His Wife (A Contract Marriage Story) by Heer Mangtani

Chapter 104
(ALEX]
“Do you have a family?” She asked, and I’d be lying if I said that the first feeling in me wasn’t suspicion.
But it didn’t look like she put any thought into it, just asked what was on the top of her head.
“I do,” replied.
“What? Really?” Her eyes widened. “I didn’t think you were a family guy.”
“I have a mom. A dad. A twin sister. Younger brother. An uncle and an aunt. The whole package, actually,”
“No way.” Her eyes bulged while she made her way to sit on the wooden steps leading to the garden, her feet still dipped into the
grass as if it was something to touch. She wanted to touch grass. Who the f**k touches grass? “Your parents encouraged you to
be a part of the...” she hesitated, her voice turning into a whisper, “Mafia?”
I rolled my eyes at how dramatic she was. “Mafia. You can say it.”
She raises her shoulders.
“And no,” I answer her, I don’t know why. “My father wanted to kill me when he found it, but I think a part of him always knew
about my knack for destruction- right since I started a fire in my school,”
Now, her eyes looked like they would fall out of their sockets. “You started a fire in your school? How old were you? Sixteen?”
“Twelve,” I smile, reminiscing.
“Why even?”
“I wanted to go watch a football game.”
She gapes. “Unbelievable. What did your parents do then?”
“I was grounded for the month. Mom didn’t talk to me for a week. It was... tough.”
“Aww. Mama’s boy?”

Full and full mama’s boy. But I wasn’t going to tell her that. “I was.”
“What happened then?”
“Then, I picked up a gun and started shooting people.”
She frowns. “If I had a family, I would never leave them. I would just stay with them forever.”
Getting tired of hovering over her back, I sit next to her, leaving a good few feet between us. “Did you ever try to find them?”
“I did. I found the social worker who put me in the system, and she told me I showed up outside an orphanage when I was just
three days old.” Her voice turns smaller. “I think they gave me up because they didn’t want me, but I still missed them all my life,
you know? Like there was this huge mom and dad shaped emptiness inside me growing up and that never went away, no matter
how much I told myself I should hate them because they didn’t want me.
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“What then?” I enquire, “No friends? No found family?”
1. I had friends,” she mumbles. “But every time I was shifted into a new foster home, I lost them. At some point, it felt why attach
yourself to people if you’re going have to leave them any way
There was a certain heaviness in her voice, and then there was the way she looked straight ahead, as if making a conscious
effort to not look at me. As i. she was hiding something.
“And what about your boyfriend?” I push. “How did you find him?”
She looks at me, a light scoff under her breath. “You really want to know?”
“really do.” Tinsist.
“I lied. There was no boyfriend.”
“Hm.” I studied her, the slight nasal flare from an unsourced anger, her grey eyes turning almost icy when they were set at me,
her hair flying due to the wind around us. “Then why did you lie in the first place?”
She gulps. “I thought I was the one getting to know you. Why do you live alone in this huge house?”

“I live alone on my floor, except you now. The other floors are staff quarters.”
“Then why do you have so many rooms on your floor if you’re the only one?” She retorts. “It must get so... creepy.”
“If I don’t keep empty rooms, where do I make other hostages stay?”
Her eyes widened, something flashing in them. “There have been others?”
“Maybe,” I lie.
“Other girls?”
I raise an eyebrow. “Jealous, cupcake?”
She scoffs. “Yes, of the fact that they’re not here anymore. Which means they got to leave, I don’t.”
“Maybe they’re not here because I killed them.” I tell her, and she visibly shudders. I resist a smile. “But you’re right, you don’t get
to leave. You’re stuck
here.”
She blinks. “Will you kill me too, when you get bored of me?”
“What?”
Her voice drops to a barely audible whisper. “Will you kill me when you’re bored of me? Bored of...?”
“Speak, I cannot read your thoughts.”
“Of... f**g me.” She was barely audible, her eyes not meeting mine.
“Is that what you think is happening here?” I ask, stiffening. “That I brought you here to f**k you, and I will get rid of you once
I’m...bored of you?”
She gulps, and then nods.
People had so many misconceptions about me all my life, and I never bothered to correct them. They never even affected me,
so I wondered why I was letting this get to me, but I was, because I was ticked off by just her question.

GUO
“There were no other girls, Mia.” I tell her, suddenly aloof. I think she senses it too, because her mouth opens, and then closes.
“And since you think I’m f**g you till I get bored of you and then I’ll kill you,” I hiss, “I will not be touching you.”
“Alex,” she breathes, “That’s- that’s not what I meant.”
“Then what did you mean, because that sentence has just one meaning?”
“I..” She looked down, “I-I didn’t know why you came to my room, why everything happened. I just figured it was because I was
convenient.”
“Convenient?” I wanted to laugh, I really really did. She was anything but convenient. A pain in the a**, a glitch in my plan, a virus
consuming me is what she was. But she didn’t have to know that. “You weren’t convenient, Mia.” I grit, “Anything but convenient,
trust me.”
I don’t give her the chance to reply, getting up and walking away, the sudden anger consuming me till the only urge left in me
was to punch, and preferably kill.