“But do you want your own room?”
The front desk clerk averts her gaze, pretending to be examining some documents on the countertop and listening to anything but our exchange.
Ha!
“Do you want me to have my own room? I can’t believe we’re arguing about this.”
I level her with a stare. “Okay. So what you’re saying is…you want to do one room? The suite with two rooms or one room with one bed?”
“Oh my god, Jack, I’m going to strangle you.”
Strangle me? I like this feisty side. “I’m just trying to make sure! Don’t shoot the messenger.”
The clerk looks on, no longer hiding the fact she’s watching and listening to our fervent exchange.
Rude and unprofessional, but whatever.
“We’ll take one room.”
“A king, or would you like a suite?”
“A suite with a king. I don’t need multiple bedrooms. It’s just the two of us.” I hand her my credit card, face on fire, ears probably red, too.
I feel like a teenager caught red-handed by my parents with my hand up her shirt. This woman knows we’re probably going to be fooling around later. I might as well take an ad out in the Wall Street Journal to advertise it.
Jesus. She probably thinks this is a hookup.
“This is our first trip together,” I tell the woman. “First trip without our daughter.”
Her eyes grow wide as saucers.
Shit.
I just made this worse, reading her mind as her eyes go everywhere, including the hand where Penelope would wear a ring. “Jack Jennings has a child with a woman he has never shared a hotel room with before? They stood arguing about it in the lobby…but they have a child? Is this his wife? Is this his fiancée? Can’t be. There’s no ring.” The woman—Beth—does a poor job of schooling her expression, considering The Four Seasons is all about class and discretion and privacy. I can literally see what she’s thinking. “None of this makes sense.”
Damn right it doesn’t, Beth, but here we are!
Beth eventually hands me the key card to our room. A beautiful penthouse room—despite not needing anything ostentatious, she upgraded us anyway.
“Oh my god.” Penelope clutches my arm when we enter the suite, going straight for the bathroom. “I’m totally taking a bath in this.” She twirls around. “This is incredible.”
Like a kid would do, she oohs and aahs at the lotions set out on the counter, plucking up the shampoo and conditioner. “This is the good stuff.” She sets it down. “Oh god, I sound so lame.”
“You don’t sound lame. You sound excited. And you should absolutely take a bath while we’re here.”
There’s a hot tub, too, out on the deck, though that holds little interest to me. Too much time spent in them after games healing my body. Cold plunge baths and hot tubs in the training room ruin the appeal, but if she wanted to hop in, I’d do it.
“How do you think they got this fruit basket up here so fast?”
Good question. “They knew I was coming. I’m sure they already planned on me being in this room. They probably have a fruit basket in another room for you.”
Penelope plucks a few grapes off the vine and pops one in her mouth. “Being pampered is so magical. It’s been ages since I’ve done anything like this.” She sweeps through the room to the window. “I haven’t even had a girls’ getaway in the past few years. This makes me want to plan one.”
I want to go to her and see what she sees. Wrap my arms around her and kiss the back of her neck.
Instead, I drag the suitcases into the bathroom, setting them up on the luggage stands, unzipping hers and mine so we can start getting ready for dinner.
I need a distraction before I kiss her senseless and make us late, so I take what I need from my bag and give her privacy to change, do her hair, put on makeup—whatever women do to get gorgeous—while I get ready in the bedroom.
It’s easy. All I have to do is change my clothes. Take off my jeans and throw on slacks and my button-down shirt. Throw on a tie and pick out some shoes.
I watch Sports Vision to kill time while I wait, nervously bouncing my leg.
Penn and I have been out before. This will be our second date, although that first date wasn’t technically a date. It was…just catching up. Disguised as a date.
But that’s before I knew she had a child—that we had a child.
Harper Halbrook changed everything for me. She changed the way I look at Penelope, she changed the way I view my job, she changed the priorities I never knew I had. Suddenly, being here with her mom is more important than anywhere else in the world.
Being there with Harper and Penn is where I want to be.