Page 108 of Entangled Vows
Mahika was terrified, but she refused to give up. Her fingers shook as she tapped thecall button, praying for a signal. Her iPhone stubbornly flashedNo Service.
She tilted it, even shook it violently, but nothing changed.
The status bar mocked her with a stupid message:SOS Only.
Shit!How was she supposed to reach anyone? All she knew was that her lifeline, her phone, had become useless.
Then, almost on instinct, she noticed a small prompt at the bottom of the screen:“Emergency SOS via Satellite. No cellular coverage detected.”
Hope sparked in her chest. As the men outside created a ruckus, she focused on the screen and followed the instructions, raising her phone towards the window. A tiny yellow dot appeared, the satellite connection briefly established, only to vanish a second later.
Still, she didn’t give up and typed quickly.
‘Stuck on an isolated road. GPS enabled. Need help.’
Then she selected both options:Send to Emergency ServicesandNotify Emergency Contact.
Her emergency contact was Vikram. But he wasn’t in the country, and she had no idea how this was going to help her. All she could do was pray that the satellite had sent the alert, even ifit showed as disconnected, and hope that the dispatch, or at least someone, knew she needed help.
Fifteen minutes had gone by, and still no help arrived. Her mind went rogue with all sorts of scenarios, and her eyes welled up with helpless tears. If needed, she would run. She would not give up so easily. She would rather die fighting than just be scared.
The men cackled outside. “She’s crying now. Look at her. No one’s coming to save you.”
Mahika gritted her teeth, trying to hold back her tears and anger. She mouthed a silent prayer to the Almighty to send someone for her rescue. Even the sound of a passing car might be enough to scare them off.
The man outside her door leaned in and sneered. “Last chance, sweetheart. Open the door. Let’s be friends. Or we will do it our way. We’ll break this glass and take you with us. Either way, you’re ours tonight.”
His words made her want to throw up, and she wanted to kill him with her bare hands. Mahika had never felt so small, so exposed, so utterly helpless.
In that moment, it wasn’t just fear crawling up her spine, it was the brutal realisation that her life might never be the same again, or that it could end tonight. And she still had so much left to do. So many stories still unwritten. So many moments she hadn’t lived yet, especially with Vikram.
And that thought gutted her.
Because it wasn’t just about dying. It was about losing all the possibilities… the might-have-beens, the what-ifs, the next kiss, the next fight, the quiet mornings, the passionate nights, and a future she’d never get to live with her husband.
She wasn’t ready to let that go.
And suddenly, the fear she felt morphed into something hot and vicious. Rage spread through her like wildfire. How dare these filthy animals trap her in a car and make her imagine her own end? How dare they steal her peace and her future with their cheap threats and disgusting grins?
They were nothing but pathetic cowards in human skin.
Mahika slammed her palm against the glass and shouted, her voice raw and furious, “Back the hell off! You come near me, and I swear to God, I’ll smash your faces with this car door!”
The men paused for a beat, startled.
Her eyes were blazing now. Her grip tightened on the umbrella.
“I’m not scared of you,” she spat, even as her heart pounded wildly. “You’re six losers on junkyard bikes trying to scare a woman in the dark. You think that makes you powerful? You’re nothing but monsters, and you’re going to burn in hell.”
She shouted and slammed her hand against the window again.
One of them laughed, flashing his teeth. “She talks tough for someone trapped in a tin box. Keep shouting, baby. We like it when they put up a fight.”
The tallest one tilted his head and stepped closer to the driver’s window. He dragged his finger slowly across the glass.
“She thinks she’s scary,” he murmured, almost like a whisper meant to crawl under her skin. “Let’s see how brave you are when that door comes off its hinges.”
Mahika’s knuckles whitened around the umbrella and her phone. Her throat burned and her body shook violently, but she didn’t shrink back. They just laughed, banging on the glass again, harder and faster, turn by turn.
