Frowning, Yasmin turned around. “Twenty-two. Why?” She wasn’t sure why she told him, but she found herself drawn to the mysterious stranger. Fascinated by him. Why would a hotel guest smoke in a dirty alley when he could smoke on his fancy balcony?

“I’m trying to decide if you’re old enough.”

“Old enough for what?” She suspected she knew, given his interest, but wanted to be sure.

“Old enough for me.” She saw a spark as he dropped his cigar to the pavement and stepped on it. “What’s your last name?”

What was this? An interview for a date?

“I don’t give my name out to strangers,” she said, rubbing her hands down her arms. It was late March and the weather was warming up after a cold winter, but her shirt was thin and she was catching a chill standing outside in the dark.

He walked toward her, and when she stepped away from him, edging toward the door to the kitchen, he stopped.

“When do you consider a person no longer a stranger?”

His accent seemed stronger the more he spoke, but she still couldn’t place it. “I don’t know,” she said, thinking about it. “Maybe three meetings.”

“How long?”

“What?” she asked, confused.

“How long does each meeting need to be?”

This guy was an odd duck, but he was amusing, so she answered. “At least five minutes per meeting.”

“And then you will consider us no longer strangers?” he asked seriously. “We will be familiar with each other?”

“Sure,” she said, digging her keys from her apron pocket and fitting them into the back door.

“Until our next meeting then,” he said, the rumble of his voice following her as she slipped through the back door.

Their strange conversation was forgotten as Yasmin continued her shift. She worked the 8 PM to 4 AM shift on weekends, which allowed time to study for school. She was in her fourth and final year of an archaeology degree at the University of Toronto.

The night manager approached while she was finishing her room service order. “Yasmin, you’re up. Room 1202.”

She looked at him in surprise as she took the trolley he pushed toward her. He was sending her to the top floor, reserved for their highest paying customers. The executive suites.

Normally, her boss wouldn’t send her to the top floors because he didn’t want her getting the big tips. He hadn’t liked her since she’d refused to go on a blind date with his failure-to-fly thirty-year-old son. She thought she’d turned him down politely, but he’d banished her to the kitchen after that exchange and she’d been washing dishes and running room service for the lower floors ever since.

The elevator dinged, and she rolled the trolley into the hallway. There were four rooms on the floor. She pushed the food to the far end of the hallway and knocked on the door.