Misc. Erotica After the Ashes

[krish_999]

Chapter- Eight

The next morning, Madhav did not leave for the office at his usual time. He suggested to Anjali that they leave together for his office. By the time Anjali got ready, Shalini had finished her morning chores and left. And Madhav asked Anjali to sit on with him for a chat.
“Anjali, I'm not sure how serious you were when you suggested it last night," he began carefully. "About continuing like this… but I still want to talk about it. Because it's not realistically possible.”
Anjali remained silent, her eyes on the floor in front of her.
“We may have our own explanations to satisfy ourselves,” Madhav continued, “but that’s not how the world works. Everyone is answerable to someone, in some way.”
Anjali looked down at her hands.
“I know I have to move on,” she said quietly. “But sometimes… it feels hard to endure life...”
Madhav watched her for a moment before replying.
“You should at least consider the person your daddy has chosen,” he said. “Manohar isn’t saying it for himself. He believes it will be good for you.”

For a moment, Anjali wondered if she should tell him the truth, that Manohar already knew about what had happened between them. But the words refused to come.
Madhav leaned back slightly.
“And if you’re not comfortable with Vikram,” he added, “that’s fine. No one's forcing you. We can find someone else.”
She looked up, surprised.
“You don’t have to rush into anything serious. Just meet people. Have a coffee. Go on a short trip. Take a small vacation. You have friends, don’t you?”
His tone was calm, but the meaning was clear. He was stepping away from the mess.
Anjali said nothing.

They left for the office together. Nothing was spoken about the subject thereafter.
Until she got a call from her father, just before lunch break.

“So,” Manohar began, his voice betraying the eagerness in his mind, “how did it go with Vicky? Must have been a good evening, no?”
Anjali took a moment before replying. “He’s a decent person. Polite… but, Dad… he… I mean… he's a little weird. I don't know how you understand... he tried to....”
There was a pause, and then Manohar chuckled. “Well, Vicky told me he got a kiss from you. Didn’t sound like he was forcing anything.”
Anjali’s fingers clenched around the phone. “It wasn’t like that. He crossed the line.”
“You girls these days get upset over the smallest things,” he scoffed. “He’s going to be your husband. You’d better get used to closeness.”
Anjali closed her eyes, the familiar sting of powerlessness crawling up her spine. Her father’s tone wasn’t angry - it was worse, it was indifferent. Perhaps he was just content that he was finally making her do what he wanted. Her voice, however firm, always fell into an abyss when it came to matters he had already decided.

Anjali told Madhav about her father’s call. “He’s deciding everything,” she said angrily. “Where I live. Who do I marry? As if I don’t exist.”
Madhav listened, and after a long pause, he sighed.
“Anjali, last night you mentioned leaving the country and living in a distant world. It’s possible you said that in a sudden rush of emotion. Still, I wanted to tell you that it’s not practical, not even as an imagination to provide comfort to our minds."
Anjali frowned. “So we just pretend this never happened?”
“We know what we’ve lost,” he said calmly. “But running away won’t fix it. The world doesn’t disappear because we want it to.” He paused. “The pain… I know. But we can’t live with it forever. For that to happen, you need to move on.”
“From you?” she asked softly.
Madhav didn’t answer immediately. Then he nodded.

In the evening, she got multiple phone calls from Vikram. She didn't answer any of them.

The next day, something unusual happened. As she was walking through the corridor of Madhav’s office, Vedant - a young manager known for his professionalism and boyish charm - approached her.
He gave a polite smile. “Anjali, I hope this doesn’t come off the wrong way… but would you mind joining me for a coffee sometime?”
It was the first time he was talking to her. The only interactions they had until then were the smiles of acknowledgement they had exchanged during meetings.
She blinked. “Coffee?”
“I mean… if it’s okay to ask. You can say no. I just thought... I’d like to know you beyond meetings and reports.”
There was something disarming about his honesty. No games, no pretence. Just a kind request. After a moment’s pause, Anjali surprised herself by saying yes.

