The Takeover Effect

by Nisha Sharma

“What about him?”

  Brahm shoved his fingers through his perfect hair. “The bastard sold his shares of Bharat to WTA for top dollar. WTA now has a sizeable amount of shares in our company. They’re a major shareholder.”

  “What the hell? How did Gopal get Bharat shares?”

  Everyone turned to look at Deepak. The old man stared into space, looking defeated and worn. The image was completely different from the framed magazine covers in the foyer of Bharat’s offices.

  “Pa-ji,” Hem said softly. “Please tell me you didn’t.”

  “He needed to focus on the family and not on his drug addiction,” Deepak said in Punjabi. “It was supposed to help him gain a vested interest in working for the company.”

  “Well, that sure as hell didn’t work did it, Chacha?” Brahm snapped. “I’m here to tell you that you can’t save him. Not anymore.”

  Ajay and Hem started in unison, but it was the older woman who quieted the room this time. She stared at Mina as she yelled, “Enough! I didn’t realize that we had . . . company.”

  She walked toward Mina and reached out to touch her hands. “I’m Hem’s mother,” she said in English. “I’m sorry about this scene you’ve just witnessed. My son has better sense usually and warns the family so we’re all on our best behavior.”

  Mina responded in Punjabi. “I’m working as an attorney at Bharat right now, Auntie-ji. I’m well aware of all three of your sons’ temperaments. No need for such formality with me.”

  The woman’s eyes filled with tears and Mina backed away, not sure what to do.

  Luckily, the British man intervened. “Mina, right?” He came over and extended his hand. “Brahm. I run the UK office.”

  “Nice to meet you.”

  “Can we focus for a second?” Ajay said. “We need to know exactly how many shares and if WTA is making a move to buy the twenty-five percent we released to the public.”

  “Dad,” Hem said. “Tell us everything. Now.”

  “Hem, leave him be,” his mother said.

  “No, this is serious. He could be tanking our chances of stopping WTA. At this point we may have to sell off parts of the business.”

  “You’re not in charge anymore,” Deepak said, his voice laced with a venom that hushed the room. “You left, remember? You left me and the business because of a woman. And now you’ve come back, because of a woman? I will not hear anything from you.”

  “Deepak!” Hem’s mother snapped. “Watch yourself.”

  “And he may not be in charge anymore, but I am,” Ajay said. “And I want those answers.”

  The brief respite was over, and the shouting continued, but this time, Deepak was raising his voice, too. His anger seemed to focus on Hem.

  “I told you going public was a bad idea, Dad!”

  “You only said that because Lisa gave you that advice.”

  “Actually she agreed with you. I formulated my own opinions, and it looks like I was right after all.”

  “She drove you away, Hem!”

  “No, damn you, you drove me away. You’re using her as an excuse! I did the same, but at least I can admit it.”

  “Blame us, blame me for your own wrongdoing. What will you do if this girl drives an even bigger wedge between us? When she leaves, will you blame us, too, for something we haven’t done?”

  “This is not about Lisa and Hem,” Ajay said. “Dad, you got us into a mess, and we’re here to get out of it. Hem is here to help.”

  “Yes, I’m solely responsible for WTA,” he shouted. “Blame me for losing the company. Do you think I intended for this to happen? I made this company the way it is!”

  “And you’re doing a good job at screwing it over, too,” Hem snapped.

  Deepak said something, but the words were lost in a coughing fit. The voices around the room quieted when Deepak started gasping. He clutched his arm and tipped out of his chair. Everyone moved at once. Time slowed, and Hem barely made it to his father’s side before he crumbled to the floor.

  “Call 911,” he shouted, but Ajay already had his phone out.

  Brahm held back Hem’s mother who began to sob in her shawl. “Deepak!” she cried.

  The housekeeper came running in and Mina intercepted him. “Please make sure the front gate is open, and there is a car ready,” she said.

  “We need them here now,” Ajay roared. “We can call the helicopter.”

  “Too slow,” Hem said. “Ambulance is our best option.”

