable for a married woman.

The wedding day dawned rainless but unseasonably, unreasonably cool, steadily getting colder as the day wore on. The pandal was done up in navy satin – and masses of white flowers were everywhere – draped on the columns, hanging in swags from the door lintels, placed artfully in carefully arranged vases. A huge vilakku, the Kerala lamp, stood in the centre, flanked by two slightly smaller lamps. The guests had been welcomed and seated; the bride was getting finishing touches put on her attire while fiercely arguing with her mother.

'Amma, it's my wedding, damn it! Why must I look like a tacky jewellery model?'

Leena's mother, slim and elegant in her own Kerala mundu sari, was having none of it. 'It may be your wedding but it's your father's reputation at stake here. I won't have anyone saying we can't put a few jewels on our only daughter...'

Leena let forth a wail. 'A few? Amma, I'm wearing five chains of differing lengths. Go on, count!'

The argument went on for some time while the onlookers watched with amusement, then Leena's mother abruptly threw in the towel. Leena triumphantly took off a bunch of necklaces but given that the two she now wore were heirloom pieces in shimmering gold and Burmese rubies, she still looked every inch the dressed-up bride.

Everything went off like a dream. Nina and Mini first escorted an uncharacteristically subdued Rohan up to the pandal, then went back to bring the bride. They decided it was the trauma of wearing the traditional gold-edged dhoti that had Rohan so quiet. 'I've belted it. Hope the damned thing stays put,' he muttered to Mini and Nina. Leena looked a vision but she also looked distinctly nervous. 'Breathe,' Mini told her. 'Everything is going to be okay.' As they escorted Leena up the aisle, Nina caught her breath at the look in Rohan's eyes when he caught sight of his bride. _God, what I'd give for a man to look at me like that_ , Nina mused wistfully, then clarified that thought. _Not any man_. _Samar Pratap Singh_.

She scanned the crowd but there was no sign of Samar. It was while moving into the dining hall that she bumped into him, and Karishma. Karishma Jhala was wearing an ivory silk brocade sari, with kundan, uncut diamonds, at her ears, throat and wrists. She shot Nina a cold look from her expertly made-up eyes, taking in the intricately woven gold chain that sat at Nina's creamy throat, a piece her father's mother had given her years ago. Nina wondered what the other girl was doing here, then realized on a note of despondence that Samar must have brought her to the wedding.

He was looking intently at her. 'You look lovely, Nina,' Samar told her.

'Thank you,' Nina replied in a muted manner even as she wanted to say, 'Oh yeah? Then why are you escorting _her_ to the event?'

Samar turned to his companion. 'You know Nina Sabharwal, don't you?' he asked Karishma.

Even as Nina was composing her lips into some semblance of a pleasant smile, Karishma flicked an icy look her way and said in a patently bored tone, 'No, I don't think we have met.'

_Liar_ , thought Nina. Samar's eyes met Nina's and there was amusement in them. And then, to Nina's horror, Samar suggested they sit together for sadhya, the banana leaf lunch. Behind her, Mini stifled a comment but all of them walked single-file to the table and took their places. And Nina found she was seated next to Karishma, with Mini's banker husband, Raj, on her other side.

It was not the most memorable meal of Nina's life and it didn't help that she was having a tough time coping with the sambar that kept slithering to the edge of her leaf even as she strove to keep the pleats of her sari pallu in place. She tried her best to chat with the extremely taciturn Raj, then gave up. Also, she was being given the royal ignore by Karishma Jhala. Samar and Mini were in cheerful conversation, frequently punctuated by his deep laughs and her chortles. Nina ate her sadhya in moody silence.

And then it happened. It happened so fast the casual onlooker would just not have caught it. The meal had come to its last course and dessert, rice payasam, was being served. Nina asked for her serving in a paper cup, not wanting another bout with the banana leaf. Karishma flicked a contemptuous smile in Nina's direction and had the attendant ladle out her payasam in the middle of her own banana leaf. And then, with one quick and deft flick of her wrist, she emptied the sweet straight into Nina's lap.

There were exclamations all around, Karishma's apologies ringing clear and sounding very sincere. Nina just sat there, looking at her ruined new sari. She wasn't faking calmness. She was so angry she was beyond words.

Somebody asked, 'What will you do?' and words came back to her.

'Oh, I have an extra set of clothes upstairs in one of the hotel rooms,' Nina informed those around her in as airy a fashion as she could. 'You know, just in case some clumsy cow upended food on me.'

And on that splendid exit line, Nina Sabharwal sailed out of the room as gracefully as she could while carefully holding her sticky pleats as far away from her body as possible. As she left the room, she could hear a gale of laughter break out at her table. It was kind, sympathetic laughter and Nina relaxed.

_Breathe, girl, breathe_ , she told herself and arriving at the elevator door, found she was not alone. Samar Singh stood beside her.

Taking a leaf from his girlfriend's book of looks, she cast him a cold glance.

Totally unmoved, Samar said, 'I'm escorting you to your room.'

'You don't need to,' said Nina as icily as she could, stepping into the elevator.

'I do,' replied Samar calmly, and as the doors swished closed, without warning, he pulled her into his arms, sticky payasam and all. Nina gave a squawk of surprise, then gave herself up to the sheer magic of his mouth. Gripping his head, she kissed him back aggressively, the way she had wanted to for a long time now. Plus, he needed to be punished for the way his companion had behaved with Nina. This was Nina's choice of punishment.

Samar stilled for a second, taken by surprise. Then he proceeded to give back to Nina in good measure. This was unadulterated combustion, this was conflagration.

They stumbled into her hotel room with more haste than grace.

'Do you know how incredibly sexy you look in a sari?' Samar growled as he divested her of the same garment with an impressive amount of expertise. All Nina could think of was that her choice of the lacy thong and strings-and-lace bra in a creamy mint colour, was perfect.

And then she didn't know how but she was sprawled on the bed in just the thong. Samar stood by the edge of the bed, looming over her as he pulled off his tie and started to unbutton his shirt, looking at her with undisguised hunger.

'No,' rasped Nina, scrambling to her knees. 'Let me do that.' And with remarkably steady fingers, she set to work on the pearl buttons down his shirt, slipping them free of their buttonholes with ease. Her fingers faltered for a moment over his belt and then she loosened that, too. A sense of fatalism had gripped Nina. Que sera, sera; what will be will be.

'Look up,' ordered Samar, his voice almost a growl. She did and his head swooped down, his mouth capturing hers in a ravenous fashion.

They kissed hard, desperately, hungrily, and the kiss went on and on till they finally broke free for air.

All of Heartbreaker Singh's famed finesse seemed to have deserted him. As he gazed upon Nina's slim and supple body, his heart was racing and he had to force himself into some semblance of control. Then he looked into her stormy blue eyes and was lost again. The time for control was long past.

Samar lowered himself onto Nina's body, feeling her soft as silk under him. Delivering a series of kisses along her collarbone and cleavage, he took one hard and erect nipple into his mouth and was rewarded by a soft cry from her. Even as he lavished attention on her breast, his hand slipped down between her legs, seeking and finding what he sought. Nina was ready for him.

'Now the other one,' she commanded, taking his head and guiding it to her other breast. Samar complied willingly, his fingers finding her nub and gently caressing it.

'Samar,' she groaned, her face flushed with excitement.

'Yes, darling?' he asked, moving lower, his tongue flicking in and out of her navel.

'I can't wait any longer,' she said, pressing the length of her body against him.

But this time, Samar was back in control. Slipping slowly into her, his gaze never once leaving hers, he proceeded to move equally slowly on her until she matched his movement. And then they were on the most glorious ride of their lives, Nina's soft cries the only sounds in the room.

It was perfect, their coming together. And as she orgasmed, Nina had just one clear thought in her mind: _I love this man_.

Moments later, she lay with her head in the crook of his arm, idly running her hand over his hair-roughened chest.

'You need a cigarette,' she told him with an impish smile.

'You have been watching too many Hollywood films,' he said lazily, his fingers caressing her damp temple.

She waited a beat, then asked, 'And will you have to suddenly rush off now...?'

'You have been watching too many Bollywood films,' he said and grinned, then bent purposefully towards her.

And as he did so, Nina's glance went to the ormolu clock on the console table. 'Omigawd, it's almost four!' she wailed.

'Okay,' Samar said amiably. 'It's you who will have to suddenly rush off now, right?'

Nina was part of the bridal party due to take Leena to her husband's home for the first time. They went downstairs together, Samar and Nina. She was now in a deep gold and navy confection; the mother of pearl buttons on Samar's shirt front perfectly matched the checks on his tie. Their eyes met in the elevator mirror, and they exchanged a smile. Nina Sabharwal's heart was singing.

It continued to sing all day long for the next couple of days. Though they didn't meet at the office, Samar turned up at Nina's flat every evening. They went out to a sushi place the first evening, stayed in listening to some vintage rock albums the next. They found enough to talk about, steering away from anything too personal, though. This was not of Nina's doing; she found that Samar Singh was a close-mouthed guy, adept at taking conversations down other paths when he chose to.

But that was fine for now, or so she told herself stoutly. Nina was fully enjoying living in this magical moment. She wasn't going to press matters. In fact, she didn't even know what matters she needed to press, at this point. This was a no-strings-attached phase, and Nina wasn't going to question it, not at this juncture.

Though they didn't spend all their time together burning up the sheets, the sizzle was ever present, firmly tamped down by both of them but invariably rearing its head the moment it could. All it took was the touch of his hand as he tucked away a stray curl behind Nina's shell-shaped ear. Or the touch of her fingers at the nape of his neck. Before they knew it, they were making love – slow and gentle love, fast and furious love, making light love, making intense love.

Samar was a generous lover and soon Nina, despite herself, found herself craving his touch, his kisses, and his body on hers. And whenever her brain told her she wanted more, deserved more than sex from Samar, she managed to shut it up, telling herself that it was still early days, that there was still time to deepen the relationship.
NINE

AND, OF COURSE, MOST of their circle at _India!_ were quickly in on what Samar and Nina didn't exactly keep a secret. There was much joshing and raillery; Mini and Leena made some far-from-subtle references to Samar's nickname but kept it at that.

Alan Pereira, however, didn't. Calling her up to his fourth floor office, Alan came straight to the point. 'Nina Sabharwal, you are dabbling in deep waters, my girl.'

'Because I'm dating Samar Singh?'

'I never thought I'd mouth all the regulation crap but I need to do this. Sita, too, is concerned as hell. Samar Pratap Singh is, not to put too fine a point on it, a player, Nina. You are going to get your—'

'Heart broken,' Nina finished for him, her face calm and serene. She was touched that Alan cared, but she shied away from any discussion of this particular topic. 'Alan, I know what I'm doing.'

'And what is it that you are doing?'

Nina's English reserve kicked in. 'I'm having a good time, Alan. I promise you, I have no expectations, nor am I too deeply involved. Moreover—'

'Moreover, Ed, you need to mind your own business.'

Both Nina and Alan turned to the door, which had opened to admit Samar Pratap Singh.

'Don't you knock before you enter?' Alan asked in irritation.

'I did. Both of you were too engrossed to pay any attention.'

Nina bent over her Pothole Project file, in order to hide her hot face.

But Alan didn't leave it be. 'This girl,' he began just a bit belligerently, 'is like a daughter to me. I don't want her to get hurt.'

'Mind. Your. Own. Business,' said Samar pleasantly but on an unmistakably steely note. The men locked eyes, then Alan changed the subject but not without a last jibe.

'Oh well, I suppose you both know what you are doing. Nina, the Pothole Project has really taken off. Readers are sending in photographs of potholes from all over the city. The Quirky Caption contest ends this weekend, and entries are pouring in. This has really fired the Bangalorean's imagination.'

Nina smiled, the colour slowly subsiding from her face. 'Yes, Rohan told me it's having a collateral effect on new subscriptions, too,' she murmured.

'Big White Chief's in town tomorrow,' Alan told both of them. 'He wants to meet Nina. Your dinner invites will be in your inbox. Black tie.'

They left the editor's cabin together but silently. Samar seemed immersed in his own thoughts. She could sense some febrile tension in him. Nina, for her part, was more than a little troubled by Alan's labelling of Samar as a player. Yes, she knew that but knowing it didn't make her feel any better. What she didn't like were the implications that came with that term. Or the fact that it seemed to ring true. Despite sharing quite a bit of intimacy with Samar, what did she know about his family, his background, what he was looking for in a woman? What she knew, she knew from conjecture and gossip, not from anything specific Samar Pratap Singh had told her. And that was typical player behaviour, wasn't it?

As for the desire to deepen their relationship, Nina Sabharwal shied away from everything that lay behind that thought. If she admitted to that desire, even to herself, she would have to run the risk of rejection, of indifference and maybe of the very heartbreak Alan had warned her about. She slid a sidelong glance at Samar. He was wearing a cream linen shirt rolled up at the forearm, with formal trousers. It was the old story. He was obviously on his way somewhere. Well, if he wasn't going to tell her, Nina wasn't going to ask.

Samar was silently replaying Nina's statement to Alan Pereira in his mind. The one that ended 'nor am I deeply involved'. He was furious, and he didn't dare to ask himself why he was furious. It was not that Samar Singh dated doormats; on the contrary, he preferred women with fire in them. And it wasn't that Samar did all the loving and leaving, either; he could recall at least two girlfriends walking out on him and as many amiable breakups.

_What the hell are you doing with someone who isn't really involved, Singh_ , he asked himself angrily. Then he turned to Nina in one fluid motion and said, 'Gotta go. Bye. See you later.' He needed to leave; he didn't trust himself if he stayed.

Nina stood near the elevator door, trying not to feel bereft.

It was not the best of days for her. Back in her office, she found Rohan Varma sulking because he had not been invited to the big bash tomorrow. 'I'm the head of sales and marketing, how come I'm not on that list? Someone's playing politics for sure.'

Nina looked at him, alarmed but realized he meant either HRD or Alan Pereira, and not her. In any case, the rest of the working day was shot since Rohan had a tendency to brood and then burst out every minutes over any and all perceived grievances; as a result, not much work got done.

As she walked to the car park, Mini caught up with her. 'There's a new Lebanese place that's just opened in Indiranagar, Nina,' she said. 'Let's go check it out?'

Figuring that Samar was not likely to drop in by her place, not this evening, Nina assented. She badly needed cheering up and if Lebanese food was going to do the trick, she was willing to give it a shot.

The restaurant was packed, and the moment they tucked into their barout del batata – spicy lamb served with potatoes – and baba ghanoush, it was clear why the place was packed; the food was superlative. However, both women seemed preoccupied. Nina still felt like there was a heavy cloud hovering just above her. Mini was on the horns of a dilemma. She'd been offered a job at a popular news magazine. Better pay, more flexible working hours.

'So, what's the problem?' asked Nina, mystified.

'Well, it's like this. The place is run by Tarun Bhat.'

Nina's mouth dropped open. 'The man you lived with before you met and married Raj?'

Mini nodded, looking miserable. Nina had met Tarun Bhat a few times. Tall and gaunt, with his straggly hair caught up in a ponytail, Tarun was one of the media world's wunderkind. On his watch, his news magazine blazed trails, fearlessly going after stories others were still considering gingerly, exposing politicians, corrupt bureaucrats and corrupt businesses with much flair and fanfare. Moreover, the news magazine had in its stables some really good writers. Mini, if she joined there, was to give the paper a light touch with her apolitical tidbits; this was Page Three stuff kicked upstairs. And Mini was very tempted indeed. Working at that news magazine would give her resume a certain edge and Bhat paid his team well, very well indeed.

'Mini, join up. He's being professional. You need to be, too. I mean, it's not as if the two of you are still carrying a torch for each other, right? Didn't you tell me he came for your wedding party?'

There was a pregnant pause. Then Mini wailed, 'I'm not sure!' and Nina took a deep breath. This was complicated. Did Mini still have feelings for her ex? She seemed quite happy with the reclusive, silent Raj. Mini would just have to make up her mind; how could Nina help her with it?

'I need to think long and hard. But I don't have the time to do so. Tarun wants an answer as quickly as possible,' Mini announced.

Nina murmured something non-committal. Concerned as she was for her friend, this was Mini's dilemma and she didn't think she could say or do anything to help. 'Stall for time?' she suggested helplessly, even a bit lamely, but Mini seemed to think that was a good idea.

Eventually, though, they managed to push all troubling thoughts under the carpet for the time being and have themselves a good time. Mini heroically forbore to ask Nina about Samar and Nina was thankful for that.

As they walked out of the restaurant, they passed a couple of women with their backs to Nina. The younger one wore a dress with many striking shades of green in it and had on Christian Louboutin heels; Nina saw the flash of red under-sole characteristic of the designer's shoes. The woman's face was in profile and there was no mistaking the profile. It was Karishma Jhala.

The last time the two girls had met, Karishma had upended her sticky sweet right into Nina's lap. Even as she considered cutting Karishma dead and walking on, the two women turned. There could be no mistaking who the older woman was, either. Clad in an olive green silk sari, with her hair sporting elegant swatches of silver, the woman's nose and mouth were replicas of her son's.

