Elevator, The (13 page)

The thought of sidestepping the reporter’s assault brings a smile to her face, but she can’t deny the irony. Greg Owens, champion for the cause of integrity and ethics, has resorted to deception in the hope of exposing an employment scam. To remain free of his sticky little web, Michelle will counter with complete honesty. If not for the danger of further fallout, she might even be tempted to expose Marshall Owens’s false application.

But what kind of jobs might he have applied for? He might have claimed to be a teacher or a writer. Depending on his background, he might have claimed to be a coach or in retail. She could ask the school principal who e-mailed her this morning for possible leads at local schools, and Lauren might know someone at the mall. If they meet at Lord & Taylor tomorrow—
when
they meet—Michelle could stop by the store office and ask for a sample application.

She pulls her purse from the corner and rummages through its depths for her notepad and a pen. She wants to jot down these ideas before she forgets them; she wants to feel as if she’s doing something useful while she sits here staring at the walls.

She finds her notepad, drops it onto her lap and thrusts her hand back into her purse. After grabbing a handful of objects at the bottom of her bag, she brings them into the light: a wrapped cough drop, a highlighter, a paper clip, a gum wrapper and two pens, neither of which work when she drags them across a sheet of paper.

From the other wall, Gina watches with a look of patient amusement. “You might check—” she points toward the purse “—to see if you have anything edible in there. By the time the storm passes, we might be hungry.”

Michelle gives her a wintry smile. “We won’t be here when the storm passes. Eddie’s coming.”

“He may be,” Gina counters, “but unless he’s bringing help, I don’t think he’s going to get us out. Even a piece of hard candy might boost our energy.”

Tired of arguing, Michelle dumps the contents of her purse on the floor. The other women lean forward as she takes inventory: “Two tea bags—one Earl Gray, one chamomile.”

“Nice,” Gina says. “If only we had teacups and hot water.”

“A USB flash drive,” Michelle continues, “a couple of wadded tissues, one AAA membership card, one tube of raspberry antibacterial hand lotion, six pieces of sugarless gum and my passport.” She looks up, anticipating the question in Gina’s eyes. “I’m not going overseas, but I do travel occasionally and I hate showing my driver’s license at the airport. The passport has a much better picture.”

Gina tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “I would do the same thing.”

“One pair of prescription sunglasses, a bottle of Motrin, a travel-size mouthwash, a handful of receipts, my cell phone, my wallet, my pocket calendar. My notepad, highlighter and two pens, both of which are apparently out of ink.”

Isabel sighs and leans back against the far wall while Gina folds her arms. “Nothing edible? You must not have been a Girl Scout.”

“Look,” Michelle says, her voice coagulating with sarcasm, “at least I brought a purse. Where’s yours?”

A secretive smile softens Gina’s mouth, but she doesn’t answer.

NOON

M
ichelle sits in silence, her eyes fastened to the sweeping second hand on her watch. Time is a funny thing. As a kid, an hour seemed woven of eternity; as a businesswoman, sixty minutes flies like a bullet.

Yet in the elevator, time hangs over them like a noxious cloud. How long has it been since she talked to Eddie Vaughn—two hours? On a good day the drive from central Pinellas County to downtown Tampa might take forty-five minutes; today is not a good day. But surely the weather hasn’t deteriorated so much that he won’t be able to make it.

She sighs, looks at her watch again, then claps her hand over the face. She’ll drive herself crazy if she fixates on the clock. Eddie Vaughn is on his way; she will believe that. He’ll arrive any minute now and he’ll save their lives.

One hero on a white horse, courtesy of 1-800-SAV-A-GAL.

The other women have grown quiet. Isabel fell silent after her abbreviated attempt at storytelling, and Gina closed her eyes soon after Michelle emptied her purse. The redhead wears the placid face of a woman at rest, but Michelle knows better. Gina didn’t lower her eyelids so she could sleep; she lowered them because she was weary of her companions.

Michelle closes her own eyes, veiling her thoughts of Parker. How she wanted to see him this morning! He has to be gone by now, and he’s probably worried. Will he look for her, maybe drive to her condo? Or will he simply go home and trust her to take care of herself?

“One thing I admire about you,” he told her once, “is your independence. You don’t sit around waiting on me. I can’t tell you what a relief that is.”

The compliment warmed her even as it stung. If he wanted to protect her, shouldn’t he want her to be a little less independent? She’s always been proud of her self-sufficiency, but it would be so nice to know that someone wanted to take care of her so she could lay her burdens down….

“You’re thinking of someone.”

The remark snaps Michelle back to the present. Gina is watching, and her green eyes have narrowed with speculation. “You have a transparent face.”

Mercifully, the dim light in the car hides the full extent of Michelle’s embarrassment. “You must have caught me in an unguarded moment.”

