by Nisha Sharma
Hem felt his mother sniffle against his chest, and he held her closer. This proud, amazing woman who’d raised a family and stood by Deepak Singh, one of the most brilliant minds in technology, deserved to feel respected and loved for who she was. Mina would understand.
“I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said. “I’ll also come out again if anything changes with Dad.”
“Okay. Drive carefully.”
Hem was across the room and opening the double doors when his mother called his name again. “Take her some food.”
“What?”
“Take her some food. She won’t turn you away if you try to feed her. It’s impolite.”
He knew he’d be facing an uphill battle because of the way he’d dismissed Mina from the estate. Because Mina wasn’t going to let him get off the hook easily, he was willing to try new things. Bringing food wasn’t all that terrible a suggestion.
“Thanks, Mom,” he said and slipped through the double doors. It was time to grovel.
Chapter Eighteen
Mina had never cried over a man. She had more important things to do with her time than waste it on tears. But when she walked back to Hem’s bungalow and saw the pretty painted shutters and remembered the way that Hem smiled at her when they stood in his foyer together, she let out a strangled sob. Just when she’d fallen in love with the idiot, he broke her heart.
When she stopped feeling sorry for herself and for the fact that she was most definitely in love with an idiot, her anger began to displace the hurt. There she was, stranded in Alpine, when what she really needed to do was figure out how to make sure she’d keep her law license and her job.
With that in mind, Mina decided that calling a car wasn’t nearly as satisfying as driving the Tesla. She had the keys, and she figured that if she got a ticket, Hem could pay for it. His car, his problem.
She spent the first leg of the drive swearing, and the second falling into a surreal calm. The turnpike gave her time to think and to focus on what she wanted to tell Hem when he came back. Despite the hurt that still festered in her heart, she was feeling marginally better by the time she reached the tunnel.
When her phone pinged, she answered right away. “Hello?”
“Mina? Hi, it’s Virat.”
Another man she didn’t want to deal with, she thought. “Virat? Hi, what can I help you with?”
“I wanted to make sure that you were still available for dinner tonight.”
The dinner. She’d completely forgotten that she agreed to see him after the chaos of the day before. She was about to say no, because she desperately wanted to go back to her condo and wallow, but it wasn’t fair to Virat to keep prolonging the inevitable. She had to cut ties with him before her uncles made the decision for her.
“Sure, I can still meet, but there was a change in plans. I’m not at my office today. A . . . friend had a family emergency and I had to go to New Jersey to help. I’ll be working remote for the rest of the day.”
“That’s fine,” Virat said. “Is there another location more convenient?”
She took a minute to think. She was flying down the West Side Highway, which meant that she’d be home within ten minutes. “There’s a wine bar across from my apartment building. If you can meet at the same time we agreed upon, we’ll be able to get a table. It’ll be quiet.”
“That works for me.” Six thirty would give Mina just enough wiggle room to decompress in her apartment.
“Great,” she said.
“Good. Looking forward to it.” He said a goodbye and hung up.
Mina wondered how transparent she had to be with Virat. She really wanted to come out and say, Dude. I’m not going to marry you, so you should probably look elsewhere. The problem was, she didn’t know whether he’d be that open to her bluntness.
Mina’s phone pinged again and this time she checked the readout before answering.
“Raj? Perfect timing. I really need to bitch to someone about how much I hate men.”
“Me, too,” her friend said in a tired tone. “But unfortunately, we need to talk about business.”
“What kind of business?”
The sound of a keyboard clicking echoed through the phone. “The kind that affects your new man. I received an interesting call from a colleague who said that parts of Bharat’s organization might be for sale soon. There is a new majority shareholder who is looking to oust the CEO and take the company in a different direction.”
It was obvious that WTA was already looking to start a hostile takeover. Mina sighed. “Thanks for that, Raj. I appreciate your help.”
“There’s more. One of WTA’s C-suite executives is related to a Bharat employee.”
Mina almost crashed into the car in front of her. In all the documents and paperwork that she and the Bharat team had reviewed, not once had they seen any connection between a Bharat employee and WTA.
“Who?”
“Her name is Sahar Ali Khan. She’s head of Research and Development at Bharat.”
“Oh my god,” Mina said. She pinched the bridge of her nose. “This is a disaster.” She updated her friend on everything that had happened since the previous day. Raj let out a low whistle when she mentioned that Sahar knew about the leak.
“You are in some deep waters, babe,” Raj said. “It makes sense that Sahar would be the leak because of her connections and her access to information. I’m going to email you a few documents. Just make sure the information checks out, otherwise you’re going to condemn an innocent person.”
“The only person I want to condemn is my uncle Sanjeev.”
“My security team has contacts with law enforcement and the Bureau if you want to use them.”
Mina laughed, and it was the first time all day that she truly appreciated some humor. “Why do you have all these connections, Raj? I spent hours with Ajay and Hem’s security people and we couldn’t find anything. But you call me with news in less than twenty-four hours.”
