Page 12 of The Friend Zone
“Anything else?” Omar asked.
“No. I’ll let you know if I decide to come to Atlanta.”
“Sounds good. Talk to you later.” Omar hung up before she could say another word.
7
“What are you doing here?” Dana asked.
Omar stood on her doorstep.
Pursing his lips, he slowly shook his head. “You did forget.”
Hair piled on her head and glasses perched on her nose, Dana stared at him in confusion and then gasped, covering her mouth. “Game night.”
“Yeah, game night.”
His gaze assessed her oversized shirt, leggings, and socks. “Please tell me you forgot, because if you’re going dressed like that...”
“Hush.” Dana swung away from the door and dashed over to the sofa where she’d been engrossed in her story.
After getting stuck on a scene for over an hour, she’d left the desk and moved to the sofa with a notebook and pen. One of the books she purchased at the bookstore suggested writing long hand to get rid of writer’s block. The tip worked, and she quickly wrote ten pages as the words poured out of her.
“What were you doing?” Omar asked.
“Writing.”
Dana scraped up her notebook and pen and dumped them on the desk in the corner. Then she turned off the computer and faced him. Of course he looked magnificent, filling the room with his presence in dark slacks and a black, fitted polo shirt lying like a second skin over the contours of his chest.
“Give me fifteen—no, twenty minutes—and I’ll be ready to go.”
Omar pulled out his phone, and she knew he was setting his timer.
“Is that really necessary?” Dana grumbled as she hurried past him and headed for the stairs.
“You do it to me, I do it to you,” he said, amusement in his voice. “You have twenty minutes.” He held up the face of his phone so she could see the countdown had begun.
She shot a nasty glare in his direction, and a burst of laughter left his throat before she raced up the stairs.
Luckily, she didn’t have to shower, so she should be able to meet the twenty-minute deadline. After screwing up because she forgot about their plans, she’d never hear the end of it if she was late. They mercilessly teased each other at the slightest shortcoming.
Dana ditched her glasses and changed bras, putting on a black one that lifted her bosom. Then she wiggled into a black, open-bust bodysuit and buttoned her figure-clinging denim dress, leaving the top button undone to give a hint of the great cleavage created by the bra.
She kept her hair piled on her head but added large gold earrings. With lipstick, a little mascara, and a pair of white tennis shoes, she was ready to go with minutes to spare.
She grabbed her cross-body bag and ran downstairs. “I’m ready—”
To her surprise, Omar sat on the sofa with her notebook in hand and was reading the words on the page. He looked up, and before he said a word, there was a pregnant pause as his gaze scanned her appearance. She couldn’t define what she saw in his expression, but his eyelids lowered, as if to hide his thoughts, and heat burst onto her cheeks and neck.
Dana snatched away the book. “You can’t read my story.”
Omar brought his gaze—almost reluctantly—from her chest up to her eyes. “Why not?”
“Because it’s a rough, rough draft.”
He stood up and towered over her. “Give it back. I’m not finished.”
“I didn’t give you permission to read my work,” Dana said, holding the notebook behind her and backing toward the far wall.
