Pretending To Belong To THE BEAST

Chapter 4: The Collision

Mira's POV

The hotel doors were my only hope against the deadly storm outside. I just wanted a safe place to hide but I had no idea of what I was getting into.

The spinning door of the Fairmont Le Château Frontenac had pushed me inside, out of the freezing rain and into the warm and bright hotel. For just one breath, I’d let myself believe the worst part of the night was finally behind me.

The hotel’s lobby was a madhouse. A kid whined nearby and I flinched and pulled my wet gown away from my thighs. Yet every single person in this lobby had somewhere to belong. I surely was the only one who didn't. Families slept on couches, luggage carts crowded the space and a huge Christmas tree stood in the center.

Ugh. Get it together, Mira. Come on. Okay. Don't fall apart in public. You have survived worse than a bad night in a hotel lobby. The part of my brain that knew how to fake being okay kicked in without me even thinking about it. The FIX IT part of me. I then rolled my shoulders back, lifted my chin about two inches and smoothed the front of my soaked dress with both palms. First rule was Keep Your Face Calm. Move like you have every right to be here, even when every single thing about you is screaming that you don't.

I walked up to the front desk and the manager had the name tag M. Tremblay and typed fast. His fingers tap-tap-tapped the keyboard without looking up as he held the phone between his ear and shoulder.

"I… I need a room," I said and cleared my throat twice. My voice came out rough and cracked. It was worn down by the cold and everything else the night had already taken from me. "Just…just for tonight, okay? That's all."

Now he put the phone down. "So... Do you have a reservation, madame?" He looked at me from head to toe with his eyes moving over my wet dress and my hair that had given up a few hours ago. Oh, Wonderful. I felt every inch of his eyes. The wet dress. The ruined hair. And the way I must have looked exactly like what I was, which was a woman with nowhere to go.

"No. Um. Look, my flight got canceled. It's not like I planned this. I'm not here for fun." I said.

"I mean, I just need a place to sleep. Anywhere... somewhere safe."

He waved his hand toward the crowded mess of people and bags and sleeping children behind me as if the answer was already obvious and I was wasting his time by asking.

“Right, so, we are all full, I'm afraid. The storm shut the city down. I cannot help you, madame. I'm sorry but I simply cannot. You understand, right?"

My chest squeezed tight the way it normally does when something really bad is about to happen. It felt exactly like being back in Queens as a little girl and listening to that landlord bang on our door because we were behind on rent and my mom had nothing to give him.

I reached into my bag and pulled out every crumpled bill I had left, the one from the pawn shop and spread them on the counter between us like they were something worth fighting for. I flattened the bills with both palms in a careful and obviously desperate way.

"I have two hundred and fifty dollars." I said it as though it was a perfectly reasonable thing to say. "I don’t need anything fancy. Just a bed and a lock that works. That's... that's all."

Tremblay looked at the money. "We need a credit card in the system. We can't just take loose cash from someone walking in off the street. You see the problem. And honestly Madame, even if we could take it, that amount of money wouldn't even cover the cancellation charges. Take a seat in the lobby with the others."

I wanted to tell him I was important, that I had a title and a career and people who needed me but even as the words were about to come out, my voice cracked right down the middle and gave me away completely. "Wait….my wallet was stolen. I…I can't... please."

"Okay, then. Next, please!" He called out to the person behind me like I had already disappeared, like I was nothing but air standing in front of him.

Then, heat rushed up my neck and into my cheeks so fast it almost felt like a slap because it was that type of embarrassment that sits in your skin for days. Don't. Don't. Don't. I grabbed my money off the counter, shoved the bills in fast, crumpled them without caring about who was looking and then stuffed it back into my bag with a zipper ZZZT without counting it. I just walked away before he could see my eyes go wet. Dignity. That was the only thing I had left and I was holding it together with both hands. The huge lobby suddenly felt like the walls were slowly moving toward me from every direction. I needed a moment to hide.

I found a vending machine tucked into a quiet hallway, dropped in some coins. CLINK. CLINK. CLINK. I grabbed the one thing it could give me that felt like comfort; a small cup of hot black coffee even though I didn't like it. I never liked it. I just needed something warm to hold. I wrapped both hands around the little paper cup and pressed it against my chest while letting the heat soak through my dress because it was the closest thing to comfort I had right now. I was twenty-seven years old, it was Christmas morning and there was no one to call, no one waiting up, no one who would notice if I just sat down on this cold marble floor and didn't get back up.

I walked as fast as my heels would let me, looking at the floor, trying to move faster than the tears that were already building up behind my eyes. Just... keep moving. I swung around one of those big fancy stone pillars to get out of the way of a family dragging their suitcases through the middle of everything.

And then…BAM. I walked straight into something solid and warm and completely still, and the whole world stopped in that moment for me.

I didn’t fall and ran straight into a hard chest. I made a sound. Not a word. Just a…sound.

Every bit of air left my body at once as though I had run full speed into a wall that had not been there a moment ago. My hands flew up and pressed flat against his chest before I even knew what I was doing.

I tried to say sorry. But all that came out of my mouth was, "I..oh…I…" The little paper cup got caught between our bodies and gave up immediately with sides caving in, lid flying off, hot coffee going absolutely everywhere with no warning and no mercy. The coffee spread fast and dark across the front of my dress and was deep into the gray fabric of his hoodie and for one horrible second neither of us moved or said a word.

“Oh ….Fuck!" Then a low, rough voice said exactly what I was thinking. Then silence followed again.

I stepped back fast and my heels slid on the polished floor with my arms going out to the sides like it was somehow going to save me from falling in front of a complete stranger. I tilted my head back and then kept tilting because this man was so tall in a way that made me feel like I had wandered into the wrong story entirely and he certainly did not look happy about any of it.

He grabbed the wet front of his hoodie and pulled it away from his skin like he was working very hard not to say something he would regret. And for a moment I forgot about Julian, the money, and the storm. Because the way he was looking at me made it very clear that this man had already been having a bad night long before I spilled coffee all over him, and I had just made everything terribly worse.