“Are you thinking about him?”

“Who?”

“Earlier I believe you said we ought to talk about our men. We heard about Isabel’s Carlos, but I’m curious about the man who brought that enigmatic smile to your face.”

Michelle smiles. “Maybe I should sit facing the wall.”

“Easier to tell me about your man. I don’t see a wedding ring…so he’s a boyfriend?”

“For the moment.” Michelle bites her lower lip, then glances at Isabel, whose face has lit with interest. “He’s older, a widower, successful in his business. An amazing guy, really. We’ve been together about a year, and I think—well, I hope—we may be ready to get serious. We were supposed to meet this morning to discuss the future, but—” She shrugs. “I guess that’ll have to wait.”

The redhead smiles, but the distant look in her eyes tells Michelle that her brain has focused on something entirely different.

Michelle leans forward. “What are you thinking about?”

The redhead arches a brow. “Don’t you hear it? The wind has picked up.”

Michelle strains to listen. The whistle of the wind has been constant for the past hour, but beyond that sound she hears new noises—thumps and bumps and splintering scrapes.

She gasps in a shiver of panic. “What is that?”

“Some of the windows must have blown out,” Gina says, her voice flat and matter-of-fact. “This building is almost thirty-five years old—it can’t handle much stress.” Despite her calm, her face has gone pale, and a drop of perspiration trickles from her hairline. “I’m afraid your mechanic isn’t coming.”

“He is.” Michelle clenches her jaw to kill the sob in her throat. “He’s been delayed, that’s all.”

“Did you ever think,” Gina continues, “what a tragedy it would be to learn how to live on the day you die? I’ve been sitting here reviewing my life, wondering what I ought to have done differently so I wouldn’t be here at this moment—”

“We’re not going to die today,” Michelle says. With an effort, she pushes herself off the floor and turns toward the elevator panel. “I’m going to call Ginger. She’ll get Eddie on the phone and you’ll see that he’s close. He’s probably trying to find a way through those blasted barricades.”

She speaks with more bravado than she feels, and her hand trembles when she presses the telephone button. She waits, her ear above the speaker, and when nothing happens she presses the button again.

Silence.

“It’s a bad connection,” she insists, jabbing the button a third time. “Any minute now the phone will kick in….”

But it doesn’t. She is waiting for nothing.

She’s done it before.

The engraved invitation stood on Shelly’s dresser, propped next to a precious bottle of Halston cologne. The invite arrived weeks ago, and every time Shelly looked at it she felt like a trash-picker who’d found the bottom half of a winning lottery ticket.

The honor was nice, but she’d never been to a tea and didn’t stand a chance of finding an escort. Even if some eligible Prince Charming crept out from a mountain holler, she couldn’t afford a decent dress.

Where was
her
fairy godmother?

Still, the card was a pretty thing, shiny silver and white, and she might not ever see anything as nice until she picked out her own wedding invitation…provided she found a way out of Bald Knob and a man who wanted to marry her.

She’d kept the card purely for decoration, but yesterday afternoon Brian Hawthorne, class president and star linebacker, asked her if it was true.

“Is what true?”

“You won the Star Student award. Mrs. Purvis said only two girls from our school even came close, you and Jennifer Milton.”

At first Shelly thought he was crazy, especially since nobody else at school seemed to know a thing about the tea and the ceremony. She looked into his eyes, searching for signs of desperation or mischief, and saw nothing but round blue orbs flecked with green and gold.

“Yeah, they’re having some kind of fancy tea to give out the awards.” She shifted her books from her hip to her arms. “But I’m not goin’.”

“Why not?”

She shrugged. “What do I know about tea? Besides, all the other girls will have an escort. I didn’t want to drag some guy all the way over to Oak Hill just so he can be bored and sip from a fancy cup.”

Brian laughed. “Well, I figure you ought to go, so if you need somebody to take you, I’m up for it. Besides—my mom’s a member of the DAR. She won’t let us be bored.”

She searched his eyes again and saw only twin reflections of her own timid image.

“Okay,” she finally said. “I’ll go. Not because I like you or anything, but because I reckon a girl ought to go to a fancy tea at least once in her life.”

Brian’s grin had practically jumped through his lips. “Great!”

The thought of that smile warmed her as she spritzed Halston on her neck and wrists. The question of what to wear had pressed heavy on her mind, but a quick search through the cedar chest produced a sleeveless white dress with a V neck. Though her mother had married in that gown, Shelly didn’t think Momma would mind if she wore it to the tea. Years of loneliness and several hundred bottles of booze had obliterated any happy memories lingering in its folds.

