Danielle Steel - Hotel Vendome

“Do you miss living in Europe?” she asked him. He was still very European, in his manners and his dress, and the hotel had a decidedly European feeling to it, and in the way it was run. It was one of the things their guests loved most.

“Not really. This is home now. I’ve lived here for almost twenty years. I just hope my daughter doesn’t decide she wants to live in Europe after going to school in Lausanne.”

“I doubt it. It would be hard to give up all this, and an adoring father. I’m sure she’ll want to come back when she finishes school.” Natalie smiled at him warmly.

“You never know. She’s only nineteen. She’ll have fun there at her age.” She was already looking forward to skiing in the Alps and had been e-mailing him about it.

Natalie talked about some of her ideas for the rooms then, and she was anxious to show him what she’d brought. As soon as they finished lunch, she retrieved her bags from the front desk, and he grabbed a key and took her upstairs. She liked what she saw in the room. It was even prettier than she remembered, and the first thing she suggested was moving some of the furniture around, to give it a feeling of more space. She took one piece into the bedroom and suggested they get new lamps. He had never liked the ones they had, so he was pleased. She propped the paint samples against the walls then, and spread the fabrics around in groups and explained how she would use them.

Just looking at what she had chosen brought the room to life. There were warm taupes and dove grays, an ivory color, and a few dusty soft blues. It all worked together beautifully, and one by one they eliminated the fabrics he liked less. She suggested a new rug, and he agreed, and he liked her ideas for the window treatment, and the right wall color jumped out at both of them immediately, and she was going to trim some of the moldings in the living room in taupe. He loved what she suggested and how she did it.

She put what they had selected in one bag, and everything they had rejected in a stack on the couch, and then they walked into the bedroom and did it all again. The yellows she had selected were absolutely perfect in the room. In less than two hours they had made all the important decisions, and she promised to order everything in the coming week. And then they sat down in the living room, and she showed him photographs of the paintings that she liked. There were two that he approved immediately, and he was impressed by how reasonable they were. He thought she was a genius at what she did.

At three o’clock they were back in the lobby, and they were both excited by what they’d accomplished in a short time. One of her big bags was full of the samples of everything she was going to order, and the other was full of what he didn’t want, although he had liked some of that too, but not as much as the rest. She had given him great choices, and he liked the prices of the fabrics she wanted to use. She had stayed away from expensive brocades and velvets and had stuck with sturdy fabrics that would hold up to constant use.

“It was great,” he said as he smiled at her. “You made it fun. I wish my daughter were here.”

“We’re going to knock her socks off with a fabulous new suite when she comes home,” Natalie promised, and she could hardly wait to start. She wanted to knock his socks off too, since he was paying the bill.

He thanked her again and walked her outside. The doorman hailed her a taxi and put her bags in it for her, as Natalie shook Hugues’s hand and smiled at him.

“Thanks for brunch and a terrific afternoon,” she said warmly.

“Thank you for a beautiful new suite.” He returned the smile as she got into the cab, and he waved as they drove off, and then he walked back into the hotel with a happy expression on his face, and a spring in his step. He hadn’t had this much fun since Heloise left for Lausanne. The concierge nodded at him as he walked by, wondering who the pretty woman was. He hadn’t seen Hugues look that peaceful and relaxed in years.

BY WEDNESDAY NATALIE had ordered everything, fabric, paints, trim, the two paintings he liked, and she had found lamps and wall sconces that were perfect for the room. She dropped by the hotel on Thursday to show him rug samples, and he was impressed by how much she’d done. He hadn’t said anything to Heloise about it when he spoke to her. He wanted to surprise her when she came home.

He had explained to Natalie that they needed to close the suite for as little time as possible. It was why he wasn’t letting her do the high-revenue presidential and penthouse suites yet. He wanted to see how fast she worked. Natalie felt sure that if they began working on it at the end of October, once all the fabrics were in, she could have it up and running again by Thanksgiving. They had agreed to leave the bathroom as it was, the existing fixtures were good looking, and with a fresh coat of paint it would look bright and new. She assured him that she had everything under control. And he promised her that if the final result was as elegant as he thought it was going to be, he would give her the other three large suites to do and one day the presidential and penthouse suites as well. Natalie was thrilled, and so was he. He wanted her advice now about some of the other rooms, without redoing them all.

