Page 145 of Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies

Bang!

It goes from premonition to reality before I have time to prepare myself.

CHAPTER 24Things That Go Bump in the Night

“Those were gunshots!” I say, springing out of bed and searching frantically for my clothes. There isn’t much to find—a T-shirt, my robe, underwear—but it’s dark in here and I don’t remember where they fell.

“Wait,” Oliver says. “Eleanor, it’s not safe.”

I find my underwear and put it on, struggling on unsteady legs. “But it was on this floor! What if Harper is…” My throat closes and I can’t get the words out. I sink to the ground.

He swings his legs around and picks up the bedside phone as I hear a door close with a thick thud. It sounds like it’s next door, but it’s hard to tell.

“I’m calling the front desk. They’ll call the police.”

“And what, we just wait?”

“We have to. Someone’s wandering around with a gun. It’s not time to play the hero.”

“Call them. Please.”

Oliver dials reception. “Ciao. Questo è Oliver Forrest. I’m in room 206. I just heard gunshots. Sì, due. Per favore, chiami subito la polizia.” He listens for a moment. “Grazie. Sì.”

He hangs up. “They said to stay in our room. They’re calling the police.”

I hug my knees to my chest. The carpeting is scratchy beneath me. “I can’t just… I—”

I stop because there are footsteps in the hall, maybe on the stairs, and some above us, too. Heavy footfalls.

“Is that upstairs?” I ask.

“It’s hard to tell. But it doesn’t… I’m sure those shots woke everyone up.”

“But then they’ll come out of their rooms…”

Oliver steps off the bed and pulls me up next to him, then wraps his arms around me. “I know this sounds terrible, but there’s nothing we can do. We have to wait. It’s too dangerous.”

I lean back against him, wanting him to be right. But every fiber in my body is telling me to move my feet and get out of this room.

I listen to the noises around me. Everything seems heightened, ominous. The footsteps up and down, a murmur of voices, and then—a scream. Again.

“It’s Harper!”

I wrench myself away from Oliver and grab my robe off the floor, throwing it on as I open the door. She screams again, and it sounds like death to me, but I have to charge toward it anyway.

When I’m in the hall, I realize the screams are coming from inside my room. I fish in my bathrobe pocket for my key and fumble to open the door as quickly as I can. It takes two tries to scan the key right, but then the lights turn to green and I wrench open the door.

Harper’s on the floor, in the threshold of the connecting door, a dim light illuminating her from behind. She’s staring fixedly at my bed, which is just a dark shape in the half-light.

But as my eyes adjust, it looks like someone is lying there. A large lump covered by the comforter.

I feel sick. Is it possible that someone… Wait, no. It’s just the way I left my pillows when I left the room to go to Oliver’s.

I rush to Harper and wrap my arms around her. “I’m here. I’m okay.”

“Eleanor?”

“Yes, I’m fine. It wasn’t me.” I hold her tearstained cheek to mine. Her lashes tickle my face.

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