Secrets of a Bollywood Marriage

CHAPTER ELEVEN


AS SHE FLATTENED her hand against the closed door of the bedroom, Tina paused. Was she ready for this?

Dev pulled his hand away and braced his hands on her hips. She closed her eyes and shivered as his breath warmed her neck. She was unprepared for Dev to span his hands against her waist. Tina gasped as he slid his fingers along her rib cage before cupping her breasts.


She sagged against him as the wicked sensations slammed into her. Her breasts were full and heavy. Her nipples tightened painfully. Tina arched into Dev’s hands as he tugged down her strapless dress.

Dev’s groan vibrated against her neck as he caressed her bare breasts. Her legs trembled when he pinched her nipples. Pleasure, hot and piercing, forked through her. She let out a high cry as a dew of sweat bathed her skin.

“How do you do this to me?” Dev asked roughly in her ear. “I can’t keep my hands off you.”

She felt the same way about him. She wanted to beg for more. Plead for Dev to take her breasts in his mouth. She rolled her hips as the lust coiled tight in her belly and she felt his arousal against her.

Tina wrenched open the door and drew Dev into their bedroom. Light from the hallway streamed into the darkness. Once they reached her bed, Tina turned around and clasped her hands on Dev’s angular face and blindly sought his mouth with her lips.

Her kisses were wilder and she found it difficult to slow down. She didn’t know what made this different than all the other nights. Why the urgency clawed at them. This wasn’t their last night together but in some ways it felt like a rebirth.

Dev pulled her short dress down her hips and kicked it away. She was very aware that she was almost naked while he was fully dressed.

“Take off your clothes,” she muttered against his lips.

His fingers tightened against her skin. “Take them off for me,” he whispered.

She reached for him with barely concealed eagerness and pulled his shirt over his head. While Dev kicked off his shoes, Tina gave a playful push and watched him tumble onto the bed. She squealed with surprise when he grabbed her and took her with him.

His husky chuckle died as she straddled him and explored his solid chest with her hands and mouth. She liked how his muscles bunched under her exploratory touch and how he hissed when she scratched his flat nipple. Tina felt powerful. Desired.

She reached for his belt and suddenly she was underneath Dev. This was where she liked to be. She was surrounded by him and nothing else existed. Nothing else mattered. Tina stopped trying to regain her position as he captured her nipple with his mouth. She went wild as the white-hot pleasure streaked through her.

Tina rolled her hips as Dev dragged her panties down her shaking legs. She couldn’t take much more of this. Her sexual hunger was ferocious and the insistent ache in her pelvis made her want to scream.

“Now, Dev.”

“Not yet,” he said in a steady voice as he rubbed his fingers along the folds of her sex.

His touch wasn’t nearly enough. “Please,” she said in a broken whisper. “I need you inside me right now.”

She nearly sobbed when he withdrew his hands from her. Tina squeezed her eyes closed and heard the rustle of his clothes and then the tear of foil. She opened her eyes and saw him put on protection.

That was a sharp reminder. Tina’s breath caught in her throat as she watched him. They weren’t starting over. They weren’t dreaming of a family anymore. This was the beginning of the end.

Dev settled between her thighs. Her stomach twisted with excitement when she felt the thickness of him against her. He clamped his hands on her hips and he entered her with one long thrust. Tina’s gasp echoed in the large room when Dev roughly tilted her hips even more. The most amazing sensations stormed her.

“More,” Tina whimpered as she bucked her hips against Dev. He responded with a slow thrust. Tina thought her eyes were going to roll back from the dizzying pleasure.

She wrapped her legs around Dev’s waist. He groaned as her tight flesh gripped him like a fist. His pace grew faster, each thrust deeper, as she followed the ancient rhythm.

The pleasure consumed her. She begged for more as she clung to Dev. She wasn’t sure what her body was chasing, what it was reaching for until the sensations exploded.

Her mind went blank as she climaxed. Her lungs burned and she forgot to breathe. She held on to Dev as he growled something fierce before he found his release.

It took her a few moments before she realized Dev had gathered her in his arms. She laid her head on his chest and heard his pounding heartbeat. She stared at him, stunned and shaken.

She was falling for him again. Falling in love with her husband. Had she ever really stopped loving him? The fear threatened to choke her. Tina knew she had to be careful. But how could she when she went wild in his arms every time and then craved his protective embrace?

Tina knew she couldn’t get used to this. If she stayed she would lose all her freedom. Dev would have total control of her. Her emotions. Her life.

She couldn’t let that happen again.

* * *

“Tujhe dekha to yeh janna sanam...” Dev sang softly the next morning as he strode into the bedroom after his shower. One towel was draped low around his hips while he dried his hair with another. He paused when he realized he was singing the romantic song that had been playing in the kitchen the night before.

