by K. T. Tomb
“His wife just left him. He must’ve gotten it into his head that this would be it,” one voice said.
“He did sound depressed the day before,” another one confirmed.
Gossip swirled around the crew, while a few of them broke from the crowd to find help. One of these men was the foreman, who marched over to his car far removed from the construction site. As he stomped towards the parking lot, he heard the distinctive sound of the construction elevator hit the ground. He stopped and looked in the direction of the sound, shading his eyes. The doors opened, a man stepped out and walked briskly down the path toward the main hotel building.
Paulson? Morton wondered, pausing for a moment.
Remembering his mission, he shook the strange sighting off and went to his car. He drove to an office building only minutes away. The foreman gripped the wheel and steadied his breathing; his measured breaths did nothing to relieve him of the mounting anxiety in his chest. When he reached the office building, he parked his car and stormed into the office.
This has to end. It has to end today! The foreman thought, reviewing the conversation that would take place once he stepped off the elevator.
The foreman stormed into the plush office down the hallway on the third floor.
“Steve. Steve!” he screamed, shooting straight past the receptionist.
“Mr. Morton, you can’t go in there without an appointment.
But Mr. Morton ignored her. He twisted the knob and pushed the door open with a full swing. Steve sat on the far side of the desk in a leather upholstered chair, appearing settled into his position as he wrote notes on a notepad.
“You have to end this,” Mr. Morton said, slamming his hands on the desk.
Steve did not look up from his writing; he remained unshaken.
“End what, Mr. Morton?” he asked.
“We’re working these men too hard. Most of them haven’t been on their required leave in months and they’re becoming over stressed. That leads to exhaustion, and that’s going to cause accidents, even death.”
Steve kept his eyes glued on the blueprint.
“Give me one minute to finish this, and then we’ll talk.”
Steve noticed the receptionist at the doorway.
“Ah, Mary, come here.”
He gave Mary the notepad.
“Make a memo of this, and then send it out right away.”
“Yes, sir.”
Mary took the notepad and departed with it, reading the writing.
“Another man jumped to his death at the worksite,” Mr. Morton said, once Mary closed the door. “This is the third one this quarter. Some guy fell from the top of the building and landed in front of the entrance.”
Steve smirked. “Need I remind you that tourist season is rapidly approaching? This is the Caribbean, the tourist destination of the world. When November ends Samsara must be ready to receive guests; we have reservations. When those people come from the States, Europe and everywhere else on this planet, they expect to stay at a completed resort. Do you hear me? Complete. That means no amount of money, delays or deaths will stand in the way of this project.”
“What about the scandals? This will make international news. The BBC and the networks in the States will pick up on this, and news outlets everywhere will follow.”
Steve shrugged and settled back in his chair. “Free publicity. That’s all it is, Andy. Besides, anyone with common sense will see these things happen all the time. Turn on the news, there’s some kind of accident every single day; some tragedy that befalls the human race because of somebody’s stupidity, or someone’s inclination to sin. But I understand your concern. I appreciate it as well, my last foreman wasn’t as careful as you are; he made some stupid mistakes when a few of his men had accidents on the site. I’m still waiting to see if those mistakes are going to come back and bite me in the rear. All we can do is arrange the funeral. What’s the man’s name?”
“Marshall Kelly. He was assigned to roof work and somehow he fell off the goddamn scaffolding.”
“Ah.” Steve turned to his computer and pulled up a file of workers’ names and their pertinent information. “Family problems?”
“Some of the guys say he’s been having some. Said his wife threatened to leave him.”
“Any next of kin?”
“Other than his wife?” Mr. Morton paused to ponder this question. “I don’t think so.”
Steve looked up Kelly’s name in the employee spreadsheet on his computer.
“I thought as much,” he said, arriving at the same conclusion from reading the screen.
He returned his attention to Mr. Morton.
“Then no one else needs to know about his death. Do with the body, as you have done with the others; ship it home, send his wife the check and move on according to plan and on schedule.”
“No.”
Steve moved the computer mouse, operating the on-screen pointer to lock himself out of the account. “Excuse me?”
“I’m done with this shit, man.”
“Need I remind you, that you are in debt to me, literally? You borrowed money from me before you started this project, or have you forgotten?”
“What? The mortgage money? I paid you the entire twenty grand back, remember?”
“No, not all of it. You still owe me one last payment.”
Morton was silent, he had been called out.
“I’m surprised with you, Morton. You’re the foreman on this site. Your first responsibility is to make sure the workers are safe, and that they’re in good medical hands if anything happens to them. It’s your responsibility to keep them working and earning a living but here you are instead, yelling at me to stop the project.”
Morton shrugged and left the office feeling beaten. He drove back to the construction site, where an ambulance and two police cars were parked. Sighing, he made his way to the scene and approached the police officers.
“Officer Barnes,” Mr. Morton said.
“Mr. Morton,” the policeman replied, in a typical island drawl, “This is becoming a regular occurrence, man. Why you workers don’t stop droppin’ like flies? You no see them need to get relieved?”
