Dinner is already a huge improvement. While Danny has a hearty meal of steak and kidney pie, mushy peas and mash, followed by chocolate cake, I am enjoying what is probably the best beef wellington I’ve ever had in my life, bar none. No wonder the reviews always compliment the chef. I need to make a note to speak to him tomorrow, and see what he thinks about the bad reviews. Internal intel is essential at this stage.
Even our waitress is a gem: polite, quick and competent.
After dinner, I retrieve our bags from Reception where Laura had offered to store them, contemplating a long drive to find accommodation elsewhere, while trying to hide the issue from Susan the Slacker.
‘Good news,’ Laura says, producing a key. ‘You’ve got a suite. Number 122.’
I exhale in relief. Mitchell must have found a solution, somehow. I hoped he’d come through, although I have to admit I didn’t think he would. Maybe he really is worth helping after all.
‘Thanks, Laura.’
‘Mitchell told me you work in hotels, and that you’re going to be helping us out?’ she asks.
I eye her. ‘If that’s okay?’ I certainly don’t want her to begrudge me. It would be a bad start, as we will be working together a lot.
Laura takes my arm. ‘Thank God. I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m just passing by, you see.’
I do a double take. ‘Passing by?’
She shrugs. ‘I’m just a friend. Don’t know the first thing about hotels. I’ve only been here a few days.’
Yikes. Is there no end to the bloke’s troubles?
‘So listen. Help yourself to Russell’s kitchen at all hours – he won’t mind – or anything else you need. Danny can potter about with any of us. I hear he likes horses?’
I grin as a shadow of a possibility opens up to me. If I can give Danny his horses, he’ll forgive me anything, and not miss me as much. Thank you, God! ‘He’s obsessed.’
‘Excellent. He can muck around in the stables with Jeremy, if that’s okay? He knows all you need to know about horses, and he is the kindest man alive.’
I almost cry with relief. My little boy’s holiday might not be that bad after all. ‘That would be heaven, thank you.’
‘All right, then. We really appreciate your help.’
‘Thanks, Laura. See you tomorrow morning.’
‘Nighty night.’
As tired as I am, who can sleep? I have a gazillion ideas to spruce up the place. My only limit is the manager, but he’ll have to deal with it. Oh, Mitchell Fitzpatrick, I almost murmur aloud, you’re in for one hell of a Christmas…
*
Room number 122 is none other than Mitchell’s personal quarters I realise, as we step over the threshold. It is a small suite, with two bedrooms, a kitchenette with a breakfast bar and a tiny bathroom with a shower stall so minuscule I wonder how Mitchell could possibly fit inside it.
The main bedroom has a lovely old brass bed and dark furniture packed with books. I pull one out and am surprised to find Jane Eyre. Surely he’s more into stuff like, I don’t know, bloke movies, on big plasma TVs? But nothing in here is modern aside from the CD player. To give me his room means that there really wasn’t another one to be found. So where’s he going to sleep, I wonder?
As Danny throws his trolley onto the master bed and begins to unpack his toys, I imagine what it must have been like for Mitchell’s ex-wife, living with him here, and waking up to these stunning views from her bed – and, well, in her bed as well.
Mitchell is the opposite of Mark. Where Mark was well-groomed and elegant, Mitchell, with that growing beard and those untamed curls that dig into his shirt collar, has a ruggedness to him that speaks of honesty and intensity. He looks more like a mountain climber than a corporate ladder climber. Despite his unbelievable arrogance, he looks… earnest. And I’m going to do everything I can to make sure he survives this bloody inspection. Correction: that we both do.
As Danny lines up his toy cars, I open the window and breathe in the crisp evening air, enjoying the whisper of the sea crashing against the rocks below. Absolute paradise. And, if only temporarily, Danny and I are going to be a part of it.
When ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ rings again, I sigh with pure exhaustion, the idea of her grilling me again making me queasy. My own mother doesn’t even call me that often. I’m tempted to let it go to voicemail again, but twice in one day is too much even for Cornwall’s broadband signal strength, and it would only make things between us worse, so I tap the green phone icon.
‘Hello?’
‘Talk to me, Rosie.’
If I wasn’t shit-scared of her, I’d laugh. She uses American expressions she must’ve picked up on TV, only she doesn’t use them like a native speaker, in other words, sparsely. No, sir. She speaks mainly in Hollywood quotes, much to everyone’s mirth. Phrases like, ‘Show me the money’, ‘Houston, we have a problem’, ‘Life is like a box of chocolates’ pepper her speech, along with ‘Shucks’ and ‘Golly’, and believe me, it’s actually very hard to keep a straight face because she sounds like a female version of John Wayne. I can almost see her in her spurred boots as she moseys on down to the saloon, sits at the bar, orders a tall class of castor oil and starts spitting fire at anyone who has the guts to look her way.
