Page 24 of Earned Husband

“Lust, huh?” I nudged him with my shoulder. “It’s hard to imagine you being hopped up on that. You’re always so controlled, but we’ll get to that later. For now, you’re not getting out of answering my question.”

A slight flush appeared at the very tops of his cheeks again. “Let’s not get back to that later, and I wanted to be a pilot. It was a brief phase, but it was either that or an astronaut. You?”

“Oh, mine changed every few months, but it was always in the same line I’m in now. Design. I went through a phase where I wanted it to be houses and another that I thought I might design fashion, but I think I always knew I’d end up designing something.”

As the afternoon light started fading, we walked along the river. The city lights gradually flickered on around us. Colin checked his watch, looking surprised when he looked up again.

“It’s almost eight.”

“How?” I asked, genuinely surprised myself, but my own watch confirmed the same thing.

He lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “I’m trying to figure it out, but it looks like we accidentally spent an entire day together.”

“It was fun,” I said, meaning it. “We should probably get home, though. I’m surprised Ashanti hasn’t called yet, but I have a feeling she’s going to start getting worried soon.”

Colin led me back to his car and drove straight to Khaled’s house. When we reached it, I felt a stab of disappointment about the day being over already, but here we were, pulling into the driveway.

A few moments later, he was opening my door, and while it should’ve felt unnecessary and old-fashioned, it felt very much like him instead. We walked up the front path together, and as we reached the front door, I turned to face him.

“Thank you for a wonderful day.”

His smile was warm and real. “I should be thanking you.”

I tilted my head. “Why?”

“Because it was completely unexpected, but exactly what I needed,” he said quietly. “Even if I didn’t realize it.”

The porch light cast a soft glow over his face, making his eyes look more blue than gray. Or maybe it was just because I was closer to him than usual, but as I stared up into those eyes, I found myself moving closer.

At the same time, he seemed to do the same thing, the distance between us slowly disappearing. My pulse started racing. His gaze dropped briefly to my mouth before he jerked it back up to my eyes.

I was imagining what his lips would feel like on mine, but the next thing I knew, the front door swung open and we jumped apart. As soon as I turned, the almost-kiss fled from my mind in the space between one wanting heartbeat and the next.

Because instead of it being Ashanti or Gabrielle who’d found us like this, it was my father, and he definitely knew he’d interrupted something.

CHAPTER 11

COLIN

Icould think of about a hundred different ways I could’ve made a better first impression on Basel Saad. Hell, I probably could’ve been caught with my pants down inhisoffice and he still would’ve liked me more than he did right now—provided, of course, that the reason for my pants being down hadn’t been his daughter.

Unfortunately, there were no do-overs for this kind of thing. Instead, I would now forever be known to him as the guy who’d been seconds away from putting my lips on his baby girl.

Fucking excellent. This merger is definitely happening now. God, Alex is going to kill me for this.

Basel had insisted I stay and I awkwardly agreed to his request, but before he’d disappeared with Deja, he’d made it crystal clear that he wanted to see me after he’d spoken to her. So I sat at the dining room table, hands clasped in front of me, listening to raised voices drifting from the far side of the house.

Ashanti was making herself busy in the kitchen, visible from the corner of the table where Basel had told me to sit, but she was wincing every so often, looking slightly uncomfortable whenever Basel got loud.

Fortunately, I couldn’t understand what he was saying. Deja and her father were going head to head, but they were doing it in an unfamiliar language. While it was becoming increasingly louder, it was literally foreign to me. I was pretty sure I knew what it was about, though.

Despite both Deja and I being fully grown adults, the Saad patriarch had looked like he’d been about to have a stroke when he’d opened that door to find our faces mere inches away from each other. I’d caught a vein bulging in his forehead like was ready to blow a gasket.

I was grateful her father wasn’t a mind reader. If he knew what I was imagining doing to his daughter, the old man would have ended up in the hospital.

A door slammed somewhere down the hall and silence fell across the house. I sat up a little straighter, my brow furrowing. It was probably my turn now. Khaled waltzed into the dining room seconds later, his hands tucked into his pockets and a sheepish look on his face.

“Do you have a few minutes to talk to my father?” he asked. “I’m sorry about all this, by the way. I should’ve told Deja we were getting in today, but after I pitched the merger to my dad, he was adamant that we get the ball rolling as soon as possible. The man has no chill.”