29. Mila
Istop by the sandwich cart for two ham and cheese on my way to the tower. I don’t know if Sebastian likes them, but I want to do something for him. I’m guessing he got an earful from Raya about Maverick.
I met the HR director, Jessie, but only for a minute before she hurried out. She was gone for almost an hour, and when she returned, she closed herself up in her office.
I bet that was about Maverick, too.
He’s making a real mess of things.
Sebastian has to be feeling pressure for bringing him on. I’m powerfully curious, but I don’t want to ask inappropriate questions. I’m guessing part of the fraternization clause that isn’t explicitly stated is that underlings can get access to information they shouldn’t have.
When I reach the base of the tower, Sebastian isn’t there. Just in case, I scan my ID card and press the up arrow on the elevator. Nothing happens. Right. Sebastian told us on our princess tour last week that our IDs weren’t coded to work here.
I can access the stairs, and they have cute windows to look out, but all the doors that lead into the circular lobbies of each floor are secure from curious guests or random visitors. I’d get nowhere.
My phone buzzes.
Sebastian: I recoded your ID for the elevator. Go to 11.
Really? I scan my badge. This time when I press the up arrow, it glows yellow.
I hear the carriage coming down with a gentle rumble. After a bright ding, the doors slide open.
It’s empty.
I step inside, remembering the bright mirrored interior, and press the button for 11.
Nothing happens.
The happy voice reminds me, “Please scan your room card.”
Right. I forgot.
I scan my ID. The voice says, “Welcome, staff member. Please choose a floor.”
I press 11.
The elevator glides upward with no dance party, since I’m staff. “You have arrived on eleven,” the voice says.
I step out. There are three doors. One is marked as the “Cinderella Suite.” One is the stairwell. And the third, a janitorial closet.
A well fortified one. Unlike the doors I’ve seen in other parts of the hotel, this one is solid metal, not painted white with a metal kickboard on the bottom. And the locking mechanism looks incredibly sturdy, not a simple deadbolt.
I hold my key card up to it, but nothing happens. That’s odd. I thought I had access to broom closets.
I wander the small space, waiting. The stairwell door opens, and Sebastian pops through. My heart leaps, like it does every time I see him.
This one is somehow mine.
I simply take in the dark waves of his hair, the suit jacket on broad shoulders. And those hands.
Oh, those hands.
“Hey,” he says. “You ready for an adventure?”
“With you? Absolutely.”
“That’s what I like to hear.” His grin is infectious, and we stand there a moment just smiling at each other.
I point at the blue door. “Are we headed to the Cinderella suite?”
“Better. Come on. You can never breathe a word of this to anyone.”
I lift the hand not holding our sandwiches. “Scout’s honor.”
He presses a quick kiss to my mouth, and that’s how I know there’s no camera here. “You were never a Scout.”
I laugh. “Were you?”
“Troop 69, Greater Boulder.” He clicks his heels.
“You were not 69.”
“Oh, yes, we were. Google it. It was a great joke, even though half of us had no idea exactly what it meant.”
I’m twenty-two, and I have only a vague idea of how it works, two people locked together in opposite directions.
I bet Sebastian knows everything.
He presses his key card to the janitor’s closet lock.
The first lock engages, then there’s a slow turning of another one. Finally, the door pops free.
“Fancy,” I say.
“Oh yes,” he says. “We upgraded and slightly rerouted this path last year when someone leaked photos.”
Ohhhh. “Is this the secret suite?”
He holds a finger to his lips. “Come on.”
When we enter, there’s a set of shelves filled with cleaning supplies. But something’s wrong. They aren’t labeled correctly. I try to pick one up, but it’s glued to the shelf.
“False front,” Sebastian says. He reaches down to pull on a yellow bucket.
Something clicks.
The entire shelf swings away from us, revealing a narrow set of stairs that definitely aren’t the usual ones with the windows overlooking the front of the property. They only go down, even though there is a floor above us.
“This is positively banger,” I say.
“Banger. I guess that means cool?” He’s grinning, like I’m talking “young people” slang. As if thirty-two is old.
Although Camille thinks so.
“Totes,” I say, even though that’s not a thing we’ve said since high school.
He laughs again.
Lights pop on as we descend the skinny stairs. The walls are painted in a pastel rainbow, and each wall sconce is a metal cloud.
We arrive at the bottom to another door requiring a card. Sebastian uses his.
“Who all can come here?”
“It’s locked down pretty tightly nowadays. Most of maintenance can get in, usually once you’ve worked here about six months. But only two members of housekeeping have access. And any room service is handled by the manager on shift. All front desk calls are routed to the manager. We deliver towels or food or anything they need in person.”
“Wow.”
“It’s an important secret. Part of the castle’s mystique.”
We step out of the stairwell, and everything is sky. The white carpeting is lush and thick. The walls are perfectly blue, brighter on top than at the bottom.
Clouds are suspended from the ceiling by invisible wire, some high, some low. It feels like you’re walking among them. I reach out to touch one. It’s softer than cotton but just as fluffy and white.
“This is incredible,” I say.
There’s a door ahead. It’s marked “Secret Suite.” Below it is a plaque that reads, “All who enter here agree to keep the secret.”
He turns to me. “Do you?”
“Of course. So no one is staying here?”
