“Are your brothers going to meet us at your place?” Raj asked.

“Hem, Mina, and Mina’s father, Tushar, will be there.”

Raj sat on the bench seat across from him, scrolling through her phone and nodding absently. “You got lucky with Tushar. He’s been great to work with. He’s already reviewed preliminary corporate documents.”

“But not Sri.”

She paused in her scrolling to glance at him. “No. Not Sri.”

Ajay had known Sri was a liability for a while now. Not because of Raj, but because of the man’s failure to provide current information. Why hadn’t he shared the intel about Sahar during one of his daily status updates?

“Can I ask you something?” he said to Raj.

She raised a brow. “If you’re done being pissy.”

“What? I was not being pissy.”

“Mmm-hmm,” she said, watching her phone. “You know, I’m only coming along because I feel a sense of obligation. My company started this project for Bharat, and even though RKH was removed, I follow through. You could be a little more grateful about it. I don’t have to be here.”

“Okay, fine. I was being pissy.” He didn’t have to tell her that he was actually pissy about the way things were between them, and not about the phone call she’d received from one of his employees. “Sorry.”

“Apology accepted,” she said.

“Great. I need your input.”

She sighed, which only made him grin.

“What is it?”

“Let’s say Bharat is hemorrhaging because of this mole who is selling our trade secrets. Hypothetically.”

“Right. Hypothetically.”

“We addressed Sahar, thanks to your company, but now we learn that we haven’t found the actual culprit. Other than fire Sri, what would you do?”

Raj put her phone aside. “You can’t really get anything accomplished if you don’t fire the people who are making bad calls. If you don’t fire Sri, nothing else you do will be of any value. Why are you so adamant about keeping Sri in the first place?”

Ajay rolled his shoulders, hating to admit how much he’d been at fault from the beginning with his head of security. “Because Sri was my first big hire at Bharat. When I started working as COO, I wanted a security department, so I personally handled the staffing. It was a big job to get that team set up. My father trusted me completely to do it right.”

Raj shrugged. “So? You made a call that at the time you felt was right. People change. Circumstances change. You can’t blame yourself if Sri didn’t turn out the way you’d hoped. Look at me. I hired my husband, and I never thought he’d screw me.”

Ajay grinned, took her hands, and dropped kisses in the centers of her palms. “What you’re saying is that it’s not me.”

“Are any of your other businesses in trouble?”