“If Ajay’s people can’t come up with basic information like mine have, then Ajay needs to fire them,” Raj said. Her voice was hard and flat. There was no doubt that Raj was a leader through and through. “You don’t make money if you play nice. Those Singh brothers are smart, and I hope they figure this all out soon. Keep me posted and let me know if you need my help.”
“Will do,” Mina said.
After valet parking Hem’s car in the garage next to her apartment building, she decided to use the time she had before meeting Virat to review the information Raj had emailed. As she read, it became clear that Sahar had motive and opportunity to leak her research. There were still so many unanswered questions, though. Why wouldn’t she simply take her skills to WTA instead of working at Bharat and then putting her whole career on the line? Was there something else that WTA wanted? Was Sahar the decoy?
Mina was still working through the details when she walked across the street and into Vino’s. The trendy Hell’s Kitchen wine bar was packed with employees enjoying happy hour specials. The bar was a deep honey gold, and Edison light bulbs with iron cage chandeliers hung from the ceiling. It was a beautiful meeting place and conveniently located. She just wished she was drinking under better circumstances.
After scanning the crowd, she saw Virat in a blue suit at one of the high tables along the back-left side of the bar. His face lit up when he saw her.
“It’s great to see you again,” Virat said when Mina approached the table. He stood and leaned forward to kiss her cheek.
“Thank you,” Mina replied. She slid into the empty chair and hooked her ankles on the bottom rung. “Sorry about the quick change of plans.”
“I don’t mind. Would you like a drink?”
“Please,” she said.
The waitress appeared a moment later with her tablet. “What can I get you?”
“Do you have any suggestions for a white wine?” Virat asked.
“Saffron Fields Riesling is our most popular right now.”
�
�I’ll take that. Mina?”
She practically tossed the menu on the table. “Any Riesling other than Saffron Fields.”
She knew that both Virat and the waitress were staring at her but she didn’t care.
“I guess we should’ve gone for the champagne,” Virat said when they were alone again.
“Why is that?”
He shot her a confused look. “Because we’re celebrating our engagement.”
His words were as effective as a slap across the face. “What? Virat, I haven’t said yes.”
“You haven’t?” Virat’s jaw dropped. “But—but Sanjeev informed my father yesterday that you accepted the arrangement and that we’re supposed to look at wedding dates in the next six months! Mina, my parents are working with the firm’s communication team to make a formal announcement.”
Mina’s jaw dropped. “And you didn’t think for a moment how strange it was that I hadn’t called you right away? That we hadn’t talked first?”
Virat’s face turned ruddy, and after he scanned their surroundings, he leaned across the table and lowered his voice. “Mina, this whole time while you’ve been working on your due diligence project, Sanjeev and my father have taken the majority of the planning and have been simultaneously drafting merger documents. He’s giving us most of what we want, so we’re just about ready to sign.”
Mina covered her face with a groan. Her uncle was using Virat as a decoy, a distraction for her, while he set her up as scapegoat for the Bharat case. She knew her weaknesses, her tendency to have tunnel vision when she got involved in a project. Apparently, Sanjeev knew her weaknesses, too. Virat had been a red herring all along. If she hadn’t told the Singhs about her mission and they hadn’t shared the workload, she would’ve been too focused on one case or another to notice her uncle’s plan.
When she looked back up at Virat, his face had gone stone serious as the waitress approached the table, left two wineglasses, and disappeared. She must have sensed the stress between them.
“Virat—”
“No,” he said. His voice was sharp and more authoritative than she’d ever heard before. He picked up his glass and downed half the contents. “No, Mina,” he started again. “Don’t make excuses and please don’t try to placate me. You never intended to agree to the marriage in the first place.”
Mina shook her head. She had two options: she could take the risk and tell Virat the truth about her situation, or she could create a lie about the validity of the merger and whether complicating business with pleasure was the right path.
There were so many lies, so much bullshit in her life at that moment, that she had to bet on the truth.
“I thought about it from a practicality standpoint,” she finally said. “My sole purpose was to obtain a partnership position at my mother’s firm, and the merger was the ticket to achieving my goal.”
He let out a jagged breath, frustration and anger blazing in his eyes. “In the times we spoke, just you and me, why didn’t you say something? I thought you were as interested in the marriage as I was, damn it.”
“You didn’t exactly seem very forthcoming yourself. You were going along with whatever your parents wanted for you.”
“I deserve that.” Virat pointed to his glass and ticked two fingers in the waitress’s direction. “I deserve that,” he repeated. “So now we’re here, after months of negotiation, back to square one.”
“Are we? I just showed you my cards. Now it’s time for you to show me yours. You can’t seriously be mad that we aren’t getting married. Did the merger mean that much to you?”
They sat for a few moments in silence. Virat twirled his empty wineglass in hand, and when he received another drink, he sipped it this time. “I want my father to retire,” he finally said. “The bastard can’t let go, and I deserve to run that firm. He doesn’t trust me to do it on my own.”
It was obvious that he was telling the truth. Some of the tension released in her shoulders as she sank back in her seat. If they had a similar goal, one that didn’t involve marriage itself, maybe he’d have input that could help her with her situation.
