“I was hoping you’d say that,” he says. “I’m feeling more exhausted than usual tonight, and I’ve got to open in the morning, so I’m going to head home a few minutes early. Don’t want to nod off on the road.”
“Hey, not funny.” Now that I’m looking at him, he really does look tired. Like, insanely tired. For the first time since Grace told me, I suddenly remember the rumors about him being sick. They may not be true, who knows, but I know one thing for sure: He’s too old to be working this late. And Cavadini is an asshole to schedule him opening tomorrow morning.
“I’ll stay alert, don’t worry,” he assures me. “But your concern is much appreciated. I just need a good night’s rest. Daisy Dog and I need our beauty sleep. Tell Porter I’m locking the two of you in with the new master code. He’ll have to punch in the override to get out. He’ll know what I’m talking about.”
“Got it.” At least he has a dog to go home to. I tell him to be careful driving and when he’s gone, I head out to find Porter. It’s weird being alone in the museum. It’s dark and eerily quiet: Only the afterhours lights are on—just enough to illuminate the hallways and stop you from tripping over your own feet—and the background music that normally plays all the time is shut off.
I quickly organize the flashlights and check their batteries, and when I don’t hear Porter walking around, I stare at the phone sitting at the information desk. How many chances come along like this? I pick up the receiver, press the little red button next to the word ALL, and speak into the phone in a low voice. “Paging Porter Roth to the information desk,” I say formally, my voice crackling through the entire lobby and echoing down the corridors. Then I press the button again and add, “While you’re at it, check your shoes to make sure they’re a match, you bastard. By the way, I still haven’t quite forgiven you for humiliating me. It’s going to take a lot more than a kiss and a cookie to make me forget both that and the time you provoked me in the Hotbox.”
I’m only teasing, which I hope he knows. I feel a little drunk on all my megaphone power, so I page one more thing:
“PS—You look totally hot in those tight-fitting security guard pants tonight, and I plan to get very handsy with you at the movies, so we better sit in the back row.”
I hang up the phone and cover my mouth, silently laughing at myself. Two seconds later, Porter’s footfalls pound down Jay’s corridor—Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! He sounds like a T. rex running from Godzilla. He races into the lobby and slides in front of the information desk, grabbing onto the edge to stop himself, wild curls flying everywhere. His grin is enormous.
“Whadidya say ’bout where you want to be puttin’ your hands on me?” he asks breathlessly.
“I think you have me confused with someone else,” I tease.
His head sags against the desk. I push his hair away from one of his eyes. He looks up at me and asks, “You really still haven’t forgiven me?”
“Maybe if you put your hands on me, I might.”
“Don’t go getting my hopes up like that.”
“Oh, your hopes should be up. Way up.”
“Dear God, woman,” he murmurs. “And here I was, thinking you were a classy dame.”
“Pfft. You don’t know me at all.”
“I aim to find out. What are we still doing here? Let’s blow this place and get to the theater, fast.”
We race each other through the lobby and grab our stuff out of our lockers. When we get to the back door, Porter pauses by the security system panel and tilts his head quizzically.
“Oh,” I say, snapping my fingers. “Pangborn said to tell you that he was using the new master code to lock us in, and that you’ll have to punch in the override code to get out.”
Porter sort of shakes his head, mumbling to himself, and then appears to dismiss it. He unhooks his leather key fob thingy from his belt. I recognize his van keys on it, because there’s a tiny shark on the key ring. But when he swings it into his palm he pauses again.
“O-o-oh, s-h-h-i-i-i-t,” he drawls. His head drops. He’s silently swearing to the floor, eyes squeezed shut.
“What?” I say.
“Pangborn took my key earlier,” he says in a small voice. “Right before the tour. He left his at home during the break between the regular shift and the ghost tours, and he had to open the back door. I was about to start a tour, and I forgot to get it back from him. That son of a bitch.”
“But you can just use the master code to let us out, right?”
Porter snorts and throws up his hand toward the panel. “If he’d used the master code, yes. But he didn’t. See this here, this number? That code indicates that the system is on lockdown.”
“And that means . . . ?”
“It means,” Porter says, “that you and I are now locked up alone together inside the museum for the rest of the night.”
“All night long I’ve had the most terrible impulse to do something.”
—Audrey Hepburn, Sabrina (1954)
20
* * *
That can’t be true. I mean, not really. There’s always a way out of a place this big, right?
“Remember that day when I had to reinstall all the locks on the doors?” Porter asks.
I do.
“And you know I had to do that because we lost live off-site monitoring of our security system, and that instead of switching to one of a hundred other companies, management just decided to buy this cheap-ass system you see before you now?”
“Uh-huh?” I say, but I’m not totally following, and he’s getting really angry. Steam is practically pouring out of his nostrils.
He takes a deep breath and calms down. “What this means is that Pangborn vaped too much weed again, left his manual keys at home, took mine, punched in a code that locks all the doors for eight hours, and drove off.”
I stare at Porter.
He stares back.
“But you can deactivate this code, right?”
He shakes his head. “Pangborn is the lead security officer. I don’t have clearance for a lockdown code.” Oh, the irony. “He lives fifteen minutes from here. So we will have to wait until he gets home, and then—and this is where it gets really funny—we will try to call him.”
“Why is that funny?”
“He usually turns his home phone off at night. He doesn’t like to be woken up. ‘Bad news can wait until morning’ is his policy. And if we can’t get him on the phone . . . well, I’m not really sure what to do. I guess we could try to call one of the other guards at home, but it’s ten thirty on a Saturday night. And not only will they be pissed, but Pangborn could get fired for this. And pretty much everyone is looking for a reason for that to happen. In case you haven’t noticed, he’s kind of a mess.”
That makes my heart twist.
“Mr. Cavadini? One of the shift managers?” I suggest and immediately realize the fault in that plan. Pangborn could get fired, and maybe Porter, too, for letting him go home early.
We both shake our heads.