A Gentleman's Affair

by Linn, A. J.

  Patrice is assisting me with a few last-minute work-related issues before I leave for a two week trip to Las Vegas. The groundbreaking ceremony for Pisa is tomorrow and I need to be available there to help get everything up and running. I also remind her to make sure that all of the arrangements for the brunch following the ceremony are in order.

  Matt Reynolds, the manager of the hotel, and Adam Pasqualla who manages The Underground, our nightclub here at the hotel, join us to go over what needs to be addressed in my absence. Matt has been with me for five years, Adam for two-and-a- half. They are both very good at what they do, and I have complete faith in them to keep the hotel from burning down while I’m away in Vegas.

  I make my way through the hotel being sure to have a quick word with every employee before I leave. I have a wonderful staff, but we all know how employees can behave when the boss is away. There always seem to be a few that try to take advantage of this kind of situation. It’s like having a substitute teacher: people want to fuck around, call in sick, try to leave early. I don’t tolerate that kind of shit. Never have, never will.

  Matt is already waiting outside for me with the car ready to take me to the airport, which is less than a twenty minute drive from the hotel. “Did you remember your cell phone this time, Donovan?” he jokes. Yes, it’s true. My last trip to Vegas, we got all the way to the airport when I realized that I had left it in my office.

  “Yes, I’ve got it right here.” I laugh, shaking my head as I hold up my cell phone in front of him. “Did you remember to put my suitcase in the trunk, Matt?” He laughs and shakes his head right back.

  Matt has become a very good friend to me over the years…almost like the brother I never had. He met his wife, Kacie, on an online dating site two-and-a-half years ago, and they were married one year later. She is now pregnant, so I have pretty much lost my drinking buddy. But that’s alright, I’m very happy for him, and the bar scene is extremely overrated—unless you’re referring to my bar, of course.

  I sit back and relax, enjoying a nice cold beer during the short flight to Vegas. I’m suddenly reminded of something that my hairstylist, Lizzy, said to me this morning as I was getting my hair cut. We were talking about all of our dating disasters like we usually do. She has been doing my hair for close to eight years now, and we always have a good laugh as we trade our horror stories. Over the years, it’s become a sort of contest to see who has had the worst date in the five weeks in between visits. Anyways, she said that I clearly have a giant “L” splattered across my forehead, with all of the bad dates that I’ve been having recently. She told me to stop taking out every single girl that I meet on the side of the road. I had to laugh as I thought back to that conversation, because she couldn’t be more right. I really do that.

  The flight went smoothly, which is always a plus in my book. I’ve never cared much for flying. But now that I’m checked in and settled into my hotel, all is good again. There is a dinner meeting tonight with the investors at one of the better local restaurants here in Las Vegas, so I decide to take a quick shower in order to wake up. These meetings usually to turn into late nights that always seem include one too many drinks.

  I arrive at the restaurant promptly at eight o’clock and seeing that my party has already been seated, I make my way through the restaurant to join them. Two hours pass, and it suddenly dawns on me that the conversation never even made it to business. Instead, the drinks began to flow immediately, and after months of this plan in development, we actually turned this into what I think was a much-needed celebration.

  After some prodding, I finally get the investors to take a moment for some much-needed discussion on the finalizing of this project. I can hardly believe that my long-time dream of opening a hotel here in Las Vegas is about to become a reality. I urge the men to slow down on the drinking, reminding them that we have the groundbreaking ceremony to attend early tomorrow morning. They all agree to take it easy, but continue to drink way too much anyway. What else can I do but join them? This is a celebration, after all. Fuck it. You only live once.

  Eight a.m. came too quickly. I wake up with a slight hangover, and seeing how the rest of my party drank last night, I can only imagine that they are feeling about ten times worse than I am right now. I place a call to room service, ordering up a light breakfast before getting into the shower. Thankfully, this will be a short day, as we only have the groundbreaking ceremony and the celebratory brunch to attend. Starting tomorrow, my days will be filled with meeting after meeting with builders, inspectors and surveyors for the new hotel.

