I nodded. “Be safe, too. Text me when you get back.”
With a wave and a blown kiss, she headed out the door.
CHAPTER 6
Sarah made sure I was presentable and ready to go before she left, so I had time to spare. For twenty minutes, I stewed in anxiety as I waited for Reid.
I popped in a mint, even though I’d just brushed my teeth, and spritzed myself with some more perfume, hoping it wasn’t too much. I was adjusting and readjusting and nitpicking everything when there was a sudden knock on the door.
I blew out a steadying breath, my stomach turning, then opened the door.
“Hi,” he said when the door opened.
“Wow.” He was freshly shaved and smelled divine even from feet away. Per my request, he was in a grey button-down that matched his eyes, the sleeves rolled up his forearms and the top button undone. I stared down at the bundle of brightly colored blossoms. “For me?”
He looked down at his hand and then presented them. “You look…wow. I mean, I already thought you were beautiful, but damn.”
I took hold of them, smelling them as I brushed my hair behind my ear and looked to the ground, heat exploding in my cheeks. “Thank you.” I stepped back to let him through. “Come on in. I’ve just got to finish up.”
I’d wasted so much time on finalizing my look that I’d forgotten to get my purse together.
“So what are our plans for the evening?” I asked as I tossed my ID, some cash, a credit card, and lipstick into a small crossbody purse with a chain strap. Basically a wristlet with a strap that held the necessities.
“The Tournament of Kings awaits us, m’lady,” he said as he propped the flowers up against the wall in a glass from the bathroom.
“Are you serious?” I asked in surprise, grabbing Sarah’s cardigan.
“What? It’s good, clean, family-friendly, PG-13 fun. Then we can end the evening with a private make-out session in the High Roller while we look at all the lights. What do you think?”
It was not the over-the-top Hollywood date I was expecting, and I liked that. It was different, a little bit silly, but it sounded like casual fun, and more memorable than some expensive display of wealth.
“I think it sounds perfect.” I double-checked for my key before shutting the door.
“Yeah?” he asked as we walked down to the elevator.
I nodded. “Just don’t tell Sarah we went. She’ll pout.”
“Her fiancé came in today, right?”
“His plane is due in soon. She went to pick him up.”
“So that’s where she is,” he said as we stepped onto a just-arriving elevator.
“She helped me get ready, and then was out.”
There were a few people in the car heading down as well. Every one of them was staring wide-eyed at Reid. I had a feeling that was how the night was going to go.
We got out of the elevator and started to walk when he stopped. “Shit, I left my wallet upstairs,” Reid said as he patted his pockets as if it would suddenly appear.
“Is this some trick to get me up to your room?”
He gave me that panty-melting grin again. “I swear, totally unplanned. We’re going to have dinner. I guess I just got a little excited about a real old-fashioned date.”
“Seriously? You?”
“Believe it or not, I don’t go on many. I’ve been looking forward to it all day. And now I sound like an idiot.”
I shook my head no. “I like it.”
We walked over to the elevator for the upper floors, and luckily the car was there waiting. I squeezed his hand as the doors closed, and he squeezed back. I watched the screen as floor numbers flew by five at a time, my ears popping around the twentieth floor.
The car suddenly shook and I reached out to steady myself, my hands landing on Reid’s bicep and chest. For a second panic surged through me. The elevator screeched to a sudden, shuddering stop, and the lights cut out. Everything was dark, it was complete and total blackness.
For those heartbeats, I wondered if the elevator had plummeted and we were dead, but that thought ended when a dim emergency light flickered on.
Speechless, we stood there trying to figure out what just happened. A strange warmth seeped into my skin, and I realized I wasn’t the only one who reached out. One of Reid’s arms was around my waist, the other sat on my hip.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“Shh, it’s okay,” he whispered into my ear, his arm around my waist. “Are you okay?”
“Mm hmm. Just a bit freaked out.” Even as I pulled away, I was still latched onto his arm. “What was that?”
“Not sure,” he said, his arm leaving my death grip as he stepped over to the control panel and hit the button to open the doors, but nothing happened.
He tried the emergency button, and still nothing.
“That’s weird.”
More than weird. “I’m calling Sarah,” I said as I pulled out my phone and dialed her number.
As with the buttons, nothing happened, just an error message. “What the hell?” I pulled my phone back, looked at the screen, and my stomach dropped. “I have no signal. No phone or data.”
“Let me try.” His face suddenly lit up from the brightness of his screen, and I watched as a deep crease formed between his brows. “Not good. I have no signal either.”
“What’s going on?”
“Do you remember what floor we were passing? Was it past fifty?”
“Forty was the last number I remember.”
He let out a hard sigh. “Fuck.”
“Why?”
“High-speed elevator. It doesn’t have an opening until fifty,” he explained.
“You mean…” I trailed off. We didn’t have a door. There was no opening.
“If it’s a power outage, there are backup generators in all these hotels,” I said.
