❤️ These chapters are of 1000 words but the paid chapters will have two such chapters combined.

**********"

Suhana's POV

The Palace

By noon the next day, I was thirty thousand feet above the ground, and the flight was barely two hours. The closer we got, the tighter my chest felt. When we landed at the private hangar, a chopper was prepared to ferry me to the palace.

The palace came into view—grand, sprawling, golden. The place that had raised me. As the chopper descended, the dome-tipped arches and carved jharokhas glinted under the desert sun. Our Palace. Home, technically. A fortress of tradition, pride, and expectations.

The moment I stepped out onto the helipad, I felt the weight of legacy settle on my shoulders like an invisible shawl.

“Welcome, Suhana,” my mom greeted me.

She looked at me and said, “You’ve lost weight. And sleep.”

“I’ve gained weight, Ma” I muttered.

She gave me a long look but said nothing, only ushered me in. We didn’t need words—she had always known everything which scared me.

"Mom, I need to freshen up, I will join you soon. " I said as I wanted to calm down and talk to Sanya first to ensure that everything had been managed or not.

" Okay, go and freshen up. We are waiting for you." Mom said. The staff moved my luggage to my room.

Everyone was already here except Sanya...

*******

Inside my suite, I shut the door behind me and leaned against it, exhaling slowly.

Inside my suite, I pulled the heavy curtains closed, needing a moment of stillness. My hands shook as I slipped off my shoes. My fingers moved to the pearls at my throat, unclasping them slowly. I sank onto the edge of the bed, my breath shallow.

This was real now. I was in Jodhpur. I was home. And I was terrified.

My phone started ringing, it was Sanya.

" Hey, what's up?" I asked.

“I just landed in Chandigarh."

" How is...?"

" Don't worry, everything is fine... Under control! I found a way out of the problem. One more day of shooting. I’ll fly out by 6AM on the 12th."

"Are you sure your plan is foolproof? "

" Rest assured!! Nothing can go wrong, just control yourself. " She replied.

" Hmm!! "

Outside my window, the palace buzzed with life. I heard Shaurya or Shlok bhai laughed heartily somewhere near the stables. They had probably already started their teasing games and forbidden cocktails.

The knock on my door jolted me, I opened the door and saw that a house help was standing there.

“Miss Suhana, Ma’am has requested you to join her in the main drawing room.”

Of course she did.

I straightened my shoulders, reapplied my lipstick, slipped on my heels, and gave myself one last look in the mirror. Perfect. Elegant. Immaculate.

Everything Suhana Malhotra was supposed to be. I could not afford to let them see what I really was, at least not with everyone around.

*******

As soon as I entered the living room, I saw my dad—and he rushed to embrace me. Sagar uncle, Damini aunty, and Sagarika all followed, wrapping me in their affection. I was overwhelmed. Shaurya and Shlok Bhai were in the stables with Satvik and maybe their friends.

"Awww... My favourite child." Sagar uncle said embracing me. I just smiled.

They all loved Sanya and me so deeply, and that only made my guilt heavier. I was hiding something from them—something that would change everything.

They loved me unconditionally, but will they love me if they come to know about my secret? No!! They would be ashamed, and it would hurt them a lot.

But maybe that was exactly why I couldn’t tell them. I didn’t want to lose the love they’d always given so freely.

I hope everything goes according to plan. I could not afford to lose them.

Ours was a very close-knit family. My dad and Sagar uncle were identical twins, and their bond mirrored the one Sanya and I shared. We had inherited that closeness from them. They would’ve laid down their lives for each other—just like Shlok and Shaurya Bhai, Sagar uncle's identical twin sons. They were inseparable, too.

Mom and Damini aunty, Sagar uncle's wife, were more like sisters than sisters-in-law. Saatvik and Sagarika didn’t have twins, but they shared a deep sibling connection.

Sanya, Sagarika (Sagar uncle's daughter), and I were the pride of this family.

And I... I had already...

But I didn’t dare to say it.

So I smiled and sat with them, talking about work while we sipped tea and munched on snacks, pretending everything was just as it always had been.

No!! It was not! I was not the same Suhana anymore.

There was something about the Jodhpur evening—the glow of a hundred fairy lights strung across the ancient stone walls of Rathore Palace, the hum of celebration lingering in the air, the scent of fresh mogra dancing on the desert breeze—that made everything feel a little too magical.

And magic, I’d learned, could be dangerous.

I shouldn’t have come. I knew the moment I stepped into the courtyard that the air would change.

And it did.

The atmosphere was loud and bustling. Too many people. Too many faces from too many parts of my life I wished I could leave behind.

Though I tried to remain in the shadows, people knew me and my family. They smiled at me and asked general questions about me and my work. A few old ladies complicated me, how I looked just like my mom, beautiful and elegant. I talked to them politely, thanking them and blushing at their compliments. And while I was talking to one of them, I felt a pair of heated gazes on me.

The weight of a gaze I hadn’t felt in five years pressed against my skin like a brand. I could sense his presence — the same way a deer senses the predator just before the strike.

I turned to look in that direction and I froze.

Oh my God!!!

What the hell!!

Veer Paul!!! Here?? How? Why?