Chapter 6
I hadn’t exactly expected a welcome wagon, but the bullets came as a surprise. They came at us from all directions, the shells ricocheting off the marble columns. I ran towards the exit and collided with two burly men twice my size running in the opposite direction. They wore golf shirts and cargo shorts. They looked like tourists, except for the handguns that they waved in the air. The smaller of the two cursed as he shoved me out of the way.
My shoe caught on the carpet edge and I went down, just as two men in suits came from the opposite direction. They were clearly after the other men and acted like they owned the place.
My heart raced as the men grew closer and the staccato of their footsteps echoed across the marble floor. I froze and debated two equally bad choices: stay still but in plain sight, or dive for cover and tempt a trigger finger.
I crept towards a seating area and crawled under a large mahogany coffee table.
The bullets stopped just as suddenly as they began.
I breathed a sigh of relief until I noticed that both of the casually dressed men were reloading their guns. The suits stopped a few feet from me, their semi-automatics pointed at their adversaries. One of the suits barked a command into a headset and a few seconds later the hotel doors locked.
“Hey! Let me out!” A slight, gray-haired man in jeans and a t-shirt shook the door handle without success. The door didn’t budge. He glanced back at the men with a panicked expression. He ducked behind a row of potted palms.
People screamed.
One of the potted palms tipped over and thudded on the marble.
We were trapped in a shootout. I doubted the ceasefire was temporary, but I had no idea what to do next. Panic welled up inside me as I considered my options. I was protected by the coffee table, but my hiding spot was smack dab in the middle of the lobby. I was paralyzed with fear. Any move I made placed me in the line of fire.
The men faced off against each other, just a few feet from my hiding place under the mahogany table. They stood silent for a few seconds, appraising each other. One of the suits whispered something in Italian that I couldn’t quite make out.
Someone swore, then all hell broke loose. A lone shot rang out. I couldn’t see much from my vantage point, but seconds later, the smaller of the golf shirt guys dropped his gun and went limp. He staggered forward as a crimson stain slowly spread across the waistline of his beige cargo shorts.
His partner grabbed the injured man under one arm and dragged him towards the exit. I froze, unable to move. I was both a witness and an easy target. Mom and Aunt Pearl were nowhere to be seen.
The two suits followed, but kept a ten-foot distance from their casually dressed adversaries. They made no attempt to fire again. If the bullets were a hint to leave, it was a pretty convincing one.
The remotely controlled door swung open and the pursued men disappeared through the open doors.
Once the men had left, the suits reversed course and walked slowly back through the lobby. They spoke in low voices, but the cavernous lobby magnified their conversation. They chatted about last night’s heavyweight fight, as if the shootout that had just happened was the most ordinary thing in the world.
I flashed back to Carla Racatelli as I peered out from my vantage point under the heavy table. Given the family’s underworld ties, I wondered if the shootout was somehow related to Carla’s death. That seemed much more likely than the curse Mom and Aunt Pearl spoke of.
Vegas or not, I had no intention of pressing my luck by attending the funeral. The hotel itself was unsafe, and I was certain the funeral would be even more so. I had to do everything in my power to stop Mom and Aunt Pearl from whatever their quest was. Sometimes it was best not to tempt fate.
I had to get us back to Westwick Corners, and there was no time to waste.
Chapter 7
I saw no one else other than the gunmen in the lobby. Mom, Aunt Pearl, Wilt and the others were nowhere to be seen. If other people hid behind the heavy furniture and marble columns, I couldn’t see them. They had either hidden just as the shooting started, or they had escaped via the stairs or elevators.
I held my breath as footsteps sounded on the marble floor. An unarmed man strode towards the suits. He came from the direction of the elevators, though I hadn’t noticed him before. He acted as if a hotel lobby shootout was an everyday occurrence. I watched him walk by from my vantage point under the table. He wore black jeans, an expensive-looking white linen shirt that clung to his muscled torso, and a self-assured smirk that said he was the boss.
