Somehow the fact that Vansh, someone she’d always felt safe around, was manipulating her made her blood boil. She turned to him, effectively dislodging his hand. In her three-inch heels he was barely a couple of inches taller than her. They were eye to eye and he seemed to pick out every bit of the anger she worked hard to keep hidden from the rest of their audience.

Gently, casually, he took the smallest step away, soft brown eyes filling with far too much understanding. This made her anger spike even more.

“Project?” Nisha said finally, but they might as well all have said it given the curiosity-laden gazes they focused on Vansh and her.

“It’s all still hush-hush. We can’t talk about it yet,” Vansh said, dropping a kiss on his niece’s head. “Do you know where the dandiya sticks are? I hope there’s going to be more dandiya than garba.” It wasn’t the smoothest change of topic, but it worked.

“I hate garba,” Mishka answered, bouncing on her heels. “Who wants to clap? I want to dance with the sticks. You’ll be my partner, right?”

“I mean . . . yeah!” Niece and uncle fist-bumped.

Just as Naina was about to let out a relieved breath at the inquisition’s ending, Nisha fixed her brother with one of her unamused glares. “How did you get involved in a project with Naina?” Did Nisha sound disgusted or was Naina being oversensitive?

“I got lucky, I guess.” Vansh’s tone was light, but he’d obviously heard the same thing Naina had in his sister’s voice because there was a warning in there too. “Naina does the kind of work I’ve been aspiring to for years now. Getting to learn from her is a huge opportunity.” He slid Naina a look. “And an honor.”

Naina’s mother looked from one Raje face to another and her hand fluttered at her chest. “So nice of you to say, Vansh beta,” she said. “He’s grown up to be such good boy.” She gave the compliment straight to Mina, who made the effort to smile but looked worried about her good boy.

“And so handsome also,” Mummy added. “Same-to-same like you, Mina. How Bollywood has not snapped him up? All those star sons. You were such big star, he should be star-son-star too, no? He should have straight leg inside. Film magazines are always going nepotism, nepotism, nepotism. He’s good candidate, no, for nepotism-nepotism?”

Something inside Naina snapped. “Evidently he’s more interested in bettering the lives of people than dancing for the camera, Mummy,” she said when she should not have reacted, but Nisha stiffened, and that was too satisfying by half.

“Vansh Mama dances better than any Bollywood star,” Mishka said, gazing with adoration at her uncle.

“Damn straight,” Mr. Modest said, bestowing another fist bump on his niece.

Everyone rolled their eyes. Some of the tension dissipated.