“No, I don’t. I don’t need another mole.”
“Another mole? Oh, that’s rich. You had one of the most incompetent teams ever, while my people saved your ass. They would never—”
“But your husband would,” Ajay said. “And yes, I heard you’re getting a divorce. But you never told us that you had someone from WTA in your house while you were working with our information, Raj. Which is why I can’t trust my business with yours, nor will my company.”
Her nostrils flared. “My business has nothing to do with my marriage.”
“Oh?” Ajay leaned down until their noses almost touched. “Can you swear to me that your husband didn’t get hold of any information about my company while you were helping us out?”
He saw a flicker in her eyes and knew it was guilt. He suppressed the urge to swear again. “What does he know?”
“Nothing that isn’t already public,” she responded. “I took care of it.”
“You took care of it?” Ajay roared. His voice echoed down the empty corridor. “Do you have any idea what this company means to me, means to my father? He started Bharat with nothing but a dream and determination. We almost lost everything to WTA because we had a mole in our company. Then you almost screwed us again, and all you can say is that you took care of it?”
“You don’t have any idea who the hell you’re talking to,” she shot back. “Your father isn’t the only one who stands on a mountain built of dreams. That’s why I put my own money, my own people into helping your company when you were the fools who got yourselves into the mess in the first place. Hell, your chief of security was so inept that it took my team a day to produce what he couldn’t in months. You think I’d help anybody, Ajay? No, dammit. I made sure Bharat wasn’t affected by my mistake and I made up for it tenfold. I take care of my own, and then I gave you more than you deserve.”
They were both breathing heavily. The fire burning in her eyes matched his temper, and no matter how hard he tried, the longer he looked at her, the more he seethed. He’d let Rajneet Kaur Hothi take advantage of him for the last time.
“And to think, despite our short conversation, I thought you actually were interested in playing with me, not playing me.”
Ajay tucked a soft, thick curl behind her ear, his fingers lingering at the curve of her chin for a moment, before he stepped away and pulled his cell out to call his chief of security
“Sri,” he said when the man answered the phone. He locked eyes with Rajneet.
“What can I do for you, boss?”
“Terminate all RKH Collective contractors immediately. We have a breach.”
“Sir?” Sri’s voice held a note of surprise. “Is there something wrong?”
Ajay felt a niggling of irritation. His head of security was always available, and did what he asked, but there had been a lot of mistakes in the last few months that should’ve been caught. This was one of them.
“It appears as if the owner of the company is married to WTA’s shareholder representative.” Raj glared at him but didn’t try to stop his conversation.
“I’ll get on it right away. That was an oversight on our part, sir.”
“The company was a recommendation. We won’t make the same mistake again.”
“Yes, sir,” Sri said.
“And after you’re done, talk to our new SVP of legal about what can nullify our noncompete agreement with the company. Then reach out to the consultants and offer a job at double the salary to work for us directly. Be honest. Tell them that their boss didn’t act in good faith. If we have to publicize this bullshit to hire those contractors, let’s do it. Communications can help.”
This time Raj gasped. She reached out to snatch the phone from his hand, but Ajay was already hanging up.
“You son of a bitch,” she said, shoving at his shoulder. “What gives you the right—”
“You did,” he replied, and tucked his phone away. He took a few steps backward before turning on his heel. “I’m neither easy prey in business nor your personal fuck boy, Raj. Don’t underestimate me again.”
He didn’t bother seeing if she’d follow him this time. He had to go back to the fundraiser and make an appearance.
He was there for Bharat and for his father. His family legacy was the most important thing in his life and no woman would ever change that.
Chapter Three
Rajneet
Raj dropped her bag on the foyer console table with a loud thud, and slipped into her heels. She was going to be late for her lunch with Mina.
It had been a week since the fundraiser, and she was still dealing with a loss of revenue and employees thanks to her conversation with Ajay Singh. He’d gotten under her skin, and now that she was missing four of her top employees, she was reminded of him every time her human resources team sent her a new hire for approval. She had a bunch of projects on her plate, and backfilling roles was not supposed to be one of them.
She had to explain herself to Mina, too. She hated explaining herself, even to people she considered her best friends.
“Kaka, was my dry cleaning delivered?” she called out. The cavernous four-thousand-square-foot brownstone echoed in silence. She waited another moment before she repeated her question in Punjabi.
Her frail caretaker popped up at the end of the hall. He had a spatula in his hand and a dishcloth draped over his shoulder. His pagadi, tied in a very regal fashion, matched the color of his beige sweater vest.
“Always shouting, just like when you were a wild little girl,” he said as he hobbled forward. “Yes, yes, your clothes are in that apartment you call a closet. I asked the dry cleaners why they shrank all of them, but apparently that was your size. If your grandmother could see you now.”
“If my grandmother could see me, she’d laugh at my fortune.” Raj approached Kaka and leaned in to give him a smacking kiss on his bearded cheek. “You should be packing. Your flight for India leaves in a few hours.”
“What do I need? My family is there to take care of me.”
Raj felt a pang of guilt. She’d called Kaka right after she’d gotten married and asked the man who’d taken care of her family’s home since she was a little girl to come and take care of her in New York. She made sure he had ample time to visit his grandchildren and brothers and sisters in Punjab, but she was too selfish to let him go so he could return to India permanently. The thought of living without the one constant source of love in her life frightened her.
He guessed her train of thought because one minute he was scolding her, the next he was cupping her cheeks and kissing her forehead. “You’ll be fine, gudiya,” he said gruffly.
“I know. I’ll still miss you.”
A timer buzzed softly in the distance and Kaka’s eyes went wide. “I forgot the bloody kheer I made.” He dashed toward the kitchen.
He’d made her kheer. Her favorite sweet rice pudding. Knowing Kaka, he’d probably stocked her freezer with a bunch of other things, too.
“I’ll taste the kheer when I get back from lunch, and then we’ll head to the airport!” she called out.
She had twenty minutes to get to the restaurant where she was meeting Mina. Luckily the restaurant was near the animal shelter where she volunteered on weekends, so if the meeting went poorly, she could pop in and cuddle with the dogs.