"Since when?", asked Raymond.

"Since he knew that Dad would splurge any amount of money on his stupid toys", Akira intervened and ratted Mike out.

"Oh Please Akira, don't get me started on that", said Mike and made a face.

"No Mike, on a serious note, since when have you started to fly them?", asked Raymond.

"I used to fly them with dad since I was in my high-school, But now I have started making them. I mean not from scratch, but I sort of use the existing ones from the market and I remodel them for my friends or some clients for various purposes".

"For example".

"Umm... say for example I can increase the weight carrying capacity of the drone. So instead of a go-pro, you can fit a basic DSLR for imaging purposes. Also, I can play with inbuilt cameras, sensors, etc".

"So how well can you fly it? Like in stealth mode and all?"

"Yeah, that's like the job of my left hand".

"Perfect !!!"

"But why do you need to fly a drone?", Mike asked all curious.

"Don't tell me that you are going to use a drone to spy on someone and you want my brother to fly that drone for you", Akira said and folded her hands in front of herself all defensively.

"Oh please Akira I don't need it for spying on anyone"

"Then?"

"Well, its sort of flying news, that we might have a surprise round of actual demo of the game based on Virtual Reality. Just like you know Pokemon game. You need to move around, go places and fight your opponents in the physical world. But we are augmenting one more factor, altitude. So as a challenge, you have to find a pointer hidden on the top of a tree or a house and for that, you need to fly the drone and take the real image of the target and then only you will unlock the weapon".

"Wao, that sounds pretty interesting !!!", Mike exclaimed.

Raymond looked at Mike and smiled gently and said,

"So for a demo, I might need to borrow your drone flying skills".

"And not to spy on anyone", Raymond said and turned towards Akira to give her a look.

"Count me in !!!", Mike said and then went back to watching television.

"But there is one more thing that needs to be taken care of".

"What?", Mike asked looking at Raymond.

"You cannot tell about this project to anyone because the future of my company will depend on keeping it a secret".

"Whoooaaa, wait, what? Is this for real?", Mike asked all surprised.

"Mike this isn't a joke. You really need to keep it a secret. You can't even tell Teddy about this. And I would like it if you can specifically keep it a secret from Vikram".

"Why are you dragging Vikram into it specifically?".

"Because of this", Akira said and played the video that she had recorded in the morning to Mike.

"He will go to any extent to destroy Raymond's company and I am not going to let that happen and I hope you will support us as well".

Mike stood all silent for a while and then said,

"I can't believe he will do something like this".

"Neither did I Mike, neither did I", Akira said and sighed.

Mike looked at Raymond and said,

"Don't worry dude, I won't say a word and you can count me on flying your drone".

"Thanks, Mike !!!"

"Ok then we will get going", Akira said and lifted her bag to leave with Raymond.

"Bye kids, have fun", Mike teased them and then he shut the door.

---

[Back at Raymond's place]

After reaching their place, Raymond went straight to the study room. He didn't talk much with her in the car too. So Akira went up to him and asked,

"Are you still mad at me because of the lunch thing?"

Raymond just shot a glance at her and then retired back to his work.

"Can you at least talk with me?"

"Go and freshen up first. You still have the banner work pending".

"I don't like you at all when you are this grumpy".

"Then don't", Raymond replied all curtly and continued his work.

Akira pouted at him but he didn't give any reaction to her expression and sat there all nonchalantly. So giving up, Akira stormed to the washroom.

After getting all freshened up she came out of the washroom and then suddenly she got a brilliant idea to make Raymond's mood all right.

She wore her black shorts which were super short and made her legs look even fairer. Then she donned a lacy camisole on top of it. She purposefully dabbed a lot of lip balm on her lips making them look all fruity and juicy. Then she went back to the washroom and slightly dampened her hair. Her complete look was extremely seductive yet cute at the same time.

Then she lightly dabbed her lavender flavored roll on her neck and went back to the study room.

She stormed in and without even sparing a glance at Raymond she picked up her laptop and placed it on the sofa which was directly in front of him. Then she purposefully lied down on the sofa flat on her stomach and started working on her laptop.

Raymond's gaze was fixated on her and even without looking at him, she was aware of it.

She slowly folded her legs up and started swaying them as she worked.

Raymond tried to ignore her for a while but eventually, he caved in and asked,

'What are you doing?"

"I am working on the banner. can't you see"?

"That I know, but I am not asking about that".

"Then what are you asking about?"

Raymond gritted his teeth and then pointed a finger at her legs and said,

"This, I am asking about this".

"What happened? Anything wrong with my shorts?"

Finally, as he ran out of his patience, so he got up and stormed towards her and took her laptop and placed it on the side table and staring deep into her eyes he asked,

"So you really don't know what you were doing right now?"

Akira looked at him and shrugged her shoulders and said,

"You tell me".