Riley appeared at Daniel’s waist, peeping out from behind him to make him jump. “It’s in the basement. Near the laundry services. You have to take the employee elevator down.”
My immediate thought went to the underground room beneath the old wing. Was there another way in? “I didn’t know there was a basement here.”
“Guests aren’t supposed to know about it,” Riley said. “Dad was super weird about that rule. He said guests shouldn’t be reminded of everyday things like laundry and power bills while they’re on vacation.”
“Sounds like a crock of shi—poop,” Daniel rectified for Riley’s benefit. “Do you think he’s hiding something down there?”
I stared at my feet. I knew exactly what Oliver was hiding and where to find it, but it sure as hell wasn’t in the same basement Riley was talking about it.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I’ve only been down there once. When Dad caught me, he grounded me for two weeks. Anyway, the breaker room’s hard to miss. Last door at the end of the hall. Want me to draw you a map?”
Daniel raised an eyebrow, trying to discern whether the question was sincere or sarcastic. “No, thanks. I think I got it. You can go now.”
With a quick yank, she tightened one of the shoulder straps of his gun holster, forcing the leather up into his armpit. He grimaced. “Toodles!” she called, running off before Daniel could scold her.
Daniel glared at me and Jazmin as we attempted to stifle our laugher. “Are you done?”
“No,” I said, chuckling. “You just got owned by a twelve-year-old.”
“I’m used to it,” he said, adjusting the holster to its original width. He pulled a baton from his utility belt and handed it to me. “Take that.”
I weighed the weapon in my hand. “What’s this for?”
“In case you run into Oliver, and he won’t calm down,” Daniel said. “You’ll need a way to defend yourself.”
I swung the baton like a baseball bat. It whooshed through the air and caught the nearby banister with a sharp thud, chipping the paint. Daniel caught my forearm.
“Be careful,” he chided.
“I will.”
“All right,” he said. “Let’s get to that breaker room. This will be a whole lot easier with the power on. After that, we’ll split up to find Oliver. If no one locates him within the hour, we’ll regroup and try again. Everyone clear on the instructions? Good. Move out.”
With Daniel’s gruff personality at the head of the charge, I felt more like a rookie police officer on her first assignment than an amateur psychic in a haunted hotel, but I was having a hard time juggling both the baton and the flashlight. First, I dropped the baton. Then, I dropped the flashlight. The heavy-duty aluminum body clanged against the wall, flashing its beam of light wildly around like a disco ball. Daniel stepped on it as it rolled past him, picked it up, and handed it back to me.
“Some discretion would be nice,” he scolded. “We don’t need to alert Oliver to our exact position.”
Jazmin held her hand out for the baton. “Give me that. I’ll take care of Oliver if we have to.”
I passed her the baton, glad to be rid of it. She stacked it on top of her flashlight, holding both without issue. This was one of the reasons I’d wanted Jazmin as my partner. She always and undoubtedly had my back, but she also managed stressful situations a lot better than I did.
The employee elevator was tiny and hidden at the back of the resort. Because of the power outage, it was also not working. Daniel swore, punching the call button with enough force to break a window.
“That’s not going to help,” I said. “We should’ve known it wouldn’t be on. Let’s find the stairs.”
“Over here,” Nick said from a shadowy corner. He shined his flashlight down a dark corridor. “Looks like these head down. Shall we?”
“Let me go first,” Daniel said. “Jazmin, you have the baton? Bring up the rear. Everyone, keep your eyes peeled. Come on.”
The stairwell was so narrow that we had to go single file. Daniel, Nick, me, then Jazmin. The darkness grew more pronounced the further we descended. I could practically feel my pupils dilating as they tried to make up for the lack of natural light. The flashlights only reached so far. Nick’s flickered and died. He knocked the butt of it against the palm of his hand, trying to jostle a little more juice out of the batteries, but it was no use.
“One down, three to go,” I muttered.
“Don’t say that,” Jazmin said. She kept so close to me that I could feel her breath on the back of my neck. For once, I was glad for the sensation. It meant something human and alive walked behind me, rather than whatever creature blew cold air across my soul in the old wing. “It sounds like you’re talking about people.”
