I listened to Tum Mile while writing this and it felt magical :")

𓆩𓆪

Manik examined the loaded metal barrel, assured that if his plan went sideways or he had even the slightest hint of suspicion, he would not hesitate to lodge a bullet through her brain. That was his punishment for betrayal.

He happened to glance in the side-mirror when he saw Nandini walking towards him, wearing an elegant yellow dress that covered her ankles and had huge silver butterflies hanging on her ears. A piece of sunshine had graced the ground as she walked on it, elevating her simplistic beauty. Her iconic pink tote too hung by her side. He snapped the barrel shut and tossed it in the glove box.

She peeked into the passenger door to make sure it was Manik who was in the Mercedes. "New car?" She asked, as he smiled and unlocked her door. Shuffling in, with a hint of surprise and appreciation, she teased "I was only away for a week, right?!" While she made herself comfortable, she failed to notice the amusement on Manik's features as he regarded her diligently with an unintentional smile.

Running her fingers along the luxurious dashboard, Nandini tried to sink in the exquisite feel of leather on it. Her middle-class lifestyle hardly ever saw such cars, forget sitting in one, so one could not blame her for beaming in such a fashion. Her curiosity overtook her as she peered into anything and everything that caught her attention.

"Don't!" Manik ordered as her hand covered the glovebox handle. She was startled but had not budged. He cleared his throat, wary of his tone, "It's a work car but the boundaries are often blurry." He commented sternly although his facial features exuded a familiar warmth Nandini associated with him.

That was extremely unprofessional behaviour Nandini almost wanted to tell him off for it, for how royally immoral it was to use professional equipment for personal purposes. It was not right, and if he was caught, he could be in huge trouble for it.

Yet, she had been desperately waiting for over a week to catch another glimpse of him, and the excitement of meeting him again had boundlessly consumed her living waking moments for the last several days. If she were to mention anything to him, their date would not go ahead as planned and she did not want that. Rescheduling or fully cancelling would be more devastating than letting her moral compass take a loss.

Keeping her own reservations aside, Nandini decided to appreciate the moment and the opportunity of being in such an elite car. "It's quite cool, wow... the seats are heated?!" Amidst her worries, she had not realised the reason she felt so comfortable and cocooned and after she did, she felt another level of happiness... much to Manik's surprise.

He grinned at her innocence. "Nice na?" When the grin diminished, Manik was very aware of the reason he had asked her out. He was out for a particular purpose, not to have a good time with her. "Alright, where to? You must have written it down in that black diary of yours." He mentioned thoughtfully, remembering how she was jotting something down in a black book when he dropped her off after their first date.

Nandini's jaw dropped as she regarded him suspiciously, "How did you know that?"

"I've been told I'm very observant," He said with a small, sly smile.

Her face flushed and a hand came to rub a side of her forehead, hiding herself from his view. "I just like being organised..."

"And when did I say that was a crime?" Manik said amusedly and as they locked eyes, they both burst into giggles.

Nandini had a place in mind that she had wanted to visit for months. The last time she went was when a bunch of girls had invited her and Navya on their last day of school, and while the food had been great, the company of some passive-aggressive bullies and their backhanded compliments had made the whole experience quite unpleasant. She wanted to redefine that memory and hence suggested it to Manik.

The car drew a lot of attention for its glamour as it zoomed past neighbourhoods noiselessly. Nandini shared their surprise equally, not believing her luck had been so great that she was a passenger in a car of such high status. Carried away by those emotions, she missed instructing Manik with some navigation in between.

She snapped her hands one at a time, decided on one, and said, "Left here,"

Manik scrunched his eyebrows as he eyed her. "Are you sure, Nandini? We just circled this block twice..."

"Listen to me, it's that left only which we passed... and then the immediate right,"

Manik hesitated but listened to her as they went around the one-way streets another time and took the left and right that Nandini instructed him to. Finally, on the right side of the road was the posh restaurant Nandini had picked. Parallel parking effortlessly behind two drab cars, Manik switched off the engine.

"We reached in one piece, congratulations Nandini Murthy!" He took her hand for a handshake, which she gave after rolling her eyes, but her expression changed on feeling a gentle touch. His lips were on the back of her hand. Butterflies fluttered in her tummy, and Nandini was extremely conscious of his gaze as he looked up at her.

Before she could realise, he had gotten out of the car and had come to her door, opening it like a gentleman. Overwhelmed by his chivalry, she focused on other external things while she brought her naive emotions to equilibrium. He was wearing a buttoned black shirt, blue jeans, and a blue, black, and grey patterned blazer. With an uncontrollable smile, they crossed the road, her hand warmly fitting his as they skipped to the other side through traffic.

In the air-conditioned premises, Manik led them to the front of the house. "Hey. Table for two, please." The attendant signalled that he would tend to them in just a minute. His free hand tapped on the wooden counter in a mindless rhythm, and Nandini noticed the clinking.

She pulled his hand, urging him to lower himself and meet her while they waited. "You're wearing bracelets today," Nandini mumbled.

"Haan woh - how did you..."

"You think I don't observe things about you?" She smiled and his hand left hers but came around her waist as he tugged her closer. Nandini gasped at the contact but hid it well. "Do they have some significance?"

They both looked at his right wrist. "The black beaded one is for strength, protection and the tiger eye one is made of leather... for similar purposes... power."

"Are you of warrior blood or something?" She chuckled and searched his eyes as they gazed at hers. They were both ushered to a table that was being set up for them, and Manik pulled a chair out for Nandini, causing her heart to skip a beat again.

