FF(Arhi): Lavender [Thread 2 link - p. 159] - Page 48

Chapter 15: Ever-losing

He faced her for the first ten minutes as she went through the modified plan, but he knew he was making her uncomfortable as her gaze was fixed on her laptop screen without deviating even an inch to the left or right. He turned around once again to look out the window and could swear that he felt her silent exhale of relief.

To say that he regretted upsetting their previously well-established squabble-filled harmony would be putting his sentiments lightly. There were some lines that one never ever crossed with employees. Don't hit on them. Don't date them. Don't have sex with them. He figured that the rule Don't get addicted to their scent was subsumed under one of those categories.

"Read that last part again." He said just then, interrupting her.

Because if you were to get addicted to her scent, you did things like this... get distracted in the middle of her sentence...

He heard her pause and turned around. She had looked up at him and for a moment he lost his train of thought as he caught her gaze unexpectedly.

"The last part, starting from "Once in phase III..." he told her, recovering from the moment quickly enough.

She looked back down at her screen and restarted from the part that he asked.

He found it distracting to watch her and turned back around to look out the window, blanking his mind for a second until it returned to neutral before allowing her voice to stream in again.

Once she proceeded towards the part that was similar to her initial presentation, his mind wandered again. For some reason, it stumbled upon the memory of her lying back on her desk that evening when he had asked her whether she was auditioning for po*n. He couldn't imagine ever saying that to her again. He had crossed the line that had commendably nullified even remote humor in such a thing.

"That concludes it, sir." Her voice penetrated his thoughts then. He looked down at his watch. It was 5:45. He could end the meeting early and just email her tomorrow with his thoughts, allowing him more time to consider both Rajeev's and her presentation. It would make sense and give him time to leave early to beat the traffic to get to his dinner reservation.

Instead, he turned around to walk back to his desk to take his seat. Just as he sat down, the phone vibrated again and he saw Vaibhavi's name pop up on the screen. He turned the phone over, which shut off the vibrate function, before leaning back in his chair. She pointedly ignored the phone and looked back at her laptop.

"I take it your initial meeting with Rajeev went well?" he asked.

She nodded, but said no more.

Rajeev was fighting an ever-losing battle of attraction to Khushi, something which she seemed entirely unaware of. The woman couldn't be entirely without sexual experience, he figured, as he had noticed how her response to certain statements or comments had changed over the years... not to mention how quickly she caught onto anything with a sexual connotation or how her skin flushed even as she came up with a rapid-fire come-back. Now that he thought back on it, it was a marvel that he hadn't been more aware of his own behavior towards her before. He was never as casual in the dissemination of his not-exactly-appropriate comments with anyone as he was with her. It should have been the first indication that he treated her a bit differently than he did everyone else. But she was Khushi Kumari Gupta. She had come into his employment under unusual circumstances as Lavanya's charity project. Back then, she had annoyed him with her back-talk, unapologetic naivete, and general irreverence, but Lavanya had always been there to intervene when he had considered letting her go. Then she had enrolled in University and Lavanya had started training her in real for more than just a secretarial position.

Looking back on the last eight years, he didn't know when exactly she had started to creep under his skin... Evidently, Rajeev wasn't the only one under threat from the quicksand known as Khushi. However, while Rajeev had chosen the middle school route of expressing an unwanted attraction in the form of rivalry and taunting, he himself, grown-ass man that he was, had instead decided to sniff her. Of all the bloody things...

"Is there anything else, sir?" she asked now and he noticed that she had closed her laptop. She was hoping that they were done. He had been hoping that they were done too. He found himself nodding instead. He saw a look of surprise pass over her face for a brief moment before she nodded in answer and reopened her laptop. He sat back and went through his initial thoughts on where there needed to be changes. He didn't pause to take questions from her, neither did she ask. At exactly, 6:00 he stopped somewhat abruptly. Making her stay any longer would be criminal, especially when he could just email her tomorrow.

"That's it for this meeting. I will email the rest over the weekend."

She looked at the screen for a moment more before closing it. She stood up and gave him a brief look and a "have a good weekend, sir" exiting the room.

He sat in his chair for a few more moments.

He found that he didn't have much of an appetite any longer.

****