I stood off to the side, taking it all in. This was what it was like. Friends. Family. Together.
I felt a strange pull in my stomach, like my very center of gravity was being tugged and rearranged. I shook my head to clear it, just as one of the guys from recreation came in to introduce our evening’s guide to a Night of Stars.
“You ready?” Archie asked, coming over and tugging lightly on the end of my furry cap.
I pulled it down tightly. “Mm-hmm. Let’s get out of here.”
“So have you ever given any thought to lecturing about what you’ve done with Maxwell Farms?” Archie asked Leo as we hiked up to Skytop.
“I do it all the time, actually,” Leo answered. “Not as much during the summer when we’re at our busiest, but during the winter I go around New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, talking about what we do. Sometimes I go to high schools, but a lot of time a learning annex or community college, garden clubs, pretty much anyone who’s interested in how to grow and eat sustainably.”
“I’d love to have you maybe do a series here, we’ve got a great lecture space up on the second floor. Would you be interested in that? I’m sure our guests would be.”
“Of course, sure! That’d be great,” Leo agreed, clapping Archie on the back.
“Maybe Roxie could teach a Zombie class sometime, pickling or canning?” I offered, winking at my friend.
“Oh my gosh, yes! I’d love to!” she squealed. “There was a super-popular class when I lived in Los Angeles on exactly that, you’d be surprised how many people would love to know more about how to do things like that.”
“Well, why stop there,” Archie said, rubbing his chin as he thought. “What if we made a kind of learning annex up here at the resort, not just for guests but for people in town and all over the Hudson Valley? We could include things like home gardening, I’m sure our landscaping team would love the chance to get out of their greenhouses a bit. And Oscar, what do you think, feel like teaching a cheese-making class?”
Oscar looked at Archie with a raised eyebrow. “I’m not so great in front of a classroom.”
“Of course, sure, whatever,” Archie acquiesced.
“Of course he will,” Natalie replied from her perch on Oscar’s back, her boots giving out ten minutes into the hike. “I can be the gorgeous mouthpiece in the front of the classroom, you just grunt and point and I’ll interpret.”
“You know who you should get,” Chad interjected, piping up from the back of our group. “Remember Hazel, who runs the flower shop on Elm?”
“I’ve known Hazel since I was three.” Archie laughed. “She used to always pin a carnation on my lapel when I was in town.”
“Me too! She’d be great, I bet she’d love to teach a floral arrangement class. Oh man, one Sunday at church she pinned a chrysanthemum that was so heavy on my jacket I almost fell over.”
“That’s Hazel.” Archie laughed again, and so did everyone else.
I didn’t know Hazel. In fact, I’d never heard of Hazel. I listened to the group laugh and tell stories about this woman who half of them had grown up with, and the other half now knew from living in town, and I began to feel that pang again, that hollowness just under my breastbone.
There’d be a learning annex at Bryant Mountain House. A freaking genius idea. Spearheaded by Archie, taught by Roxie and Leo and Oscar and Natalie, attended and contributed to by Chad and Logan. This is a plan that’d come together over countless lunches and dinners, cocktails and porch swings, and would premiere to the town and the resort with a great chance for success and would likely continue on as one of the centerpieces of the new Bryant Mountain House.
After I left Bryant Mountain House.
After I left this group of friends, this group whose lives would go on without me, undoubtedly missing me in the case of Roxie and Natalie, and maybe Archie, but still, I was the one piece that could be dropped in and pulled back out without disturbing the group as a whole, as a thing, as a unit.
There was an entire ecosystem of Bailey Falls that had existed before I arrived and would remain long after I left. I’d be off on another job, another project, another hotel room with empty suitcases in the corner and a rental car in the parking lot and room service eaten at a coffee table while I scratched out another master plan on a stack of legal pads while an infomercial for Time Life’s Classic Soft Rock filled my ears with the sounds of Jim Croce and Linda Ronstadt and made sure that while that TV was on and giving my brain the static it needed to function, I wouldn’t be thinking about this group, this thing, this unit, this family in Bailey Falls.
I rubbed my chest. A few paces ahead I heard the astronomer talking about the meteor shower and where to look to make sure we didn’t miss it. I surged ahead, leaving my group and joining him to listen. I needed the static.
“You tired?”
“A little, you?” I asked, leaning against the main banister in the lobby. We’d packed up the crazy people and sent them back into town. It had been a fun night, and the great news was everyone was ready to book their resident weekend. And come back for Easter.
Archie’d invited everyone so easily, like they were his friends. Which I suppose they were. But tonight, everyone had blended together nicely. It all seemed very natural, like we’d been friends for years. All happy, all coupled up. Except that wasn’t the case. Not with Archie and me. Right?
“Not too tired?”
“Why?”
He smiled. “Come with me, I want to show you something.”
“Do I still need my mittens?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Definitely,” he replied, and started going up the staircase.
“We’re not going back outside?” I asked, confused.
“Stop asking questions,” he said over his shoulder, and I had no choice but to follow him. Up six flights of stairs. And down three hallways. Around several corners. All the way to the end of the line, the very edge of the east wing.
