“You can’t vent to Bryce?”

  “Oh, that isn’t the same and you know it,” Dina said, laughing. “I like Bryce, but he just doesn’t like to gossip the way you and I do.”

  Halle laughed. Her phone call with Dina had had the desired result. She was feeling better. “Okay,” she said. “I guess I’ll head back to my hotel now.”

  “Did the fancy billionaire at least spring for a nice hotel room?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Halle said. “I can’t complain about that part of the job at all. The room is incredible.”

  “I want pictures,” Dina said. “And I’ll send you some pics of the place I’m staying tonight, okay? That’ll make you rethink this maybe I should quit thing.”

  “Maybe so.” Halle chuckled. “Bad accommodations?”

  “They should actually be paying me to stay here. It’s gross.”

  Halle had reached the hotel now. She went inside, crossed the lobby to the elevator, and pressed the button to call it. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll stick it out. Thanks for the pep talk, Dina.”

  “What are you going to do tonight?”

  “I don’t know. Order room service, probably.”

  Dina groaned longingly. “Room service. Is your boss paying for that?”

  “Well, yeah. He said I could charge incidentals to the room.”

  “See, I’ll be getting my dinner from the motel vending machine,” Dina said. “I’ll let you know how the off-brand toaster strudels are, though.”

  “Oh, go out to a diner,” Halle said. “Treat yourself.”

  “You treat yourself,” Dina said. “As long as your dinner is on his dime, get something really good. Lobster or something.”

  “Might as well,” Halle agreed. “If he’s going to give me a hard time on the flights, I should get to live it up in between them.”

  “Exactly,” Dina said. “You have a good night.”

  “You too,” Halle said.

  But when she had hung up the phone and returned to her room, she felt a bit at a loss. Did she really even want to order room service? Would it be much fun to sit alone in this room and channel-surf, even if she was eating expensive food while she did it?

  If Dina and I were in the same city, that would be fun. How many evenings had they spent in one another’s motel rooms, watching bad TV and eating takeout food? Right now, she thought she would take that over lobster for one and a pay-per-view movie.

  She grabbed the room service menu and began to flick through it, smiling when she saw that one of the offerings was a charcuterie tray. She guessed it would probably be a lot nicer than the makeshift charcuterie she had served to Grayson to land herself this job in the first place.

  Suddenly, there was a knock at the door.

  She frowned. Is that reception? What could they want? Maybe there had been some kind of problem with payment for the room. She felt a spike of anxiety. If that was the case, she would have to call Grayson and let him know. That wouldn’t be a fun conversation.

  But when she opened the door, it was to find Grayson himself on the other side.

  “What are you doing here?” she blurted.

  Grayson raised his eyebrows. “That’s how you talk to your boss?”

  “I’m not on the clock right now,” Halle pointed out.

  “True enough, Grayson said. “Which is why you’re at perfect liberty to say no to what I came here to ask you.”

  “What?” Halle asked.

  “I wondered if you’d like to go out with me tonight.”

  “Go out with you?”

  “Out of the hotel, I mean,” he clarified. “Just as boss and employee, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  “It just seems a shame to be in Rio and not experience the city,” he said. “And going out with someone sounds like more fun than going alone.”

  Halle hesitated. Was this really a good idea? Did she want to spend her evening with Grayson Bloom?

  “Unless you have other plans, of course,” Grayson said.

  Halle glanced over her shoulder at the room service menu on the bed.

  “No,” she said. “I don’t have any plans. Let’s go.”

  Chapter 6

  Grayson

  Grayson was a little annoyed that Halle had seemed reluctant to come out with him. What did she have to do that was so much better than exploring Rio de Janeiro with him?

  But she had agreed in the end, so he did his best to shrug it off.

  He led the way out of the hotel. It wasn’t the nicest place in the city. He had chosen it largely because of its proximity to the downtown area, because he hadn’t wanted to rent a car while he was here. Now they could walk to all kinds of interesting places.

  “Wait up,” Halle called.

  Grayson turned, surprised, to find that she was several feet behind him. “Keep up,” he said.

  “You walk too fast,” she told him. “And your legs are a lot longer than mine.”

  “No they’re not,” he said. “You’re tall. They don’t let you be a flight attendant if you’re not tall.”

  Halle grinned wryly. “You know that’s a myth, right?”

  Grayson frowned. “Don’t you have to be able to reach the overhead compartments?”

  “You do, but that doesn’t mean you have to be tall,” Halle said. “Anyway, it’s irrelevant. You’re taller than I am. Your legs are longer than mine. And you’re walking too fast and leaving me behind, so the polite thing is to just slow down.”

  “Now you’re telling me what’s polite?”

  “Well, you don’t seem to know.”

  He stared at her. “Have you ever had a boss before?”

  “I’ve never had a boss who didn’t respect me, if that’s what you mean.”

  “What are you talking about?” he asked, startled. “I respect you.”

  “No you don’t. Case in point. If you did, you would be walking with me. Talking to me. Asking me how I’m liking the job, and if my hotel room has been comfortable. Things like that.”