Mini hissed into her ear. 'That's Samar's mother with his...' she tailed off uncertainly, shooting a glance at Nina.

Mini went through the doorway and as Nina was about to follow her, Karishma suddenly spoke up. 'Yasho aunty, there's Nina Sabharwal. You know, the one I was telling you about?'

_Well_. _The cheek of the Jhala woman_. _If I've got to go through this, I shall_ , thought Nina and turned a calm face to them.

The older woman's face was unreadable. 'I'm Yashodara, Samar's mother,' she said with a level look at Nina.

Nina greeted her. Karishma chimed in, 'And this is Nina, Samar's latest.' The omission of the word 'girlfriend' was deliberate but both Yashodara and Nina didn't indicate they had caught the jibe.

'I gather you work in the paper's marketing department. Where are you from?' the older woman asked her in a distant, impersonal tone. It was clear that Yashodara Singh did not think it inappropriate to interrogate Nina at the entrance of the restaurant.

'My mother lives in the Cotswolds, in a village called Armscote,' Nina offered, adopting the older woman's tone.

'And your father?' It was Karishma who asked the question. 'Does he run the neighbourhood convenience store?'

Though the blatant insolence of the question took Nina's breath away, she directed her reply to the other woman. 'My father was one of the UK's best cardio-thoracic surgeons. He worked at the Royal Brompton Hospital in London right till the day he died.'

Karishma flushed scarlet. Her move had clearly backfired, she had equally clearly overplayed her hand. Yashodara Singh threw her an icily disapproving look, then turned to stare at Nina. 'Are you going to be in Bangalore for long?'

No way could that intrusive question be filed under friendly curiosity. And then, the most surreal thing happened. A third woman of a certain age joined them, and as if picking up the threads of a conversation, told Nina, 'Because Samar isn't. Going to be in Bangalore for long, I mean. We need him back up north. He has a family business to run.'

Which was how Nina was introduced to Samar Pratap Singh's patrician and extremely haughty aunt, Hemant Singh Jamwal. Enough was enough, Nina decided. Without answering Yashodara Singh or Hemant Jamwal, she smiled pleasantly at them, then walked off. It took pretty much all she had to stay composed but she pulled it off. Both women were silent on the drive home and bade each other a very subdued goodnight.

That night, alone in bed, Nina took stock of her situation. She loved Samar Singh, there was no getting around that fact any longer. But Samar, for all the tenderness he showed her when they were alone, hadn't for a minute said or done anything to show he reciprocated that love. He had Karishma Jhala, one nasty piece of work, status still uncertain, forever waiting in the wings. And his mother clearly had other plans for her only child, her son and heir. So did his dreadful aunt. What's more, Samar had not even mentioned to her that the women were visiting him. So much of his life was still hidden from her, deliberately or unwittingly.

So where did that leave Nina Sabharwal, elder daughter of Anne and Dr Prem Sabharwal?

_Nowhere_ , she thought miserably, pressing her face into a lace-edged pillow. _Nowhere at all._ _My stalking plan is just not working. I need to get out of this as best I can. But I don't want to, not at this juncture. And right now, I need to sleep_.
TEN

SATURDAY, THE NEXT DAY, dawned bright and cold. By the time she was sipping her second cup of strong filter coffee, Nina had recovered both her equanimity and her mojo. This girl wasn't going to give up that easily, no siree, she decided.

So, Samar Pratap Singh was one gorgeous male specimen. Moreover, Nina Sabharwal hadn't met anyone who turned her on quite the way he did. Ergo, she needed a strategy. And for the moment, all she could think of was that with their current no strings attached affair, at least she got to be with Samar. If she changed the equation, maybe he would walk away. And right now, she couldn't face a life without Samar with any degree of composure.

She was off work today. Which meant she had the whole day to attend to essential matters like a facial, a mani and pedi, and a blow-dry. Like always, her stylist baulked at giving her the blow-dry, exclaiming that Nina's curls looked lovely au naturel and all it required was a dollop of extra-strong conditioner. But Nina insisted, as she always did, feeling good about the way her sleek and styled hair fell to just below her shoulders when she finally walked out of the salon.

Samar hadn't called. Did that mean she would have to take herself to the _India!_ party at the city's only seven-star hotel? _Big deal_ , thought Nina stoutly, _if I have to, I will_.

She'd already decided on her attire. Usually a conservative dresser, India had opened up her colour choices. This evening, she was going to wear a deep amber fitted dress with an asymmetrical hemline. The beauty of the outfit lay in its stark cut. She'd chanced upon it in the most charming little boutique off St Marks's Road, a boutique funnily enough called LBD.

Samar called late in the afternoon.

'I heard you met my mother.'

'Yes,' she told him sweetly. 'And your aunt.'

She could hear the smile in his voice. 'Ah, my aunt. And what did you make of Hemant?'

'Rather like Bertie Wooster's Aunt Agatha, I thought,' she continued in the same sweet tone.

Samar chuckled and as he did so, some of the constraint she had sensed emanating from him seemed to fall away. 'Hemant's a tough one. Just about all of Jaisalmer, as also most of New Delhi's denizens, live in terror of her. But she's had to be tough. She was widowed in her thirties and ever since had to take over the reins of her husband's factory. No kids to help out, either.'

Nina let him talk about his aunt. Was that why he'd called?

Eventually, though, he came to the point. 'What time shall I come pick you up?'

She kept quiet. Samar said, 'You haven't tied up to go with someone else, have you?' and Nina thought she could detect a faint wire of tension in his voice.

Suddenly tiring of the game, she said, 'Come by 7.30 p.m.?' Then, impelled by a spurt of mischief, she added, 'And bring me a corsage.'

She had underestimated Samar Pratap Singh. He was at her doorstep at 7.30 p.m. looking impossibly gorgeous in black tie, and he held a small package in his hand.

'Your corsage, ma'am,' he said with one of his slow sexy smiles.

'No!' said Nina, dumbfounded. 'I don't believe it. You can actually get a corsage in Bangalore? I doubt you can get one even in London today.'

She looked down at the package in her hand. It was a corsage all right but the flower glittered. It was an orchid set in gold with enamel leaves. He'd hoisted her with her own petard.

'This is gold, Samar. I can't possibly accept it,' she told him hesitantly.

'Of course you can. And I'm still waiting to be thanked for the corsage.'

She looked up into his dark eyes and was immediately lost. Her heart raced as he slowly drew her to him and lowered his head.

'It's been so bloody long,' she heard Samar say before he started to kiss her like a man starved of sustenance. Dropping her corsage carefully onto the sofa, she put both her arms around him, holding him tight. He smelled so good.

Eventually, they had to come up for air. 'You smell so delicious,' Samar told her, nuzzling the hollow at her throat. And then he put her a little distance away from him and looked at her. Nina's breath caught as his golden gaze roved all over her intimately, possessively.

'You are a gorgeous woman, Nina Sabharwal,' he informed her solemnly.

In a bid to lighten the suddenly charged atmosphere, Nina made a mock curtsey and said, 'Why, thankee, sir.'

His voice growing deeper, Samar said, 'I am so looking forward to getting this do over with. And coming home. With you.'

Nina's heart started up its old lilting tune again. He'd called her apartment home.

By the time Samar's car drew up at the wide sweep of the hotel's overly ornate patio, Nina's heartbeat had steadied. She was looking forward to the evening. Most of the time, the _India!_ offices functioned like a boys' club, it would be good to meet some of her women colleagues too.

The hotel was way over the top in décor and ornamentation. Gold cornices, statuary in alcoves, yardage of silk swags on pelmets; it was as if the place couldn't decide whether it was emulating the Bath Assembly Rooms or an art deco palace. Or a maharaja's mahal.

The ballroom, straight out of a Disney set in a blaze of cream, scarlet and beige, was packed with people, editorial rubbing shoulders quite happily with sales and marketing as well as advertising. Even the legal cell had broken out in thin, wary smiles. Clearly, everybody was having a good time. There was a live band playing some lively tunes, but the buzz of conversation was giving the music a run for its money.

In the usual run of things, sales and marketing moved in a different world from editorial. Their offices were on different floors, their meetings rarely if ever intersected and as for parties together, that was rarer still. Nina had been to a party where someone from sales and marketing was introduced to a journalist. 'And where do you work?' the former, a dapper gent, had asked the journalist who was a lovely lass he was clearly hoping to impress. 'At _India!_ ' she had answered, and he had look puzzled. 'Really? Have you just joined?'

'No,' the girl told him. 'I've been with them for almost three years now.'

The S & M man had smiled a superior smile. 'No way,' he told the bemused girl. Right then, Mr Murthy had come along and whisked the girl away, to meet a columnist from their Mumbai office. Nina, feeling sorry for the man from her department, had told him that the girl was from editorial. 'That explains it!' he had exclaimed. 'Who knows people from editorial?'

Alan Pereira now bore down upon them. Not quite cutting Samar Singh dead, he spoke to Nina. 'Come, the chief wants to meet the brain behind the Pothole Project.'

Nina hid her dismay and looked up at Samar. He smiled at her, and was about to turn away when Alan Pereira said, in a somewhat grudging tone, 'You too, Samar. He says he hasn't seen you in a long time.'

'If you call a couple of months a long time,' murmured Samar peaceably and putting an arm along Nina's waist, he led her across to the newspaper owner. The arm lay lightly on her body yet just about everyone in the room looked at it in a transfixed manner. Samar Pratap Singh was making a statement.

Mr Vinod Mittal was an unassuming man, small in stature, with a head full of grey hair, sharp grey eyes hidden by horn-rimmed glasses and a smile that lit up his face. He spoke in staccato sentences. He looked inordinately delighted to meet Nina. 'Ah, Miss Sabharwal. Heard a lot about you. So glad to finally meet you. That idea of yours is a wonderful one. We are going to carry it across all editions. Campaign for filling up potholes in every city.'

Clearly, Nina wasn't expected to do anything but smile and nod. Which she did. Then Samar said in an easy tone from beside her, 'Mr Mittal, the campaign has taken off but I have to tell you, not many of the potholes have been filled by the municipal corporation. Just a few arterial roads have been attended to. They will hold up... till the next rains.'

Mr Mittal looked even more delighted to see Samar. Looking up at the younger man, he exclaimed, 'Samar Singh. Good, good. Not coming too often to Delhi these days, are you? Your mother and I are co-chairing the Heritage Foundation's new venture.'

'Yes, she told me about it.'

'Has she gone back to Rajasthan?' asked Mr Mittal, and Nina waited with bated breath to hear the answer.

'Yes, both Hemant and Ma went back this morning,' Samar told him, mentioning his aunt with the ease of old familiarity. 'Ma to Jaisalmer, Hemant to Delhi.'

'Yes, yes,' said Mr Mittal, still talking as if in Morse code. 'Hemant is to come to lunch at our place on Wednesday.'

It looked as if he wasn't going to say anything in response to Samar's statement about the roadwork not being done. He fired some sentences at Nina, talking to her, but never asking her anything and she didn't know whether to be irked or amused. Then when her smile had started to hurt, Mr Mittal moved away. The audience was clearly over.

As Samar and Nina turned away, Vinod Mittal said, 'Samar, citizen awareness doesn't necessarily translate into work done.'

Samar turned around and threw a grin at the slight man in a suit that hung loose on him, a man who was worth many millions, one of the most powerful men in the country.

Seeming to materialize from the polished woodwork, Alan Pereira joined them. Samar looked at him and raised one eyebrow. 'I heard,' Alan said shortly. 'The deal is, we have to drum up maximum citizen awareness before we move to the action plank.'

Even as Samar snorted in derision, Nina said, 'Which means an action plan is on the table? That's good, isn't it?'

The resident editor grinned. 'Oh, I don't know about an action plan. I said plank. _India!_ isn't going to go out on a limb and get on the wrong side of the politicians. If it can set the stage for a massive people's protest, then it can sit back, watch things move on its own momentum—'

'And take the credit,' Samar Singh said laconically. He turned to Nina, who was starting to say something, put a long finger on her lips and smiled into her eyes. 'Dance with me?'

They danced like they had been dancing with each other for years, their bodies perfectly in sync. The music was retro but soft retro tunes, nothing too modern; when the Big White Chief was around, no one was taking any chances. Samar held Nina closer than was necessary, and his touch was distinctly possessive. She was aware of the many eyes on them. Impelled again by the sense of mischief she was discovering in herself, she raised a hand and ran it slowly, caressingly, down the side of his jaw. The jaw immediately clenched.

'Really, darling?' Samar drawled. Nina smiled up into those caramel-gold eyes, read the message in them and blushed a fiery red.

Recovering her poise, she said, 'Well, I was just checking to see if you'd had a good shave.'

He smiled, genuinely amused. 'You can bet I did. More to the point, you can verify for yourself that I did. Later...'

Nina's heartbeat set up a loud insistent rhythm, rivalling that of the song being sung. And then, a colleague from sales cut in on their dance and it was some time before she could be with Samar again.

She was somewhat bemused, and a bit gratified too, to discover that the buzz at this party was all about the Pothole Project; what was more, she'd been identified as the ideator. The advertising and marketing honchos were patently thrilled at the potential the campaign held for boosting circulation. Rather to her surprise, Nina found the journalists too were uncharacteristically enthusiastic. 'It is working well,' Mr Murthy, the news editor, told her in his earnest manner. 'Letters are pouring in, most of them with photos attached. Everyone is so angry,' he concluded on a note of inordinate glee.

The copy chief told her, 'This one's a blockbuster, Nina! The corporators are already on the run, putting out defensive statements which the public is just not buying. Some patchwork repairs have already started. The public is not going to settle for that either. We just need to keep this on the boil.'

Nina walked over to Samar and found he was chatting with Jenny and Hugh Hamilton. Jenny was in a sari and looked very graceful in it; she chuckled at Nina's surprised expression.

'Darling, don't look so gobsmacked, I do wear a sari once in a while.'

'This one's for Mr Mittal,' Hugh told Nina solemnly.

'And was he impressed?' Nina asked Jenny equally solemnly.

A new voice replied, 'Oh yes, he was. I heard him tell our Jenny that blue was quite her colour.' They turned to find Sita amongst them, looking striking in a handloom sari in the colours of a spectacular sunset. One thick silky plait lay on her shoulder. Diamonds glittered in her ears.

'Not to take away from Jenny's glory but you look gorgeous, Sita,' said Hugh in his most gallant fashion. Sita flashed him a serene smile. 'He's acquiring charm late in life, I see,' she observed tranquilly to Jenny, who burst out laughing. The two women were good friends and ran a dog shelter together.

'He's learning from our resident charmer here,' Jenny said, indicating Samar Pratap Singh.

'Oh, our resident charmer has narrowed down his focus,' Sita said in dulcet tones. 'It's all about Nina now.'

Nina could feel a blush coming on. Samar grinned lazily, then turned to her. 'I think we're being roasted,' he informed her. 'Time to break free of this crowd.'

They walked away from the ribald comments that followed them, back onto the dance floor. The band was playing a series of Fleetwood Mac songs, and Nina sighed happily. Life was good.

It was too good to last, of course. 'Can I cut in?' a voice asked silkily, and they turned to face Karishma Jhala. The woman looked absolutely spectacular in a sea-green chiffon gown with a neckline cut to daring depths. Green was really her colour. Nina had to wonder at her effrontery, though. This woman really was like the Canadian Mounted Police... didn't rest till she got her man.

Samar stopped for an instant and Nina felt so good about that hesitation. 'Of course,' she told Karishma calmly and left the dance floor. Alan beckoned her over and she was soon in a discussion about Bangalore's eateries being given an extension on their closing time. The young techie crowd was happy, the cops were distinctly unhappy and the politicians were sitting on the fence as usual.

But Nina's equanimity soon dissolved as Samar and Karishma continued to dance. The woman was pressed up close to Samar, both her arms around his neck. She was talking earnestly to him, his head bent to hear her but his inscrutable face giving away nothing. Suddenly, Karishma reached up and kissed Samar on the cheek. All Nina could do was not to flinch.

'Not to worry,' murmured Sita beside her. 'It's endgame in action.'

Nina's British genes kicked in. She was most embarrassed at being the recipient of words of consolation. She was even more embarrassed by the way the couple were comporting themselves on the dance floor.

Alan Pereira took one look at her face and said, 'You are leaving. You don't want dinner.'

'Right on both counts,' Nina informed him tersely as she turned to go.

She had made it to the massive doors of the ballroom when Samar Singh caught up with her.

'Where are you going, Nina?' he asked.

'Home,' she told him coldly.

'I brought you here, I will take you home,' he informed her imperturbably, taking her hand. 'Let's go have dinner.'

'I don't want dinner, and please let go of my hand,' Nina told him, her tone positively glacial now.

Samar looked at her for one long minute, then deftly swung her through the open doors and out onto the softly lit patio, into a dark corner. Nina gasped as he brought his mouth down on hers. It was a short but intense kiss, and the few people out on the patio clapped politely and amusedly when they broke apart.