“You think the merger is going to push your father out of the picture.”
“I know it will. He said that with me married and with another lawyer by my side, I’ll be able to handle the immigration arm, and one day the whole legal empire. I don’t care about the entire business, but I deserve to lead the client base I built.”
“Trust me, you don’t want anything to do with my mother’s firm . . . no, with Sanjeev’s firm,” she said. Her heart broke a little when she admitted the truth out loud. With all the damage Sanjeev had done, it was hard to see Kohli and Associates as a representation of good or a representation of her mother’s work.
“The merger will definitely satisfy my father. But if you don’t want to get married, then I can’t force you. Shit. Shit.”
Mina reached out and grabbed his hand. She needed to tell him about the firm, about what he wanted and why it was so wrong. Trusting him could be dangerous, but there was something about Virat’s reaction that made her feel like they were kindred spirits.
“I’m about to tell you something in confidence. It could cost me my license, and if that happens, I’ll have a few very angry Punjabi men looking for you. Which, by the way, isn’t as scary as I can be.”
His eyes widened. “Fine. Tell me.”
“Let’s say hypothetically there was a case I was working on for a company. And hypothetically, a managing partner at my firm you may or may not know, has some inside knowledge about this case.” She gave Virat the high-level overview of what her uncle was involved in. Trusting him with any ammunition that her uncle could use against her was a risk, but it paid off when she saw the disgust in his face.
“What are you going to do?” he asked after she finished. “About this hypothetical case I mean.” He’d run his hands several times through his hair, contributing to a mussed look that was the antithesis of what he’d always presented himself.
“I’m still working on that. All I know is that I have to report Sanj—I mean this managing partner. I have a friend who offered to help, but even then, it could be weeks or months.”
“Wait a minute.” Virat sat up a little straighter, his eyebrows furrowing at a thought. “I know someone who can help you.”
“Help me with what?”
“With your report. She’s a . . . friend at the economic espionage and trade secrets division of the FBI. She transferred over there after she left USCIS a couple months ago. I’m happy to share her contact information with you. Honestly, I’m glad you told me what’s going on. You saved my firm from what sounds like a terrible business deal. Hypothetically of course. Let me help by giving you a contact.”
Virat smiled, and the genuine expression brightened his face. For the first time since Mina met him, she realized that his boyish looks were charming. He might be shorter than her, but so was most of the world’s population. And most important, he wasn’t running off to tell Sanjeev what she’d said.
Mina shook her head. “It’s not an equal trade-off. I’ll still be indebted to you for giving me a shortcut to kicking Sanjeev out of the picture.”
“Maybe, after this is all done, you can help me come up with a solution for how I can get rid of my father.” When the waitress came over one last time, he asked for the check and discreetly slipped her his credit card.
“Have you asked him bluntly to get out?” Mina asked when the waitress left.
Virat laughed. “Of course not. He’s my father.”
“And you’re the nice son who does what he’s told, whose mother serves him food at the table, and who probably lives in an apartment over the garage. Maybe acting outside the norm might be your only chance at proving how much of a leader you are.”
He let out a deep breath, even though his face was flushed with embarrassment. “Well, this situation is definitely outside the norm. Maybe it’s a starting point for a longer conversatio
n.”
“Prove your confidence. Tell him it’s your turn.”
When the waitress returned, he signed the check and then escorted her out of the wine bar and onto the sidewalk. The night air was chilly, but Mina didn’t seem to mind. She felt lighter and more at peace. One problem resolved, one more in the form of Bharat to go.
“I’m going to tell my father tomorrow about nixing the merger,” Virat said. “Let me get the ball rolling. In the meantime, I can connect you with Josette Hu. Josette will be able to expedite Sanjeev’s case.”
“Do you want to text her or call her so that she knows to expect me?”
“I can do that,” Virat said. He looked across the street at Mina’s building and back at her. “But I actually have a better plan—”
“I’m listening.”
“Can I make a suggestion as a friend to another friend? If you have some whiskey, we can call Josette together. I’m intrigued about how she plans on dealing with your uncle’s fuckery.”
“Hypothetically,” they said in unison.
Virat let out a laugh. “Immigration law is never this exciting. And truthfully? I could really use something stronger than wine.”
Mina laughed. “I’ll order pizza, too. But you have to get Josette on the phone to stay.”
“Yeah, she’ll pick up my calls. She has the same suggestions you do. That I should move out and stand my ground against Dad.”
“If you’re open to them, I have a few more. Like how you’re never supposed to tell a woman that you don’t like it if she wears heels, especially if she’s taller than you.”
Virat groaned. “That’s a thing?”
“Oh you have so much to learn, friend.” They walked side by side across the street.
Chapter Nineteen
Hem was exhausted by the time he got to the city. He went straight to Mina’s apartment building, and after a brief stare-down with the security guard, took the elevator to her floor. He hadn’t texted her, because he wanted to grovel in person. When he approached her front door, ready for a confrontation, he heard laughter.