They met the following weekend to look at some other rooms, and she suggested simple fixes and adjustments that wouldn’t cost a lot of money but would update their look. They had brunch in the restaurant again, and they seemed to find reasons to talk to each other every day. Jennifer smiled at him now whenever Natalie called, or Hugues mentioned her name. He seemed to be enjoying their new decorator a great deal. It made Jennifer happy to see him relaxed, interested, and enjoying a woman he was willing to spend time with, and not just the quick hit-and-run clandestine affairs he had had for years. The time he was sharing with Natalie contributed something to his life.

“Don’t give me that look,” he said to Jennifer one day, when she announced yet another call from Natalie. Her third of the day, and he called her just as often. “It’s just business. She’s doing a great job. Heloise is going to be thrilled.” Jennifer was not so sure. If her father was as interested in Natalie as he appeared to be, not just as a decorator, Jennifer was concerned that Heloise might feel threatened by her. She was completely unaware of her father’s quietly conducted dating life for the past fifteen years and had never shared him with anyone. It would be an entirely new experience for her.

He talked to Natalie about Heloise the second time they had brunch together, and went for a walk in Central Park afterward. It was a golden September afternoon. He told her how important his daughter was to him and what a special girl she was.

“I can’t wait to meet her,” Natalie said, as they strolled along next to each other, enjoying the warm weather. He had left his suit jacket in his office, and she was wearing a T-shirt and jeans. “It sounds from what I hear from everyone that she’s part of the life force of the hotel.”

“I bought the hotel when Heloise was two. And her mother left two years later, when she was four. She’s had free run of the hotel ever since, and she loves it as much as I do.”

“It must have been hard for both of you when her mom left,” Natalie said gently, and he nodded, thinking about Miriam, which he seldom did. He hadn’t cared about her in years. Heloise had filled a void for him. He didn’t have a serious woman in his life, but he had a daughter he adored.

“Unfortunately, Heloise doesn’t see much of her mother. She leads a very different life now. She’s married to Greg Bones.” Natalie couldn’t imagine the handsome Swiss hotel owner married to someone who would be married to Bones. “That was a long time ago. It’s been almost fifteen years. And she has two other children. She and Heloise don’t have much in common when they get together. I guess she’s too much like me.” He smiled at Natalie. He liked talking to her.

“That sounds like a good thing to me,” Natalie said, smiling at him. Greg Bones was well known for his cocaine and heroin addictions and his frequent stays in rehabs, and even visiting in their world didn’t sound wholesome to Natalie.

“Thank God she didn’t try to take Heloise with her. And I think she’s been happy with me here at the hotel. Everybody loves her, and it’s a safe, protected little world. Kind of like growing up on a ship.” It was a funny way to put it, but Natalie could see what he meant. The hotel was totally self-contained, almost like a town unto itself.

“She must miss it,” Natalie said sympathetically. Hugues sighed as they sat down on a bench in the park.

“Not enough, I’m afraid. She just started going out with a French boy at the hotel school, and she sounds like she’s falling in love. My worst fear is that she’ll stay over there.”

“She won’t,” Natalie said confidently, “not with all this to come home to. It sounds like she’ll run the hotel with you one day.”

“I didn’t want her to. I thought she should do something else. But once she decided to go to hotel school, that was it. She fought me like a cat about it when I tried to dissuade her. This isn’t the life I wanted for her once she grows up. It doesn’t leave room for much else.” She could see that that was true. Whenever Natalie called him, at any hour, he was at work.

“Were you never tempted to marry again?” She was curious about him. He was very reserved and a little bit aloof, except with her. Natalie made him feel comfortable and at ease, and he did the same for her.

“Not really. I’m happy the way things are. I’m too busy to be married, and I’ve had Heloise for all these years. That’s been enough. What about you?” He turned to look at Natalie then. She was a beautiful woman, and she had never married. She lived for her work, as he did, and she had no children. In some ways, it seemed like a sad life to him, especially without a child.