Chapter 5 #2
I headed toward my room to get ready.
At least someone in Tariq’s household was willing to admit it.
I ate the lunch Amanda had ordered me to eat before I started getting ready.
The gala gown waiting in the guest suite was deep teal, darker than the sapphire dress I’d worn to dinner but just as unforgiving of the idea that I could disappear inside fabric.
I stepped into it.
The dress fit close through my waist and hips before falling in a long clean line to the floor. The neckline framed my breasts without turning them into public property, and the color made my eyes look brighter against my pale skin.
My freckles showed across my shoulders.
I left them.
A stylist helped with my hair, smoothing the strawberry-blonde waves and pinning back one side while leaving most of it loose.
When she finished, I faced the mirror.
I still looked like me, just with better structural support and significantly more expensive fabric.
That helped.
The gala didn’t.
The ballroom had been transformed since the first day I walked through the corridor and asked Elias to move two stanchions.
Now light glowed through towering arrangements and glass. Music moved beneath the conversation. Guests crossed the room in eveningwear that made my rushed Omaha wardrobe feel like evidence from another life.
Amanda seemed completely at home.
I concentrated on staying near her.
Then Tariq entered.
Conversation nearest the entrance dipped as several heads turned toward him, then resumed.
He wore formal black eveningwear, his beard precise, his dark hair immaculate, and the same authority he carried into a meeting room multiplied by several hundred people.
Across the room, he found me anyway.
My stomach tightened.
Amanda was talking to someone beside me, so I had no legitimate reason to stare at him.
I did it for another second.
Then Tariq was pulled into greetings.
That was probably healthy.
I took a canapé from a passing tray before turning my attention back to the room.
For the next hour, I watched the gala operate around the strategy we’d spent all week discussing.
A server quietly replaced a guest’s chair with one that gave her more room without interrupting the conversation.
A staff member intercepted a family looking uncertain near the ballroom entrance and guided them before they had to ask.
At another table, a guest reached for water and found the glass already filled.
When Tariq finally reached me, he stopped at my side without touching.
“You’ve been watching the staff.”
“I’ve been working.”
“At my gala?”
“I’m very dedicated.”
His attention moved slowly over my dress.
I felt the look everywhere.
“You chose this one too.”
“Yes, I did.”
“You should keep choosing your own clothes.”
“That sounds suspiciously like permission.”
“It was admiration.”
“That was better.”
His mouth tilted.
A photographer called toward him from several feet away.
My shoulders tightened before I could stop them.
Tariq noticed.
He didn’t take my arm or pull me into position.
He simply shifted slightly so his body blocked the easiest angle.
“You don’t have to be photographed with me.”
I met his eyes.
“I know.”
“If you want to leave this part of the room, I’ll have someone take you wherever you prefer.”
“I don’t want to leave.”
“Then stay.”
He turned back toward the photographer alone.
By the time the gala began winding down, my feet hurt, my cheeks hurt from smiling, and the assignment I’d flown across the world to complete was finished.
Amanda found me near the ballroom doors.
“You did well this week.”
“So did you. For the six hours you were here.”
She gave me a dry look.
“I’ll see you in the morning.”
My throat tightened.
“I’ll see you then.”
“Get some sleep.”
“I’ll try.”
She walked toward the elevators.
Tariq appeared beside me a minute later.
“Come with me.”
He said it quietly, and I went with him.
He took me upstairs to a private sitting room I hadn’t used before, close to the rooftop terrace but enclosed from the night air.
No staff remained inside.
A folder sat on the table.
Beside it was a small dark box.
My heart started beating too hard.
I turned to him.
“Sit with me.”
We sat opposite each other.
He touched the folder first.
“Yesterday, I told you I wanted to use you professionally in the company.”
“And then you said you meant my work in the presentation.”
“I did. I wasn’t offering you a position then. I’m offering you one now.”
He slid the folder toward me.
I opened it.
The first line stopped me.
Brand Strategy Manager, Guest Experience.
Al-Hadid Hospitality Group.
Dubai.
I read it twice.
Then I read the portfolio language covering North American guest perspective, brand strategy, guest experience, and a reporting structure through the company’s brand leadership.
The compensation made me blink.
I raised my head.
“This is a legitimate role.”
“I can see that.”
“You would work across the Grand portfolio. You’d be involved earlier in strategy, which is what you told me you wanted.”