As Manik sat down opposite her, Nandini continued, "I never thought of you as a religious person,"

"So what do you think about me?" He asked with a smirk, resting his elbow on the table and bringing his chin to the cup of his hand. Nandini shyly shook her head, endearing Manik further. "Nahi? Nahi bataogi?" She bit her lip as she fiddled with her nails. "Okay then... tell me a little about you,"

"What do you want to know?" He shrugged and separated her hands, grasping one in his and rubbing his thumb along the back of hers. It was getting increasingly difficult for Nandini to maintain her composure when he was being so affectionate. Especially in a public setting. Perhaps he did not know much about her background.

So she began setting the scene. "I was born and raised in Mangalore... the hospital I was born is just a ten-minute walk from here,"

"Fascinating," He said in a trance, enchanted by the way her lips moved.

"And... I am going to start work soon... at an army camp."

"Oh, military?"

"Psychologist,"

"Oh, mental doctor..." He said and grinned.

Nandini straightened in her seat and pulled her hand. "Excuse me?!"

"Kidding baba!" Manik chuckled and drew her hand back in his hold.

Reluctantly enjoying his teases, she said with certainty, "It's a misconception, everyone on some levels is in need of some guidance and direction."

"That's a highly generalised statement." He said haughtily.

"What, you don't think you need it?" Manik twitched his lips, and Nandini took it as a challenge. She was usually highly sensitive to disapproval compared to her peers, but to experience it from a person she admired was distressing. "What is your job like?" She provocated.

"I... drive celebrities around for a living... It's chill, not that hectic." Oh, what a heavily revised version it was, of ruthless bloodshed, vengeance and putting your life on the line every single day.

"Do you have to bodyguard them?"

"To some degree, yes... they have people that do it for them, but it's partly my duty to do it too,"

"Why's that?" Manik blinked and shook his head, causing her to rephrase or clarify what she meant. "Why do you feel it's your duty to?"

"Because it's uncomfortable to let others take cha – wait a second, stop trying to therapise me!" Her all-knowing smile, as if she won what she was trying to achieve, brought a flicker of amusement to Manik's features too.

"We can talk about that another time... maybe in my office room at two-thousand rupees an hour... I am not going to do it for free,"

Glad that she hadn't taken offense to his bluntness, he decided to chide her a little. "Speaking of guidance and direction, you should really learn your rights and lefts," Nandini unconsciously snapped her hands one at a time again, earning another smirk from him. "Maybe I can help you with that." He suggested. "Don't worry I won't charge you."

When their food arrived, Manik offered his plate and when Nandini refused to try it, he found out she was vegetarian. Extremely guilt-ridden, he ordered a couple of other dishes for them to share and filled their table with different starters, mains, and finally a dessert to share too. He asked her if she would like to order drinks, and learned that she also did not drink alcohol.

What a huge contrast she was to the world he came from!

Over the course of their meal, Manik found himself more and more at ease by Nandini's naivety and by the end of it had practically ruled out his doubts on her. No, she could not have known a thing. Besides, she was too pure for games of that sort... for the world he was from.

When the bill came through, Manik bundled a wad of cash into the waiter's hands and asked him to keep the change. The waiter was beyond thrilled by the huge bonus almost equivalent to a day's pay, and left behind a happy Manik and an enraged Nandini.

"Why do you keep paying for things on my behalf?"

"Do you not know the rule? Whoever asks the other out is the one who pays," He spoke while stuffing his wallet back into his pockets.

"Alright then next time I will schedule it, I just have to look through my calendar."

"Oh yes, the infamous black diary." He mocked as he disposed of his tissue onto the used plates.

"Manik!" She nagged and he sniggered as he held her hand again.

"Besides it's only fair that I paid this time, I ordered a meat dish... If I knew you were vegetarian, I would have ordered something else from the start!" Wanting to spend a little more time with her, he led her through a small alleyway that connected their street to another similar one behind. "Let's take this route..."

"It's no big deal!"

"Arrey, but it's terrible manners."

She shrugged, holding his clasped hand with both of hers. "I don't mind..."

He turned to her, glancing at the ethereal glow on her cheeks and the subdued pink tint on her lips, half-smeared off by the oils from their food. His immediate intrusive thought was those lips wrapped around his length and the dark turn his imagination took was...

"And also very inconvenient!" He said as he stopped in his tracks and faced her. How was she so beautiful even while she barely tried to earn his attention?

"Inconvenient? For what?"

For whom should have been the real question.

He took a step forward as she naturally took one behind, until her back hit the brick protrusion of a building, hiding them from the eyes of society. One of Manik's hands swooped into the wall, pressing, while the other approached her lips and cleaned up the smudges along her lip-line. Torturously. Slowly.

"Are you sure you... don't mind?" He uttered in a low, controlled tone as he continued tracing.

Nandini's heart drummed her ears, blocking her senses one by one by the proximity that had her mind twisted like spaghetti. "Choose your words carefully around me, I can make you regret it." He said in warning, cursing himself for the way his own body was responding to having her between his arms. Being intimate with multiple women gave him no upper hand, he thought grudgingly... no, there was something about Nandini Murthy that felt different. Sincere and without an ulterior motive.

Her stomach flipped with the intensity of his powerful gaze and the gentleness of his touch on her... both contradicting the deadly statement that he had flung around so casually. Either that or she was not sure of how insanely hot his very dangerous remark sounded.

She gulped his name.

"Hmm..."

Unsure of what to do with her hands that were uselessly hanging by her side, she bravely put one on his heart and felt his thundering heartbeat. Empowered by her effect on him too, she politely pleaded, "Can you kiss me?"

A moment later, her jaw was cupped and his soft lips sensually embraced hers, blissfully releasing the nervous excitement that was channeling within her since the day she first met him.

𓆩𓆪

Looks like Manik assumes it's not Nandini looking to sabotage him but is struggling with how obsessive his attraction for her goes *smirks*

Does that mean she really IS the one ruining him? ;)