They met at a small café tucked away from the busy street. The lights were soft, and the breeze carried the scent of roasted beans and cold rain. They talked easily - mostly about office jokes and food, and later a bit about music and movies. He was witty, flirted gently, but never stepped across the line. Anjali found herself smiling more than she had in weeks. To help her feel at ease, Vedant never asked anything about Vinayak. He already knew the tragedy.

However, when it ended, Anjali suddenly wondered if Madhav had something to do with it. The timing of someone showing up to ask her out felt too convenient. Yet she didn’t ask Madhav. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know the answer. Perhaps she preferred that her doubt not turn out to be true.

In the evening, she left Vikram's phone calls unanswered as usual. But every time his name flashed on the screen, she found her heartbeats getting tighter. She was getting nervous.

That night, Manohar called again. His tone was not amused.
“You went out with another man? Who is this Vedant?”
"How do you know about Vedant?" She didn't know how her father had found out about her casual coffee date. “It was just a coffee.”
“Don’t lie to me,” Manohar's voice rose. “You need my push and convincing to go out with Vicky, but have no problem going with some random guy?"
Anjali stiffened. "It was just a coffee, Daddy." She said.
“I don’t care!” Manohar shouted. “From now on, I don’t want you to disrespect Vicky. Put it into your head, Anjali. This marriage is happening. You’d better write that on your wall, so you wake up every day and read it.”
Anjali’s protests were met with silence. He had hung up.

Two days later, after her morning yoga practice, Anjali was stepping into the shower. Madhav had already left for the office, and Shalini was preparing to leave after finishing her household chores.
Just as the warm water began to run down her shoulders, Anjali heard the doorbell ringing. Anjali closed the tap and tried to listen to know if Shalini was still there to answer the doorbell.
She heard the front door opening, and a few seconds later, Shalini's footsteps.
Shalini said it's someone named Vikram.
“Tell him to wait,” Anjali said aloud. “I’m in the shower. And can you make tea for Vicky before you leave?”
Shalini went back. Anjali closed her eyes as the water streamed over her face. She wondered why he had come. Perhaps Daddy would have told him he had chided his daughter, and now Vikram would be expecting her to show warmth and cooperation. Despite the anger, Anjali knew she had to be careful.
And she decided she needed to warn Vikram not to convey the outcome of every meeting to her daddy.

After finishing her shower, Anjali wrapped a towel around herself and hurried to her room to change. She had just slipped into her leggings and was holding her kurta against her front when there was a knock on the door.
“Anjali?” Vikram’s voice.
“I’m changing. Wait outside.”
The door opened anyway.

He stepped in and then tapped the door backward to close it behind him. His face was serious, impatient.
“I’m sorry,” he said quickly, “but I can’t wait anymore. I need to know. What’s the final word, Anjali? Yes or no? I can’t live in this uncertainty.”
Her heart began to pound. She clutched the kurta tighter across her chest.
“What is this behaviour, Vikram? Can’t you see I’m changing?” she snapped. “You should go out. Now.”
“I didn’t see anything,” he said calmly, dismissing her anger. “Put it on first, and then tell me your decision.”
“I still need time,” Anjali said as she forced herself out of the shock and quickly wore the kurti. She turned slightly to the side, but she knew it still exposed her bra-clad body to him. Vikram watched nonchalantly, as if she were simply drinking a cup of water.
“But why? Is there someone else?” His voice lowered. “Is there something you’re hiding?”
She didn’t turn to him, her mind racing. Vinayak. Madhav. The tangled truth she couldn’t speak. She kept adjusting the kurti on her body. The thin fabric clung to the places where there were still drops of water on her skin.
“Anjali.” He stepped closer, and the distance between them shrank. Anjali didn’t know what to do. For a moment, she even wondered why Shalini wasn’t showing up at the door.
He grabbed her hand and turned her toward him. “Tell me.”
She flinched. “Don’t. Don’t touch me.”
“I want you to trust me.”
“I’ll call Shalini,” she said sharply, raising her voice. “Shalini!”
Vikram didn’t move. “She left,” he replied evenly. “After serving the tea. I told her I've come to pick you up.”
Anjali’s stomach tightened. She had told Shalini to leave after making tea, but she wasn't ready to admit it to Vikram.
“You sent her away?” she asked.
“I just wanted some privacy,” he said. “Don’t overthink it.”
The room suddenly felt smaller. The air felt heavier.

