Aradhya's Encounter

"Please, my pleasure," said I as I stood up and held the chair out for her.

"You're alone?" she said as she looked around to check.

"Yes, I am," I said.

She looked relieved.

"Do you come here frequently," she asked.

"Not exactly," I said. "In fact I have seen this place plenty of times from the outside but this is the first time I came in."

"I do come here very often," she said, with that mesmerizing smile on her lips. "In fact, I come here every Wednesday and Friday. We are a small group," she pointed towards the other women who were looking at us with curiosity and waved a frantic 'hi' when they saw me looking "who come here on a regular basis. Why don't you also join us?"

"Me?" I was taken aback, "joining an all-woman group? No thanks."

She laughed heartily and I observed her laughing. She had the perfect pair of teeth, dazzling white, shining like a set of pearls in a necklace. God still makes them that perfect, I found myself amazed.

"Though you see here an all-woman group, we do not mind the company of men at all. In fact, we wanted men to join as well but somehow they were all too busy during the week," she said.

"Why? I thought Mr. Arun was always free and eager to please women; didn't he want to join you?" Ever since Aradhya had mentioned that name, it was etched in my head.

Neetu became serious all of a sudden. Then, with a look of severe irritation on her face, she leaned towards me and said, "in fact he was very eager but we didn't want him to be with us. We all hate him for his flirtatious nature. He thinks he is the most charming of all people and is always trying to hit on one woman or the other. Why, the other day I saw him hitting on Ara..." Her voice trailed off as she realized who she was talking to.

"His behavior did not deter you from inviting him to your party it seems," I was bitter in my voice.

She immediately could sense me. She clasped my hands in hers, leaned over further, looked around and then whispered, "I wanted to talk to you about that. Would it be possible for us to talk about it when we're alone?"

"I'm okay with it, you tell me the time and the place."

"No point in delaying things. Let's move over to our table and you can have dinner with us. After that, we'd stay back and I'd tell my friends that you would be dropping me off. When they're gone, we would go together and talk. Is that okay with you?"

I nodded in agreement and approached their table with she leading.

When they saw me approaching, the other women jostled among themselves for me to sit by their side. I was embarrassed and probably flushed a bit, which was a cause of their further amusement. In the end, I sat by the side of Neetu.

I had a great dinner, interspersed by the women's flirts, and when I offered to pay and reached for my wallet, I found my hand being grasped by all the women, all at once. I removed my hand, my face red as an apple.

When Neetu announced that we would be there for some more time and would go home together, the other women had varied expressions to convey. Some smiled covertly, some shook Neetu's hand and whispered a 'best of luck' while some had a clear look of jealousy on their faces.

We waited some more time after they had gone and then I led Neetu to my car. It was quite late in the night and as soon as I opened the door for Neetu, I felt something cold touching my neck. As I tried to turn, a hand went round my neck and a voice told me to stand still. I looked over at Neetu and saw that a masked man was behind her, holding a blade to her neck. I could see her arms slowly moving upwards in an act of surrender.

The man holding Neetu had one of his hands down her shoulder and I could see him moving his hand towards her breast. I saw him starting to unbutton her shirt and Neetu winced at his touch. He pressed the blade to her neck and told her to stand still. He opened a few buttons and inserted his hand in the shirt. From over her clothes, I could see his hand mauling her breasts.

The man behind me told me to take out all my belongings including my wallet and my watch and slowly place it on the ground and that's when I understood that they were novices at this.

I slowly removed my wallet and as I leaned over to place it on the ground, the other man was within my easy reach. I placed the wallet and in a sudden move, grasped his leg and pulled with all my might. He flew in the air and then fell down with a loud thud.

Before the person behind me could understand what was happening, a solid punch from me had landed on his balls and he crunched forward and slumped to the ground.

Their blades were scattered on the pavement and I reached forward and collected them. As one of them started moving a bit, I kicked him on his head and he went still.

Neetu stood there, shocked for a moment. She then ran towards me and hugged me tight, with her head buried in my chest. I stroked her hair and said it was okay now and she had nothing to fear.