Red-faced, Nina looked around and registered Mr Mittal's mildly intrigued expression and Karishma Jhala's furious expression. She looked up at Samar, who was back to being his unflappable self.

'I...' she began and Samar cut in peaceably, 'Okay, no dinner for us. Let's go.' And he swept her before him, through the doors and out to the hotel patio.
ELEVEN

THE TENSION INSIDE THE car on the way back to Nina's place was so thick you could have cut it with the proverbial knife. Samar threw her a look once or twice and attempted to break the loud silence, but Nina wasn't having any of it.

In actual fact, she was more than a bit flabbergasted at her loss of control. She was so furious that she knew she had better opt for silence; heaven knows what would come out of her mouth if she spoke. Inside her a small voice asked: _but why are you so angry, Nina?_ And she quickly stifled that voice.

She was out of the sleek vehicle in a flash and at her ground floor door, inserting the key into the lock, stumbling and fumbling in her haste. But Samar was quicker; in one fluid movement, he was beside her, murmuring, 'Shall I open it for you?'

Ignoring him, Nina walked into her apartment and turned to close to the door, only to find him very much inside.

'I'd like you to leave, Samar,' she managed in an icy tone, her accent suddenly going all posh.

One mobile eyebrow went up. 'I don't think I'm going to leave, Nina,' he replied calmly, then walked up to her and took her gently by the shoulders.

'And just why are you so angry, Nina?' he asked quietly.

Stormy blue eyes clashed with caramel-coloured ones. Her characteristic restraint clashed with her sudden desire to throw caution to the winds and start one big row. One long moment later, the former had won.

Taking a deep breath, Nina said, 'I don't wish to talk about it.'

'But I do. Because for the life of me, I can't fathom what suddenly got you so mad.'

'Let go of me, Samar,' Nina said through gritted teeth and he immediately stepped back, raising his hands in apology.

'Was it because I danced with Karishma?'

And like quicksilver, Nina Sabharwal's hard-won composure evaporated.

'You were not dancing with that woman, Samar. You were kissing her.'

'I was not kissing her. She was kissing me. There is a subtle difference if you can appreciate it, Nina.'

'Don't give me that crap,' she said. 'Everyone was watching the two of you on the floor... you were entwined like snakes.'

This time, both of Samar's eyebrows rose high and it was obvious he was trying not to laugh. There was no stopping Nina now, though.

'I felt so damned humiliated. If Karishma Jhala is your girlfriend, Samar, you had no business taking me to the dinner. I didn't ask you to, you called me, right?'

'Right,' he murmured but Nina was now in full flow.

'I have never been so humiliated. In fact, I've had enough, Samar. I'm out of my depth here, and I don't like the feeling. So...'

Before she could conclude the sentence, Samar Pratap Singh cut in, 'Back up a mo, won't you, Nina? Are you saying that what we have between us is serious?'

At a total loss for words, Nina stared at him. He continued in a silky tone, 'Because that's not how I heard it.'

'Heard it?' she spluttered.

'Yes, heard it. I heard you telling the RE that you were just having a good time with me. And now you are saying something else, something quite different.'

Nina opened her mouth to reply but Samar acted before she could say a word. Moving close, he backed her up against the wall, casually stretching one arm alongside, palm on the wall. This close, she could smell that signature scent of his, she could see the pulse beat in his throat.

Samar bent closer still, his mouth mere inches from her own.

'Nina Sabharwal, are you playing with me?'

Stiff with indignation, she continued to splutter. 'Playing? What do you—'

The words were taken from her mouth by Samar's lips as he kissed her, hard. Nina kept her lips tightly closed but Samar seemed prepared for that. His tongue lightly flicked at the corners of her mouth as he bestowed a series of small scorching kisses. One hand was still on the wall but the other was at her breast, gently cupping it, one thumb gently rubbing her silk-clad nipple.

Nina gasped and that was all the opportunity Samar Singh needed. He immediately coaxed her mouth open and deepened the kiss. He brought his body to hers, and she could feel his arousal. She caught fire herself.

Oh, Nina was still angry, very angry, but the row could wait. This could not. She brought up both her hands and clasped his head tightly.

'Darling,' Samar said thickly before he lowered his head and left a line of nibbling kisses down her jawline to her collarbone. Nina moaned, then felt a draught of air as he moved away from her. Her eyes flew open.

'What?' she managed, even as she reached for him.

'Just this,' Samar said. 'I love you.'

Transfixed, Nina looked at him. He was serious, despite the small smile playing on his well-cut lips.

'I love you, Nina Sabharwal,' he said again. 'Now make love to me. Please.'

And Nina didn't need a second bidding. She reached out and pulled him to her by his silk tie. Samar grinned.

He continued to smile as Nina stripped him of his tie and shirt; this time her hands were steady, even when they went to his belt buckle.

But Samar lost his smile and drew a sharp breath as she unzipped him and slid one hand inside, caressing him softly.

'My,' she told him admiringly. 'You are so ready, aren't you?'

He made a rough sound of pleasure. 'I've been ready a long time now, my dearest,' he told her unsteadily, and her heart turned over at that. Samar was never casual with his endearments and she treasured the moment as much as the spoken words.

Looping both arms around his waist, Nina jerked him onto her, her mouth blindly seeking his even as she guided him into her.

They made love standing there, with Samar putting a protective arm between Nina's soft body and the wall. There was no noise to be heard except for Nina's gasping breath as he drove into her hard, finding and keeping the perfect rhythm.

They came together in one glorious moment, Samar's face buried in her neck, Nina's head thrown back in ecstasy. Long moments passed, then Samar gently picked Nina up and walked over to her couch.

'That was spectacular,' he said, kissing her throat softly as he laid her gently down. Once again, both of them were breathing audibly, raggedly.

And then they lay together feeling their heartbeats slowly come back to normal.

'Shall I fetch us some wine?' he asked, a while later. Nina smiled her assent and Samar got up, entirely unselfconscious about his magnificent nudity, walking over to Nina's makeshift bar.

_He told me he loved me_ , Nina thought suddenly. _Was it just in the heat of the moment?_

•

The next morning was a Sunday, and Nina woke to the happy decision that she would make a full English breakfast for Samar and herself. Only, Samar was no longer around. There was a note in his looping hand on her nightstand, which said he had had to go meet someone about a vintage Leica camera, and would call later.

_Back to square one_ , Nina thought with a real pang. Was this going to be the pattern as long as they were together? More to the point, could she really handle this? She wished for a modicum of insouciance so she could just go with this flow. But Nina Sabharwal just did not have that lightness of being this situation called for and there was no way she could continue to fool herself.

•

'Ma's in town, staying with me. Come have dinner with us?' Samar's voice was relaxed, languid, in direct counterpoint to Nina's heartbeat which picked up at a Formula One pace. She was at the fridge, door open, inspecting the contents with a view of making a nifty lunch. She threw a quick look across at Samar who was at the table reading the paper. The sun streamed in gloriously from behind him, lighting up his face and head, and she felt she could stare forever.

'Well?' he asked in an amused tone, and she realized she had been doing just that, staring at him in utter silence.

'When?' she asked, annoyed to find her voice had suddenly acquired a husky overtone. Meeting Mrs Singh was not high on her list of delightful things to do but Samar had asked; though his face was unreadable and his tone casual, he had asked!

'Nina, close that fridge, the room is getting chilly!' he told her with a grin and then continued, 'Let me find out what Ma's schedule is like. You won't believe how packed it can be. She comes purportedly, as our news editor would say, to visit me but I'm lucky if I get a glimpse of her once a day.'

And then, unbelievably, it was his voice which suddenly acquired a husky overtone. 'Come here... please?' he asked her, his eyes on her mouth.

Filled with a sense of mischief, she shook her head mutely, suddenly becoming aware of how her thin floral shirtdress clung almost lovingly to her contours. Samar studied her for a sizzling minute, then got up from the table in one swift and fluid movement, moving on light feet towards her. The next minute, he had backed her up against the wall, boxing her in with his arms on both sides of her head.

They stared at each other, both breathing hard, audibly. Her gaze moved to his collarbone where she could see a telltale pulse beating hard. Desire washed over her with force, taking her by surprise with its intensity. Bringing both her hands up to his body, she pulled him to her by his shirtfront and reached up and started to softly kiss that pulse. Which, of course, led to other things and left both Nina and Samar out of breath, but thoroughly satisfied.

In the event though, Nina was unable to go over to Samar Singh's place for a meal. She went down with what was obviously an occupational hazard in Bangalore, a flu virus, and was laid up in bed for the better part of a week. Mini and Leena brought over tiffin boxes full of food, Sita came home and made a week's worth of her famous spiced lentil soup ('Nothing like dal to get you over the sniffles,' she pronounced) and Alan called to give her a rather belated lecture on how the fast-changing climate of the city was positively dangerous. Her household help Shanti was most concerned, hanging around and asking what she could make for Nina to eat. Samar dropped by the first two days. 'Nothing like a quick cuddle to get you over this,' he announced, but she pushed him away, turning her face into the pillow. Her head was pounding, her nose was all red, she felt hot one moment, cold the next, and the congestion sat heavily in her chest. Nina was definitely not in the mood for a spot of cuddling or anything else.

The third day, he called to say he was heading back to Kanchanaburi. Nina was a bit relieved initially because Samar was not the most restful person to have around when you were under the weather. He prowled restlessly around the small apartment behaving like a caged tiger, he picked up things to examine closely, then put them back wherever he wanted to, and he took endless calls on his cell phone. The conversations were always muted but didn't help ease the buzzing in Nina's head.

Soon enough though, she was missing Samar like mad. He called occasionally but sounded distracted; she had realized that whenever he was still in the conceptualizing stages of some project, he was extremely preoccupied. That didn't help her feel less melancholic though, as well as a bit worried. Was she getting addicted to Samar Pratap Singh's presence in her life? How would she cope without that presence?

One evening, when chatting with her mother, she let something slip and Anne was quick to pick up on it.

'Getting quite fond of this Samar, aren't you, love?' she asked cheerfully.

Nina struggled with her feelings for a minute then capitulated. She would never be able to fool either her mother or sister, however hard she tried.

'I think so, Ma. I have never felt so vulnerable in my whole life. It's scary.'

Anne took a moment to digest that. When her voice came through, it was light and clear.

'Darling, that's because you have led such a nun-like life all this while. You know how hard I tried to get you to behave your age, go cut up a rug or two...'

Nina laughed despite herself. 'Cut up a rug? Ma, I love when you turn quaint on me!'

'Well, you know what I mean. Give this a chance, give Samar a chance. Nothing chanced, nothing gained, right?'

'Right,' said Nina in an unconvinced manner, then deftly changed the subject by asking after Anne's cheese-making endeavour and her mother let herself be led off the subject, happily talking about rennet, starters and how the home cheese-making kits in the market were all bogus stuff. Anne had moved into her cozy stone cottage when she relocated from London, after her beloved husband died. Now she was very happy back in her village, forever embarking on some new endeavour. It was growing hydrangeas one time, needlepoint another time, and now it was all about cheese-making. Typical of Anne, though, everything she tried turned out to be a roaring success.

By the end of the week, Nina was up and about and celebrated the fact with a quick trip to the department store down the road. She was happily tootling about in the Food Hall, wondering whether she should buy the bottle of paanch phorun she had picked up and if she would really end up experimenting with the pungent Bengali masala – a mix of mustard, cumin, fennel and fenugreek – that gave vegetables, meat, and even soups a distinct flavour. Nina was familiar with it, she had eaten some fish cooked in the seed and spice mix, and had become an immediate convert to all food cooked Bengali style, and to paanch phorun, too.

'I wouldn't buy that if I were you,' announced an imperious voice from behind her. Nina turned sharply to face Yashodara Singh, dressed immaculately in a sky-blue chiffon sari with two rows of top quality pearls glistening at her fair throat. The sari pallu covered her hair, the way most Rajput women wore it.

'Hello, Mrs Singh,' Nina said, smiling sweetly at the older woman. Mrs Singh looked a bit taken aback, then asked briskly, 'How are you? I was told you were unwell.'

Did the words carry the faintest hint of accusation in them, Nina wondered, then pulled herself up.

'Yes, I was down but I'm feeling much better now, thank you,' she replied calmly.

'Do you have time for a coffee?' Mrs Singh asked, already moving towards the white wrought iron tables and chairs in the café section of the Food Hall.

Nina sighed, then hid a smile. Obviously, she was to make time for that coffee.

Once they had ordered coffee, a blueberry tart for Mrs Singh and a brownie for Nina, the older woman stashed away her designer sunglasses in her Louis Vuitton bag and looked directly across at Nina. The girl looked a vision, her hair a soft frame for her Madonna-shaped face, her eyes bright, without a cloud in them.

'You aren't a fan of paanch phorun, I think,' Nina said, her smile successfully concealing a sudden bout of nerves.

The other woman succinctly said, 'Don't have it so soon after a chest infection. It will taste bitter on your tongue.'

She went on to ask Nina about her recent bout of illness, and Nina dutifully supplied the details. Mrs Singh made no mention of Nina's aborted dinner date, maybe Samar hadn't got around to telling her that he had invited Nina home.

Then Mrs Singh surprised her by asking about Susan and Adam's impending wedding. She really seemed to be in the know about all things concerning Nina.

'It's going to be a November wedding,' Nina told her. 'Mom and Sue will be here a month before that, Adam a week before D-Day.'

'Have you booked St Patrick's Church for the ceremony? It's a charming church,' Mrs Singh asked, and Nina told her that Alan and Sita had done so.

Mrs Singh leaned forward. 'I'm leaving tomorrow,' she told Nina. The coffee and pastry came to the table. Both of them sipped at the steaming hot liquid, Nina's eyes fixed on the frosted pink polish in the other woman's fingernails. She herself was in a sweatshirt and track pants but both were in deep mauve.

'Are you going back to Jaisalmer?' Nina asked politely.

'Jaisalmer? No, Hemant and I live on the outskirts of Delhi. We have our farm there, and I also run the family business. I took over the reins when Samar's father died. Actually, Hemant – you have met her, haven't you – is my sister-in-law.'

There was a silence. Nina was clearly meant to ask more about the business. And Nina, of course, had no intention of doing anything of the sort.

Mrs Singh sat back. 'Are you serious about Samar, Nina?' she asked, straight off the bat.

Nina had been expecting a certain amount of beating around the bush, nothing so direct. She took a deep breath, recoiling at this personal intrusion.

'Is Samar serious about me, Mrs Singh?' she riposted, smiling sweetly, like she didn't have a care in the world.

A gleam of admiration shone in Mrs Singh's eyes. 'Touché,' she said softly.

Then she continued, 'Well, it's just that Samar is my only son. I don't know how much he has told you about his childhood, his heritage. I know he's a talented photojournalist. And he knows that, sooner or later, he will have to give the job up, move back up north and take over the running of his father's estates and business. Hemant and I can't go on running the show indefinitely; we're getting old, and our pace is slowing.'

Nina didn't say anything, she just kept watching Mrs Singh. If this formidable woman was operating at a slowed pace, Nina could well imagine what a dynamo she must have been in her prime.

The other woman searched Nina's eyes, then gave a soft sigh. 'It is time Samar settled down. We are not your conventional Rajput family who pick out young girls just past their infancy for our sons and heirs... despite what Karishma Jhala, that silly deluded girl, thinks,' she concluded, smiling meaningfully at Nina.

There. It was out in the open. And Nina Sabharwal acknowledged it with a small smile, which the older woman saw and registered.

'Karishma has been chasing Samar in the most juvenile fashion for years now. At first we were amused by it, now we are irritated. It is time someone sat that silly girl down and told her what was what.'

'Samar?' Nina asked softly. The usage of that collective 'we' was not lost on her. It was Mrs Singh's way of letting Nina know just how involved she was in every personal facet of her son's life.

The other woman shook her head decisively. 'Samar has not encouraged her. All he offered was friendship. He doesn't have to explain himself to her.' She continued, 'However, Samar cannot afford to tie himself up with someone unsuitable. There is more than just his married life at stake here, I'm sure you appreciate that. He will be better off married to someone who is preferably from our background, knows the ropes and, more importantly, knows just what is expected from a Rajput wife.'

Now she was in full steam. Leaning forward, Mrs Singh said, 'I have nothing against you, Nina. You are a lovely girl. But you are half-English and for all I know a practising Christian...?'

Nina looked back impassively, refusing to either deny or confirm what Mrs Singh so clearly wished to ascertain. In actual fact, both Nina and Susan had been brought up on the most liberal of religious lines; both girls had been baptized but had grown up with more than a passing knowledge of Hinduism. Their father's mother, Dadima, would often tell them stories from the Mahabharata and the Ramayana whenever the girls visited their paternal grandparents in Kent. Today, Nina knew as much about Hinduism as most of her Indian friends, though she did not feel the need to broadcast that fact.

