Chapter 8: Service Elevator

On Friday a storm came in off the lake and hit the hotel at six o'clock.

I was in the basement stockroom with a cart of folded linen napkins and a box of printed cards.

The decoy card I'd sent Cass asked who would eat the last dessert, and she had answered with three hearts.

The real middle-round card was in my bag, sealed in an envelope with a rubber band around it.

I wheeled the cart into the old service elevator and pressed two.

The doors were closing when a boot jammed between them.

Elias stepped in, wet to the elbows, with a toolbag on his shoulder.

"Humidity check upstairs," he said. "The paneling hates weather."

"There's room if you stay in the corner," I said.

He stood in the corner. His shoulders took up most of it.

The elevator climbed one floor, shuddered once and stopped.

Then every light in the shaft went out.

It was totally dark. The only sound was rain hitting the roof, far above us.

"Okay," Elias said, in an even voice. "That's the whole building."

"The engineer is on call."

"Then we wait."

I felt along the wall for the emergency button and found it already pressed.

A tiny green light came on beneath it, and a voice from a speaker said forty minutes.

I slid down the wall and sat on the floor beside the cart.

He sat across from me. I could hear his coat creak.

For a while neither of us said anything.

"Do you want to play something?" he asked.

"If you say the Matching Game I'm pushing you down the shaft."

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