He Didn't Know She Was the Heiress novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Housekeeping

Ethan flies to Chicago and hands Lena a check marked Housekeeping to stay away from Connecticut. She takes it, and plans to hand it back at his grandmother's table.

At eight that night the front desk rang the penthouse.

The night manager sounded careful.

"Ms. Fairbanks, a Mr. Ethan Sorrell is in the lobby. He says he's your husband and he won't leave."

I was standing at the window of my father's old suite in a hotel robe, watching the lake go black.

I had been in the building for ten hours and every employee already knew my name.

"Is he alone?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"I'll come down."

Ethan had taken a flight to find me.

He stood in the middle of the lobby in a camel coat, with his phone in one hand and a white envelope in the other.

He had found me by the shared location on my phone, and I had left it on to see if he would.

The bellmen watched him.

So did the two women at the front desk, and a couple checking in with a sleeping toddler.

I walked across the marble in my bare feet and a robe with a gold F stitched on the pocket.

Ethan's eyes went down it and back up.

"Wow," he said. "Housekeeping lets you keep the robes?"

"What do you want, Ethan?"

"To talk. Somewhere private."

"Here is fine."

He lowered his voice, which made it carry less and sound worse.

"Lena, I'm not here to fight. Look, I was blunt yesterday, and that's on me."

"Is that the apology?"

"It's the start of one." He held the envelope out. "Grandmother doesn't know I'm married."

I did not take it.

"Seven years," I said.

"She thinks I'm single. She would have asked who you were, and I'd have had to say a night clerk's daughter with a nursing degree." He shrugged, easy. "She's old. She likes names."

The younger of the two desk clerks stopped typing.

"Thursday is the biggest day of my life," Ethan said. "A good deal fell apart this morning, and my brother is the reason. Some woman in a coat took the whole Fairbanks board away from him, and nobody even knows who she is."

I looked at the floor so he would not see my face.

"So you want something from me," I said.

"I want you to stay away from Connecticut. Stay in whatever hotel this is. Don't call Grandmother, don't call Becca, and let me bring Maisie home in peace."

"And in return?"

"Fifteen thousand dollars, and the apartment through March."

He put the envelope in my hand, and I opened it.

It was a cashier's check.

On the pay-to line, in his tidy printing, it said Lena Ward.

In the memo space he had written: Housekeeping.

I read it twice.

The bellmen had stopped pretending to look at the luggage.

"You wrote 'housekeeping' on it," I said.

"It's a joke, Lena. It's a business thing." He glanced around and gave the lobby a smile. "She's going to be fine. She's dramatic."

The night manager had come up behind Ethan without a sound.

He was a broad man in his fifties, and he stood with both hands folded, and said nothing.

I let the silence run.

Then I folded the check in half and put it in the pocket with the gold F.

"I'll stay away from Connecticut," I said.

Ethan nodded, relieved, and I disliked him more for it.

"Good," he said. "You always were sensible."

"I'm going to bed. You can show yourself out."

"You're not going to say thank you?"

"Thursday," I said. "I'll say it then."

He frowned, unsure whether that was a promise.

He decided it was, because he always did, and he buttoned his coat.

"By the way, nice hotel," he said. "Do they pay you well? Tell me if you need a reference."

The night manager spoke for the first time.

"Sir, the car for your return flight is waiting. Mr. Sorrell's ride is on us."

Ethan blinked at the courtesy and gave an arrogant nod.

He walked out through the revolving door into the cold.

The toddler woke up and cried, and nobody in the lobby moved to hush him.

I turned to the manager.

"Thank you for the car."

"It was my pleasure, Ms. Fairbanks." He cleared his throat. "Your father would have thrown that man through the glass."

"My father would have hired him," I said.

I rode the elevator up to the penthouse.

In the suite I laid the check on the desk and smoothed it flat.

My phone buzzed.

It was a text from Becca, with a photo of Maisie asleep on my couch under the blue blanket I had crocheted.

Under it she had written: She asked if you hate her. What do I tell her?

I held the phone a long time.

Then I typed: Tell her I could never hate her. I haven't decided about you.

I set the phone down.

I looked at the check again, at the word Housekeeping in his careful handwriting.

On Thursday at two o'clock, I would hand it back to him at his grandmother's table.

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