Page 77 of Coup De Grâce
“Do you think anyone knows the elevator fell?” Sarah asked.
Of course. The phone. We needed to contact someone. The idea of moving across the elevator right now didn’t thrill me, but if we wanted to get out of here, someone had to do it.
“I’ll call. Maybe someone in the panic room can help us.”
“Careful. Don’t shift your weight too fast,” Quinn said.
I could hear the panic in her voice and tried not to let it get to me. Inch by inch, I slid across the floor to the call box. I was almost there when the elevator gave a sudden lurch, sending us falling another few feet before coming to a jerking halt.
I held my breath, terrified to move another inch. It was strange that I hadn’t been panicked at all while I was throwing knives around upstairs, but put me in an elevator that’s plummeting to the ground and I was absolutely terrified.
“Because I can kill someone with knives,” I muttered to myself as I carefully moved another inch.
“We have to look on the bright side. If the cables snap, at least we’ll go fast,” Sarah said, her voice shaking.
“How do you figure?” Quinn asked.
“Well…the way I see it, we’re in a metal box. The impact alone would be enough to turn our brains to jelly, right? Which means it would be a quick death. There have to be worse ways to go.”
“Like death by lava,” Quinn agreed. “Burning in hot magma definitely doesn’t sound like a good way to go.”
I moved another inch closer, focusing on their conversation to keep me calm. “One of Scottie’s plane crashes,” I added.
“Yes,” Quinn laughed. “God, he’s the scariest pilot ever.”
“Or boiling in a vat of Fox’s acid,” Sarah said. “Have you ever seen him boil someone? The screams will live with you forever.”
I was almost there. I stretched out my hand and pressed the button, hoping that meant we would be rescued soon. But as I pushed it, nothing happened. Fear skittered down my spine as I pressed it again and again, only to get no response whatsoever.
“Uh…we have a slight problem.” Trying to keep the shaking out of my voice, I swallowed several times before gathering the courage to tell them the gravity of our situation. “I pressed the button.”
“And?” Quinn asked.
“Nothing. It’s not connecting.”
“Figures,” Sarah sighed. “Must have knocked out the power and the backup when the building went kablooey.”
“The light is still on. The power can’t be out!” Sarah said hysterically.
“It could be a separate system or maybe it’s battery operated,” I said. “I don’t know!” Anxiety threatened to overcome me as the reality of our situation sank in. I could not go out like this, not when I was finally at the height of my career with so much going for me. Not when I had Red and my kids. There was just too much to live for.
“So…what do we do? Should we try to climb out?”
Sarah scoffed. Even in the red glow of the elevator, I could see the horror on her face. “Climb out and what? You want to scale the walls like Spider-Man? I don’t know about you, but I can’t shoot webbing from my fingertips!”
“So we just stay here and wait for the elevator to crash and turn our brains to jelly?” I asked hysterically. “I’m too young to die!”
“So am I,” Sarah snapped, “But I can guarantee I’ll die a hell of a lot faster if I climb out of this elevator!”
“You guys, this is not helping,” Quinn cut in. “We can’t turn on each other now. If anything, we should turn on them!” she jabbed a finger at Harry. “If they hadn’t shown up, maybe none of this would have happened.”
“Man, this is so good,” Harry chuckled. “It’s like a bunch of cats in an argument.”
“Pretty sure we’re really about to die,” the cameraman said.
“It wouldn’t have mattered if they had shown up or not,” I sighed. “Those men forced their way inside. They broke past the security protocols. If they can do that, it means they knew what they were doing.”
“Yeah, but who is they?” Sarah asked. “Do we even know who’s trying to kill us?”