Damn, what kind of power did Tina have over him? All she had to do was take him to bed and he was breaking out into song. If he wasn’t careful, he’d start dancing. But he couldn’t hide the satisfaction that poured through his veins or the hope that wanted to burst from his skin. His relationship with Tina had taken a turn and he was so close to his goal. He would keep her as his wife long after their first wedding anniversary.

Dev stopped toweling his hair when he thought he heard a whimper. He glanced at the bed. Tina was huddled in the middle with the twisted bedsheets cocooned around her.

“Tina?” Was she having another nightmare? She’d said she didn’t get them anymore. Dev rushed to the bed and saw that she held her hand over her face. It wasn’t a bad dream. She would thrash and kick out. Scream. At the moment she didn’t seem to have the energy to move. “Tina, what’s wrong?”

She grimaced and scrunched her eyes closed. “I don’t feel well.”

He remembered she’d had a stomachache last night. He’d thought it had been from the stress of dealing with Shreya. Tina was rarely ill and she hadn’t shown any signs of pain during the night.

“Was it the khichri?”

She opened one eye. “My khichri heals stomachaches, it doesn’t create them.”

He smiled at her offended tone. No one questioned her cooking. “Did you have anything at the party?”

“No.”

He tried to remember what she’d had the day before. She had visited her mother but he remembered the number one rule with Reema Sharma’s cooking: avoid it at all costs. Tina would know that. She once told him she’d learned how to cook as a matter of survival.

But there was one thing Tina couldn’t refuse when she visited that side of Mumbai. “Did you eat street food when you went to your mother’s?”

“Of course I did,” she said as she wrapped her arms around her stomach. “They have the best chaat.”

He placed his hand on her forehead. She looked pale but her skin wasn’t warm to the touch. “What did you have to eat?”

“Samosas,” Tina said and swallowed hard, as if the thought made her nauseated. “And channa chaat. I also had some of Meera’s dahi puri....”

He shook his head. “And you wonder why you’re not feeling well. If they were anything like the chaat stalls we’ve visited, you probably have food poisoning.”

She gradually opened her eyes. “I don’t think it’s the food.”

He didn’t know what else it could be and he wasn’t going to take any chances. Dev knew he was being overprotective but he hated seeing Tina in pain. “Come on,” he said as he reached for her hands. “Let’s get you to the doctor.”

She flinched and jerked back to avoid his touch. “No!”

He stared at Tina as her voice echoed in the large bedroom. He saw the hunted look in her dark eyes and the fear etched across her face. She was shutting him out again.

“I see,” Dev said as he slowly straightened to his full height, the pain radiating from his body. The hope shriveled inside once he realized nothing had changed between them.

“I don’t want a doctor,” she said quietly, unable to meet his gaze. “I hate hospitals.”

“No,” he corrected her, his voice cold and stiff as the biting hurt slashed his chest, “you don’t want me to help you.”

“That’s not it.”

“You don’t want my name or my protection. My connections? Yes. My concern? No.” Dev’s tone was harsh. “Now I’m not even allowed to look after you when you’re sick?”

Tina weakly closed her eyes. “I don’t know why I did that.”

“I do.” She was rejecting his help again. Rejecting him. “You trust me when I tell you I didn’t have an affair with Shreya. You trust me enough to share your bed, your body. But when it comes to taking care of you, you can’t trust me at all.”

“It was just a reaction,” she explained. “I wasn’t thinking about it.”

That made it worse. Dev clenched his jaw as he fought back the rising tide of anger.

“Go back to sleep, Tina,” he said wearily as he took a step away from the bed. “I’ll have Sandeep bring something up for you. He’ll check up on you throughout the day.”


“Where are you going?”

“Out.” Any other time, he would have thought she sounded like a wife. But he knew the concern wasn’t for him.

“Dev?”

There was something about her tone that pierced through his anger. Dev stopped at the bathroom door and looked over his shoulder. Her back was turned away from him. It was a familiar sight. “What is it, Tina?”

There was a long pause before she spoke. “Would you...stay...with me? Please?” she asked. She said the words slowly, as if they were dragged out from her. “I want you to look after me. No one else.”

It wasn’t true. She’d rather curl up in a dark corner alone than ask for help. Dev knew she was doing this for him. And yet she acted as if she expected he would reject her. What had he done to make her think that?

“Yes, jaan,” he said as he walked to the bed. He didn’t feel victorious. He felt as if he was walking on eggshells. One wrong move or wrong word, and he could ruin everything. “I’m here for you.”

* * *

Hours later Dev set down his laptop computer and leaned back in his chair. He gave Tina an assessing look. “You are a terrible patient.”

“So I’ve been told,” Tina said as she flipped through the movie magazine Dev had asked Sandeep to buy. She sat on the bed and wore her softest, most comfortable shalwar kameez. Her stomach didn’t hurt as much but her heart was heavy with regret. She couldn’t rid the memory of Dev’s stricken expression from this morning. She kept pushing him away when she really wanted him near. She didn’t know how to stop.

