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Useless.
I sat up and grabbed my phone from my bed, loading up a social media site. Sumner had to be a unique enough name that I’d easily be able to find it, right? Except when the search loaded, I was met with a few women named Sumner, a few profiles with no picture, or profiles that didn’t belong to the man sleeping next door. I tried a different app, but again ended up with nothing.
In the age where everything was online, how was it that the only two men in my life didn’t have profiles I could stalk?
Three knocks on my hotel room door pulled me from the depths of my spiral, along with a soft voice through the wall. “Room service.”
“Finally,” I all but exclaimed. Pushing up from my bed, I shoved my feet into my slippers and stalkedacross the room. Most of the lights in my hotel room were off save for the lamp near my bed, and it threw odd shadows on the walls. “Nearly an hour for a bottle of wine.” With that, I hauled the door open.
A staff member stood outside with a cart that held the chilling bottle of wine, and he greeted me with the signature Massey Suites smile. He must’ve heard my muttered remark through the door, because he replied, “We didn’t have what you requested in stock, Miss Margot, so we had someone run to the store.”
I peered closer at the label on the wine. “I didn’t ask anyone to make a special trip.”
He had his shoulders hunched like he was afraid of a scolding. “Only the best for our best.”
I actually cringed at the motto.
The door to Sumner’s hotel room ripped inward, much like it had the very first time I’d discovered him to be my neighbor, but this time, it only startled the staff member. Sumner stumbled into the hall in his bare feet, as if ready to catch me sneaking from my room, but halted at the sight of the room service deliverer and their cart.
“You weren’t sleeping?” I asked him in mild surprise. It was clear that he’d planned on it soon. He wore navy pajama bottoms and a loose-fitting gray T-shirt. His golden hair was loose in waves over his forehead, eyes bright.
I became aware of my attire, and all the bared skin on display. There was no time, no chance, to cover it up this time.
Sumner didn’t focus on me, though. He zeroed in on the staff withimmediate suspicion. “What’s this?”
“He’s delivering wine, clearly.”
“At eleven o’clock at night?”
The man butted back in, “We deliver whenever someone orders it.”
“Helpful, thank you,” Sumner muttered, and turned to me with his eyebrows raised.
I, however, was no longer willing to continue the conversation in the hall. I stepped out of the path of the door and held it open. “Into the living room, please,” I told the staff.
Sumner immediately laid his hand on the service cart, refusing to allow it to move even an inch. “She doesn’t need you to bring it in,” he said. “Having a man in your room is exactly what your parents are against.”
“He’s a staff member.”
“So was I when you kissed me.”
The man, after a moment of deliberation, seemed to decide it was in his best interests to abandon the cart. “H-Have a good evening.” With a little bow, he excused himself, and Sumner turned back to me.
I leaned my hip against the door. “You scared him off.”
It was almost as if Sumner didn’t notice what I wore until that exact moment. The vintage inspired piece was nothing scandalous by any means. The silk gown was white, but perfectly opaque. The top was lower cut, but not so much that cleavage was visible. The lace hem fell just below my knees, and the sleeves were long, cinched at my wrists. Not anything scandalous at all.
And yet Sumner looked sharply away, as if he’d seen aplethora of my skin and not the silk material. “What—what are you wearing?”
“Pajamas.”
“It’s—it’s adress.”
I tilted my head to see him clearer. Even though he turned his face away, I could see a flush to his cheeks. “More specifically, it’s a nightgown.”
“You don’t wear dresses.”
I stepped back out of the doorway. “Come in and we can argue about my clothing attire over a glass of wine. Or at least out of the hallway.”