“My next team doesn’t arrive until Friday, Barnes. They’ve got to make do; there’s no way I can stop the work, we’ve only got another ten weeks to be finished and it’s the height of hurricane season already.”
“I understand man, but the men them have to be more careful.”
Morton nodded his agreement and went into the lobby to find the decorators; maybe he could have one bit of good news that morning. He watched as the policeman climbed into his tiny patrol car and drove away from the hotel.
***
One year later…
“Mr. Carter,” the technician said, without taking his eyes from the computer screen, “We’ve initiated a complete lock-down of the property.”
“Excellent,” Carter replied. Then he turned to another man and asked, “Gibson, what are the reports? How strong is this thing?”
“N.O.A.A. has it registered as a Category Three presently, sir, and it’s definitely headed straight for Samsara. We have about twelve hours before the eye passes over us.”
Inside the hotel, the staff members were busy getting ready for the hurricane to hit. They’d been well trained for the past two years; every one of them knew the procedure like the back of their hand. Even though Samsara had never been hit by a storm since it's completion, there wasn’t a manager on the property who doubted their capabilities.
In the kitchen, Chef Antonio barked orders to everyone around him. The commis chefs and stewards were busy rearranging the cold storage rooms and the fresh product cabinets into the proper sequence for consumption during a storm. The freshest food would have to be consumed first followed by the more preserved, even though they wouldn’t be losing power at any time during the squall; the extensive backup power system would ensure that.
He paused and told one man that their new, state
-of-the-art hotel could withstand any storm.
Smiling he added, “He can huff and puff all he wants, but not even God can blow this resort down.”
As their guests calmly reclined by the heated indoor pool, enjoyed massages in the well-appointed spa and sipped afternoon cocktails at each of the hotel’s twenty-six full-service bars, Eric Carter and his four computer technicians sat comfortably in front of the screens at their workstations and began to go through the emergency sequence. Computer screens showed every possible angle of the massive resort and with the touch of keys and the flicking of switches, metal shutters appeared out of the hotel’s exterior and covered all the windows, skylights opened and custom recessed light fixtures flooded every room and level with artificial sunlight. Steel doors locked into place, protecting the entire lobby and entrance way and additional commands were emailed to the maintenance department for the generators to be primed and tested and all debris to be removed from the outside of the hotel. With that Samsara, the indestructible resort, was declared fully armed against the coming storm.
As the winds hit the island with Category Four hurricane force, confirmation spread among the management team that the hotel was indeed the architectural wonder that it was built to be.
In the hotel’s executive offices, Steve Masterson smiled at the large screen on the office walls. Images from the exterior cameras flashed periodically showing the nightmarish scene outside.
“Isn’t it everything we said it would be, Mr. Ivorsson?” he said to the tall, blond Swedish man who stood beside him smoking a cigar as they both watched the pictures on the monitor.
Ivorsson blew out a ring of smoke as he watched the storm rage outside. But inside, the lights didn’t even flicker. Comfy. He held up his glass and looked at the amber liquid. Without even taking his eyes from the spectacle he was watching, he recited a version of the children’s book, “And they huffed and they puffed, but they couldn’t blow this house down.”
“I’m happy that the investors happened to be here for our first storm. Not that I want you to be in harm’s way, but how better to exhibit the real premise of the hotel; what makes Samsara so different from any other resorts,” Masterson said, stepping back towards his desk. “You and your colleagues invested in an indestructible hotel, but really what we offer here is an indestructible vacation; no matter what Mother Nature throws at us, there won’t be one interruption to the indulgent retreat all our guests have planned.”
Ivorsson said nothing but nodded appreciatively as he lifted his glass to his lips.
In the distance, Hurricane Freda raged and threatened to strengthen to a Category Five before passing over La Isla Samsara. But Steve wasn’t worried and neither was anyone else who was inside the resort. Unfortunately, that wasn’t quite the case with the other inhabitants of the island.
Chapter One
Kingston, Jamaica,
Present Day
The Winfreds walked through the finger docks between the airplane and the terminal.
The atmosphere seemed different, and Karl Winfred sensed the humidity around them almost immediately. Passengers pushed past him and his wife as they struggled to pull their small carry-on suitcases behind them. When they reached the airport terminal, Karl noticed a rainbow through the spanning window. The skies were welcoming and generous with sunlight. The sun rays brushed the grounds with enthusiasm as the rainbow extended across the sky.
Karl looked up at it.
“I hate rainbows.”
Rebecca glowered at him, and Karl saw her expression out of the corner of his eyes.
“What do you mean, you hate rainbows?” she asked in disbelief.
“We’ve been married 15 years. You didn’t know that?”
“I think you mentioned it in passing, but not as though you were making it as an out-and-out statement. Really, who says they hate rainbows?”
Rebecca pouted with a mocking tremble in her lips. She put her hand on Kyle’s shoulder.
“Did a rainbow hurt your feelings in school?”
Karl quickened his pace. Some people strolled through the terminal like it was a day in the park, while a few here and there dashed through like they were attempting to reach the end zone of a football field.
