“A man of the people? Get the fuck out of here.” We both laughed. I was being dramatic, but I was also serious.
“No, I’m for real, Kareem. In high school, not many people cared about me, and I knew that. At times, I even felt like my grandparents only loved me out of obligation, but you? I never doubted how much you cared about me, not for a second.”
Kareem got up from his desk and came around to the side where I was sitting. Sitting on the corner, he stretched his legs out so that the chair I was sitting in was between them. I got the impression that he used this sitting-on-the-corner-of-the-desk thing as a tactic to have me completely wrapped up in whatever he was about to say.
“What do you have planned for the rest of your day? Any sightseeing?”
“Honestly, I didn’t know if we would have any downtime, so I didn’t plan anything.”
“Lucky for you. I did.”
“And you just knew I would say yes to this?”
“Yeah. I definitely didn’t imagine you telling me no. I try not to let negative shit enter my mind.”
The smirk Kareem had on his face was so damn sexy. One of his curls had fallen just above his brow, which made him look even more delicious. This whole assignment was dangerous at this point. Still, I was all in.
“I got a few things I need to finish up here, but I’ll knock on your door a little later.”
“And how do you know where I am staying before I do?”
“I told them to give you the room across from mine. You don’t have to sleep there if you don’t want to. My bed is big enough for both of us.”
“I’ll see you later, Kareem. I still need a shower from the condition you left me in earlier.”
“Hey, how was I supposed to know your body needed me the way it did?”
Chapter
Ten
Kareem
We were staying at the Pullman Paris Tour Eiffel Hotel. I made sure Karina had the perfect view of the Eiffel Tower for her pictures. It was now nighttime, so I knew it was lit up, giving her the perfect backdrop. No matter how bright that tower shined, it wasn’t going to outshine my baby.
I knocked on her room door, stepped back, and waited for her to answer it. It wasn’t long before she swung the door open and motioned for me to come in. Just as I knew she would be, Karina was still getting dressed.
“Did you know we had this perfect view? Oh my God, Kareem! It is beautiful!”
Karina was walking back to the bedroom part of her suite as she spoke. It looked like she was slipping one of her earrings into her ear while trying to decide which shoes to wear.
“You always said you wanted to see the Eiffel Tower.”
“Huh?”
Karina walked back into the living room area of the suite so she could hear me better. She was now putting in her other earring. She took a seat on the sofa to buckle the straps on her heels.
“When we were kids, you always said you wanted to see the Eiffel Tower.”
“Kareem!” Karina beamed from ear to ear. “You remember that?”
“I remember everything about you, Karina.”
We let silence fill the air for a moment. She continued getting ready, and I took a seat at the counter. Just watching her do her had become my favorite pastime.
Karina didn’t know it, but I had started playing with ideas for things we could do while we were in Paris. I knew it was only a short time we had here before we were off to London, but I still wanted to make sure she did something on her bucket list. I settled on the Eiffel Tower.
I knew if I booked a hotel nearby, she could see it from her balcony, and we could also find somewhere to eat where the Eiffel Tower could be the backdrop.
