Chapter 145: Thoughts

One and a half months.

He had kept her for a whole month to sabotage her thinking, to take control over her mind.

To cover up his insecurities so she would never think of any man again in her life.

And during this month, he had been actively observing her, waiting for the right moment to

make a decision about her at last.

It was either her signing that contract or her friend being killed.

As he sat in his office, waiting for time to elapse and night to fall, his eyes were fixed on a

feminine ring that didn’t appear to belong to the present. It held memories, past tales, and

miracles.

Miracles of what seemed to him selfishness but appeared to the world as selfless love.

Such a selfless love that the love of a mother for her children faded before it.

Such a selfless love that the utmost love of her husband dimmed in front of it.

No doubt, it was a miraculous love.

Now held proudly between his fingers, the world was unaware of the journeys this ring

alone had witnessed. The only witness of the evolution, the crux, and the ending of that

miraculous, selfless love—apart from him.

The ring, in particular, held great importance to him. Despite disdaining its owner since his

childhood, he couldn’t bring himself to let it go.

No.

It wasn’t within his power.

One of the few things he didn’t have control over.

And this ring was reminding him of its owner once again. Her face appeared before his

closed eyes, and when he opened them, her face was replaced by Sheharzaad’s.

She was everything like her.

In every way.

If she was everything like the woman he despised, then why… why was his inner self so

adamant about keeping her? Keeping her by his side?

Why couldn’t he bring himself to let her go?

He was still searching for this answer. Though powerful, he felt as helpless as anyone else.

He remembered mocking his father, saying he would marry someone unlike his mother—or

not marry at all. He didn’t want to end up like him.

Alone. Depressed. Longing for the love of his better half.

The woman in his life would be nothing like his mother. She wouldn’t have a past. She

wouldn’t have any man in her heart but him. She would love him as Jaha Ara loved Omer.

Selflessly.

Obsessively.

Intensely.

Insanely…

And his whole life, he was on a hunt for that woman who could become his better half, who

would fit into the frame of his ideal partner.

The ideal frame sketched by his mind, his brain.

Yet he almost forgot that there was one thing left in him apart from this devilish mind.

A heart.

A heart he considered dead.

A heart he thought had been slowly withering away with each passing moment as he

became the sole witness to those intimate moments.

And that dead organ was buried after witnessing the woman who birthed him hanging from

the ceiling.

That organ had skipped a beat—a pulse traveling throughout his body—when he first saw

the troubled woman walking on the office floor, begging for a job. It began to beat more

when that woman responded to his question with, “What is it to you?”

It came as a surprise when he saw her in a brothel, running away from a man. The trigger

automatically moved, killing the person who aimed for her, as if he himself were the target.

It became increasingly drawn to her, and he realized it when he indirectly put more work

on her, forcing her to stay in the office for longer hours, often watching her from his office’s

glass wall as she left late at night.

He quietly admired the effort she put into her work.

She was different.

Her eyes…

They were unlike any he had ever seen.

The timidity she had around other men, yet her posture remained confident.

Her head held high but her eyes lowered as she moved around the office. It always told him

that she wasn’t someone who would bow down easily.

Her hesitance around other men fascinated him. So much.

But one dark incident was enough to cast suspicion on her, to conclude that she, like others,

wasn’t what she appeared to be.

The incident with Rafay.

Although the evidence stood against her, his heart twisted whenever he even considered

them, let alone condemned her as the culprit.

He didn’t want to believe she had lured Rafay with her charms.

He didn’t want to believe it.

The condition of having a one-night stand was just a test. A test for her. A chance to prove to

him that all the evidence was wrong. That she wasn’t that type of woman. That she was

different. She was still the woman he had been searching for.

Yet she came that night.

They committed the sin.

She, too, became a source of pleasure for him.

There were no compromises. It was just a perfect business deal. The kind of deal he’d made

with all the other women.

He paid, and they pleased him.

She had failed her test.

Yet after that night, all he could think of was her. Her alone. Her innocent movements. Her

gasps. Cries. Moans. Just her. And he hadn’t had a one-night stand since, as no one else could

bring him the pleasure her body did.

Only she could fulfill those desires. Just her.

His heart screamed that she was innocent. She was still innocent.

She was the ideal he had been searching for, despite failing that test.

His mind tried to silence his heart, but the voices grew louder, forcing him to believe in her

chastity.

Her hesitance remained intact. And to top it all, her fear was overwhelming.

Unlike those other women, who would beg to share his bed again, who would keep

returning to him, she didn’t. Instead, she was running from him. Drawing him toward her

even more.

Women had never meant anything to him other than a source of pleasure, or as creatures

with the power to ruin lives by luring others with their charms. Just like his mother had

deceived his father, blinding him to everything she did behind his back.

That was why he had never allowed a woman into his life unless he was completely certain

about her. And to this date, he still wasn’t sure about anyone. Even Sheharzaad.