Need You Now (1001 Dark Nights)(6)

I take off my shoes and hurry toward the hallway, grabbing my purse and never stopping. I’m out of the door in a flash, and I run down the hall. The door behind me doesn’t open so he’s either glad I left or still lost in debate with whoever called. I don’t take a chance, though. I exit the stairwell, go down two flights, and run down the hall and catch a service elevator. I exit and put on my shoes, finding the side door and head out into the hot summer night. This was a foolish move I made tonight, a risk I can’t afford for a hot man I didn’t even manage to see naked. No other place will pay me the way Meredith pays me. I can’t lose it or it will be another year and a half before I can take the MCAT again.

Ten minutes later, I’m on the subway, and I collapse into a seat. Slowly, logic returns and I’m breathing easier. I’m not going to get fired. I was off duty and free to do what I please, as long as it didn’t hurt the reputation of the hotel. I could have stayed with Jensen, except for the phone calls, and my gut instinct that they were a problem. He was married. I feel sick with the certainty he was married.

By the time I reach my stop and enter the twelve-story red brick building where I live, I wish for the elevator we don’t have, and I can’t take the stairs fast enough. Once at my door on the seventh floor, I enter my apartment and slam the door shut, locking it, before I lean against it. One night of hot sex, even with a man as delicious as Jensen, isn’t worth proving my mother right. I am not like her and I never will be. Alone again and it still feels wrong tonight when it’s always been safe. It is safe.

I walk to my bedroom, and kick off my shoes, turning on a hot bath before I grab my purse to dig out my phone and charge it, only to find it missing. I sink down on the lumpy, ancient mattress, and drop to my back. I left my phone in Jensen’s room. I don’t even have a landline to call and try to get it back. No more tequila for me. Ever.





Part Three: The Morning After



After hours of tossing and turning, I bolt to a sitting position in my bed in a panic, glancing at the clock. Four a.m. If Jensen takes my phone to the front desk and Katie sends me a text about something private, the potential the staff will see it is very real. I get up and go to my ancient monster of a computer and send her a message. I’ll go into work early to call her and to be sure Jensen isn’t an early riser and drops my phone off sooner rather than later.

I’m back in bed and staring at the ceiling fifteen minutes later, finally dozing off around five, and jolting awake at six, the aches in my body wishing I hadn’t slept at all. I think I’d feel better. By seven, I’ve had three cups of coffee and am dressed in a pale pink skirt and black sleeveless silk blouse with my black pumps. I’ve forced myself to take a few minutes to cover the dark circles under my eyes and applied just a little extra lipstick to match my skirt and a little extra eye shadow and blush.

I walk into the hotel at 7:20, almost two hours before I’m scheduled, and head straight to the front desk. “Has anyone turned in my cell phone?” I ask Sheila, the thirty-something front desk supervisor who is as friendly as she is efficient.

“No but I’ll keep an eye out for it. What color is it?”

“White but it’s in a red case. An iPhone.”

“Oh,” she says, her red painted lips twisting. “That’s bad. They can be reused fairly easily.”

“Yeah,” I say, though I somehow doubt Jensen needs to use my phone. “Thanks for keeping an eye out. I’ll be at my desk in the next fifteen minutes. And Sheila, I’m worried about the staff reading some personal stuff from my mother.” It’s not completely a lie. My mother is a piece of work who has embarrassed me more than once. “I don’t want Meredith to get irritated by chatter floating around about her or me like it did last time.”

“Yeah,” she agrees, having witnessed the “last time” when my mother made a scene over my disdain for stepfather number four. “Your mom’s pretty crazy. I’ll guard your phone.”

“Thank you so much.” Her phone rings and she gives me a nod and answers it.

Turning, I quickly decide against the main elevator where I might run into Jensen and instead head for the service area, forcing myself to consider an uncomfortable possibility. Jensen is still here. He has to be. I could go to him and ask for my phone. I discard the idea, afraid I’ll end up naked and in his room when I can’t forget why I left in the first place. I think he’s married. But I could leave a note under his door. And say what, though? I already expect him to leave my phone up front. And what if he catches me while I’m still there? I step into the service elevator and stare at the buttons to each floor, trying to decide my next move. I’m an adult. I could go to his door. My finger lingers over floor thirty and I grimace and punch twenty where I’ll find Katie and her rocker.

Fifteen minutes later, I’ve slipped the birthday card and a note warning Katie not to use my phone number under her door and made my way to my office on the tenth floor where the executive offices are located. I decide to call the room Katie is in, but there’s no answer. I resist the urge to look up Jensen’s room and confirm he really is Jensen. That’s wrong. It’s unethical. I dial Katie’s room again to no avail and force myself to work.

An hour of work later, and several unanswered calls to Katie’s room, my lack of sleep starts to get to me. I make coffee, but now I’m jittery, and I need food. Still in avoid-Jensen mode, if that’s really his name, I call down to the restaurant and order breakfast to limit the time I’m downstairs. Nervously then, I venture downstairs and manage to slip into the kitchen where I eat my breakfast. I return to the office at ten minutes to nine, surprised to find Meredith’s door shut. She never closes her door until I’ve brought her coffee.