CHAPTER 9
ABHIMAAN
The glow from my monitor flickers across the desk, casting long shadows over the folders I haven’t touched in the last twenty minutes.
I’m still in my chair, spine stiff, tie loosened but not taken off. The office around me is still. Silent. That time of night when the hum of ambition quiets and what’s left is just… inertia. Focus. Or the ghost of it.
Everyone’s gone. They always are by eight. Except me.
And I assumed—logically, reasonably, with all evidence pointing that way—that she was, too.
Until the door opens without warning. No knock.
No announcement. Just the soft click of the latch giving way, then the sharp cadence of her heels against marble.
Aditi storms in like the office belongs to her.
Like I didn’t give her very specific instructions about protocol.
Like there isn’t a hierarchy. A system. It's the way things are done here.
She crosses the room without pausing, stops at the edge of my desk, and slams a thick folder down. The sound lands like a slap in the silence. I glance at the clock. 8:02 PM.
I don’t flinch. But my eyes lift, slow and cold.
She’s not winded or smug. She’s just there.
Standing tall. Well, not tall, honestly.
But chin up. Arms crossed. Not asking for approval.
Not waiting to be dismissed. Typical. In years, I guess, she is the only gutsy one I have met who actually doesn't cower or avoid me. And that makes her very interesting.
I lean back in my chair, the leather creaking under the shift.
My fingers tap once against the desk. I gave her this task because I have found that I love challenging her; winding her up is a source of entertainment for me apparently, and it's been a long time since I have been entertained.
She actually did complete it before going home; well, she overworked, but still, technically, she is a woman of her word, and I respect that. Highly.
The damn folder is color-coded. Tabs. Notes. Highlighted headers. Margins aligned. It’s not just done. It’s… presentable.
I open the cover. She watches me flip through. Doesn't say a word. I glance up, once, and she’s still standing there, arms crossed like she’s daring me to find a flaw. She doesn’t flinch either.
The room is too quiet. Just the faint whir of the AC and the occasional honk from the city below.
I return my attention to the report. The summaries are crisp. She’s cut fluff. Refined the data into something digestible. The finance section is bracketed. Legal is annotated. She even flagged a discrepancy in the operations numbers with a sticky note labeled “Cross-check with inventory logs?”
Impressive? Sure. For someone else. I like this. I snap the folder closed.
“This’ll do.”
She gives me a salute so sarcastic it almost counts as mutiny. Then she stands there like she’s waiting for something else. I don’t know what—praise? A medal?
I lift a brow. “You need something?”
“Nope,” she says, popping the ‘p.’ “Just wanted to see if you’d actually look at it or pretend to.”
I say nothing. She takes that as permission to keep talking. Obviously. “You know, you could say thank you.”
“I could.”
She leans forward slightly, one hand braced on the desk. “But you won’t.”
“No.”
She exhales. Not dramatically—just enough to say typical. Then straightens.
Her presence lingers longer than she does.
When she turns and walks away, there’s no stumble, no hesitation.
Just a clean exit, like she’s not waiting to hear more.
I have been dismissed. I see so much of myself in her, and I already know she needs no lessons from me, but I will keep her here as long as she wishes to stay.
The door shuts behind her. Sharp click. Final. I sit still for a moment. Staring at the door she walked through.
I reach for the folder again. Flip it open. Re-read one of her sticky notes. “Timeline off by two days—suggest pushing legal review?”
She’s right. Damn it. I push the file aside. Lean back.
My eyes sting. I haven’t blinked properly in hours. Haven’t eaten, either, unless you count the coffee I abandoned three hours ago.
I should let it go.
But—she didn’t just finish the task. She understood it.
That doesn’t mean anything. People have flashes of competence all the time. Doesn’t make them reliable. Or safe. Or permanent.
Still... I rub the bridge of my nose. I’ve worked with hundreds. Hired dozens. Fired most. I’ve built this company from the ground up. Structure. System. Silence. That’s how it survives. That’s how I survive.
But there’s something about her I haven’t catalogued yet. Something... inconvenient.
Maybe it’s the way she doesn’t bend under pressure. Or the way she treats me like a person and a puzzle at the same time. Maybe it’s the fact that she makes my office feel smaller just by walking into it.
I shake my head. This isn’t about her. She’s not part of the equation. She's temporary. A shortcut because I needed someone to plug a gap for a few weeks. I’ve been through worse and worked with worse. She’s a bump in the schedule, nothing more.
I won’t make her into more than that. I can’t. I keep working. At least I pretend to. The report flutters open. The summary pages were laid out. But my focus has cracked.
The problem is I know people like her. Bright. Bold. Full of conviction. There are only two things I have seen happening: they burn out. Or walk away.
And when they do, they don’t just leave gaps in the company's functioning, but also in my functioning.
They leave cracks. I’ve built my world to be immune to that.
So whatever this thing is—that awareness in the room when she’s there—I ignore it.
I file it under distraction. Then I get back to work.
Because it’s late, the city’s loud, and I have no intention of letting a woman with too many opinions and clever sticky notes make it past my armor.