Past a broom closet and almost hidden behind an armoire, a heavy six-paneled door stood with a thick-looking lock.
“Is this where you keep the guests who couldn’t pay?” I whispered, peeking under his shoulder.
“They check in, but they never check out,” he replied, in his best Vincent Price voice.
“For the record, that’s creepy as fuck.”
“So is this,” he said, twisting the old metal key so the door swung open.
Darkness beckoned, and through the gloom I could just make out a narrow, steep staircase. “I mean, come on.”
“Scared?”
“I’m not stupid. Staircases like that are never meant to be climbed unless there’s a guy running behind you with an ax.”
“I can see if Walter from maintenance is available.”
“I can see if Walter from maintenance is available to kick your ass for saying shit like that while standing at the bottom of the staircase from Psycho.”
A door opened and closed at the other end of the hallway and we both jumped.
“Okay, buddy, you’ve got thirty seconds to tell me what this is about or I’m heading back to my room to a bubble bath.”
“Hmm, a bubble bath.”
I punched him in the arm. “Twenty-five seconds.”
He laughed, then yanked on a string. A single bulb shone down, illuminating the staircase and making it a few degrees less creepy. I peered up; the stairs went on at least two stories, maybe more. “Okay, I’ll bite. Where does it lead?”
“Nothing ventured . . .” he said, and started up the stairs. Creepy stairs, or the newly planted mental picture of an ax-wielding Walter?
I followed him. The walls were down to the studs, plaster over wire over brick. The stairs were paneled about halfway up the wall, then open.
All along the paneling were signatures carved into the wood.
Jeremiah, 1897
Bartholomew, 1912
James. Mickey, 1933
George, 1941
Jonathan, 1952
r />
“Who carved all these?” I asked, running my fingers over some of the names. There were other words too, mostly of the limerick variety. There once was a girl from Nantucket . . .
“People who worked here. People who lived here. Did you know back in the thirties they used this part of the hotel to house a boys’ boarding school? It only lasted a decade or so, there are pictures in the library of the bunk beds they installed. In the summer, the boys would sleep out on the balcony, before air-conditioning, of course.”
“A boys’ boarding school,” I mused, reading a poem about a rather busty girl from Tallahassee. “Did you know there are boobs carved into the wood?”
“Boys will be boys,” he muttered, and I rolled my eyes. “That was my favorite panel to look at when I used to come up here.”
“And where is here exactly?” I asked, as we finally reached a landing. The bulb was far below us now.
“Just a few more steps,” he said, turning a corner and disappearing into the darkness.
I stood there, rolling on my ankles when I heard a thunk then a squeak then his voice floating back to me.
“Don’t be chicken.”
“Oh, please,” I said, and marched around the corner into that same darkness.
Cool air swirled around my legs. Silhouetted by moonlight, Archie stood in a doorway that opened up into an inky black sky punctured by twinkling stars. He was on the roof.
“Careful, give me your hand,” he said, helping me over the knee-high ledge that separated the staircase from the roofline.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute, I—”
“Trust me,” he said softly, his hand strong in mine, “I’ve got you.”
I stepped. Out into a different world. Up this high, we could see everything. The entire hotel spread out below us, the golf course, the parking lots, the gardens, everything. The lake was calm tonight, reflecting back a perfect mirror image of the moon and stars, ebony and alabaster and pure magic.
“This is incredible,” I breathed.
“There’s supposed to be another round of meteor showers soon, thought we might catch that show from up here.”
“How cool is this!” I squealed, looking in every direction at once, not wanting to miss a thing. “How close to the edge can we go?”
In response he tugged my hand toward the rock railing that ran along the roofline. I peeked over the edge. On the lakeside, I could see the porches below, all the different levels, and the lanterns that lit the way to the dock. It looked far away but peaceful and somehow comforting.
“Watch where you step, this roof hasn’t been patched in a few years.”
“What?” I yelped, stepping closer to him.
“Kidding, I’m kidding,” he soothed.
I glared up at him. “You’re a bit twisted.”
He gazed down at me, an expression I couldn’t quite identify on his face. “You’re a bit wonderful.”
And in a scene right out of central casting, as I stared up into those warm indigo eyes, a sparkling trail blazed across the sky, arching right over his head with perfect Disney timing.
“The shower is starting up again.”
“Is it?” he said, still gazing down at me.
I gulped. “You’re going to miss it.”
He leaned down, pressing his forehead to mine. “I guess I’ll miss it.”
“But I thought you wanted to—”
“Stop. Arguing. With me.”
I stopped arguing. He started kissing. And it was on.
I slipped my hands up around his neck, and suddenly realized I wanted to be able to feel him, touch him, get a sense of his skin that I just couldn’t with my stupid mittens on. I tore them off, flinging them over my shoulder as I sank my fingers into that ridiculously soft hair of his, never once taking my lips from his, not wanting to break this contact once it had begun.
His hands, meanwhile, had slid around my waist, tugging me closer to him, his fingertips splayed wide around my hips, dipping down lower to my bottom. I sighed into his mouth as one hand slipped up and underneath my shirt, his cold fingers feeling white hot against the small of my back.