“No, that’s two down and several to go,” I said. “But probability is on our side. Am I right?”
“Miss Star, now is not the time for jokes,” Nick said. His every other step was accompanied by the click of his cane. Could he swing it like the police baton if Oliver came calling for us? “Or at least those kinds. I am quite fond of knock-knock jokes though. Anyone care to lighten the mood?”
“Knock, knock,” Daniel said.
“Who’s there?” I answered.
“Shut up, so the killer doesn’t find us before we find him.”
We took the rest of the stairs in silence. At the bottom, we found ourselves in a passageway similar to the one beneath the library in the old wing. Old brick walls, no decoration. The place was meant for maintenance only. I imagined our location in relation to Oliver’s secret room. If I hadn’t gotten turned around, the part of the hidden basement that had caved in should have been right around where we were, but there were no flaws in the construction on this side of things. Or maybe I was wrong.
“Here we go,” Daniel whispered, shining his flashlight at the last door at the end of the hall, the opposite direction from the old wing. “Let’s get the lights back on.”
When he strolled to the door and pulled the handle, it remained stubbornly shut.
“It’s locked?” Nick said. “Seriously?”
“We should’ve asked Riley for the keys,” Jazmin added. “Why didn’t we?”
“It wouldn’t have helped.” I aimed my flashlight at a busted piece of plastic to the right of the entrance. “It’s a keyless entry, and Oliver smashed the keypad.”
“Damn it!” Daniel kicked at the door, but it wasn’t made of the same cheap wood of the hotel room doors upstairs. The sturdy frame didn’t give. Daniel kept at it, each pound of his boot louder than the last. “Crazy—effing—Oliver—Watson—”
Jazmin pulled him away. “That won’t help either. Come on. We have to look for Oliver in the dark. Once we find him, we’ll force him to tell us how to get into the breaker room. There’s gotta be a backup key.”
The plan shifted. We returned to the ground floor, each of us breathing a bit easier as we emerged from the dark stairwell. Nick’s legs trembled. The steep stairs had taken a toll on his strength.
“Do you want to go back to the Eagle’s View?” I asked him in an undertone as we followed Jazmin and Daniel out of the employees’ sector. “You could take a break. Regain your strength.”
“No, no.” His cane slipped and slid across the tile floor. “I’ll be all right in a few minutes. I can’t let Detective Hawkins down.”
“You’re no use to Detective Hawkins if you can’t stand.”
“I know my limits, Miss Star.”
A hint of indignance colored his tone. I immediately shut up. Nick put on a burst of speed, intentionally increasing more space between me and him as if to prove that he could. As he fell in line with Daniel, Jazmin fell back.
“Is he okay?” she muttered. “He looks sick.”
“He said he’s fine,” I said. “I won’t tell him what he can or can’t handle.”
Jazmin flipped her hair over her shoulder. “Men. They’re always so proud. They’d rather die than admit weakness.”
/>
I watched Nick’s shoulders bob at uneven heights as he struggled to keep up with Daniel’s pace. “He does seem like he’s got something to prove, doesn’t he?”
“Yeah, that his horse is bigger than Oliver’s.”
“More like his ski lift.”
Jazmin sniggered.
“You girls coming or what?” Daniel called. “Catch up.”
We hurried along, and the four of us soon arrived at the entrance to King and Queens’s seasonal restaurant. Though Oliver once told me it was only open during peak tourist season, the restaurant looked as though it hadn’t been operational in several years. I long suspected that this entire sector of the hotel existed solely to disguise the entrance to the old wing.
“We should split up here,” I suggested. “Jazmin and I will check the old wing. You guys go on.”
Daniel shined his flashlight into my eyes. “The old wing’s dangerous. No one should be in there, not even Oliver.”
“Which is why we should double check,” I countered, batting away his light. “Like Nick said, Oliver knows this place better than anyone. If he’s hiding, he probably picked a place we wouldn’t think to look for him.”
“Then Nick and I should go,” Daniel said. “I’m a trained cop. You and Jazmin are less likely to be able to handle Oliver if he goes off.”