  “I don’t have to ask you if your hotel room is comfortable,” he said. “I’m staying in the same hotel. And by the way, if I didn’t respect you, why would I have paid for this nice room, and allowed you to charge incidentals to my tab?”

  “Showing respect doesn’t mean paying for things.” There was a clear note of exasperation in her voice. “I mean, I appreciate the room. I really do. But I’m guessing a guy like you pays for things for everyone he comes across, no matter what he thinks of them.”

  Grayson frowned. Did he really not respect her?

  I do respect her. I think she’s great at her job. That’s why I hired her.

  But then he thought back to the flight. He had found fault with many of the things she had done, and she had pointed that out to him. He had even considered firing her—and after only one day! He had hardly given her a chance.

  Maybe she has a point. Maybe I should take it easy on her.

  “All right,” he said. “I’ll tell you what. Maybe you and I can start over. I think we might have started this employment off on the wrong foot.”

  She eyed him suspiciously.

  “I mean it, he said. “Give me another chance to make a first impression. And I’ll do the same for you. We’re in Rio. We might as well have a good night. And I don’t know about you, but I’d really like this working relationship to work out.”

  “I’d like that too,” she admitted.

  “Okay, great. So are you hungry?”

  “Well, I had something to eat a little bit ago…but I was about to order room service before you knocked on my door.”

  “Well, you can’t get room service in Rio,” Grayson said.

  “I can’t? They had a menu for it.”

  “No, I mean, you can, but you shouldn’t. You should eat in a restaurant. You want to make sure you experience the cuisine of the country while you’re here.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Oh, is that what I want?”

  He laughed. “Fair enough, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to speak for you. It’s what I think is a good idea.”

  She laughed. “I’m sorry too. I didn’t mean to nitpick. And you’re right, going out is a good idea. I did have some street food earlier, and it was really good.”

  “Street food’s fine,” Grayson said. “It doesn’t always have the best reputation, but there’s some good stuff out there. But for a real meal, we need to go to a sit-down restaurant.”

  “You sound like you’ve got something in mind.”

  “As it happens, I asked the hotel receptionist for recommendations,” he said. “One thing I’ve learned in my time is that hotel receptionists have the best information about their city. They’re used to having to recommend places to tourists, and the smart businesses invite hotel owners and operators to try their services so they can get their promotion.”

  “You seem like you know a lot about it.”

  “I do operate a chain of hotels myself,” he said. “That’s what we do.”

  “I’ve actually never stayed in one of your hotels,” Halle said.

  “You mentioned that in your interview,” Grayson said. “May I ask why not? We’re very highly reviewed.”

  “You’re very highly priced, too.” Apparently, she had decided to be candid. “It’s outside my budget.”

  “You’ll be able to afford it now, with the salary I’m paying you.” He smiled at her.

  She smiled back, but shook her head. “I actually need that money for something else.”

  “Oh,” he said, surprised. He hadn’t considered that. She had been working as a commercial flight attendant—not a particularly high paying job. Surely she couldn’t need money that badly?

  But maybe she couldn’t get a better job. Maybe she’s been struggling.

  It wasn’t a concept he was overly familiar with, having never struggled financially himself. But he could sympathize.

  He wanted to ask her about her circumstances, but he wasn’t sure it would be appropriate to do so. She had just made a big deal about the issue of respect. Maybe the wise thing to do would be to show respect by letting her have her privacy.

  They’d arrived at the restaurant. He stopped in front of it, but she didn’t notice right away and continued on a few steps before coming to a halt.

  “Oh,” she said, surprise evident on her face. “Are we here?”

  “This is the place,” he confirmed. “And tonight’s meal is on me.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Of course. Consider it a working dinner.”

  She smiled. “Fair enough.”

  They went into the restaurant. There was a wait for a table, but Grayson was able to slip a few bills to the host and skip to the head of the line. They were shown to a small table near the back of the restaurant.

  Halle surveyed the menu. “This is all in Portuguese. I can’t read it.”

  “You can’t?” Grayson didn’t speak Portuguese, but the written words were similar enough to Spanish that he could pick out the basics of what the menu said.

  “You can?” she asked.

  “Well, it’s just like Spanish.”

  “I don’t speak Spanish either.” She looked bemused. “Why would you think that I did?”

  “I thought everyone had to learn Spanish in school.”

  “I didn’t. I had a language elective, and I chose Mandarin.”

  “Oh,” Grayson said. “I had to learn Mandarin too.”

  “I’m guessing you went to private school?”

  “Well, yes.”

  “That explains it. Public schools don’t make you learn a bunch of languages. You pick one. And I don’t know if my experience is typical, but I didn’t get a lot of guidance when it came to knowing what to pick.”

  “How did you decide?”

  “My mom helped me,” she said. “She told me that knowing Mandarin was the most likely to be beneficial in the future.”

  “Are you close with your mom?”

  “I was.”

  “Past tense?”

  “She died a few years ago.”

  “Oh,” Grayson said. He felt himself flush. Had he overstepped? “I’m sorry.”

