(Off) Balance Sheet

1. The Middle

Present Day, Night-Time

When he saw the shadow at the door of the room, Ritvik knew he was in trouble.

Asset recovery was never an easy thing at Sync-7 where Agent Ritvik Talip worked. Sync-7 was an Intelligence Agency following the money trail and the assets could be anything, right from pendrives having money secrets or discs containing National Defence Secrets.

Yes, Ritvik had seen both and today, despite the rich surroundings, the stakes were the same. It had started with him coming to a horrendously rich marriage, and no Ritvik was not thinking about that hot, curvy, delicious best friend of the bride.

Sriya Ram was really something, and Ritvik was trying his best to look around for anything untoward while trying not to think about her. It did not work. The second part, that is.

Ritvik could not seem to think about anything else other than Miss Sriya Ram.

The reason he was trying his best not to think about her, was that the dark eyed chartered accountant just managed to mess up his hormones at all levels. Which was a first for Ritvik. Adding to the fact, Ritvik was at this wedding, undercover, for the recovery of a pen drive. For the first time Ritvik regretted his work at Sync-7, because now that he thought about it, he realised that this was doomed from the beginning.

*

Unhappily, he was trying to hide away from the curious Sriya, when he spotted the middle-aged man in a boring, beige-coloured sherwani walk across the place. Being the high society marriage that this was, that man was wrong for this type of crowd. It could be the man's not-so-rich clothes or his worried expression in the wedding of the year or both. Whatever it was, Ritvik followed that man involuntarily, his training almost screaming at him. The man walked towards the floral arrangements of roses, looked around at the crowd and slipped inside the corridor. Ritvik did not make any move to come forward. He had a clear sight of the man from where he stood and he saw a practiced hand-flick from the man. As Ritvik watched, the man slipped a heavy pen drive behind a massive gold painted plant at the base of the floral arrangement of the corridor.

After that, the man walked away.

This was a classic drop and was designed to avoid risky hand-to-hand exchange that could be recorded, photographed or spotted.

As the beige-coloured sherwani man moved away, Ritvik saw a burly thick-necked man in a dark tailored suit, step in front of the corridor. Ritvik nearly swore under his breath. This was the lookout.

*

A few minutes later, Ritvik walked into the dimly lit corridor towards the lookout.

"Private lounge, sir. Invitation only." The 'sir' was forced and the guard looked and sounded surly.

"Just looking for the restroom." Ritvik said smoothly and looked around.

There was no one there and Ritvik saw the guard reach for his inner pocket.

Unhesitatingly, Ritvik grabbed the man's wrist and twisted it. The lookout guard groaned but angrily wrenched his hand free and threw a brutal left hook. Ritvik ducked.In a lightning-fast move, Ritvik struck the lookout guard's chin with his palm and followed it by a nasty blow to the guard's solar plexus. The lookout guard did not have a chance. He fell and was coughing, but the guard did not give up.

He lunged forward and in a single move he grabbed Ritvik by the lapels of the bandhgala and using his body weight the burly lookout guard slammed Ritvik against the wall.

The gold-painted plant wobbled dangerously, but Ritvik could not pay any attention to it. He was too busy trying to stay alive.

Ritvik brought his forearms to break the burly man's grip and in the same move swept a low kick across the burly man's ankles.

The huge man crashed onto the floor. And the man hit the base of the gold-painted plant and the plant crashed sideways.

That was good. Because the impact dislodged the pen drive from the plant.

What was bad was that the pen drive flew from the plant and skidded across the floor towards the entrance.

That was when Ritvik saw the shadow at the entrance.

*

For whatever reason, Sriya Ram had taken this precise moment to come to this service corridor.Yes, Ritvik knew he was in trouble.