“Everything’s at the upholsterer now. I had some of the art reframed. The electricians are putting in the new fixtures next week. We can’t put the carpet in for two more weeks, and after that we’ll be ready for the installation. I promised you’d have the suite up and running again by Thanksgiving, and I think we’re almost there.” She looked pleased and so did he. And they agreed that the two new paintings were going to add some real power to the room.

She could hardly wait for the guests who stayed there to comment on what they’d done, particularly those who had stayed in the suite before. They got so much return business that most of his best clients knew the suite well and were upset that it was unavailable right now. All of them said that they had loved it before, and the reservations manager assured them that they would like it even better once it was redone. Hugues and Natalie both hoped that would be true.

“There’s an art show at the Armory this weekend,” Hugues commented as they finished lunch. As always, it was delicious, and even if just sandwiches, the hotel’s kitchen and restaurant had added all the little flourishes and touches that they were famous for. “Would you like to go?” he asked her. He was looking for every excuse now to spend time with her, even if it meant redecorating the entire hotel. He was totally smitten with her.

“That sounds like fun.” She smiled at him, finishing the last of their lunch. “I’d love to find you a new painting for the lobby, something strong,” she said pensively, and explained to him exactly where, as he glanced at her with a pleased expression. He had the feeling that she was falling in love with the hotel, just as he had. She was, but she was falling in love with him as well.

“I can’t wait till Heloise sees the new suite,” he said with a delighted expression.

“I can’t wait to meet her,” Natalie added, “although I have to admit I’m nervous about it. She’s a legend in this hotel, much more than even Eloise at the Plaza.”

“Everybody here loves her,” Hugues admitted. “They’ve seen her grow up since she was a baby, and they were wonderful to her when she was a little kid. They still are. She used to push the carts around with the maids, and she was always in the basement hanging out in the kitchen, or following the engineers. I used to worry that she’d want to be a plumber when she grew up. You have to be a jack of all trades in this business and wear a lot of different hats.” Natalie knew he did.

“How do you suppose she’ll feel about our seeing each other, aside from just decorating the suite?” It had crossed Natalie’s mind several times in the past month, since he had started asking her out. It hadn’t gone further than dinner and some very enticing kisses so far, but his daughter was so much a part of his life, and so much of a central focus for him, that she knew whether or not his daughter liked her would matter to him a great deal. And Heloise had had her father to herself for a long time.

“I think we just need to let that develop over time. She’s a big girl now, with her own life, and this French boyfriend I’m worried about. I think she’s ready to let me have my own life.” Heloise had never stopped him. She just hadn’t known about the women he went out with. But it would be different if he introduced Heloise and Natalie to each other. It was a big step for him.

“I don’t think you have anything to worry about,” Natalie said as she leaned toward him, and he kissed her. She slipped into his arms then, and they kissed for a long time. The bond between them was slowly deepening and the attraction growing stronger, but they both wanted to let things happen naturally. Neither of them was rushing it, and both had been burned before, so they were cautious about who they got involved with. And she was a very different woman than the casual encounters he had had for many years. She was becoming important to him. And Natalie wanted to take her time and let things unfold, which was comfortable for Hugues as well. They were in no rush, and they both felt that if this were meant to be, and a relationship were to develop, it would blossom at the right time. She knew his resistance to marriage and commitment. They were having fun with each other and discovering new things about each other every day. She wasn’t asking for anything more, and Hugues liked that about her too.

“I guess I’d better get back to work,” Hugues said regretfully as things started heating up between them. “I’m having trouble with my head sommelier, and I don’t want to lose him. I promised to meet with him to discuss it. Not to mention a disability claim one of the engineers is making, and threatening to sue me.” He looked unhappy about it. He had only been sued once by a guest in the past fourteen years, who had fallen in the bathtub and cut herself badly. She’d been drinking, and the fault was her own, but Hugues had settled to avoid bad publicity for the hotel, since the woman in question was well known.