‘Yes, things are going well,’ I say. ‘It’s a lovely place.’
‘And the manager?’ she wants to know again. As if she already doesn’t. She has pictures of all Johnson Hotels employees on file, and if she weren’t so anti-man, she’d have his blown up to poster size in every room of her home. I know I would.
What’s he like, she wants to know. Tall, dark and handsome isn’t the half of it – not even a millionth, actually. Did I mention the body of a Greek god? Not that I can see much beyond his clothes, but the width of his shoulders, and the narrow hips bode well. Not that I’ve been ogling him, of course. My senses have been closed down in that department for years now. Especially after the stunt that Mark, who was a real looker, pulled on me. These days, I’m afraid that good looks alone won’t do much for me. Besides, who needs sex – or a relationship – when you are a single mother with a full-time job?
‘Mr Fitzpatrick is very professional and amiable,’ I hear myself saying. Why I’m putting my own neck on the line for someone so undeserving, I don’t know. Probably because he’s been dumped, and just needs a break. Remind you of anyone?
‘You’re not on first-name terms yet?’ she asks.
Is that what I’m supposed to do? Chat him up, drag him to bed and when he has his pants down, shout, ‘A-ha! You shouldn’t be sleeping with your guests?’ In that case: a) I know I’ve blown it already because he hates my guts, and b) I’m not, as I’ve already tried to tell her, suitable for this task. What the hell do I know about inspections, for Christ’s sake? I’m just an assistant manager, not a HR person. With people, I go by my guts. But so far, it’s not going very well at all.
‘What, with Mitchell?’ I say. ‘Yes, a very nice man.’ My nose is still growing, by the way.
Pause. ‘Really?’ she says.
‘Absolutely.’
‘Are you already flirting with him, Rosie?’
The question throws me completely. Have I exaggerated a bit in my praise? ‘I beg your pardon?’ And what does she mean by ‘already’? I don’t flirt.
‘You sound like you’re very chummy with him.’
Chummy? If she only knew. ‘Uhm, no, you see, the receptionist and I got to talking…’
‘Oh. Is she indiscreet?’
I slap my forehead. Can I not get one thing right? You can tell I’m not used to lying, can’t you? ‘No, of course not. She’s very professional.’ My nose has just hit the opposite wall.
‘Has she got a crush on him?’
What kind of a question is that? ‘I beg your pardon?’
Susan pauses. ‘I’m looking at a picture of him as we speak. I suspect the staff are a bit distracted.’
Bingo. Told you she’d know. ‘No, I don’t think they are. I’ll email you my preliminary report within the hour, bye,’ I promise in one breath and hang up before she can answer.
Three weeks. Three weeks and I’m out of here. I call Liz, just to hear a friendly voice, and to erase the unpleasant effect of Susan’s screeching.
‘Hey, Rosie, how’s it going? How’s The Rudest Man Alive?’
‘Well, actually, he’s just given up his own suite for us.’
‘Really? What a gent.’
Always sarcastic, my Liz. But to me, it is a big deal. Where’s he going to go? From what I can see, I don’t think he has his own place outside the inn. I just hope he doesn’t end up sleeping in the broom cupboard because of us.
‘And what’s the joint like?’
‘It’s really, really nice, Liz. The dinner was superb, the place is spotless.’ Apart from the lack of festive cheer. I understand that the bloke hasn’t much to be cheery about, granted, but business is business and the show must go on and all that.
‘Tomorrow I’m going to start my digging,’ I tell her.
‘Okay. Just make sure he doesn’t find you out. I’d hate to come looking for your bones,’ she says with a laugh.
‘Ha, ha. I’ll keep you posted.’
‘Bye, love.’
It’s already the end of Day One of my mission and, apart from the double booking, which every hotel does, and Mitchell’s prickly personality, I’ve discovered absolutely nothing that warrants the bad reviews. Because, to be fair, against all odds, Mitchell did find a solution. All in all, I think he did a top-notch, proper job, as the Cornish say.
I reread my preliminary report once more and send it off. I’m so absolutely shattered that I barely manage to tuck Danny in before I’m out completely. Susan would be overjoyed to see me brought down by a twenty-two-bedroom inn in the middle of nowhere. I dig deep under the covers, enjoying the feeling of letting go, something I rarely do at home. It must be the fresh air, or the good food. Maybe even the physical distance from Susan.
‘Mum?’
I bolt up into a sitting position, eyes wide, heart racing, instantly ready for combat. Mother’s instinct, I guess. Danny is standing by my bed. He looks all in one piece, except for a worried expression on his adorable little face.
‘What is it, darling?’
‘This place is so quiet, I can’t sleep. Can I sleep with you?’
I bite my lip. It took me ages to get him to sleep on his own, and I don’t want to revert back to that. I want him strong and independent. But this is a new place for him and, well, maybe just for tonight. ‘Of course, darling.’