Page 1 of Hotel Mallois

Chapter 1

"I just need a couple more days, please. There's been a delay and I haven't received my paycheck," Jodie pleads anxiously.

"I'm sorry, Miss Sinclair, but we've been waiting for over a week for the monthly payment. Your mother needs special medication that we can't give her if you don't keep up with the fees," explains a man with a nasal voice and a tone that reveals his weariness on the other end of the phone.

"I'll try to solve it this afternoon," Jodie says, stopping as the head of housekeeping at the Mallois Hotel in New York halts in front of her.

"You can't talk on the phone while working, how many times do I have to repeat myself?" Marjorie snaps through gritted teeth.

Jodie covers her phone's microphone with her hand and speaks slowly.

"It's an urgent matter that can't..."

"If you don't hang up right now and get out of here in two minutes, you'll earn yourself a warning, Sinclair," the supervisor threatens, pointing her finger at Jodie.

Jodie Sinclair feels her mind might collapse at any moment. The physical exhaustion she's been carrying for so long doesn't compare to the mental burden she's been holding since a family tragedy destroyed the peace and perfect world she lived in. Her brother, addicted to gambling and drugs, led a double life that no one knew about until he ruined the family business, then took his own life and practically took their parents' lives with him. Now Jodie is alone, working two jobs, with many debts to pay and a sick mother she can no longer care for at home, so she had to, much to her regret, place her in a nursing home. Although the institution is one of the most affordable she found, its location in New York makes it almost impossible to afford. If Jodie didn't have to face the debts her brother left behind, it wouldn't be so hard to pay the monthly fee to keep her mother well-cared for. She sighs with weariness; she's been working at the Mallois Hotel for two years now and has no problems with her paycheck, but at her other job, the one she has to go to in the evenings until late at night, there's always something happening, and she ends up getting paid late.

She promises the man on the phone that everything will be resolved that afternoon and quickly hangs up to leave the locker room and collect her work sheet. She senses that Marjorie has assigned her more rooms than she can clean and needs to start as soon as possible.

"Are you okay, Jodie?" the question comes from Sarah, a coworker who has become a good friend.

"It's the nursing home payment again," Jodie tells her as they walk together toward the laundry room.

"Can't those jerks wait a few days?" Sarah asks with a furrowed brow. "It's always the same, not even twenty-four hours after the payment date and they're already calling to collect."

Jodie shrugs. She's used to it by now; since her mother was admitted, there have been few times she's paid on time.

"This time I'm a week late, I need to find another job," Jodie says while loading clean towels and sheets onto a cart.

Sarah stops dead in her tracks.

"You can't be serious, right?" she says and grabs Jodie's arm to make her look at her face. "You often look like a ghost, you're thinner, and the dark circles under your eyes are more obvious every day. Having a third job isn't something you can even consider, Jodie. This whole situation is killing you."

"What do you want me to do, Sarah?" Jodie asks more harshly than intended. "Something always happens, when it's not the delayed weekly payment from the bar, it's some garnishment or fine. You know I can't lose the house, it's all I have left, and believe me, it's not even about keeping the place where my father was born anymore, it's because I wouldn't have anywhere to sleep."

Sarah looks at her friend with a mixture of affection and sorrow. If it were up to her, she'd take her into herhome so she'd have, at least temporarily, one less worry. But her case isn't much different; although she doesn't have the debts Jodie carries, Sarah is the head of her family. She helps her parents, too old to work, and has a daughter from a relationship that didn't work out, whom she's raising alone. She knows Jodie is an incredible woman, intelligent and strong; life has slapped her hard, yet she's kept fighting tooth and nail against adversity.

"Instead of a third job, quit that sketchy bar and look for work at another hotel, Jodie," Sarah tells her, pulling her to a corner of the laundry room where there's a blind spot in the cameras. "Or better yet, ask for more hours here, you know the pay isn't bad, and if it weren't for that sexually frustrated Marjorie, we'd be living the dream."

Jodie lets out a spontaneous laugh; at least in moments of stress, Sarah always helps her relax somehow. Her friend isn't lying; if it weren't for Marjorie's presence, that tall, sickly-looking woman, the cleaners at the Mallois Hotel would be more comfortable, especially Jodie, because Marjorie seems to pay special attention to her.

"Talk to Ms. Taylor," Sarah says, opening her eyes as if she's just had the best idea in the world. "I'm sure she'll listen to you and find a place to put you."

Just hearing that surname makes a shiver run through Jodie's entire body. Katherine Taylor, the owner of the Mallois Hotel, has been her platonic love since she saw her one afternoon entering the reception area accompanied by who she now knows is her father. For Jodie, who had never believed in love at first sight, the moment she exchanged afleeting glance with Katherine, an arrow pierced her chest and made her heart race wildly. Since then, Jodie turns into a rag doll whenever she runs into Katherine Taylor in any wing of the hotel, making her lose all the confidence that has always characterized her. Her almost platinum blonde hair contrasting with those blue eyes has the power to completely dominate her with just a blink.

"I can't even look at her when she's nearby, I don't know how you think I could talk to her," Jodie shakes her head while returning to the cart to grab it and start making her rounds to the assigned rooms. "Besides, you know I've asked Marjorie for more hours, and she's always said no."

"That bitter old woman has it in for you," Sarah grumbles. "There's always work to do in this hotel, and it seems unfair that they hire new girls when someone on staff asks for more hours. Well, what are you going to do about the nursing home payment?"

"As soon as my shift ends, I'll go to the bar to ask for what they owe me. I hope the owner is there and pays me," Jodie sighs, knowing it would take a miracle for that man to be there early and actually have her money. "If not, I'll go to the nursing home to talk to the director personally."

Sarah squeezes her friend's arm in an attempt to give her strength before both women separate at an L-shaped hallway on the second floor of the Mallois Hotel.

Jodie enters the first room she has to clean that morning. She lets out a groan as soon as she steps inside, seeing sheets on the floor, the minibar in chaos, and all kinds of waste telling her the clients' night has beenquite wild. She puts on her gloves and mask to start picking everything up. Her mind is a whirlwind, constantly thinking about everything she's had to live through in recent years, and she begs heaven for a bit of luck so her situation might change, just wishing, at least for a while, to be able to breathe easy without worry and debts suffocating her.

Chapter 2

"Thank you so much, doctor," Katherine Taylor says, shaking the physician's hand.

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