Part 54

They came home. Elsa had retired to her room but papaji and mummiji were in the hall waiting for them eagerly. Mummiji came driving her wheel chair forward. She looked at both of them  and Khushi went into her arms "mummiji..!" Mummiji patted her smiling with teary eyes. She asked both of them to change and handed over towels to them.
Khushi changed and came back into the hall and saw Arnav was already in the hall wiping his wet hair with the towel. Papaji hugged him getting overwhelmed with emotions. Arnav, for the first time experienced such warmth in the hug. He looked at Khushi, who looked at him in surprise, with dropped jaw. He had a smile on his face and was looking at her as if he has taken away her papaji. She came forward sulkily; “Papaji…!” she pulled his arm and papaji embraced her too with Arnav. Arnav wrapped his arm around her shoulder and she blushed. "Happy Birth Day, my dear child!" said papaji kissing her forehead.

Butler brought in the hot coffee. Arnav sneezed and Khushi looked worried. "Don't worry, Khushi, nothing will happen to him. He is a strong boy!" said papaji smiling. And She sneezed. Arnav looked at her arching his eyebrow. She smiled and said "Don't worry! Nothing will happen to me. I am a strong girl!" papaji roared in laughed thumping on her back and sending her off balance. “You two are made for each other…!” he thought winking at his wify….!

Next day early morning, though she had not slept well in the night, Khushi and papaji were taking their morning tea. Arnav was still sleeping and Mummiji was in her room. "Khushi, though it's a Sunday, since Arnav is here, I would like to have a meeting with all of you. Call Shondeep at 8 and ask him about his availability at 11.00 in the morning today. We will have lunch together." Said papaji.

"Ok. Papaji, I will do that," She said looking at Arnav who had just walked in. "Good morning, Puttar!" greeted papaji. "Good Morning, Papaji!" Arnav reciprocated. Khushi looked at him in surprise. "Papaji?" she asked him silently. He smiled. Butler brought in black coffee for him. He looked at Khushi. There was no trace of the night's ordeal on her face. But her eyes reflected pain. The color on his face changed and he looked serious. "Puttar, if you are free, I would like to have a meeting with you and Shondeep at 11.00 today" Said papaji. "Ok." Arnav agreed.
"So my dear children get ready..." He said and left.
"Arnavji, I am taking mummiji to the Mandir. You take rest and get ready. I will join you at breakfast." She said getting up to leave.

"Listen Khushi..." Arnav said halfheartedly...
She stopped. Turning and coming near she asked little concerned "What?" but there was no response from him. He was staring at her, making her conscious. "What is it?" she gasped unable to bear his gaze. He did not answer but his gaze travelled from her eyes to her lips. She blushed and tried to turn away from him. He was quicker and she could not escape. “Happy Birthday! And thanks for this .." He whispered in her ear. She pushed him away and ran to her room.

They were gathered for the breakfast at 9.00 in the morning and Khushi said, "Papaji, I plan to leave early to prepare for the meeting."
Arnav's phone rang. "Yes Aakash, is everything ok?" He asked. He listened hard for a while and then said "Ok. Aakash, we will have to find out some other way. We will discuss when I come back."
"What is it Arnavji?" Khushi asked worriedly.
"Nothing Khushi, we can talk about it later..." Arnav clearly not wanting to talk about it, tried to avoid her question.
"What other way? What were you discussing?" She was not ready to leave the topic.
"OK! Aakash talked to HIM about his proposed trip for special training to Mumbai ..." Said Arnav, looking at papaji.
"He is one step ahead of us. He had plans to take Di with him.... He says it will be nice change for her too!" said Arnav seriously. "Anyway, I can handle it later when I reach Delhi, now can we proceed for the meeting?"
"Khushi is going ahead and we will join her later. Shondeep would also reach early .." said papaji.
"Oh! Ok. I mean, I will also leave with Khushi and download my mails. Yesterday night I could not do it." Arnav said looking at Khushi. Papaji nodded.