The tension that had been building in her mind each time his name flashed on her phone screen over the past few days was now reaching a peak. She didn’t know how to respond.

“Don’t be scared of me, Anjali,” Vikram said nonchalantly, placing his hands softly on her upper arms. Then he lowered them slowly, his palms sliding along her forearms. After reaching her elbows, his grip tightened, and he continued downward, claiming her arms with deliberate firmness.
Anjali did not let go of her stance, but a wave of unease surged through her. He was forcing space between them.
“What are you doing? Leave my hand,” she protested, pulling her arms free from his grasp.
Vikram did not grab her again. Instead, he spoke softly, as though calming a restless child. “Shh… Anjali. Don’t fight what’s meant to be.”
Her voice trembled. “I’ll scream if you try to force me.”
“I have no such intentions, Anjali. We’re not going to have sex,” Vikram said calmly.
“Then what is this?” she demanded.
She backed away until she hit the edge of the dressing table. As she steadied herself by placing her hands behind her on the surface, her posture opened unintentionally. Though she was now fully dressed, she felt unbearably exposed under his gaze.
“Vikram! Stop this!” she shouted.
But he moved even closer.
“I just want you to understand how much I want you,” he said quietly.
“If this is how you show it, then you’re intimidating me. And I’ll have to keep my distance,” Anjali warned, trying to steady her breath.
His eyes moved over her slowly. She felt it—the weight of his stare, the hunger he was trying to mask behind measured breathing. It made her skin prickle, not with desire, but with alarm.
Then his voice shifted.
“I know what happened between you and your father-in-law.”
Anjali’s heart stopped.
“What?”

“Don’t try to deny it,” Vikram said, his tone steady but firm. “I’m the only person you don’t need to lie to anymore. Because I already know the truth.”
The room seemed to tilt.
Anjali froze - not because of his accusation, but because of the certainty in his voice.
For the first time, fear replaced anger.
And she realised this visit had never been about a proposal.
It had been about control.

Anjali's lips parted, but no words came out. A thousand questions bombarded inside her. The sum of all of those broken questions was how he knew.
Only her daddy had found out. But her daddy couldn't betray her like that.
Or had he whispered it in Vikram's ears so that he could stun her beyond self-grip?
No. It wasn't possible. She tried to assure herself.

Vikram stepped closer and gently cupped her face. “You look like lightning just struck you,” he murmured, his thumb brushing against her cheek. “Do you think I don’t see how shattered you are?”

Vikram's face was moving closer to hers. She felt her breath would soon touch him. Anjali felt something hollowing out her chest. She wanted to scream. She wanted to vanish. Her heart ached with the force of a blow she hadn’t braced for.
“You probably have no idea how much I want you,” Vikram whispered, and before she could react, he kissed her.

This time, she didn’t stop him. Something in her had broken too far. She stood still, lips caught in his, limbs heavy with confusion and helplessness.
He paused briefly and touched his forehead to hers. “That’s how much you’ve grown into me,” he said. “You live here now - inside me.”
Then his lips found hers again, firmer, hungrier. His arms wrapped around her. She barely remembered that she was standing in an absurd condition. Her legs and arms were shaking from the inside. Her lips were being pulled into his mouth. The back of her hip was being invaded by his arms. And she couldn't even breathe properly.
She was dazed - lost between the power to resist and the will to surrender.
Vikram gave a break to the kiss after a few seconds, making Anjali gasp, though it didn't relieve her with any solace whatsoever.

“Do you love him, Anjali?” Vikram asked suddenly, his breath warm against her chin.
Anjali blinked, shaken by the question. “What?”
“Do you love your father-in-law the way you loved Vinayak?”
Anjali didn’t answer at once. Her gaze dropped. Her lips parted slightly.
“No,” she said finally, her voice a mere whisper.
“That’s all I needed to hear,” Vikram said, brushing a strand of her hair behind her ear. “You need saving. You need to be pulled out of this... illusion. And I’m going to do that. Because I love you more than anything in this world.”