“God, you feel amazing,” he groaned, breaking our kiss as he swept kisses along my jawline straight back to my ear. “Your skin . . . I want to . . .”
His mouth was back on mine again, swallowing whatever it was he was going to say and instead tangling his tongue with mine over and over again. His hands pressed me into him farther, and I could feel him, Jesus, I could feel him, thick and hard and oh he was hard and thick, and my eyes rolled back in my head just imagining what it would feel like to fuck this man.
My hands roamed restlessly now, down along his shoulders, along his arms, and back up again. I wanted more. I needed more. Meteors were fucking screaming across the sky and I needed more.
The hand that was under my shirt now slipped higher, moving around front and spanning my rib cage, long and strong fingers playing my skin. His mouth was on the move again as well, back at my ear, whispering, “I want . . . I need . . .”
“What,” I asked, “what do you want?”
He didn’t answer with words. But he did answer. He spun me, pushing me up against one of the chimneys, wrapping one hand around the back of my knee and hitching it around his hip, opening me up to him.
And he thrust against me. Yes. He thrust against me again, his eyes now burning down into mine. Yes, yes.
Wonderful, brilliant friction was building as he pressed into me again and again. Cold brick and stone scratched my back, incredible. Bits of papery soot rained down from above, collecting in our hair, fantastic. My right foot scrambled to find purchase on the gravelly surface, twisting this way and that and even rolling painfully enough once that I knew I’d feel it the next time I tried to run. Fucking awesome. Because while my right foot was rolling, my left foot and all its toes were pointing skyward as oh my God I can’t believe Archie Bryant was dry humping me straight into an insane orgasm.
“Oh my God,” I heard myself say, heat blooming everywhere. “Oh my God, oh my God.”
He cinched me tighter around his hip, rocking into me, using his body to bring me higher and higher.
“Clara,” he said, and my name on his lips caused me to shatter. Broke me wide open. Waves coursed through me as starry streaks crossed the sky above. As I clung to him, panting, boneless, witless, all I could think was that I never wanted to come down from this roof again, if it meant I could stay wrapped around this guy.
And once the meteor shower had finished, this thought spurred me into action faster than anything else could have, and as soon as politely possible, I kissed him and ran back downstairs.
Danger. Danger. Danger.
Chapter 14
After feeling empty and cavernous for weeks now, the hotel was suddenly alive and buzzing with excitement with the arrival of Easter weekend. The floral arrangements were more elaborate, the bellmen were moving with a little more pep in their step, and for the first time since I’d been there I couldn’t get a dinner reservation that entire holiday weekend because they were—and these are the words every hotelier lives for—all booked up.
“I love when a hotel feels like it’s bursting at the seams, don’t you?” I sighed, standing at the bottom of the stairs in the lobby with Mrs. Toomey late Friday afternoon, watching car after car pull into the porte cochere. “Families coming from all over the place, deciding to spend their weekend away from home, somewhere they’ll be treated a bit like royalty. Someone makes their bed, someone brings them their paper, someone folds their towels, and who doesn’t love coming home after a long day to find a chocolate on their pillow?”
“I know what you mean,” she said, “especially on these holiday weekends. It’s like having one big extended family all under one roof.
“Whoa, can we help you with that?” Mrs. Toomey said as Archie came around the corner, carrying an enormous egg tree. Wintry branches were crammed into a large vase and littered with eggs painted
in springtime colors. It had been a crafting project that some of the evening activity guests had been working on all week, making tiny pinpricks in eggs and blowing out the insides to make the shells empty. They were then decorated with tiny beads, glitter, ribbons, all delicate and beautiful. One more Bryant family tradition carried on for another year.
“This looks great.” I admired the tree, wanting to bat at the eggshells like a cat but knowing that’d be frowned upon. “Where is this ending up?”
“Right . . . here,” Archie said, balancing left and right and finally setting the tree down delicately in the center of the lobby table. “That way the guests can see it when they check in.”
“It looks great, really, better than I expected.”
“You doubted our egg tree?”
“I walked into the lounge one night to find seven old ladies blowing eggs . . . what the hell was I supposed to think?”
Mrs. Toomey smothered a laugh. “I’m just going to go find something to do.”
“We’ll be at full capacity by tonight, I’m sure there’s something to do,” Archie joked, and she swatted at him as she toddled off to terrorize the girls at the front desk. Once she was out of earshot, he looked carefully at me. “Have you been avoiding me the past few days?”
Yes. “Yes.”
“Care to tell me why?”
Because I can’t stop thinking about you. Because you’ve got me all tied up in knots. Because I don’t know how much longer I can go without seeing you naked and underneath me. Because now I’m feeling some feels beyond what I know how to deal with. “I’ve been super busy.”
“Hmm,” he said, not buying it. I looked away, not wanting to meet his gaze. “You don’t look super busy now.”
“I’m slammed, actually. I’ve got a meeting with the guys in room service to make sure they have everything set for the new menu we’re rolling out, I’ve got to talk with Lucy in the greenhouse about bringing up some fresh-cut tulips for the elevator lobby, and I still need to stop by the spa and make sure they have everything they need to roll out the new Spring Awakening package this weekend, and I wanted to check the bookings.”