They were ready to leave for the meeting after the breakfast. Papaji declared, "We are going out for lunch with Shondeep and we will have a special dinner in Taj tonight." Kids were planning something else. "But dadaji... we had different plans" said meera sulkily. "You can have it in the evening, kids!" said papaji and turned to leave.
Arnav and Khushi left for the meeting early.  Papaji gave Arnav the car keys.
"You could have downloaded your mails at home also and joined us later..." Khushi said looking at him.
"And what? Leave you with that CEO alone?" He asked her directly.
"What?" Khushi gaped at him. He ignored her question. They drove to the office silently.
They reached office. Shondeep had already arrived and had started working. He greeted both of them wondering how they came together. Arnav greeted him back seriously.
Khushi, smiling pleasantly came forward "Hello Shondeep Sir, how are you? How is your father?" She asked.
"Oh! He is ok now and discharged yesterday from the hospital. Thank you Ms. Gupta. And yes, my mother has invited you for lunch at your convenient time." He said looking at her.
She avoided looking at Arnav's furious face.
"Ok. Arnav, coming back to the agenda of today's meeting, I would like to brief you about the plan of floating a new company for this acquisition...." Shondeep started off..
"I think we can discuss this in the conference room..." said Arnav getting up and wanting to take him away from Khushi. Both of them went into the room leaving Khushi behind to prepare for the meeting and take copies of the essential documents.
Papaji arrived exactly at 11.00 am. Arnav admired his punctuality. He greeted him rising from his chair and so did Shondeep. Khushi brought in the copies of agenda and all the supporting papers. She turned to leave but Mr. Balwindar Singh gestured her to sit. And asked her to take down the minutes of the meetings.

"Ok. So coming to the point, we have decided to go ahead with floating a new company as a liaison office with both AR and BTR group as stakeholders. However, there is another Person willing to invest in the corpus and join us as promoter. " He paused for other's reaction.
"He is from US. Mr. Roger..." He looked at Khushi and Shondeep.
"What?" Khushi cried. Arnav did not understand who this Roger was. He looked confused.
Mr. Balwindar Singh said in a steady voice hiding his excitement. "Its Raj. My son. He is popularly known as Roger" He smiled.
"He is putting in half a million dollars and we are putting the rest. The proportion between AR and BTR groups is yet to be decided but we will soon conclude on that." He went ahead looking at Arnav. Arnav nodded.
The initial corpus fund will be of Five crores and half a million is around 2.5 crores. We need to put in another 2.5 crores together.
"If Roger, Raj is putting in 50% then AR group can put in the balance" Said Arnav calculating the risk factor for himself as well as for BTR group.

"No. Mr. Raizada, he will be investing as a separate business house and it has nothing to do with BTR's investment. He will control the major activities and we will provide the operational support," He said looking at Shondeep for approval. He nodded.

"Mr. Raizada, I would like to have your opinion on this as you will be the integral part of this entire operation." He looked piercingly at Arnav.
"Yes Mr. Balwindar Singh, I would like to put in my 50% in the corpus fund balance. That makes 1.25 crores from AR Group." He said looking at Balwindar Singh to gauge his reaction.
"Ok. The remaining is our contribution," He concluded.
"There is another major decision I would like to take in this meeting; the second and final point on the agenda. He referred to the file and took out the paper. Glancing at the paper he said, "The next point is to appoint a person in charge of operations. I propose Shondeep will be acting Managing Director but to put another responsibility on his shoulder will be taxing for him as he handles two of our companies single handedly. So I propose, We appoint Mr. Sham Zaa to take over this acquisition as CEO..." He could not continue..

"What...?" Khushi had got up from her chair, horror struck. Shondeep looked at her reaction in surprise. "Ms. Gupta, what happened? Are you ok?" He asked her getting up from his chair unable to understand what her reaction was for.
Arnav came back to his senses after the initial shock and looked at papaji for support. He did not want Khushi’s outburst.

