Shoma Narayanan - Twelve Hours of Temptation

‘Right,’ Samir said. ‘I guess I should have explained that I’m only handling the take-over—I’ll have someone else actually managing the agency once I’ve got it fully integrated into Maximus. Look, Brian told me I could trust you to call things as they are. And that you’d be discreet even though you’re one of the younger members of the team.’

Melissa nodded in what she hoped was a suitably responsible and discreet manner. So far in every interaction with Samir she’d come across as being a lot more immature and irresponsible than she actually was, and she was keen to correct the impression before he wrote her off as a complete airhead. Staying calm and focussed was difficult, though, with the completely unexpected effect that he was having on her.

‘So it’d help if you told me exactly what people are worried about,’ he said, leading the way into his room. ‘I plan to address the team tomorrow, but I want to get my bearings first.’

‘The older guys think you’ll sack them,’ she said bluntly. ‘Especially the copywriters who work on regional languages. And people like me are worried that we’ll no longer be doing the kind of work Brian trained us for—we’ll just be churning out run-of-the-mill advertising. And a few, like Devdeep, just want to know how they can impress you and get promoted as soon as possible.’

Samir raised an eyebrow, and she went on.

‘I’m not criticising him. He’s probably the most sensible of the lot, and he has a wife and two kids to think of. It’s just that for the rest of us there was a reason we joined Mendonca’s, and the reason’s now gone.’

‘The work you’re talking about,’ Samir said. ‘Could I see some of the things the agency’s done in the past?’

‘It’s all around you!’ Melissa exclaimed, but then the bare walls of the room registered. ‘It’s been taken down,’ she said in surprise. ‘Brian had all our best work framed and put up on the walls. And there were the awards and certificates we won...’

She sounded distinctly upset now, and Samir found himself explaining.

‘I can’t work in clutter,’ he said. ‘I didn’t really look at the walls last time I was here, but I asked for the office to be cleared out completely before I joined. I assume Brian took the ads home.’

He was probably right—Brian had been inordinately proud of the collection of award-winning ads his walls had been plastered with and it was more than likely he hadn’t wanted to leave them behind. It felt a little as if the soul of the agency had been torn away, Melissa thought, and then gave herself a quick mental shake. Brian was gone, and agonising over the past wasn’t going to do her any good.

‘There are soft copies of everything saved on the common drive that we all have access to,’ she said briskly. ‘I can show you if you like.’

She went around to his side of the table so that she could show him where the ads were stored. As he turned the laptop, his hand touched hers briefly, and she pulled away as if from an electric shock. His lips tightened imperceptibly, making her flush. For a few seconds she’d forgotten that she was dealing with a rather dangerously good-looking man, and the sudden jolt of attraction had made her react stupidly.

‘So, the ads are here,’ she muttered, pointing at the screen. ‘I’ll...um...leave you to it, then.’

He looked up. ‘Which one is the ad you wrote—the one Brian said was nominated for an award?’

‘It’s in the Robinson folder,’ she said. ‘The third one.’

He pulled the ad up onto the screen and looked at it silently for a while. It was a text-only ad for a range of baby products, and she’d written it from the point of view of a first-time mum. It was charming, and a little whimsical, and it wasn’t really an ad in the traditional sense because it didn’t talk about the products at all—it just said ‘Happy Mother’s Day’ and the brand name at the end.

‘Interesting,’ Samir said. ‘Any idea on how it impacted sales?’

Melissa stared at him as if he’d suddenly grown a second head. ‘It doesn’t work that way,’ she protested. ‘Ads like these make customers connect with the brand. There’s no immediate effect on sales.’

‘Right...’ he said, but he was evidently not convinced. ‘Always helps to have sales figures, though.’

It took all Melissa’s willpower not to snap at him. ‘I work on the creative side,’ she said finally. ‘It’s the client servicing guys who work on the numbers.’

‘You’re not curious enough to ask for them?’

‘I did ask!’ she said. ‘The sales figures were good, but I’ve forgotten exactly what percent they went up by. Devdeep would have the details.’

Samir didn’t react, and she wondered if he’d even heard what she’d said. He was gazing intently at a spreadsheet now, his brows narrowed in concentration. In spite of her annoyance, one part of Melissa’s brain noted that he managed to look very, very hot in an intense, brooding kind of way. Even when he clearly found his spreadsheet more fascinating than her ad.

She moved towards the door in what she hoped was an unobtrusive manner, and her hand was on the doorknob when he looked up, his rather stern features lightened by a genuine smile.

‘It’s a great ad, by the way,’ he said. ‘I can see why Brian thought so highly of you.’

The smile made his eyes crinkle up at the corners—suddenly he seemed a lot more human and approachable, like a movie star morphing into the local college football hero. Except that he was far more potently male than the average college heartthrob, and Melissa felt her breath come a little faster.

‘Thank you,’ she said, all her usual poise deserting her. ‘I’ll...um...I’ll see you around, then, OK?’

She slipped out of the door, but it was a few minutes before Samir went back to his spreadsheet.

TWO

‘Where is everyone?’

Melissa looked up. ‘Devdeep and Shivani are in Goa for the ad awards,’ she said. ‘The rest of us are all here. As in they’re around,’ she added as Samir surveyed the empty cubicles and raised an eyebrow. ‘They’ve gone for breakfast, I think.’

Samir had been travelling, and it was a week since she’d last seen him. He looked tanned and fit and almost good enough to eat.

His brow creased in a frown. ‘If you wrote the ad why aren’t you on your way to Goa? Didn’t Devdeep think of taking you along?’

‘He did.’ Melissa bit her lip. She didn’t like Devdeep much, but the poor man wasn’t to blame for this particular situation.

‘And you decided not to go?’ Samir sounded positively incredulous now.

There was no way out of this other than admitting the embarrassing truth. ‘I...um...I have a slight phobia about flying,’ Melissa said in a rush. ‘The trains were booked solid because it’s a long weekend, and Devdeep said that going alone on a bus might not be safe.’

‘And a bullock cart would take too much time, I assume?’ Samir said, his lips twitching. ‘How about cycling to Goa? Did you consider that?’

‘Very funny,’ Melissa said crossly. ‘I did want to go. I’m just trying to tell you that it didn’t work out.’

Too late, she realised that snapping at the new agency head was probably not very bright of her. Luckily, he looked more amused than offended.

‘You could come with me,’ Samir said, taking even himself by surprise. ‘I’m driving down—I’m leaving early tomorrow morning and I can pick you up. Where d’you live?’

‘Colaba,’ Melissa said, trying not to gape at him. ‘But are you sure?’

‘Yes, I am,’ Samir said, though he was wondering whether he’d suddenly gone quite mad.

There was no way Melissa could know it, but he never volunteered to spend time with a woman—let alone thirteen hours closeted with one in a car. For a second he wondered whether he should retract the offer, but there was no way he could back out of it without coming across as being incredibly rude.