  I have about an hour before I need to be at the site for the ceremony. After a quick shower and a shave, I put on my favorite dark blue Armani suit with a black silk tie, and I sit down at the small table in my suite to eat breakfast. This will give me time to go over the notes that I’ve made for the speech that I am giving this morning.

  Startled by a sudden knock at my door, I look up from my notes trying to shake off the writing trance that has consumed me for the past hour. I check my watch, and realizing the time, I assume that it’s my driver at the door. Taking a final sip of coffee, I gather up my now-finished speech and walk across the large suite to open door. The hotel driver tells me that my limo is waiting, and that we need to leave now in order to arrive on time.

  I rehearse the speech in the limo a couple of more times as we drive to the site. I’m nervous, anxious and excited, all at the same time. Today is a very important day, and I only wish that my parents were here to share it with me. Mom would have been extremely proud of me, and I know that Dad is…but he just didn’t have it in him to make the trip. But I won’t let any of that ruin this day. I’ve worked way too hard for it.

  We arrive at the site, and there is a crowd of around 100 or so people already gathered. I see the Mayor standing near the podium talking with my investors and an older gentleman that is holding the shovels that we will be using to break the ground in the ceremony.

  I shake a few hands as I make my way over to them, greeting the Mayor first with a firm handshake and a nod. “Mayor, thank you for taking time out of your busy morning to be here.”

  I turn to the investors, shake their hands, and quickly turn back to the Mayor as she responds: “It’s my pleasure Mr. Hart. We’re all extremely excited about this particular property—not to mention the new interest that it‘s going to bring to the city.”

  She turns to address the investors, smiling graciously. “Gentlemen, if you’ll excuse me, it looks as though we’re ready to begin.”

  Turning her attention back to me, she holds out her arm directing me towards the podium. “Mr. Hart, please join me at the podium. Let’s break some ground shall we?” I respectfully nod, follow, then stand just off to the side of her at the podium as she begins her opening speech.

  “First, I’d like to welcome you all to the groundbreaking ceremony of Pisa. We’re all very excited about the erecting of this new hotel and are certain that it will be a wonderful addition to the city. I’m honored to have had the pleasure of getting to know Mr. Hart over the past few months, and we are thrilled to welcome him, and Pisa, to our fair city. Now, without further ado, let me introduce you to a man with quite a vision, Mr. Donovan Hart.” She turns and smiles at me as the crowd cheers and roars with applause along with her.

  I can’t help the ridiculously wide grin on my face as I hear the applause. I shake the Mayor’s hand as I take my place at the podium, completely forgetting to take my speech out of my coat pocket. I stand silent for just a moment to take in the crowd. All eyes are on me and the applause continues.

  “Thank you. Thank you everyone.” Chuckling, I hold my hand up in the air in an attempt to silence the crowd. “That was quite a warm welcome. Thank you, Mayor.” I turn to her with a nod and a warm smile as the applause finally dies down.

  “Thank you all for being here this morning. This project has consumed the better part of my life for the past year, and today the dream becomes a reality. My fa
mily has been in the hotel business since I was eight years old, and I always knew that one day I would follow in the footsteps of my parents and open a hotel of my own. The idea for Pisa came to me back in 2005 during one of many family vacations to Northern Italy, where my mother was born. For some reason, that awkward leaning tower that always looked like it was about to fall down to me as a child, suddenly held new meaning for me. Its architectural beauty is unlike anything else in the world, and I knew then that I had to find a way to replicate this masterpiece and somehow erect it right here, in Las Vegas.”

  The crowd again roars with cheers and applause, and again, I hold up my hand to quiet the crowd. “Now, I would like for Michael Rafferty and Russell Montrose, my business associates on this project, to join me here at the podium.” I join the crowd in the next round of applause as they walk up and stand next to me. “I would like to thank the both of you for believing in my vision and helping me see it through to its fruition.” Nodding with a grin, I shake each of their hands while posing for pictures that are being taken by local press and guests.

