Bollywood Fiancé for a Day Read Online Free Page B

It hadn’t required effort to fight that attraction. Unlike now. As though this man had a beam-you-up spotlight just like the starship in a game she’d used to play. You stepped into the circle and whoosh, you were swept up into its mysterious insides.
    â€˜Zaheer…’ someone called. He was wanted and he excused himself. ‘If you have to wait for me again, remember I’ll be making it all up to you later on.’ He winked and was swallowed up in the group.
    Left to her own devices, Vishakha stood frowning. The crowd was dispersing. The image of those glinting gold flecks still in her mind, she made her way to the patio encircling the hall. Her head spun with the after effects of meeting Zaheer Saxena.
    She supported her hands on the cool rail, inhaling the scent of damp earth. It had rained during the time she’d been inside. The breeze coming from the wet garden hit her bare arms.
    What had she been thinking? If she hadn’t been so rattled from last week, she’d never have pressed him for this ridiculous ‘real’ date.
    Her last date had been with her ex-fiancé. Admittedly a total disaster. She’d been so pleased a two-year-old patient with pneumonia had survived against all odds, she’d provided Munish with the details of it all through the evening. He had listened with what she’d thought must be interest, but could only have been politeness because he’d cut short their date saying he had an urgent call from home. She had tried not to mind but the evening had left her disturbed. She cringed at herself now. What a dim bulb! He’d been making an excuse to get away from her obviously boring ravings about her patient and she hadn’t even guessed.
    She squeezed her eyes shut as they pricked with tears again. How could she
not
have seen what was coming?
    Had he taken that date as a sign of their coming life together? She blinked away the tears. She wasn’t about to march up and ask him, so there was no way of knowing if that was true.
    Twenty-six and almost a complete novice to the dating scene. Her mouth curled in disgust. That was the price for keeping her nose buried in medical books. As a child she’d seen her mother struggle to bring her up because she had no proper job qualifications. She’d been determined she’d never have to face that kind of grind, determined to get her degree and build her career. Her mother’s remarriage to an affluent and wealthy man hadn’t made any difference to that vow.
    Her stepfather was as loving as she could have wished for, except for being a stickler for tradition. He’d told her in no-nonsense terms while sending her to the hostel in Delhi, ‘No boyfriends, no love affairs.’
    Since she wasn’t the rule-breaker in the family, she’d had no intention of going against him. An intention that had been strengthened by seeing too many failed affairs. So many of her friends exchanged love notes in the library and fixed up dates, only to end up weeks later, shedding tears over broken relationships. So she’d steered clear of deepening the friendships with her male cohorts.
    Now here she was. On the brink of dating a Bollywood star. On the threshold of an evening that didn’t bear any resemblance to her humdrum hospital rounds.
    Maybe she needed this to make her unwind. Free herself from the stresses of work and her personal disappointments. This evening could be her path to fun.
    Could it?
    Couldn’t it?
    She came back to the hall and almost ran into the black-clad muscle machine that was Zaheer Saxena.
    â€˜Steady on. Don’t flatten me with your eagerness.’ The laughter lightening his eyes teased her, making her scowl and heat up both at the same time.
    He said in his typical drawl, ‘So when do we start? I’m ready to leave.’
    I’m ready to leave.
It sounded so final. So he meant it. Instead of raising her hackles, the low tone served to