Rudra woke up, a few hours later. He found his phone and looked at the time. Seven pm. His eyes widened as he realised he had slept for almost 3 hours. He quickly got up, worried that Shivaay had already come home. He freshened up and changed out of his gym clothes and headed down, only to find the house unusually quite. By now, even Om should have come home inquiring about Rudra's whereabouts. Rudra looked around hoping to find someone. He moved to the kitchen and helped himself with a glass of water. By the time he did come out, he smiled widely. Anika was talking to Bhavya but she looked rather tensed.

Rudra realised he wasn't supposed to be happy. He walked towards them, hands in his pockets.

"Anika Bhabhi, I wanted to talk to him about something, if you won't mind-"

"Talk to whom, about what?" Rudra interrupted, feigning curiosity.

"Uh, Rudra, I didn't realise you were home already."

"Bhavya, I haven't left the house today, if you didn't realise."

Bhavya looked at him in confusion. "Are you sick? Do you have a temperature?"

"Why would you care, all you care about is firing at those stupid criminals. They don't even let me spend some time with my wife." Rudra pouted. Bhavya rolled her eyes and they both turned to find Anika looking at them with a huge grin.

Rudra rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly and cleared his throat, while Anika pretended to be serious.

Three seconds later, they were laughing and Bhavya was slightly red.

"Oh My God!" They heard a loud voice and turned to find Gauri standing at the door, looking amused. "This is Gauri Singh Oberoi reporting live from the Oberoi mansion. We have here, a rare case where we can see Bhavya Singh Oberoi, ex Pratap Rathore, still ACP, blushing!" Her hands were held in a camera position amd it only fueled Bhavya's embarassment.

Rudra walked to Gauri and draped an arm around her shoulder. "Kya Gauri Bhabhi, you should ask me anytime. Come to our bedroom, if Bhavya doesn't blush every ten seconds, you get to choose a horror movie on the next movie night."

All three ladies' eyes widened while Rudra grinned cheekily, enjoying their states. Especially Bhavya's.

"Uh, I will go change." Bhavya stammered and ran to her room while Gauri hit Rudra's head playfully. "Stop embarassing her like this."

Rudra rolled his eyes and looked at Anika for support who shook her head with a smile. "Well, Rudra has got to be the best husband, right?"

Rudra grinned at Anika. That was, until he realised that normal, daily stuff was not supposed to happen here. There were supposed to be intricate plotting against one another and normality was not okay. He stiffened and only nodded his head before excusing himself and rushing out of the mansion leaving behind a disappointed Anika.

Gauri looked at Rudra's retreating figure and then at Anika's slumped shoulders with a frown. She could do nothing but watch as her family lost out on happiness.

"Arey Di! You haven't told me. What brought you to your pyaara sa sasural?"

Anika smiled, although it was clearly fake. "Well, Shivaay is back and I can't see him in the clothes he's wearing. Decided to take some advice from his wadrobe. Untouched, but still there."

Gauri nodded. "I'll freshen up?"

Anika blinked her eyes and headed to their room.

---

A few hours later, Rudra sat in front of Anika's apartment. Which now resided Shivaay too. Rudra had sat for a while in front of the mansion, hoping Shivaay would come. He didn't and Rudra's heart broke once again. Did he not care about them at all? Could he not once visit, to see how the mansion was? How Om and Rudra had still kept his room tidy. How Rudra still had that weird painting Shivaay made back in grade 7, hanging in his room, not even telling Bhavya what it was.

After what seemed like eternity to Rudra, he had driven off to the apartment. He knew the address, of course. He would drop Bhavya and Gauri for spending some time with Anika, helping her cope with Shivaay's absence and the pain of staying all by herself.

Rudra leaned a bit and looked at the windows, counting all the way upto 7th floor. The lights were dim.

Rudra, it's now or never. You can pretend you didn't know Anika Bhabhi wasn't home and just wanted her sign on some files. With that, he turned and tried finding a random file, hoping Shivaay didn't actually read through.

Getting down the car, he took a deep breath. He would just have a look, not having seen Shivaay in flesh and blood for so long. Afterall, even if Bhavya's eyes matched Shivaay, they didn't have the warmth and love Shivaay's did.

---

Eeks, this is really short but I sort of wanted to leave it hanging. Next one is probably going to be a flashback one. Let's see. If it is a flashback, it's going to be painfully long.

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