Chapter Three
The grand stairs were just off the lobby, as was an elevator, obviously built in the twenties. It was small, barely big enough for two people and one suitcase, behind doors festooned with wrought iron in an art deco pattern. “Is this safe?” I asked.
“Absolutely. It was upgraded sometime in the sixties. Claudine remembers it as being a very big deal. And it really hasn’t been used very much since then. I believe it was inspected recently.”
We went up the stairs. “There are a few guest rooms on the ground floor,” Bing explained, “but most of the work will be up here.”
At the top of the stairs was a landing, with the obligatory chandelier and a spacious corridor with tall, carved doors leading to rooms on the front and back of the hotel.
“The rooms behind us overlook the side of the hotel. Basically, it’s an alley. But the rest of the rooms have some sort of view.” He led me forward and opened a tall wooden door, its creamy white paint peeling off in long curlicues.
“All the rooms on this side overlook the interior patio,” Bing said.
I took a step in.
“On the other side, the rooms overlook the front courtyard. And at the other end there, those rooms look out on our garden.”
“There’s a garden?” I asked, taking another step. The first thing that caught my eye was a beautiful fireplace, its mantel made of carved marble.
“Yes, but it’s a real garden. That is … well, we grow things there.”
We? Who was “we”? And what kinds of things? “Oh?” I looked around. “Oh…”
The ceiling here was also twelve feet tall. Water stains darkened the plaster walls. The windows were almost to the ceiling and broad, a few panes cracked, with a simple diamond pattern across the very top of the glass. In the center of the filthy wooden floor was a cluster of furniture. Or at least I assumed furniture. There was a dusty tarp thrown over the top of the pile, but I could see the curved legs of a chair and possibly a bed underneath.
I walked past the fireplace. “Does this work?”
“Maybe.”
I then went to the window and looked.
The entire back of the property was enclosed by another one of those high stone walls. Below me was an empty patio of gray slate, the silhouettes of barely leafed-out trees casting shadows in the pale sunlight.
“What a view!” I said, feeling a surge of excitement. “How about this balcony? Is it safe? Can guests have direct access to the courtyard from up here?”
Bing came up behind me to look over my shoulder. I could feel the heat of his body against my back, and I could smell something that reminded me of turpentine. Was he painting something? And did he really have to stand so close to me?
“The balconies are all safe. There’s been some sort of inspection in the past year. And there’s another stairway from this floor that leads directly down to the salon.”
“It would be perfect,” I said, my mind starting to spin. “Each balcony is big enough for a small table and a couple of chairs. And down on the patio, we can put iron tables and more chairs, lots of big clay pots with palms and ferns. Does it get much sun all day? Maybe geraniums.”
That snort. “Claudine will kill you if you try to put a geranium back there. But ferns sound good. If you can talk her into it, that is.”
I tried to open the window, but the hasp had been painted shut.
“They’re called portes-fenêtres,” Bing explained. “They’re windows, but open like doors. It’s a French thing.”
I looked at the floor. No water damage there, at least. The radiator was rusty. “Does that work?”
“Yes. All the basic mechanicals work. Things had just been neglected.”
I opened a paneled door set into the wall. The bathroom. Very narrow, running probably half the length of the room. The floor was black-and-white hexagon tiles, mostly intact. A simple pedestal sink, toilet, and bidet, all lined up in a row. At the end sat a claw-foot tub with no shower attached. I looked into the tub. Stained rust and black. The stains in the sink and toilet were almost as bad.
“So, I guess there hasn’t been any regular cleaning in the past eighty years?” I tried to keep my voice light, but my stomach was sinking fast.
“Actually,” Bing said, “Claudine tends to the rooms on a regular basis. Just checking for mold and damp and airing things out. For the big stuff, she holds a party every Bastille Day, and we all drink wine and clean.”
“We all?”
He shrugged. “We all who live here.”
“So, once a year, six drunks get together to dust and vacuum?”
“Not just the six of us. Sometimes there are other invited guests.” There was laughter in his voice, but he kept a straight face. “No vacuum. But we do have mops.”
“I see,” I breathed. I stepped out of the bathroom and looked at where the wall met the ceiling. “How old are those water stains? Please don’t tell me the roof needs repair.”
“It doesn’t. The roof is slate and, to be honest, only started to give us trouble a few years ago. It’s been fixed. This hotel was regularly maintained up until right before the war, and places like this were built to last. The damage looks bad, but it’s mostly on the surface.”
