Daniel shook his head.
"Thank God."
"Labor shortage?"
"Turnover is higher, but not catastrophic."
He slid another report toward her.
"The problem is in the reviews."
Margaret read.
Beautiful property, terrible attitude.
Front desk made us feel like we were bothering them.
Asked for help with my elderly father and was told wheelchairs were "not hotel equipment."
Waited forty minutes while staff served guests who arrived after us.
Manager behaved like we should be grateful they let us stay.
Margaret looked up.
"How many?"
"Enough."
Daniel opened his tablet.
"Average review score fell from 4.6 to 3.9 in six months."
"That's not a fluctuation."
"No."
"When did Derek take over?"
"Seven months ago."
Derek Cole had been hired as general manager after the previous GM retired.
His résumé was excellent.
Luxury properties in Miami.
New York.
Chicago.
Strong revenue management.
Aggressive upselling.
High guest-spend metrics.
Margaret remembered the interview.
Forty-three.
Polished.
Confident.
He had talked extensively about brand positioning.
Premium segmentation.
Filtering low-value traffic.
At the time, Margaret had considered the language sophisticated.
Now she heard something else inside it.
"Have we audited him?"
Daniel nodded.
"Financially."
"No major irregularities."
"Operationally?"
"On paper, everything looks acceptable."
"Training completed."
"Standards signed."
"Guest-service scores submitted internally are strong."
Margaret looked at him.
"But public reviews aren't."
"Correct."
"Which means somebody is grading their own homework."
Daniel almost smiled.
"Possibly."
Margaret flipped through more complaints.
Most were not dramatic.
That was what concerned her.
Luxury hotels could survive dramatic mistakes if they handled them well.
A lost reservation.
A broken air conditioner.
A delayed room.
Those things happened.
What destroyed hospitality was something quieter.
Contempt.
A guest could forgive a room problem.
They rarely forgave being made to feel small.
Margaret had learned that from her father.
Arthur Whitfield had not begun in luxury hotels.
He started with a twelve-room roadside motel outside Hartford.
Margaret had grown up changing sheets during summers.
At fourteen, she cleaned bathrooms.
At sixteen, she worked reception.
Her father once watched her ignore an older couple while finishing a phone conversation.
Afterward he made her apologize.
Then he told her:
"People do not come into a hotel because they need walls."
"They have walls at home."
"They come because, for a little while, they want somebody else to make the world easier."
She never forgot it.
Or thought she had not forgotten it.
She closed the report.
"I'll go to Boston."
Daniel looked up.
"When?"
"Tomorrow."
"We can schedule an inspection."
"No."
"They'll prepare."
"Exactly."
"They'll know you."
Margaret leaned back.
"Do they?"
Daniel frowned.
"You're the owner."
"How many employees at Aurelia have met me in person?"
He thought.
"Senior management."
"Some department heads."
"Anyone under thirty?"
"Probably not."
Margaret nodded.
"Then I'd like to see the hotel they operate when they don't know I'm coming."
Daniel understood.
"No security detail?"
"Discreet only."
"Driver?"
"No."
"Margaret."
"If I arrive in a Maybach with two assistants, we will learn that Derek knows how to greet a billionaire."