‘C’mon, James!’ Cormac shouted back into the flat as he jiggled the box he was holding to try and get a better grip. They didn’t have much to take, but the few personal items they did have, he wanted to ensure they got to wherever they were going in one piece.
James was still pouting over the fact they had to move again, although Cormac failed to see exactly why his little brother was dawdling—anywhere had to be better than here. Cormac was not going to miss the tepid showers—even when he turned the temperature up to max. Or the hob he had to keep checking was off because he’d occasionally smell gas as he walked by. Or having to sleep on a sofa bed far too small for his large frame.
‘I’m here,’ James said with a tone Cormac had believed he wouldn’t hear until his brother hit at least thirteen, but had prayed it would be never.
‘Drop the attitude,’ Cormac told him, shifting the weight of the heavy box of the few family mementos they had from one arm to the other. ‘I don’t know why you’re moping so much about this. Think you’d be grateful to get a proper bedroom, more than likely with your own flat panel TV and all the consoles you’d ever want.’
James merely shrugged in response, pulling his little suitcase over the threshold, and heading towards the stairs. Cormac rolled his eyes and hoped his brother didn’t trip over his own lip with how much it was sticking out.
‘And that should just be those cases left then,’ Cormac told the two guys standing in the hallway. He’d told Victoria he didn’t need a whole van, but she’d sent one anyway—even if it was on the smaller side. Their meagre possessions—a couple of suitcases, boxes of James’ toys and books, his own smaller collection of fiction and textbooks, a box of a few personal bits, and the box in his arms filled with the only pictures and a couple of keepsakes he had left from his parents—looked rather sad and pathetic in the long-wheel-based Transit van.
‘We’ll follow you to the hotel,’ one of the removal men told him. ‘We’ll take everything to your rooms there and then come back here for the rest. You said everything left here goes to a disposal site? Are you sure you don’t want to donate some of it?’
Cormac shook his head. ‘I got almost everything from charity stores years ago—if you’re able to get them downstairs in one piece, I’ll be amazed,’ he confessed. The men grabbed the bags and hauled them up on their shoulders in a way that said they’d done this hundreds of times before. He let the two men go before him, so he could both lock up and not hold them up on the stairwell as he carefully made his way down with his box of treasures.
James sat on the kerb a few feet from the back of the van, his elbows resting on his knobbly knees and his hands cupping his face. He was kept company by his little suitcase carefully placed next to him. The picture was so pitiful it hurt.
Cormac sighed, shifting the box to hold it in one hand as he reached down and ruffled James’ hair, making a mental note it needed to be cut again.
‘C’mon, buddy. Chin up. Whatever we’re going to is going to be better than here. You do believe that, don’t you?’
‘Yeah,’ James said glumly, making Cormac even more puzzled. But, with a very weary sigh for a six-year-old, James pushed himself to his feet and pulled his little case along the few feet to the back of the van where one of the removal men waited patiently for the brothers. Reluctantly, Cormac handed the guy his box and watched as the man carefully put it into another, foam-lined, container. Cormac raised his brow.
‘If we’d had time, sir, we’d have packed everything for you in these.’ Cormac had to admit they did look a lot more secure than the cardboard ones he’d used.
‘Is that to go in too, young sir?’ the man crouched down and asked James, nodding towards his little suitcase.
‘I suppose,’ he said quietly with a little shrug.
Cormac moved to the front of the van, looking to see where Toby might be parked, but he couldn’t see a Rolls Royce anywhere. Instead, he saw a sleek black car parked a few metres down on the opposite side of the road. Just as he spied the luxury sedan, it pulled out of its spot and made its way towards them.
As the Bentley Mulsanne pulled up, Cormac resisted the urge to open the door himself and climb inside, remembering how Victoria always waited for the driver. It seemed pointless when he had to wait and could easily just open the door himself, but if he was going to live in Victoria’s world, he had to begin to follow her rules—even if he thought they were stupid.
‘Whoa,’ James said, taking in the shiny black car.
The younger Blake seemed more impressed with this one than the one they’d been in just two days ago. ‘Can I sit in the front?’
‘Afraid not,’ Cormac said as the driver opened the rear door and ushered the pair inside.