Neetu had started crying and I held her and made her sit in the car. I bent both their blades till I broke them in half. I threw those at them and sat down on my seat in the car.

Neetu leaned towards me and placed her head on my shoulders, still sobbing. I took her face in my hands and wiped away her tears. The top buttons of her shirt were torn off and a lot of cleavage was showing. I pulled her shirt hems together to cover her up. She looked down to see what I was doing and then, instinctively, kissed me on my lips.

"It was my duty, you don't need to thank me Neetu," I said. "I'd do this much for a friend like you."

Even at that moment, she showed her inclination for naughtiness. "Just friends!" she pursed her lips as if annoyed and I laughed out loud. She looked at me for some time, then with all seriousness, cupped my face in her hands and pulled me to her. She kissed me deeply and for quite a long time. She inserted her tongue in my mouth and started wrapping it around mine.

I had no experience of kissing any other woman other than Aradhya and could feel my cock getting hard. I got a further shock when one of her hands left my face and started traveling downward, down my chest, to stomach and finally resting on the bulge. I could feel my cock twitch at her touch.

My god, if this was what happened with just a kiss of Neetu, I don't know what would happen if I saw her breasts – I was an all out breast man.

Neetu had definitely felt the twitch of my cock and she started unzipping my trousers. With her tongue still playing inside her mouth, I felt her pulling my cock out of my trousers and her gasping when she felt the thickness and the length. She left my mouth and glanced down and I could feel myself beginning to sweat.

"Neetu," I could barely hear myself, "t-this is w-wrong."

She put her finger across my lips. "Sshhh..." and she bent down to lick the head of my cock.

I gasped and had my hips thrust upwards. Aradhya would never do it as she felt it was dirty.

She pushed the head of my cock in her mouth and started sucking on it. She would suck once or twice and then would release it from her mouth and then again start sucking.

"Oh god," I moaned. "Please stop. I can't hold myself."

All these nights of not having sex was adding up to my arousal. I held her head in my hand, "Neetu, please stop."

She left my cock and looked up at me. "Really?" she asked in a not-so-serious tone. "You need me to stop?"

I held her face in my hands. "I really need you to stop," I said.

She assessed the sincerity in my face for some time and then let my cock go. I pushed it inside my trousers and when I zipped up, I saw her looking at me with surprise.

"I haven't yet heard of a guy who could go back from that point," she said, stroking my face. "Thankfully, there aren't many."

_____

By the time we reached home, we had our plan set. I would not say I wasn't feeling very bad for Aradhya but Neetu convinced me. "If she does something like that only then we need to move, otherwise not. So, rest assured you're not doing anything wrong. Please take care of your bank and office accounts and if you're not sure how to do it, you now have the name of a trusted accountant."

I entered home with a mix of emotions.

Aradhya was waiting at the dinner table. I looked at my watch. I was really late today; it was past midnight. I felt a pang of grief for her.

"Dinner?" she asked.

I said I already had. She never said anything and entered the kitchen. She brought out some food and sat down to eat. At that point I felt tears coming to my eyes. She was waiting for me without having dinner herself for all this time!

I could not look at her any more and hurried to the bedroom. I closed my eyes and started thinking about the plan Neetu had suggested. After some time, I felt Aradhya climbing on the bed and laying down next to me.

We kept lying down side-by-side.

"How long do you think we can go along like this?" she asked.

"What exactly do you mean, 'like this'?" I asked.

"Like you have been behaving for so many days now," she said. "Not talking to me, not responding to my questions, not looking at me, refusing to have meals with me, not letting me touch you and last but not the least, not even doing it."

"You are trying to make me feel as if I am responsible for all this!" I said in a sarcastic tone, "when actually you're solely responsible."

"Me?" she seemed genuine in her surprise.

"Let me refresh your memory a little bit," I said. "You think your behavior was very decent when you decided to spend time alone with that Arun the night of the party? You were laughing and talking as if you knew each other from years! You even decided to completely ignore me when I went to the counter. Even when you saw I was alone, you never made an effort to join me and still spent time with him!