It was a risk they ran daily with both guests and employees, not to mention with the unions, and the ordinary daily running of the hotel, with a constant flood of reservations and demanding guests. At times it was a heavy burden, and he still hated to have Heloise take all that on one day. He loved what he did, but the hotel’s success and reputation didn’t come easily and had to be constantly guarded and maintained. Natalie was becoming more and more aware of it as she got to know him better. It was not an easy business, and he did his job extremely well and had a gift for handling people, particularly those who were potentially trouble. He put balm on every situation and tended to every detail.

And he was kind to her as well. She thought he was a lovely person, and obviously a devoted father. She thought his ex-wife had been very foolish to have left him, particularly for the man she’d married. Greg Bones was no angel, and nothing Natalie would ever have wanted in a man.

They left his apartment together after kissing one last time, before stepping out into the hallway, and they looked professional and businesslike as they took the elevator downstairs. She got off on the floor of the suite she was working on, and he was going down to the lobby and back to his office. And a few minutes after Natalie checked on how the painters were doing, and was satisfied with their work, Jennifer came upstairs to see how things were going. Hugues had raved so much about the fancy paint job that she wanted to see how it looked for herself. And she was impressed with the artful job Natalie had gotten out of their ordinary hotel painters. It looked like a fancy first-class decorating job to her, and like everyone else, she could hardly wait to see it complete.

“The light in here is so good that it really helps,” Natalie said modestly, and Jennifer liked that about her too. She wasn’t full of herself or a diva. Despite her obvious talent, she was a very unassuming person. Jennifer had brought a box of the hotel chocolates upstairs for her, and they sampled them together, commenting on how irresistible they were. “If I worked here, I’d weigh six hundred pounds. The food is so good every time I eat here,” Natalie said as she ate a chocolate.

“Tell me about it,” Jennifer said with a woeful expression. And since they were alone, Natalie decided to ask her something that she was wondering about increasingly.

“What’s Heloise really like? Everybody here talks about her like she’s five years old in pigtails, and her father is so crazy about her, it’s hard to get a reading on who she is.” Natalie wondered if she was horrifically spoiled or really a sweet kid.

“She’s a lot like her father,” Jennifer said thoughtfully. “She’s very bright, and she loves this hotel as passionately as he does. It’s the only home she’s ever known, and the people who work here, and have for a long time, are her family. She has no one else except her father, and he thinks she walks on water.”

“I know.” Natalie smiled at her, helping herself to another chocolate. They really were impossible to resist. And they had little gold flecks on them for decoration, and a chocolate V. They were made exclusively for the hotel, yet another of the many touches that Hugues had insisted on from the beginning, even when he couldn’t afford them. People bought them and sent them as gifts by the caseload from the shop downstairs, which was actually a lucrative part of the business.

“It sounds like they have a very special relationship, which is understandable since she grew up without a mother. I imagine she must be very possessive about him. It sounds like there’s been no woman in his life for a long time.” She was snooping, and Jennifer knew it, but she didn’t mind. She would have done the same herself, and it was obvious to her that something romantic was happening between her employer and the interior designer he had hired to work on the hotel. She liked Natalie a lot, and thought she might be just the kind of person Hugues needed. And Natalie wasn’t jealous about the hotel, she was coming to love it too, which Jennifer knew was important to him. But Heloise’s approval would be more than important to him, it would be essential and a deal breaker for him. Natalie had correctly sensed that.

“Possessive?” Jennifer said, laughing. “She owns him. She’s had his heart in her pocket from the day she was born. And she was a mighty cute kid, with red hair, big green eyes, and freckles. She’s a beautiful young woman now. And her father and this hotel are her whole life. It’s pretty much the same with him. I’d be very careful with her, if I were you. If she feels you might take him away from her, she’ll be your sworn enemy forever.”

“I’d never do that to her, or to him,” Natalie said quietly, and meant it. “I respect the special relationship they have. I just wonder how she’d feel about his having anyone in his life, even without stepping on her toes.”