"Would you please bring in his profile?" papaji ordered signaling her to go out.
She walked out with ghostly face. Shondeep kept on looking at her back in shock.
"What happened?" He asked looking at the duo.
"Nothing Shondeep, I think she forgot to incorporate his profile in the file! She lacked attentiveness. ." He shrugged.
"Oh Ok. I have his profile in my laptop" Shondeep said opening the profile document.
"I will get my laptop too. I have a copy." Arnav said getting up and looking at papaji for approval.
He went to Khushi's cabin. She was sitting there like a statue not knowing what to do.
"Khushi....!" He called her.."Arnavji... What is he doing, putting that person in power..." She was aghast.
"And what do you think you were doing? Reacting like this in front of everyone?" He was furious.
"You know, that CEO does not know anything about HIM and you were all set to reveal.." He went on angrily.
Khushi kept quiet looking down. "Khushi..!" Arnav came near and glancing around put his arm around her shoulder to console her. "Try to understand and control yourself. We will take care. Papaji must have had a plan for all this. Trust us. Khushi!" he said gently and helping her to get up, he took his laptop from his bag and went into the conference room.

They went out for lunch. Shondeep kept on asking Khushi whether she was ok; Every time making Arnav to look at him angrily. Papaji had solved the sitting arrangement, sitting next to Khushi and placing the two on opposite side; Shondeep opposite papaji and Arnav to Khushi. Papaji diverted the discussion from business. Arnav was gaping at Khushi's bright smile and Shondeep somehow missing his heart beat.

Papaji had become nostalgic about Hindi cinema and Khushi was at her best. She kept feeding him with movie names and he went on telling details. She was at her best in spoonerism too saying "mait a binute! For wait a minute! Dyasa pil for pyasa dil..." This had made everyone but for Arnav laugh their hearts out releasing all their tensions. Arnav kept flashing furious looks at Khushi whenever Shondeep appreciated her Bollywood knowledge. Arnav became a passive listener morose with Khushi. The discussion turned to instruments and musicians.. Arnav was at his best. He knew many great maestros with their compositions right from BonyeM, to hariprasad chourasia to Beethovan, mozaart to Zubin mehta...
Khushi kept gaping at him. He seemed a mystery to her.
"You are truly an ocean, my laad governer!" She thought looking at him with dreamy eyes.

“Sunaa Maine…” he suddenly barked glaring at Khushi and she winced dropping the spoon. 

“What?” Sondeep was confused.   “No! Nothing…!” Arnav looked away embarrassed and Khushi hid her face bending down to pick up the spoon.  Papaji narrowed his eyes suspiciously and then shrugging, continued…!

Shondeep had all admirations for Arnav. They had lunch peacefully. Papaji ordered his favorite desert Chocolate mousse, before khushi could order hers, Arnav muttered "Jilebees.." causing Shondeep look at him in surprise. It was difficult for both of them to hide their feelings.
Bringing back to the business topic, Shondeep said "It's a good decision to bring a person like Mr. Sham Zaa to work on this acquisition." Khushi chocked, coughing hard and gasping for breath. Arnav could not control himself. Getting up and reaching up to her, he thumped on her back holding her hand. "Are you ok?" He asked in a worried tone still holding her hand. She nodded and tried to take her "Band hack! Oops, hand back"

Shondeep looked at them in surprise. Papaji said "Ok then, let us disperse. I have some work and need to meet someone. So Shondeep, thank you for taking out time on Sunday!"
"Mr. Raizada, you and MS Khushi carry on with your work in the office" he winked causing Khushi blush and Arnav smile. He left with Shondeep. Khushi and Arnav were lost in each others’ gaze.

"Khushi puttar," Papaji had come back. She startled. "Remember, kids have something for you. So, both of you, go home early!" he said. "Yes papaji!" both of them said unanimously.