The dining table was quiet except for the clink of cutlery and the distant hum of the city. Sunlight slanted through the blinds, painting lines across Veeresh’s jaw. He watched Ruby — the way her fingers toyed with the rim of her glass, the little crease of concentration between her brows when she thought — and felt fewer things than a man should, and yet more than he wanted to admit.

“Tell me,” he said suddenly, casual like a blade wrapped in silk, “what do you think about… remarriage?”

Poornima blinked, confused. “Remarriage?” she echoed. “Why are you asking me that?”

He folded a napkin, eyes steady. “Just curious.”

She laughed softly, the sound light and honest. “Veeresh, I don’t believe in that. Not for other people, maybe — their ideas may be different — but for me… I married you. Forever means forever. I won’t leave in the middle.”

The words landed in him like a hand on a smoldering coal. Quiet, simple, absolute. He let them sit. He tasted something like relief and something dangerously close to pride.

“And my London application?” she added, a spark in her voice. “It’s accepted.”

Heat flickered across his face — not anger, not exactly. “Fees?” he asked, because he needed facts more than flattery.

“I already paid them,” she said, like it was the most ordinary line in the world.

He studied her. She had done it alone — applied, earned it, paid for it. A smile so faint it could have been mistaken for shadow touched the corner of his mouth. He could do everything, but he liked that this victory was hers.

“Will you come with me?” she asked suddenly, eyes hopeful. “To London. At least the first day?”

He looked toward the window, thinking of planes and conferences, of men who expected devotion and deals that bled into midnight. “No,” he said after a pause. “I can’t. But I’ll be there on your first day.”

Her face lit like a lamp. “Really?”

“Really,” he confirmed, voice low. “First day — I’ll watch you walk into that world.”

She smiled, then a mischievous, wicked glint returned. “And Veeresh — if you try to cheat on me or do something… immoral,” she said, leaning forward and whispering with mock menace, “I’ll infuse more drugs in your tea. You’ll see.”

For a heartbeat the room froze. Then Veeresh’s laugh — dark, surprised, nothing like the snarl the city feared — broke out. The guards in the hallway would have called it impossible. The pets would have tilted their heads and wondered what joke had passed between them.

“Threatening the underworld don?” he teased, amusement curling his tone. “That takes courage.”

She puffed her cheeks, delighted she’d ruffled him. “You might be the devil to everyone else,” she said firmly, “but you’re my husband. I have rights.”

Veeresh watched her: the way she said my husband with such ownership; the softness that followed the fight in her words. A sudden, sharp protectiveness coiled in him — not for his reputation, not for his empire, but for that small, fierce woman who’d sat on his back and ordered him into push-ups.

He reached across the table and covered her hand with his palm — a gesture small enough to be private, big enough to be binding. “Do your worst, Ruby,” he murmured, not threatened but amused, “and I’ll do worse in return.”

She grinned, squeezed back, and leaned into the ordinary warmth between them.

Outside, the city went on — deals were made, fortunes were counted, empires rose and fell. Inside, at a simple table with cake crumbs and teacups, two dangerous souls stitched a fragile promise with laughter, threats, and the kind of quiet that meant more than vows.

Veeresh left the table first that night, pausing in the doorway. He didn’t look at her; he didn’t need to. His stomach still twisted at the thought of her leaving for London, at the ache of another man’s praise on her name.

He was a king of shadows. She was a girl who had once kissed a stranger in the rain.

Somewhere between the two, something like belonging had begun — and neither of them could yet say whether it would save them or burn them.