I laughed. “Come on, let me show you to your room. I already checked you in. I’ll let you settle, and then we can enjoy happy hour at the main bar upstairs. It has a beautiful view of the City.”
***
“Come meet my new friends.” Scarlett swiveled on her bar stool as I walked back into the lounge. I’d been called down to the basement to deal with a broken pipe. When I returned, two very handsome men were seated to her left, and both stood.
“You must be Sophia.” The taller of the two smiled, extending his hand. “I’m Ethan, and this is my business partner, Bryce.”
I looked to Scarlett to fill in the blanks. I’d only been gone for about twenty minutes. Perhaps they were people she knew here for the fashion show. “Nice to meet you.”
“Ethan and Bryce are in the travel industry, too,” Scarlett said. “They own private planes that are rented by people who aren’t satisfied flying first class commercially. I told them they could buy our next round.” She picked up her drink and swirled the straw. “What more does a girl need than a best friend who owns beautiful hotels and two new friends who own private planes? Sounds like a match made in heaven, if you ask me.”
There were no seats left at the bar, so Bryce motioned to the one he’d been sitting in. “Please, take a seat.”
Scarlett caught my eye and wiggled her eyebrows discreetly. The men were handsome and obviously successful, but I’d been looking forward to some alone time with my friend. Though Scarlett seemed excited about our new companions, so I smiled and took a seat.
“What can I get you to drink?” Bryce asked.
Just then the bartender, Sean, walked over. He set a napkin down on the counter in front of me. “You want a vodka and diet cranberry, Ms. Sterling?”
“Ohhh. That sounds good. You have diet cranberry today?”
He nodded. “Sure do. Mr. Lockwood made sure we ordered a case of it the other day.”
“He did? Are we adding a special drink to the menu that uses it?”
“Not that I’m aware of.” He shrugged. “He just told us to make sure it’s in stock from now on because that’s what you like.”
It had felt odd to take a seat and agree to have drinks with these two men. But I quickly chalked that up to being out of practice. Liam and I were together for a long time, and I hadn’t jumped back into the dating world yet. Well, not really. Obviously Weston and I had had our dalliances. But the bartender’s mention of Weston doing something so small, yet sweet, made me realize the reason I felt uncomfortable sharing a drink with a man had nothing to do with being out of practice.
Forcing that thought from my head, I said, “Vodka and diet cranberry sounds perfect, Sean. Thank you.”
Bryce smiled. “I guess it’s hard to buy a woman a drink in a hotel she owns, huh?”
I smiled, and the four of us fell into easy conversation. Eventually, the seat to my left opened up, so Bryce sat down next to me. It allowed the conversation for four to turn into two more intimate conversations of two.
“So, I take it you live here in the City?” he asked.
“Right now, I live here in this hotel. My family just recently became partial owners of The Countess. I’d been living in London the last few years and moved back to help transition things here.”
“Does that mean you’ll go back to London after things are settled?”
I shook my head. “No, I don’t think so.”
Bryce smiled. “I’m happy to hear that. New York is my home base, too.”
His flirting was innocent, yet it made me feel guilty to participate. Obviously, Weston and I hadn’t talked about seeing other people. Not that he and I were actually seeing each other. I wasn’t naïve enough to think there was anything other than a physical relationship going on, and even that seemed to have fizzled as of late. So, I forced myself to stay open-minded, even though all I really wanted to do was go back to my suite with Scarlett and tell her all about me and Weston.
I sipped my drink. “So your office is here in the City, then?”
“Only a few blocks away. I’ve never been inside this hotel though.” He looked around the bar and out the tall wall of windows nearby. “The view is amazing. I have to admit, Ethan wanted to come here for drinks to celebrate a new contract we just signed, and I didn’t feel like it. Now I’m glad I did.”
Bryce and I sat together for a half hour, our conversation flowing pretty easily. I learned that six months ago he came out of a two-year relationship, and I shared that my long-term relationship had also recently ended.