I pulled off the tarp, expecting a cloud of dust, but it slid off without much bother. Yes, there was a bed under there, an ornately carved headboard and footboard, with a mattress that looked like a body had bled out on it. There was also a small desk, obviously antique, and a dresser that looked like it had come out of a farmhouse, with simple lines and whitewashed wood.
“Very, ah, eclectic styles here,” I said, leaning in to take a closer look.
“The furniture situation is very uneven. Some pieces are, seriously, original to the opening of the hotel back in the 1800s. Then you have bargain-basement pieces that were dragged in throughout the years.”
“Well, that should make decorating a breeze,” I muttered. “No closets?”
“Closets were never a thing in France. Especially not in the eighteenth or nineteenth century. We do have an extensive collection of armoires and wardrobes to choose from.”
“Gotcha.” There was a very ornate chandelier hanging in the middle of the room, half of its crystal pieces missing. “Is the electrical any good?”
“It’s very good. Claudine never had a lot of money to keep the place up, but she always found, um, ways to get the important jobs done.”
“Ways?”
His mouth twitched. “Well, she has an extensive list of clients, and she has a very unusual relationship with some of them. I believe the electrician slept here through the entire job.”
“Ah.” Well, then. At least that wasn’t written into my contract. “So, is this pretty much what all the rooms look like?”
He nodded and crossed his arms against his chest. “Everything may look rough, but you have a lot to work with.”
There was a challenge in his voice, and I immediately rose to meet it. “Yes, I think I do. There are a few similar properties in Rennes, so we have to make sure this one stands out. Le Magic Hall has kind of a similar vibe, but the interiors there are very modern. There’s the Balthazar, but that’s also very modern, and they have a spa, so that’s a completely different kind of guest. We are going to be very niche, a very old-world vibe. You know”—I lifted an eyebrow—“billowing curtains and fluffy pillows.”
He nodded slowly, as though to himself. “I see that you’ve done a little bit of work.”
I closed my eyes and took a cleansing breath. If there was one thing I had been fighting my whole life, this was it. I opened my eyes and gave him what my brothers used to call “the look of death.”
“Yes. I’ve done the work. I’ve been in hotels my entire adult life. I started busing tables at a Holiday Inn as a part-time job in high school, and I’ve hardly done anything else. I’ve worked in every department—housekeeping, reservations, I’ve prepped food in half a dozen kitchens. I even spent a summer following around the head of maintenance at the Marriott in Short Hills, New Jersey. This is my job, Bing. And I am very good at it. More than that, I love it. There have been plenty of screwups in my life that I deserve criticism for, but no one can fault my work. Especially not someone who obviously knows nothing about me or hotels.”
I took a breath. Had I been shouting? I glanced over, and there stood Raoul, looking rather cowed and holding a large paper bag.
“I have food,” he said.
Bing clapped his hands together. “Good. I think a little food is what we all need.” He looked at me. “I apologize. I know what it means to love what you do. I will not make this mistake again.” He followed Raoul out into the hallway.
I put my hand through my hair, tucking in a few curls that had escaped the bun.
Food would be good.
Back downstairs, the salon was dark, the floor-to-ceiling doors covered by interior shutters. Bing opened them up, and the room slowly filled with sunlight, revealing small wooden tables and an assortment of chairs pushed against the wall. He opened a few of the portes-fenêtres, and the cool, fresh air rushed in. The patio beyond was silent in the morning sun, without so much as a ripple in the branches of the trees. Raoul pulled one of the tables in front of the open window, then reached for a few of the chairs. I sat, and from the paper bag came the smell of warm baking.
Bing handed me a croissant, and my mouth began to water. He looked down at me. “Would you like some more coffee?”
I managed to not stuff a piece of the croissant into my mouth until after I said, “Yes, please.”
He smiled, again with that blast of sudden charm, then walked through a set of double doors in the corner of the salon.
How could one person be so smug and patronizing one minute, then turn into something so yummy … Wait. That was the wrong word. That applied to the croissant. Not Bing. Not Bing.
“He is not such an asshole,” Raoul said suddenly.
I looked at him, surprised. “What?”
“Bing is good man. He cares about us. But he can be real … what is it? Douchebag?” he looked at me hopefully. “Is that a good word?”
I burst out laughing. “Yes, that’s a very good word.” I found that breaking the croissant into small pieces kept me from wolfing it down like a maniac.
