Chapter 4

All of the officers' head whipped to the door, as three well-dressed men stood there. Daya smiled and waved his hands to the team, as Purvi's eyes focused solely on one person. A person she never thought she would come across, maybe sometimes on the street when they were both in their hometown at the same time, but definitely not at her workplace. The rage she felt in her stomach made its way through to her heart and she felt her hands shaking.

"YOU! What the hell are you doing here?" she yelled, charging towards him and stood toe to toe looking up at him, both of their feet touching. He looked at her, a small smirk playing on his lips that irked Purvi more.

"Hi" he whispered, looking at her eyes and maybe at her lips too, but he didn't remember. Her frowning brows told him that she might not be as happy to see him there or would be welcoming.

"What is he doing here?" Purvi turned her head to Daya who had now left them at the door and was busy greeting other members of CID.

"Let him come inside, Purvi. Him, with Daya and Dushyant, will be working with us on this case." Abhijeet announced, as Purvi only right then saw Dushyant standing beside Shreya and waving at her. Purvi's eyes soften seeing one of her best friends from the academy and she waved back at him with a smile.

"Why him?" Purvi stepped away, allowing the man to enter. He winked at her, with a small smile and went ahead to meet the team.

"Team, we are going to work with our field office in this case. Pradyuman Sir wants all the hands-on deck and find out who kidnapped the minister's daughter. Meet Dushyant Hemraj, our field office's newest recruit." Dushyant waved his hands at everyone, with a sweet smile. "He has graduated his police academy, second of his class. He is a sharp close-range shooter, the highest of his class with a score of 23/23, with a major in communications engineering and a minor in linguistics."

Dushyant looked at them, a faint blush creeping up his neck as he started saying how Abhijeet was making a mountain out of a molehill. Everyone but Purvi turned to the other person, dressed in a leather jacket, blue jeans and ankle-high combat boots - making him look like an actor in an action thriller.

"And this is Kavin Khanna. One of the best snipers in our country, he graduated from the police academy top of his class, the same year as Dushyant. He had majored in counterintelligence and two minors in criminal interrogation and internal security."

Unlike Dushyant, who was all flustered when Abhijeet introduced him, Kavin loved the spotlight and smiled at everyone who looked at him in awe. Purvi shook her head, trying to focus on anything but Kavin, who she could feel burning a hole with his intense gaze at the back of her head.

Daya, approached Purvi, who was looking at a case file attentively, "Hey Purvi, how are you?"

Purvi looked up at him, her eyes soft and a small smile appearing on her lips, "I am good, how are you? Did you have to bring Kavin here?"

"Don't question me" Daya raised his hands, in a playful surrendering motion, "Pradyuman Sir chose both of them. I could not deny it, because Kavin is the best there is in my team, at this moment. Since you would not join my team at the field office. Oh, by the way, Pankaj says hi." Daya relayed the message from one of her closest friends.

A couple of years ago, the government decided to break up the CID team into two parts. Even though most of the time they worked most cases together, sometimes both the teams worked with officials from different agencies. The intelligence team was now left with Purvi, Shreya, Ishita, Freddy, and Mayur with Abhijeet leading them, the field/tactical team comprised of Pankaj, Divya, and now joined by Kavin and Dushyant led by Daya. It worked perfectly because the brains of the team comprising of the intelligence branch could finally solely focus on the clues and evidence. After which they would normally hand over the details to the tactical team whenever and whatever they would need to be on the field.

Daya asked Purvi to join the tactical team over and over again. She was fast on her feet, have more successful undercover missions than anyone on the team, and she loved to be on the field. And she would have joined, but a small surgery on her knee a few months ago had stopped her. But recently she was weighing her options and she was determined that once she was 100%, she would talk with Abhijeet and Daya about transferring to the tactical team.

"That is not true," Purvi whisper yelled, her eyes big, looking at him as if she was being accused of murder "I was coming to join your team once my knees are 100%." She then looked at Kavin, who was at the meal's table, helping himself to a cup of coffee "But now, I am not sure anymore."

"He has changed, Purvi" Daya followed the line of her sight, "He has matured. I know he misses you. The first thing he has asked me when he joined my team was, how you were doing, even though he was sure that I might break his neck and I almost did."

Purvi returned her eyes to Daya and shook her head, murmuring "A tiger never changes its stripes. You know it better than anyone." Then she looked up, with a watery smile, "And I miss Pankaj too. We should go now and discuss the case details."

Daya nodded, even though Purvi didn't stay long enough to see it, before following Purvi to meet with the team.

"So, guys, I want three of you to go to the minister's house and start everything from the scratch," Abhijeet announced looking at everyone. "Some of us would go to the stadium where Ovika had her practice. We will trace back her steps from there, with CCTV footages. Purvi, I want you to go with Kavin and Dushyant to Minister Pujari's house. I want every single detail of his daughter's daily routine."

"Can't I go with the other team, please? Send Ishita with them." She countered, looking directly at Abhijeet with a questioning glance. Out of everything, she did not ever want to come face to face with Kavin in her life ever again. But today it seemed like both the universe and Abhijeet wanted to drive her crazy.

"No, I want you there. And Kavin's counterintelligence experience is going to come in handy while interviewing the family. Come, see me in my office, I have something to talk with you." He then turned to the team who was discussing their plans, "Daya and I are going to meet Pradyuman Sir and discuss the case details from the local police's point of view and see if we could pick up anything else."

Purvi followed him to his office and closed the door behind.

"Kiddo, I know you don't want to work with Kavin, but would you please bear him for this one case. If I had known Daya would bring him to work on the case, I would have denied it. But he is here. You don't have to talk to him about anything else if you don't want to. But we both know, he is intelligent, experienced and can help us solve this case faster. Just bear with him and be civil?"

Purvi nodded her head and took a deep breath, "Sorry Bhai, I should not have lost my cool. I promise I will be civil but don't expect me to be friendly with him."

"I won't."

"Okay, I will go and investigate with him at Minister Pujari's home," Purvi promised.

"Oh, and Tarika expects you to be a weekend dinner this Saturday. And Aarav has been asking for you for weeks now." Abhijeet informed, looking at the picture of his family on his desk.

"I will be there, I promise. I miss my little happy bunch of a nephew" She promised again, before giving Abhijeet a hug and trudging out of his office room. She halted for a moment, send a prayer up above to give her strength to tolerate Kavin for the next few days, before faking a smile and moving towards him.

"I am strong, I can do this. He is just a guy, we will solve this case and he will out of my life" She affirmed to herself.

If only she knew.

A/N: Hello, I hope each one of you is staying safe in these uncertain times. I also hope how the story has been so far. If you are liking, please don't be shy, leave a comment, a question or what would you like to read next. I love reading your comments.