Lilli…

We were late, but I’d kept Veronica up-to-date with regular texts and she was the only person we were technically late for. She kept telling me to stop worrying about it and to have fun, but it was how I was. I was a worrier.

We pulled into the subterranean parking garage of the hotel and stopped at the kiosk to pull a ticket. The attendant at the booth let us know that we just needed to present the ticket when we finished checking in and that they would add the parking to the room charge. I was good with that. I didn’t want Backdraft paying anything and by golly, the movie studio could foot the parking bill. He’d just saved them a huge amount of money in airfare, so yeah.

We parked in one of the motorcycle stalls conveniently located near the elevators and Backdraft unlocked and opened up one of the hard-sided saddlebag things, pulling out a heavy black backpack. He slung it over one shoulder after locking up and, helmet dangling from his other hand, gestured for me to go ahead of him.

I’d taken my helmet off too, and tried to smooth down the flyaway hairs in my reflection on the elevator doors. This was a swanky hotel, probably one of the finest in New York, and had been rented in full for the premier.

The elevator dinged and the doors swept open onto a lobby full of brass and dark marble. We clacked our way across the shiny floor, our boot heels making a heavy sound and I smiled. Silly, but it made me feel like a badass.

“Can I help you?” The desk clerk looked disdainfully at our presence and I felt myself blush and shrink a bit. I just wasn’t the prima donna type and I still wasn’t used to asserting myself, so I tried to remain polite, even though the desk clerk didn’t seem to have any interest in even trying.

I wonder what the matter is? I thought as I said, “Yes, I’m Timber Philips and I believe there should be a reservation for me under that name?”

“Right,” he said. “Identification?”

I blushed and pulled out my production ID with my author name on it and my given name and handed it and my new Maryland state ID over the counter. He looked at them both like he didn’t believe who I was and said, “I’m going to need to see a proper ID with the name ‘Timber Philips’ on it, Ms…” he checked my license again, “Banks.”

“Hey, don’t do that, man. She’s trying to be polite. There’s no need to talk to her that way,” Backdraft said, and his tone was gentle but firm.

“And you are...?” the clerk asked and I stiffened taken aback.

“Is there a manager I can speak to, please?” I asked, abruptly. I was pretty done with this guy.

“Timber!” We all turned to the voice that called out and I smiled, my shoulders sinking with relief as Veronica hurried across the lobby in our direction.

“Problem?” she asked.

“Yeah, guy’s being a total dick,” Backdraft stated flatly, and Veronica gave me a long slow exaggerated blink, her expression saying it all. When she turned, she gave the clerk a pointed look.

“Problem?” she demanded again, and the clerk tugged his jacket down and shook his head.

“This is Timber Philips, I’m officially vouching for her. Now, get her a damn room key,” Veronica snapped and I got the distinct impression that this wasn’t the first problem she’d had with the hotel.

The clerk did his job but didn’t look happy about it, and he held out the room key to Veronica. She snatched it out of his hand, rolled her eyes, and handed it to me. I took it; he said, “Room 1422,” in a bored tone, and Backdraft looked like he was about to come unglued. I put my hand on his arm and jerked my head toward the elevator leading up into the rest of the hotel.

We trooped over and called it to the lobby, and when the doors swept open, stepped on board. As soon as the doors shut and the elevator began to lift, Veronica and I squealed like the two excited girls we were, hugged, and bounced up and down.

Backdraft looked surprised and turned a little bit green as he said, “Whoa!” I tried to rein in my excitement, remembering what he’d said about elevators and entrapments before he quickly followed it up with, “Do that again.” He grinned, I laughed, and Veronica did too before holding out a slim hand.

“Veronica Preston,” she said and arched one auburn brow. “You must be Backdraft.”

“Yeah,” he said with a slow, sexy grin and I rolled my eyes. Just friends, I reminded. Just friends, you can’t be jealous and why wouldn’t he flirt? Veronica is beautiful.

She was, too. Tall and slim, perfectly toned, with long auburn hair swept up into a high ponytail. She wore a perfectly-tailored matching dark-brown suit jacket and pencil skirt with light gold pinstripes and a cream silk blouse underneath. Her high spike heels were a chocolate-brown alligator skin, though I didn’t think it was real.