It was a long journey for a six-year-old, even in a car as amazing as this one. After playing with every button James could reach, moving every knob and lever, flicking through the TV channels on the small screen in front of him, the questions Cormac always dreaded started. And without knowing where they were going, he couldn’t answer his brother’s incessant are we there yet? And how long now?
‘Dude, I don’t know,’ he said after the twelfth time. ‘We’ll be there when we get there.’ Cormac saw the driver glancing his way in the rear-view mirror and Cormac knew he wasn’t supposed to speak unless spoken to first. ‘Hey, bud, sorry I didn’t catch your name.’
‘William, sir,’ the driver said, his eyes quickly flickering to Cormac before refocusing on the road.
‘Nice to meet you, Will. Could you tell us where we’re going?’
‘Sorry, sir, but I’m afraid that Lady Snape requested that I not reveal that information.’ Cormac snorted. Requested. She’d probably demanded it. He still wasn’t too sure which version of the woman he’d met was the real one, but he had to admit that he was kind of looking forward to finding out. Particularly if the real Victoria was the one he’d kissed in the back of the car.
The car twisted and turned its way through the capital’s streets, hampered by the ever-present traffic cities seemed to be forever caught up in. But as the car turned down Main Street, Cormac’s heart began to speed up, his breath caught in his throat. There was only one hotel on this street and there was no way they could be staying there. From his earlier days of taxiing through the capital, he knew the money that lined the pockets of the people who stayed there. It was where Heads of State were housed when they visited. There was no way he could afford even the most basic of rooms at the Denyer Hotel.
But then he wasn’t paying for it, and Victoria was a member of the Royal Family, where else would she stay if not in the country’s finest hotel? He really needed to get his head around this whole thing and quickly.
The car slowed and pulled into the curved driveway of the most expensive and glamorous hotel in all Avalone. The Denyer hotel was known throughout the world as the height of luxury, and anyone who was anyone wanted to secure rooms—even a basic one—when they had the option, just to be able to say they were staying at such an establishment. His mouth fell open at the idea that he and James would be staying at such a place. Never in his wildest dreams would he have ever thought of stepping foot through the doors of such an establishment.
When he’d been a bellboy at a lower-end hotel—that he still couldn’t afford to stay in—a few streets over, he and the bellboys from other hotels would hang around on lunch breaks, talking about who they’d seen that day, what type of tips they’d had, and so on, but the bellhops from the Denyer had never graced their breaks. They may have held the same job as them, but their bellboys—the cleaners too!—were all graduates, working their way up in the hotelier industry, desperate to be spotted by Niles Denyer one day.
‘Look at those men in the weird hats,’ James said pressing his nose against the window to get a better look at the impeccably dressed doormen.
‘I think you might have the wrong place,’ Cormac said to the driver just before they stopped.
‘No, sir.’
One of the doormen opened the car door and James almost tumbled out at the unexpected action. Without even glancing back at his older brother, the younger Blake jumped from the car and stood on the pavement, head craned back to stare up at what seemed an impossibly tall building for a six-year-old.
‘Whoa,’ he breathed. ‘Corrie, look.’ He pointed up at the flags that billowed majestically with the breeze coming in from the ocean, high above the entrance.
‘Yeah,’ Cormac said distractedly, giving them a cursory glance as he peered around for the van with their belongings that had supposedly been following them.
‘They’ve gone via the delivery entrance,’ William told Cormac as he came around the car. ‘They’ll use the service lift to take your possessions up. Cormac’s heart leapt into his mouth at the idea of his precious box being lost or dropped.
‘Don’t worry, sir, the men were personally chosen by Lady Victoria. Here’—the driver handed Cormac a small silver card—‘show this to the lift attendant and they’ll take you directly up.’
‘I don’t need to check in?’ The other man shook his head.
‘All taken care of, sir. I wish you well.’
Cormac lifted his hand in a half-hearted wave, his mind whirling with questions and self-doubts and the realisation he was well out of his depth.
‘Corrie, is this where we’re staying?’
‘I guess so,’ he said, his own head tilting back as he too became hypnotised by the dancing flags as he tried to get his head around the fact.
