“Vansh, brother, come on, get up here!” Jiggy boomed into the mic, gesturing wildly.

A smile spread across Naina’s face. Some invisible force had to have taken her cheeks and physically pushed them up. Her hand moved of its own free will and she pushed Vansh forward, smiling and smiling, clapping and clapping.

For a second he studied her so intently that she thought he’d be stupid enough to say something. Then he smiled too, dimples digging deep, so impossibly deep they seemed hypnotic and 100 percent unreal. Then, with a look that she would not let slice her in half, he ran toward the stage and took the mic Jiggy handed him.

The ringing in Naina’s ears was too loud. She forced herself to focus on Vansh’s voice as he thanked Jiggy, dimples digging and digging. He was blushing, modesty and gratefulness flowing from him in big rolling waves. Every woman in the audience pressed a hand into her chest and body-surfed his boundless charm.

If his family was watching her, she didn’t know. Her vision was tunneled to the stage and her cheeks burned from smiling. How she hated these men. They beamed at the crowd as though they’d won one war and were off to another. They sang each other’s praises as though this was their wedding and they’d spent the past month obsessing over penning personalized vows that sounded exactly like the vows at every other wedding. Then they followed it up with chest bumping and back slapping and every form of male congratulatory ritual ever created on God’s green earth.

“It’s such an honor to have access to Omnivore’s money,” Vansh said with enough cheekiness that the laughter rippling through the cavernous hall turned delighted. Then he found Naina across the crowd and his voice turned just a slightest bit more somber. “The real honor, though, is getting to work with Naina Kohli and to learn from her. Mr. Mehta’s generosity might be the Omnivore Foundation’s soul, but Ms. Kohli’s vision and organizational genius is its brain, muscle, and heart, pumping blood and distributing oxygen and making sure it all works.”

Mishka let out a loud woot and the crowd followed suit.

“To Naina Kohli.” Vansh lifted the glass Jiggy handed him in a toast as waiters rushed around the room distributing sparkling champagne.

“To new alliances!” Jiggy Mehta clinked his glass with Vansh’s, beady eyes shining knowingly at Naina, telling her he had her exactly where he wanted her. Telling her this was his game and she was nothing more than a pawn.

The bastards.

Naina smiled at them and downed the entire glass in one gulp, bubbles hitting her brain like the realization of her own insignificance.