To her disbelief and dismay, Mrs Singh was still on the subject. 'Samar's wife will have certain duties. Back in Jaisalmer, we are still regarded as de facto rulers. It's different in Delhi but no less onerous. It's hard for any Indian girl to make herself fit into that mould, leave alone...' and here she petered out, throwing the younger woman a speculative glance.

By now, Nina Sabharwal had worked herself up into a quiet fury. She wasn't going to explain herself to Mrs Yashodara Singh. Even though she understood the compulsions that were driving the other woman, she was livid about being put so clearly under some kind of microscope like this.

'You tell me, do you think you will make an obedient, dutiful wife for Samar?' Mrs Singh renewed the attack.

Nina had had enough. Putting the cup back on its saucer with a steady hand, she looked over at Mrs Singh and smiled graciously, her eyes cold. 'Mrs Singh,' she said in the softest of tones which barely hid the glacial note in them, 'I really don't know if I will make _anyone_ an obedient or dutiful wife. I do hope that when I get married, my obedience or dutiful nature will not be on test. What I do know is that I will make a loving and caring wife to the man I will marry. Now if you will excuse me, I must return home. I will settle the bill on my way out. Bye...'

Mrs Singh sat back. She nodded as if something had been confirmed, then smiled cordially at Nina. Unsettled, Nina stared at Mrs Singh.

'You won't settle the bill. I will,' the older woman said and Nina conceded that point. As she walked out of the café, she could feel Mrs Singh's eyes on her. Strangely, it didn't bother her.

Que sera sera, Nina Sabharwal told herself. Increasingly, that was her prevailing frame of mind these days.
TWELVE

NINA HAD TO TRY several times before she could get the car to start. Her hands were shaking so much, they kept slipping off the ignition keyhole. Once she got the engine running though, she took a deep breath and switched the ignition off. Then she put her head down on the wheel, trying to calm herself.

Curiously enough, she didn't cry. There didn't seem to be tears in her. She could hear her heartbeat, the dull thumps falling like so many blows against her aching chest. This then was heartbreak; but in actual fact, her whole body ached, not just her chest, in a pulsing kind of pain.

_Face it, Nina_ , she told herself bleakly. _You saw it as it is_.

Samar was two-timing her, and she really couldn't blame anyone but herself for this sorry state of affairs. With all this carpe diem nonsense she had told herself, theirs had been pretty much an affair that coasted along day by day. Nina had not once tried to deepen the relationship; of course, that was partly due to the very real fear that she would chase Samar Pratap Singh away if she got clingy.

But getting serious was not being clingy and she realized that now. Just as she saw their affair for what it was: in bed, they were setting the sheets on fire. Out of bed, they were able to have some good times and some good laughs. They were able to carry on several threads of conversations, all on the most casual of lines. And that was all. For the rest of it, there was Nina Sabharwal's reserved nature and there was Samar's innate caution. And there was their no strings attached relationship.

_But he told me he loved me_ , Nina's heart spoke up.

They were good in bed, they were better than good, they were terrific. Was that what Samar considered love? He talked to her about his assignments, about his lenses and filters, usually when he was back from a shoot. When had he asked her anything about her future plans?

_I never had any claim on Samar Singh_ , she thought dolefully. _I don't have the right to feel jealous, to feel this pain._ She was hurt to the core but she wasn't confused. Some part of Nina had anticipated that this would happen. That part was now keeping a tactful silence.

_I'm better out of it_ , Nina told herself, taking deep breaths to calm down. It was good, it was better than good while it lasted. But it was over.

Well anyway, _they_ hadn't seen her, and that was a small mercy.

Last night, Nina had thought she'd surprise Samar by landing up at his place for a change. She had baked a strawberry tart, something he loved, and driven to the gated community where he lived, a smile on her lips and a song in her heart. She had news for him, too. She had sent the first three chapters of her book in progress to a publisher in London. That had been weeks ago, and she had almost forgotten about it. This morning, she'd heard back from them; they were interested in commissioning her book.

Samar occupied the penthouse apartment of his block. Stepping outside the lift, she'd been surprised to see that his front door was open, more than a few inches ajar. Noiselessly pushing the door further open, Nina had made to enter, then stopped.

Samar was inside his apartment, and he was with a woman. There was a charge swirling in the room which hit Nina in the face like a wet sock.

The picture of the woman and Samar was now etched deep into her mind. The skin-tight suede jeans the woman wore which moulded her pert and shapely rear so well. Her long hair cascading down her lissom back. The way she stood close to Samar, so close there was barely an inch between them. The way her face was raised to his. That smile on his mouth as he looked down at her. The smile that all this while Nina had foolishly thought was reserved for her, only her.

Who was this woman? On the heels of that agonized thought, instinct took over and Nina quickly stepped away from the door before Samar could look up and see her. She fled, taking the endless flights of stairs so fast, it seemed she would trip and fall down any moment.

Suddenly realizing it had grown dark, Nina tried the ignition again. It fired at the second attempt this time and she drove off. What had been a drizzle had now turned into a regular downpour. Given the bad stretches of road and the many potholes between Samar's place and her own, she would do well to drive slowly and carefully, she told herself wryly.

And so she drove home slowly, on auto-pilot, feeling numb, bone-tired, dispirited. The traffic had bottlenecked at several places along the route, cars moving at a slow crawl, drivers sounding their loud horns angrily, as if the noise generated would somehow get things moving again. The wind was a gale now and lightning crackled sharply in the distance. She needed to get home before the storm broke. It was going to be a big storm.

Stuck at a traffic light that refused to turn green, Nina looked idly across and met the eye of the man driving the car alongside hers. Trapped in the misery of her tortured thoughts, Nina stared blankly at him. The bearded young man grinned at her. Suddenly coming to her senses, Nina looked away. Only to look at him again from the corner of her eye when she saw him moving. The man had taken out his cell phone and was clicking a photograph of her.

Do I react or do I ignore it, Nina asked herself. This kind of thing had never happened to her before though friends had said they'd had to face it a few times. Looking across, she found that the wretched man was still clicking away furiously. Wrenching her features into a scowl, she gestured for him to stop. To her disbelief, the man leaned across and slid the passenger-seat window down. He meant to speak to her!

A bit nonplussed about what to do next, Nina was relieved when the lights changed and she quickly slid her car forward. She'd gone some distance past the busy Indiranagar flyover and was on a particularly ill-lit stretch of road when she felt her front left tyre going straight into a pothole with a sickening noise.

Nina tried to reverse the Beat, get the wheel out of the rut but the car seemed firmly stuck. Giving in to a momentary surge of frustration, she hit the steering wheel angrily with the flat of her hand. Great! This was all she needed right now. Her car stuck in a furrow down a dark road and the heavens pouring its woes down on her.

_Oh, snap out of it, woman_ , she told herself impatiently. The heavens were pouring down not only on her but on all of Bangalore, on all those unfortunate enough to be out on the roads in this weather. She was just one of many.

There was no help for it, she would have to get out and see if she could find someone to help get the wheel free. But there weren't too many people on the road and those who were around were scrambling hastily to the nearest shelter. The vehicles that whizzed past did so purposefully, intending to be back in their parking bays before the weather turned squallier.

Thunder broke, virtually on top of her head, and Nina gave a startled jump. She reached in the back seat for her windcheater jacket and pulled it on, securing the hood. Going around to the affected wheel, she found to her relief that only one quarter of the wheel was in the seemingly shallow trough. However, she was a realist and it was clear she could not pull the car out by herself, she would need help.

On the heels of this thought, a car slid to a smooth halt next to her. Nina turned in relief, only to see the bearded man who had been harassing her a while earlier, flash very white teeth at her from the dry safety of his car.

Now he was openly leering at the bedraggled girl whose dress was sticking wetly to her hips and thighs. 'Want my help?' he enquired in an oily manner and Nina's mouth went dry with fear.

'No... no thanks,' Nina croaked in reply, but the man wasn't listening. Rain or no rain, he decided to get out and come up to her.

'What happened?' he asked her, eyes fixed on her chest. It was a well-covered chest under the sturdy windcheater, but the man's gaze made Nina feel positively dirty.

Still, she attempted a response. 'My car's wheel is stuck in that pothole,' she said, pointing to the rut but the man wasn't looking. He came closer and now she could smell liquor on his breath.

'Foreigner?' he asked her, trying to shake her hand.

It was all so weird. The flashing lightning, thunder rolling relentlessly, the pouring rain and this man making a pass at her. Trying to get a grip on herself and the situation, Nina said again, 'My car...'

The man took her hand. Nina shook his hand off.

'You come with me. In my car. I take you to safe place,' he said with that fixed manic grin.

Nina came to a quick decision. She would have to bolt for it, get back into her car, roll up the windows and stay put. Then she could call the cops. Even as she turned sharply, the man put an arm around her waist and pulled her to him. She froze even as her brain raced. Then she gave a stifled scream. She couldn't believe this was happening to her. The man put a rough hand under her chin, trying to force her face up. He was going to kiss her!

Nina went limp, suddenly becoming a dead weight on him. Taken by surprise, the man staggered back and she lifted one knee purposefully, sinking it full-weight into his groin. This was something she had picked up in the Krav Maga classes she had signed up for last year, never once dreaming it would come to such good use.

The bearded man fell back, scrabbling at the air in an effort to not fall onto the wet road. Nina didn't stay to look, she ran swiftly to her car and got in, locking the doors in one swift motion. Her heart was thudding so hard she couldn't breathe properly. After what seemed like an endless amount of time, she heard the car beside her own drive off into the night and gave a sigh of abject relief.

The rain hadn't let up – this was more of a cloudburst than the typical north-easterly monsoon Bangalore was usually subjected to at this time of the year. There were other cars going by, their headlights made sharper, more luminous in the rain-soaked air. There were blank faces in the cars; some of them turned to look at her. But no one stopped.

Nina's brain registered a gurgling noise. Wearily, she looked out and saw that the rainwater had made an impromptu channel running busily on the edge of the road.

She didn't look up when a car halted alongside hers, not even when the driver started sounding his horn repeatedly, like some sort of a claxon. Then she distinctly heard someone calling out her name. 'Nina! Nina! NINA!' like a frantic litany.

Slowly raising her head, she looked across. There was a man behind the wheel of the other car and he was gesticulating frantically. When she didn't react, he got out of his car and ran across to her side, tapping hard on her window.

Finally, she registered that it was Devaiah, her colleague in the marketing department.

After that, things became something of a blur. Devaiah had to tell her three times before she got into his car while they attended to hers. He had a friend travelling in the car with him and with the help of a crowbar, they got Nina's car out of the rut, getting thoroughly soaked in the process of course.

Nina was still on auto-pilot. She got out of Devaiah's car and made to go over to her vehicle. She knew he was looking worriedly at her pale face.

'Will you be able to drive yourself home safely?' Devaiah asked, a crease appearing between his brows. Nina looked at him but didn't answer, couldn't answer.

Her colleague exchanged a quick look with his friend. He put her back in his car, signalling that his friend should follow in Nina's car. Devaiah kept flicking her worried glances all through the drive, but he didn't attempt conversation, for which Nina was deeply thankful. She knew that if she didn't attempt to talk, a surface image of normality could be maintained. And it was very important for Nina Sabharwal that she kept up that façade of normality. She didn't know why it was important, only that it was.

Devaiah knew where she lived; she had hosted small impromptu meals there for her team often. When they drew up finally, after what seemed an interminable drive to Nina, he saw her inside the apartment while his friend parked her car and waited for Devaiah.

'Will you be okay? Shall I call Mini?' he asked quietly. Devaiah clearly thought that her car falling into that pothole on a night such as this was enough to totally unsettle Nina.

At last Nina found her voice, or a version of it. 'I'm fine and thank you, Dev,' she got out, even managing the semblance of a smile. 'See you at work tomorrow.' With which he had to be content.

It was possibly the roughest night of Nina Sabharwal's life. She had a hot bath and pulling on a terry-cloth dressing gown, settled down in her roomy armchair with an outsized bowl of mushroom soup in her hand. The incident on the road had receded so completely from her mind, it was as if nothing had happened. Her mind kept flashing to Samar bending so tenderly over the unknown woman in his apartment.

Who was she? Why was she holding him in such a proprietorial manner?

But that wasn't the real nub, was it? The problem Nina had refused to face till now had nothing to do with other women. She knew Karishma Jhala was no threat to any relationship she, Nina, might have with Samar. Even the matter of the unknown woman in his arms possibly had its own backstory. Except Nina didn't want to know, didn't want to ask him.

The real problem had everything to do with Samar Pratap Singh and herself. She had gotten into a situation quite out of her depth. It was just as Alan Pereira had warned. Nina was not someone who changed boyfriends frequently, who sampled relationships, as it were.

When she gave her heart, she gave it for good.

Obviously, her preternaturally calm and serene exterior had fooled Samar into thinking she was someone who could play the game and walk away without a backward glance should things not go her way.

There had been no real communication between Samar and her. Not the sort that really shaped, moulded, cemented a good relationship. Now Nina remembered that often Samar would start to tell her something about his family or schoolmates, something on a personal note. She'd listen interestedly but at some point, Samar would stop, then change the subject deftly. That too had become a pattern.

She started to tick the facts off in her mind, one by painful one. I wanted it all, more than he could give me. I grew to want definite commitment; Samar, on the other hand, had never shown any kind of emotional involvement. Maybe it was just sex for him. There too, he had been a caring man, always seeing to protection, ensuring that she felt good each and every time.

Well, to be fair to him, he had never promised her anything. It was she who had changed, who had wanted a change in the tenor of their relationship.

Yes, but he told me he loved me, her heart cried out. And she sat in the armchair, her lovely face stony, her heart an icy wasteland, musing on that thought while the air grew cooler and the night grew darker.

At around one a.m., Nina suddenly remembered that the strawberry tart she had baked for Samar was still in the back seat of the car where she had flung it on her unceremonious return to her car that evening. Setting her jaw, she went downstairs to the car parking lot, opened her car door and retrieved the squashed tart.

Upstairs in her own apartment, she had a bad moment as she stared down at the dessert, on the verge of tears, biting her lower lip hard to stem the flood of emotions that hovered just below the surface. _He's a rotter, Nina_ , she told herself. _You can't cry over rotters_. _You don't cry over rotters_.

Then, coming to a decision, she reached for her cell phone, and dialled her sister. It would be evening in London but Sue would take the call if she was free. And Sue's calm, practical advice was what Nina wanted badly now.

•

Nina called in sick that day. Obviously, Devaiah had told sales and marketing what had transpired on that ill-lit road, or at least his version of what had transpired, so Rohan was most sympathetic.

'Oh, take the day off, take rest,' he said in a hearty manner which he obviously thought was a soothing one. Then he spoiled the effect by saying slightly anxiously, 'You will be in for the project meeting tomorrow, right?'

Nina assured him she would be in, and she meant it, too. Thanks to Sue and the hour-long conversation she had had with her practical, pragmatic sister, she had recovered her composure. The end of an affair was not the end of the world. She was not going to allow Samar Singh within a mile of her. Nor was she going to allow him to break her in any manner. She was going to continue showing up at the _India!_ offices, she was going to finish her Bangalore tenure and yes, she was going to be there to make sure Adam and Susan had a most memorable wedding. Both of Prem Sabharwal's daughters were fighters. Nobody was going to chase Nina away.

She expected to fend off phone calls from Samar all day but not one call came from him. Inside her head, a voice whispered that maybe he would come around to find out why she hadn't come to office. She knew how fast news of all kind travelled up and down the three storeys of the office; Samar was sure to have heard about last night.

But he didn't call, and when midnight rolled around, Nina was forced to face up to the fact that the likelihood of his dropping by was near nil. Her jaw set but she remained calm.

She fell asleep on the thought that Samar didn't care enough. He didn't care at all, in fact. Yet, surprisingly, she slept well, but then Nina always slept well after she made a decision.

At the office the next morning, she discovered that Samar had flown to Delhi on a 'family emergency'. It was Mini who told her so, and the other girl clearly expected that Nina already knew.

Nina was spared from making any kind of comment by a call from the features editor upstairs on the second floor. He was calling to tell her that her piece on the fast-fading Chinese heritage of Bangalore was going to run in the weekend paper.

'Good job,' he told her patronizingly, though to be charitable to the man, he didn't for a moment realize he was being patronizing. Continuing to put his large foot into his mouth, the man said, 'It started to get too serious in the middle, then you put in that bit about the Chinese deejay, so the piece was balanced out.'

'But you liked the bit about the young Chinese belly dancers, right?' Nina asked, careful to keep the sarcasm out of her voice.

The features ed wouldn't have known sarcasm if it had come and bit him on his small nose. 'Yes, yes,' he told Nina excitedly. 'That was great stuff. Pity they don't hold belly dance shows. In any case, I'll ask the photo ed to send someone down to the classes to see if he can get some sexy pics.'

Nina was pretty sure the girls weren't going to allow anyone to take pictures of their belly dancing sessions, but she wasn't going to rain on the man's parade. It was clear that she was expected to sound excited and grateful, possibly overwhelmed too, that editorial was carrying a piece by someone from sales and marketing, never mind the fact that this was her third feature for the paper. She went about making all the right kind of noises till she remembered that she was due downstairs for a meeting.

