The Indian Tycoon's Marriage Deal (12 page)

‘You don't know me well enough to know what I want,' she said through gritted teeth. ‘I am not the kind of woman you're used to.'

Krish didn't move a muscle, but she was aware of everything about him—every breath he took, the passion-drenched look in his eyes, the male scent of him and the husky edge to his voice as his tone sharpened. ‘What kind of woman would that be?'

Maya took a deep breath. ‘The kind you bring here to enjoy your dirty little weekends.'

His reaction came hard and fast. ‘Bloody hell!' Krish cursed angrily. ‘You think that's why I have brought you here?'

But, before she could retort, he strode towards her and pulled her up to him, squashing her to his chest and leaving her breathless. She couldn't pull her gaze away from his dark eyes.

‘Let's get two things very clear. One: I don't believe in forcing a woman into providing sexual favours. Two: I have never brought anyone—man, woman or child—here. This was my mother's private retreat and it has stayed that way. You're the only person—apart from my mother and me—who's been here.'

‘I…It's just that you are so secretive about it.'

His eyes were like blazing-hot coals. ‘Not secretive, just protective—especially when it involves my mother's memory. Much as I would like to, I can't forget the fact that certain people caused her so much distress and turned her into a figure of ridicule in the media. She could have had her say—demolished all of them publicly—but she chose not to. She was too dignified and detested public displays of emotion. But eventually the speculation, ridicule, gossip…destroyed her.'

Maya was aghast. ‘And you thought I would go to the media with some scandalous story?'

He gave her a hard look, dragging his fingers through his hair. ‘It's been done before.'

‘You really
are
paranoid!'

‘You would be too…if you found your schoolmates poring over salacious titbits in the papers about your father and his latest squeeze.'

‘Oh!' Anything she said would be grossly inadequate.

‘It was worse for my mother. Especially after Monica came into the picture. She flaunted every little detail about her affair with KD in the media. She hoped that it would resurrect her Bollywood career. But after a while even the press lost interest in her.'

KD's affair with Monica had devastated his mother. There had been many other women in KD's life, but with Monica it was different. With her, he seemed to lose all discretion, revelled in the salacious gossip and took blatant pleasure in taunting his wife, almost compelling her to lose her dignity and hit back with angry tears instead of stoic silence. But his mother hadn't exploded in tears and recrimination. Instead, hers had been an implosion—her rage had been icy-cold and directed not at KD but at herself. She had tortured herself instead of KD.

The only person who had known about her self-inflicted torture was her mother's trusted maid. One night she had been desperate enough to call him at his boarding school, despite his mother's strict instructions to never bother Krish. He was appalled to hear that his mother had stopped eating, refusing to come out of her room or meet anyone. KD, of course, was away in Europe, uncaring of his wife's condition. Krish had rushed home from Doon School to be with her. He'd made her promise that she'd never ever do this to herself again.

A month after that incident, they had come to the Deovan cottage for the first time during Krish's summer holidays. They had spent a month trekking all over the hills.

‘When we came here for the first time, I saw a new, carefree, spontaneous side to my mother…It was the first time that I'd seen her truly happy,' Krish recalled.

Maya wondered how a fifteen-year-old boy would have coped with tittering schoolmates and his parents' complicated relationship. He would have shut out the outside world—mother and son would have bonded and sought strength from each other.

Just like she and her father had. They shunned everyone—neighbours, relatives, acquaintances. Even Meena Mashi had stopped visiting them after a while. They only had each other for support—but for Papa that wasn't enough.

As his alcohol addiction grew, he began to withdraw from her too, cutting her out. Those were the times when she'd felt as if she was a huge burden on Papa. Maybe he'd felt it too…Did he think of her in those last moments in the hospital?

Krish's words jolted Maya back to the present. ‘It was she who inspired me to set up this project and when I started putting it together I decided to name it after her.'