  Her heart pounded as she watched the scene helplessly, the fear on Hem’s face, the glassy loss of focus on Ajay’s, and the shock on Brahm’s handsome features. She ended up holding Hem’s mother at one point as she sobbed into Mina’s shoulder.

  Long, agonizing minutes passed until the ambulance finally came and Deepak was loaded onto a stretcher. Mina followed everyone outside and to the car. She was about to get into the back of one of the vehicles when Hem stopped her.

  “Take the Tesla back to my place. Or I’ll have our housekeeper order a car for you.”

  “Hem, I want to go to the hospital with you.”

  “No,” he said. His lips thinned, and his eyes were wild with panic. “No, I don’t want you here with my family. I should’ve never brought you.”

  “Hem, you don’t mean that. I can help.”

  “You were right, damn it. You need to focus on Bharat and not on me. You can’t afford to make another mistake. Go home and get to fucking work, Mina.”

  Ajay called Hem’s name and he slipped into the passenger seat of the sedan without a backward glance. The car roared down the drive and Mina was left standing at the base of the steps, reeling from Hem’s rejection.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Hem knew he’d screwed up the moment the panic and fear cleared from his brain.

  He sat in the plush leather chair of the private waiting room, the one reserved for people who were shelling out major cash for the welfare of family members, and closed his eyes. He shouldn’t have told Mina to go. She’d only been trying to help.

  He heard the chair next to him squeak and looked over to see Ajay collapse next to him. “What a day.”

  “Any info from the nurses?”

  “No, just that Dad’s stable. Relapsing from congestive heart failure means that his recovery time is now going to be longer.”

  “Shit.”

  “I know. But it’s not as bad as we thought. He’ll be okay. The doctors are confident.”

  “He’s going to be pissed when he’s healthy again.”

  Ajay nodded. “As cruel as it sounds, with Dad busy getting better, we’ll be able to fight a little dirty and find out how WTA is screwing us.”

  “Don’t talk like that with Mom around, man.”

  “Brahm is with her in the cafeteria. They’re trying to get some chai.”

  Hem closed his eyes again. “This is a disaster.”

  “No, you’re a disaster,” Ajay said.

  He turned to his brother again. “What the hell does that mean?”

  “You shouldn’t have sent Mina away, man. She was handling things like a pro.”

  Even though his thoughts were along the same lines, he felt the need to defend his decision. It wasn’t his brother’s job to tell him how he’d messed up a relationship that was more important to him than anything else he’d experienced before. “You saw how Dad reacted to her presence. She was only going to make things worse by coming to the hospital with us.”

  “Dad was reacting that way because of you, not Mina. He trusts your leadership more than he’s ever trusted mine. He was ignoring me and Brahm before you showed up. Then when you started asking the same questions, he got defensive.”

  Hem let out a breath. He knew that Ajay was still struggling to prove himself, and his father wasn’t cutting him any breaks. After the last couple months, Hem truly believed that Ajay belonged at Bharat more than he ever had before. “He may not show it, but he respects you. I’ve been with him at the helm for a lot longer, and t
hat’s the only reason why he’ll hear me out first. It’ll take time, but once he wakes up from his stupidity, he’ll see that you are so much better at this job than all of us.”

  “I hope so.” Ajay nudged him in the arm. “Tell me something. Is it true that Lisa thought we should go public?”

  “Yes,” he said. “She said I was making a huge mistake by leaving the company when it had so much promise.”

  “She was right. The numbers don’t lie, Hem. We’re just as deadly as the worst of the sharks in these waters.”

  “I see that. And if anyone can turn this around, it’s you. It’s also clear I don’t belong at Bharat. I have other dreams and the longer I’m helping Bharat, the more I know that I made the right decision to leave.”

  “Does Mina agree?”

  “Mina . . . yeah. Yeah, she believes in the impossible for me. Or at least she used to until I basically told her to get lost and that she’s a screw up. Man, I really fucked it up today.”

  They slipped into a silence, the sounds and smells of the hospital around them. No matter how plush they made the private waiting room, the facility was still a hospital.

