Page 27 of Tasty Cherry

“Feel absolutely free to call on me if you run into any trouble.”

“Thank you, Sebastian!” Brooklyn says.

This is a disaster. I head to the bussing bin and drop in my plate. A night that was so perfect has morphed into a day from hell. I can’t seem to do anything right with Mila.

I turn to the room to see if I can simply escape. Everyone is occupied.

I won’t go home yet, though. I need to talk to Mila, and we should be careful about how we do it. I can’t go to her room, not with all five of the new hires on the same hall.

I’ll send a note. Maybe we can meet off site.

Of all the dumb scrapes I’ve gotten into in my thirty-two years, this one takes the cake.

11

MILA

The five of us leave the meeting together. Ilsa and I push our carts. The bellhop got called away before he could move them.

We wander an endless maze of halls, and after fifteen minutes, Owen, who is leading us, comes to an abrupt halt.

“What?” Brooklyn asks.

“I think I’m lost,” Owen says.

Everyone groans.

“I’m out,” Maverick says. “I can jog the castle and find my way back in no time. See ya.” He takes off in a run.

Owen turns to us, hands extended, his shaggy hair falling in his eye. “I thought I knew what I was doing.”

“We can figure this out,” Brooklyn says. “Sebastian said there are codes on the corners.” She walks ahead. “There, I see a turn.”

Owen hurries to catch up with her, Ilsa and I trundling along behind our carts.

When we get there, Owen and Brooklyn are puzzling out the letters at the top of the wall. BH-1.

“Bathhouse one?” Brooklyn says.

“There’s no bathhouse here,” Ilsa grumbles.

“Barbie hall?” Owen ventures.

“No,” Brooklyn says. “The only themed wings are princess and haunted.”

“Besides,” Ilsa says, “we’re in the guts, not the public area.”

I snap my fingers. “Banquet hall one. There’s a banquet hall with an outside entrance, so that guests can park in the side lot and not have to go through the lobby. I think we’re on the west side service entrance.”

“Well, that’s fine,” Ilsa says. “But where is the staff wing from here?”

I pull up an aerial of the castle on my phone and angle it at them. “If we’ve gone all the way to the west side, then we went too far.”

“We definitely walked a lot less last time.” Brooklyn heads back the way we came.

Ilsa sighs. “Let’s check every turn on the way back.”

Owen takes the lead again. “There’s a turn.”

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