That was never me.
But I was the kind of guy who made a move. If I have to go another day in this office without doing anything, I’ll perish from the fucking earth.
Everything that goes on at the Bliss Resort is my responsibility, but even I can’t be held accountable for the way she looks at me. It’s like those big green eyes see right through my clothes. Every time she cocks her head to the side and pauses for a moment before she speaks, I’m convinced she’s going to have cooked up another excuse to get me back in the pool. Maybe this time without the swim trunks? She never says it, but if she did, it would be with that professional attitude, a little wrinkle of her brow as if the answer to the question is the only thing standing between abject failure and incredible success.
I’m done waiting.
I’ve been done waiting.
And I’m sure as hell not going to take this too far, because I’m beginning to get the sense that Jenny London knows exactly who she is. She knows exactly what she’s doing.
She knocks on the door of the Emperor Suite right on time, and when I open the door she lets out a huge sigh of relief. The color in her cheeks is so endearing I can’t stand it. Genevieve Starlight would never have come close to being this endearing.
“I was worried this was the wrong room.” She puts her hands on her hips and takes in another breath like she’s just crossed the finish line of a marathon. The gesture is almost...practiced. “I thought there was no way you wanted me up here, but—” Then she straightens up and looks past me, into the room. “Whoa.”
I had it set up the way we do for honeymooners. It’s one of the most expensive upgrades guests can buy at Bliss, and largely because it involves candles. Someone has to staff the room from the moment they’re lit, and we have a carefully planned check-in later in the evening to make sure they’re extinguished for the night before the guests are. I move out of the way so she can enter the room. “I hope you brought your camera with you. I wouldn’t want the candles to burn down before you can get some good shots.”
Jenny takes a tentative step inside the room, then another. “The Emperor Suite?”
“There’s a matching suite in the other wing. It’s rare for the couples to come into contact with one another.”
“Is that a real thing?” Jenny pulls the office camera from her purse and twists at the lens cap. She flicks her eyes across at me. “Couples not wanting to...come in contact?”
“Everyone wants to be the only ones experiencing royalty on their wedding night. We do our best to coordinate arrivals.”
She takes a few more steps into the room, and I follow her gaze as she takes it all in. It really is something—the candles, the soft classical music playing from built-in speakers, and the table.
The room itself is done in white, everything pristine, but the table set for two in front of the balcony doors is the centerpiece. Low candles burn in the middle, and it’s decorated with two long-stemmed roses, resting gently on the tablecloth.
“Wow,” Jenny breathes softly, and for a moment she seems smaller, overwhelmed. Then she draws herself up to her full height, and the girl I used to overlook in the high school hallways is gone. “How long do I have?”
“All night.”
That punches through her professionalism. “All night?”
“I wasn’t kidding when I said I wanted to show you the best.”
She shakes her head, looking truly uncomfortable for the first time. “Roman, you don’t have to—I mean, Mr. Bliss....”
“Roman.”
A deep flush comes to her cheeks, highlighted by the sunset rays cascading in through the open curtains. “Roman,” she repeats, her voice low. “This room must cost a fortune. There’s no need to toss out a booking—”
“You think of everything, don’t you?” I don’t dare laugh at her. “There was no booking. Or it was my booking. Either way, you don’t need to worry about that. I want you to enjoy this the way a guest would.”
The corner of her mouth curves upward, tugging at something behind my rib cage. “A single guest in this room?” Jenny raises her eyebrows at me, then lifts the camera to her eye and turns away. She snaps a few shots of the table and its immaculate place settings, then leans in to capture the details.
“You won’t be alone.”
It’s a risk to say it out loud. It’s a risk to even suggest it, even put the hint into the air between us. But to hell with tiptoeing around her.
Jenny goes still. “I won’t?”
Hedge. I have to hedge, obscure the want that’s beating hard in my heart. “How could I give you the official tour if I left you up here by yourself?”
She shrugs, flips through the photos on the camera’s screen, not looking at me. “You couldn’t, I guess.”
“That’s right.” Looking at her for this long, in this room, is painful. She changed out of the slacks and blouse she wore at the office today into a black sleeveless dress that verges on sin, the way it hugs her body. I go over to the window so I have a chance to discreetly adjust myself and think of England. “Let me know when you’re done with the first round, and we’ll get started on dinner.”
“You planned dinner?”
“This package comes with a staffed dinner.”
I hear her quick intake of breath, and the giddy excitement in the air is unmistakable. But when I turn back toward her, Jenny’s face is neutral, focused on taking more photographs. She moves around the suite, bending down to get different angles and nearly giving me a heart attack. I take her through the guest room, then into the master bedroom. We don’t do rose petals at Bliss. We do a single long-stemmed rose on the king-sized pillow in the center of the arrangement. Jenny bites her lip when she sees it.
I want to be biting that lip.
“It’s really gorgeous,” she says. “It would be such a shame to mess it up.”
“Hardly,” I say as she raises the camera to get another shot. Everything is suffused with golden sunlight, a ray coming down directly on the rose as if the scene is being directed by some divine hand. I’d say I had nothing to do with it, but that’s a lie. I had everything to do with it. What kind of person in my position has no idea when the lighting in the rooms is best?
Jenny lowers the camera, then steps toward the bed. She considers it for a long moment, then reaches down and brushes the back of her knuckles against the fabric. I know instantly that she’s the type who, given the suite, would choose the guest room. It would be a damn shame. This bed almost deserves her.
“It’s really nice.” Her voice is different, almost reverent, and with a pang another realization washes over me, mortifying in its simplicity. I have no idea what it was like at home for Genevieve Starlight. Watching her touch the comforter like that—
She turns back, lips slightly parted, dark hair cascading over her shoulders....
A knock sounds at the door and the moment breaks, her eyes slipping away from mine. She holds the camera a little bit closer to her body, an oddly defensive motion.
“That’s dinner.” I reach out a hand, extending it into the air between us, and Jenny blushes radiantly before she extends her own and takes mine.