They were waiting for her, to start the meeting. Rohan was his usual jittery self; clearly he'd forgotten why Nina had taken the day off yesterday. As she pulled out a chair next to Devaiah, she met his eye and he mouthed, 'All okay?' To which, she smiled a reply and Dev seemed satisfied by what he saw in her face.

'The Pothole Project is going great guns,' Rohan Varma informed them. 'They are running the Worst Pothole Picture competition from tomorrow. The response from people has been tremendous.' He beamed at them, then quickly scowled. 'But no need to feel too puffed up, guys. Editorial is pretending this was their own masterstroke, the idiots. We have a subscription target riding on this campaign and the moment we cross it, we'll tell them what is what!'

He paused for breath, then suddenly turned to her. 'Nina, you fell into a pothole, didn't you?'

'Well, I didn't, the front wheel of my car did,' she murmured.

'Don't be pedantic,' Rohan told her impatiently. 'What I think is, we must capitalize on it. Let tomorrow's City edition carry a hair-raising account of all you went through, a first-person account. With snapshots.'

Leena snapped, 'Rohan, I somehow don't think Nina had the time or the inclination to take pictures of her car in the pothole.'

Her words were water off Rohan Varma's back. 'Of course, I know that,' he glared at his wife. 'What I meant was, we could get a snap of a car that looks similar to Nina's in a trough similar to the one she fell into and...'

Nina switched off and threw a smile at Leena, who shrugged in exasperation. Rohan had scented a new angle to the Pothole Project, and he wasn't going to rest till he had explored every angle to it. The project had given _India!_ an edge over their rival, and Rohan wasn't going to be caught napping. As he repeated ad nauseam to his team, there was no room for complacency in the Circulation Wars. __

As the meeting wound up, Leena moved over to Nina and said, with a perfectly straight face, 'I'm getting Rohan a gift for his birthday which I think he will love.'

Nina raised an eyebrow, to which Leena said complacently, 'I'm getting him a plaque that reads: _Quantity over quality. Always_.' Both women broke out laughing. A couple of colleagues joined them, and was told about the gift.

One of them grinned. 'I've got a better line for that plaque: _Let's move downmarket. Now_.'

But the quality of the debate didn't improve upstairs, as Nina discovered when she went upstairs later in the day, to give the copy editor contact details of the people she had profiled in her piece. Virtually all of editorial was crowing at another paper's temporary misfortune. _India!_ 's rival paper had published some very risqué photographs of an up-and-coming film actress, who had then promptly sued them. The _India!_ Op-ed page writers were busy composing a holier-than-thou edit piece lamenting the lack of ethics in today's media. The paper would leave no stone unturned to close the circulation gap with their rival who still led by a considerable margin, in the state.

No one for a moment talked of the inevitable consequences – in the form of lawsuits – when newspapers published salacious gossip and tried to pass it off as quasi-news. So many libel cases piled up in the legal cell of this and other dailies only because of the near libellous things they published happily, without any qualms whatsoever. What was worse, Nina noticed, was that everyone on the second and third floors really believed that their paper pushed no boundaries, that by bowing to the demands of the public, they were tastefully sensational! Then again, maybe it was good that everyone collectively laboured under this misconception; it gave them the motivation to do what the paper demanded of them without too many misgivings.

Sid, the crime reporter, had a different take on the matter, though. 'Why was Tappy wearing an outfit so damned revealing if she didn't want to be clicked by the paps?' he demanded in an offended manner of Nina, for all the world as if she had been Tapasya Roy's dress designer or PR agent. 'Her boyfriend must have given her hell after the photographs appeared, and now she's pulling a Sati Savitri on us.'

Nina was cordially teased about crossing over to editorial with this, her third article for _India!_. 'Has RE offered you a job here as yet?' asked one of the copy editors and Nina grinned, saying, 'Not yet. I'm still waiting.'

She looked up to see Alan beckoning to her from inside his cabin and made towards his office.

'What were all of you talking about?' asked Alan, with a gleam in his eye that told her he knew just what it was they had been talking about.

Nina met his eyes with a limpid look. 'Oh, we were just discussing whether sensationalism can be finessed,' she said keeping a straight face.

Alan Pereira fell into the trap. 'Of course it can,' he told her seriously. 'That's what we are,' he said insistently. 'Tastefully sensational, I mean. Our Page Three pieces are all about fun parties, rock concerts, art gallery openings, and suchlike. We don't run a boobs and bottoms ticker; we just carry pics of glamorous people wearing glamorous clothes and looking...'

'Glamorous?' Nina suggested tongue-in-cheek. 'And, Alan, no one says boobs and bottoms any more. The term is...'

'I know what the term is, woman. I didn't want to embarrass you.' They shared a smile of perfect understanding before Alan continued, 'Samar isn't here. He had to...'

Nina cut in quickly. 'I don't want to know, Alan,' she said, happy to note that her voice remained even.

Alan stood there for a full minute, his mouth open. His eyes met hers searchingly. Then he closed his mouth and said, 'What happened, Nina?'

'Nothing,' Nina told him firmly. 'It's over. I have to move on.' She didn't realize how telling her use of the words 'have to' was. Even as she was cringing inwardly at the possibility of having to say more on the subject, Alan said on a slightly grim note, 'So be it. Have you given Sharma all the info he wanted on the Chinese article?' And Nina accepted the change of subject with gratitude.

It wasn't that easy to fob off Leena and Mini, though. They were in the café, sipping hot and fragrant filter coffee, and the conversation naturally turned to Samar.

'It seems Mrs Jamwal, his aunt, has taken ill, and he has rushed off to Delhi,' Mini told Nina. 'Did he tell you when he'll be back?'

It was a casual question but Nina's response had both the girls dropping their jaws. 'I didn't know he was away. And I don't know when he'll be back. Samar and I, we are over.' Nina actually managed a wan smile for effect.

The questions followed quick and fast. Nina didn't reply, she kept smiling, till Leena said awkwardly, 'Okay, Mini, we need to back off. Let's not pester the girl.'

Mini ignored Leena and sat forward, arms resting on the table top. Her eyes were intent. 'What happened, Nina?' she asked.

Nina took a deep breath. 'It was going nowhere,' she said, and her listeners winced as they heard the note of desolation in her voice. 'I think it was always casual where he was concerned. And I don't do casual too well. So, for my self-preservation, I decided to end it.'

Leena and Mini sat digesting this bit of information. Then Leena asked, 'But does Samar know?'

'No. He will, though, as soon as he returns to Bangalore.' Nina strove for a light tone. Polite reserve, something that came naturally to her, was the only way out of this.

Later that night, with the midnight blue silk curtains drawn, Nina Sabharwal sat at her dining table, staring down at her cellphone. There were four missed calls from Samar, calls she hadn't responded to. There was one text message which just asked '???' She hadn't responded to that, either.

She needed to gear up for when Samar would be back. Because somehow she knew he wouldn't take 'no' for an answer all that easily.

•

Samar came into the office three days later. He had tried calling Nina from the airport, but she hadn't replied. Something was definitely wrong but he wasn't too worried. He'd set everything right once he met Nina. Fortunately, this was not a girl who pulled drama into their relationship. She was calm, she was cool, she was self-contained.

The first chance he got, he went down to sales and marketing, and there she was, looking absolutely gorgeous in a shift dress the colour of her eyes. She was in Rohan Varma's cabin; Samar bit back an oath, he would have to handle this carefully. Rohan was such a gossip. All he needed was to know that Nina hadn't been taking Samar's calls, and he'd go to town with that titbit.

Rohan looked up and saw Samar. 'Hello there, HB Singh,' he said cheerfully. 'Or are your heartbreaking days over?'

Samar looked at Nina. She was refusing to meet his eyes, putting away some papers into a folder. He waited patiently. Suddenly sensing something in the air, Rohan Varma too, looked on silently.

Eventually Nina looked up, straight into eyes the colour of molten caramel. Summoning all her composure, she smiled pleasantly at Samar Singh. 'Hello, Samar,' she said, her tone matching her smile.

'You didn't take my calls,' Samar said pleasantly enough.

'No,' Nina replied steadily, holding his gaze, 'I didn't.'

There was a tense moment, then he shrugged and cracked a smile at the watchful Rohan. 'Not the time or the place, huh?' he asked the other man, and Nina marvelled at his self-composure.

Rohan was momentarily thrown but picked up his cue and said a trifle over-heartily, 'I guess. Did you want something, Samar?'

There was a wry twist to Samar Singh's lips as he replied, 'It will keep.' And he left the place.
THIRTEEN

IT HAD BEEN EASIER for Nina to stick to her resolution of ending things between them when Samar hadn't been around. Then again, any fear she might have had of him trying to engineer meetings turned out to be unfounded, and she didn't know whether to be sorry or glad about that. A couple of days passed with no calls or text messages from him, and a bit to her aching heart's dismay, nary a sight of him, either. But she had known this was how it would be; Samar wasn't the type to keep at it if he didn't get a response of some kind.

And then, along came the weekend and with it came the annual _India!_ conference. Last year, it had been held in Goa; this year, it was up in the Nilgiris, in Coonoor, a lovely small hill town. Nina had been up there earlier on a fleeting visit, and looked forward to spending some more time in the green environs of the Blue Hills, as the Nilgiri ranges were called.

HRD had made all arrangements for travel and accommodation in their usual meticulous fashion. Some of the senior staff were driving up the hills from Bangalore, an easy seven-hour drive through a national park, and then up the pin curves of the Western Ghat roads. Alan told Nina she could go with him in his car but she declined, just not up to further discussion about Samar Singh and herself. Alan Pereira might think he was the soul of tact but he would end up bruising Nina's already fragile nerves. It would have been better if Sita was coming along but she wasn't. 'Sit around while you guys talk shop non-stop?' she had asked Nina with some asperity, and Nina had laughed.

So Nina flew to Coimbatore with many of her colleagues. Coimbatore, a small bustling town in the foothills, was stiflingly hot but as they drove up the hills in the fleet of air-conditioned coaches provided for them, the landscape changed dramatically. The tropical forest, known as _shola_ in the local parlance, grew gloriously wild as they made the climb – eucalyptus with mahogany and myrtle trees looming in the lower reaches, pine and acacia making their appearance as they gained height, the undergrowth a sprawling shrubbery full of giant fern, holly, moss and lichen. This being September and the 'second season' in the hills, the flowers were out in full splendour – mallow, daisies, red hot pokers, thick bushes of yellow gorse and broom, violet and scarlet salvias, the glorious morning glory twisting itself around trees and stone revetments.

Just like the first time she had visited, Nina couldn't quite believe that this was a piece of hot, tropical India, this rolling range of hills with a perennially cool wind blowing, with green grasslands stretching out as far as the eye could see, fat white clouds billowing low in the sky, old stone cottages and manor houses with names like McIver Villa, Crookson's Folly and Glenlivet. The main town of the Nilgiris, Ootacamund, was no longer a charming place, having succumbed to tourist marauding ages ago. However, Coonoor, about twenty kilometres away, still retained something of its old world quaintness.

The _India!_ staff from all over the country were put up at a large resort, The Croft; the senior and mid-level staff in lovely wooden cottages, the rest in well-appointed single and double rooms. The Croft was tucked away in a fold of some foothills and accessed via a lovely long drive hedged on both sides by flower beds. The grounds had rows of poinsettia trees, wave upon wave of scarlet that met the eye most pleasingly.

The moment they got off the coaches, the eucalyptus-spiked air hit the city dwellers like a dose of an exotic pick-me-up. _This is just what I need right now_ , thought Nina. _A break from Bangalore_. _If only Samar Singh wouldn't be attending the conference_. Then again, editorial was holding their meeting separately, so with some luck, her interaction with him would be minimal. A little voice inside Nina whispered, _yes, but just seeing him will be painful_. She tried her best to ignore the voice. She was getting better at ignoring that pesky little voice.

Nina had expected to share her cottage with Mini but surprisingly, she was the sole occupant of her circular hut, with its polished wooden beam ceiling, old wardrobes and cheval mirror, four-poster bed and a bathroom that was basically a glass enclosure on all four sides. The lush vegetation that grew outside the cottage was literally crowding two sides of the bathroom, the giant monsteras seemingly tapping at the glass wall, and Nina idly wondered if passing frogs and suchlike would play peeping Toms.

They were all to meet for drinks and dinner in the open air platform just below the reception hut, but that was still some time away. Nina decided to go for a walk, pulled on a windcheater and retraced her path out of the resort. It was going on five o'clock but there was still a lovely filtered light over the hills and valleys. Just past the resort gate, she picked up a companion, a large shaggy black dog that fell into step beside her, occasionally throwing her a smiling glance. Nina loved animals, they had had a Labrador back in London during her teen years, and she took some kind of comfort in the fact that this dog wanted to go on a walk with her.

Hedged on both sides by a thick profusion of lantana bushes bearing a thickly clustered collection of white, pink, yellow and orange blooms, the lane looped and wound its way past shops selling cheese and chocolates, a tailor's establishment and a wool shop. Nina stopped to stare at the different skeins of coloured wool in the shop window and Blackie stopped obediently alongside her. She really ought to get her mother some wool from here; Anne was an enthusiastic knitter of stoles, mufflers and cardigans galore.

It was well after an hour of brisk walking that Nina and the black dog turned back. The streetlights slowly came on, and faint wisps of mist drifted across from the hill opposite. Blackie stopped at the resort gate, wagged his tail in goodbye and refused to come any further. The nip in the air had intensified into cold now, and Nina wondered where the dog slept but was forced to head back to her cottage. The walk had really done her a lot of good, she felt energized and well prepared to face whatever the evening had in store for her.

Tomorrow would be the formal dinner for _India!_ staffers; tonight was a casual event. Nina decided to wear a long dress in pashmina wool; it looked elegant and kept her toasty too. The dress was in a deep emerald shade which served as a striking foil to her auburn curls, making them gleam when they caught the light. She had managed to get a pair of stiletto heels the exact colour of her dress, and now she regarded the strappy footwear with approval. She remembered reading that a woman would never look like she had fallen apart completely if she was wearing a good pair of shoes, and the truth of that struck her forcibly now.

Nina locked the cottage door behind her and went to look for Mini's room. Her best bet would be to ask at the reception, and accordingly, she headed there. As she stepped into the large room with mullioned windows and a fire crackling merrily in the grate, she collided with someone who steadied her with firm hands. She looked up and met a pair of black eyes that held a startled look which mirrored her own.

'Manish!' Nina gasped. 'What are you doing here?'

The tall and whipcord slim man smiled down at her. 'Well, well. If it isn't Nina Sabharwal!' Then, acquiescing to the question asked by her still raised brow, he said with easy charm, 'I'm shooting here. Been here for almost a fortnight now, we are just winding up our schedule.'

Suddenly, Nina realized they had attracted a large group of gawkers, most of them _India!_ staffers. Manish Mann was one of the country's top film stars, trailing just a few steps behind Shah Rukh Khan himself. Manish was one utterly gorgeous specimen of manhood but it didn't stop at that; he was also one of India's finest actors. He could romance his heroines and sing love ballads as convincingly as he could get the hankies out when it came to the tear-jerker scenes. He could play army officer, auto mechanic, business tycoon, a loveable tramp, all with utmost conviction. Actually, if Nina thought about it, she herself was a fan. Quite apart from which, she liked Manish Mann.

Nina had met Manish while on her stint at the _India!_ Mumbai office. The local edition of the paper was doing a promotional feature with Bollywood actors and the resident ed had realized that Nina Sabharwal, with her looks, was the ideal person to handle the campaign. What added to her appeal was the fact that she appeared quite unconscious of the impact she had on people.

The 'Stars for Mumbai' campaign had been a rip-roaring success, of course. She had lost touch with most of the film stars she had interacted with during the course of the project, but strangely enough, Manish Mann had become a friend. They had met for dinner on and off, usually at a mutual friend's place given that any public appearance by Manish generated more than a fair amount of hysteria. Whenever he held private screenings of his films for a close circle, Nina had been invited.

Nina was now meeting him after nearly three years. As if reading her mind, he smiled his devastating smile and told her, 'Good to see you, girl. We have a lot of catching up to do. Let's go settle down somewhere and have dinner together, what say you?'

Nina hesitated. 'I'm here for the annual _India!_ conference. We are all having dinner out there.' She gestured beyond the door.

But Manish Mann was having none of it. 'Darling,' he told her, not caring one bit that the onlookers could hear him. 'Now that I've found you, I'm not letting you go all that easily.'

