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“We didn’t share anything,” she snapped.
“I beg to differ, Princess,” he said. “If I recall, you were whimpering?—”
She slapped a hand on his mouth. “Enough. Okay?”
He chuckled beneath her palm.
She lowered her hand. “What do you want from me?”
He stared at her for a long moment. “Now, isn’t that a million-dollar question?”
She frowned in confusion. But before she could probe, the door opened on her floor.
“Have a good first day, Princess,” he said, before she stepped out. “I’ll see you around.”
“I’d rather not see you anywhere,” she muttered, walking quickly away.
He smiled at her prickly reply. The doors shut again, and soon, he was entering his own office on the fifteenth floor. Sheena was clearly mad at him, as she ought to be. He’d deliberately pretended that the kiss they’d shared had meant nothing. That night, he’d allowed her to believe it was a pity kiss, as she’d called it. Doing so was the best for both of them. Especially because he refused to accept how the kiss had shaken him up.
Sitting in his chair, he looked out of the glass window from his office. The sun shone a bright gold in the sky, its rays blinding and stark as was usual to this time of the year. Remembering to hydrate himself, he grabbed a bottle of water and sipped from it. His thoughts quickly jumped back to her.
Sheena Sehgal.
After his mom’s party, he’d gone to the sports club where Aaryan had been waiting for him. They’d fought and bled and fought all over again until he was out of breath and too tired. The fight had helped because he’d gone home and fallen asleep the minute his head had touched his pillow, and he’d slept a deep, dreamless sleep. The next day, he’d hung around at home with his family. They’d simply lounged around watching TV and catching up with one another as they usually did on most weekends.
His sisters, however, hadn’t been able to stop talking about Sheena. All three of them had been taken in by her, and they’d made plans to catch up with her soon. He’d kept quiet through all their conversations concerning Sheena, not saying anything. But Ananya had kept watching him in that pointed way of hers, as if he was hiding something, and she was waiting to decipher what that was. He and Ananya were the closest in age. She was two years younger than him, and she understood him very well. Navya was a year younger to her, and Reina a year younger to Navya.
That night, thanks to his sisters’ nonstop chatter about Sheena, he’d tossed and turned restlessly. All his efforts to forget about Sheena had gloriously failed because each time he shut his eyes, he saw her. He remembered every meeting of theirs in vivid detail. He recalled the spark in her eyes when she was mad at him. He recollected the way she felt in his arms when they’d kissed. And finally, when he’d fallen asleep, he’d dreamt of her. Raw, erotic dreams in which she was sprawled on his bed, with him pounding inside her. He’d woken up with a start, hot and hard, with his hand on his raging erection.
Disgusted with himself, he’d risen earlier than usual and gone to the gym at the sports club to work out some of his frustration. On his return, Ananya was waiting for him at the breakfast table with a smirk on her lips and a knowing smile as if she knew exactly what he was feeling. He’d ignored her throughout breakfast and focused on the newspaper instead. He wasn’t even going to ask what she was smirking about. It would just add fuel to whatever it was she had in her head, and he wanted no part in her machinations. None.
He tapped his mouth. Sheena, being able to access his private elevator, had Ananya stamped all over it. She was responsible for ensuring Sheena’s credentials were given to the reception so that they had an access card waiting for her when she arrived at Poseidon. He knew it in his bones that his sister had deliberately given her a private access key card, hoping for them to bump into one another.
Ananya was trying to pair them up, he was certain. And to his luck, Sheena had arrived at the same time as him and taken the same elevator, too. Talk about coincidence! Where Sheena was concerned, there were one too many coincidences that kept adding up. Now, if only he knew what to do with them.
Sighing, he switched on his laptop and opened his mailbox, deliberately putting thoughts of Sheena away.
Nearly four hours later, he finally stood and left his office. It was almost one thirty—lunch time. He just needed to check on Sheena to see if she was settled at work. He remembered her mentioning in her conversation with Professor Shetty that she didn’t have any professional work experience. He hadn’t forgotten the dismay in her voice when she had made that statement. He was just being a concerned boss, that’s all, he reasoned with himself. There wasn’t more to it.
He took the stairs down to the fourteenth floor, where Professor Shetty had set up an office. His accounts, admin, and HR team occupied this floor. It sat about thirty or so people. As it was the lunch break, most of the floor was empty. Only a few cubicles were occupied, along with some of the corner offices. But the usually noisy floor was mostly quiet right now.
He took a step forward, and loud voices reached his ears.
“Do you know that the woman who joined today is Sheena Sehgal?” He recognized the voice of one of his HR managers.
“I was introduced to her earlier,” another girl replied. Rajiv recalled her as someone who worked in the admin department.
“I thought the name sounded familiar,” the first one said. “So, I did a quick Google search on her.”
“And?” the other one asked. Her excited and eager tone disgusted Rajiv.
The first one laughed. “You won’t believe what I found.”
The air around him shifted. He looked up and found Sheena standing at the side, a sheet of paper in hand, her face pinched in horror as she overheard the girls talking about her.
“Apparently,” the girl lowered her voice, but it reached him anyway. “There is this huge scandal surrounding her. A man went to jail because of her.”
Fuck. Was this what the Sachdeva women had been referring to at the party? Sheena looked up, and her wan eyes clashed with his. Her face fell, further confirming his suspicions. He’d heard enough. He walked deeper into the office. Seeing him approaching, the girls stopped talking and stood up.