“I don’t hate them like that like I plot to rid the world of them. Ever since I was a kid, when I saw my first one in a puddle after a rainfall, it didn’t do anything for me. Many people would have stared at it, but for me, there was no fascination. Then, whenever I see one, it’s like… nothing. I don’t think about whether pictures should be taken of them and put on greeting cards, or that I should feel inspired to think more positive. None of that. Rainbows have no room in my life.”
Passengers stood around the baggage claim carousel waiting to pick up their bags. The Winfreds stopped to wait as well. Rebecca retrieved a small mirror from her purse, fluffed her bangs and stuffed the mirror in her purse.
“You have the oddest quirks about you.”
“Really? Now there’s something I’ve never heard you say before, Rebecca,” he replied sarcastically.
Rebecca adjusted the shoulder strap of her purse.
“Christ, here we go again.”
The siren sounded, accompanied by a flashing light on the machine. The conveyor belt rolled, and a rush of baggage came out from behind the wall.
“Seriously, Becky. Is that all I am to you?” Karl said. “A source of amusement? Don’t I do anything right?”
His wife paused. She opened her mouth, but nothing came out. Awkward silence lingered between the two amidst the bustling of the terminal. The silence drew out after Karl asked his question.
Karl shrugged.
“I’m waiting.”
“Sometimes, when my girlfriends and I get together for lunch, or when we go workout at the gym, we … talk.”
“You talk to your friends about me.”
Karl pursed his lips, churning this new information in his brain.
“That comes as no surprise. Girls talk to each other all the time about anything and everything. Those ‘Real Housewives’ shows are a good example of idle women who talk to each other too much. We don’t talk about housewives, or Sex and the City or what happened when a next door neighbor ran out into the streets naked with sushi sticking to her naked skin. We have … meaningful conversations.”
A black bag rolled out. Karl moved closer to the carousel. Recognizing the tag, he pulled it off the conveyor belt.
“I’m not trying to bust into your girl’s night out or whatever it is that you call it, okay? What do you tell them?”
“Before I discuss this any further, remember that I don’t bash you, but when you come into the picture, I’m honest.”
Karl spotted another piece of luggage right behind his own: a light blue one, followed by a dark blue one. He grabbed one in each hand and yanked them off the conveyor belt and dropped them onto the floor. “What do you say to them?”
“I don’t say much, okay? I’m only expressing concern that you … about your…” Rebecca looked around herself. “We can’t talk about this here.”
Karl passed the blue baggage to his wife. “Fine. When can we talk about this?”
“At the hotel. That way, I can at least order a cocktail before telling you anything else.”
Karl and Rebecca traversed by foot through the airport down the escalator and into the humid air that instantly weighed down on them. The hot Jamaican sun washed over the sidewalk as the couple stepped up to it along with nearby strangers waiting for a taxi cab.
“I can’t wait to get to the hotel. They just finished it, and it’s supposed to be unlike anything that’s ever been built,” Rebecca said. “I hear that it’s so huge, you can see it from a plane.”
“I see,” Karl said, observing the street and hailing for the upcoming taxi.
“But, I’m frightened too. According to the news reports, a lot of the workers have died during the construction.” Rebecca leaned closer to Karl.
&nb
sp; “People are saying the place is haunted by their ghosts.”
“Really now?”
A taxi pulled up to the curb and Karl leaned into the open passenger’s side window.
“We need to go to the Tinsen Pen airstrip, please.”
The driver nodded and stepped out to help with their bags. Karl opened the trunk of the taxi and put Rebecca’s suitcase inside.
“You understand we’re here for business as well as pleasure, don’t you?” Karl said to Rebecca. “The heads of the company who built the Samsara Resort want us to review this hotel to prove to potential investors it’s going to be worth their money when they invest in it.”
The driver loaded the rest of the luggage into the trunk as Karl and Rebecca climbed into the cab. On their way to the airstrip Karl took in the beauty of the island: the ocean view, the lush greenery and the blue sky as the taxi drove towards Kingston’s industrial downtown area.
“I talked to Steve and of course he tried convincing me that the hotel is the best they’ve ever built. State of the art, eco-friendly—this place is revolutionary in terms of its construction. Should be able to withstand any storm. So that means no worries about huge repairs or costs after a natural disaster.”
Rebecca shook her head.
“Sounds too good to be true, if you ask me. A building that can withstand a natural disaster; no matter how bad it is? I don’t know, it sounds shady. Besides, you’re a college professor. Why are you involved with any of this?”
“For our retirement, of course. Sure, we live quite comfortably, but if I don’t get tenure in the next couple years you’ll soon see that a professor’s salary isn’t enough for us to retire on.”
“ So, if this place turns out to be a good investment are you trying to say we should invest in it as well?”
“I’m thinking along those lines,” he replied dryly. “Besides, it’s not like anybody’s trying to get their hands on our money before we’ve had a chance to see the place for ourselves.”
Karl took Rebecca’s hand. “I need your support. Give the idea a fair shake, okay?”