By Wednesday night, Mira was running on caffeine, adrenaline, and a stubborn refusal to give Rohan Malhotra an inch more ground than absolutely necessary.
They’d spent the entire day holed up in a cramped brainstorming room with no windows — just dry-erase boards scribbled with half-baked slogans and crumpled paper scattered like battlefield debris.
Sameer had poked his head in once with pizza and a look that said God help you both. Anya had sent Mira three texts:
Please don’t kill him.
Seriously, I like my job.
If you do kill him, bury the body well.
But now it was nearly 1 AM, and Mira had to admit — grudgingly — that something was shifting.
They weren’t tearing each other apart tonight. Instead, they sat on opposite sides of the long table, laptops open, ideas passing back and forth like a game they were both finally willing to play.
Rohan was the first to break the quiet. “You ever think about freelancing?”
Mira glanced up, surprised by the question. “What?”
He shrugged, looking strangely casual — his hair a little messy, tie abandoned hours ago, top button undone. “You hate being told what to do. You hate authority. You could run your own agency tomorrow if you wanted.”
She snorted. “Says the man who steamrolled my pitch on his first day.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Which you rewrote and made better, by the way.”
Mira paused, caught off guard. “Is that… a compliment?”
Rohan cracked half a grin. “Don’t get used to it.”
She shook her head, hiding her smile behind her coffee cup. When she looked at him again, she noticed how tired he looked under the harsh light — not just tonight’s exhaustion, but something deeper. Something she hadn’t seen before.
“Why did you come here?” she asked suddenly. “You had a cushy job at Brandsphere. Better pay, more perks. Why this place?”
He leaned back in his chair, spinning a pen between his fingers. For a moment, she thought he wouldn’t answer. Then he said, “Brandsphere had everything — except freedom. Here, I can build something real. Something messy, risky.”
She studied him. “That’s why you keep pushing me?”
He met her eyes — steady, unguarded for once. “Because you’re the only one here who doesn’t settle for ‘good enough’. You just don’t know how far you can go yet.”
Her throat tightened unexpectedly. For a second, the room felt too small — too quiet. She hated how warm her chest felt hearing that from him, of all people.
She dropped her gaze to her notebook, pretending to scribble something. “So, what’s your story, Mr. Malhotra? The calm genius with the perfect suits. What’s the catch?”
His fingers drummed the table — a small tell she’d learned meant he was uncomfortable. “No story. Just the usual family drama. Overbearing father. Expectations. Boring, really.”
She raised an eyebrow. “You don’t talk to him?”
“Not if I can help it.” He looked at her, then down at the table, as if realizing he’d said too much. “I don’t exactly do well with people telling me who to be.”
She gave him a small, conspiratorial smile. “So we have that in common, at least.”
His answering smile was softer than she expected — and it did something stupid to her chest again.
They worked in companionable quiet after that, the argument forgotten for now. Around 2 AM, Mira’s head dropped onto her crossed arms. She didn’t mean to fall asleep, but exhaustion finally won the battle.
When she woke up, she was half-covered with someone’s blazer. Rohan sat next to her, still typing with one hand, eyes flicking to her every few minutes like he was making sure she was breathing.
She sat up, blinking at him groggily. “Did you…?” She tugged at the blazer.
He shrugged. “You were shivering. Don’t make it weird.”
She wanted to snap back with something biting, something that would remind him she didn’t need his kindness — but the warmth still clung to her shoulders, and the words wouldn’t come.
Outside the windowless walls, Mumbai’s first light was just beginning to seep into the sky. Inside, Mira realized that maybe — just maybe — the man she thought she hated wasn’t quite what she’d expected.
And that terrified her more than any late-night pitch ever could.
---
***Download NovelToon to enjoy a better reading experience!***
Download
Like this story? Download the app to keep your reading history.
Comments