“You don’t need to stay, Dev,” Tina said with a sigh as she tossed the magazine to the side. “I had some bad chaat, that’s all.”

“You shouldn’t try to diagnose yourself,” Dev warned her. “You should have a doctor check you out.”

“No, that’s not necessary.” She shivered at the thought. She had grown to hate the sight of surgical scrubs and white coats. “I’m fine. Why don’t you go watch cricket or something?”

Dev propped his chin against his hand. He was in no hurry to go anywhere. “Why are you trying to get rid of me?”

Tina leaned her head back against the stack of pillows behind her. “I already feel bad that you’re wasting your day in that chair staring at four walls.”

“This is where I want to be,” he said softly.

“I don’t know why,” Tina muttered.

“If I was sick, would you look after me?”

She made a face and looked away. “Yes, but that’s different.”

“Because you never want to rely on anyone,” Dev said. “You have to do it all yourself.”

It was true. She wasn’t comfortable asking for help. Not from anyone, especially her family. She had already been a burden to her mother. A problem for her husband. The last thing she wanted to do was highlight why she was an inconvenience.

“Next time I’m not going to wait for permission to take care of you,” Dev said. “I don’t mind that you need me. I like it when you depend on me.”

Tina frowned. A great many people relied on Dev, from his mother to the people who worked for him. He didn’t need another dependent. “You don’t want to take on my problems, Dev. You have enough of your own.”

“I don’t see it that way,” Dev said. “When you disappeared, I frequently dropped by your mother’s house to check on her and your sisters. You weren’t around so I did it for you. Your family is my family.”

“Family is important to you.” It was a fantasy of his to be part of a big, noisy family. Have the kind he saw in the movies but never had for himself. That was yet another thing she couldn’t give him.

“I like being a big brother to Rani and Meera,” Dev said with a hint of a smile. “I like helping your mother. She treats me as a son instead of a movie star. I would like to take care of you. You need to stop fighting me every step of the way and just let it happen.”

“It’s not that easy.” She had given him that control, had placed all of her trust in him because she couldn’t function. It had been terrifying. And then suddenly he had no longer been there, choosing to be anywhere but at her side. She had felt betrayed.

“Because I wasn’t there when you miscarried. I wasn’t there afterward.”

She raised her gaze to the ceiling. “I didn’t ask you to be there.”

“I should have been there even if you were trying to kick me out of the room.” He paused. “Why didn’t you ask for me? Why were you pushing me away? Did you think that I would turn away? Reject you when you needed me the most?”

Tina pressed her lips together as the tears burned in her eyes. “Yes,” she said.

The tense silence pulsed in the room. “What did I do to make you think that?”

“It wasn’t you. My father ran out when we needed him the most,” Tina said softly, lowering her gaze. “When life wasn’t turning out the way he thought he deserved it. But he had been absent long before that. I learned not to ask him for anything because it would only lead to disappointment.”

“I didn’t run out on you. I made sure you had everything you needed.” Dev met her gaze. “But it’s my deepest regret that I wasn’t there when you needed me the most. It wasn’t until you disappeared that I realized I was following my parents’ footsteps. They were too busy making movies. Sandeep was there for me more than my parents. I don’t want to be an absent husband or father. Next time, I’m going to every doctor’s appointment and I’m sitting at the table every night for dinner.”

Next time. Tina closed her eyes. Next time wouldn’t include her. She knew Dev would be a good father. She would’ve loved to have seen him cradling their baby. He would be a fierce protector, a patient teacher and offer the unconditional love he hadn’t got as a child.

She opened her eyes when she heard the beep of his watch. “Time for your medicine and a drink,” he announced as he pushed a button on his modern timepiece before rising from his chair.

“No more water.” She shook her head. Dev was taking his role as caregiver very seriously.

“You need to keep hydrated,” he said as he walked around the bed to the door.

“Be careful, Dev. I might get used to this kind of attention.”

He paused and captured her gaze. “That’s the plan.”

Tina watched wordlessly as he strolled out of the room, whistling a tune from a Salman Khan movie. She stared at the door long after he left. She wasn’t sure what he’d meant. Did he want her to stay after the two months were up? No, she shouldn’t get her hopes up. His words must have had a simpler meaning. That the next time she was sick, she should turn to him for comfort.

There was probably not going to be a next time. She was usually healthy. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a cold or the flu. The last time she’d felt nauseous and dizzy was...

Tina’s gasp echoed in the bedroom. She flattened her hands against her stomach as the panic raced through her blood. The last time she’d felt like this was in the very early stages of pregnancy.

“No,” she whispered as the fear clawed through her. “No, no, no! Not again.”