He was the type of arrogant guy I despised, but I found it hard to take my eyes off him. He was tall, dark, and oddly familiar. He abruptly stopped and turned his head in my direction. My heart thumped as his steel blue eyes locked on mine.
Caught.
I retreated further under the table and sucked in my breath. My life was about to be over before it even began. This turf war was almost certainly his, and he wouldn’t want to leave any witnesses.
After what seemed like an eternity, he broke his gaze and resumed walking in the same direction as the suits. He kicked the dropped revolver with a calfskin boot, sending it clattering across the marble floor towards me. It landed inches from my hiding spot.
The barrel pointed towards me and I thanked my lucky stars that the gun hadn’t fired from the impact. I held my breath, scared that one of the men would retrieve the gun and discover me under the table.
The man joined the suits by the front door. The two men were clearly under his command. The boss man paused and turned. His eyes scanned the lobby once more before turning back to me
The man had somehow noticed me, despite my hiding place. I felt exposed and vulnerable, as if the table wasn’t there to cover me. On the other hand, he had made no effort to expose me, so I let down my guard a little.
I also felt a surge of adrenalin, and something else I couldn’t quite describe. My strange attraction to him was almost enough to draw me out of hiding. As I angled my body under the table to keep him in my line of sight, I hit my head on the underside of the table.
“Damn!” The table sent shockwaves through my head as my voice carried through the silent lobby.
The boss man frowned. Seconds later he turned without a word and whisked the suits through the heavy glass doors, which were now unlocked. One of the men went ahead, followed by the hunky boss man.
The last man remaining tracked his gun around the lobby in a semi-circle to prevent anyone from following. After what seemed like an eternity, he left the building. Seconds later car doors slammed and tires screeched into the distance.
A split second of silence soon erupted into panicked screams and shouts. I wasn’t alone in the lobby after all. People scrambled from their hiding places and raced around the lobby looking for loved ones.
I stayed under the table, in shock from both the shooting and my attraction to the handsome stranger. I opened my mouth but no sound came out. I was a mess.
“Ouch!” Someone kicked my ankle and I rolled over to face Aunt Pearl. I was positive she hadn’t been under the table seconds earlier.
“Let me go home, Aunt Pearl. This is like a bad movie, only it’s real. What the hell just happened?” I couldn’t fathom any other reason for gunfire at our five-star hotel.
Aunt Pearl frowned as she crawled out from underneath the table.
Panic rose in my gut as I searched for Mom and Wilt. They had stood beside me seconds before the shooting broke out, but were now nowhere in sight. I broke into a sweat as police sirens wailed outside. I inched towards the table edge and peered out from my hiding spot as the sirens grew louder.
People were everywhere, some crying, others huddled together in shock. A dozen or so people pushed and shoved towards the exit, oblivious to the fact they were following in the footsteps of the recently departed gunmen.
I slowly slid out from under the table and rose to a sitting position. I was reluctant to stray far from my refuge just yet.
A woman beside me shouted frantically into her cell phone while others crammed into elevators, anxious to escape to the safety of their rooms upstairs.
I spotted Mom as she rose from behind a large overstuffed couch. Wilt stood beside her. Relieved, I glanced back at Aunt Pearl. She sat upright and cross-legged on the thick throw rug a few feet from the table. Her hands rested on her thighs in a Zen-like yoga pose, as if deep in meditation amidst the chaos.
But I knew better. She was casting a spell of some sort. I held out my hand, which she promptly brushed away.
“Darn it, we missed him.”
“Missed who?” I asked. “What the heck is going on that you’re not telling me?” The lobby swarmed with at least a dozen police by now. They directed people towards a line by the reception desk, where they interviewed witnesses one by one. There were officers stationed at the exits and elevators, so no one else could leave the lobby. It was just a matter of time before they questioned us.
“Did you see that handsome fella?” Aunt Pearl’s eyes widened in mock innocence.
