Wait.
If her power was out...
She jumped from her bed and scrambled into the clothes she always left prepped in her bathroom. In her job, middle-of-the-night emergencies required her to look at least somewhat presentable. It didn’t happen often, but occasionally, a guest flipped out, received traumatic news, or—once—became convinced they’d seen a ghost and demanded to see her.
She grabbed her phone from beside the sink and checked the time.
3:57 a.m.
She called the reception desk.
No response. That was weird. That desk was supposed to be staffed 24/7.
“Bronwyn?” Meredith’s voice floated down the hall. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Just need to run to the office.”
“Why?”
“The power’s out.”
“Yes, I noticed that when my fan cut off. But why do you need to go to the office?”
“No one’s answering the phone.”
Meredith grumbled something unintelligible, then, “I’m getting dressed. Don’t leave without me.”
“This isn’t your problem. Go back to bed.”
“Like I would do that.” Her voice was closer now, the light from her phone a glowing orb bouncing along the wall. Meredith pointed the light at Bronwyn. “There’s a zero percent chance of you walking out the door alone. Also, where’s your gun?”
That’s when Bronwyn noticed the small pistol in Meredith’s other hand. “Why are you walking around the house with a gun?”
“Hold that thought.” Meredith disappeared into her room and emerged thirty seconds later with her shoes on and her hair up in a clip. “I think under the circumstances, the more importantquestion is why aren’t you carrying yours? We’re in the middle of a situation here.”
“Just because I can doesn’t mean I make a habit out of walking around armed! And I don’t want to make it a habit. Since when do you carry a gun everywhere you go, anyway?”
“Since I got myself engaged to the chief of police and he decided I should become even more proficient with firearms than I was before. And I don’t always carry it. I’m not walking around like half the old ladies in town with a pistol in my purse.”
“That’s a relief.” Bronwyn headed to the door, but Meredith held up a hand. “What now?”
“Now we tell Mo, Cal, and Gray what we’re doing. And we do that before we go running off into the night. If”—Meredith pecked away at her phone—“I wanted to grab you, this is the kind of thing I’d do. I’d create a situation that forced you out of your house. Anyone could snatch you and have you in the woods in seconds.”
Bronwyn waited until Meredith was done. “Would this be a good time to point out that this property is fenced? Even if they drag me into the woods, they can’t get far.”
Meredith nodded. “True. But it only takes a few seconds to kill you and leave your body behind. So let’s not tempt fate. Okay?”
On that cheery thought, they jogged to her car and drove to the main reception area.
The night desk clerk, a bubbly and beautiful young woman named Miller, threw up her hands when she saw them. “Oh, Ms. Pierce. Thank goodness you’re here! I was sitting at the desk and pop! Everything went dark. The emergency lights are on, of course, but still! Some of our guests will flip right on out when they realize there’s no power!”
“There will be power,” Bronwyn said. “We have generators. We’ll need the maintenance crew to get them fired up, but it won’t take long.”
“How did I not know that?” Miller’s eyes were wide. “That’s something I should have known.”
She was right. It was. But, unlike many of her coworkers, most of whom shared Bronwyn’s last name, Miller genuinely seemed to want to learn and do her very best. Bronwyn couldn’t fault her work ethic.
“We haven’t needed to use them since you’ve been here. Don’t worry about it. We’ll get things sorted. The first step is to find out what happened and when we can expect to regain power. There’s an emergency protocol in your desk drawer.”