And so Nina Sabharwal let herself be led off to a set of chairs near the fireplace, there to while the evening away most pleasantly, sipping mulled wine and chatting with Manish Mann. She caught Dev's eye and indicated that she would be joining the team later. Later, though, really didn't look like it was going to happen because Manish cajoled her into having dinner with him. Star-struck fans from the _India!_ roster kept coming and hesitantly asking for selfies, and the good-natured actor obliged them all. Luckily for Nina, Manish quite liked the sound of his own voice so the conversation smoothly became a monologue at some point during the evening, but an interesting monologue for all that, spiced with much gossipy tidbits of all his co-stars and of the Hindi film industry in general. Equally fortunately for her, Manish didn't seem to notice her less than enthusiastic reactions to all the tittle-tattle, so they were able to spend a pleasant evening.

As they rose from the dining table, Alan and Mr Murthy, the news editor, walked into the dining room. Alan was clearly looking for Nina, and she was touched by his concern. She introduced the men and all of them stood chatting idly for a while.

Manish's parting shot as Nina left was, 'You are spending all your free time with me, you hear?' Nina threw a laughing glance back at him but didn't reply. He didn't know they were all heading back to their offices late on Sunday evening, and she didn't feel the need to inform him, either.

'Boy, is that one major string to your bow or what,' Alan said, slyly shooting a sideways glance at Nina. She smiled serenely, refusing to rise to the bait. Alan Pereira was not one to be star-struck, all he was doing was pulling Nina's leg.

'Known Manish Mann for long?' asked a very curious Mr Murthy.

'He's a friend,' replied Nina calmly and the two men had to be satisfied with that.

She went along to her cottage thinking about Manish Mann. He was at the peak of his career and had carefully built up a reputation of being a player. And yes, he had made a move on Nina once or twice but when she had rebuffed him gently, falling back on the 'boyfriend back home' fib, he had accepted it most good-naturedly. Which naturally made her suspect that his flirting had been of an automatic nature, an attempt to add one more feather to that legendary cap of his.

The interior of the cottage was icy but Nina welcomed the bracing cold, opting not to switch on the room heater she could see standing next to the grate. Snuggling under the goose-down duvet, she gave a deep sigh and closed her eyes. Falling into a fitful sleep, she dreamt that she was a fan girl, chasing someone famous and elusive. Somehow, it was imperative that she catch up with him. When she did catch up with the tall, lean figure, he turned around and she found herself staring into a face composed of forceful features and eyes the colour of hot chocolate. And he stared back, one eyebrow raised high. _Do I know you_ , he asked, and she fell back, stifling a cry of despair. Her world came crashing about her.

Nina woke before sunrise, recalling that she'd had a disturbing dream but not able to remember the details. Unable and unwilling to go back to bed, she dressed warmly and headed out. She would find Blackie and go for a walk, this time in the other direction to the one she had taken last evening. She found the big black dog at the resort gates, being fed bread by a small bird-like woman who turned out to be The Croft's owner, Iris O'Connor. The O'Connors had been in Coonoor for more than three decades, and had been running The Croft for almost ten years now.

The two women fell into step, with Blackie – who Iris called Douglas – trotting happily just behind them. 'He turned up at the gates a few months ago. But he doesn't care to come in, however much he's cajoled,' Iris told Nina with a laugh. Nina turned to look at Blackie/Douglas, who wagged his tail as if to confirm what Iris said. This was definitely a dog with a personality.

The Croft's people, Nina discovered, were an enterprising and hardworking lot. They grew their own vegetables, churned fresh butter from the milk of the two cows they had, kept chickens for both eggs and meat and made their own preserves and cheeses, too, as Iris informed a fascinated Nina. It was a small operation; they deliberately kept their staff numbers tight, but with all shoulders to the wheel, Iris and Jimmy O'Connor managed things beautifully.

'What's more, we are probably the only biodynamic farmers up in these parts, at least so far,' Iris told Nina, who drew in a sharp breath. Did Samar Singh know of these people, she wondered and almost as if Iris O'Connor read her mind, the older woman told her artlessly, 'Do you know Samar Singh? He's a famous photographer who works in Bangalore. Well, we've known him for some years now, and he recently bought some land off Jimmy on the western side of the resort. Wants to start up a biodynamic farm project of his own, apparently.'

As Nina silently digested that piece of information, they passed a small shrine built in the Japanese style. Nina chose to change the subject and asked Iris about the shrine. 'It was built by a local architect and if you peer through the glass panes, you will find there is no idol inside, just a small diya. Hindus and Christians all stop here, bow their head for a minute and then continue with their journey. Charming concept and luckily, it has endured.'

Nina and Iris walked on to the observation point some distance ahead, and stood gazing at the rolling hills in contented silence. The big black dog was busy investigating something in the thick undergrowth. The sun cast a golden light on the hills of the eastern ridge, the western side remained shrouded in mist. The air was slowly warming up. Nina felt a sense of peace slowly settle into her.

Then Iris announced cheerfully, 'Well, it will soon be time to see to breakfast for all of you. Shall we head back?'

Nina dressed for the conference in a navy pantsuit cut sharply and stylishly, teamed with a crisp white shirt the colour of clotted cream. Breakfast was a sumptuous spread, mainly continental. There were eggs, racks of toast, freshly baked croissants, pats of creamy white butter, pots of bilberry and guava preserve, cut and peeled fruit, jugs of freshly squeezed orange juice, and steel canisters bearing steaming hot tea and coffee. This being tea country, as it were, almost everyone opted for the fragrant, tan-coloured brew.

Mr Murthy sat to one side, casting a jaundiced eye over everyone. 'Don't eat too much, you will fall asleep at the conference table,' he announced portentously to those sitting near him. One of them happened to be Sid. He caught Nina's eye, winked and then snaked out an arm for more toast. 'Pass the butter, won't you?' he asked the news ed most affably, and Nina had to stifle a giggle.

Mini was seated next to Nina. 'So,' she asked, her straight face belied by the wicked gleam in her eye, 'are you going to attend the S & M conference or are you going to spend the day with Manish Mann?'

'Oh, I rather think he'll be busy shooting all day,' Nina sweetly informed Mini. 'In which case, I might as well come to the meeting, right?'

The morning session was a lively one, with a huge turnout comprising sales and marketing people from _India!_ offices all over the country. The Bangalore office got their moment in the sun with special mentions of the Girl Child campaign as well as the Pothole Project. Nina was asked to give a brief overview of the latter venture. The Pune and Chennai offices immediately decided to adopt the Pothole Project for their respective city roads, too. As per Mr Mittal's directive, eventually all the editions of _India!_ were going to run their own versions of the Pothole Project.

When the coffee break rolled around, Nina was rather amused to find herself surrounded by quite a few staffers from upcountry _India!_ offices. 'Hmmm,' said Leena rolling a meaningful eye at Nina, when they caught up later, 'quite the centre of attention, aren't we?'

Nina didn't react. 'They wanted to know more about the way we went about our media planning for the Pothole Project,' she told Leena, who snorted. 'Really? Funny how only the men wanted to know these crucial details,' she said. Nina looked at her and smiled a glorious smile of unconcern, and Leena had to laugh.

As the two women stood there laughing, Samar Pratap Singh's silver Mercedes swept into the ivy shrouded portico of the resort. He got out from behind the wheel and went to open the passenger door. From which emerged a vision, a young woman whose face was instantly recognizable to just about everyone in the vicinity, as it was to just about everyone in the country.

'It's Tara,' breathed Mini, who had just joined the other two girls. Tara Rawal was the reigning superstar of Bollywood currently, all alabaster skin, deep dimples and legs that went on forever. Those legs were very much on show now, clad as she was in a sheer silk top paired with a killer leather skirt that was dangerously short and in the most unusual shade of mint green. Her leather boots matched the mint shade of her skirt. _How many vegetables were involved in the dyeing of that skirt and those boots_ , Nina thought sourly and rather ridiculously, even as Leena said in an enraptured tone, 'Manolos, of course.'

'And how exactly would you know that?' enquired Nina innocently. 'Friends with her dresser, are you?'

'Idjit,' replied Leena without heat. 'Anyone who reads the Filmi Gossip column in _India!_ knows that Tara wears only Manolo Blahniks. All the time.' She threw Nina a mock-challenging look. But Nina wasn't in the conversation any longer. Samar had thrown an intent glance over in their direction and Nina turned to stone, her composure temporarily deserting her. The other two girls threw her concerned looks.

Nina felt a stab of dismay when she saw Samar was actually steering Tara over to where they were. _Was he bringing the star over to flaunt her in my face_ , Nina wondered wildly. There was some activity going on behind them and turning around, they found the film crew were standing there, enjoying the morning sunshine as well as a cup of tea. Samar was taking Tara Rawal to them!

As Samar and Nina came face to face, he threw her a look, his face unrevealing, his eyes intent. She abruptly turned on her heel and walked into the conference room. Throwing him apologetic smiles, Leena and Mini followed her. People who were watching this byplay saw nothing in Samar's face except for a slight tightening of his jaw.

The session that followed was, of course, shot to hell for Nina Sabharwal. She couldn't concentrate on the PP presentations or note down the salient points raised by others. All she could think of was the stupid way she had behaved out there on the lawns. Now Samar would think she was jealous of Tara Whatsername, and he would be ever so pleased. If she was going to fall to pieces every time she saw Samar Pratap Singh, it would be better if she excused herself and left Coonoor.

Moreover, she had taken great pains to make it look as if Samar and she had broken up by mutual consent. The way she had behaved just now, _India!_ staffers would find something to gossip about for ages. Sales and marketing would wait for their editorial colleagues to finish with their separate conference down the hall to fill them up on this one. Nina winced and Dev shot her a concerned look from across the table. She shook her head reassuringly at him. If this carried on, she thought wryly, Deviah would think she was a real basket case!

Thankfully, she was not called upon to talk or even present anything; all she had to do was sit with an expression of simulated interest. Everyone had unwisely lunched a bit too well, and now they all looked distinctly heavy-eyed. Nina had developed a slight headache by the time the never-ending afternoon session wound up. Pressing a hand lightly to her left temple, she exited the conference hall, walking gracefully across the lawns, only to run into Manish Mann again. 'Hi, darling,' he greeted her. 'I'm heading for my emotional confrontation sequence. Come watch me at it?'

Nina gave a wild laugh and fled the scene, leaving Manish looking after her in a puzzled fashion. Emotional confrontations! She had had enough of them to last her a lifetime.

Now that the conference was over, it was fun and games for the _India!_ staff. They were all leaving the next day, back to their different cities, after a mandatory trip to Ooty for some shopping.

The Bangalore resident editor Alan Pereira, though, planned to drive down later tonight, after staying awhile at the formal dinner. For a moment, Nina contemplated asking if she could ride back to Bangalore with him. Beside Nina, Mini read her thoughts and pulled her aside. 'Nina Sabharwal!' Mini hissed at her. 'You can't run away like that!'

Nina hunched a pettish shoulder at Mini. 'Of course I can,' she said. 'Watch me.'

Mini said urgently, 'For how long, Nina? You can't spend all your time avoiding Samar Singh. _You_ decided to call it quits for reasons best known to you. Now act like a woman with a spine. Face the music.'

Mini was right, of course. Nina would have to find a coping strategy, till she finally left Bangalore, and India. She decided against asking Alan for a lift home.

Actually, Nina badly needed a coping strategy right now. She went along to see if she could attend the resort's in-house yoga class before dressing for dinner; luckily, she had a pair of track pants and a loose tee-shirt in her suitcase. The yoga teacher, a very short man with a long, straggly beard, was most happy to have her join the class of three. It was an arduous session, and Nina welcomed it. She felt much better as she went back to her cottage. In fact, she felt she could take on both Tara and Samar together; luckily for her, she didn't see them anywhere around. Thoughts immediately crowded her brain but she refused to contemplate where they were and if they were together. Samar would have attended the editorial conference, but that had wound up an hour ago. And he was nowhere to be seen. _So what_ , Nina asked herself in an uncharacteristically savage tone.

Dressed for dinner, she inspected herself in the cheval mirror. She had on a deep tangerine dress that fitted her like the proverbial glove, a silk one at that. She had teamed it with just one piece of jewellery, chandelier earrings of deep Mexican amber that brushed the tops of her shoulders softly. She smiled wryly down at her nude heels; the shoes may not be Manolos but they fit perfectly and looked great. Spritzing some Rive Gauche on her pulse points, she picked up her beaded purse and left the cottage, locking the door behind her carefully.

The lawns were softly lit by old Victorian lamps and also by fairy lights of gold and silver strung on the trees. The bandstand was empty as of now, and piped music issued gently from discreetly placed giant speakers. People were in huddles and, of course, the talk was all business, flowing fast and furious. Marketing was hotly debating the pros and cons of some of the group general manager's suggestions. 'Editorial will never hear of it,' someone groaned, and Nina bit back a smile. Editorial, she knew, treated the GM like an alien who had landed in the newspaper offices quite by unhappy accident and was to be treated with the bare modicum of courtesy but generally ignored. 'We need a non-journalist to tell us what news to carry and what news to drop?' the journalists scoffed. The GM did what he had to, pretending to have a much thicker skin than he did in actual fact.

Within a few minutes, the top brass entered the venue – all the editors and top honchos of the various departments of _India!_. They flashed very white smiles of fake affability all around, stopped to chat very briefly with a few staffers, then moved to their own corner, hierarchy thus firmly established. Nina watched the minions rush up to what had willy-nilly become the top table, with finger foods and tray after tray of drinks. As she circulated, stopping to chat with friends and acquaintances from the other _India!_ offices, the Kolkata resident editor stepped up to Nina to tell her, in that order, that she looked smashing and to ask if she was going to switch to editorial. No, she told him, the thought hadn't crossed her mind, she was quite happy in marketing. 'But you write very well,' he told her, his tone almost plaintive. 'I've read your feature pieces.'

The women were all dressed to the nines in both Indian dress and Western gear. Leena looked lovely in a Kerala sari, and Nina noticed her husband throwing her appreciative glances from time to time. Mini was in a dress that exposed a lot of her finely sculpted shoulders and slim arms. 'Brrr, no one told me Coonoor would be quite so cold in September,' she moaned to Nina, who smiled pitilessly at her. 'Go on, now,' she told the other girl. 'You bought this dress just so you could impress everyone at this dinner.'

Mini conceded the point and then said, 'Well, if I'm going to leave _India!_ for Tarun's paper, there really is no need to spend so much and impress people here, hmmm?' This provocative statement was typical of Mini, and Nina regarded her with a smile.

'Have you decided then?' Nina asked her. Mini shrugged and replied, 'I've given myself a deadline. And I'll start thinking about the job switch only when I'm back in Bangalore. I'm here to have a good time.'

Nina opened her mouth to ask something, then prudently closed it. But Mini threw her a wry glance. 'Have I talked it over with Raj? Yes, I have. He's okay with whatever I choose to do.'

The band set up and started to play some upbeat tunes and people were soon out on the wooden dance floor. Nina was dancing with Dev when she heard a buzz at the steps leading down to the lawns. Turning, she saw Tara Rawal standing on the top step, resplendent in a one-shouldered crimson gown and flanked by two gorgeous hunks, Manish Mann and Samar Singh. _Pity the paps aren't here_ , Nina thought sourly, then resolutely turned back to Dev. But a fine thread of tension was starting to unfurl inside her.

Would Samar Singh approach her? This time she was determined to be civil. But it was Manish who came up when Nina got off the floor. 'Get you a drink?' he asked, simultaneously snapping his fingers imperiously at a passing waiter. Nina laughed as he put a glass of champagne in her hand. 'What?' he asked her. 'I got you a drink, that's all.'

'What are we celebrating, Manish?' Nina asked.

'We are celebrating pack-up, my dear girl,' he replied. 'It was one of the most arduous shoots of my career. But wait for the film: it will put me firmly in the number one slot.'

'Oh, and here I thought you just didn't believe in or play the numbers game,' Nina told him, opening her eyes wide.

Manish's mouth twisted. 'Yeah, right,' he told her. 'Me and the whole of Bollywood. But Tara's done a terrific job, too. She plays a widow getting a second chance at life and at love.' Smiling an unselfconsciously complacent smile, he then told Nina, 'A pile of awards coming our way, Tara's and mine.' And Nina had to laugh again.

They turned to watch Tara, who was chatting animatedly to a group of completely star-struck journalists, her hand firmly in the crook of Samar Singh's arm. Nina looked at him hungrily. He was looking decidedly dishy in a chocolate brown suit cut in a manner that suggested bespoke tailoring. His sexual impact was now overlaid by all that had happened between them, and Nina felt very low for a second.

Striving for a casual tone, she asked Manish, 'How do those two know each other?'

He said, 'Who? Samar and Tara? They both belong to Jaipur or Jaisalmer, or some such place in Rajasthan. Samar did her a special favour and shot her portfolio back when Tara was a model, and he has been looking out for her ever since.'

_I bet he has_ , Nina thought coldly. Her mind flashed on the ways Samar Singh could take care of Tara. In ways she, Nina, did not want to imagine.

However, Nina had herself well in hand when Samar did come up to her later in the evening. People were curiously watching while pretending not to. She smiled a neutral smile, her mind racing furiously, her mouth dry, and he shot her a sardonic look. They stood looking at each other for a fraught minute.