“Nice to meet you, Backdraft.”

He looked past her and his eyes landed on me, a questioning look in them as he asked, “Lil didn’t introduce me as Emmet?”

“Why would I?” I asked. “That may be your name, but it’s not the one you choose to go by. I told you that your preference mattered more than formality.”

His mouth drew down into that classic, I’m impressed look and he asked, “So, we’re here, what’s the plan?”

Veronica laughed and said, “I like him.”

I grinned. “I told you,” I said.

Backdraft paused. “Wait, you told her what, exactly?” Veronica and I exchanged a look and both of us burst out laughing. Backdraft reeled back and said, “Oh, oh-ho, I see how it is!”

The elevator doors opened and we stepped off onto our floor. We found the room and I slid the keycard into the lock. The little light blinked green and I opened the door into a typical hotel room with a single king sized bed in it.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Veronica looked like she was fuming. “I’m going to feed that little twerp every brass button off that vest in reverse.”

“What does that even mean?” Backdraft asked.

“Up his ass,” I explained.

“Come on, we’re going to get this fixed,” Veronica declared.

Cue over forty-five minutes of arguing with the hotel staff and management over the lack of pre-ordered accommodation as laid out in the initial agreed-upon booking. Or, so Veronica said. She was pretty much to the point that even her unflappable calm was severely damaged. I expected her to lunge over the booking desk at any second and make good on her promise upstairs. Me? I sucked at confrontation. I just wanted everyone to stop fighting and being angry at each other.

Backdraft ended up being the calm to prevail when he stepped in and put his hand on Veronica’s shoulder.

“Clearly they aren’t willing to compromise,” he said. “In the interest of not causing a total scene right now, this room will do, but you know what? There’s a thing called Yelp and there’s plenty of other social media outlets, so this is what’s going to happen. Your hotel is going to comp the room completely, and in exchange, on our end, Lil here isn’t going to pick up her pen. Trust me, boys. Her pen is indeed mightier than her sword and she could completely destroy your hotel’s reputation.” The desk clerk looked down his nose at me and the manager finally took a good look and blanched. Backdraft’s smile was pure evil as he said, “That’s the compromise, boys. Either take it or you put your head between your legs and kiss your asses goodbye.”

I tried to back up Backdraft’s threat by calmly looking them back in the eyes like I was already thinking about what to write and how to phrase things. The manager, realizing that I was, indeed, the real Timber Philips, asked us, “Would you like a complimentary breakfast served in your room, or will you be taking it in the restaurant?”

“Attaboy, and in our room, if you please.”

The manager looked to me for confirmation and I smiled sweetly. “That would be lovely, thank you,” I said calmly, and Veronica gave me a tight-lipped smile with a raised eyebrow.

We left the front desk and went back for the elevator and she said, “Impressive, you two.”

“Not really,” Backdraft said, tiredly. “Feel like we took the low road.”

“We did, but it wasn’t any lower than the road they seem to travel on a regular basis,” I murmured.

“Right, totally the high road by comparison,” Veronica agreed. She gave me some side-eye and asked, “You’re going to rake this place over a verbal cheese-grater even after they comped the room, aren’t you?” I gave her a tight-lipped smile back and sighed. She knew me so well.

“They comped the studio,” I said with a shrug. “We’re the ones they insulted.”

“That’s a good point,” Backdraft said. He was looking at me like he was duly impressed.

I sighed, it was a bit of a damper on the trip but I refused to let it get to me. Instead, I changed the topic completely and asked Veronica, “Did you bring them?”

“I will have them brought up, now that we know your room number.”

“Thank you.”

“Bring what?” Backdraft asked.

“The clothes she ordered, and the designer dress the studio ordered to put her in for the red carpet.”

“I don’t have any idea how any of this works,” he confessed and Veronica smiled.

“That’s ‒my‒ job, thank you very much,” she said.

“Dinner is?” I asked, and Veronica launched into doing what she did best. I smiled at Backdraft and let him be swept along with the Hollywood tide.