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He leaned back in his chair and steepled his index fingers before he lifted his eyes to lock with mine, blessing me with the opportunity for rebuttal.
How kind.
This man was sexy,verysexy, but he was also an asshole. I had pegged him all wrong. That one night had misrepresented who I believed him to be. His very rude and crass assumptions of why I was here in his office would ensure I had no issue working with him without the slightest amount of unrequited lust surfacing.
Thank you very much, asshole.
“My name is…” He held up a finger to pause me when his phone rang. He didn’t wait to see if I minded the intrusion, instead lifted the handset and listened. A few seconds passed before his eyes were on me again. The “well fuck” moment passed through his expression before he thanked the caller and lowered the handset back to the base. I smirked.
“Jhorie Abraham?”
I nodded. “Samiya should have notified you I was coming.”
His brows pinched. “She did.”
You just weren’t expecting your one-night stand and your new colleague to be one and the same.
“Good, then let’s get started, shall we? Or would you like to accuse me of any other manipulative grand schemes before we get down to business?” I arched a brow and he smirked. His eyes crawled over my body once more but this time I wasn’t affected.
“No more accusations, but I would like to apologize for my assumptions. My life is a bit…”
“I know who you are and why you would assume, Mr. Omari. I can only imagine how many fictional love children you get accused of fathering on a weekly basis. Apology accepted.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” I pointed to the seat across from him. “May I?”
“You may.” He nodded and I got settled. “And just so we’re clear. You are correct. There were no slips that night. I am not, in fact, carrying your child. I’m only confirming because I don’t need you distracted from our purpose.”
He smiled sinfully slow and oh my. This was going to be a very long meeting. “Good to know. How about we get started then? Some deadlines have been moved up and I’d love to hear your thoughts on the new ideas I have.”
“Great, let’s get started.”
With a slight tilt of his head, he agreed and I decided spending time with this man was going to be a lot tougher than I originally thought.
four
Ezekiel.
“I understand the timelines but also feel the priority should be on renovations and construction of new affordable housing.”
“We’ll get there but…” Jhorie glared my way and cut off my thought. Once again, she planned on presenting an argument. She had been challenging me since she’d stepped into my office. First with her beauty and enticing smell, now with her words, arguing every gotdamn point I presented.
She was brilliant, had a keen sense for business, and a passion for others’ wellbeing. All of which were a terrible combination considering I wasn’t supposed to be intrigued by this woman. Hell, I wasn’t supposed to ever see her again, yet here she was, in my office, the reason for my incredibly hard dick and mounting frustration.
“But what? You think it’s better to have beautiful parks and community centers over comfortable,safe, and affordable housing? The kids will spend hours of their day in top-tier establishments only to go home to less than favorable living conditions. You take them from one extreme to the next. How does that build confidence?”
Fuck. She had a point but so did I.
“The parks and community centers give the kids somewhere to focus their energy other than in the streets. The housing will come—”
“They don’t know that.”
I drummed my fingers on the desk.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“ItmeansI was a resident of those same neighborhoods. I’m currently in an apartment two buildings away from the one I grew up in and guess what, it’s exactly the same as I remember from childhood. Well, that’s not exactly true, it’s worse. As a kid I remember being hopeful after promises,from men like you, to revitalize our communities. Those same promises happened in my teens, but neither delivered. We got signup sheets and questionnaires about what we wanted to see in our communities—new nets for the basketball goals, maybe a few new pieces of equipment for the playground, and some pretty flowers to make the area lookrevitalizedfor their photo ops. Housing should be the priority. The residents will appreciate that more. Trust me, I’m speaking from experience I’m sureyoudon’t have. No offense.”
