Twelve Hours of Temptation. Shoma Narayanan

his shoulder. ‘Some of the other guys are already here—you could call them and catch up maybe.’

      Was that a subtle way of telling her not to expect to hang around with him? Melissa felt absurdly upset at the thought as she watched him stride away.

      Just as he was about to step out of the lobby, he turned around. ‘Melissa?’

      ‘Yes?’ she said.

      ‘Make sure you eat your meals on time, OK?’ he said, smiling a crooked little smile. ‘No fainting when you’re called up to receive the award.’

      ‘OK,’ she said.

      It was only when she reached her room and looked into the mirror that she realised that she was still smiling goofily.

      ‘Idiot woman,’ she told her reflection crossly. ‘It was fun, but the trip’s over now. You’ll be lucky if he pays any attention to you at all after this.’

      Her reflection looked back at her just as crossly, and she gave it a wry grin.

      ‘I know. I liked him too. But he’s my boss—I can’t chase after him. Time for a cold shower now, OK?’

      She moved away from the mirror, her good humour at least partly restored. She’d decided a couple of years back not to take men too seriously, and so far she’d managed to stick by it.

      Wandering into the bathroom, she hummed softly under her breath as she turned on the taps. Eek, the cold water was really, really cold. Maybe a lukewarm shower would do just as well without giving her pneumonia.

      By the time she was done with ironing an impossibly crushed pair of shorts, tucking her hair under a shower cap and actually going ahead and taking a shower, it was past six. It took her a few seconds to give her hair a brushing and pull on a yellow spaghetti strap top over the neatly ironed shorts. Once she was done, she gave herself a quick look in the mirror and headed off to the beach.

      There was an enthusiastic game of cricket in progress between Devdeep and a couple of other guys from Mendonca’s and a bunch of youngsters from another agency. Pretty much the entire Mumbai advertising fraternity seemed to be in Goa, either infesting the beach or helping the state economy along by drinking larger quantities of beer and feni.

      ‘Join us!’ one of the younger cricket players in the group yelled out to Melissa.

      ‘You’re supposed to play volleyball on the beach, not cricket,’ she yelled back. ‘Losers!’

      ‘Leave her alone—girls can’t play cricket,’ one of the surlier members of the team grunted.

      ‘Oh, can’t they?’ Melissa said, promptly kicking off her sandals and joining them.

      The sand felt good under her feet—it had been a long while since she’d gone barefoot. Mumbai had its fair share of beaches, but they were crowded and often dirty.

      ‘You can field,’ the surly man said. ‘Just don’t get in the way of the other fielders.’

      Melissa didn’t say anything—just waited till the luckless batsman hit a ball in her direction. She moved across the sand like a guided missile, leaving Mr Surly and the others gaping as she caught the ball in mid-air and whirled around to knock down a wicket. Clearly unused to running in the sand, the batsmen were only halfway down the crease—they didn’t stand a chance.

      ‘Out,’ she said with satisfaction. ‘I think I’ll bowl next, thank you.’

      There was a second of stunned silence, and then ‘her’ team started cheering madly. The bowler was the man who’d first called out to her, and he relinquished his place to her gladly. He was a nice-looking chap, with curly hair and an impish grin, and Melissa liked him immediately.

      ‘Down here for the ad fest?’ he asked as he handed over the ball.

      Melissa nodded.

      ‘I’m Akash,’ he said. ‘Would you like to catch up later? Figure out which of our entries is likely to get a gold in the festival?’

      ‘Akash, stop hitting on the bowler,’ one of the other players said.

      ‘Yeah, Akash, there’s no way she’d want to be seen with a loser like you,’ another chimed in.

      Melissa gave the guy a saucy grin. ‘I’ll tell you once the game is over,’ she said.

      She wasn’t in the least attracted to him, but it made sense hanging out with a bunch of people her own age rather than hanging around and hoping Samir would come and find her.