Chapter Four
Sameera had her office door firmly closed to dissuade visitors on Monday, but she shouldn’t have bothered.
Blake bounded inside first thing to regale her with stories about his weekend exploits, and then slyly rub in the fact that yet another of his friends would be sending business to the firm.
He ended by once again needling her about her billable hours before offering to put in a good word with the partners when the time came for her exit interview.
“I’ll write you a stellar reference, don’t worry,” he offered. She deserved a cookie for not throwing something at his big dumb head.
Which was why when someone knocked on the door fifteen minutes later, she growled at them to go away.
“But I have coffee!” Bee said, and Sameera opened the door.
“I thought you were Blake,” she said, and her friend wrinkled her nose.
“Yuck. I’m here to talk about you, not our office nemesis.” Bee handed her a coffee and settled down on the padded white chair in front of Sameera’s desk. “I know you have a lot of work, so quickly, tell me what happened at your parents’ house.”
Sameera had already filled Bee in somewhat, and now shared the remaining details. Her friend gasped in all the appropriate places, and when they got to Tom’s fake marriage proposal, she clasped a hand to her mouth.
“I knew it! He wants you,” Bee squealed. “Please tell me you went home with him.”
Sameera threw her friend a withering look. “I went home by myself and worked for six hours straight.”
Bee blew a raspberry and gave her a thumbs-down. “No fun.”
“I’ll have fun if I still have a job in the new year. Or if I lose my job and have nothing to live for. Whatever happens first.” Sameera leaned back in her desk and sipped on her too-sweet vanilla latte. She hoped the caffeine and sugar boost would keep her awake.
“Would it be the worst thing if you had to leave the Undertakers?” Bee asked. “You’d never have to talk to Blake again.”
“Happy days,” Sameera said. “Except that it took me months to find this job. I still owe thousands of dollars on various credit cards, and my mortgage broker made it clear I have no flexibility if I miss a payment. I’ll have to sell the condo, and move in with you.”
Sameera kept her other reason to herself—that sometimes, it felt like her tenacity, persistence, and work ethic was a double-edged sword.
Her job and career was so demanding, had required so much effort, sweat, and tears over the years, that losing it now was unthinkable.
If she wasn’t an associate at the Undertakers, who was she? Nobody.
“You’re welcome anytime, babe,” Bee said staunchly. “Stop changing the subject. You should have gone home with Tom. You deserve to enjoy mutual orgasms with a talented hottie. I bet he knows his way around . . . the kitchen.” Bee waggled her eyebrows.
“Please stop,” Sameera said, laughing.
But when her phone pinged later that afternoon with a message from Tom, she couldn’t ignore the swoop of happiness at the distraction.
Are you free for dinner tonight? he wrote.
She stared at the text. Had Bee somehow manifested this message with her joke about mutual orgasms?
Her friend would claim this was a clear indication of his interest. Or was this more of a “let’s be friends” sort of invitation?
Not that it mattered—she didn’t have the time or space in her life for a romantic entanglement, even if Tom was a particularly attractive prospect.
She responded, careful to keep her tone light.
I have to work, remember? Billable hours, job in trouble, imminent ruin ahead.
His response surprised her. I’ve been thinking about your situation. I think I can help.
Sameera’s eyes lingered over that last sentence.
I think I can help. She couldn’t imagine how he could.
But she had been working nonstop for weeks, and nothing seemed to make a dent in her situation.
Sometimes she felt like a cartoon character sticking her fingers and toes into the wall of a dam, trying to stop the river from overwhelming her, but knowing it was too little, too late.
What if he really could help, in some way? After all, she had met Tom twice now, and each time he had made things better—first by taking care of her at the firm’s holiday party, and then by supporting her at her parents’ house. As if in a dream, her fingers typed back: I can meet for an hour.
Tom replied with a thumbs-up, and she instantly started to panic.
What had she done? She couldn’t afford an hour to meet Tom, which would turn into two hours including transit.
She was already so deep underwater, any time away from her files would feel wasted.
She quickly drafted a message to get out of their meeting: Something just came up, I have so much work to do, I have no life and nothing to look forward to and I wish I could but I really shouldn’t . . .