I shrugged, afraid to say anything that might reveal my attraction.
“It’s obvious you did, judging from your reaction. That was Carla’s grandson Rocco.” Aunt Pearl smirked. “How could you not recognize our Rocco after all these years? You two used to play together all the time when you were kids. Remember?” Aunt Pearl gazed wistfully into space.
“The guy was most definitely not Rocco.” I hadn’t seen Rocco since high school, but my former schoolmate bore no resemblance to the mysterious, attractive man who had powered by us. I knew, because I had gotten a very good look at him. The mystery man was unforgettable.
I stood and walked over to the sofa behind me and surveyed the lobby. Aside from the gaggle of stunned tourists, there was little evidence of the shooting. Just a few bullet holes in the lobby walls, which the police were busy attending to.
It was nothing short of amazing that no one had been hit in the crossfire. “We need to talk to the police. We’re witnesses.”
“Don’t be silly, Cen. We can’t draw attention to ourselves. Rocco does enough of that already. Such a flair for the dramatic.” Aunt Pearl tittered as her hand flew to her mouth. “I do wish he would tone it down a bit though. Manny’s not going to like it.”
I doubted that the police would let us leave without interviewing us, but things were still pretty chaotic in the lobby.
“What’s so funny? We just got shot at. We need to get out of here.” I wanted to ask who Manny was, but Aunt Pearl was clearly baiting me, and I had no intention of giving her the satisfaction of asking.
Aunt Pearl shook her head. “You’re right. Let’s dump our luggage upstairs and then go to the casino. You need to unwind. Maybe we’ll even see Rocco.”
“He’s the last person I want to see right now.” That was true and not so true. I could stare at that man forever. But I wasn’t about to be a pawn in one of Aunt Pearl’s escapades. I also didn’t want to reconnect with a boy from my past that I had never even liked very much. No matter how good he looked.
“Stop being so negative.” Aunt Pearl rolled her eyes. “You complained about the gas and your stupid job interview all the way here.”
“Why wouldn’t I? You tricked me into coming here.”
Aunt Pearl waved her hand in dismissal. “Poor Rocco just lost his Grandma and all you think about is you. I never should have brought you along.”
“That’s right. You shouldn’t have. I want nothing to do with Rocco and whatever weird scheme you’ve concocted.” My mood lightened a little as Mom and Wilt walked over and joined us in the seating area.
Aunt Pearl grinned an evil grin. “Rocco’s not just a nice boy, Cen. He’s ambitious and smart. You two would make quite a pair.”
“I don’t see what that has to do with anything.” The idea of Aunt Pearl fixing me up with Rocco while he was still mourning his grandmother was extremely tacky, even for her. I just hoped she wouldn’t do anything to embarrass me.
“Oh, but you will, Cen.” A smile played across my aunt’s lips as she placed an arm around me and squeezed my shoulder. “You will.”
Chapter 8
We checked in once the Las Vegas police had taken our eyewitness accounts and personal details. I was completely exhausted, though it was barely after breakfast.
I was furious with Aunt Pearl for the way she danced around the truth. “Why didn’t you tell the police that you knew Rocco?”
“They never asked, so why mention it? It makes no difference either way.”
I shook my head. “It makes a huge difference. He was with two of the shooters.”
“Whatever.” Aunt Pearl dismissed me with a wave. “We’ve got a life or death job to do, so we need to stay under the radar.”
“What job?”
Aunt Pearl made a zipping motion across her lips and turned away. She completely ignored me as we followed the bellhop and our luggage across the lobby to the elevators, zigzagging around groups of bewildered guests.
The only saving grace from the chaotic lobby scene was that Wilt soon disappeared. He had decided to stay in the RV instead of the one suite we were apparently all supposed to share. I was relieved, since even reluctant witches like me had to let their hair down and be their witchy selves once in a while.