My fingers stayed on the paper.
He remembered that conversation.
Of course he did.
“You’d report through brand leadership,” he continued. “Not through me.”
“And if I say no to everything else?”
“The job offer still stands.”
“Everything else?”
His attention shifted toward the dark box.
My pulse jumped.
He picked it up.
“This is separate.”
He opened the box.
A diamond caught the low light.
I stopped breathing.
The ring wasn’t enormous in the ridiculous, impossible way I would’ve expected from a sheikh.
It was beautiful, elegant, and chosen for a hand rather than a display case.
He left it in the box.
“I know what I want, Chrissy.”
I couldn’t look away from him.
“I want you in Dubai.”
My breath caught.
“I want you in my company because your work belongs there. That has nothing to do with this.”
He touched the edge of the ring box.
“This does.”
I swallowed.
“I want you in my home. I want you as my wife. I want the family we’ve talked about when we’re in bed, but I want it when we’re dressed too.”
My eyes burned.
“That is an extremely unfair sentence.”
“I’m not trying to be fair.”
A shaky laugh escaped me.
His expression softened.
“I’m trying to be clear.”
“You’re succeeding.”
“I’m not putting this ring on your hand tonight.”
I glanced at the box.
“Why did you bring it out?”
“Because I won’t hide what I’m asking you to consider.”
My chest ached.
“I’m not asking you to abandon your career to stay with me. I’m offering you work because you earned it. I’m offering you marriage because I love you.”
Tariq held my gaze.
I pressed my fingertips against my lips.
“You love me.”
“Yes, I do.”
Tears stung my eyes.
“That is also extremely unfair.”
This time he smiled.
“I can stop speaking if it helps.”
“It probably won’t.”
I laughed through the pressure in my throat.
I glanced down at the offer.
The job was exactly the kind of work I’d told him I wanted before I knew any of this was possible.
And tomorrow morning, Amanda expected me to get into a car and go back to the life I’d planned before Dubai existed.
“I want to say yes.”
Tariq went very still.
“To which part?”
“That’s the problem.”
“I want the job.”
His eyes stayed on mine.
“And I want you.”
He didn’t move toward me.
“I want to say yes to the whole ridiculous thing.”
My voice shook.
“But I need one night.”
He nodded once.
I let out a breath, and my shoulders dropped.
“I need to know I’m choosing it because I’m ready to choose it,” I said. “Not because you’re sitting here looking at me like you could make Dubai rearrange itself if I asked nicely.”
“I could rearrange parts of it.”
I laughed.
“That is exactly the problem.”
“I know.”
“Amanda expects me home. StayWell is my job. My apartment is there. My entire life is there.”
“And your flight is still scheduled.”
“Yes, it is.”
“I haven’t changed it.”
“I know you haven’t.”
“The airport car is still arranged.”
“I spent all morning trying not to look at it.”
His mouth moved faintly.
“I won’t cancel it.”
My eyes burned again.
“You could make this so much harder.”
“I could, but I won’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t want obedience from you.”
Tariq closed the ring box.
“I want your answer.”
I nodded.
“I’ll give it to you tomorrow.”
He stood.
So did I.
For one second, neither of us moved.
Then I went to him.
I wrapped my arms around his waist and pressed my face against his chest.
His arms closed around me.
He kissed the top of my head.
After a minute, I stepped back.
“I should go to my room.”
“Yes, you should.”
“You agree too quickly.”
His eyes darkened.
“If you stay here tonight, I won’t ask you to decide in bed.”
Heat moved through me anyway.
“That wasn’t what I meant.”
“I know.”
I laughed softly.
I glanced at the ring box again.
“You’re keeping that?”
“Until you tell me otherwise.”
“Then keep it for now.”
I picked up the employment offer.
He walked me to the corridor leading toward the guest wing but stopped before entering it.
“Good night, Chrissy.”
I tipped my face up to him.
“Good night, Tariq.”
I closed the guest-suite door behind me.
My suitcase stood where I’d left it.
My phone was on the table.
The itinerary still showed tomorrow’s airport car and return flight exactly where they had been all week.
I set the Al-Hadid employment offer beside it.
I took off my gala shoes and stood barefoot in front of the table, looking from the itinerary to the offer.
The car was still coming in the morning.
I had until then to decide whether I was getting in.