As she stared at the rambling message on her phone, finger hovering over the send button, her thoughts drifted to annoying Lubna Aunty’s words from the Eid party: Don’t forget, you need balance in your life for other things, too.
Her mother’s friend was a judgmental old bat, but that didn’t make her wrong about everything.
Something had made Tom reach out. Something had made her accept his random invitation.
Maybe instead of pushing whatever this was away, it was time to “lean in,” as he had suggested in her mother’s kitchen.
She could spare one or two hours to satisfy her curiosity. With any luck, Tom would try to sell her on an MLM scheme, which would dissipate any lingering attraction. She turned back to her files.
When she parked near the address he had texted, Sameera stared at herself in the rearview mirror.
She looked pale, her hair limp, dark shadows below her eyes, lips tight with fatigue and worry.
She started to reach for a lipstick but stopped herself just in time; this wasn’t a date, and she didn’t want to give Tom—or herself—any ideas.
It wasn’t until she locked her car and started walking toward a large white building that she realized he had invited her to dinner inside .
. . an industrial unit? A side door opened, and Tom motioned for her to join him.
He must have been watching for her from the window.
She took a deep breath and set a timer on her phone for fifty minutes.
After that, she would leave. Maybe earlier if possible.
“Did you invite me here to murder me?” she asked, only half joking.
“To cook for you, actually,” he said, lips quirking. “I rent out a commercial kitchen.”
Sameera followed Tom into a large, airy space that contained a massive range, a walk-in freezer, a line of deep sinks, and two of the biggest refrigerators she had ever seen. The place smelled delicious, and she perched on a barstool by the center island.
“I followed the Malik family chai recipe,” he said, handing her a small cup with a frothy, perfectly golden-brown liquid. She sipped cautiously. It was heavenly.
“I hope you like biryani. The Eid party really inspired me to work on my South Asian cooking skills,” Tom said, reaching into a large oven to withdraw a black aluminum roaster.
He lifted the lid, and Sameera inhaled the aroma of saffron and ghee and spices. Her mother had tried to teach her to make biryani, but it never turned out like this, a fragrant mixture of baked marinated meat and delicately seasoned basmati rice.
“If my mom saw this, she would marry us off immediately,” Sameera blurted, instantly regretting her words. She wasn’t here to flirt with Tom. She glanced at her phone—forty-three minutes left on her timer. Her nervousness mounted.
“It’s funny you should say that,” Tom said, and when she looked up at him, she noticed he had a faint flush across his cheekbones.
“Is this . . . bribery biryani?” she asked, mock-affronted.
“How long have you been holding on to that zinger?” Tom asked.
“Ever since you told me you made biryani,” Sameera admitted, her light tone masking another spike in anxiety.
Seriously, what was she doing flirting with Tom and accepting his excellent food?
She had billable hours to make up, and a complicated life to manage.
And yet, here she was, on what felt a lot like a first date. The thought made her palms sweat.
Sameera hadn’t been on a first date since law school. After Hunter left, she couldn’t bring herself to “get out there,” as Bee put it (and as her friend had encouraged more than once). It felt too vulnerable, and she wasn’t sure how she could trust anyone—or her own judgment—again.
Once her plate was clean, and there was less than thirty minutes on the timer, she lay her palms flat on the table. “Are you going to tell me the real reason I’m here?”
The flush returned to Tom’s cheeks, and he rubbed the back of his head, a gesture she recognized from when they had hung out at her parents’ home. Why was he nervous?
“I want to start off by saying, I would have asked you to dinner no matter what.”
Something softened at these words, but then her mind caught up with her ears. What did Tom mean by “no matter what”? She nodded at him to continue.
“My agent, Lauren, called me today. I started working with her after my cooking videos went viral last year. She told me I had more attention from that candid video I shot at your house than any others in the past six months,” Tom said.
There was a pleading look in his eyes she didn’t quite understand.
“Do you want to ask my mom if you could use her kitchen again?” Sameera asked. Tahsin would definitely think they were an item if her supposed not-boyfriend wanted to come over again. Another secret, shameful part of her deflated at the request; he wasn’t interested in her after all.