“So, tell me, Raoul. How long will it take to get all the rooms here in good working order?”
He was chewing on a piece of baguette, smeared with some sort of jam. “My part? Six weeks. We need to check lights and plumbing but is mostly good. I do mostly plasterwork. Some wood repair.”
“That’s pretty quick.”
He nodded. “Yes, pretty quick. But not mean paint. Or clean. Or, what say … décor?”
Right. Because paint, clean, and décor … that was my part. “Tell me about the other people here. They’re going to help me?”
He nodded. “Yes. Colin and Bing. They very much help. Marie Claude and Eliot are married. They both work but will help at night. Eliot very big.”
“Eliot is huge,” Bing said as he came back in and handed me a steaming cup. He smiled. “He needs direction.”
“I’m good at that,” I said. “Directing.”
“I bet you are,” Bing said, sitting down across from me. He was holding his own cup.
“And where is all this delicious coffee coming from?” I asked him.
He nodded to a set of double doors. “We have a complete kitchen here. And any French kitchen has an espresso machine. Is Raoul giving you the rundown of available personnel?”
“Yes. He said you and Colin are very much help.” I raised both eyebrows. “Are you?”
He sipped coffee, but I saw that smile. “Very much.”
“Marie Claude and Eliot are the night shift. Who else have I got?”
Raoul made a face. “Vera.”
“Now, Raoul, don’t start,” Bing warned.
“Oh?” I reached for more croissant. “Vera?”
“Vera is alcoholic,” Raoul said. “Very undependable. Claudine…”
“Claudine is Vera’s very good friend,” Bing explained. “And Vera has been sober for many years.”
Raoul rolled his eyes. “Very undependable,” he repeated. “Then there’s Karl, who is so old is useless.”
“He is not,” Bing countered, but there was laughter in his voice. “He’s very energetic for his age.”
“Which is?” I asked.
“Eighty-three,” Bing said, his mouth twitching.
I sipped more of that soothing, delicious coffee. “And does he have any particular skill? Like Raoul here?”
“You mean something useful? Like plumbing or masonry or tile work? He is a gardener.” He was grinning now. “And a retired professor of history. What he is mostly good for is explaining things to you in much more detail than you ever realized you needed.”
I felt desperate. “Can he hold a paint roller?” I asked.
“If you can give him a very good reason to do so,” Bing answered.
“If this hotel fails, will he lose his home?” The croissant was finished, and I felt ready to take on the world.
Bing shrugged, and there was laughter again in his voice. “Not necessarily. After all, we’ve been limping along for years. But there’s always a chance that Claudine may just give up, so … Yes. That might be just the reason he needs.”
Raoul brushed his fingertips together, loosening crumbs. “Should we begin? I have all day today if you want work.”
I sat, my mind going through the myriad of lists I’d put together last night before bed. “Go into each room. Start on the first floor, I guess. There are guest rooms here?”
Raoul nodded. “Yes. Three.”
“Can you repair the plaster? All the walls need to be ready to paint, so any water damage needs to be fixed right away. Can you do that?”
He nodded as he stood. “Yes. I do that. Very good start.”
“I want to look at this so-called garden. And figure out a plan for the patio here. I also need to inventory all the furnishings and see what can be used and where. Can Marie Claude and Eliot clean up the furniture? Polish light fixtures?”
Bing nodded slowly. “Yes. I’m sure they’re capable of doing those things.”
“How about Vera? Does she work during the day?”
“At university, in library there,” Raoul said.
“So, she has lots of time to help or not?”
“Yes,” Raoul said. “But she will not.”
“We’ll see,” I said. “And Karl?”
“We can visit him right now, if you’d like,” Bing said.
“No. This afternoon, after I find something suitable for him to do. Okay, then, Bing, how about the rest of the tour?”
He stood. “Of course. I’m very interested in what you have to say about the rest of our little hotel.”
Why? What else could possibly be wrong with the rest of the hotel? And once again, there was laughter in his voice. Why did he find this all so funny? But I just smiled.
“Lead the way.”
The rest of the rooms on the second floor were not all that much better than the first one we’d looked at. There were degrees, of course. Some plaster walls were smooth, just faded and ugly. Most of the floors were undamaged but filthy. In the center of each room was a pile of furnishings in varying degrees of repair and/or disrepair. All the bathrooms were either oh-my-God or almost oh-my-God.