  “Thank you,” she said. “It was hard. But I’ve still got my dad, and we’re very close.”

  “That’s great,” Grayson said. “I wish I was close with my dad.”

  “You’re not?”

  “He’s not a fan of the direction I took the resorts,” Grayson said. “He wanted me to focus on keeping costs low and profit high.”

  “But Bloom Resorts are luxury hotels,” Halle said. “How can you operate luxury hotels and keep costs low?”

  “I mean, the most effective way to do it is by underpaying your staff,” Grayson said. “You can hire cheap labor and save a lot of money that way. And you can also cut corners when it comes to guest experience. If you spend money on flashy things like big TVs and jacuzzis, a lot of hotel guests won’t notice if you use cheaper sheets or flatter pillows, or if the food in the restaurant isn’t quite as good as it could be.”

  “Oh,” Halle said. “But you don’t cut those corners?”

  “No,” Grayson said. “It’s not the way I do business. I want each of my hotels to offer a unique experience that you can’t get anywhere else. Part of that is making sure my employees are happy, because you don’t get great customer service from a person who’s unhappy in their job. So I pay them well and I give them good benefits.” He laughed. “You should have heard my dad the day I changed the health insurance package we were offering the hotel employees.”

  “He didn’t like that, I take it?”

  “Oh, he was pissed. He told me they already had perfectly good insurance, and there was no reason to throw away money on a premium package. But you know what?”

  “What?”

  “Ever since we got the premium package, employees have taken fewer sick days.” He could feel himself beaming. “They’re actually healthier.”

  “Wow,” Halle said. “You really care about your employees.”

  “Of course I do. They’re part of the Bloom family.”

  “I’ve had bosses tell me I was a part of the corporate family before,” Halle said. “But I’ve never actually believed that they gave a damn about me.”

  “Well, I give a damn about everyone who works for me,” Grayson said, looking at her meaningfully and hoping she would understand the intention behind his words. “I feel that if someone works for me, I have a responsibility to them.”

  “That’s pretty decent of you,” Halle said.

  Grayson smiled. “You know what?” he asked. “I think that’s the first compliment you’ve paid me. Took you long enough.”

  Halle laughed. “That’s what you’ve been waiting for from me? Compliments?”

  “Is it so much to ask?”

  “I don’t think it’s in the job description for a flight attendant,” she said. “Sorry to disappoint you and everything.”

  “You’re not what I expected when I hired you,” he said.

  “Is that a bad thing?”

  “No. If anything, it’s a good thing. I think you and I are going to have a good time working together.”

  “Maybe you’re right,” Halle said. “I’m starting to feel pretty optimistic about it.”

  “I’m glad to hear it,” he said. “You know, on the flight here, things didn’t go that smoothly. I was worried you might quit.”

  “I considered it.”

  He raised his eyebrows. Even if that was true, he would never have expected her to admit it.

  “Why did you decide to stay on?” he asked.

  “Because this is a good job,” she said. “The money’s great, and the opportunity for travel is exciting. And you can’t be that bad, can you?”

  She was smiling when she said it, so Grayson knew she wasn’t serious. He smiled back.

  “No,” he said. “I’d like to think I’m not too bad, all things considered.”

  The waiter approached their table. “Are the two of you ready to order?” he asked. “Or would you like some more time?”

  “I’m going to need you to order for me,” Halle said. “I can’t read the menu.”

  Grayson nodded. “Not to worry,” he told her. “I’ve got it covered.”

  Chapter 7

  Halle

  “So what made you decide to become a flight attendant?” Grayson asked.

  Their meals had arrived, and he had immediately insisted on splitting the two dishes in half on additional plates so that they could both try some of everything. A part of Halle had been irritated that he was still taking such command—he seemed to really think he was in charge in every situation. He hadn’t bothered to ask her if she wanted to share her meal like this.

  But on the other hand, she couldn’t deny that there was something attractive about it. It was masterful. And in a way, though she hated to admit it to herself, it increased her respect for him.

  He thinks he’s in charge because he is in charge. I’ve never met a man who just takes control like this.

  “I always liked the idea of travel,” she said, in response to his question. “But it wasn’t something I could afford to do, especially right out of college. My parents weren’t wealthy, and of course I had student loan debt. So when I started looking for a job, one of my top priorities was to find something that would let me see the world.”

  “And have you?” he asked. “Seen the world, I mean?”

  “Not really,” she admitted. “I’ve been limited to domestic flights. This is actually the first time I’ve ever been out of the country. I always kept my passport up to date, just in case the opportunity came up. But it never did.”

  “I don’t get it,” Grayson admitted. “International flights need flight attendants. Couldn’t you have asked to be assigned to them?”

  “Those assignments usually go to more experienced flight attendants,” Halle explained.

  “But you are experienced,” Grayson said. “You’ve been in that job for a long time. You told me so.”

  “Yeah, now I have,” Halle said. “But when I first started, I couldn’t pick the assignments I wanted. I had to take what they were willing to give me.”