Chapter 163: In his office

She sat in his office with her head bowed down, eyes staring at her lap. Her hands rested

between her knees and her shoulders slumped. The moment she had entered the office, she

didn't dare to look up. She kept her gaze down. Her eyes were fixed on observing the

mesmerizing floor. Apart from that, she could feel her heart beating a mile a minute,

drumming in her ears, and her mind running a mile a minute too as she thought about

explaining herself to him.

He was standing near the table, going through a file and simultaneously waiting for the call

he had just made.

She was looking at him with her peripheral vision. Her hands went clammy suddenly as she

saw him putting that blue-cased file on the table as he came near her and occupied his prior

position sitting on the sofa in front of her again.

She sat on a swivel chair that he had dragged in front of the couch and made her sit on it

before sitting on the settee. Her legs were sandwiched between his when he had made a call

asking for the details of all the incoming and outgoing calls for the last two weeks. While he

was giving instructions on the phone, his eyes were on Sheharzaad as he was playing with a

few stray strands of her hair that had managed to escape from her ponytail. Once done

making the call, he went to the table looking for something and now came back again.

Her legs were between his, and she wasn't moving her eyes to look at him. He rested his

back against the sofa as he drummed his fingers against his thigh.

"What is so mesmerizing?" he suddenly asked, and she looked up at him with those big grey

innocent eyes of hers.

"Hunh?" Her breathing was labored.

"About the floor?" he addressed the question in her eyes, and she just shook her head.

"No—nothing," she whispered.

"Then let your eyes remain on me," he told her, and for a moment, she thought his voice was

cold. It unnerved her instantly.

Rather, she had been unnerved the very moment Alizey told about the phone call at the

dining table, and he dragged her all the way up to his study. She hoped he wouldn't hurt her

or, worse, that he would be suspicious of her and send her back to the cell.

The thought had been eating her. The anxiety was becoming unbearable with every passing

second. She was praying to God to save her this time from this phone call blunder and the

next time, she wouldn't even stare at the phone ever.

The way her heart was pounding, she had a hunch he could hear it.

"Whom were you talking to?"

The question she feared. And this time, she did not have an answer either. The blood

flowing in her veins was freezing as she stared at him with the look of pure horror.

She was struck. Struck badly.

Her tongue now didn't have the courage to move and say anything. Even if it had the power

to speak, she was so confused and in an intense dilemma, not knowing whether to go with

the truth or the lie. Because in both cases, she would be cornered.

He snapped his fingers, breaking her trance. His eyes could detect how her face was going

from pale to white.

She shook her head. "I—I was... m-me?" she stuttered in the middle when he leaned closer.

Things were getting serious for her.

Terror began to course through her veins.

"Yes, you, Sheharzaad?" his eyes probed hers.

The hairs on her neck stood as she tightly clenched her fingers together. She dug her nails

into her palm so the pain would overtake her overwhelming fear. Her face depicted nothing

but apprehension, as if someone had asked her the most difficult question of her life, and if

she wouldn't answer, it would result in her doom and death.

She shook her head. "No—noh," she whimpered in her tiny voice.

She was so overwhelmed that she didn't notice the slight blood drawing out of her palm

where her nails were piercing through her skin.

"What no?" his brows furrowed in a frown. He was relentless, not taking mercy on the

quivering girl, rather rising her panic attack with every passing second.

His frown alone was enough to do the deed, as her head began to feel light.

'Take her to the cell. I will deal with her personally,'

His voice from her dream played in her mind.

A tear dropped from her eye out of utter fear.

"It w-was n-no one. I don't know anyone. Maybe—maybe some random person. Alizey m-m-

ight be mistaken," she said in a low voice at last.

He poked his tongue against his cheek and again leaned toward her. This time, he paralleled

his face with hers. Her heart skipped a beat as his intense stare probed her eyes.

"We will know, Zaad. We will know soon," he uttered, and she couldn't help but gulp in fear.

On cue, his phone rang, and she knew it was the person calling whom he had asked for the

details.

Sheharzaad felt her breath shortening as she saw him picking up his phone from the sofa's

seat and then swiping on the screen before placing the phone next to his ear. Her lips

slightly fell apart.

He was listening carefully to what the next person was saying. And he came to know it was

an international number calling. The number was not possible to trace yet, but most

probably, it was someone within the country using a different SIM to make a call at the

haveli. A person who might be associated with government institutions because they have

such facilities or a criminal gang. Also, they had activated the phone recorders of the haveli

now to tap the conversations. Heeding all the information he got, Shehryaar hung up the

call, and his eyes settled on an anxious Sheharzaad again.