Hotel Vendome

“There’s your igniter,” he said, looking at Heloise and two of the security men. “Somebody set that on fire. There’s another one under the couch. I’d say somebody is playing games with you.” It probably wouldn’t have caused a big enough fire to burn down the hotel, since their alarm system was up to date and very efficient, but it could have caused some damage if the fire department hadn’t been as quick. And as she was talking to them, she saw one of the room service dishwashers grinning. He hadn’t worked at the hotel for long, and while he was watching Heloise talk to the firemen about the rag, he looked amused. She saw the look of defiance in his eyes, and she slowly walked toward him.

“Did you see somebody do this?” she asked him directly, and he laughed at her.

“You think I’d tell you if I did?” he jeered at her. He knew who she was, but he didn’t care.

“What do you know about this?” she persisted. She wasn’t afraid of him at all.

“I know your daddy fired two guys, and the union is gonna kick your ass if you don’t take them back,” he said defiantly, as the security men moved closer to them both. Bruce was off for the night. “They told you there was gonna be trouble, so maybe someone lit a little fire tonight to show you what they mean. You can’t fire anyone just like that. The union won’t let you do it,” he said, he was standing inches away from her, and the way he looked at her would have frightened anyone else, but it didn’t frighten her. He was threatening her hotel.

“Did you do this?” she asked him, moving an inch closer to him. She was a slim woman, and twenty-one years old, but she was as brave as any man in the room.

“What if I did?” he said, and laughed at her again, and as he did, one of the firemen got on his radio and called the police. There was going to be trouble. He could smell it, and the security men from the hotel knew it too.

And then before they could stop him, he reached out and grabbed Heloise by the neck and slammed her against the wall. “Bitch,” he spat at her, “don’t tell me what I can do.” Heloise never took her eyes off him and remained completely calm. None of the men around them wanted to make any fast moves, in case he had a gun or a knife. They were waiting for the police. And with that, without saying a word, she landed her high heel squarely on his instep with her full strength, and as he doubled over, cursing her and shouting in pain, she took a nice clean swing at him with a fist and punched him in the nose, and as he wheeled a step backward, she raised her leg sharply and kneed him in the groin. She had taken self-defense in high school, and it served her well.

She took a step away from him as the police came through the door. His nose was bleeding, and he was spitting at her. The cops put him in handcuffs as one of the security men explained what had happened, and Heloise hardly looked ruffled, although she had ripped her skirt to the thigh when she kneed him in the groin.

“Thank you, gentlemen,” she said pleasantly. One of the patrolmen asked for a statement from her, and she was in the middle of it when her father came rushing downstairs. He had woken up to the sound of fire engines, saw them outside, and dressed quickly. The elevators had been stopped for safety so he took the service stairs. He took one look at the situation and turned to his security men. “What’s going on here?” Smiling, one of the firefighters described the scene to him. She had put them all to shame.

“Are you all right?” he asked his daughter, and she looked at him. She wasn’t even unnerved, although she’d been mad as hell at the man who’d set the fire.

“I’m fine. I think some asshole at the union paid the guy to set a fire in the basement tonight. We lost a couch and some rolling trays. But it could have been a lot worse.”

“Are you crazy?” her father said to her. “To hell with the couch. They just told me you punched the guy. He could have stabbed you. Did that ever occur to you?” He looked at her like she was insane.

“He set the fire. Someone paid him to do that. I’m not going to let a jerk like that burn down our hotel and destroy everything we’ve built.” Her eyes were rock hard as she looked at her father. She wasn’t going to let him destroy it either. The message was clear.

“Did the alarm go off?”

“Yes, it did. That’s why I came down here. The security boys were putting out the fire, and the fire department got here at the same time I did,” she told her father. “They found the rag he used to light it.”

“How do you know it was him?”

“He pretty much said so, or he implied it, and then he grabbed me by the throat.”

“And then you hit him?” Her father looked stunned by both the stupidity and the courage of what she’d done.

“She broke his nose, sir,” the young patrolman filled in.

“You broke his nose?” Hugues stared at his daughter as though seeing her for the first time.