Crap! Crap! Crap!I closed my eyes for a too-brief second, then somehow managed to paste on a smile as bright as my name before turning around to face the pissed-off showrunner striding straight toward me.
“Good morning, Rick. How are you?”
Rick, like most longtime Vegas showrunners, had a standing bi-weekly "facial rejuvenation" appointment, wore bright-colored readers on the very tip of his nose, and employed a displeased sneer as his version of resting bitch face.
So, I knew he wasmad-mad when he didn’t just frown up at me but also managed to squeeze a single anger line into the middle of his forehead. “Well, I was fine until I got wind of this bullshit. Care to explain yourself?”
No. No, thank you,I thought but didn't dare say out loud.
I glanced over at Pru, the only person I’d told the real reason I’d had to pick up the extra shifts at the Tourmaline, and decided to go with a mild version of the truth. “Well, the thing is, I’m dealing with a rat problem at my apartment, and that’s why?—”
“A rat problem?” Rick cut me off, narrowing his eyes as much as his several ccs of injectables would let him. “That’s your excuse? That’s why they’re asking for me to send you straight over to the top floor of corporate without giving me even a couple hours of rehearsal?”
"Corporate's asking forme?" I squeaked.
My stomach bottomed out.
Oh no.This was worse than Rick finding out I had taken a second job at a competing hotel. Way worse.
"Not just corporate.Top floor," Rick repeated. Then he asked again. “Seriously, Sunny, what did you do?”
* * *
She knows.She knows. She knows!
Those two words echoed relentlessly in my mind as the elevator chimed, announcing my arrival on the top floor of the Benton Worldwide Hotel & Resorts Group’s glass-encased corporate offices.
I'd never actually been to this building before. Day-to-day operations were nestled toward the back of the Benton Grand’s first floor, less than a five-minute walk from the Nora Benton theater.
Day-to-day was where I’d signed up to become a Benton Girl, and ever since then, those ground-floor offices had been my go-to spot for any issue, including updating my address after I moved into my new apartment and closed my Benton Credit Union account after I found it completely drained.
I knew Nora Benton, my grandma's best friend, kept a work suite in the glass building across the parking lot from the main hotel tower. But she'd never invited me to visit her there.
Until today. When she summoned me to her office in the most official way possible.
She knows. She knows. She knows.
Dread churned my stomach as I walked down a hallway made of vanilla marble flecked with gold. Portraits of ruthless Benton magnates, spanning generations, adorned the inside wall. From Victorian-era merchants to modern-day moguls. They all wore matching expressions, stern and resolute. Apparently, extreme gravitas was a highly heritable trait.
Eventually, I reached a familiar face. Coleridge Benton, Nora's late husband, stared down at me, his cold blue eyes seeming to judge my every step.
Sorry, Mr. Benton.I silently apologized as I passed by his portrait, feeling much like the small child I'd been the first time I'd met him.
The next CEO painting should have featured his and Nora's only son, Coleridge Benton II. I didn't know much about him except that he'd abruptly resigned after less than two years. But whatever happened, it must've been messy because the next portrait wasn't of him but of the current CEO, Coleridge Benton III. The original Coleridge and Nora's oldest grandson.
I'd heard Rick and other Benton workers call him Triple Ice. Like, often. And I had a feeling it was more than just a play on the three Roman I's behind his name.
The artist had painted him looking away, in half profile. Yet the current CEO somehow exuded even more authority and intimidation than all the Benton head honchos before him.
My gaze lingered on the grandson's portrait, and I suddenly understood why some businessmen were referred to as hawks. His hair was a luxurious mane of brownish-blond locks, slicked back with precision, not a strand daring to step out of line.
Yeah, the only difference between this guy and a hawk was that birds of prey didn't have chiseled jaws or wear dark, finely tailored suits. Even looking away, his eyes somehow commanded the room. An icy combination of his grandfather's crystal blue and his grandmother's vibrant green, it felt like he was either staring down a board of directors—or straight into some poor employee's soul.
A chill ran down my spine at the thought of being that employee.
But then I reminded myself that I'd been called here to meet with Nora Benton, the family's matriarch, not the current CEO.
Letting out a small breath of gratitude, I passed by his portrait, too. More marble, and then, way sooner than I wanted to be, I found myself in the inner lobby of the Benton family’s suite of offices. It was quiet here, with a kind of hush I couldn't even begin to imagine replicating in the always-noisy main building of the Benton Grand.
