Anna Leigh Keaton and Madison Layle

Part II


When the world stopped shaking, Constance found herself huddled in the corner of the elevator, arms over her head, and “Oh, God, please don’t let me die!” on her lips.

The elevator—she tried not to think of it as her coffin—was pitch-black except for the faint, flashing red emergency light up in the corner that did nothing to light the space.

Her heart thudded in her ears. Little stars danced in front of her eyes because of the adrenaline causing her blood pressure to skyrocket.

She told herself she was okay. The elevator hadn’t fallen. She was alive. Standing up, she felt her way across the space to the button panel and pushed them. Nothing happened. What she thought was the Door Open button didn’t do anything. Nothing even dinged. The thing always dinged.

“Hello!” she called, and heard the panic in her tone. She clenched her teeth and called again. “I’m stuck in the elevator. Is anyone out there?”

She didn’t know what floor she was on—or near. She hadn’t been paying attention to the numbers over the door. She banged on the door. “Hey! Help! I’m in the elevator!”

Panting, she pressed her heated cheek against the cool metal door and tried to catch her breath. “Please,” she whispered.

The phone. Duh. Below the buttons was a little door that said, In case of emergency…

She felt around the smooth panel until she touched the little latch. It took her a moment of fumbling—perhaps she should pay more attention to things like this before an actual emergency happens. She couldn’t remember the last time she listened to the flight attendant on a plane when they gave their little speech before takeoff. Dear God, she prayed. Let me take another flight someday. I’ll pay attention from now on.

The little door popped open, and she fumbled for the phone. A jolt of relief so strong went through her, she landed on her knees on the floor as she raised the receiver to her ear.

It was an odd sounding ring, more of a buzz, buzz, buzz, but it seemed to go unanswered forever. Finally, she heard, “Hello?” And she recognized the voice as the building’s security officer, Paul Daniels.

“Paul! This is Constance Meriwether. I’m stuck in the elevater. Please, get me out!”

“Calm down, Constance. We’ve lost all power and—“ His voice was muffled all of a sudden, but she thought she heard him tell someone to get them out as fast as possible.

“Paul!” she shouted. “What’s going on? Is the—“

“It’s all right, Constance. Everything’s under control…”

No it wasn’t. She could hear it in his voice. Visions popped into her head of that horrible day. Of collapsing buildings. Of people trapped. Tears stung her eyes, and her breathing grew shallow.

“I’ve got to put you on hold, Constance,” Paul said, “so I can call the fire department to get you out.”

“No, no. No! Don’t hang up on me—“

“Panicked woman stuck in the elevator.”

Constance made a face. I’m not panicked! “Paul, please just—” The phone clicked, and the silence was deafening.

* * * * *

“What’s up?” Jared Majors said as he was ushering a couple elderly women through the lobby when he saw the security guard on the phone.

“Panicked woman stuck in the elevator.”

“Right through there,” Jared directed the women, then turned back to the guard. “She hurt?”

The guard shook his head and hit the Hold button on the phone. “Just panicked. I have to call the fire department, but I bet it’ll be a while. That was one hell of a quake.

From somewhere in the building, Jared heard a groaning sound over the raised voices of panicked employees pouring out of the stairwells. Not good. So not good. He took the phone from the guard. “You call. I’ll see if I can calm her down.”

The guard scowled and tried to take the phone back from him.

Jared turned to keep the phone out of reach. “I’m an off-duty 9-1-1 operator. I’m good at handling panic. Now call the fire department to get her out of there.” He glanced up as another strange, metallic scraping sound echoed through the marble lobby. “Before this bitch collapses,” he muttered.

“Ma’am?” he said after he hit the Hold button on the red phone on the guard’s counter. A phone that had ten lines—luckily no other lines were lit up—and was a direct line from every emergency phone in the building.

“Where’s Paul?” the woman all but screeched into the phone. “Are you here to get me out of this elevator?”

“Ma’am, I’m going to talk to you while the security guard gets the fire department on the phone. Everything’ll be fine.”

“Did you hear that noise? What was that noise? Did you hear it?”

“I heard it, ma’am. It’s just the building settling after the little tremor we had.”

Silence.

“Ma’am?”

“I wish I was in Chicago in a snow storm right now.”

That comment pulled a chuckle from Jared. “And give up the sunshine and beaches of California?”

“I haven’t had time to go to a beach in forever,” she said softly, then sighed.

“What’s your name?”

“Constance. Uh…Connie.” Her voice trembled. “I’m scared. I-I’m claustrophobic.”

“Help is on the way, Connie. Just keeping talking to me. We’ll have you out of there in plenty of time to head for the beach this weekend if you like.”

The building jarred as if it had been hit by a massive, invisible fist. Connie screamed. The phone went dead.

“Son of a bitch!” the guard next to him shouted. “We’ve got to get the hell out of here!”

~*~ ~*~ ~*~

To Be Continued… Look for Part III, the finale, day after tomorrow.

In the meantime, you can read excerpts and more about any of our 40+ books on our Web site at: www.LayleKeaton.com, as well as a few free reads that are multi-authored anthologies.