Page 49 of Wrong Room, Right Billionaire

Chapter 17

Morgan

“Miss me already?” Conrad answers the phone with his usual cockiness, and I am immediately seething.

I was seething before he answered the phone. I was seething as soon as I heard the woman yelling at the counter. Because issues in one of my resorts should never escalate to the point of yelling. There should never be anything wrong enough for that to happen. Ever.

But I needed to get out of that room. Before things went too far. Yes, we need to practice believable chemistry. But with the way things were going, we were about to practice more than that. And I’m not about to let myself get that distracted. No matter how fucking luscious those hips are.

Goddamn those pants.

So I focus on the negative.

“What the hell is going on at these resorts?” I growl into the phone.

“You tell me. I was recently suspended from the travel portion of my job,” he tells me. I wish I was standing in front of him so I could pop that smirk off his face.

“The drains are clogged. The beaches are dirty. The A/C units aren’t running properly. And that’s just the tip of the shit pile, Conrad.”

“Sounds like normal hotel things to me,” he says flippantly, and my rage level goes up another notch.

“We are not a normal hotel, Conrad. We are Bale Resorts, and I don’t know if you are aware, but we are at the top of the chain for luxury resorts. Or we were,” I nearly shout.

“Why are you so riled up about it?” he asks. “You never cared before. Not enough to go hotel hopping with a checklist.”

“That was your job. A job we agreed to years ago. How long have things been this bad?” I demand.

“You’re assuming they've always been this bad,” he says. “San Diego is kind of a cess pool anyway, at least compared to other resort cities. Definitely not my favorite. You should go to Rio! That resort is banger.”

I grit my teeth so hard I’m pretty sure my tongue is bleeding. “Our standards, our parent’s standards, should apply to every resort we own. I don’t care if we open a roadside motel, the Bale standard should stand.”

But Conrad just scoffs. “Be real, brother. Our standards will never reach Mom and Dad’s standards, and you know it. They can’t. We aren’t them.”

His words feel like a rip in my chest, like sutures are being slowly torn from old wounds. “No, but it was left to us. And letting things go to hell in their absence is a disgrace to them both.”

“You know what else is a disgrace,” he says with literally no emotion in his voice. I mean, I am deflecting the pain too, but where I throw up walls, he throws out sarcasm. At least my defense mechanisms aren’t a direct hit at our late parents. “These articles. People are saying you’re hooking up with guests. Pretty sure Mom and Dad would be shaking a finger at that.”

“Are you going to believe everything you see on the internet?” I snap.

“Only the good stuff,” he says. I know he’s grinning; I can hear it. “Though I will say, this little minx you hired is very good at her job.”

My anger shifts to something else. Something more spiked. Something almost possessive.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“The travel blogger? MooreToExplore? You haven’t seen her recent post?” he asks.

“I haven’t time to scroll Instagram, no,” I mutter. “I’ve been too busy cleaning up your messes.”

“I’ve heard. Also, the mess isn’t entirely mine. Middle management is a huge issue at these places. We can stomp around all we want while we are in the building, but once we leave, things go lax again. Not much we can do about that,” he says. I have about a hundred things to combat every part of that sentence, but I bite my tongue and he goes on. “You should check it out. The post I mean. She’s a great photographer. There are some gorgeous shots of the resort. And even a couple of your ugly mug. I didn’t even know you knew how to smile.”

I have zero idea what he’s talking about. Obviously, I’ll have to check it out later. But right now, I’m just trying to get to the bottom of things.

“Anything going on there?” he asks, and I’m ready to wrap this useless conversation up. I’m pretty sure his voice is on the verge of giving me a migraine.

“What do you mean?” I ask on the back end of an exhausted sigh.

“With you and Scarlett. I mean, even her Insta handle implies there’s a lot to explore if you know what I’m saying. Might as well take advantage while you’re already on vacation.”