When everybody was having dinner and talking to each other, you chose not to talk even to me and you and him were exchanging glances! What was that all about? And if you think nobody else noticed you two, let me tell you that you're absolutely mistaken."

She fell silent for a few moments. "Who else noticed?" was the first question.

I was astonished at her attitude. Instead of defending herself, she wanted to know of who else knew! The pang of grief that I had felt for her sometime back just vanished.

"Really," I could not hide my bitterness, "that's the only thing you're bothered about?"

"I mean I need to know who thinks that way, because I'm going to have to explain to all of them that it's nothing like it looks." She was up to her antics once again. "It's easy explaining to you because you're my husband, but I would need to find time to go to the others to explain. That's what I meant when I asked who else thinks like that."

"Don't bother explaining to anyone," I said. "However hard you may try, you are bound to fail. Nobody is going to believe a word of what you say and that includes me. Now if you choose to stop, may I sleep?"

She propped herself up on her elbows and looked at me. "Just because I have spoken to some guy does not prove that I'm a bad character. You are unnecessarily maligning me by saying such things. We maintained our distance when we talked and there was not even a touch of hand between us. If that means something so disturbing that you stop talking to me, I cannot help it."

I could not hold myself anymore. I stood up from the bed abruptly and told her to get up as well.

"What happened", she was surprised.

"Come with me," I demanded.

Reluctantly, she followed me as I entered the living room.

"Who gave you these?" I asked, pointing to the bunch of flowers in the glass vase on the side table.

"I-I p-purchased them," she started stammering.

"Really, where from?" was my next question.

She was quiet for a moment. I could see she was desperately trying to find a name in her mind.

"F-from a p-person who brought them; it was a d-door to door s-seller." She blurted out in the end.

"Just wait here," I said as I went inside the bedroom. I opened my wallet and brought out a piece of paper I had carefully kept there. I brought the paper in the living room.

"This is where it was actually purchased from," I showed her the piece of paper. "Aks Florist. And I actually saw who purchased it because this purchase was done in front of my eyes. I didn't know who they were meant for at that time. When I came back from the office that night, I saw the same flowers here and when I picked the bunch up from the base, I saw this piece of paper attached to it. I removed it and kept it with me. You never noticed it at the time you put it in the vase, did you?

"Now would you be kind enough to spit out what's happening in my absence? Clearly, that Arun has been coming here and you've not only been enjoying his visits, but have also been hiding it from me. Please try and explain this now."

I could see her breaking bit-by-bit as the entire thing unfolded. As I finished, I could see that she could not hold herself together any more and she just slid to the ground, crying.

I stood there, looking at her. I was surprised that I felt disgust looking at the woman whom I had loved with all my heart till just a few days back.

After several minutes, I said, "You should be thankful that I have still not divorced you; so, stop crying and feel great about it till the time it lasts."

She looked up at me, fear engulfing her now.

She moved her hands to grip my legs but I moved away.

She cried, "Please don't talk about divorce. I agree that I got a bit carried away but believe me, that was it. We never got beyond friendship and nothing happened between us. In fact, even when he came to deliver the flowers, I did not let him come in and he just gave me the flowers and went away from the door. Believe me."

"That's not what I had heard." I blindly took my chances. "You not only did allow him to enter but he was here for quite some time."

Her eyes grew wide and she started looking into my eyes trying to ascertain what else I knew. "N-no, I m-must have f-forgotten. He p-probably did enter but he left s-soon after."

"I give you 15 days," my voice was ruthless. "Either you promise to really mend your ways or this is the countdown to your doom."

I went to the living room and lay down on the couch, leaving her sitting on the floor. After some time, I fell asleep.

_____

The next few days were no different from the last few days as far as I was concerned. Neetu called me up in my office and told me to meet her at a different restaurant tonight for dinner. After that night, she has stopped going there altogether and her Wednesday and Friday dinners have now shifted to this restaurant.

