The case of unrequited love

4 - Wrongly accused

Lavanya paid a visit to Anu's house to convince her regarding the case. "Hello!" Lavanya barged into Anu's house when she was cooking.

"Don't even dare to talk to me," Anu threatened her with the ladle in her hand.

"Is this how you talk to the CEO? No doubt, you lack discipline, baby," Lavanya said, grabbing an Apple from the refrigerator.

"What is the point of working in a company, where my friend is the CEO, when she treats me the same way she treats others?" Anu said, taking out all her frustration on the vegetables that she was cutting.

She further said, "What makes you think that I can take this case and deal with it with utmost professionalism when a sight of him is enough for me to get distracted?"

"Do you still love him?" Lavanya asked out of nowhere.

"Don't forget that I still have a knife in my hand. Just because we have been friends since our graduation, doesn't mean I am going to let you talk sh*t like that," Anu gave her a deadly warning.

"That's intimidating!... If you are done murdering those vegetables with knife, can we talk for a minute?" Lavanya turned off all the stoves.

"See, I have three valid reasons. Hear out all of them and then come to a conclusion. I will go in reverse, ranking them according to the weightage they hold. The third one is, I want you to take up this case because no one else can deal with it better than you..." Anu was about to say something but Lavanya raised her voice and continued, "...because, what is the first rule of our firm?"

"Don't trust your client," Anu said.

"Exactly! And you have completed your PhD in not trusting him. Moreover, many of them are his fans. They will be not doing justification to the law because they will always find him right," Lavanya completed giving her third reason. "The second reason is, I know it sounds wrong but as a CEO my primary motive is to increase the goodwill keeping an eye on the profit".

"Law is not business," Anu corrected.

"These kinds of things are good only for listening. Assure me that the lawyers working in our law firm won't kick me out if I delay their salary for ten days… I will be happy if they won't slap me. So please, be practical," Lavanya stated the reality of life.

"Taking up a high-profile case will help us achieve our 2022 goals, in terms of everything," Lavanya mentioned her plan.

"I can't believe I am being part of your commercial plan," Anu disliked her friend's evil plan. She further said, "They say, 'Birds of the same feather flock together'. No one's going to believe that we are friends. I mean, look at our ideologies".

"That is the reason we kept it a secret on the business ground". Lavanya said. "Now coming to the first and important reason... he wants you to defend him," Lavanya revealed which flabbergasted her friend.

She continued saying, "Actually, he wanted me to keep it confidential but – "

"You are not joking right?" Anu stepped closer to her.

"You are not going to kiss me, right?" Lavanya moved back. Anu looked at her seriously.

The old-evil friend was in a mood to tease her friend. "I gave 2 valid reasons but only the 1st one excited you? Wow! I am sure you still love - "

"LAVANYA!" Anu startled her dear friend.

"Thank god, I am alive," Lavanya checked her heartbeat. "Why would I joke about something like this? He really wants you to take up this case," She further said.

"Please leave for now. I will talk to you later," Anu pushed her friend from behind, forcing her to leave.

"Hi, Auntie," Vikram, who just woke up from sleep, greeted Anu's beloved friend.