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‘I’m not surprised,’ Ben answered even though he knew a regular manager would have given the bellhop a smack-down for talking about guests that way. He wouldn’t. He’d taken the measure of most of the staff within the first few days, and he knew he needed to draw a line between stellar customer service and surrendering your dignity. This bellhop had been nothing but courteous to all the guests. No wonder he needed to let off some steam.
He offered him a quick smile before he nodded towards the luggage trolleys and had the boy hurrying back to his place. Order still needed to be kept.
‘Mr Chatsfield?’ Heels clicked behind him and he turned to see his PA, Rebecca, smiling uncertainly at him.
‘Rebecca. What can I do for you?’
‘A reporter from the entertainment network wanted to interview you for their piece about catering to the stars?’
‘Oh. Right.’ And that was something he really felt like doing. Trying not to grimace, Ben followed Rebecca to the waiting reporter.
Twelve hours later, with it heading on to midnight, Ben was finally able to relax. He’d put out more fires—including an actual one when a guest had knocked over one of the two hundred aromatherapy candles she’d scattered around her suite—and soothed more giant egos than he cared to remember. And he hadn’t lost his temper. He hadn’t lost his temper in fourteen years, but he was holding on to it now by a thread. Tension knotted his shoulders and his head throbbed.
He shouldn’t have come back to The Chatsfield, he acknowledged as he headed to the rooftop pool for a swim. He shouldn’t have thought he could handle the memories, the emotions. Sighing, he stripped off his suit in the men’s changing room and headed into the pool area.
The Chatsfield’s swimming pool was one of the highlights of the hotel, an Olympic-size pool on the roof, glassed in on all sides, with a panoramic view of the city. Swimming laps had always been one way Ben liked to relax, to burn off the excess emotion and stress.
The pool was thankfully empty at this late hour, and Ben could see the city stretching out in every direction, sparkling under the night sky. He could make out the Bellevue Palace as well as the iconic Victory Column, and the dark expanse of the Tiergarten now covered in a thin dusting of snow. He’d never been to Berlin before now, and he didn’t think he was going to have much time to see the sights during the two weeks he was here.
Not that he cared. He just wanted to get back to France. To his life.
And if Spencer asks you to open restaurants in all the Chatsfield hotels?
It was a question that had dogged Ben since he’d made the demand of his brother because the truth was he wasn’t even sure he wanted to open restaurants in all of the hotels. He didn’t need the money or the publicity, and the thought of linking himself so closely to The Chatsfields—and to the Chatsfield family—made his gut churn.
You couldn’t go back. Ever. Even if you wanted to.
But did he want to?
Shoving the question aside, Ben dove into the pool. The water felt cool and refreshing and his head started to clear. The tension between his shoulder blades loosened and he did a couple of laps before flipping onto his back and staring up at the domed ceiling as he let his mind empty out.
A door squeaked open and Ben lifted his head from the water; he could only see a pair of trim ankles and curvy calves coming towards the pool. Someone had clearly had the same idea as he had.
He flipped back onto his stomach and started to swim towards the edge. His fifteen minutes of relaxation were clearly over.
He was about a metre from the pool’s side when he saw something in his peripheral vision, too late for him to do anything about it, and then he felt the breath leave his body in a rush as the female guest who had just entered the pool area dove straight into him.
* * *
Olivia felt as if she’d just dived into concrete. Stars danced through her dazed mind and she let out an undignified shriek, her head pounding from the impact, before arms clasped her shoulders like bands of iron.
‘Do you always,’ a familiar, masculine voice asked in disgust, ‘leap before you look?’
Olivia blinked the water from her eyes and shook her wet hair from her face. And stared into the angry, arrogant face of Ben Chatsfield.
His eyes blazed and his cheeks were slashed with colour and for a moment, her mind still dazed, Olivia thought he looked like some ancient water god emerging from the sea, water dripping off his perfectly formed pecs.
Then sanity returned and she started to sputter.
‘I didn’t see anyone in the pool,’ she said, and her sputtering erupted into a coughing fit. She’d swallowed several mouthfuls of pool water when she’d made contact with Ben Chatsfield’s chest.