Jazmin knocked Daniel’s feet out from under him. In a matter of seconds, they were both on the floor, Jazmin’s legs wrapped around Daniel’s torso as she trapped his arm across her chest. If she pressed further, his elbow would pop out. Daniel—eyes wide, nose flaring—frantically tapped her shoulder. She let go and rolled to her feet.
“Brazilian Jiu Jitsu,” she said, grinning as Daniel shook out his arm and scrambled to pick up his fallen flashlight. “Black belt. I started when I was eight.”
Nick didn’t bother to hide his glee. “That was fantastic! Say, could you teach me that?”
“Maybe later,” Jazmin said. “After all this murder crap calms down.”
“Right. Of course.”
Daniel got shakily to his feet. “Ahem. Right. Well, I’m still hesitant to let you girls go in there alone. It’s dangerous. The whole place is unstable.”
“I’ve been in there multiple times,” I said, ignoring Daniel’s look of disapproval. “I know what goes boom and what doesn’t. You don’t, and Nick will have trouble navigating the debris with his cane. Sorry, Nick.”
Nick rearranged his disgruntled expression into another winning smile. “Not to worry. I understand completely.”
“Let’s get this over with,” said Daniel. “Same plan. One hour. If you don’t find him, meet us in the lobby. We’ll give each other a fifteen-minute window to arrive. After that, if the other party hasn’t shown up, assume something’s gone wrong and go look for them. Carefully. Lucia, come here.”
He guided me away from Jazmin and Nick and into the forsaken restaurant. Chairs were stacked upside down on tables. Piles of linen napkins, perfectly stacked, waited for someone to fold them into swans for each place setting. Wine glasses and champagne flutes lined the bar. When this place was operational, they probably sparkled like an expensive pair of diamond earrings, but the dust dulled their shine.
“This is embarrassing.” Daniel picked up a glass and blew on it. A cloud of dust poofed into his face. He sneezed.
“What is?”
“I’m not a sentimental guy, okay?” he said, feigning interest in the bar’s construction so he wouldn’t have to look at me. “I know we’re on a timeline, so I’ll make this quick.”
“Please don’t tell me you’ve fallen in love with me,” I said sardonically. “I don’t think I can take it.”
He snorted. “Ha!”
“Okay, you don’t have to be rude.”
“Shut up for a second,” he said. “All I wanted to say is you’ve been a decent influence on me in the past couple of weeks. I never thought I’d learn anything from an online psychic, but you’ve taught me a lot.”
“Is that it?”
“Yeah, that’s it. What, not mushy enough for you?”
I made kissy faces at him as Jazmin and Nick came into the restaurant to check on us. Jazmin bounced on the balls of her feet, arms stick straight with her hands shoved deep in her pockets. It was the same posture she assumed right before every job interview or new introduction. To her, it was a power stance. To everyone else—and I’d mentioned this to her before—it looked like she really had to go to the bathroom. Alternatively, Nick was the picture of stillness. Despite our unfortunate objective, his straight back and squared shoulders gave the illusion of unyielding confidence.
“Shall we go?” Nick said. “The more time we waste, the higher the probability someone in the lounge gets hurt.”
Daniel, his sentimental speech forgotten, didn’t bother with goodbyes. He joined Nick at the door, pausing to give me and Jazmin one final warning. “Don’t do anything stupid.”
“Have you met Lucia?” Jazmin deadpanned. I jabbed her side, but she used her elbow to block me. “We’ll be fine. See you in an hour.”
They left, Daniel walking a step behind Nick to avoid his cane. Jazmin fiddled with something in the front of her jean jacket. I caught a glimpse of a GoPro on a chest strap.
“You’re still filming?” I asked. “You realize we’re going to get arrested for this, right?”
She arranged the camera so the lens had a clear view through her jacket. “I’m not going down without a fight, and if I do, I’m going to make damn sure the cops know as much as possible about whoever put us in danger. Besides, think glass half-full thoughts, Lucia. If we make it out of here and the cops don’t confiscate our footage, we can release the greatest episode of Madame Lucia’s Parlour the Internet’s ever seen.”