Shelly sniffed at the garment before laying it out on the bed. The fabric smelled of mothballs, but she didn’t have enough time for a trip to the dry cleaner’s. The steam iron had removed the creases and probably set a sprinkling of orange spatters near the hem, but good enough would have to do. Nothing mattered but getting to the awards ceremony.

Brian had promised to pick her up at three-thirty. Shelly showered at two, then took extra time applying her makeup and curling her long hair. When she was satisfied with her face and hairstyle, she slipped the dress over her head and breathed deeply to fill out the bodice. Her mother had always been bosomy, but Shelly refused to stuff her bra the way some girls did. If she couldn’t pass muster with what Mother Nature had given her, tough.

She pulled on her best gold bracelet, the pearl necklace she’d inherited from her grandmother and a sterling silver ring that had cost her the proceeds from twenty quarts of wild blueberries.

After glancing ruefully in her closet, she wished again for a fairy godmother—a pair of glass slippers would have been highly appreciated. A collection of dirty sneakers littered the floor, sprinkled with old socks, two pairs of stuffed-animal slippers and one pair of sandals. The white sandals matched her dress, but the left shoe’s ankle strap had lost its buckle.

Shelly pulled the broken shoe onto her lap. She could cut off the useless strap, but she wouldn’t be able to walk with a shoe that wouldn’t stay on her foot. She had no choice, then, but to try to repair it.

After searching every drawer in the trailer and the shed, she came up with three options: duct tape, adhesive bandages or staples. The staples bit into the top of her foot and then gave way. The bandage strips lacked staying power (no surprise, since this bargain brand barely stuck to a cut finger). The duct tape wouldn’t be the most attractive solution, but it was certainly the strongest.

With an eye on the clock, Shelly slid the tongue of the strap into the broken buckle, then encased both pieces in gray duct tape. When she was sure the repair would hold, she put on the other shoe. Standing, no one could see the tops of her feet. Sitting would be a problem, but if she kept her right leg crossed over the left and her skirt pulled down, maybe no one would notice.

At three-fifteen she was ready to go.

She paced in the living room, the skirt of the white gown swishing against her legs as she walked from the TV wall to the kitchen. Her mother lay on the couch, a cigarette between her fingers, her free arm thrown over her head, her eyes glued to a rerun of
M*A*S*H.
At every commercial break, she lifted her head, gave Shelly a bleary look and said, “Face it, girl, you ain’t the type to drink tea.”

By the time the four o’clock soap opera faded from the screen, Shelly realized Brian wasn’t coming. She sat in her dead father’s recliner and watched the shadows lengthen across the room. Had Brian met his buddies at the diner and told them what he’d done? Were they heehawing about her even now?

The thought lacerated her.

She wouldn’t let them laugh. They might think her a misfit, they might not invite her to their parties, but she had every right to accept an award she’d earned. She would go to that tea in her mother’s yellowed wedding dress and her own duct-taped sandals. She would show up, sweaty and defiant and late, and she would revel in secondhand glory.

Because one day she would leave Bald Knob. She would exchange her hopelessness for success. She’d forget about this trailer and these people. When she broke a shoe, she’d throw it out, and she’d never, ever wear anything with even a teeny, tiny stain on it.

And if by chance one of her classmates found her in the great, wide world, she’d look at him in consternation, furrow a brow and say, “Bald Knob? You still living in that flea-bitten town?”

She tucked her battered purse under her arm and headed toward the door. “Bye.”

“You going somewheres?” Her mother rose up on an elbow and cast a wide-eyed look over the sofa pillow. “In my weddin’ dress?”

“See you later, Momma.”

Gripping the last shreds of her courage, Shelly Tills stalked out the door, marched down the creaky porch steps and grabbed the handlebars of her bicycle.

Twenty miles lay between her and Oak Hill, with ten of those miles spread over a strength-sapping incline.

But she’d find the energy to pedal up Mount Everest if doing so meant she could confront Brian Hawthorne and his friends and shame them into silence.

Gina leans forward and stretches the ache from her shoulders, then lets her hands fall back into her lap. If only she’d remembered to grab a magazine from the nightstand before she got in the car…

She grimaces at the absurdity of the thought. If she’s not careful, she’ll drive herself crazy with if-onlys. What’s done is done; the present and future are all that matter. She must endure this interval of confinement, then she’ll be free to do whatever she must to protect her children.

Her plan has been postponed, that’s all, though the storm has added a new wrinkle to the situation. Despite Michelle’s blind faith in that mechanic, it’s going to take a dedicated rescue team to get them out of here. The governor will have learned from others’ mistakes after Katrina, so he’ll implement rescue efforts as soon as the storm has passed. Professional people will scour these buildings; the rescue may merit media attention. Sonny, who has to know where she is, will be on the scene, eager and solicitous about her welfare.