Chapter Two

Mina Kohli lay sleepless in bed like she did every year on this day. The muted sounds of an early New York City morning filtered through the open window as a backdrop to the drifting memories of her mother. Mina couldn’t help but wonder what kind of relationship they’d have if she was still alive. It’d been fifteen years since the accident, but that didn’t matter. Every birthday reminded her of the hole in her heart and in her life.

A familiar ping echoed through the bedroom and Mina reached out to pick up her phone.

DAD:You’ll get through today.

Simple, short, and to the point. Her father wasn’t an affectionate man, nor were he and Mina close, but sometimes he managed to say just the right thing at the right moment. She sent back a response.

MINA:Just like I always do. Hopefully I’ll see you at the office.

DAD:No. Working from home. I’ll ask my assistant to schedule a lunch later this week.

MINA:Okay, Dad.

DAD:Okay. Happy thirtieth birthday, Mina.

“That’s as close to a touching father-daughter moment as we’ve ever had,” Mina muttered. With a sigh, she opened up her photos and clicked through the albums until she found the one labeled ‘Mom’.

Pictures filled the screen. Her mother looked like her. Long dark hair, eyes too big for her face, and sharp cheekbones. Mina scrolled through the pregnancy photos, the baby photos, and the pictures of the few times they went to Central Park when she was a child.

Shalini Kaur Kohli had been such a powerhouse her entire short life, with an active career and social life. No matter what, she’d always made time for Mina. She’d been a mother, a wife, a litigator, and a sister who raised two younger brothers to be litigators as well. Her life had ended the day her brothers voted her out of the firm she built from the ground up. She’d gotten raging drunk, then climbed behind the wheel of her sedan. Mina discovered the truth about the accident when she was seventeen. That’s when she began her mission to take back her birthright. Nothing was going to stop her.

Except maybe an arranged marriage.

She shifted against her silk pillowcase, thinking about her uncle’s offer. If she married Virat, the son of the managing partner at J.J.S. Immigration Law, she’d get the equity partner position at her mother’s firm. Her marriage would make way for the union of two of the largest South Asian-owned firms in the country.

The problem was that she wasn’t attracted to Virat. He was such a nice guy, but unfortunately, he possessed the personality of a cardboard box.

Mina’s phone buzzed in her hand. Her eyebrows rose clear to her hairline when she saw Sanjeev’s number. Her uncle rarely called her, and never at four in the morning. Maybe he remembered it was her birthday. Doubtful, but Sanjeev was full of surprises.

“Yes?”

“You agree to the partner position yet, girl?”

Mina slowly sat up. “No, I’m still thinking it through.”

“What the hell is taking you so long?”

“You’re basically bartering me for an immigration firm. I deserve some time.”

His gruff voice boomed in her ear. “There may be another way to get you that equity partner position. Get to the office. There is an emergency board meeting at Bharat, Inc., and you’re the only senior associate with patent experience who has the bandwidth to take on another case. If you’re here in an hour, that’ll give you, oh, three hours to prep on the company, the other board members, and WTA Digital.”

Mina’s mind raced as she tried to piece together facts. Bharat had recently gone public, but they were floundering, or so the news said. Sanjeev was friendly with the CEO and chairman, which was how he’d been selected to be part of the board. WTA Digital, however... Well, their name was as well-known as Google. A tech company that was in bed with the government. They did everything from artificial intelligence and smartphones, to government defense projects and NATO commissioned research.

“Mina! Are you there?”

“I’m here. Let me guess. Offer for purchase?”

“Just get to the office, girl.”

Even though Mina hated her uncle, his words made her smile. Once she’d put in her dues, she’d slowly edge out her uncles. Then she’d take the firm to another level, one that would make her mother proud. Cases like a WTA takeover would be the norm for her.

As she showered, she dictated to her digital assistant and drafted emails to her legal assistant and paralegal. She needed to rearrange her schedule, which meant shifting two client calls and asking for an extra day to review a contract.

Mina slipped into a maroon suit dress with matching pumps and a coordinating Chanel bag. Because it took her an extra minute to pile her long hair on top of her head in a sleek updo, she had to call for a car to pick her up in front of her apartment building in Chelsea.

“Looking lovely today, Ms. Kohli,” George said as he opened the door for her. “Spring weather at its finest.”

“Thanks, George. I may have a meeting with a new client today.”

“Knock ’em dead.”

“I always do.”

The car was already waiting at the curb, and in a practiced move, she folded herself into the back seat and answered emails for the entire drive to Park and 40th.

The lights were on in the building when she scanned her badge and stepped through the glass doors and into the offices for Kohli and Associates. She loved the rows of redwells stacked on top of the filing cabinets that hardly anyone used anymore, the desks for the paralegals and assistances crammed with paper, discarded coffee cups, and personal items. Most of all, she loved that her floor was high enough to get a view of the East River along one row of windows. Sometimes when she was going for a run or binging on movies at her condo, she’d imagine this exact view was spread out in front of her.

“Mina?” her uncle roared from his corner office.

She headed toward the sound, passing empty cubicles along the way. When she reached her uncle’s assistant’s desk, she paused to admire the woman typing away at the keyboard. Except for the circles under her eyes, Sangeeta was pressed and polished, as if it wasn’t five thirty in the morning.

“Good morning, Mina. He’s ready for you.”

“Why don’t you get some coffee, Sangeeta?”

“No, I’m okay.”

Mina pulled out her company card and handed it to her. “Get something for yourself. Pastry, too. And if you don’t mind, coffees for me and the dragon.”

She glanced at his office and then back to Mina. “I shouldn’t...”

