“I expected you to bargain for a lower score,” she answered honestly.
“If I have to work a little harder to earn you, I’ll do it.”
The sparks in her belly bloomed into a wildfire. It felt like she’d turned into a mass of energy giving off heat waves because Vihaanhad used words for her that no one else ever had before. She had no idea how to process it.
Vera Talwar, the girl whom boys feared to approach, whose no-nonsense attitude had earned her the nickname ‘Ice Princess’, was ready to melt into a puddle at this boy’s feet. What was he doing to her? She’d never felt so. . . desired.
With his singular determination to change their status from rivals to friends, Vihaan had somehow seduced her with his attention, and she was on her way to getting addicted, if she wasn’t already.
“What do you want?” Her eyes fluttered to a close when he tugged closer, afraid that she would give him more of herself than was wise.
“If I score higher than eighty, I want an honest confession. More than ninety, I want a date.”
For a long moment, they said nothing else, the soft sounds of their breath keeping them company.
“Okay,” she agreed, her voice reduced to all but a whisper. Her response brought a small, almost bashful smile to his face. With a playful bump of his nose against hers, he shoved her off his lap. She grappled with the edge of the table to catch her balance. As soon as she was steady, his grip on her waist receded. She spun around, ready to rip him a new one when he waved his hand in the air, shooing her away.
“Quit distracting me with your excessive sexiness.” He flipped the pages of his books seriously before shooting her a sly wink. “I have a challenge to win.”
8
Loggerheads
Vera
Three weeks later, Verawas ready to quit.
Not her job, no she’d never do that.
She was ready to quit being a normal functioning adult and turn to a life of crime. She fantasised daily about the multitude of ways in which she could get away with maiming one particular man.
A bucket of ice tipped precariously over his office door.
Super glue on his chair seat.
A poisoned red apple on his desk.
She didn’t want to kill him. She’d never be so bourgeois as to give Vihaan an easy end. She wanted him to suffer.
Vera shuffled yet another set of papers that he’d demanded she have ready for this morning: printed, annotated and delivered to his desk.
She dropped the stack in front of him, as gracelessly as possible without seeming rude.
Vihaan raised an eyebrow, questioning her.
“The seventh revision,” she said. “Annotated as requested.”
He nodded, putting one finger up in a signal to make her wait while he flipped through her work.
I hope you get a papercut. No, no, wait. THOUSANDS of papercuts!
She stood there, refusing to complain about being made to wait when he could just as easily send her his notes through an email, or the office courier. But she’d never give him a chance to point out that her behaviour was less than professional. Her thoughts, however? Oh, her thoughts could be borderline unhinged, and she didn’t care.
She imagined herself sitting in a dark room, cackling maniacally, holding a little voodoo doll stitched with a clipping of his hair while she poked hot needles into his crotch. Erectile dysfunction would be a fabulous way to bring his attitude down a notch. The man was absolutely insufferable.
He’d already made her re-do her proposal multiple times, picking apart every graphic, her word choice, asking for references and source material going back months before he’d ever even stepped foot into Ethos. She knew why. She’d won enough votes to push her idea into the project phase and Vihaan was taking out his anger on her. He hadn’t been able to stop her from winning their little challenge so now, he was making her life miserable.
He’d forced her to do menial tasks even though it wasn’t her job—arranging the board room, fixing mechanical problems, scolding her when the projector did not work, having her arrange and rearrange schedules when he missed a presentation because his invite had supposedly stated the wrong time. She was fed up.