Page 34 of Cocky Prince
There’s no way the facility manager isn’t in on the suite Mira and Tyler found. He has access to everything going on in the building. I slam the drawer shut, and all the bobbleheads nod their agreement. It’s got to be here somewhere.
Scanning the rest of the room, my gaze stops on a tall file cabinet in the corner. One of the drawers is locked, but the others aren’t. I head over and open them one by one. And strike gold. The manager keeps site plans for the building as well as work repair documents in the file cabinet. I’m definitely getting warmer.
Riffling through the papers, I find nothing out of the ordinary. Which coincides with the other digging I’ve done. I’ve searched every hotel floor at Blue Casino and have yet to find a suite that doesn’t look like all the others. One of the floors has been under construction for months, but it was the first place I looked. The completed portions check out. These documents do too.
I shut the bottom drawer of the cabinet and stare at the top, locked drawer. If someone wanted to hide something, it would be under lock and key.
I hurry back to the desk and search for keys. I’m running out of time, and the facility manager has about two hundred keys in his desk to choose from. Only a few are small enough and look like they might fit. Grabbing the small keys, I scramble back to the cabinet and I try each in the locked drawer. None of them work.
Crap. I look around once more. The office is simple: a desk and chair, the cabinet, and a shit ton of bobbleheads. Most of the bobbleheads are sports themed, but a few are interesting, including a jaunty little skeleton pirate with a square treasure chest…
A treasure chest that looks like it opens.
I return the keys to the desk drawer and stare at Mr. Pirate’s treasure chest. I reach over and flip the lid.
And see a small key inside.
Holy shit.
I grab the key and carry it to the drawer, my hands shaking. I slide the key in the lock and it turns, the cabinet opening for me.
Locked cabinet drawers are suspicious, but that’s not why my heart is blasting through my eardrums—the row of files labeledBlissinside the drawer is why. Everything I’ve found so far I could identify as something I’ve seen or heard of before at the casino, but not Bliss. I’ve never heard of this project, and as a manager, I should have.
Pulling out a handful of folders, I cross to the desk and lay them out.
The penthouse wing has been under construction for months. Blackwell told us a while ago that it was being renovated, and it was the first place I searched after Mira and Tyler found the suspicious guest room. The penthouse suites checked out, but according to the Bliss files, one half of the penthouse level—a portion separated by an outdoor veranda—is entirely different from the other half. And this portion of the floor has been blocked off from employee access these last few months while under construction.
According to these documents, there are four suites, each with the same layout. And they are so large as to be ludicrous. We have wealthy patrons who stay in our regular penthouse suites, which cost a couple of grand. Those rooms are booked for special events, at the most, and I’ve never heard of anyone leaving disappointed. The only reason the casino updates them is to keep current with trends. But maybe there was another purpose for the timing of the remodel.
The four Bliss suites that take up the second half of the penthouse floor are insanely extravagant, with a bar, an elaborate living area, their own elevator, and almost no windows—which is odd. The penthouse suites are known for their sweeping decks and views of the mountains and lake.
This whole time, I thought Blackwell switched rooms for his illicit activities. But what if instead of sneaking them in with the scenery, he’s created a new space for them? One so conspicuous it blends with the existing high standard of the penthouse floor?
Technically, no one has been allowed to look at that section of the penthouse floor. Sending unauthorized employees to a construction zone is a liability for the casino. The noise alone forced us to block off the floor beneath in order to maintain a standard of quality for hotel guests. But when I consider it, not allowing people onto those top floors has also provided a buffer and a level of privacy for whatever they want to do up there.
The Bliss suites are huge, their layouts strange, and based on the floor plan, there’s no reason they couldn’t serve the same role as the suite Mira and Tyler stumbled upon. This has to be it.
Male voices sound outside the facility manager’s door.
I look up, then glance at the files spread haphazardly across the desk. “Shit.”
I slap the files closed and race to the cabinet, shoving them back inside the drawer and locking it. I could pretend I was leaving a note for the facility manager. Which means I need to create one, dammit.
I scurry back to the desk and jot a quick note for the manager to come see me. I’ll think of a reason later. Lunging for the door, I freeze midway.
The key.
Spinning around, I run back to return the key to the pirate bobblehead’s treasure chest, but my heel catches on the carpet. I fly forward, and the key launches from my palm. I catch myself on the edge of the desk before I take a nosedive, but the key is nowhere in sight.
Shit,shit.
I drop to the ground and crawl, searching beneath the desk. After a moment of frantic patting of the carpet and not having much luck at finding the key, cold prickles race down my spine.
The sound of the door closing comes from behind and I suck in a breath, holding it.
“Hayden? What are you doing?”
Only Adam.I can talk my way out of this.