  The Mayor approaches the elderly man that has been standing by with the shovels, two in each hand. She takes the shovels from him then joins us, congratulating us as she passes them out. All four of us place the shovels into the dirt, smiling as we pose for more pictures. I hand my shovel to Mike and return to the podium to wrap things up.

  “I would like to thank you all again for being here this morning for this momentous occasion. We look forward to seeing you all in the grand ballroom back at my hotel, for a celebratory brunch.”

  I turn to address the Mayor one last time. “Mayor, thank you again for everything. I hope that you’ll join us to celebrate.” After shaking her hand, we all leave the site to make the short drive to my hotel to begin the celebration.

  Chapter Five

  ~Zoie~

  It was a perfect day. The ceremony and celebratory brunch were all that I had hoped for and more. The only thing missing were my parents. I would have really loved to be able to share all of this with them. But if the last seven years since my mother’s death have taught me anything, it’s to seize the day.

  And that’s exactly what I did. I seized it with one too many glasses of extremely expensive champagne. Now back at my suite, I change out of my Armani suit and into my swim trunks, deciding that a few laps in the hotel pool before dinner with Mike and Russ will wake me up.

  The cool water of the pool is exhilarating. My mind drifts off as I’m doing my laps, and I begin the non-stop evaluating of my life that I seem to be doing a lot of lately. The bad dates. The brief relationship I had two years ago with my former assistant, Danielle, that urged me to never date anyone that I do business with again. That makes me think of Scarlett and how I would probably ask her out if she wasn’t now working for me.

  I think of Matt, my hotel manager, and how he met his wife, Kacie, on an online dating website. He’s tried many times to convince me to sign up on one, but I never thought of myself as an “online dating kind of guy”. It feels impersonal to me, but nothing else seems to be working… Maybe I should just give it a shot. What can it hurt, right?

  I ask myself why I turned down the hot blonde who was all over me at the brunch this afternoon. She was practically begging to come up to my suite. Why? Because I’ve been there. I’ve done all of that. Alright, so I am a guy and I have needs…and I love sex, don’t get me wrong. But I have had plenty of “stranger lovin’ ”, as I call it, to last a lifetime. I want more.

  I get out of the pool and go back up to my suite to shower off the chlorine and get ready for dinner. After my shower, I wrap a towel around my waist then take the trimmer out of the small toiletry bag on the bathroom counter to trim the scruff on my face to a five o’clock shadow length. I run my fingers through my wet hair smoothing it back, thankful that I had a haircut the other day and that I can forgo gel for a few weeks before it becomes unruly again. I fucking hate that shit in my hair.

  Now dressed in my favorite pair of jeans and a white button-down dress shirt, I slip on my watch, noticing that it’s time to go downstairs and meet Mike and Russ. As I ride the elevator down to the lobby, I can’t help but wonder what tonight will hold. Knowing those two and the steam that we all need to blow off, tonight will be filled with some sort of debauchery.

  Mike and Russ have been friends and business partners for over ten years now. I decided when I partnered up with them that I would leave my personal life out of the equation. Little do they know the secrets about my personal life that I keep from them. Maybe after Pisa is finished, I will invite them to my club and let them see for themselves. But for now, all they will see is the professional side of me. It’s better this way, trust me. Only my staff, people closest to me, and the elite members of The Underground know the real me. And I plan on keeping it that way.

  Moving on. I’ve already said too much. Now I’m going to eat, rid myself of my near hangover from earlier, and see what kind of trouble Mike and Russ have planned for tonight. I’m not going to get into what happened the last time we all met here for business. That’s a whole other story.