We met and Neetu greeted me with a smile. She told me that she did not know what I had done but they had stopped seeing each other initially. But for the last two days, Aradhya had been calling a cab and going out. Her informer has noticed that some time later, she takes a different cab and the cab stops at the back lane of Arun's house. She goes in and they spend some time together.

After that, a cab comes at the same spot and she leaves. She goes somewhere and then she takes a different cab and comes on the front street. She pays the cab and enters home. To anybody not having a keen eye, it would appear as if she has been going out at one time and coming back after some time, which is nothing to doubt about.

"Can we go to Step 2 now?" I asked Neetu.

"That's what I wanted to talk to you about. Do you think this is the right time to do it?"

"Of course. Let's get to know what's going on behind those closed doors. Meanwhile, you go to your telephone office and submit an application form asking for call details that have either been made or received of the last 30 days. Obviously they have been talking to each other to fix the date and time of meeting." She said.

"I'd do that tomorrow itself."

As we left and moved towards my car, I felt an immense gratitude towards Neetu. She was going out of her way to help me. I suddenly stopped midway, held her hands in mine and told her I didn't know how to pay her back. She had that smile of mischief when she answered next, "I've already figured that out and believe me, the payout would be heavy."

_____

She called me to her house a few days later. She said that her husband would not be there till late at night and so, it would be safer for us to meet at her house.

Aradhya had already shown us how to go about it undetected, so I took a cab and went round to the back lane. Apart from the garbage collection people who collected it once every morning, nobody else used it throughout the day.

When I went in, it was already dark. She had kept the back door open, so it was easy for me to sneak in.

When I went in, she was alone. She told me to have a seat and that her informer would be sending in the stuff in some time.

Some time later, the doorbell rang. Neetu went and answered it. Once she came back, she had an envelope in her hand.

She opened it and poured the contents out. It was a series of photographs, detailing what happened in that house.

I went through three or four of them before I surrendered and said to Neetu I didn't want to look at more. Neetu understood my point but she went through all of them.

They were a series, detailing the encounters Aradhya had with Arun. The few I saw showed them kissing, Arun removing her clothes, sucking on her nipples, licking her pussy, she sucking his cock. This last one was the final nail in the coffin for her – apparently, with me, she found it 'dirty' and never ever did that.

Me and Neetu sat down and went through all the details. Neetu had prepared a check-list and we just ticked on what had already been taken care of and the rest, with a big red underline below for us to do it fast.

As I went to my house that night, I saw Aradhya sitting in the living room in her nightie. I avoided her completely and went up to the bedroom. She came to the bedroom just after. She wanted to know if I would like to have dinner, which I denied, as usual.

She came closer and said, "Do you think we can do it tonight? It's been a very difficult period for me without doing it for so long; I don't know how you are managing."

I looked up at her and saw complete sincerity on her face – 'women are the finest actors...'

I did not even want to look at her face again, realizing how easily she could lie on my face. I just picked up her pillow and took it with me to the living room.

"Are you going to sleep here again?" she had followed me.

"You're mistaken. This is your pillow and you are going to sleep here. I'd be in my bedroom."

With that, I threw her pillow on the couch and went to my bedroom and locked the door from inside.

_____

I deliberately stayed home that day. I could see Aradhya prancing around me, trying to figure out when I would leave home – she didn't have the guts to ask directly. Some time later, she changed and came back wearing a sari.

"I'm going out for some time," she announced.

"You can't go now," I said.

"Why?" she had probably never thought this would be my answer.

"Because I've ordered something for you which is due any minute now. Take that and then leave."

She sat down, in anticipation. Then, she came closer to me and with a smile on her face, held my arm and said, "What is it? A gift for me? Is it a necklace? No, wait, it must be the earrings that I once told you about! What is it? Please tell me."

She was suddenly so much in love with me – women are the finest actors...

The doorbell rang and Aradhya rushed to open it as soon as she heard it. I also came out from the living room – I didn't want to miss out on the look on her face when she saw what it was.