“Yeah,” he agreed, but there was something in his voice that didn’t reassure me.
“But?”
He turned his attention back to me. “Huh?”
“Your tone says you’re not sure.”
His lips formed a thin line and he seemed to be studying my face. “I don’t want to scare you. You don’t like elevators, do you?”
I swallowed hard and shook my head. “As long as I try not to think about where we are, I’m okay.”
“Okay, that and I don’t want to scare myself,” he admitted.
“Fine, say it so we can get the freak-out over with.”
“The generators for these places kick on automatically.”
“And?” I pressed.
“And it’s been five minutes,” he said.
It felt like my whole body was vibrating. “And?”
“They are set up to turn on within something like a thirty-second window.”
“Oh, shit.” I bent over and tried to remember the breathing technique my brother used when he had a panic attack. “So, you’re saying we’re stuck in an elevator with no power and no way out?”
“Basically. But I can’t see the power being out long.”
I racked my brain trying to come up with any explanation. “It’s a new building. Do you think they fucked something up?”
“I would say yes, but no phone signal worries me.”
“You always lose signal in elevators,” I argued, but by the faint light illuminating his features, I knew it was just me grasping at straws. I fell down onto the floor, my heart jumping into my throat as the car gave a shake.
“It’s okay,” he assured me and squatted beside me. I realized the squeak I heard came from me. “I’m sure it’ll be back on any minute.”
“Yeah, you’re right.” I leaned back against the wall, my knees pulled up to my chest.
Reid relaxed back as well, his long legs crossed out in front of him.
My eyes adjusted to the dim light, but it gave little comfort.
“Look at it this way—you will never forget this first date.”
I let
out a laugh, long and full. “You really know how to show a girl a good time,” I said as I swept tears of laughter and fright from my eyes.
“Let’s play twenty questions,” he suggested, his hand finding mine and threading our fingers together.
The warmth felt good, and I focused on that and away from the emptiness below us.
“Okay. Not like we can do much else. There’s no way out of here until the power comes back.”
“Hmm.”
“Hmm, what?”
“Is that your first question?” he asked.
I shrugged. “I guess.” It wasn’t going to be, but he kept drifting off, making me curious as to what he was thinking.
“I was wondering if there was another way out. My turn. What’s your last name?”
I let out a hmph. “Going basic.”
“I’m saving the more interesting questions for later.”
“Evans.”
“Evans,” he repeated with a nod. “Harper Evans. Good name.”
“Is Reid Gallagher your real name?” I asked, thinking back to a few days earlier. “Kalvin alluded it wasn’t.”
“Yes and no,” he said as he shifted his position. “It’s technically Arthur Reid Gallagher, but I’ve gone by Reid since I was a kid. I hated Art. How long was your last relationship, and when did it end?”
My expression dropped and even in the dark, he noticed.
“Three years, and it ended five months ago. I’ve been, I don’t know, trying to remember who I am since it ended. Same question to you.”
He slipped his hand into mine. “I think you have a pretty good handle on who you are.”
“Maybe, but I was defined as ‘Jeremy’s girlfriend’ for so many years that the fallout hit me harder than I expected.”
“What happened?”
“You still haven’t answered my question,” I reminded him, hoping to steer the conversation away from my relationship with Jeremy.
“I will, I just don’t want you to dodge this conversation. I kinda have you trapped,” he pointed out.
I let out a laugh. “In more ways than one, it seems.” I ran my hand through my hair and blew out a breath. “Have you ever been with someone, convinced you loved them, you know them, and suddenly they tell you it’s over?” He nodded. “Turns out I was just a placeholder. Someone to keep his bed warm until he found Miss Right. He never wanted a future with me. Said we were friends with benefits. I mean, I should have seen it coming. We lived together but it seemed oddly compartmentalized, and talks about the future never went anywhere. I was just too stupid to see all the signs.”
He squeezed my hand. “They say love is blind. It can force you to rationalize someone’s actions.”
“Sounds like you speak from experience.”
He nodded. “I was just breaking out when I met Sasha. She made me believe I was her world, but when I traveled I had trouble connecting with her. Turns out about three other guys were also her world.”
“Ouch.”
“Now to answer your question, it was Sasha for two years and that ended eight years ago.”
I furrowed my brow. “You haven’t had a relationship in eight years? I don’t believe that.”
“Swear to God. I mean, I’ve dated, but nothing lasted more than a couple of months. Often they were actresses whose schedules are just as crazy as mine. It takes a lot of work, and it’s hard.”
I swallowed hard. It was a harsh reminder that whatever was going on between us was just a fling. When the week was over, we would be, too.
“It’s also hard for me to trust. Sasha wasn’t the only one to bite me, and I’m a lot more cautious now.”
“Says the man who invited a strange woman who literally ran into him in an elevator to his room, stalked her—”
He cut me off. “I did not stalk you.”