I asked to see the garden, and we went down a back staircase, into the lobby, and out the front door. At the far corner of the hotel, through an archway in yet another wall, was the garden. It was a level patch, quite large, and enclosed on all sides. It was neatly planted, and there was a whole lot of growing going on. I recognized stakes for tomatoes, tepees for beans, and elaborate trellises. Pale green sprigs were everywhere, pushing up through dark, damp earth.
“This is practically a farm,” I said.
Bing nodded. “This is all Karl’s work. It’s been years in the making.”
“And it’s beautiful, but we need this to be used as public space. How are we going to have guests sit out here among the vegetables?”
“On these benches. They’re not very fashionable, but they’re comfortable enough,” Bing said easily. “This garden is a showplace. Look at it. It’s as well laid out as any formal garden. And there are whole beds of flowers among all the vegetables. Does it matter that we can eat the things that grow here, instead of just looking at them?”
He was right. The broad flagstone paths divided heavily planted areas mulched with straw. Three simple benches were lined up in front of the tomato stakes. The air smelled fresh and earthy, birdsong was everywhere, and the bees hummed happily.
“Can we get here from the hotel lobby?” I asked.
He shook his head. “No. All the rooms on this side are guest rooms. There are three of them, and they open up directly on to the garden.”
I looked around, then back at the hotel. “We can convert one of the guest rooms to public space. We’re going to need more than just a dining room, anyway. We’ll need somewhere for guests to work, plug in their laptops, copy things. Maybe we can create an office that can then open up to the garden.”
“You’d lose a room. And the revenue of that room,” Bing pointed out.
“Yes. But having a room with work space capability will be attractive to guests.”
“Aren’t these guests supposed to be on vacation?” There was laughter in his voice.
“Being on vacation won’t stop them from checking emails and that sort of thing,” I said. “Can you show me the first-floor rooms?”
He shrugged, and I followed him back. We went past the front desk down a window-lined corridor that turned to the back of the building. Raoul was in the first room, a tarp spread on the floor, tapping the walls gently with a hammer. I watched as chunks of plaster fell. The room was at the corner and overlooked the front courtyard and the garden.
“The next one?” I asked.
The second room was smaller but had a beautiful fireplace. There was no visible water damage, but it was bleak and charmless, with debris piled in the corners, cracked panes in the glass window, and wires dangling where a gleaming chandelier should have hung. “Maybe,” I said.
At the end of the hallway was the other corner room. Tall windows opened on the garden side and to the interior patio. Here, the floor was scuffed but fairly clean, the windows intact, and the walls smooth. There was the expected pile in the center of the floor, chair legs peeking out from beneath a dusty tarp.
“This is it,” I said. “Accessible to both the garden and the courtyard … Yes, this will work. And that doorway? Is the salon right there?”
He shook his head. “No. The bathroom.” He opened the bathroom door. It was like the others, long and narrow, the toilet and sink at the far end, a claw-foot tub taking up most of the space.
“We can break through to the salon easily enough,” I said, half to myself. “Make this a storage closet? Or powder room? Guests can go from breakfast to work, or outside to sit in the sun, or to the garden. Yes, this is perfect.” I felt a mounting excitement, a familiar feeling that I hadn’t felt in a long time. This was a plan coming together.
I walked to the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the garden and pushed one open, breathing in the sweet spring air. I turned back to the room and nodded. “We’ll put in bookshelves and a few comfortable chairs, and in the corner, we’ll have a desk.”
“You think it’s just that easy?”
“Yes, I do. Why? What would be so hard?”
That smile played around his lips again. “You just seem to think you can walk around and talk like you’re actually going to accomplish something.”
“Can I ask you something?” I said, stepping closer. There was no pitter-patter in my chest this time, just a slow, angry throb.
“Certainly.”
“What about this do you find so damn amusing?”
His eyes flew open. “What?”
“You. This. Every time you open your mouth, you sound like you’re going to burst out laughing. This is a monumental task, and you know it. There are completely unrealistic expectations here, and you know that, too. Or at least you should know it unless you’re a complete idiot. At least I’m trying. I’m thinking and trying to figure out how to make this whole thing work. So tell me, what’s so funny?”
He crossed his arms against his chest. “That you—or anyone else, for that matter—can think that this is even possible. Claudine is a brilliant woman, and I admire her very much, but her scheme to bring this hotel back to life is a pipe dream. She’s convinced all of us—well, not me, but the rest of them—that it’s possible. And then she got you to fly over here to sort everything out. Which, under the circumstances, I find absurd.”
