Ben And Meg In The Wild West
Chapter 4
The Sunset Hotel had a very exclusive lobby. A bright polished oak floor, and red carpets. The guests meet a large round table at the main door with a big flower arraignment on. From the roof in a long iron chain hanged a crystal chandelier.
Tim Truman looked around the lobby. He lifted his hat at a woman that passed him by. He turned and looked at her swinging hips when she made her way through the door. God, he missed having his hand on a woman’s body! It had been twenty-four hours sense he left Connie sleeping in his bedchamber. He wouldn’t have left her if it weren’t important. He needed to find his strayed bird!
He had heard Joanna talk to Hank about her and that she was at the moment in Springfield. Tim was not going to let her get away with that awful behavior at their engagement celebration.
He walked up to the reception, and ringed at the small bell at the disk.
Mark, the young management for the hotel appeared from a room behind the reception. He smiled at the man in front of him, that without no doubt, was a city gentleman.
" God evening, sir. How may I help you?"
" I want a room with bath, if that is not much of a trouble?" Tim said and started to pull of his gloves, one finger at the time.
" Certainly not, sir" Mark said and picked up a big brown book. " If you will sign her, sir" he said and Tim did so.
Mark looked at the wall behind him and retrieved a blank polished key.
He quickly looked at the man’s signature and handed him his key.
" Room 28, Mr Truman. Have a pleasant stay"
Tim never said a word of thanks when he took the key. He was about to walk towards the stairs when he suddenly turned to face Mark again.
" I would like to leave a massage to a guest"
" Certainly, sir" Mark said a picked up a small piece of paper.
" To Miss Margurite Cummings. Simply tell her that someone she knows well will be waiting at room 28!"
Tim turned and walks away. At the same time, as Tim disappears up the stairs, Ben and Meg walked in to the hotel lobby. Meg just gasps.
" This is so beautiful" she looks around and takes in the amazing surrounding.
" Thank you" he said. Her compliment felt greater than anyone else’s did.
" If I did not know that this was Springfield, I would believe I was in Paris!"
She looked like a small child getting a wonderful gift when she walked over the red carpet. Her bright eyes where twinkling.
Mark looked up from his job his saw his boss with a young woman. He was supriced to se Mr Evans pointing, showing and explaining to her. Usually he was a very quiet and a closed person. And who in the world was she? Mark wondered. She was certainly not a native Springfielder, which was easy to see. She held her head high, her back strait and her hands where locked in front of her, just like fine ladies did! Plus that those earrings most have cost a fortune.
Ben noticed Mark, and nodded in a greeting. Ben excused him self to Meg, but it did not look like she heard him. She was admiring a spectacular painting on one of the walls in the lobby. The motive was a lake area in northern England.
Ben reached the reception desk.
" Did A.J leave any message before he left my office?"
Mark flipped throw the package of message, before he shook his head.
" No, sorry. Nothing" he said and looked at the young woman again. Ben saw where his eyes where located. He smiled and opened the guest-book.
" She is beautiful, isn’t she?"
Mark just nodded and kept looking at her in awe. " She’s not a guest here. Because I would have remembered that!"
Ben leaned against the disk and looked at her to. " No, she is staying at Bette and A.J´s"
Meg turned around to talk to Ben, when she saw him and a young man looking at her. Her cheeks became fluttered and she had to turn away to catch her breath.
Men had always exposed her to looks, but for some reason his gaze where different. It felt different. Her heart started to beat faster, her needs to breathe become irrelevant, her knees got weak, her thoughts became floozy and her tummy was invaded by millions of butterflies. But non-of it felt strange- just wonderful!
She walked slowly over to the reception desk, and on her way she made it look like she took in the surrounding.
" Meg, this is my manager- Mark Wopler" Ben said. Meg smiled at Mark and he returned it.
" How are you finding Springfield, miss…?" Mark asked.
" Cummings! And I love Springfield, it much more beautiful than Boston!"
Mark got a strange look on his face, and he started to look through the cards with messages. He held up one.
" Do you happen to be Miss Margurite Cummings?" he asked.
Meg looked very supriced. " Yes I am. How did you know?"
Mark put the card in front of her. " One of our guests left a message for you. I have looked through our lists and I could not find a Miss Cummings"
Meg read the note. " Is the person still in room 28?"
Mark nodded. " Yes, he is"
Ben and Meg in union: "He?"
Meg blushed, but did her best not to show Ben that.
Mark looked at them in amusement. Even a blind man could see what was happening between them.
Meg thanked Ben sweetly and started to climb the stairs. Ben watched her hips move as she held up the long skirt. For the first time sense he was a hormone racing young boy, Ben wanted to feel her next to him. To love her in every way possibly. He wanted to be able to comb his fingers throw her thick soft hair. To wake up in the morning with her safe in his arms, to protect her from what ever she was running from. He wanted to see the sun dancing on her peaceful sleeping face in the dawn. He wanted to hear her nag about: him drinking to much whiskey, or smoking to many cigars or working to late in the evening. He would love to nag her about spending too much on dresses and jewelers, but only to kiss her later and tell her how wonderful she looked in them.
He saw her disappear around the corner on top of the stairs. He hade to drag his gaze away, when a guest asked a question.
Mark made his way up stairs, using the staff stair. A gust had complained about the clock in his room.
Meg walked the long corridor until she reached the door with the number "28" on. She paused for some seconds. She wondered who it might be. It could not be Tim. Please god, don´t let it be Tim! she thought as she knocked on the door.
"Come in!" someone said and she did so. The door swung open and she entered.
Meg froze.
She could recognizes that his backside among millions of men.
"Oh god" she whispered. Her hands started to shake and her knees got so week she was afraid that they would not hold her up.
He tuned around. He was dressed in a light gray suit with white stripes. In his pocket at the west was a gold watch with a chain. His boots where shining. He had a handsome face, but his eyes where vicious.
He just starred at her. She was nervous. Not to show him her weakness, she walked up to him and kissed his cheek.
When she pulled away, a hand greeted her.
Tim hit her right across her face, so hard she lost her balance. For some short seconds her world became black and saved her from the pain.
Mark stood as nailed to the floor. He saw her fall through the opened door.
It was rigging in her ears and the pain on her cheek was indescribable. It felt like her eye was going to explode. She tasted blood and brought the hand to her lips. When she looked at her fingers, she saw that they where stained with dark blood. Meg felt tears burning behind her eyelids, but she would not give him the satisfaction to let them fall. She looked up at him and saw him staring down at her.
" Get up from the floor, Margurite!" he said…