Krish was amazed at how cathartic it felt to actually talk about his growing up years. It was almost as if they had crossed some kind of invisible threshold in their relationship. So far he had been happy to share information with Maya on a need-to-know basis. And all of a sudden he had thrown the door wide open, letting her into a private space that had been locked up for years. What was it about her that made him go into a confessional mode? Never, once, in any of his admittedly brief relationships with women, had he felt the need to go beyond the physical.

Krish walked back to the couch and settled down in front of the computer. ‘Right. I think we've had enough soul-baring confessions for one night, don't you agree? Let's get some work done, shall we?'

She couldn't have agreed more. Her thoughts were still in a whirl. Frankly, she had never imagined that Krish's gilt-edged life could have been anything but glittering and the glimpse that he had given her into the darker side of it made her want to reach out to him. But that wouldn't do. She had never felt so conflicted. She should be happy that he was beginning to trust her. But, at the same time, she didn't want his trust, she didn't want this camaraderie, she didn't want any of
this
warm, soul-sharing, fuzzy feeling!

‘These are the conceptual drawings of the first resort that the architects have come up with.' Krish's words cut through her inner turmoil and she turned her attention to the computer screen. The drawings were an artist's impression of a typical luxury resort with a swimming pool and other activity centres located in and around a main building.

Maya scrolled through the drawings. ‘Have you thought of creating a complex of small buildings instead of having one main resort building?'

‘Can you tell me what you have in mind?' he asked, interested in her idea.

‘Every building could have its own reception area but would be dedicated to a similar group of activities. So the décor of each building would be different, though there would be some broad synergy.'

‘That's a thought,' he murmured.

Maya forged ahead. ‘One could think of the resort as an interconnected network of spaces. I'm just thinking aloud. What if there were themed spaces within the overall resort theme of rejuvenation? For instance there could be a “nature-lover's space”. So those who want to come to the resort to do bird-watching treks, and other “nature” oriented activities, the look of the building and the flora around it would be distinct from the other parts of the resort.'

‘Rejuvenation of the body, mind…'

Maya finished his thought, ‘…and spirit…Is there any lake or body of water near the site?'

‘Yes, there is an old dried up lake. But right now it's in a pretty sad state.'

‘A lake is a great way to jazz up a place.' She shared an incident about a client for whom they had created an artificial pond. ‘It was amazing. Over the next few months, the place turned into a sanctuary for birds. The whole ambience of the place was transformed.'

‘So, from just a bunch of bricks and mortar, it becomes a living, growing thing,' Krish mused.

‘Exactly,' she said forcefully. ‘And, for a resort like this one, we should landscape it in such a way that it blends seamlessly into the environment.'

Krish loved the way her eyes sparkled and danced with excitement, her mouth soft and upturned as she tried to keep pace with her mind, which was churning with ideas. ‘Let me show you something.'

He stretched across to get to his laptop case and his arm brushed against her skin making her blood sizzle. She tucked her hair behind her ears, trying to regain her composure as Krish pulled out a bunch of photographs. ‘I commissioned a photographer to take pictures of the local wildlife and he came up with these.'

‘Wow!' She looked at a photograph of a Crimson Sunbird. ‘Look at these colours. We could have creepers climbing up the outer façade with blooms in shades of pink and crimson, intertwined with the bright blues and purples of the morning glory.'

She grabbed her handbag and took out a notebook and a pen and started to sketch furiously. Krish watched with wonder as her fingers flew over the paper.

‘Is there a local nursery where I can check out some of the local varieties of plants?' Maya was too absorbed in putting her idea down on paper to notice Krish's look of admiration.

‘Oh, yes. We can stop on the way to the site.'

She finished the sketch and thrust it at him. He was impressed at how quickly and instinctively she had created a concept and a design for it. As he looked at the sketch, she chewed at the end of her pen. ‘You don't like it?'

‘I love it. I'm amazed that you came up with this idea so quickly.'