  “Are you going after her?” Ajay finally asked.

  “I’m going to try.”

  “She’s good for you, brother. Both of you work like a unit. I can see that she makes you happy. Do us all a favor and don’t make her pay for the mistakes you made with Lisa.”

  Hem nodded, his brother’s words a truth that weighed on his shoulders. “It’s so much more complicated than that.”

  Ajay switched to Punjabi when one of the cleaning crew came in to change out the garbage. “I know we don’t talk about things like ‘feelings’ but I have some advice for you. I know you hold Mom and Dad accountable, but with the way you and Lisa were going, they just happened to be an easy scapegoat for how your relationship ended. Our parents will never change. They’re stubborn and brilliant. Mina is stubborn and brilliant, too. She can handle them in ways that your ex never could.”

  Hem looked down at the bracelet he always wore and ran his finger over the metal. A kara was a symbol of strength, a reminder to always keep his guru’s teachings in mind and to do what was right.

  “What makes you think Mina is more accepting than my ex?”

  “Are you serious? Like Lisa, Mina didn’t have the same upbringing we did, but she understands you, and that’s what makes her different.”

  Hem had spent so long repressing memories of his ex-girlfriend that now, when he recalled some of the complaints she’d had, he had to agree that Mina would never say the same things.

  Things are moving too fast. Do normal people even have multi-day flashy weddings?

  Who lives with their parents at our age?

  I can’t do this anymore, Hem. I can’t be your girlfriend and share you with your parents, your brothers and your religion anymore.

  You’re making a big mistake. How could you even think about leaving Bharat?

  Hem realized that his intelligent, witty, Punjabi queen didn’t judge him like that.

  She was the one. Mina Kaur Kohli was the girl for him because she accepted him for who he was. She saw possibilities with him, and she made him laugh. She should’ve been the first woman he’d introduced to his parents. He couldn’t change the past, but he had every intention of keeping her in his future.

  “Do you think she’ll stick around?”

  Ajay laughed. “Brother, if she’s lasted this long, I think she’s in it for life. You’re lucky. In the little bit of time we’ve worked together, it’s clear that she’s an amazing woman.”

  “Damn straight.”

  The double doors opened and Brahm escorted Hem’s mother into the room. They each held a cup of chai in hand.

  “I’m going to go check with the nurses,” Hem’s mother said.

  “Mom, I just checked,” Ajay replied. “He’s stable.”

  She muttered something in Punjabi about sons who don’t know how to keep their mouths shut and crossed to the nurses’ station at the other end of the room.

  Brahm hitched up his pinstriped pants and sat in the chair on the other side of Hem. He put his cup in one of the holders and lifted the chair’s mechanical footrest. His rainbow socks peeked out between Ferragamo shoes and slim-fit dress pants.

  “Chachi is a demon. I don’t know how you guys live with her.”

  “What did she do now?” Ajay asked.

  “She asked if I’d found any sensible Indian boys to marry in the UK.”

  Hem snorted. “I think she wants you to get married more than she wants us to.”

  “Because she knows that when I get married, it’s going to be classic and elegant. I’d have something like a traditional Punjabi ceremony with a vineyard backdrop. You three blokes are probably going to have keg stands and beat your chests during the milni.”

  Ajay laughed. “Brahm, the whole purpose of the wedding milni is to meet the brothers, cousins, and uncles of the other family and prove that we’re stronger and better and staking a claim on one of their women. Beating chests is part of the ritual.”

  “See what I’m saying? Heathens, the lot of you.”

  “Your upper-crust British bullshit is too much right now,” Hem said.

  Brahm slapped him on the shoulder. “Chutiya, you’re only saying that because you look like a sad, kicked puppy. Why don’t you go to her? In all honesty, I expected you to have left already.”

  Hem faked a nut shot that had Brahm jackknifing in his seat. Ajay and Hem burst into laughter as their cousin straightened his suit jacket.

  “Fuck you,” he said in his crisp accent.

  “You deserved it.”

  His cousin was right about needing time to beg for forgiveness. However, there was one last thing he had to address before he left. “Brahm, what happened to Gopal?”

