Take One Arranged Marriage...

‘I take back everything I said about this being a bad idea.’ Ritu said. ‘I saw your fiancé for about five minutes outside, and he’s gorgeous. Most women would kill for a night with a man like that.’

Tara gulped. Other than a kissing session with a college classmate, which she’d entered into on a purely experimental basis, she was terribly inexperienced when it came to men. And Vikram looked anything but inexperienced. He’d probably slept with dozens of women. The thought of the wedding night had her tied up in knots. She was so unsure about what to do and how to behave. The thought of actually getting into bed with Vikram was scary and exciting at the same time, and a little shiver went through her.

‘Feeling cold?’ Ritu asked, oblivious to the turmoil in her best friend’s mind. ‘It’ll be warmer in the main hall—it’s actually getting a bit stuffy. There are dozens of people around. You sure you don’t have some gatecrashers in there?’

Tara grinned unwillingly. At some point, the ‘quiet family affair’ had got completely out of control, probably because the ‘family’ on either side numbered over a hundred people. The noise filtered in even through the closed doors of the changing room. Everyone was talking and laughing at once, the priest was chanting Sanskrit mantras at the top of his voice, and to add to the pandemonium there were live musicians playing traditional music to accompany the mantras. The plaintive strains of the nadaswaram in the background intensified the fluttery feeling in Tara’s stomach, and for an instant she had a childish impulse to cover her ears with her hands.

After about ten more minutes her mother turned up again, to lead her out to the wedding pavilion.

‘I can’t see—stop shoving me!’ she hissed, her eyes discreetly lowered as her mother had instructed.

She was seething as she was finally pushed into her seat in front of the sacred fire by various over-helpful female relatives. The noise was much louder, and the heavy beat of the drum seemed to make her heart pound harder. Her eyes began to water—the priest had just poured a pot of butter into the fire, and it was smoking dreadfully.

‘Such a coincidence, meeting you here,’ an extremely sexy voice drawled into her ear.

She spun towards the sound and found herself looking right into Vikram’s eyes.

‘Calm down,’ he said, lowering his voice. ‘Not changed your mind, have you? You look more like you’re at a funeral than a wedding.’

‘I feel ridiculously over-dressed,’ Tara muttered, taking in the sight of Vikram in a white T-shirt over a veshti, the single white cotton kilt-like lower garment that was traditional male garb for any South Indian religious occasion—weddings and funerals included.

His hair was still damp from the shower, and the white collar of his T-shirt set off his tanned skin to perfection. Ritu was right—he looked gorgeous. Tara unconsciously clenched her hands. It wasn’t fair. She didn’t want to be attracted to him so strongly. He was just looking at her now, for God’s sake, and it was driving her crazy with longing. The suppressed heat in his eyes was making her imagine all kinds of delicious things.

‘You look absolutely stunning,’ he said finally, his voice low. ‘Don’t look at him now, but even the pundit’s checking you out.’

Tara smiled. She couldn’t help it. Vikram was perhaps a little too calm and collected, but he definitely was a help in getting things into perspective.

‘That’s better,’ Vikram said. ‘I feel a little less like an undertaker’s assistant now.’

She laughed at that, and both her parents gave her disapproving looks.

‘Vikram, kannan, you can’t get married wearing a T-shirt,’ one of the hovering aunts clicked in exasperation.

In addition to the veshti, tradition also dictated a bare-chested dress code for men.

‘It’s cold,’ someone else said chidingly. ‘He can take the T-shirt off once the actual ceremonies begin.’

‘They’re about to begin!’ the first voice chimed in. ‘Vikram …’

‘Yes—OK!’ he said in exasperation, and stood up, pulling the T-shirt over his head in one fluid movement.

Ohhhh. He had the best body Tara had ever seen off-screen, and she almost cried out in protest when he slung an angavastram carelessly across one shoulder, the white cloth covering up a large part of his near-perfect chest.

‘Drool alert,’ Ritu whispered warningly into her ear.

Tara looked away in a hurry, hoping none of the aunts had noticed her casting lustful looks at her almost-husband. She couldn’t turn off the images in her mind, though—her anticipation for their first night together had just been turned up a notch.

Most of the ceremony passed by in blur—except for her having to perch on Vikram’s knee for the duration of one particularly complex ritual. In her efforts to a) not put her full weight on him, and b) not seem too flustered at having to climb onto his lap in front of a hundred interested onlookers, she almost overbalanced.

He put his hands around her waist, his warm palms touching her bare skin just above the waistband of the sari. ‘Relax, you won’t crush me,’ he said, and pulled her back against him.

Tara sat quietly, doing her best not to breathe. For the few minutes she stayed on his lap she felt as if they were isolated from the rest of the world. The priest’s chants and the excited conversation among their relatives seemed to be coming from a long, long distance away. All that was real was the feeling of his hands on her waist, and his breath on the nape of her neck. She had a sudden mad urge to turn around and press her lips to his, and she almost shuddered with the effort of keeping still.

Finally the priest beamed around at everyone, pronouncing all the ceremonies done, and the magistrate’s assistant came forward with the marriage register. Tara felt her heart thumping in her chest as she signed it. This was it. She was tied to Vikram for the rest of her life now. She caught her father wiping his eyes furtively and was almost unbearably touched. Her mother, in contrast, for once looked completely in control.

‘So far, so good,’ Vikram murmured out of the corner of his mouth as they posed for photographs with the nth set of beaming relatives. ‘Are you feeling better now? For a minute I thought you’d bolt—you looked petrified.’

‘I didn’t!’ Tara said indignantly. Talk about a mood-killer. ‘It was all that smoke and noise.’

‘Smoke and noise?’ he repeatedly thoughtfully. ‘Hmm …’

His arm slipped round her waist, and he bent and lightly brushed his lips against hers. It was a teasingly casual embrace, but her already heightened senses went haywire at his touch. She instinctively leaned into the kiss, blushing when he drew away and surveyed her with amused eyes.

‘I’m looking forward to tonight,’ he said huskily, almost to himself.

Someone called out to him, but he held her gaze for a few seconds, his jet-black eyes burning into hers before he turned away. Tara could feel her pulse racing. Thankfully no one was near enough to notice her agitation, and she took a couple of deep breaths before she went to stand by Vikram’s side for the next round of photographs.

CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_11a8aeac-8947-5e6b-988b-cec616ed6af0)

TARA scowled into the mirror. ‘This blouse was a mistake,’ she said, looking at the fussy red and silver long-sleeved brocade blouse she was supposed to wear for the wedding reception that Vikram’s father was hosting at his swanky club. ‘I shouldn’t have let my mother and the tailors bulldoze me into getting it stitched this way. I look ridiculous.’

‘Tara, it’s too late to do anything. The guests have begun to arrive,’ Ritu protested. ‘Put it on, and we’ll drape the sari in a way so it doesn’t look too bad.’

‘I am not about to step out in front of a thousand people dressed like Santa Claus in drag,’ Tara said through her teeth. ‘Can you get me a pair of scissors from somewhere?’

‘Tara …’ Ritu said despairingly.

Tara turned around. ‘I need to look like I belong with Vikram,’ she said. ‘Not like some schoolroom miss dressed up by her mum.’