“I can’t believe you’re thinking of that.”
“Aren’t you?”
“People have died,” I reminded her.
She stopped adjusting the camera to brush dust from my collar. “If you recall, that’s the whole reason Madame Lucia exists in the first place—to help the dead settle. I know you nominated us to search the old wing for a reason. Why don’t you fill me in on what it is?”
I led the way through the restaurant’s kitchen and into the old ballroom. It was Jazmin’s first time in the outdated sector of King and Queens. She spun across the marble floor, twirling under the ridiculously high ceiling.
“I feel like Anastasia!”
“Before or after she got kidnapped?”
She came to a dizzy halt. “Way to rain on my parade.”
“You wanted to know about the old wing.” I led her to the far side of the ballroom, where the original doors were chained shut. “After you.”
She eyed the tiny gap and rusty chain. “You’re kidding. This is where you’ve been sneaking off to?”
“Still upset I left you out?”
“Not at all.” Cautiously, she wiggled under the chain and squeezed through the gap. As I followed, she took in the sight of the burnt lobby and whistled. “Wow. Why do you think they left it like this?”
“Still a mystery,” I said. “Jazmin, I should warn you. The last few times I’ve been here, the spirits chased me out pretty violently. That’s how I got that burn on my arm.”
Jazmin pushed up my sleeve. “You mean the one that’s magically gone now?”
“It’s a long story.”
“Catch me up on the details later. What are we doing here?”
“Are you up for an adventure?”
She winked. “Always.”
The lobby was quiet as I led Jazmin through the debris to the library, but I didn’t stop worrying. This was how it always was. The ghosts gave me time to get comfortable, made me think I wouldn’t wake them. As soon as I got complacent, they set the place on fire again, and I wasn’t sure how Jazmin, a non-psychic, would handle their illusions. Hell, I didn’t know how to handle them myself. We made it to the library, but when I ducked underneath the desk and pulled the t
rap door out of place, Jazmin found her limit.
“Nope,” she said, staring into the dark hole. “No freaking way, Lucia. This is how people get killed in horror movies. I am not going down there.”
“It’s just the basement.” With less hesitation than last time, I lowered myself into the narrow tunnel. “We didn’t freak out when we went down with Daniel and Nick.”
“Yeah, because we used the stairs, not a sewer hole. Lucia, don’t.” She grabbed my arms before I disappeared completely. “Are you serious?”
“Would I let anything bad happen to you?” I asked. “I think I know where Oliver is.”
“Down there?”
“Yup. Are you coming or are you going to stay up here all alone?”
Jazmin glanced around the library, taking in the spookiness of the burned books and fallen shelves. She sat at the edge of the tunnel and dangled her sneakers in my face. “Move. I’m coming.”
At the bottom, when we were both on level ground again, Jazmin shuddered and shook out her arms and legs. Her denim jacket was caked with moisture and grime.
“This is vintage,” she said, trying to wipe off the dirt. “And my favorite.”
“Throw it in the wash.” I aimed my flashlight at the door to Oliver’s creepy secret room. Jazmin held onto my belt loop as we crept down the hallway. The door was closed, but the padlock wasn’t done up. Someone had just been here.
“What is this place?” Jazmin muttered.
I knocked on the door. “Oliver? It’s Lucia. Are you in there?”
No one replied, but I was so sure this was Oliver’s go-to hiding spot. I nodded to Jazmin, who raised the baton to her shoulder, ready to swing. I took a step back and kicked in the door. It rocketed open, banged against the wall, and fell off the hinges with an enormous clang. My jaw dropped at the sight of the room, and Jazmin lowered her baton.
“What exactly was supposed to be down here?” she asked.
Everything was gone. The room was bare. No newspaper clippings, no articles, no pictures. Oliver’s stack of crazy journals no longer occupied the corner of the room. Even the desk had vanished, leaving nothing but my memory of the information I’d discovered here. Was any of it real or had I imagined Oliver’s connection to the investigation?
The Haunting of Riley Watson Page 36