  Brahm’s face grew solemn. “He’s in rehab near Bath. His therapist said that he’s over the withdrawal and he’s suffering from depressive mood disorder. He’s getting the help he needs, though.”

  “How did you find out about the shares?” Ajay asked.

  “I went to see him yesterday. He was sobbing. He said that a few days before I extracted him from Punjab, he’d been approached by a WTA representative. They offered twice the amount they were worth. Gopal wanted the money, so he sold the shares.”

  “Son of a bitch,” Hem said.

  “There’s more,” Brahm said. “This is what I really didn’t want to send over email or even a phone call. I took care of Gopal’s dealer when the extraction happened. He was starting to threaten the family. Our cousins, the ones that still talk to me anyway, were ready to take out their shotguns.”

  Ajay stood. “Thanks, Brahm. That’s one less thing we now have to worry about.”

  “Not quite. Some intel I received says that the dealer was paid to target the family. They had to find the weakest link and report back to another person.”

  “Do you think it’s WTA?” Hem said. “Were they the ones who tried to get to Deepak through his brothers?”

  “Maybe. I’ll keep digging but I don’t know anything for sure yet.”

  If Brahm’s intel was right, the corporate giant had made a critical mistake. They’d purposely targeted family, and now that it was personal, Hem and his brothers were going to go above and beyond to fight back.

  “Thanks for all your help,” Ajay said. He pulled out his phone and began typing. “We figure out the percentage that WTA now owns, and then we come up with a plan. We can’t wait any longer to clean house.”

  “What does that mean?” Hem asked.

  “It means we move up the board meeting to next week.”

  “I’m just as invested in the future of Bharat and the family as you two are, so I’ll stay for a few days and see if I can help with developing a strategy to fight,” Bhram said.

  “Use Zail’s office in New York for the week.”

  Brahm grinned. “It’ll be good to see your assistant again, Aj
ay.”

  “If Rafael quits or brings sexual harassment charges against you, I’ll personally snap off your dick.”

  “Harsh, and completely not necessary. Raphael was interested once. I just have to remind him of what he liked back then.”

  Hem stood as well, WTA still on his mind. “On a more serious note, I’ll talk to some of my contacts and see if we have any recourse. I’ll ask Mina if she has suggestions on how to deal with this, too.”

  “Speaking of Mina,” Ajay said. “Weren’t you on your way to beg for her forgiveness?”

  “Yeah, yeah. Just you wait until you find a woman worthy of groveling to. You’ll do it as gladly as I am, if it makes her happy.”

  “When hell freezes,” Ajay said dryly. “Say hi to Mina for me.”

  “I won’t. Let me know if Dad’s situation changes.”

  “Where are you going?” His mother’s voice had him turning around. She was still a little pale and cupped her chai in both hands. Hem went to her and rubbed his hands down her arms.

  “I’m going to check on Mina.”

  Her face brightened. “Mina. What’s her last name?”

  “Kohli.”

  “Sikhini?”

  “Yes, Mom,” he said, rolling his eyes.

  “I like her.”

  Despite the dire circumstances his family was embroiled in at the moment, he couldn’t help but laugh at his mother’s obvious excitement. “You’d like a paper bag as long as it was a Punjabi Sikh paper bag.”

  She called him an idiot in both Hindi and Punjabi. Only a Punjabi mother could make an insult sound like an endearment. “You should’ve warned me that you were bringing her to the house. I’m so ashamed of what we said in front of her. And your father! I’ll straighten him out the minute he’s better. I don’t know what’s wrong with that man. Mina shouldn’t have seen the fight. I don’t want what happened with Lisa to—”

  “Mom,” Hem said. “Mina isn’t my ex. She’s made of stronger stuff. I truly believe that she can handle whichever way you want to welcome her.” He pulled his mother in for a hug, and some of the resentment he’d carried around for over a year dissipated. He leaned down and kissed the top of his mother’s head. “You be who you are. Family means accepting people’s true self, even if my Muma and Pa-ji are drama queens.”