Samar spoke first, in an even tone that did not match his smouldering eyes. 'I heard about your car going into a pothole. That must have been harrowing.'

There was no doubt about it, his concern was very real and it nearly did Nina in. But she was not going to let this smooth player get under her skin any longer. Her moments of weakness were over.

'Yes, that was a bad time. Luckily, Devaiah came to my rescue, a real knight in shining armour. You know Dev, don't you?' she asked, gesticulating vaguely to a knot of sales and marketing people standing at the edge of the lawns.

Samar looked down at her broodingly. She looked stunning in that dress, her hair backlit by the party lights to look like some kind of glorious halo, her eyes shining. And cold. Her earrings dangled tantalizingly from her ears; he wanted to bend down, remove one of them and nibble softly at her lobes, the way he had often done in the not-so-distant past. He wanted to bend down and trail kisses on her silky smooth skin, all along her collarbone. Damn, but he wanted to do a lot... including punching that silly ass Manish Mann in the face. The way the man had been holding Nina on the dance floor had been positively outrageous.

For the life of him, Samar Singh couldn't fathom just why Nina Sabharwal was giving him the big freeze. But it was clear that she felt strongly about something, and was just not prepared to talk about that something with him. Over the past ten days, he had wished he could just consign the whole Nina dilemma to the devil and be done with it. But he just couldn't and that was the problem.

Heart hammering so loud she was sure he could hear it, Nina stared away, pretending to watch the dancers with a lot of interest. And then she remembered and looked up at him.

'I heard your aunt was unwell. How is she now?'

'Yes, Hemant was in hospital with a ruptured appendix. But she's a tough old girl and is recovering very well now.' Nina could hear the very real affection in his voice. If he remembered how he had rushed to Delhi without even informing Nina, he wasn't showing any remorse.

Apparently tired of making polite conversation, Samar asked Nina, 'Dance?' The tone was so arrogant that Nina wanted to slap that handsome face of his.

She shook her head. 'No,' she told him, not meeting his eyes. 'I'm feeling a bit tired.'

He shrugged and smiled coldly. 'Well then,' he told her, 'let me go find someone who _will_ dance with me.' And then he walked away, away from her. She watched him go, a smile on her lips, the pain in her heart not reflected on her tranquil face.

Nina headed to the banquet table with the idea of grabbing a quick bite, more for a convincing show of normality than anything else, before retiring for the night. Unlike the food on offer at breakfast, the dinner menu was entirely Indian, and south Indian at that. There were dosa stations, there were frilly-bordered appams with a side accompaniment of chicken stew, there was platters of fragrant white and red rice as well as a host of local delicacies made from locally grown vegetables, and there were at least three different bean dishes, another very popular local staple. The dessert table held gulab jamun, payasam, the impossibly sweet Mysore Pak and incongruously enough, large vats of ice cream, too. There were people from all over the country and the O'Connors were clearly catering to all tastes.

Nina had lost her appetite long ago, but Mini joined her now and under the other girl's watchful stare, she helped herself to some food, trying not to peck listlessly at it. A few minutes later, she gave up.

'Not really having fun, are you?' asked Mini sympathetically, and suddenly Nina found tears close to the surface. 'Not really,' she said, attempting a smile. 'I'll slip away now. Tell Manish bye from me.'

She made a discreet exit and wound her way back to her cottage. The pitch darkness was alleviated somewhat by the rather dim glow of the hunting lodge lamp that was affixed to the cottage wall. As she stood fumbling with the key in the lock, trying to unlock the door, she heard someone come up behind her. Even before she turned, she knew who it was.

Samar came up to Nina and just as she turned, caught her up in one smooth motion, locking his mouth onto hers. It was a hot and urgent kiss, his lips determined to wring a response from her. She could feel his heart crashing against his rib cage beneath the fine white dress shirt he had on. But she remained stiff and unresponsive, cold as stone. His mouth gentled after a while, but still there was no response from her. Eventually, he lifted his head.

'So,' Samar said bleakly, 'this is it, then. You really are dumping me, aren't you, Nina Sabharwal?'

Nina thought back to what Mini had told her a few days earlier, quoting a popular saying, often heard in Hindi films. _Dil mein patthar rakhna_. Placing a stone on your heart. That was what she needed to do. For her own good.

'You still haven't got it? Don't pester me, Samar,' she said, enunciating each word clearly and coldly, and Samar Singh went white. She knew she had effectively pushed him away with those words. Samar was too proud a man to chase after someone who was not interested in him.

They stared at each other for a long moment, the air charged with both electricity and animosity. And then, Samar spun on his heel and walked away from Nina. And this time too she watched him go with an aching heart, tears prickling at her eyelids.

Much later that night, she sat at the window alcove, staring out with unseeing eyes at the thick white mist that obliterated everything outside. As Samar Singh had said, that then was that. Except Nina didn't think she could continue to stay on in Bangalore and see him every day. She would have to leave. She would have to go back home. And try to start over.
FOURTEEN

THE DAY DAWNED AND predictably enough, it was another grey, sunless morning. There were patches of frost on the small piece of lawn in front of the ground floor apartment that Sue and Nina shared. Nina stood at the picture window, staring out at the bare and stark black outline of the trees in the compound. No leaves, no flowers, no colour. London this morning looked as bleak as Nina felt inside. The silence of an early winter was suffocating.

She hadn't slept well, but most nights now she wasn't sleeping well. Nina's head told her she had made the right decision but she was still quite a long way away from making her heart accept that decision. It was a little better when Sue was around; they tried their hand at some new dish, they watched a favourite TV show, they fine-tuned the master plan for Sue's and Adam's upcoming wedding. They did everything but talk of Samar Pratap Singh. All the Sabharwal women were possessed of an innate reluctance to wear their emotions on their sleeves, leave alone let those emotions run riot. As long as Nina didn't look as if she were wilting from blighted love, and that she certainly did not, Susan was content to let matters be. After those late night phone calls from Bangalore, Sue knew just how seriously her sister had fallen for Samar, but she was a pragmatic girl and firmly believed that time would make that crucial difference.

If only Nina could buy into that concept herself. It had been three weeks now since she had returned home. _India!_ had allowed her to cut short her stint with the Bangalore office and return to London. Back home, she had chosen to work on her book rather than go find a job, and she found the writing slow going, even frustrating at times. But she went over to the Cotswolds to visit her mother twice, she went for the occasional drink with friends. For all intents and purposes, she had picked up where she had left off her London life.

Some days, Nina managed to fool even herself. Other days, she faced up to the fact that she had left a piece of her heart behind in India, in Bangalore. Oh, she would get on without it, but life would never be quite the same. Samar Singh was not Nina Sabharwal's first love, but he was quite definitely her most serious love. And there it was.

There were other things she missed. She missed Bangalore's balmy winter, she missed the sight of the tabebuia and laburnum trees shedding their blush pink and sunshine yellow blossoms. She missed sitting at her dining table, gazing out on the neem and gulmohur trees just outside, sipping her coffee, a fragrant blend of chicory and coffee beans.

She missed Samar.

She closed her eyes and saw him clearly, like he was imprinted on the inside of her eyelids. The sharp jut of his cheekbone, the chiselled slant of his jawline, the way he flexed it when tense or angry. Those devilishly arched eyebrows, one forever raised in humorous query. Those eyes the colour of molten chocolate, eyes that you could drown most happily in. The deep dimple in his cheek. The fine line of his mouth, that slow sexy smile. The way he kissed.

Drawing in a sharp breath that actually hurt, Nina opened her eyes. Only to see Samar Singh outside her small gate. This was nonsense; had she conjured him up on the sheer strength of her need to see him?

But no, Samar was paying off the cab and lifting the metal hinge of the gate. He was dressed for the weather, in a beautifully cut duffle coat that kept the cold out and in style, at that. The wind momentarily lifted a strand of his hair and he impatiently smoothed it back. Nina's heart stopped at that familiar gesture and she felt a wave of love roil inside her.

The doorbell rang, and then Nina knew this was no dream. Taking a deep breath and calling for her usual calm, she went to the door and opened it.

Samar Singh stared at her. He did his level best not to stare like a man who had been starved of this particular sight. Because he had been starved, there was no doubt about that. She was looking as lovely as ever, dressed in a roomy pair of brown corduroy pants that he recognized, with a thick chambray shirt in cream and brown checks over it. She was wearing thick virulent purple woollen socks, and he felt a moment of tenderness as he glanced down. Her hair was caught up in a knot and there were the usual irresistible curls framing her oval face. He also noticed the faint shadows beneath the blue eyes.

He curled his fists and attempted a neutral tone. 'Good morning, Nina,' he said, for all the world as if he was a casual visitor.

But for some reason Nina wasn't playing. 'Samar,' she said, her voice carrying the faintest undertone of uncertainty. Just 'Samar.' She didn't greet him. She didn't invite him in, either, so Samar decided to take matters into his own hands.

'May I come in?' he asked with a pleasant smile.

Her blue eyes were locked onto his face. 'Yes, of course,' she murmured, opening the door wider, and Samar entered the front room, immediately owning the space. His swift glance took in the airy room done up in soft greys and blues. He took off his overcoat, looked around, then hung it on the peg behind the door. After which he turned to Nina and simply stood there, hands in the pockets of his beautifully cut grey gabardine trousers, feet well apart, rocking back lightly on his heels.

They looked at each other, all barriers up and firmly in place, for what seemed to be an interminably long while. Then Nina remembered her manners, and asked politely, 'Will you have coffee?'

Samar shook his head. The silence stretched between them, becoming heavy with something intangible. Finally, Nina felt compelled to ask, 'What are you doing here, Samar?'

It was as if he had been waiting for her to ask. Relaxing visibly, Samar moved to the deep couch and sat down in one fluid gesture.

'I had business in London,' he told her evenly. 'A new photo series for Nat Geo's UK edition. And then I wanted to meet you, Nina. Because we have unfinished business.'

Nina could hear her heartbeat thudding heavily in her ears. 'We do?' she found herself asking Samar. Then she shook her head. 'We don't, Samar. We had, to put it plainly, an affair. It was good while it lasted but it is over.'

And then, feeling particularly vicious, she asked him, 'What's the matter, Samar? Never been dumped before?'

Samar Singh's eyes flashed. He opened his mouth to say something, then thought better of it. He smiled, a slightly feral smile.

'Oh, I've been dumped before as you so elegantly put it, Nina,' he told her, almost purring the words out. 'But I've never been dumped without good reason.'

He leaned forward, linking his hands. 'There's something about you and me, about us, which has been troubling me. I thought what we had was going well. What I want to know is, just why did you call it quits? I want you to look me in the eye and tell me just why we are over.'

Their eyes met and held, cold brown clashing with cautious blue. Samar continued to speak in a conversational tone.

'I met Jenny Hamilton the other evening. She seemed to feel that I was two-timing you. I don't know if I was more surprised or angry to hear that.'

Now he got off the sofa in one seamless motion and moved over to where Nina stood rooted to the spot. His voice low and steady, he asked, 'Just who was I cheating on you with, Nina? Did you really believe that?'

He was angry, very angry. Nina immediately understood that whatever Jenny had hinted at, it had cut deep with Samar. He prided himself on being an honourable man, that much Nina knew; not for him the petty cheating and lying other men indulged in. Even as she completed that thought, she realized that Samar Singh had not been two-timing her. She had used the unknown woman incident as an excuse to end something which she realized was going nowhere and worse, would leave her utterly vulnerable and heartbroken.

Nina was in a dilemma. If she mentioned the woman in his flat, he would clear the air... and then what? Did they go back to being lovers in bed and casual friends outside it? No, Nina couldn't bear that, wouldn't bear that, not any more.

And then, even as she was casting about in her mind for something definitive to say, Samar took a deep breath and spoke.

'I can't do without you, Nina,' he said hoarsely. Nina's head whipped up. She stared at him, confused. Had he really said that? Did his eyes actually have the sheen of tears? Then he continued, on a very real note of despair that she just could not miss, 'But I suspect you can do very well without me.'

He spun away, his back to her, staring out of the large windows. Nina stared at his ramrod straight back, her lips quivering. He really loved her! He had come all the way to London to tell her that, despite having a very real conviction that she would spurn him in her cold English manner, the manner he had often teased her about in the past. Samar was a proud man, and he had just lowered his defences.

She moved swiftly, sliding her arms around his slender waist, feeling him tense. 'Darling,' she breathed tremulously, 'I adore you. I can't live a moment without you. I tried hard to these past months and much good it did me.' She laid her head gently on his shoulder blades, breathing in the very male, very Samar scent of him.

Samar turned swiftly, crushing her to him so hard she couldn't breathe. Putting a finger under her chin, he lifted her face up and stared searchingly into her eyes. His eyes still held a trace of vulnerability. There was a time to drop her natural reserve and Nina knew this was it. Letting all her love show in her eyes, she linked her arms behind his head and drew his mouth down to hers.

They kissed like they had never kissed before, seeking each other's mouths desperately, their lips conveying the depth of their emotions. Eventually though, they had to come up for air.

'Do you know what you put me through these last few months?' demanded Samar. 'You were fast developing the personality of a porcupine, my darling. A cold reserved English porcupine,' he told her, his voice full of laughter.

Nina reached up and kissed the side of his jaw lovingly. 'I thought you didn't love me,' she told him.

The eyebrow flew up. 'Didn't love you? You have an appallingly short memory, my love. I distinctly remember telling you I loved you, at least twice.'

Nina stared into his eyes, wondering if she could risk telling him that she had doubted the very nature of that love. It would keep for later, she decided. Nestling closer, she told him with mock severity, 'Don't let's move away from the subject. Who was the tart in your arms?'

He raised a genuinely puzzled eyebrow. Keeping it admirably brief, Nina told him about her impromptu visit to his apartment, and the scene she had chanced upon.

Samar threw back his head and laughed. 'Ah, so Jenny was right. I'll thank you not to call my friend a tart; that was Meera Thomas. She lives abroad, and was in town on a short visit.'

Nina digested the fact, then decided to ask the crucial question anyway. 'Yes but why were you standing so dashed close to the woman? You looked like you were about to kiss her!'

'About to kiss Meera?' Samar looked astonished. 'I wasn't about to kiss Meera! Meera is married to a good friend of mine, Cherian Thomas. I don't go around kissing other men's wives!'

His outrage was genuine, but Nina had to clear her Meera-doubt once and for all. 'I've heard about Meera. And you,' she told Samar, her voice troubled. 'She asked for a transfer away from Bangalore when you broke up with her.'

He looked astounded again, then a cold smile of understanding curled his lips. 'That was the _India!_ gossip, was it?' he asked her in a biting tone. Nina didn't tell him it was Jenny who had mentioned Meera to her. She looked steadily up at him, not saying a word.

His customary air of cold hauteur was stealing up on him. Nina watched in despair. Now he wouldn't talk to her, not about Meera at least. But Samar realized what was happening and taking Nina's hands in his lean ones, led her back to the sofa.

'Nina, my darling, I have never ever dated Meera. But yes, we hung out a lot together, Meera, Cherian and me. Then Cherian was transferred to Kolkata and Meera's office was not giving her a transfer to join him. She was in a job she really enjoyed doing, a job that paid well but she was ready to chuck it all up and go to Kolkata. Eventually, her bosses realized they would lose a great event manager and gave her the transfer. Cherian and Meera now live in the US.'

He leaned in further and nibbled hungrily at the corner of Nina's mouth. 'I'm fond of Meera. Fond, that's all. What made you think she and I were—'

Nina cut in self-consciously, 'I saw you with her. Something about the way you were looking at her hassled me...'

Samar's face had an expression that said he had worked that fact out already. He quirked one eyebrow. 'And?' he asked gently, already guessing the answer.

Nina looked down at their entwined hands. 'I saw you with her and ran away.'

'And proceeded to break us up.' The tone was matter-of-fact and Nina stole a quick glance from beneath her lashes at his face. His face wore a deadpan expression but his eyes were gleaming. Was he angry? Well, she would just have to risk it; he needed to know the truth. No more half-truths and evasions. If they were to make a fresh start, they needed to be totally honest with each other.

'It wasn't just her, Samar. And it wasn't Karishma, either. It was not about other women, it was about us. I realized we didn't have the healthiest of relationships. We were dating exclusively but we weren't really talking, were we? I didn't know you left town till after you left town. Not once, but time and again. And that was just one of the many things I didn't know. I didn't know when you had family over. I...'

Samar laid one long, lean finger on her lips. 'I'm sorry,' he told her, looking slightly uncomfortable now. 'I had time to reflect on just what went wrong. You see, I got together with you without too many expectations, then soon realized I'd got in way too deep. And I like to be in control, all the time. So I was fighting myself unwittingly.'

Nina stared at him lovingly. Who was the real Samar Pratap Singh? The man who went through life with a suave smile on his lips, refused to let others glimpse into his inner self with any vulnerabilities that might be lurking in there? His life had shaped him to shoulder responsibilities early on and the habit of sharing feelings did not come easy to him. It was as if he had figured that he could get things done most of the time quietly, efficiently, without fuss. And so he didn't see the need to put his head down, even momentarily, on someone else's shoulder, leave alone that of the woman he loved. Those Samar loved, he protected. Now he would have to learn to confide, to share, to reveal the chinks in his armour, and to know that it was okay to do so.