That would have been impossible with Wilt in the suite, and my temper was already frayed from our exhausting road trip. One of us was bound to slip up sooner or later. Hiding witchy talents 24/7 was almost harder than being a witch in the first place.
The bellhop motioned us towards a private elevator at the end of the elevator bank. The doors opened and we stepped inside the elevator like VIPs, attracting glares from the dozens of people lined up at the regular elevators. Our special treatment almost certainly came with strings attached.
The bellhop followed us inside the elevator, pulling his brass and velvet-lined luggage cart behind him. He scanned his key card and pressed one of several buttons that were marked with letters instead of floor numbers. He pressed a button engraved with an “R” written in fancy script.
I was surprised to see my suitcase atop the luggage heap. I hadn’t packed anything for my unexpected trip. Either Aunt Pearl had brought my luggage because she had planned to kidnap me all along, or she had used magic.
I barely had time to wonder before the elevator door opened into a spacious marble foyer with impossibly high ceilings. It was in the same Italian theme as the lobby but on a smaller scale. The walls were lined with large impressionist paintings above a marble fountain with colored water that burbled.
Mom exited the elevator and gawked at her surroundings. “You sure this is the right room? It looks more like a villa.”
The décor was a cross between a French provincial apartment and a mid-century Italian villa that was undergoing some weird nineteen seventies’ renovation. There were a lot of other decorating themes mixed in, but those were the main ones. Like the lobby, it was a blend of several different eras.
The ornate European architecture contrasted with gold-colored shag carpeting. Smack dab in the middle of the open floor plan was a sunken living room seating area, straight out of an old 1970s Mary Tyler Moore sitcom. A wrought-iron spiral staircase led to a second floor, where I assumed the bedrooms were.
The over-the-top interior decorating made me momentarily forget that we were in a brand new Las Vegas high-rise and not a retro, hippie Versailles. I stood in the foyer, awestruck.
“C’mon, we haven’t got all day.” Aunt Pearl grabbed my arm and pulled me into the suite. “We’ve got stuff to take care of.”
I wrested my arm from hers and paused at one of the large oil paintings. Judging from the brushstrokes and expensive-looking frame, the painting was both authentic and really old.
The portrait looked to be from the 1930s. A small man in a pinstriped suit stood behind a seated woman. Her sequined dress was accentuated by a long string of pearls. She had the same piercing blue eyes as
the man in the lobby.
I traced my hand across the bottom of the frame. It slid slightly out of place so I righted it. It was the first suite I had stayed in where the pictures weren’t bolted to the wall. But there was something else. In place of one of the man’s eyes was a bullet hole.
I gasped and turned to Mom and Aunt Pearl, but they had already left the foyer. I followed them into the suite and watched the bellhop take our bags up the spiral staircase.
“Welcome!” a deep male voice boomed behind me.
I jumped and turned to see a fit-looking blond man in his early thirties, formally dressed in a dark suit. My first thought was that he was dressed for the funeral.
He smiled and extended his hand. “I’m Christophe, your butler.”
I frowned as I shook his hand. I scanned the suite. It had to be over two thousand square feet just on the main floor, plus the additional space on the upper floor. “I think there’s been a mistake. This isn’t our room.”
Christophe smiled politely but didn’t respond.
“We can’t afford to stay in a place like this.” Mom turned to Pearl. “It must cost a small fortune. Exactly how much did you win in the lottery?”
Aunt Pearl waved her hand in dismissal. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll tell you later.”
“Can I offer you ladies some cocktails?” Christophe asked.
“It’s barely 9 a.m.,” I said. “Don’t you think it’s a bit early?” Butler-prepared drinks had to be several magnitudes more expensive than mini-bar drinks. Even if Aunt Pearl’s lottery win was real, I doubted we could afford it.
“There’s no time like the present.” Mom giggled. “Live a little, Cen.”
I grabbed Aunt Pearl’s boney arm and pulled her aside. “What did you give to Mom? I’ve never seen her like this.”
Rags to Witches Page 4