The Moretti Clause

Chapter Three

The staff entrance of the Moretti Grand was on the side of the building, a heavy door with a security panel next to it and a man in a black uniform standing outside who looked at every person who approached like he was personally deciding whether they deserved to enter or not.

Imani decided she liked him immediately. That kind of energy she understood.

She gave her name, he checked his list, nodded once and let her through. Inside was a long corridor, cool and bright, nothing like what the outside of the building promised but functional in a way that made sense. This was the part guests never saw. The part that made everything else work.

Josh was already there when she walked in, standing with a small group of other temp staff near a folding table where two women in hotel uniforms were handing out name badges and clothing bags.

"You're late," he said when he saw her.

"I'm exactly on time."

"You were supposed to be here at eight fifty."

"It's eight fifty-eight."

"Like I said." But he was smiling.

She took her place in the short line, got her badge, IMANI, printed clean in the hotel's font which was probably worth more than her rent, and was handed a clothing bag with her uniform inside. Black skirt, a white dress shirt, a black vest with the Moretti Grand crest on the chest, small and gold. She held it up for a second.

It was nicer than anything she currently owned.

She changed in the staff bathroom down the hall and looked at herself in the mirror when she was done. She looked like she worked here. Like she belonged here. She straightened the vest and told herself that was not a feeling she needed to explore right now.

When she came back out a woman was standing at the front of the group and everyone had gone quiet without being asked. That was the kind of presence that did that to a room.

Her name tag said PATRICIA and she looked somewhat in her forties, sharp-eyed, the kind of thing that came from never sitting still. She held a clipboard and looked at the assembled group of temp staff with a rigid look .

"Welcome to the Moretti Grand," she said. Her voice was even and precise. "I'll say this once so please pay attention. This hotel operates at a standard that most of you have not worked at before. That is not an insult, it is simply a fact. Our guests are not regular guests. They do not have regular expectations. And you, for the duration of your time here, represent this hotel and everything the Moretti name stands for."

Imani kept her face neutral. Beside her, she felt Josh stand up slightly straighter.

Patricia went through the list. No phones on the floor. No personal conversations between staff where guests can see. Eye contact and a greeting for every guest you pass. If a guest asks you something you don't know the answer to, you find someone who does, you do not guess, you do not speculate. You move quickly but you do not appear to be rushing. You smile but not too much. You are present but invisible.

"Present but invisible," Imani repeated quietly to herself.

Josh leaned slightly toward her. "She always like this?"

"How would I know?"

"Right." He straightened back up.

Patricia looked in their direction. They both looked back at her with completely innocent expressions.

"Any questions?" Patricia asked the group.

Nobody had questions.

"Good." She clicked her pen. "Follow me."

They went through a second set of doors and then through a short hallway and then Patricia pushed open a door and held it and the group filed through and Imani stepped into the actual hotel.

She stopped for just a second.

She couldn't help it.

The lobby was … it was a lot. That was the only way to put it. High ceilings, the kind that made you feel small in a way that wasn't unpleasant. Dark marble floors that reflected the light coming through the tall windows. A chandelier that Nico had been right about it, it was ridiculous, it hung in the center of the space like something that had no business existing in the same world as her apartment. Everything was deliberate. Every surface, every arrangement of flowers, every carefully placed piece of furniture.

She made herself start walking again.

This was a job. Thirty-eight dollars an hour. That was what this was.

She caught Josh looking at her from the corner of her eye.

"Don't," she said.

"I didn't say anything."

"You were about to."

He pressed his lips together and kept walking.

Patricia spent the next hour taking them through the sections they'd each be working, explaining the layout, and introducing them to the permanent staff they'd be operating alongside.

The permanent staff were polite but weary of them. Imani understood that. She'd been the new person enough times to know how to navigate it. She did her work, she stayed out of the way, she learned the floor faster than most people because she'd been waiting tables since she was nineteen and some things were just muscle memory by now.

By afternoon she had the section down and was moving through it with the kind of quiet efficiency that she could tell Patricia was noting without saying anything about.

She was refilling a water station near the east corridor when she heard it.

Not a sound exactly. More like a shift. The particular change in atmosphere that happens when someone important enters a space.

She'd felt it before at the bar sometimes when somebody walked in who had a certain kind of feel to them. The room just knew.

She looked up.

Down the far end of the corridor a small group of people were moving. Suits, earpieces on two of them, the kind of formation that meant whoever was in the middle was not to be approached without invitation. She could only see him for a second , tall, dark suit, the kind of posture that didn't come from effort, it just was. The staff in the corridor were moving differently around him, adjusting, straightening.

Then they went through a private door and the corridor went back to normal.

Imani looked back at the water station.

Rich guest. Big security. Probably some CEO or politician or whatever.

She finished refilling the station and moved on to her next task.

She didn't think about it again.

She got home at eight that night and called Nico before she'd even taken off her shoes.

"Okay," she said when he picked up. "The chandeliers."

He screamed a little. "I TOLD YOU."

"You told me."

"Was it not the most beautiful thing you've ever seen in your life?"

She looked around her apartment. The string lights around the window. The worn hardwood. The fan was going because Gerald still hadn't fixed the AC.

"It was pretty up there," she said.

"Pretty. PRETTY. Imani."

"Okay it was a lot. It was a whole lot. Happy?"

"Extremely." She could hear him settling in. "Tell me everything."

So she did.