“They checked out last night. The next person arrives tomorrow. It’s a rare empty day.”
The first room is an extension of the clouds in the foyer, but colored like a sunset in pale pink and orange. It’s filled with pastel furniture, and soft white curtains frame grand windows that look out on the mountains.
“This is magical,” I say.
“It’s only the beginning,” Sebastian says. He turns a dial by the door.
The sunset fades into night, and I realize the walls are actually screens. Soon, the room is filled with the chirping of insects.
He moves it again, and dawn shifts the colors from black to dark blue to the pale rising of the sun.
“That’s amazing.”
“And that is only the setting for time of day. There are themes.”
I spot something shifting in another room. “Does it affect the entire suite?”
“Yes, you can sync every room, or do them independently. The bathroom isn’t automatically included so that no one is surprised in the shower if someone moves to the pirate ship.”
“Pirate ship?”
“It’s a cool one, but I think that one is best in the bedroom.”
The bedroom.
My body tingles, forgetting that it was sore a few hours ago. Funny how that works.
Every day is a revelation.
I follow Sebastian through an archway into the next room. A huge round bed matches the circularity of the room itself. Everything inside mirrors this shape — the cushioned chairs, all the tables, a desk with a round mirror.
He turns a knob by the door and this room cycles through the day, breaking its connection with the living room. Then the room darkens into night, and a constellation of stars appears overhead. The walls become the hull of a ship and a lone lantern sways on its post.
Waves crash all around us, and I startle.
Then come the rush of smells. Seawater. Wet wood. Salty air.
“This is amazing,” I tell him.
“Come over here.” He takes my hand and draws me to the bed.
Only when I sit down do I realize it is part of the experience, gently rocking with the movements of the lamp, and the glint of moonlight on the water beyond the ship.
“This is an immersive experience,” I say.
“State of the art.”
But, my ever practical mind is already whirring. “Does it break a lot? Who does the programming?”
He chuckles and draws me close. “We hire an outside company to maintain the tech in this room. We haven’t had too many problems.”
I look around, our bag of sandwiches on my lap. “It’s amazing.”
“You brought lunch?” He picks up the bag and opens the top.
“I did. Ham and cheese.” But I’m still in awe of the room, the shifting of the bed. “Can I try the other settings?”
He pulls out a sandwich. “Absolutely.”
While he eats, I fiddle with the knob.
The pirate ship dissolves into a green twilight. Trees surround us, thick with leaves and vines. The wind rushes through the room, and my hair blows gently away from my face. In the distance, I hear the quiet chatter of monkeys and the call of an elephant.
“A jungle?”
“Mmm hmm.” Sebastian has a mouth full of bread.
I sit beside him and take the other sandwich. “I love this one. What does the bed do?”
He gestures to the wall behind us. It’s the deck of a tree house, like in Tarzan. The bed rests partially inside the bamboo walls, and partially outside, beneath the canopy of trees on the ceiling. Occasionally, the leaves will part in the breeze to reveal a piece of sky, the bed will creak, and shift ever so slightly.
“It’s like we’re in another world,” I say and take a bite.
We sit in the scene while we finish our lunch, then I hop up to move to the next option on the dial.
We’re surrounded by sand, the ocean stretching into the black night. Waves crash in a lulling rhythm, and the tangy smell of the sea fills the room, brighter and cleaner than the version on the pirate ship.
“Turn the inner ring that controls time of day,” Sebastian says.
I shift my fingers and twist, and the colors of dawn spread across the walls.
He drops his empty sandwich wrapper in the bag. “You can sync it with the actual time of day, but most people choose their favorite.”
When the pinks and oranges radiating from the ball of yellow on the water begin brightening into dawn, I stop twisting. Seagulls call, and the waves lap on the edge of the sand.
Behind the bed is a hut, open on one side so the occupants of the bed can see the ocean. I sit next to Sebastian to admire the view. Birds wing out over the water. In the distance, a dolphin leaps into the air and splashes back down.
“There will be a whale, too.” Sebastian slips an arm around my waist and draws me close.
“This is lovely. Why does Havannah want to keep it secret?”
“She likes the idea of a secret club of people who have slept here.”
“I guess it must be very expensive.”
“Actually, Havannah doesn’t charge for this room.”
“Really? She could charge hundreds a night. A thousand!”
“She doesn’t want an experience like this to only be for those with money.”
“How is it booked?”
“Her special guests, mainly. She sometimes will accept a request. Her assistant Sarah goes through them. We’ve hosted a few very tiny weddings.”
“Like celebrities?”
“More like hospice cases.”
“Oh. With those stairs?”
“There’s a back way on the tenth floor. A secret passageway from the other suite on this floor, through a bookcase. Someone has that suite at the moment or I would have shown you.”
I close up our sandwich bag and set it on the floor. “It’s amazing. She’s amazing.”
“She’s great. She had some struggles. It gave her perspective.”
I snuggle up against his shoulder. The waves continue to crash, and low on the wall, near the bathroom door, a turtle makes his way along a piece of driftwood and holds his tiny head up to the sun.
Magical.
I wonder if we’ve already used up too much of whatever ill-defined lunch break we have, when Sebastian’s hand lifts to my chin and turns my face to his.
When his lips land on mine, I think, yes. This is what we’re here for.