The Guest With Claws

The Guest With Claws MONSTER HOTEL BOOK ONE ELLA MAVEN This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental. Copyright © 2023 by Ella Maven All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. Cover Art and Design by Phantom Dame First Edition: February 2023 For those who want a monster who will lay your enemy’s head at your feet… and who will also rub your feet. The Guest With Claws I’ve never met him before… so why do I feel as if I’ve known him all my life? Scoring a job at the exclusive and secretive Hotel Castle Verna is exactly what I need to pay off my debt and avoid a punishment I might not survive. The guests are a little eccentric, but they are great tippers. All I have to do is ignore the strange sights, smells, and sounds coming from the guest rooms, and I can remain gainfully employed. Simple, right? Except there’s one guest at the hotel who’s always watching me with his mismatched black and white eyes. Half his face is covered with a black mask, and his stare sets my skin on fire. I don’t know him… and yet I feel known with every stolen glance. Strange happenings are going on at the hotel, and each day, I fall deeper into a world I never knew existed. And the guest who’s watching me? He isn’t who I thought he was… but then again, neither am I. The Guest With Claws is a monster romance with an obsessed hero, heats, reincarnation, fated mates, and a very, very odd hotel. This is a standalone romance with an overarching plot across the series. Check in to this high heat series from USA Today Bestselling Author Ella Maven. This is not a dark romance. See Table of Contents for Content Warnings. Contents Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Content Warnings About the Author Chapter One Nessa The doorman stared down his nose at me. The wall sconces on either side of the door cast a yellow glow over his waxy complexion. His eyes were a sharp blue that pinned me where I stood. “I have an interview.” I tried not to fumble my words. Making a good impression here was vital. I needed this job. “With, um…” Shit, I knew the manager’s name, but stuck under this man’s piercing glare, my mind went blank. And then I couldn’t stop the panicked sounds from rolling off my tongue. “It’s, um, uh—” “Cazz Vizmin.” The doorman’s nose crinkled like tissue paper. Yes, that was it. I’d practiced it in my head a million times in my bare bones apartment. I’d said it to the raven I’d named Gary who visited my window for food scraps. I’d repeated it in the shower getting ready for this damn interview. My stomach squirmed, and I placed a hand there. The doorman’s eyes dipped down, and I quickly shoved my hand behind my back. I nodded. “Yes, Ms. Vizmin.” Someone shouted down the street—a bark of sound that startled me. I tottered on the cracked sidewalk in my heels, praying that the glue holding my right heel onto the sole didn’t decide to quit. With a balmy trickle, nervous sweat slid down the back of my neck under my low, conservative ponytail. The doorman knew. He knew I didn’t belong here applying for a job that was way out of my league. It wasn’t like I couldn’t do the job, but the employees of Hotel Castle Verna weren’t hired off the street. It was the best paying job in the whole damn city of Baxint, and to even be standing in front of the massive wooden doors, you had to know someone who knew someone. I knew someone who knew someone and that someone knew someone else and that someone else had the same name as me but died before her interview. So here I was, wearing borrowed heels in front of this very judgmental doorman hoping that no one realized I was actually Nessa Black and not Nessa Wentworth. But I wasn’t a quitter, and no way was I going to walk away or back down when I’d gotten up the nerve to come this far. Not even in the face of this stupid doorman who still stood like a wax statue. My life hadn’t been rainbows and roses for a very long time, but I always managed to find my way out of terrible situations. Glass half-full and all that. If I didn’t remain positive, I was pretty sure I would have curled up in the fetal position and given up long ago. A breeze blew over my bare arms, carrying the oily smell of fried meat from the food truck down the street. I should have brought a sweater, but this dress was one of the last pieces of my life when I had been able to afford anything decent. It fit me like a glove, hugged my curves like nothing else, and I wanted to show it off. Finally the doorman sniffed, which was the first human gesture he had made, and slithered up the steps in his shiny black shoes. With white gloves, he lifted a five-inch ring shaped into the jaw of a golden skeleton and slammed it against the wood three times. The door swung open, and he took a step to the side. Staring past me with his gloved hands clasped in front of him, he stood silently. I hesitated, and when he didn’t speak, I peered through the door. A faint glow could be