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She looks from Elliot to me with the blank stare of a cartoon character that’s been thwapped over the head with a frying pan.
“Elevators are over there.” She points behind us.
“Thanks,” I say. “I just need my key too.”
“There are two in there,” she says, pointing at the little packet Elliot’s holding.
Man alive, she’s as incompetent as she is uninspired.
“For my room.”
She screws up her nose like a bad smell just wafted under it. “He has your keys,” she says slowly, like I’m the stupid one, and points at Elliot.
It’s late. I’m tired. And I very much need to stop being around the one man on the planet I can’t jump on but who I seem to have developed an irrational and constant need to jump on.
“I booked two rooms under Dashwood.” I take a breath and try to keep a lid on my impatience. “He has the keys for one. And I need the keys for the other.”
She does a long, slow blink. “There’s just one room.”
“I booked two.” I do my best to smile. I’m certain it looks fake, but it’s better than yelling. “Could you check, please?”
She sighs and taps her keyboard. “One.” She cocks her head to one side and gives us an I-told-you-so look she’s probably spent years perfecting. “There’s one room for you.”
“I definitely booked two. So if there’s only one, that’s an error. Could you please book me into another room?”
“Nope.”
“What? Why?”
“Because we’re full.”
“But I was able to book two rooms just a few hours ago.”
“Well, I guess we must have filled up just a few hours ago. Everywhere in town is already at capacity for the a capella champ?—”
“Yes, we know all about the a capella championship,” Elliot says, stepping up to the counter and taking over from me. Possibly in fear that I might be about to lose my shit so badly he’ll end up without a room too.
He leans on the counter and gives her his most charming look. If that doesn’t work on her, nothing will.
“Look”—he peers over his glasses at her name tag—“Raquelle. We’re in a bit of a pickle. If you knew my assistant here, you’d know she’s the most organized person on the planet. The chances of her having made an error when she booked are about the same as the chances of the winners of the a capella championship not having perfect pitch.”
He straightens and drums his long, slender fingers on the counter. “So, since there must have been a mistake in your system, do you think you could see your way to finding us a second room?”
Raquelle sucks on her top teeth. “I can’t. We’re full. There are no rooms. None. I don’t know how else to explain it to you.”
Elliot blows out a breath and looks at me. “Do you want to call around, see what you can find?”
“This place had the last two rooms in town. And they’ve already sold one of them.” I give Raquelle a sideways glance. “At one thirty in the morning, the chances of me finding another are zero.”
He holds up the key card packet. “Then I guess we’re roomies. There’ll be two queens. It’ll be fine.”
“There’s not,” Raquelle pipes up.
“Not what?” he asks.
“Two queens.” She points at his key cards. “That’s a one-bed room.”
“A king?” he asks, ever hopeful.