  I wake up still wearing the clothes that I had on last night. Head pounding, mouth dry. Mike and Russ were in rare form last night. Dinner was followed by about ten too many drinks, and they made sure that we hit every single hot club here in Las Vegas. I think that there was a strip joint thrown in towards the end of the night, but at this point, I can’t be completely sure.

  Now I have to wake my ass up and get to a breakfast meeting with the site manager for the new hotel, while Mike and Russ will be sleeping in, as they are taking a later flight back to Los Angeles. Assholes.

  I drag myself out of my nice warm bed and stumble to the bathroom for a quick shower. Luckily, Steve, the site manager, is a pretty easygoing guy, and my unprofessional, highly hung-over self shouldn’t even phase him.

  After an eye-opening cold shower, I quickly pull myself together, pulling on jeans and a black button-down shirt. I slide my feet into my new Amedeo Testoni shoes that I picked up during a trip to Milan earlier this year. I hear a knock on the door, which can only mean that my driver is here to take me to the breakfast meeting. I grab my wallet, shoving it into my back pocket and answer the door.

  You may be asking yourself right about now: “Why is this man, who is the boss by the way, running around in such a rush, when he indeed calls all of the shots?” Well, I’ll tell you why. It is simple. I practice what I preach. I expect the people that I employ to always be on time and ready to work, so I, in turn, will always behave in that same manner. Sure, I can shuffle some things around, be late on the rare occasion that it can’t be helped, but I will always give 100 percent and I will always expect the same to be given back to me.

  After a long day spent going over the blueprints for the interior of Pisa with Steve, I’m finally back in my suite and completely exhausted. I’m definitely never drinking like that again, especially when I have to be up that early for a meeting.

  I order dinner from room service before taking my laptop over to the bed. Relaxing back against a few pillows that I’ve propped up against the headboard, I decide to check my emails. The first email that I open is from Patrice informing me that Scarlett has cleared her schedule and that she will be set to begin the redecorating early next week. I reply to her, then return a few more emails as I hear a knock at the door. I jump up from the bed to go answer it, happy to see a cart with my dinner being wheeled into the suite.

  After consuming one of the largest steak dinners that I’ve ever seen—full and now extremely sleepy—I return to my large bed. Too tired to deal with the remaining emails, I shut down my laptop, turn off the light, and before I know it, I’m fast asleep.

  After a long week of breakfast meetings, conference calls and late nights going over blueprints, I find myself wanting to shut off my cell phone and lock myself in my suite for the night. I’ve given a lot of thought about what Matt said about how he met his
beautiful wife. Online dating. I bite the bullet, search the internet, and choose a site. After setting up my profile, I add a headshot of myself and write out a short bio, then begin to search the women in the Los Angeles area.

  Christ, there are some frightening-looking women on here. I wouldn’t be caught dead with most of them. But I remain positive and continue my search for the love of my life. I know. That made me laugh too.

  Fifteen minutes go by and just as I’m about to shut this bullshit down and go to bed, I get a notification at the top of my profile page: “You’ve got mail”. Seven messages. I’m almost afraid to look, but I click on the mail icon and dive right in.

  Jenny 67, Oxnard…Are you fucking kidding me? Too old. Deleted.

  Susan 35, Big Bear…Five children. No thank you, Susan. Deleted.

  Mirabella 22, Brentwood…Too young. Deleted.

  Charles 26, West Hollywood…Charles, what the fuck? I’d better check my settings. Deleted.

  Zoie 26, Hermosa Beach…Nice photo, pretty face, lives nearby. I open the email and begin to read before moving on.

  Hi!

  I came across your profile and just wanted to say hi. I really love your eyes and your super sexy smile! Look at my bio and write back if you’re interested. Oh yeah, what’s your name?

  Zoie

  Alright, she seems normal, and she thinks that my smile is sexy—points for her. I read her bio thoroughly and decide to respond. Here goes nothing…

  Hello Zoie,

  Thank you for your interest and for the compliments. I did take a look at your short bio and I have to say, very impressive indeed. Forensic Science, good for you.