His face answered before he could.
Chapter 9: Blackout
"Dad," I said. "What happened the night my mother died?"
He opened his mouth.
The hotel went black.
Not dim. Not flickering. Black. The chandeliers died. Behind the desk, the piano stopped mid-note, its last sound hanging.
"Do not move," Greer said. "Everyone stay where you are."
A woman screamed near the elevators, then someone told her to hold the rail.
"The emergency lights," I said.
They came on a second later, red strips above the doors, washing the marble dull red.
"The generators," my father said. "Where are the generators?"
"They switch automatically," Greer said. "Ten seconds. Fifteen at most."
We waited. Twenty heartbeats. Thirty. Forty. No hum. No brightening.
"They are not coming on," I said.
"No," Greer said.
Jack.
That was my only thought. Jack, upstairs near the seventeenth floor with a man I had met two hours ago.
I started moving.
My father caught my arm. "Clara, wait. We do not know what this is."
"I know where my son is," I said. "That is enough."
"Running blind helps no one. Stay with me."
I tore free, and hated the grief of it: pulling away from my own father in the dark.
"Ms. Whitfield." A guard pushed in. "The Brennan girl. She is gone."
"What do you mean, gone?" Greer said.
"She was by the side door with another guard. The lights went, and she went through it."
"Find her," Greer said. "Service corridor. Go."
"We tried the radio," the guard said. "Nobody answers anywhere."
Greer tried his own radio. "Front desk, this is Greer. Security, respond. Engineering, respond. Anyone on this frequency, respond." Only static.
"Then we walk," I said. "Stairs. Now."
The emergency door stood behind the desk, its push bar cold. Red bulbs burned at every landing.
"Jack is on seventeen?" my father said.
"Executive dining room," Greer said. "Near it. Jonah has him."
"Near it is not good enough," I said, and I started up.
We climbed, Greer first, radio crackling, my father last. I took the steps two at a time until my body objected.
"Slow down," Greer called. "You will have nothing left by ten."
"Then I will crawl from ten."
By the sixth floor my lungs burned, each breath scraping.
By the tenth floor my legs shook. I gripped the rail and kept going. My father kept pace, sixty-eight, never closer, never farther, and I hated feeling safer for it.
"Clara," he said. "Whatever you believe about me, I am here."
"I believe you are here," I said.
On the twelfth floor landing, Greer's radio crackled. A voice broke through.
"Greer? Can you hear me? This is Jonah Ellis."
Greer snatched it up. "Jonah. Is Jack with you?"
"He is with me," Jonah said. "He is safe. But we are not in the dining room."
"Give it to me," I said. Greer handed me the radio. "Jonah, it is Clara. Talk to me."
"Ms. Whitfield, just before the lights went, a woman came to the dining room. She said she was from executive services, that you had ordered the boy moved somewhere safer."
"Who?" Greer said, over my shoulder.
"It was Kayla," Jonah said. "Kayla Brennan. She had changed her jacket, but I recognized her."
"Where did she take you?" I asked.
"The Presidential Suite," Jonah said. "Room 1701. She sat Jack down, said she needed to check the hallway, stepped out, and the door locked behind her. It will not open from this side."
"Is Jack hurt?"
"No, ma'am. Frightened. He keeps asking for you. He has not cried, but he is close."
I closed my eyes. All that remained was that small, brave fact.
"Jonah," I said. "Stay with him. Do not leave him for one second, not for any voice, not for any order, not even mine. Tell him his mother is coming."
"I will tell him," Jonah said. "He can hear me telling him."
"Good. We are on twelve. We are coming."
The radio died back into static.
I handed it to Greer and I ran.
Not fast, because there was no fast left in my legs, only stubborn. Thirteen. Fourteen, Greer beside me. Fifteen, and my father's hand brushed my back once, steadying, then was gone. Sixteen.
"Clara," Greer panted. "The lock is electronic. It may not open."
"Then we break the door down," I said.
"Those doors are steel cored."
"Then we break the wall."
Seventeen.
The corridor beyond lay drowned in red gloom. At the far end stood one door: 1701. I crossed, stopped, and put my palm flat against the wood, as if Jack might feel it.
"Jack?" I called. "Baby, I am here. I am right here."
The electronic lock above the handle showed no light. No green. No red. Nothing. Dead as the hotel, and between me and my son.