“I’ll keep him busy. You look like you could use some fresh air. I think the cart downstairs just opened up.”

Sangeeta glanced one more time at Sanjeev’s open door before she quickly grabbed her small purse from a bottom drawer in her desk. “Thanks, Mina.”

“Anytime. You can always come to me if you need anything. I know that you trusted my mom when you worked for her. I want you to know that you can trust me, too.”

“I—I’ll be right back,” she said before she scrambled down the hall.

“Mina!” her uncle roared again.

She stepped into the corner office, ignoring the smell of stale cigarettes. The space was a pigsty with papers everywhere. There were discarded suitcoats and ties, dirty bowls and mugs, and an overflowing ashtray. She passed the small conference table and dropped her bag into one of his client chairs.

Her uncle turned in his high-back chair, dressed in a black suit and wearing a thunderous scowl. “What took you so long?”

“You said an hour.”

“Whatever. Sit down.”

Mina pulled her tablet out of her bag and sat in the second chair. “WTA Digital wants to purchase Bharat. The board is going to have to appoint a committee to determine if the value of the offer is equivalent to the value of the company based on forecasting and financials. Depending on the technicality of the patents Bharat has and how well management at Bharat cooperates, it’ll take a while to make that decision. This whole thing could take anywhere from ten days to months. WTA’s offer is only good for thirty days, but that can be renegotiated.”

Her uncle leaned back in his chair, resting his hands on his round belly. “Good. That’s very good. I want you to head the committee that’s reviewing the offer.”

“The committee has to be an impartial party.”

Sanjeev ran two fingers over his mustache. “I talked to a friend of mine who handles high profile acquisition cases. Even though I’m on the board, it wouldn’t be a conflict of interest if one of my attorneys takes the case. As long as they don’t report to me. I also talked to Deepak’s son at Bharat. They’re okay with my firm’s involvement. The remaining members of the committee will be selected by the rest of the board. They’ll need to be experts in business intelligence, integrity, and finance.”

“Okay. You do realize that I’ll have to be on site a couple times a week, right? I do have the bandwidth to take this on since I just closed out a bunch of cases, but court dates, depositions, and meetings for the rest of my workload will have to be rescheduled.”

“Fine. Do what you have to do. I want the committee to make a decision as quickly as possible, so if that means you set up a makeshift office there, so be it. Oh, and there is one more thing.”

“Shoot.”

“I’ll make you equity partner, with or without the arranged marriage to Virat, if you report to the Bharat board at the end of your review that we need to take WTA’s offer.”

Mina jerked in her seat. “What the hell?” She couldn’t have heard him right. There was no way he’d just asked her point-blank to commit a crime.

“I know you don’t want to marry Virat,” Sanjeev continued. “I also know you’ll do whatever it takes to become partner. I’m willing to give you another opportunity. One that doesn’t include an arranged marriage. Make the WTA deal happen, Mina. If you can’t, then it’s wedding bells for you. Unless of course, you’d rather be unemployed.”

Sanjeev looked too smug, too content. Was he testing her, or trying to get rid of her? She’d do anything to get her mother’s company back, except lose her integrity.

“I feel like I’m in an alternate universe. Sanjeev, you aren’t seriously asking me to sabotage the vote.”

“This is how the real world works, Mina. I shouldn’t have to explain myself. Bharat is in the process of registering a patent for software that can locate moving targets traveling over two hundred miles an hour with ninety-eight point eight seven percent accuracy. It’s my friend’s latest invention in an effort to find missing persons across the world. However, I’m a lawyer and a businessman. I know that they’ll never be able to do it. WTA has the resources and manpower to successfully execute the research.”

“How the hell did you find this out?”

“Oh, the RD team presented to the board last quarter,” Sanjeev said, waving his hand in dismissal. “Just look like you’re doing a due diligence review, but in the end, your report should have one conclusion. It’s not only for your future’s sake, but also because it’s the smartest move.”

Sanjeev wasn’t telling her the whole truth. That much was clear. He was asking Mina to jeopardize her license and do something unethical for the sake of staying at the firm. Did she appear so driven that he assumed she’d consider risking her future for a chance at a partner position?

Mina should’ve thrown his proposition back in his face, when something about his expression made her pause.

Bingo.

If she pretended to go through with his plan, it would buy her time to find out if her uncle had waded into anything illegal himself.

She stood and picked up her bag. “Fine. I’ll consider... all of this. When do we leave for the board meeting?”

“Two hours. Remember, I’m counting on you to make the right decision for both your career and this law firm. It’s about time I get some use out of you.”

Her hand tightened on her purse handle. “I’ll be in my office.”

She left the stifling room, her brain running through legal ethics violations and consequences that Sanjeev could be involved in when she ran straight into Sangeeta.

“Uh, Ms. Kohli? Your coffee and card.”

“Oh. Thanks, Sangeeta.”

Sangeeta picked up a small wrapped package from her desk and held it out. “And I got you this,” she said quietly. “I was reviewing your employment contract for signature and saw your birth date. I know you haven’t celebrated it in a while, and a croissant isn’t much compared to a cake but...”

“No, it’s okay. You don’t have to—”

“Happy thirtieth birthday.”

“Oh. Uh... thanks.” Mina took the pastry, feeling queasy at the idea of eating anything at the moment. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I wanted to. You have your whole life ahead of you, Mina. Don’t waste it... here with some of these people.”

With a sigh, Mina dropped the pastry and card into her bag. “I don’t know where else I’d rather be. I feel closest to Mama here. Thanks again, Sangeeta.”