I too want a love story - KarEena

13. Frenzy of rage

Viraj is waiting in the café for Karishma, it's been 3 days since the meeting and the acclaimed agreement between Adbul and Karishma, before the board announcement Abdul wants Karishma to sign some papers proving she is the legal heir of the Singh empire and go through some business stuff so that it would be easy to convince the board members that Karishma does know what is going on with the companies.

Viraj has been talking to Karishma every day, trying to make her understand the workings of the companies, their profits and strategies, he is impressed by Karishma's quick learning, and now he truly believes that genes do play their part in human growth. To him Karishma has great potential and can help the industry reach greater heights if she focuses on it, he is against the agreement and now seeing Karishma's capability his sole goal is to make Karishma stay.

His thoughts were soon disturbed by Karishma who was sitting before him offering a coffee and a cookie, they started growing a friendly bond in these few days. Although he wants her to join the industry, he can't help but acknowledge how good she is at baking and running the café, he has grown fond of her food.

Accepting the coffee, he passed her some papers, as he finished his coffee, she thoroughly checked the papers and signed on them,

"Anything else?"

"No mam, most of the work has been finished, maybe next Monday we can meet the board members"

Karishma nodded, "Mr Jha, you don't have to call me mam, please call Karishma"

"Whatever you are comfortable with Karishma," he smiled, "and also please call me by my name, Mr Jha sounds like I am in a business meeting" They both chuckled

"Fine then, I'll call you VJ for Viraj Jha" Karishma smiled

"Fine by me," they both sat in silence for a few minutes, Viraj couldn't hold himself back and said, "Don't take me the wrong way but I still can't understand your terms in the agreement, I mean if you take up the position permanently then you can open cafés like this in every corner of the city. I am sure this café is profitable but compared to what you are leaving this is not even 1%. Don't you think you are being unreasonable?"

Karishma was enraged by his insinuation of her café being worthless more than his opinion of her being dumb for leaving everything, she fisted her hands to control the urge to smack him right across the face, right when she thought they were making nice progress he dragged everything into the gutter.

'People are judgemental and opinion is the least form of intelligence as it does not take facts and emotions into consideration and especially, I don't want to do the same thing by forming an opinion on Viraj now itself, everyone deserves time to be known, even if they piss you off' Karishma thought to herself, she took a deep breath before answering him

"It's not about the money VJ, it's about the life I built through my hard work, I prefer to be known by my work rather than someone's heir. I lived, I live and plan to live like this forever. And my passion is in this, even though my café is small, it's everything I need in my life"

Viraj nodded without saying anything, Karishma's balled fists and stern tone were enough for him to understand that he was in treacherous waters. The short lady before him intimidated him, a 6 ft jacked-up man was scared of the young lady before him, who was now looking more terrifying with her incisive stare, the sweet mellowly aura suddenly transformed into a dark one.

As a godsend, Santosh came to Karishma easing the tension in the air,

"Karu, I am starting on the cakes, the cupcakes are almost over, you need to unload them," she said but her eyes darted between Karishma and Viraj, she saw him a couple of times talking to Karishma, she was waiting for Karishma to introduce him but it seems Karishma is not taking her hint, she turned to him, "sorry for disturbing you guys"