Read Online The One She Was Warned About by Shoma Narayanan - Free Book Online

smile didn’t reach his eyes.
    ‘Is everything OK?’ she asked.
    Nikhil sighed and rubbed at his face. ‘It’s been a crazy week,’ he said. ‘Sometimes I’m tempted to throw this whole thing over and go and do something else. Maybe work in an office—it’s got to be simpler.’
    ‘More stars throwing tantrums?’
    He shook his head. ‘I wish. That’s the easiest thing to handle. No, some of my clients are delaying payments. Big corporates. Apparently they hadn’t got all the internal approvals in place before they hired me, and the bills aren’t getting cleared. I’ve had to threaten legal action in two cases to get them to pay up. It isn’t hurting me right now, because business is doing well, but unless I play hardball with these guys I’ll have other clients trying to take me for a ride.’
    Shweta was looking mildly shocked.
    He laughed. ‘Let’s change the topic before your eyes glaze over and you fall asleep on the table. How was your Pune trip?’
    ‘Pretty good,’ she said cautiously. Nikhil still looked on edge, and she would bet anything that it wasn’t about a few missed payments.
    ‘Your dad happy to see you?’
    ‘I guess so.’ Her father rarely displayed any emotion, but he’d cancelled his weekly bridge game to spend time with her, and that was saying a lot. ‘He’s growing old,’ she said. ‘He was forty when I was born, so he’s pushing seventy now... I get a little worried sometimes.’
    Shweta had grown up without a mother, and losing her father was one of her biggest fears. She rarely spoke about it, not acknowledging it even to herself, but the expression in Nikhil’s eyes showed that he understood.
    She hurried on before he could say anything. ‘How’s Veena Aunty doing?’ she asked. She knew how fond Nikhil was of his stepmother—he was probably closer to her than to his own mother.
    Nikhil’s face clouded over. ‘I haven’t seen her for a while,’ he said tightly. ‘I had a bit of a bust-up with my parents. She lives with them, and I’m not keen on going there if I can help it. Amma’s taken their side on the whole thing.’
    ‘Maybe she has her reasons,’ Shweta couldn’t help saying. She’d always thought that Nikhil was a bit too hung up on the whole being illegitimate business. She could see why it had bothered him during his growing up years, but surely it was time to let go now?
    Nikhil didn’t seem to have heard her. ‘I asked her to move here and stay with me,’ he said. ‘I have a decent flat, and I could hire someone to look after her during the day. It would be so much more dignified than letting those two take care of her. I told you, didn’t I, that she’s pretending to be Mom’s cousin now?’
    ‘Go to Kerala and try speaking to her,’ Shweta said. ‘You don’t need to talk to your parents unless absolutely necessary.’
    ‘My father’s told me not to come near until I’ve apologised to him for what I said during our last argument,’ he said. He stared broodingly into space for a few minutes.
    Having run out of useful suggestions, Shweta stayed silent.
    After a while Nikhil shook himself and seemed to come back to earth. He took a largish swig out of his glass and turned to Shweta. ‘I’m not the best of company today, am I?’ he asked, forcing a smile. ‘It’s just that you know the whole story—it’s so much easier talking to you than to anyone else...’
    Of course it was. For a few seconds Shweta felt such an acute sense of disappointment that she could hardly speak. That explained why Nikhil was seeking her out, she thought. He must have kept all this stuff about his parents bottled up for years, and it would be a relief being able to pour it out to someone who knew all about it—save him the embarrassment of having to tell whoever his current friends were that he was illegitimate.
    But after the first wave of anger ebbed she was able to think about it more rationally. It was natural, his wanting to talk to her.