The Guncle Abroad (THE GUNCLE) by Steven Rowley EPUB & PDF – eBook Details Online
- Status: Available for Free Download
- Authors: Steven Rowley
- Language: English
- Genre: contemporary romance
- Format: PDF / EPUB
- Size: 2.6 MB
- Price: Free
Patrick mustered the last of his patience to smile warmly at the Claridge’s
doorman before slumping against the revolving door into the hotel to jumpstart its spin. Nothing. Even employing his full weight he didn’t have the
strength to nudge the London hotel’s door from a dead stop, and he looked
pathetically at the doorman for an assist. Over his weeks-long stay he had
come to find the doorman’s commitment to the top hat to be, well, a tad
over the top—a bit of a bad habit-dashery—but as the man tipped his brim
with a wink and sprang to help, Patrick was charmed in spite of himself. At
last he was inside the hotel.
“Evening, Pip.” Patrick waved as he emerged from the door at last. The
night clerk looked up from his paperwork with wide eyes; instead of the
string bean his name might suggest, Pip was squat and muscular and filled
out his classic uniform quite nicely.
Claridge’s was a London institution
situated between Hyde and Green Parks, triangulating it perfectly with
Buckingham and Kensington Palaces, and everyone who worked there was
seemingly named after a Dickens character, even Pip, who had moved to
England just three years prior from Jaipur. During Patrick’s first week in
residence at the hotel, he amused himself by assigning names to the people
he did not know. Mr. Bumbleporridge. Jiminy Pocket. Madame Squeers.
But no such made-up name was required for his favorite employee. “Have
anything for me?”
“Evening, sir. Nothing for you, I’m afraid, but I do have an envelope for
Jack Curtis.”
Patrick chuckled as he accepted his mail. Jack Curtis was the name he
used when he didn’t want to attract attention (a combination of Jack
Lemmon and Tony Curtis from the movie Some Like It Hot). He used the
envelope to salute Pip.
“I see you’re leaving us on Friday,” Pip said.
“The party had to end sometime.” Shooting a film wasn’t exactly a
party, and certainly not this one, which had been plagued by both poor
weather and endless rewrites, but Patrick was committed to use the last of
his energy to charm.
“Shame.” Pip held Patrick’s gaze and a spark of electricity crackled
between them. “You look pretty knackered. I could have something else for
you. Turndown service, perhaps?”
Patrick had invited Pip up to his room once, weeks earlier, and so he
knew this turndown would be full-service. Was he up for this tonight? He
studied how sharp the desk clerk looked in his waistcoat and thought maybe
it was worth getting a second wind. “Sure. Give me a few minutes?”
Pip playfully slapped the front bell. “I’ll find someone to cover the
desk.”
As he waited for the elevator, Patrick weighed the envelope in his tired
hands and snarled at the overwrought calligraphy. Ivory. An invitation, he
surmised, which was the last thing he wanted—when this movie wrapped
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