The uncertain look in her eyes disappeared and her enthusiasm sparkled through. ‘This is just one possibility. Once I have seen the location, I will be able to give you a lot more choices. Why are you looking at me like that?'

‘I'm fascinated. You have given me more ideas in ten minutes than our architects have been able to come up with in three months. You're not an architect by any chance, are you?'

‘Nope.' She laughed. ‘I picked up the basics of gardening from Papa. Later, of course, at Evergreen, I read up on whatever books I could find on the subject. And a lot of them were on architecture. What I love to do is put things together…you know, like mix and match…'

‘You really do have a talent for this. I can't wait to see what you come up with next.'

Maya's cheeks flushed at the praise. ‘Oh, it's always easy to come up with ideas for new projects where you start right from scratch.'

‘You are being too modest. Hey, why don't you go through those pictures while I make us some coffee? Sound good?'

She nodded. ‘I'd love some coffee. Do you need help?'

He gave her a self-deprecating smile. ‘At least let me impress you with my coffee-making skills.'

She felt herself go warm. She couldn't believe how comfortable she felt brainstorming with him. Normally, she liked to work alone. At Evergreen, she'd been diffident about sharing her ideas with her colleagues, especially the ones that she hadn't thought through. And, realising this, Kavita had given her the space to do it her way.

But with Krish she had no such reservations; she knew instinctively that he would hear her out and even if he didn't like her idea he would not just dismiss it but would give her a reason. She cringed when she recalled her own behaviour—how she had been so quick to stand in judgement and accuse him of using his father's connections to get ahead. How her casual comment must have hurt him when he was intent on doing just the opposite. SHVP was a tribute to his mother and he wouldn't wish KD to influence it in any way.

Krish emerged from the kitchen with two mugs of steaming coffee and placed one before her. ‘I think we'll make a great team. To us.' He clinked his mug with hers. ‘When we get back to Delhi, I will set up a meeting with the architect. He can integrate your ideas into the overall plans.'

‘Krish…I'd like to say something.'

He settled down comfortably on the couch, barely inches away from her. ‘Sure, go ahead.'

She glanced at him briefly before looking intently into her coffee mug. ‘I owe you an apology for what I said earlier…in the car. That was totally uncalled for. It was wrong on my part to make such a sweeping judgement about you and I'm really sorry.'

‘Maya, Maya, Maya…' His husky incantation of her name sent a thrill through her.

He leaned forward and held her chin with his fingers. ‘Don't think about it,
jaaneman.
'

The soft look in his eyes made her want to wrap her arms around his neck and the mug nearly slipped from her hands, splashing coffee on her skirt. As she brushed off the scalding-hot liquid from her skirt, trying not to wince at the pain, Krish grabbed the mug from her hand and placed it on the table. His voice was full of concern. ‘That must hurt. Let me take a look.'

She was burning up from embarrassment at her monumental clumsiness. ‘I'm all right.'

He knelt on the floor and lifted her skirt to expose her thigh. The skin where the hot liquid had dropped was already turning a dark shade of pink. His fingers skimmed the flesh gently, making her break out in goosebumps.

‘Stay here,' he commanded. ‘I'll get some ice.'

She hastily pulled down her skirt and tried to get a grip on her madly racing heart.
Gosh, Maya, you're such an idiot!
He was back in a flash. As he bent down to gently apply the ice cubes wrapped in a hanky on her hot skin, she clenched her palms, trying desperately to quell the urge to run her fingers through his thick hair. ‘Does that feel better?'

She nodded, not trusting herself to speak. He blew on her tender skin as he applied the ice pack, then placed a soft kiss there. Her hands unclenched and she clutched at his shoulders, trying not to sink into the couch and give into the pleasure that was coursing through her.

He looked up and saw her eyes cloud over with passion that she couldn't hide any more. Raising himself on to the couch, he pulled her on to his lap as his lips found the side of her neck. She felt herself almost swoon as he finally covered her mouth with his and his fingers found their way to the soft swell of her breasts.