Page 25 of Driven By Desire

F or the life of him, he couldn’t figure out women. Last night had been perfect hadn’t it?

Crack

The sound of the pencil in his hand snapping in two had his Marketing Manager stopping uncertainly in the middle of his presentation.

“Sir?” Hand still hovering in the air as he pointed to the projection screen, the man shifted uncomfortably.

Clearing his throat, Krish nodded to him to continue. Tossing the pieces of the pencil into the bin, he banished all thoughts of Max from his mind and focused on work. He’d barely made it out of the meeting before the next crisis of the day hit.

“Sir.” His Public Relations Manager, Rita Varma, was hurrying towards him with a look that told him the rest of his day was going to be a nightmare.

“The blood pressure machines.” Her voice low and calm, she added succinctly, “Defective.”

“How many?”

“Reports are still coming in but the current count stands at about five thousand.”

Swearing, he turned away from her and into the nearest conference room. “Get every single person involved in this mess on a conference call right now!”

Tossing his phone to Mrs. Sharma, he told her to hold all his calls unless it was an emergency at home and disappeared into what would soon be called Command Central.

Hours of chipping away at the system in place traced the problem to a change in vendor two months back.

“Who authorized this?” A shaky hand went up towards the lower end of the table. “Why?”

“Sir?” Sweating profusely, the Operations Manager looked like he was going to faint.

“Why did we change vendors?”

“They were quoting lower prices.”

“Did you do a quality check before you gave them the order?”

The short silence told him what he needed to know. “I want to see you and your reporting manager in my cabin once this situation is controlled. Where are we on recalling the units?”

“Sir.” His Vice President Sales, Ramesh Subramanyam, spoke up. “It looks like there is only one consignment with the defective pieces. We don’t need to recall all of them.”

“Yes, we do. I want every single piece back in the factory for a quality check.”

“The revenue loss-“

“Will be nothing compared to the loss of our reputation.” The harsh interruption had the room falling silent.

Suit jacket off and tossed over his chair, shirt sleeves rolled up, he yanked his tie completely off before pushing back from the table to pace the length of the room.

“I want all our clients, big or small, to get a personal visit from one of our managers. Apologise, do what you can to make up for the inconvenience caused and make sure they get fresh stock in perfect quality as soon as possible.”

He continued to pace while the rest of the room burst into frantic activity that involved calls and notes and enough chatter to make him feel like his head would burst.

“What’s our timeline on replacements?”

“A week at the least. I’ll speak to the vendor-“

“No.” The firm order stayed the manager’s hand from reaching for the phone. “They will never do business with us again. Get estimates from the other players in the market by EOD today. And I want timelines on how soon they can provide us with the part.”

It took hours and hours of wrangling and organization to start the process of recalling the machines, soothing irate clients and organizing fresh stock.

He was just ending a handholding conversation with one of their biggest clients when he saw Mrs. Sharma signal to him from the doorway.

Walking over he took the phone from her hand and barked, “Yes?”

“Mrs. Sharma just briefed me. How bad?” Chirag’s calm voice had him modulating his own.

“Pretty bad. The numbers are still coming in. I don’t think I’ll make it home tonight. I’ll crash on the couch in my office. Is everything okay at home?”

“Yes. I’ll handle everything here. You take care.”

Disconnecting, he handed the phone back to Mrs. Sharma and made his way back into the controlled chaos that awaited him.

---***----

He made it home late the next evening. He was doing a fairly good impression of the Walking Dead by the time he reached.

Shouldering the front door open, he called out a greeting that was met with complete silence.

Frowning, he peeked into the drawing room and found no one there.

Swinging into the kitchen, he found both his brothers huddled around the kitchen table.

Raising an eyebrow at Adi’s buzz cut, he refrained from comment and clasped Chirag’s shoulder in a silent, tired thank you.

His brother covered his hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze before saying, “Pooja’s in her room reading a book. ”

Krish dropped the bottle of water he’d just been raising to his lips. Quite conveniently on Adi’s almost bald head.

“Ow.” The resultant glare made him feel better. Tossing him a napkin to wipe up, he asked, “Since when does she read?”

“Since yesterday when Max introduced her to Nancy Drew.”

Max. Taking a deep breath, he moved towards the sink and rinsed out the bottle he’d just dropped.

Grabbing another one, he uncapped it and drank more than half in one swig.

The first thing he’d done when he’d finally wrapped up the whole mess was check his phone.

There hadn’t been either a call or a message from her.

Adding that up with her strange behavior when he’d been leaving yesterday, he knew something was wrong.

He knew his above average IQ would come in handy for something, he thought with a wry grin.

“You might want to wipe that grin off your face.” Chirag advised. “Every time your name comes up in conversation she looks like she’s sucked on a lemon.”