Then he kissed her again. Longer. Deeper. His hands roamed her back, her waist, her hips, and pressed her closer. In a few seconds, he had her pinned against the dressing table. His lips trailed along her neck, down to her chest, and lower - his movements filled with a hunger she hadn’t felt from him before.
“Vikram...” she murmured, a hint of hesitation.
But he was already on his knees. His mouth pressed over her lower belly, then moved between her legs, still over the fabric of her clothes.
Her breath caught. “Vikram, stop…”
He looked up. “Don’t make me stop, Anjali. I just want to show you how much I want you. Believe me.”
"You are forcing me..." Anjali tried to talk.
“I won’t cross the line,” he said quietly. “I just want you to understand something. What happened in your past doesn’t frighten me. It doesn’t disgust me. If you think it makes you flawed, then I’m willing to accept those flaws.”
His voice softened, but the intensity did not.
“I’m not here to take something from you. I’m here to show you that nothing about you pushes me away.”
She swallowed. “Then what are you doing?”
“I’m communicating,” he replied. “How deeply you’ve grown inside my head. You can’t stop me now. Even I can’t. I’m obsessed with you, Anjali.”
The way he locked her eyes and said it froze her more than his touch.
He reached beneath the kurti, and she felt the last barrier fall away. Her mind screamed to move, to protest - but her body felt distant, unresponsive. Shock had numbed her.
Before she could respond, he reached under the kurti and tugged down her pants along with the panties in one swift motion. She gasped, hands instinctively reaching to stop him, but he was already there - pressing his mouth against her now bare centre. His tongue traced deliberate, aching circles. She whimpered, her body reacting against her will.
“Vikram… don’t… please…”
But his hands gripped her thighs and parted them further. He lifted one of her legs onto his shoulder, making her feel vulnerable - exposed - but unable to pull away.

His mouth moved with slow, deliberate precision, and his tongue began with a delicate touch over her inner lips. It tickled Anjali at first, with a sense of disgust still brimming inside her, and then her breath became shallow, her chest arching inward, and her mouth quivering.
Vikram’s tongue moved over her as if it were searching for an entrance. It finally stopped right at the opening, but he didn’t push it in. Instead, his lips moved and engulfed her, and then his tongue slid masterfully forward to directly touch her clit.
“Ahh… Vikram…” she gasped, clutching the edge of the table, knuckles pale.
Anjali didn’t realise it, but her body had been anticipating it, longing for a wet touch right there. The moment his tongue came into contact with her clit, she felt a shiver pass through her body, replacing the ticklish feeling with something new - something she had never felt before. And she didn't know which spell had been cast upon her.

It was the first time she was feeling a man’s tongue there. She never knew she would welcome him like this. She wanted to take her leg off his shoulder - but that was only until a moment ago. Vikram's tongue continued to move around her, and by the time he paused and looked up into her eyes, Anjali had surrendered her will to resist. She didn’t know when she had begun to see him as someone who held authority over her.
“This is all I want to do. Can you bear this version of me?” he asked, a tint of teasing in his eyes.
“Oh, Vicky… what are you doing with me?”
She sighed. The cold air now touching her exposed pussy annoyed her, but she didn’t know how to cover it.
“Did you like it?” he asked again.
He got up without waiting for her reply. Anjali barely placed her foot on the floor and steadied her breath as Vikram led her to the bed.
“Lie down here,” he said and kneeled again, as Anjali sat on the edge of the bed. Vikram grabbed her legs again, and Anjali knew what he was going to do. This time, she was ready. She lay back across the bed, stared at the ceiling, and let him lift and spread her legs. She closed her eyes and anticipated.
The warmth of his mouth and the wetness of his tongue met her again, and she let out a soft moan.