“And what circumstances are you talking about?”
He narrowed his eyes. “This charade of yours that you knew nothing about what Tony Fielding was doing and that you don’t know where he is today. Aren’t you just waiting for him to fly you to whatever island he’s bought with all those millions, so you can go back to playing house?”
If this had been a movie from the 1940s, I would have slapped him in the face. If this had been Brooklyn in the 1980s, I would have taken out a gun and shot him. As it was, I just took three steps back and gulped for air.
I started to swear. In Italian, because I had found over the years that cursing in Italian was much more empowering, especially if the one you were swearing at didn’t know Italian. Watching the facial expressions of a person who knew they were getting blasted, but not sure exactly how, added a whole other level of satisfaction.
Then, my hands started flying. I couldn’t help it. First, they flipped around my face, then, as I took a step forward, they started inching toward his face and he began to back away. Good. Then the pointing began, and that’s when I stopped even trying to control myself.
He blanched and kept moving back, and I kept moving forward, through the open window and out into the garden, and by then, I was shouting. Okay, maybe screaming. The birds and maybe the bees were silent as I raged on. I took a deep breath to possibly gather my thoughts, or maybe just get more oxygen in my lungs, when I heard someone applauding, quite loudly. And there was laughter.
It was Claudine, dressed in a simple black suit, a large tote bag over her shoulder. She was standing at the edge of the garden, grinning. “You are right,” she called out. “He is a thoughtless pig with no manners. And although he usually does know what he’s talking about, if this is about you and Tony Fielding, I’m on your side.”
I glared at her, my chest heaving. “Your hotel is a total disaster!” I yelled at her in French.
“I know,” she answered. “Can you save it?”
“Of course.” I narrowed my eyes at Bing. “That’s why you hired me, right?”
He took a step back, stuck his hands in his pockets, and went back through the open window.
Claudine waved a hand. “Come. Tell me all the wonderful things you are going to do to my hotel.”
“He’s really not an arrogant, no-nothing son of sea whore,” Claudine said.
When Colin had said she could understand a bit of Italian, he’d been off the mark. She had understood everything I’d said.
I was feeling calmer, but not much. “He made a few assumptions that were completely false.”
“So I gather. You speak Italian like a native.”
“My parents were both from Rome. They went to the United States on their honeymoon and never left. It’s what we spoke at home.”
“That explains your grasp of the, ah, vernacular.”
I grinned. “I have two younger brothers. The vernacular was pretty much all they spoke.”
“That makes sense. But don’t be too hard on Bing. He’s quite a wonderful man. He is just a bit skeptical of my mission, and my choosing you to be part of it. He gave you the tour?” We walked back across the front courtyard into the hotel.
“Yes.” I felt my anger easing. Talking business did that to me. “I was thinking that we have to turn a first-floor guest room into a public space. A kind of office work space and a way for guests to get to the garden without having to walk all the way around.”
“The garden? Karl grows his beans and tomatoes. Marie Claude grows herbs. Why would anyone want to go to the garden?” she asked as we walked into the lobby.
“We need to utilize every inch of this place, Claudine. It’s called maximizing the assets.”
“And the garden is an asset? Interesting.” Vague construction sounds were echoing. She looked at me. “You’ve put them to work already?”
“Just Raoul. He’s repairing any damage to the walls so we can start to paint.”
“Excellent.”
We walked down that front corridor, past the open door where I could see Raoul up on a ladder, still tapping away at the softened plaster.
“We will hire someone to help him,” she said. “He is very fast, but he can only work twelve hours a day.”
Twelve? Were there no unions here? But then, he was a partner. I supposed I’d probably be working twelve-hour days as well. I watched Raoul as he worked. “How many rooms exactly?”
“There are sixteen rooms upstairs. And three on this floor. This is the ground floor, yes? I know in your country, this would be the first floor, but no. This is the ground floor. Upstairs is the first floor.”
“And what about the attic? The second floor?”
She shrugged. “Bing lives there. There are empty rooms. But no elevator.”
“That won’t matter. We also need to accommodate housekeeping.”
“We have an entire cellar for that, with washing machines and dryers. Commercial grade. And on each floor is a large closet for storing cleaning supplies and linens and towels. This was designed to the highest standard when the house was transformed into a hotel.”