‘This is so… cool!’ James exclaimed. ‘Can we go in? Can we?’ His brother grabbed the hem of his t-shirt and tugged on it, fruitlessly trying to make his brother move. Cormac looked down at the kid, noting that his eyes were now bright with anticipation and wonder, eager to see what else awaited him. The grin that split wide across his face was a far cry from the pout that had graced his lips earlier, and he bounced on the balls of his feet, suddenly desperate to move and needing to do it quickly.
Cormac nodded and grabbed James’ shoulder as he tried to race off into the grand building. He was fairly sure people who stayed here didn’t run through throngs of people, darting around them as if they were an obstacle course.
‘Hold my hand, bud.’
‘Aww, Corrie-’
‘No. No arguing on this. This isn’t a place to run about in, and I don’t want you getting lost.’ He glanced down at the key card in his hand again; it seemed to shimmer in the morning sun. This was his way into something bigger and better for both James and himself, and if he was going to survive this for as long as he’d need to, he was going to have to throw himself into everything Victoria asked him to.
He squared his shoulders, fixed the neck on his t-shirt from where James had pulled it out of shape with his pleading, and stepped forward, telling himself he belonged here.
He flashed the doorman a smile and nodded to the older gentleman as the man held the large gold and glass door open for him.
‘Good day, sir,’ the man said. Cormac nodded his head at the guy.
He kept tight hold of James as they strode through the lobby. A few members of staff raised their eyebrows at him, dressed in a plain white t-shirt and faded jeans—that were clearly not designer—but he kept his head up high.
He’d almost reached the bank of lifts when a large gentleman, dressed in the colours of the hotel, stepped in front of them, stopping the duo in their tracks. James stepped closer to his brother and Cormac automatically pulled him against his side.
‘Excuse me, sir.’ The man’s voice was deep, shaking the very air around them, making Cormac’s hair stand on end. ‘Only guests are permitted to the rooms.’
Cormac cursed himself as he felt his brows raising high, and his cheeks heating up. People walking by and getting into the lifts he’d been heading towards were starting to pay attention to them, their eyes filled with judgement, finding him wanting despite having no clue who he was or any connections he might have. Part of him wanted to tell them all he was about to marry into royalty, that they’d soon be lining up to catch a glimpse of him at the first royal wedding in over a quarter of a century, but he quickly stamped that part of himself down. The announcement wouldn’t go out until Friday and if it got out before Victoria was ready for it, he’d ruin all her plans.
He quickly schooled his face into one of utter contempt, mirroring those around him. He kept his eyes on the man—probably security—as he brought the silver card up level with his face.
‘I am a guest.’
The human barricade glanced towards the card before doing a double take. His olive skin paled and he quickly licked his lips as he calculated the best way to get out of the mess he’d got himself into.
‘I’m sorry, sir, I didn’t realise. It’s just… You’re going to the wrong lift.’ The man swallowed and pointed to another lift set across the lobby. It had a single width, silver door and surround, and was easily missed if you weren’t specifically looking for it.
‘Thank you. I haven’t stayed here before and my assistant arranged the room.’ The security-guy’s own brows raised at that. ‘She failed to pass on exactly where I was to go.’
‘Of course, sir. Please let me know if there’s anything you need. Anything at all.’
Cormac looked the man up and down, before nodding and turning to head to where he needed to go.
He glanced down at the card as he pressed the button, his head snapping up as the door slid open immediately. The operator inside jumped, scrambling to shove his phone deep in his pocket as he simultaneously tried to stand to attention. Cormac rolled his eyes before trying to step inside when the operator held out his hand to stop him.
‘I’m sorry, sir. Platinum level only.’
Again, Cormac held up the card in his hand and the other man quickly nodded and stepped to one side to allow the Blake brothers access. Cormac glanced over to where the buttons usually were, surprised to see that there wasn’t a list of floors as per usual. Instead, there were just two buttons, great big platinum—not silver—ones side by side.
‘Your card please, sir,’ the operator asked, holding out his hand. Cormac hesitated before handing it to him and watched with James, both curious as to what he needed it for, as he slid it into the slot under the two buttons. A ring of light highlighted one labelled as up.
‘Next stop, Penthouse,’ the operator said as he pressed the lit-up button.
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