Page 138 of Lawfully Yours
Her heart skipped.
She glanced at Raj, trying to mask the sudden tremor of emotion in her chest.
“Fine, get Anant seated in the conference room,” she said carefully.
“He’s already seated at Kushal sir’s cabin,” Akash replied.
“But Kushal isn’t here,” she argued.
“He came in just a few minutes ago.”
Her heart did a somersault.
He washere?
She caught the look Raj Verma gave her. Her uncle had read every flicker of expression on her face. Before he could say anything more, she picked up her phone and stepped past him.
“I’ll be right there,” she followed Akash out.
But inside, her pulse was hammering.
She didn’t know if she was rushing away from her uncle’s impossible questions or if she was hurrying toward the man she hadn’t seen in three days.
Arundhati took a steadying breath before unlocking the door and stepping inside Kushal’s cabin. And there he was.
Standing beside Anant, mid-conversation, dressed in a crisp white shirt that clung just right. He looked professional, and amazingly... good. So good, in fact, that it physically hurt to look at him and realise he wasn’t even sparing her a glance.
Every ounce of the warmth he had poured into her over the last few weeks, every soft look, every unspoken moment, every night they’d shared, was now locked away, as though it had never existed.
He hadn’t just pulled back. He hadretreated. A hundred steps backwards into the version of him she had first known—distant, unreadable, courteous but cold. The version from before Anant’s case. Before Dalhousie.
But this time, it hurt more. Because this time… it was her fault.
Forcing herself to focus, Arundhati turned to Anant and offered a polite smile. “Good morning, Anant,” she said, extending her hand.
Anant smiled and shook it. She caught the moment Kushal averted his gaze, eyes glued to his laptop screen, refusing even the briefest glance in her direction. As if her presence didn’t register anymore.
As if she were just… another colleague.
It was a reaction she should’ve welcomed. It was so professional and detached. Exactly what someone in the middle of a divorce should hope for. But her heart twisted in protest.She hated it. And this time her mind was screaming out aloud clearly, that his cold behaviour affected her.
Kushal slid a set of papers across the desk to Anant and said, “Now that Ms. Verma is here, we can proceed. Start by signing these, and we’ll walk you through the hearing protocol.”
Ms. Verma.
She froze. He had never stopped calling her ‘Mrs. Nair,’ even when things between them had been at their worst. And now, here he was…deliberately stripping her of his name like it meant nothing.
She didn’t know why she looked down at his hands just then…maybe instinct, maybe dread…but her eyes found them easily.
And there it was.
Or rather, wasn’t.
The ring.
The wedding band he had never taken off. Not even during the ugliest fights. Not during the first court hearing. Not even when she’d sworn, she was done with this marriage. It had stayed on.
But now… it was gone. He had finally accepted it and taken off their wedding band too, just like she had stopped wearing Sindoor and Mangalsutra from months ago.
