Page 23 of Tech Prince Troubles (Runaway Prince Hotel #6)
Chapter Twenty-Three
ADRI
time to be grown-ups
T he past few weeks had been a rollercoaster, as humans say.
Night after night, we scrambled to catch up on the renovation work. Undoing the damage Jim had caused—replacing parts and rewiring the affected floors—took up most of our time, but every shift ended with a new spark of hope that we might make it.
My days revolved around Sam, once his children left on their vacation with Evan.
After well-deserved naps and exploring every inch of each other, we ventured into Princedelphia.
Sam showed me a different part of Princedelphia every day.
From the twins’ favorite store and the kids’ schools to their paddling club and the house he’d grown up in, I mapped every single one.
He didn’t only show places close to his heart.
He also took me to the zoo and the Princedelphia Metropolitan Museum, where I spent hours drawing and gazing at birds in many forms.
Today, he’d taken me to his home. I wasn’t sure who’d been more nervous—him or me.
Drinking espressos on the swings of their combined backyard—excellent, of course, even if he didn’t have an industrial Gandalf at home—he’d entertained me with snippets of their lives together.
He had a story about every toy, tool, and piece of furniture.
They made his face light up, more so when he talked about his children. It was clear he missed them.
As his tour ended, he’d invited me into his bedroom, where he’d fucked me long and slow.
Sitting on Sam’s wonderfully soft mattress, his head in my lap, his sweat-soaked hair tickling my legs, I embraced his family’s vibrant, hectic, and loving energy surrounding us. This was the energy Sam lived and breathed every day. He thrived on it. Nothing seemed too much for him.
I’d expected their spirited chaos to affect me more, to turn my system jittery, but Sam’s presence calmed me. Even when he’d driven me to the height of arousal, my system buzzing with need, his grounding shielded me, and I could truly let go.
He personified the perfect grounding system—dispersing all ambient stimuli before it unsettled me. Like my weighted blanket, with added espresso and addictive kisses.
“Can you not think so loudly?” Sam muttered.
“I…”
He snorted. “It’s a joke. Well… it should be, but there’s something buzzing beneath your skin that feels far too active for someone I just fucked through the mattress.”
And he made me feel comfortable, even when he made me blush—comfortable enough to try a joke myself. “I’m relishing in your energy. You were more than generous.”
A silent beat, then bright laughter. Sam raised his head. “Funny. Though, I’m sure I read an article by a conspiracy theorist from the sixties who’d believe that shit.”
“I read that too. When I said everything contains energy, I didn’t mean we could steal energy from sentient beings.”
“I didn’t think so.” He sat up and leaned his head against my shoulder. “Time to be grown-ups and get out of bed.” He kissed me. “If I want to get you back to the hotel in time for your shift, I’m going to need more coffee.”
I followed him, and we dressed in companionable silence. It made me smile when he helped me with my skirt while he was only half-clothed himself—pants clinging to his knees, one arm through his shirt.
I was still smiling when I drank his coffee.
“What?” Sam asked as he grabbed his car keys off the hook.
“I like it when you zip up my skirt.”
“Good. ‘Cause I like it too.”
We didn’t speak on the drive to the hotel, but listened to the playlist of my favorite music he’d created—classic and instrumental, as opposed to his modern tastes. He dropped me off at the entrance. “Have a good shift.”
I brushed my lips across his. “You too.”
A giddy buzz zinged through my system as he drove off—to the beat of his own playlist—and I went up to the Tech Hub. Time to get back to work.
As the hub door whispered shut behind me, I froze.
Not because Rick was yelling instructions into his phone—loud, but manageable—but because on the far side of the room, Jim sat at his desk.
I couldn’t move. I still remembered him standing over me with a gleeful look on his face after the energy glitch hit my system.
He was hunched over now, typing furiously, shooting glances at Rick every few keystrokes.
Rick hung up and frowned at me. “Are you okay?”
“What is he doing here?”
A pained expression crossed Rick’s face. “Yeah. Sorry. I was supposed to tell you, but I’ve been on the phone since I got in.”
“Tell me what?”
“That we need him back on night shift. I know Layla promised his shifts wouldn’t overlap ours until the ball, but I’ve been calling in every bloody favor, and no one’s available nights.
None of us are happy with that solution, including Layla, but there’s no other option.
And we all agreed to give him a second chance if he volunteered at the Vocational Center and ‘worked off his debt’ to the hotel. ”
He must have seen something in my face because he hastened to add, “I had desks moved to the ballroom if anyone needs space. Actually… Riley’s in there now, checking the new scans. Maybe you’d like to look at them before you start on the third floor.”
I left without a word.
Riley sat in the middle of the floor, surrounded by her lifeless chandeliers and three tablets, tapping away on her Bluetooth keyboard. She turned when I knocked on the door, her eyes red and puffy.
“They were perfect,” she muttered, sniffling. “Look at them now. One’s a write-off, and half of the LEDs are dead.”
“I’m sorry,” I said as I joined her on the floor.
One tablet displayed Riley’s chandelier schematics. She probably itched to work on them, but considering all that needed to be done, they weren’t very high on the list.
“What can I do?”
“About the chandeliers? Nothing until Layla finds a replacement.” She gave me a tablet. “Can you imagine the masquerade without the chandeliers?”
I shook my head. The ballroom would seem bare without them. Our schedule left little time for her to fix them, though.
“Anyway. Here are the scans.”
We bent over the tablets and compared the new scans to the ones we ran after the wall had stabilized.
“Ballroom systems are still a mess, but the lingering energy in the wall is still interfering with repairs. Same for the rooms above us, as you predicted. There are a few issues on the second floor that need our attention. The rest is unchanged,” Riley said.
“Should we tackle those now? Or leave them for later?”
I checked the schedule. “Best leave it. Fred and Ted are doing finishes there—trim and fixtures—and I don’t want to delay them any further.”
“Oh. Right. I’ve been so focused on our schedule that I forgot they were back on-site.” She sighed. “I might have to hit them up for alternative ideas if we can’t get the chandeliers up in time.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, other than offering her first choice of repairs.
“Thank you. Why don’t we alternate rooms on the third and see how far we get before our break?”
With one last glance at the chandeliers, we grabbed our toolkits and went up to the third floor.
It took us five hours and two snack and charging breaks to repair every issue, but when we were done, the energy flow on the third floor had smoothed out to a gentle hum that made me smile.
We’d even won a few more hours on the schedule.
As we stepped into the elevator, Riley looked me up and down, then narrowed her—still puffy—eyes at me. “If you weren’t Niren, I’d have asked if you had your hair done, but I know it’s not that. But there is something… different about you.”
“You mean since I was hit by glitchy energy?”
“Ha. You’re deflecting.” She shook her head. “I bet it has something to do with a certain espresso wizard.”
“‘Wizard’? Is that something from fairytales?” Of course, I was deflecting. Though her question reminded me of what Sam had told me about the coffee machine wizard and the magical coffee it brewed, which two of his children had made up stories about.
Riley explained wizards to me but stopped mid-sentence and glared. “Oh. Clever, using our cultural differences as a distraction. ”
The elevator doors opened, and I stepped into the hall. I didn’t feel clever at all. But what Sam and I shared was… too new, and I felt uncomfortable talking about it.
Shaking her head, Riley veered toward the vending machines. “I’m going to stock up on snacks and get some lunch. See you in half an hour?”
“Yes. I’ll get Rick up to speed. See you here or on the fourth.”
“Fourth.” She turned around. “And I will find out what you’re hiding.”