“When did she leave for home?”

“She didn’t.”

Freezing with the bottle to his lips, Krish turned towards the window that looked out on to the backyard. Lights were blazing in his garage and if he contorted into quite the most uncomfortable pose possible, he could see her legs sticking out from under the car.

“You think it’s safe to go out there?”

“Only if you can separate her from her tools.” The two knuckleheads chuckled and fist bumped each other at that.

Although asinine joke or not, they had a point.

Max did have a tendency to go for her tools when she was angry.

Not that he was scared of her. No 5’ 2” sprite who smelled of grease and machine oil was going to intimidate him.

Eyeing the bright red sneakers that traitorously beckoned him forward, he stayed in the safety of the kitchen and drained the bottle of water.

“All okay at office?” Chirag came to lean by the sink near him as he continued to stare out the window.

“It’s handled. Will take a while for things to settle down completely but for the moment the storm’s settled.”

“Defective blood pressure machines.” Shoving his hands into the back pockets of his jeans, Chirag mused, “Hell of a lot better than defective pills.”

“Bite your tongue!” Krish couldn’t control the shudder that ran through him.

That was a nightmare he didn’t even want to contemplate.

He was doing another process run through tomorrow to ensure something like this never happened again.

Scrubbing a tired hand through his hair, he almost missed Chirag’s next aside.

“Ever think of chucking it all up and starting your own architecture firm?”

Old, scabbed-over wounds throbbed and had him clenching his fist around the empty bottle. “No.”

Wincing at the brusque answer, Chirag cast his mind around for a more neutral subject only to have the back door shut in his face.

Walking across the backyard, Krish approached the garaged area. “Max.”

The only indication she’d heard him was a slight stiffening in the legs that were in view. When she showed no signs of emerging from under her metal comfort blanket, he crouched and gave her legs a yank. In reply, she kicked him. Hard!

“What the fuck!” Fatigue, stress and honest to God bewilderment had his temper coming to a boil.

Wrapping a hand around the ankle closest to him, he said, “Get out of there now or I’ll drag you out.” Tightly laced fury had him practically spitting out the words.

Shoving back with her heels, Max propelled herself out from under the car.

Jerking her leg out of his grasp, she got to her feet and moved away from him.

Hair unraveling from her braid, dirty overalls and outraged fury sparking in her eyes, she made him want to haul her over his shoulders and carry her up to his bed.

To lose himself in her soft sweetness. Except right now it would be like trying to make love to a cactus.

“What?” Aggravated beyond reason by the desire that had a stranglehold on him, he growled, “What the hell have I done wrong now?”

Tossing her braid over her shoulder, she sniffed. “If you don’t already know, there’s no point in telling you anything.”

“Ah hell, Max.” Tugging at his hair until it stood up in tufts, he said, “Don’t go all female on me now.”

Which was obviously the wrong thing to say. On so many different levels. He could almost feel the Universe pitying him.

“Max, I’m exhausted.”

“When are you not exhausted?”

That gave him pause. Maybe she had a point about those vitamin supplements.

“Alright.” Lifting his hands in surrender, he tried for a placating tone, “Whatever it is, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t patronize me, you jackass.” Seething, Max packed her tools with a controlled violence that had Krish taking a wary step back.

“First you hide me like an ugly little secret and now you want to talk to me like I’m a hysterical floozy.”

He was by her side in two strides. Wounded pride had him grabbing her arm and hauling her around to face him. “What the hell are you talking about? When did I ever treat you like that?”

“Yesterday morning,” she flung at him. “You didn’t come near me or even acknowledge me until the entire family was gone.

Of course, the minute they were out of sight, I seemed a lot more appealing.

Even the key to the house was only for work as far as they were concerned.

God forbid, they find out you’re sleeping with the help! ”

The final thread of sanity snapped at the last word.

Hurt and temper had him tightening his grip on her arm and dragging her into the kitchen.

Adarsh and Chirag looked up in surprise from the kitchen table.

Taking in the fact that Pooja was still nowhere in sight with one sweeping glance, Krish came to a halt in front of them.

Spinning Max to face him, he anchored her with a firm hand at her nape and kissed her. Raw, passionate and possessive in a way that branded her inside and out, Krish seemed oblivious to the hoots and cheers that echoed around them.

Pulling back enough to see her face, Krish cupped her cheek and tipped her face back to meet his eyes. His gaze burning into hers, he announced, “In case you numbskulls haven’t yet figured it out, Max and I are seeing each other.”

When he finally loosened his grip on her cheek, she buried her burning face in his shirt to avoid looking at the grinning faces of the other two. Over her head, she heard Krish ask Chirag, “Can you hold the fort for another night?”

“Happily.”

“Then I’ll be at Max’s if you need anything.”