From there, Vikram met no resistance from her as he continued with unhurried exploration and confident rhythm. His mouth didn’t move away, even for a break. Heat coiled low in Anjali’s stomach as she let the pleasure spread through her body. To her own dismay, she was completely overwhelmed. She took deep breaths, gasping for air in an attempt to contain the rising waves within her. Her body had betrayed her, and she was no longer trying to resist. In fact, she didn’t hold back at all. Vikram's hands had started to freely explore the softness of her thighs at will. She didn’t mind.
“You know what?” Vikram suddenly lifted his head and asked.
Anjali was perplexed by the abrupt pause.
“I know that I can’t talk sweetly or softly to any girl. I cannot seduce women. And I have never tried, because I never found one worth trying for. You are the only one. Please forgive me.”
His apology came across like another joke, and Anjali laughed absurdly.
“Shut up, Vicky. What is left now to talk about?”
Vikram nodded and went back to his business. With each small break, Anjali’s consciousness drifted further away from her earlier objections to whatever he was doing to her.
Vikram grabbed her thighs and pulled her closer to the edge, lifting her legs over his shoulders again. Then he resumed, savouring her pussy like a long-cherished, precious dessert. However, a few seconds later, his intensity changed. He licked her hole and sucked her clit like a man possessed. Anjali soon lost her grip on herself. Within a few minutes, a wave of heat tore through her. Her knees weakened. Her whole body stiffened. She let out a broken moan as pleasure washed over her like a storm she didn’t ask for. The release melted her from within, and she trembled in the aftermath, unsure whether what filled her chest was relief, shame, or something else. She helplessly arched her body, and a cry escaped from her throat.
“Ahhh… ahh… oh… my God!”
She could feel herself melting from within, but Vikram continued to slurp it all without pause. Heat rushed to Anjali's face out of shame at having surrendered too much, yet she somehow resisted the urge to grab his hair and acknowledge what he had done to her. Her breathing was uneven, and her thighs still quivered from the force of the orgasm. A moment later, when the reality began to return, she became more aware of what had just struck her.
She pushed his head away and shifted her body upward slightly, instinctively pressing her knees together as if she could hide the evidence of her own surrender. But she had welcomed him without intending to. She had let go without meaning to.

She sat up, lowered her kurti, and continued to breathe heavily. Vikram slowly stood and gently picked up her panties from the floor to hand them to her.
“Was that your first time… something like that?” he asked, his voice tinged with satisfaction.
Anjali nodded slowly. “Yes.”
He smiled. “I’m glad I could give that to you. I hope there’s more to come.”
He stood there for two more seconds, staring at her with a smile. And then he left, not bothering to look back.

Anjali fell back onto the bed, not feeling any urgency to put on her panties again. She lay still for a long time, staring at the ceiling. Her mind drifted to memories of her intimacy with Vinayak - his slow-touches and smooth lovemaking style that had no clear beginnings or endings. He would start with a kiss and follow it with another, all while cracking jokes, telling stories, or discussing things they both found endearing. Even when he was on top of her, he never treated it like a task to be completed. He let it unfold naturally. There was no peak. There was no hurry. There was no panting rush or race to finish. There was no destination, and he had made her believe that the journey was the purpose; the destination wasn’t.
But fate had closed that chapter and now opened another for her. The shift felt so abrupt that Anjali couldn’t tell whether she was enjoying it or not.

That night, she felt drained. She didn’t sit with Madhav on the balcony. She went to bed early instead.
However, she couldn’t fall asleep as easily as she had hoped. Memories of Vinayak kept rushing back to her mind, but the dim outline of the ceiling above her kept pulling her back to the moments of the orgasm she had been unwillingly gifted by Vikram. The latter kept interrupting the tenderness of the former. No matter how much Anjali tried to calm her thoughts, she couldn’t find peace.
She longed for comfort, yet she didn’t feel strong enough to go to Madhav. She didn’t know how to ask him for what she now craved - to be taken again to the place Vikram had led her. The other day, Madhav had given her an orgasm, something she had never experienced with Vinayak. At that time, she had dismissed it as accidental. Now, realising that such pleasure could be consciously given and received, she felt an urge to tell him she had loved it. Her body desired it.
But she did not have the courage to walk into her father-in-law's bedroom and say it aloud.