“Two hundred years ago,” I muttered.
She smiled. “You’ll see.”
We continued walking.
“What about permits?” I asked.
“All plans have been approved, permits issued, and the proper palms have been oiled. The electrical work has already passed inspection, and the plumbing for the hotel is staying as is, so that’s not an issue, either. There is no need for construction, just repair work and paint. Then we will do a bit of redecorating and open by the summer, yes?”
“Claudine, I think you need to realize that you’re going to need more than a bit of redecorating.”
“Not every room is bad,” she said. “We will fix the best rooms first, so we have pictures to put on our new website.”
Right. The website. That was a whole other list.
“Much has been done already,” she said. “We have been working all winter.” She opened the door to the last room, the corner room, the room I had chased Bing out of minutes before.
“This is what I want to use for the office,” I told her. “We can just create a doorway here, through the bathroom, so guests can come right from the salon. So, maybe a little construction?”
She nodded. “Yes. We can have a bit of hallway here with no problem.” She looked around. “We can make this your office space, if you’d like. I don’t mind losing the revenue of this room. I would feel guilty renting it out to guests.”
I was surprised. “Why? This goes right to the outside. Guests would love it.”
She shook her head. “Maybe not. The courtyard is haunted,” she said.
I mentally counted to five. Slowly. “The courtyard is haunted?”
“Yes. Not a bad ghost, you understand, but, well, some guests might be frightened.” She looked very calm, just as though she hadn’t just said something totally outrageous.
I reined in any urge to jump up and down, scream, and run like hell. “Do you know who it is? The ghost, I mean?”
She smiled and opened the tall window that led to the courtyard. I followed her slowly.
The air was sunlit and still. No traffic sounds came over the walls, although I knew that the street was right on the other side. No breeze ruffled the leaves gathered in the corners. No birds chirped from the eaves.
“I think she was a maid,” Claudine said quietly. “Who knows? Many people have died here. You know that the original house burned to the ground in the great fire? Not in this exact location, of course. The estate was much larger then. They rebuilt here, where the fire had not reached.” She motioned with her hand. “They used the local limestone for the new house. Simple but very beautiful. Then they renovated it to become a hotel. There was much money then. The Perrot family was on the right side of the revolution.”
“Why do you want to bring it back?” I asked her. “It seems…”
“Impossible. I know,” she said simply. “But what else can I do? Sell it? To whom? New owners might tear it down. I was born in this house, right in that upstairs room there.” She pointed. “My brother and I played in this courtyard. We were not afraid of her, the ghost. My brother, Maris, named her Polly. Such an American name.”
She sighed. “I have a new family here now. You can’t throw out family. Where would they live? Bing has been here for thirty years. Karl just as long. Jacques, ah, I wish you could have met him. He died last Christmas, but he’d been here even longer.” Her smile was wistful. “He was my brother-in-law. He moved in when Hubert and I first married, and after the divorce, well, he stayed. He was lovely.” She looked around the courtyard. “Vera came here almost ten years ago. She was … Things were very bad. She had nowhere else to go. Now she is happy and has a good job and is making amends. This is her home, too.”
I looked around and then up. I saw that the third-floor attic windows were much newer than the rest, wide expanses of glass.
“Bing put those in when he fixed the roof,” she said. “He needed the light to work, he said.”
“He fixed the roof?” I asked.
“Yes. It was a huge job. I am so grateful to him. For many things.”
“He said you let him live here rent-free.”
“And he has paid me back many times over.” She ran her hands through her gray curls and shook herself. “I am getting very sentimental. Come, let’s look upstairs. Bing spoke to me this morning and said you wanted white walls and fluffy pillows. I think that is very good. I trust you, Lucy. I know you will make good choices.”
She turned and went back inside. I stood in the courtyard, and in the unnatural stillness, I could feel the weight of history, of family, of promises kept and promises broken. I took a deep breath. Yes, there was something here. Something that had nothing to do with rebranding a hotel or rebuilding my reputation.
She had talked about her new family. Was that even possible? My own family seemed very far away, with not just an ocean between us but years of resentment, anger, and disappointment. I sometimes felt that they lived in my head, rather than in my heart. How much of their coldness was I supposed to forgive?
“What am I doing here?” I whispered into the warmth and sunlight.
I waited for something: a touch, a whisper in the air, any kind of a sign.
“Are you coming?” Claudine called.
I walked back into Hotel Paradis.