He had called Imran then with an order. Remove Tina Mehta from all Jogra project affiliations, effective immediately.
Imran had obeyed. But Bharat had registered the two-second pause.
He knew the pause was to gather a moment to understand the weight of the order. Tina was the chief minister's daughter. There was a government partnership in active negotiation. The political capital required careful management in the weeks ahead.
Bharat had known the consequences before he gave the order. He had given it anyway.
He sat back as he closed the factory footage.
Then, almost without conscious decision, he shifted to palace cameras.
Feed 21: the palace kitchen.
Yamini stood near the long marble counter, laughing at something one of the maids had said. The staff around her looked relaxed, almost familial in their ease.
He paused the footage.
Replayed it.
Though he could not hear the audio clearly, he could see the unguarded nature of her expression, the way her shoulders loosened, the way her eyes crinkled slightly when she laughed.
There was no calculation in that moment.
He changed feeds.
The newly set-up studio wing inside the palace came into view.
The kitten darted across the polished floor, clumsily chasing a ribbon. Yamini crouched beside it, her long skirt pooling around her. When the kitten leaped awkwardly into her lap, she laughed again, head tilted back, emerald pendant catching the light.
Bharat’s fingers stilled on the control panel.
He watched longer than necessary.
Her laughter did not align with the structured tension that usually defined her posture around him. It was spontaneous. Uncontained.
He advanced the footage to later that evening.
Feed 08: main palace entrance.
Yamini stepping out of the helicopter. Her expression was different now.
Rigid. Jaw tight. She acknowledged no one.
Her movements were clipped as she walked through the corridor toward her suite.
He knew why.
The previous night. Her deliberate attempt to conceive. His refusal.
The anger and humiliation in her eyes at breakfast.
He had seen it. Cataloged it. Understood it. But he had not addressed it.
He turned off the screen.
The darkness that followed felt deeper than before.
On his tablet, the physician’s secure confirmation remained open.
