Page 88 of Tasty Cherry
“With you? Absolutely.”
“That’s what I like to hear.” His grin is infectious, and we stand there a moment just smiling at each other.
I point at the blue door. “Are we headed to the Cinderella suite?”
“Better. Come on. You can never breathe a word of this to anyone.”
I lift the hand not holding our sandwiches. “Scout’s honor.”
He presses a quick kiss to my mouth, and that’s how I know there’s no camera here. “You were never a Scout.”
I laugh. “Were you?”
“Troop 69, Greater Boulder.” He clicks his heels.
“You were not 69.”
“Oh, yes, we were. Google it. It was a great joke, even though half of us had no idea exactly what it meant.”
I’m twenty-two, and I have only a vague idea of how it works, two people locked together in opposite directions.
I bet Sebastian knows everything.
He presses his key card to the janitor’s closet lock.
The first lock engages, then there’s a slow turning of another one. Finally, the door pops free.
“Fancy,” I say.
“Oh yes,” he says. “We upgraded and slightly rerouted this path last year when someone leaked photos.”
Ohhhh. “Is this the secret suite?”
He holds a finger to his lips. “Come on.”
When we enter, there’s a set of shelves filled with cleaning supplies. But something’s wrong. They aren’t labeled correctly. I try to pick one up, but it’s glued to the shelf.
“False front,” Sebastian says. He reaches down to pull on a yellow bucket.
Something clicks.
The entire shelf swings away from us, revealing a narrow set of stairs that definitely aren’t the usual ones with the windows overlooking the front of the property. They only go down, even though there is a floor above us.
“This is positively banger,” I say.
“Banger. I guess that means cool?” He’s grinning, like I’m talking “young people” slang. As if thirty-two is old.
Although Camille thinks so.
“Totes,” I say, even though that’s not a thing we’ve said since high school.
He laughs again.
Lights pop on as we descend the skinny stairs. The walls are painted in a pastel rainbow, and each wall sconce is a metal cloud.
We arrive at the bottom to another door requiring a card. Sebastian uses his.
“Who all can come here?”