Page 18 of Fixation

“So, are you going to tell us who she is?” Mihir asked.

“Who?” Vedant asked.

“Anita Svensson!” Armaan tsked.

“Oh, her—she works for the bank I was closing the oil well deal with. I went out with her a couple of times before my attack.”

“A couple of times?” Armaan looked bewildered. “Since when do you take a woman out more than once? Is this serious? Why don’t we know of this? And wait again; since you’re out of action, Mihir and I closed the deal with the director of the bank. She was nowhere in the picture.”

“That’s because she was the financial analyst assigned to the deal. Her part in the deal ended a while back.” Vedant gave Armaan a hard stare. “I met her often because of that oil deal. It was nothing but a perfect mix of business with pleasure. Sheknows we aren’t… weren’t serious. You need to stop blowing things out of proportion.”

Armaan shrugged. “Can’t blame me for being curious!”

Vedant scratched his jaw. This was the first time in years he had kept the facial hair on his face for longer than a day. He addressed Mihir, “When she calls next, tell her I’ll call her when I get access to my phone. God only knows when my doctor will approve it.”

His mind went back to his testy doctor. She was the only woman he was constantly thinking of these days. He wondered why that was the case. Why did her touch ignite him like it did? Why did her presence calm him like it did? Why did all his aches and pains ebb when she was around?

He had so many questions and hardly any answers. Perhaps, once his brothers left, he’d be able to decipher the mystery that Dr. Reina Singh was.

6

Reina left Vedant’s room in a huff. He was back to being awful again. That day, when they had shared a laugh together, she thought she’d finally managed to change a bit of her ghastly equation with him. But no, she’d been mistaken. Vedant Oshnov had no respect for her and wouldn’t talk politely for even a second. She truly hated men like that. Her biological father had been one such man, and his actions had scarred Navya and her for life. Pocketing her glasses, she untied her hair as she made her way to the kitchen.

She smiled as her thoughts flew to her family. The world had forgotten that Navya and she were the adopted daughters of Sara and Anvay Mehra. Her real parents were Gautam and Latika Singh, both deceased now. Sara Mehra was her paternal aunt, and she’d taken Navya and her in after the death of their mother, Latika Singh. Reina had been a mere eleven years old then, and Navya, twelve. Sara, Anvay, and their two kids, Rajiv and Ananya, had embraced them into their family as one of their own, and had never once made them feel any different. The two of them were truly blessed to be a part of their family. And it wasprecisely because of the said family that she hated being held prisoner here.

Her family had a bad history with the Oshnovs. First, Mihir Oshnov was the man that her elder sister Ananya shared a not-so-great past with. Mihir refused to talk to Ananya, he refused to see her, and he refused to discuss anything with her. Second, there was the yacht incident four years ago, where Ananya and Navya had gate-crashed the Oshnovs’ party with Sheena.

After that yacht incident, Ananya was wasting away. She’d become a shell of her former self. She’d become a workaholic, she ate far too less, and slept even lesser. She was too thin and pale. She hardly went out or socialised with anyone. Reina and her siblings were too damn worried about her, but she always brushed them off in that typical nonchalant way of hers.

Now, more importantly, there was another problem. A few days ago, during one of her many monitored conversations here, Reina had learned that Navya had been having a secret affair with Armaan Oshnov, and that she was head over heels in love with him. But due to a terrible misunderstanding, he refused to believe her feelings for him. Navya was heartbroken and sad. Reina sighed, hating the fact that two of her sisters were lovesick over two Oshnov brothers. These men were just awful.

And to her luck, she was stuck with the worst one and, unfortunately, the sexiest one of the three. She chewed her lip. She never should have seen that stupid magazine. She never should have gotten carried away by her colleagues and their ridiculous conversation about his hot body.

Because now she knew that he indeed had sharp abs with that sexy Adonis Vee going down… She cut off her wild thoughts and slapped a palm on her head. What was wrong with her? She still didn’t know what had gotten over her to have gawked at his abs like she had. Even now, her cheeks heated at how blatantly she’d behaved. And what was worse was that he had noticed itand had looked amused by it. She’d tried to keep her distance from him post that, ensuring she took the shifts when he was sleeping to control her raging mind and also to ensure that she never repeated such outrageous behaviour again. Thanks to Su Min filling her head with utter nonsense, she now knew what those damn tingly feelings were.

When she’d seen Vedant’s bare chest and abs, she’d felt overwhelmed, like her skin was coming alive and announcing itself. Like even her cells were buzzing. She winced. What was wrong with her? Her thoughts were so damn unethical. But then again, nothing about her current situation was ethical anyway.

Nonetheless, Vedant was her patient, and yet her mind hadn’t been able to stop conjuring images of his hard body again and again. Even now, a few days later, she couldn’t get over how freaking hot Vedant Oshnov was. As each day passed, and the bruises slowly faded from his face, his real features were beginning to show, and she had to admit that his bone structure was striking. She pursed her lips. Well, no matter that, his terrible attitude was definitely a deterrent. Horrible, mean man.

She entered the kitchen and found Su Min sipping her coffee.

“Good morning,” Reina greeted her, checking the time. It was six in the morning. “You’re up early.”

After she’d changed his dressings, Su Min and Laila had kept peppering her with questions about Vedant and his stupidly hot body. But she had ignored them and replied that she hadn’t looked. They’d promptly shut up after that, and thankfully, that topic was long over now.

“Yeah!” Her friend grinned. “I woke up a little while ago to drink some water and noticed some commotion outside my window. I peeked out and realised that the other two Oshnovs were in town. Since Vasily is the head of their security, he will surely be with them. I’m hoping to run into him at some point. I just wanted to be up and about in case he comes this way.”

Reina dropped into the chair next to her. A noise at the entrance made her turn and she locked eyes with Armaan Oshnov. Seeing him, she wore her glasses again. She’d never met him. In fact, she’d never met any of the Oshnovs prior to the day Mihir had brought them here.

Nearing them, he addressed Su Min, “I need to have a word with the doctor.”

Su Min left them immediately, and Reina was finally alone with the man her sister Navya had fallen for.

“Hello, Dr. Singh,” he said, reading her name tag. “Or should I say, Dr. Reina Mehra?”

Her whole body froze in shock. How had he guessed?

“You look like her,” he said, more to himself. Of course, she looked like Navya. They were sisters. And this man had been obsessed with Navya for far too long. But now? Now, she didn’t know what he felt for Navya or why he was here talking to her.

---