Weeks had passed since that electric night with Arjun , but Nandini's body still remembered it—in the way she moved, the heat in her breath when she was alone, and the fire behind her eyes. Something inside her had shifted. She was no longer the quiet girl who only dreamed of blackboards and lesson plans.

She still wanted to teach. But she also wanted to feel—deeply, fully, endlessly.

So when the school trust invited her to a teacher’s retreat nestled in the hills near Konark, she accepted without hesitation. A quiet temple town, surrounded by forests and sacred spaces, it offered both peace and escape.

The retreat was hosted in an old heritage haveli turned guesthouse—stone courtyards, breezy balconies, and the faint echo of temple chants floating through the evening air.

On the second evening, she met Dev.

He was a visiting professor from Delhi, in his mid-30s, tall, sharp-jawed, with a quiet intensity. He wore kurta-pajamas, smelled like sandalwood and musk, and spoke in a voice so low it made her skin tingle.

They met during a poetry session on the terrace. He watched her as she read a piece by Amrita Pritam, her voice trembling on the line: "Ajj akhaan Waris Shah nu..." His eyes never left her.

Later, after dinner, he approached her near the temple steps, where the stone was still warm beneath her bare feet.

“Your voice,” he said, “makes me want to forget all my disciplines.”

She laughed, unsure if he was flirting or simply intense. But when he stepped closer and brushed her hair from her neck with the back of his fingers, her breath hitched.

The temple bells rang in the distance as he leaned in and kissed the side of her throat.

Heat pooled between her legs.

She followed him back to his room—stone walls, open windows, incense burning.

He took his time with her.

Undressing her like she was something sacred. Blouse by blouse hook, kissing every inch of skin he revealed. His hands explored her as though memorizing scripture—the curve of her waist, the dip of her spine, the softness between her thighs.

He laid her down on the floor, on a spread of soft rugs and thin silk cushions.

Dev licked her slowly—like a ritual. His tongue circled her clit with slow reverence, fingers pressing deep inside her until her hips rocked with rhythm. He didn’t stop when she came the first time. Or the second.

He kissed her belly, breasts, thighs—his beard grazing her skin until she squirmed.

Then, he entered her—deep and deliberate—his hips grinding against hers with a slow, rolling rhythm that left her gasping.

The open windows let the moonlight pour across their bodies. Nandini clutched his shoulders as he filled her again and again, until she came undone with a cry that echoed against stone walls.

Afterward, they sat naked by the window, wrapped in a shawl, sipping masala chai he'd brewed himself. Her thighs were still shaking. His hand rested on her bare leg, fingers stroking circles lazily.

“You’re different,” he whispered. “There’s a wild goddess inside you.”

She smiled and looked out toward the silhouette of the Konark Sun Temple in the distance.

Maybe she was. Maybe the teacher in her was also a student of her own sensuality—learning what it meant to be fully alive.

***