I patted his forearm. “Shh, yes you did. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. You then gave her your personal phone number, like your real one, gave her your room key, chased off some bitch that works for you and rearranged your schedule to see said stranger.”
“Yeah, well, you’re different.”
“How do you know?”
His brow scrunched. “It may be naive given my history, but I just have this feeling in my gut.”
“I said it before—that’s constipation.”
His elbow swung out and tapped my arm. “You’re this breath of fresh air. It’s like my whole being lights up when I see you. Corny, I know, but that’s the best way I can describe it.”
“You set the butterflies off so much that I get nauseous.”
“Yeah?”
There might not have been much light, but it didn’t matter. I could feel the heat radiating off his skin as he leaned in. Instinctively, I turned toward it. The butterflies felt like they were going to explode from my stomach at the feel of his breath against my skin.
The soft caress of his lips against my cheek, drawing a path to my lips, left a trail of warmth. Electricity shot through me when his lips met mine. A moan left me as I wrapped my arms around his shoulders and I melted into him.
His tongue lapped against mine, and I pulled him closer.
“That’s it,” he said abruptly and pulled away.
I followed his lips, needing them on mine again. “Huh?”
“I know how to get out of here,” he said.
CHAPTER 7
I blinked at him before reaching out and pulling his face back to mine. He groaned against me, his arms wrapping around me as he tipped me down onto my back.
“Fuck,” he hissed. “You are way too enticing.”
“Come back,” I grabbed for him as he sat back up.
“Hold on.” I watched as he stood and pressed against the ceiling panels. There were sounds of metal flexing, but nothing moved.
“What are you doing?”
“Trying to get to the hatch. Elevators have an emergency hatch at the top, but you have to get past the layer of decor.” He pulled at another piece and it released, popping off in his hands. “Yes!”
After laying the panel on the floor against the wall, he pulled out his phone and turned the flashlight on, shining it up and revealing the release handle.
With a hard twist, the seal popped and he pushed the lid back. It fell to the other side with a loud clang that echoed through the space. A wave of new air flowed in, making me realize how stuffy the small compartment had become.
“Come on,” he said as he held out his hand.
“And go where? We should just stay.”
“The power has been out for over half an hour now. We have no idea what happened or when it’s coming back. Nobody knows we’re here. There’s a ladder against the wall. We can climb it until we reach the door and pry it open.”
What he was suggesting was ludicrous. While I didn’t like hanging so far up in the air, leaving was far more dangerous than staying.
“Then what? We’ll be in a dark hallway,” I argued as my stomach churned.
“That has access to the emergency staircase.”
The switch flipped and I understood. “That unlocks automatically in a power failure.”
“Exactly. We can make our way up to my room.”
My excitement fell. “But there’s no electricity. We can’t get in,” I reminded him. Everything in the hotel relied on electricity and with none, we were stuck.
“Shit, you’re right.”
“Then what?”
“I bust the door down, I guess.”
“You sound pretty confident about all this,” I said, wishing I had a fraction of his courage.
“I’ve done it before.”
It hit me then. “A movie set is very different from real life.”
“Maybe, but I’m willing to gamble. You?”
The idea alone, the danger associated with it, was fear inducing, but not as much as the idea of staying where we were.
“Maybe, especially since your idea is to climb a vertical ladder and pry a
n elevator door open while balancing yourself so you don’t fall and leave me stranded.”
“I see where your priorities lie.”
“Yeah, getting my ass out of this situation intact, but I guess this is Vegas, and it’s all about the gamble.”
He cupped my face and tilted it back so that our eyes met. “I can do it. Trust me.”
“Trust isn’t the issue. One of us getting hurt is.”
He pressed his lips to mine before stepping back. “We’ll be okay. I promise.” His fingers deftly worked open each button from his shirt, and he pulled the hem from his jeans.
“What are you doing?” I asked as I stared, transfixed at his movements.
“Too restraining. No safety nets here, and I need all the movement I can get.”
That was not a comforting revelation at all. “Now you’re scaring me. This is like a seriously life-threatening escape.”
“Not going to lie, it’s not safe, but we need to get out of here. For one thing, you seem calm, but I can tell you’re suppressing the panic.”
He was right. I wasn’t sure how he knew, but the panic vibrated just below the surface and any opening would put me into a full on attack. “And what you’re proposing will make that better?”
“When we get out, yes.”
I really wished there had been lighting to watch him reach up, grab the sides, and pull himself through the opening. It was almost flawless, smooth, with only a few kicks of his legs to gain leverage. Once through he took a look around, shining the light on his phone around, then popped his head back down.
“We’re at the forty-eighth floor. I can see the door for fifty.” He extended his arm toward me. “Grab me, I’ll pull you up.”
I stuffed my phone in my back pocket and threw my purse strap over my head before clapping my hand around his wrist. He let out a strained grunt as he pulled my dead weight up until my shoulders were through the opening and I could help pull myself the rest of the way, though that didn’t stop Reid from grabbing my hips and pulling them through.
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