Conflict involving hotel and female in dock (5)
I believe the answer is:
wharf
'dock' is the definition.
(I know that dock can be written as wharf)
'conflict involving hotel and female' is the wordplay.
'conflict' becomes 'war' (war is a kind of conflict).
'involving' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'hotel' becomes 'h' (phonetic alphabet: alpha, bravo, charlie etc.).
'and' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other).
'female' becomes 'f' (abbreviation).
'war' placed around 'h' is 'whar'.
'whar'+'f'='WHARF'
'in' is the link.
(Other definitions for wharf that I've seen before include "space available for mooring" , "Loading area for ship" , "Come ashore here" , "moor" , "Waterfront landing stage" .)