Samar continued in a serious tone. 'How about you, darling?'

Nina looked startled. 'Me? What about me?' she asked. He lifted her hands to his mouth and dropped feather-light kisses on her palms. She sighed happily.

Looking straight into her eyes, Samar continued, 'You are the most self-contained girl I have ever known. Never for a minute do you let anyone see what you are feeling. It is as if you can cope with anything that is thrown at you. You didn't once come and ask me about Meera, did you? Instead, you distanced yourself like a true-blue Englishwoman, and then came away.'

Nina was about to remind him that she wasn't a true-blue Englishwoman, at least not completely, but Samar went on.

'And remember, I heard you tell Alan you were in this relationship just for kicks!'

At that, Nina felt she had to register a protest. 'Never for kicks! I don't use that kind of language.'

Samar looked impatient. 'Well, you know what I mean.'

Nina did know what he meant. Who was the real Nina Sabharwal, she mused. A girl who seemed imbued with preternatural calm, who went through life with an air of serenity? To a large extent, that calm, that serenity _was_ Nina. But there was a part of her that shied away from conflict, scenes. Nina was not really a risk-taker, and if staying in her cocoon meant playing safe, well, so be it. Now she would have to learn to be a little more demonstrative, to wear her love on her sleeve and let the man she loved know how completely, unreservedly, she loved him.

Fear of losing control, that was what they both had. That was what both of them would have to work on.

Nina looked earnestly at him. 'Samar, I knew by then that I was in love with you. But I didn't know if you were serious, and I quite definitely didn't want Alan speculating.' Then on a note of complaint, she added, 'I still want to know one thing: why were you holding Meera so close?'

Samar looked amused. 'You know me, I'm a touchy-feely, hands-on kind of man, that's what I am.' Even as he spoke, his hands were moving purposefully to the pearl buttons of her shirt, in a very touchy-feely manner indeed.

But Nina had never met a man less touchy-feely than the reserved Samar Singh. She snorted. 'Hands-on kind of man, huh? Well, from now I want your hands only on me, Samar Pratap Singh.'

'Done, baby, done,' he murmured and she suddenly realized his attention had wandered. He was staring at the neckline of her soft shirt which had fallen open, exposing the swell of one creamy breast. The tenor of his breathing altered, deepened. 'Are you warm enough in that thing?' he asked, brushing the top of her breast with the back of his fingers. Nina shivered pleasurably.

'And if I say I'm not warm enough?' she asked him softly, throwing him a teasing glance from behind thick lashes. Samar paused in his action of pushing her shirt off her shoulders and looked into her eyes, a slow and sexy smile widening his mouth.

'Ah, then we must get you warm now, mustn't we? We must get you positively hot, in fact.' In one swift movement, he gently pushed her down full length on the deep couch, and his lean muscled body came down beside hers. His hands slid knowingly, familiarly, intimately beneath her pants to caress the soft skin of her upper thigh. Desire spiked through her, devouring her like a fast-moving flame. Pushing apart her shirt, he saw the lavender scraps of lace that was her bra and smiled a smile of pure male appreciation. Looking into her eyes, he stroked her breast. She caught her breath and his hand became urgent.

'Darling...' he said huskily.

'What?' she asked him, her face very flushed, her hands feverishly tearing his shirt open. It had been so long, too long. But Samar suddenly stilled, lifting his head from her breast.

'Where is your sister? At work?' he asked.

Nina smiled the smile of a satisfied feline. She slanted a significant look through her vivid blue eyes at him, leaned into him and trailed kisses down his throat, nibbled at the muscle that jumped to life there.

'She won't be back for a while. She's in Bangalore with Adam.'

Samar smiled. He moved her under him in one smooth gesture. 'So we have all the time in the world?' he asked her.

Nina smiled up at him with her heart in her eyes. 'Yes, my dearest,' she told him. 'We have all our lives.'
EPILOGUE

IT WAS ANOTHER BALMY autumn in Bangalore. Nina Singh woke up to bright slats of sunlight slashing the bedroom. She stretched lazily; she could hear the shower in the bathroom and knew Samar was back after his morning run. Across from the bed on the opposite wall hung a striking black and white portrait of Nina, taken by Samar. It was a candid shot; Nina had not even known he was clicking her as she sat on the Karwar white-sand beach, her legs drawn up, knees tucked under her chin, gazing out over the water.

It was almost ten months since they had got married. It had been a grand wedding in the desert town of Jaisalmer. Samar had looked dashing in full Rajput regalia, with a jewelled turban, and a scimitar at his waist, and Nina had loved the inky blue of her own lehnga, with heavy gold zardosi embroidery at the hem, to match her dupatta. Her wedding attire had been chosen by her mother-in-law, Yashodara Singh. Both Anne and Susan Sabharwal had also most happily got into what they called 'costume' for Nina's wedding, and both had looked very good in their finery.

Sue and Anne had taken to Samar almost immediately. For all of Anne's natural dignity, she was quite susceptible to a handsome man's undeniable charm, and even more so when that handsome man was her new son-in-law. Anne's own love story went over big in her late husband's country. She had fallen in love with the young, very handsome Indian doctor who had come to live in Armscote, had furtively dated and eventually married Prem Sabharwal under the disapproving eyes of her parents, moved to London with him and set about proving all the doomsday prophets who decried their mixed marriage wrong.

Susan had surprised them all, even herself. She had always been a little more forthright, a little less tactful than Anne. Fixing Samar with a deadly look from her cornflower-blue eyes, she had declared, not entirely keeping the accusation out of her voice, 'You gave my sister some bad moments.' There had been a moment when everyone around froze, then Samar had smiled a disarming smile. 'Not half as bad as the bad moments she gave me, I assure you,' he'd said. After which, they had proceeded to get along like a house on fire, her sister and her husband.

There had been a church wedding in Bangalore on Alan and Sita's insistence. Alan had given Nina away, and Sue, Leena and Mini had been her bridesmaids. As she had walked up the aisle to Samar, dapper in a sharp dress suit, with her favourite flower, a white carnation in his buttonhole, he had suddenly turned and looked straight at her and the old sizzle had burst into fresh flame, leading at least a handful of women present to sigh loudly and audibly. Then there were receptions, in the magnificent Jaisalmer fort, in New Delhi and of course in Bangalore, too. Nina got a clear indication of just how well connected her in-laws were when she saw the turnout at the reception in the capital; there were Rajput royals, politicians, bureaucrats, film stars, activists, all kinds of shakers and movers. Both Manish Mann and Tara Rawal had been invited, and had attended.

The wedding celebrations had become a formidable show with several acts for Nina. But any time she started feeling out of her depth, before she could even contemplate an attack of nerves, she got a clear indication of just what kind of a caring man Samar was. Each time she felt a little lost or overwhelmed, she looked up and found her husband at her side, smiling encouragingly at her, reaching out a tender hand to tuck a stray curl behind her ear, saying something to her in a low voice that would have her laughing and blushing at the same time.

Karishma Jhala had been present at both the Delhi and Bangalore receptions. She had come with a young psychiatrist from the same facility she worked in, and had stayed out of Nina's way after giving her a cold smile and colder congratulations, handing over a large gift-wrapped package. Another large package had arrived from Philadelphia, bearing the names of Meera and Cherian Thomas. Nina didn't know whether she was relieved or sorry that Meera couldn't be there on her wedding day.

'One ex-girlfriend is all I can take,' she informed Samar, shooting him an innocent look. At which, he had taken great pains to make her see that she was the only woman in his life, a process which left Nina thoroughly satisfied on that point, if rather out of breath.

Before Nina and Samar got married, there had been Susan Sabharwal and Adam Pereira's wedding in Bangalore. Sue had made the most beautiful bride ever, and both Nina and Anne had gotten more than a little teary at the wedding. After a honeymoon in Bali, both of them were now back in London. Nina and Samar had chosen to spend a week in Coonoor for their own honeymoon, staying at The Croft, walking over to Samar's piece of land and making plans for the farm that would come up there.

Since their own marriage, Samar and she had made two trips out to Delhi. Nina was slowly getting to know her in-laws better. She had quite warmed to Samar's sister, Rani. Rani had the same easy manner as her brother and the same striking good looks, too. Rani's husband, Rajvir, was a Rajput and came off looking and sounding stiff and starchy till one got to know him. In actual fact, he had a great sense of humour.

Yashodara Singh now was a different matter. She was friendly, most cordial to her daughter-in-law but there was this invisible line and Nina knew it would take time to cross that barrier. Hemant Jamwal was not easily won over, either. She felt she was on some sort of test, Hemant's eyes following her every move.

'How old are you?' Hemant asked Nina once, out of the blue. She caught Samar's laughing eye. 'Twenty-six,' she told Hemant. _How old does she think I am_ , Nina thought a bit indignantly to herself, and had to endure Samar's merciless teasing when they were alone.

'Once Samar's time with _India!_ is up, will you move back with him to Delhi and find something to do here?' Hemant asked her another day. Nina wondered fleetingly whether Yashodara Singh was putting Hemant up to these questions, but knew that her mother-in-law was not that sort of woman. When Yasho Singh wanted to know something, she would ask.

Then again, Nina knew something that Samar hadn't told his mother or aunt yet. After his Bangalore stint, he planned to take up a one-year documentary project in the United Kingdom. They planned to make London their base. Nina would finish her book while Samar went around the countryside with his crew. Then there was the matter of the farm in Coonoor. However, Delhi would definitely be their home sometime in the future and Nina looked forward to that.

'Of course,' she told Hemant, smiling at her. The older woman met Nina's clear-eyed gaze and saw something there which satisfied her, because she fell silent. And then piped up with, 'What good-looking children the two of you will have.' Laughing, Nina had looked over at Samar, blushing furiously at the expression in his eyes.

Both Yasho and Hemant looked up to Samar and their adulation, Nina realized, was something of a double-edged sword. It put him on an impossibly high pedestal, it didn't give quarter for any failings he might have and it also made impossible demands on him, sometimes in the most insidious of ways. But now Samar had Nina beside him, ready to rescue him from anything he might need rescuing from! Both Yasho and Nina were the calm, unflappable sort, and already recognized and appreciated that quality in each other. In time, they could and would become good friends.

Time would do the trick and time was something she had to work on strengthening her relationship with Samar, with his family. In the meantime, Nina had joined spoken-Hindi classes and was finding it fairly easy and interesting to pick up more of the one language that worked for virtually most of this large and diverse country.

Her reverie was interrupted by Samar who came out of the bathroom wrapped in a large white towel. She gazed at his superbly muscled torso and all traces of sleep fled. Unbidden, Jenny's remark on Samar holding the trademark on sex appeal slipped into Nina's head, and she gave a gurgle of laughter. Samar came up to the bed and gave her a curling smile, quirking an eyebrow.

'What's so funny?' he asked, taking in the sleep-tousled perfection of his wife in the bed. Nina shook her head in reply, smiling up at him.

'I'll be back from Mumbai only by the middle of next week,' he told her. 'Will you be okay?'

'Yes, darling, I'll be fine,' she told him, sliding to the edge of the bed and running her hand lazily along his calf. The muscle under her hand immediately clenched in response and she laughed. Then, looking up, she told him, 'Mini wants me to go baby-clothes shopping with her. That will take all of this week, I'm sure.'

Mini had quit _India!_ to join her ex-boyfriend Tarun Bhat's news magazine and had settled into the job most comfortably. Not prepared to risk a repeat of their formerly tumultuous relationship with many a quarrel and many a separation, Tarun Bhat now treated her with the right amount of distance and respect. And in the meantime, Mini and Raj were all set to start a family.

Nina suddenly realized that she had been idly running her hand up and down Samar's thigh under the towel. He stood perfectly still, watching her, his eyes gleaming like molten cinnamon. And then as if he couldn't stand it any longer, he bent to kiss her, parting her mouth urgently like it had been ages since they had kissed.

'Time for my second workout of the day,' Samar told her wickedly. Not taking his mouth off of Nina's, he whipped off the sheet covering her, and covered her slender body with his hard muscled one. Still in one fluid motion, he took her arms and pinned them with his own above her head. Nina gave a gasp, then closed her eyes and fell into the sweet, blind heat of passion. Just before he took her, Samar Singh told her in a low urgent voice, 'I love you, Nina.' It was a vow he took often, in bed and out of it. Nina smiled at him, her heart in her eyes. 'I love you, too, Samar. Forever and always.'
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thank you, Karthika V.K., for immediate recall of manuscript when accosted at a Bangalore book launch. I really liked it, you said, and I floated on air for the rest of the evening.

Thank you, Bidisha Ganguly, for being the point-person on aforementioned manuscript, as well as for the frequent handouts of much appreciated hope.

Thank you, Manasi Subramaniam, your enthusiasm was most infectious.

Thank you, Sohini Basak, my amazing editor, and sorry for confounding you with the ever-changing eye colour of my heroine! It was a pleasure working with you.

And then, thank you, Charlotte Lamb, queen among romance writers. Her __ books combine red-hot romance with substantial slice-of-life stories and she is the reason this diehard cynic has tried her hand at crafting a romance.

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Celebrating 25 Years of Great Publishing

HarperCollins India celebrates its twenty-fifth anniversary in 2017. Twenty-five years of publishing India's finest writers and some of its most memorable books – those you cannot put down; ones you want to finish reading yet don't want to end; works you can read over and over again only to fall deeper in love with.

Through the years, we have published writers from the Indian subcontinent, and across the globe, including Aravind Adiga, Kiran Nagarkar, Amitav Ghosh, Jhumpa Lahiri, Manu Joseph, Anuja Chauhan, Upamanyu Chatterjee, A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, Shekhar Gupta, M.J. Akbar, Satyajit Ray, Gulzar, Surender Mohan Pathak and Anita Nair, amongst others, with approximately 200 new books every year and an active print and digital catalogue of more than 1,000 titles, across ten imprints. Publishing works of various genres including literary fiction, poetry, mind body spirit, commercial fiction, journalism, business, self-help, cinema, biographies – all with attention to quality, of the manuscript and the finished product – it comes as no surprise that we have won every major literary award including the Man Booker Prize, the Sahitya Akademi Award, the DSC Prize, the Hindu Literary Prize, the MAMI Award for Best Writing on Cinema, the National Award for Best Book on Cinema, the Crossword Book Award, and the Publisher of the Year, twice, at Publishing Next in Goa and, in 2016, at Tata Literature Live, Mumbai.

We credit our success to the people who make us who we are, and will be celebrating this anniversary with: our authors, retailers, partners, readers and colleagues at HarperCollins India. Over the years, a firm belief in our promise and our passion to deliver only the very best of the printed word has helped us become one of India's finest in publishing. Every day we endeavour to deliver bigger and better – for you.

Thank you for your continued support and patronage.
About the Book

'THE KISS CAUGHT FIRE, GROWING MORE
URGENT, MORE INTIMATE,
ITS TENOR CHANGING RAPIDLY AS THEIR
MOUTHS FUSED AND CLUNG.'

They make each other breathless. Their kisses are dangerous.
Their chemistry is simply off the charts.

Samar Pratap Singh and Nina Sabharwal can't seem to keep their hands off each other. Yet, they don't quite trust each other either: he thinks she's eyeing bigger fish, she's convinced he's a heartbreaker. They have both decided that falling in love is simply not an option – no strings attached is how they roll. Only, the fact that they have to see each other at work every day makes situations stickier, and the more their lives become intertwined, the more they realize that love – a real and lasting love – is just a leap of faith away. But will they make that leap? Can they?
About the Author

**Sheila Kumar** is an independent writer and manuscript editor, as well as author of a collection of short stories titled _Kith and Kin_. On a more personal note, she has a dual personality: there is SK, the rock music-loving, tai chi-practising free spirit and there is Mrs Kumar, the colonel's wife, all chiffon and pearls. Sheila Kumar has given up trying to integrate the two.

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First published in India in 2017 by Harlequin

An imprint of HarperCollins _Publishers_

Copyright © Sheila Kumar 2017

P-ISBN: 978-93-5264-414-8
Epub Edition © May 2017 ISBN: 978-93-5264-415-5

2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1

Sheila Kumar asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

This is a work of fiction and all characters and incidents described in this book are the product of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under The Copyright Act, 1957. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins _Publishers_ India.

Cover design **Divya Saxena**
Cover image **iStock**

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# Table of Contents

  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Dedication
  4. Table of Contents
  5. ONE
  6. TWO
  7. THREE
  8. FOUR
  9. FIVE
  10. SIX
  11. SEVEN
  12. EIGHT
  13. NINE
  14. TEN
  15. ELEVEN
  16. TELVE
  17. THIRTEEN
  18. FOURTEEN
  19. _Epilogue_
  20. _Acknowledgements_
  21. _About the Book_
  22. _About the Author_
  23. Copyright

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaBook