Chapter 16

Between a Locked Door and a Hot Place

P anic swept through me as swiftly as flames consumed the corridor. This was impossible! How did the fire start? Too many thoughts ricocheted through my brain at once, threatening to short-circuit it. Purposefully taking a grip on my consciousness, I forced myself to focus. Nothing mattered but getting Winter and Elaine to safety.

Elaine started coughing and crumpled to a heap by the glass doors. She gasped again. "I don't have my inhaler with me."

Asthma? On top of everything else, she has asthma?

"Pull your shirt up over your mouth and nose," I directed as my old teacher instincts kicked into gear. If Tammy had been here, she could have kicked the door down. How long before anyone came looking for us? Too long.

Winter sped to a vending machine and tried to push it toward the window. It might reach and break the glass, but she'd never get it over by herself. I rushed to her side, and we strained at the heavy drink dispenser, heaving, lifting, and thrusting with all our might until at last it tipped and crashed against the panes. Nothing. Not even a crack in the obviously bulletproof glass. It made sense. New Orleans was a high-crime city, and this was a fancy, high-priced hotel. I groaned and Winter whimpered.

Her anxious gaze fell on the ice maker next. "Maybe I can get ice out of here and put the fire out with that." As she poked and prodded the dispenser, I figured it couldn't hurt, even though I estimated it would take too long.

The seconds we'd wasted with the machine had allowed the burning fabrics to flare. I grabbed the hem of my new blouse and yanked it over my head. Moving first to the cushioned bench along a wall in the middle, I used it as a fire blanket to beat down the combustion. Too bad if Winter and Elaine got an eyeful of my sexy lingerie, even if it wasn't the way I'd envisioned Winter seeing it.

My blouse was too small and not made of fire-retardant fabric, hindering my efforts. While I mitigated any further spread toward the corridor door where Elaine wheezed and struggled to breathe, by the time the bench blaze was out, nothing but ashes remained of my shirt.

"Why aren't the sprinklers coming on?" Winter yelled in frustration. I glanced at the ceiling, and, sure enough, one was mounted there. Still, in this little, seldom occupied space, there was no fire alarm to pull. She threw a handful of ice cubes at a spot of burning carpet in a desperate ploy that only made them sizzle.

"Winter, do you have your phone?" It had been less than a minute since the tinder ignited and already the charring fumes encompassed my senses.

Her red, irritated eyes lit, and she jerked it out of a pocket. I tried to think of something else to try while she punched in 911 and reported the situation to the operator. "They said five minutes," she conveyed in a worried tone. "Help is coming."

"I don't think we have five minutes."

Although the smoke accumulated at the ceiling first, it was settling farther down by the second. Taking two long strides, I sidestepped Elaine on the floor and slammed my foot into the glass door, kicking it again and again with all the strength I could muster. It rattled and shook but didn't break.

I clenched my jaw in raw determination, cocked my right arm, and punched it, throwing my hip and all my weight into the assault. Pain shot through my knuckles but not a crack in the reinforced glass. Rage warded off fear and, in that instant, I hated SapphicLover69 more than I had ever hated anyone. Fury burned in my core, hotter than the inferno that had leaped up the curtains to the ceiling. With a glance upward, I witnessed tongues of flame lick the white panels over Winter's head and I called out with a shriek such as I ‘d never uttered.

"Get away! Over here!"

The service room couldn't have been over twelve or fifteen feet long, and only half as wide. This spot was the furthest from the blaze.

She rushed to me, her face sheet-white with sweat pouring down it. It was hot, all right, but my biggest concern at the moment was air.

Then I saw somebody walking by the main hallway and I banged my fist on the door, screaming, "Help! Open the door!"

Two women hurried over, shock and dismay stricken across their expressions. They started yelling too, and both tried the door, but it was also locked on their side. I coughed, first once, then again, and raised a hand to cover my mouth. Blinking the sting of smoke from my eyes, I snapped at Winter.

"You're the engineer—how do we get out of here!"

Traumatizing energy had her feet tapping up and down like she was running in place while she hugged herself. She appeared like a fawn who had lost her mother and didn't know which way to turn. The sharp tone of my demand seemed to snap her out of the trance, and she peered behind her at the exterior metal door, then back at the one with the two horrified women on the other side. One stayed while the other dashed away, presumably to get help.

"See those hinges?" Spinning, Winter's back leaned into me as she pointed across the burning carpet. "They're on the inside. If we can pop the pins, we can yank the door off and escape to the terrace."

I wrapped my arms around her, planted a quick kiss on her cheek, and cried, "You're brilliant!" Releasing her from my sticky hold, I asked, "How do we do that?" I knew they were searing hot and, even if they weren't, I probably couldn't just pull them out with my fingers.

"A flathead screwdriver!" Winter spun back to me with hope and inspiration, then covered her mouth and fell into a coughing fit.

"Elaine, please tell me you have a screwdriver in your purse!" I crouched beside her, hoping beyond reason she carried everything imaginable in her silly bag. I could tell she was fading fast, and it tore at my soul like vicious raptor claws. She couldn't die—not because of me!

It had happened in a blink and was so unexpected that the scenario didn't seem real. Maybe it was a dream. But would smoke burn my throat this bad in a dream? Would my skin feel like it was blistering under an intense noonday sun at the beach? Never had I been in such a horrific dilemma, and I didn't care to be ever again—if I survived this one.

With tears in her eyes and a pale, bluish pallor to her face, she shook her head with a look of anguish. Pulling the neck of her shirt away from her mouth for a second, she squeaked out, "I didn't bring it."

My heart sank. We finally had a plan that would work and no tool to implement it. Maybe the fire department would get here in time, yet the aggressive flames crept closer and sucked oxygen from the room like a maniacal sponge, greedy, vindictive, and laughing at us with an awful hiss.

"There's steel flats in my back brace, like a corset has," Elaine got out before a high-pitched whistle chased her words. She clamped a hand to her chest and coughed before issuing another wheeze. "Quick. Pull one out," she directed. She twisted her torso and pawed at the hem of her blouse.

Shifting around behind her, I yanked up the blouse and examined the unfamiliar accessory. Winter was immediately at my side, picking at the fabric with nimble fingers to get hold of a metal stay and pluck it from its bone channel.

"Here." She handed me a narrow strip of steel about a half-inch wide and ten inches long. The tip may not have been as thin as a screwdriver's, and the floppy body of the flat certainly wasn't strong and stiff, but maybe it would work.

The next thing I knew, Winter pulled off her T-shirt and her glasses. With a decisive snap, she broke off both earpieces at their hinges. Then she ripped a strip from the hem of her shirt and used it to bind the plastic glasses stems around the flimsy strip of the back brace stay, which I placed back in her hand when she reached for it. In ten seconds, she fashioned a makeshift screwdriver.

"I'm not tall enough to get the top one," she admitted as she thrust the tool into my hands. "Take the rest of this T-shirt to protect yourself. If it's not working or you're getting burnt, come back." Raising an elbow to her mouth, she coughed again.

She looked different without her glasses. I could see her eyes with crystal clarity, both the emotions they conveyed and the dry, red irritation from the smoke. There was so much I wanted to do, to tell her; there wasn't time. When we get out of here, I silently promised.

I hopped around burning streaks and patches in the carpet and used Winter's shirt to beat down a spot in the corner near the door. Inserting the flat end under the hinge pin's lip, I jimmied it up. It moved! Encouraged, I worked faster until it was loose enough to grab with my fingers.

"Ouch!" Too hot. I gripped it again with Winter's T-shirt and tugged until the pin came free. An exuberant wave of accomplishment spurred me ahead to the middle hinge, which popped just as easily. One to go.

The top one was about as high as I could reach—over my head where I couldn't see what I was doing. Add to that the severe, concentrated heat radiating from the fire burning on the ceiling, and my hopes waned. You must do this, Mary! I ordered myself. If you don't, you and your friends could die before help arrives. They're counting on you. Just do it!

I ripped what remained of Winter's shirt in half and coiled each piece around my hands. Then, fitting the improvised lever below the lip of the hinge pin, I wiggled and pried, and fraction by fraction, it moved. As seconds dragged like hours, I feared it was taking too long. Still, I shimmied and shoved, jammed, and forced that pin until it fell to the floor with a thud.

Winter was immediately at my side and together we pulled the door a few feet away from the doorjamb. The influx of fresh air allowed me a free breath, but it also fueled the conflagration that burst into life with renewed vigor. "Elaine," I huffed out.

We raced the few feet to where she leaned in the corner of the least consumed portion of the room. Winter grabbed her by one arm, and I clutched her other one. "Get your feet under you while we pull you up," I instructed. Feebly, she obeyed. Engulfed by a sea of hungry flames, we half-dragged Elaine through the outside door onto the safety of the patio. By then, the fire roared. Smoke billowed out and tendrils of flame licked through the opening, but we kept moving across the tiles, past the wrought-iron tables and chairs, beyond the planters with their cheerful flowers, to the decorative tree hedge that lined a brick fence hemming us in.

We set Elaine down on the top of a short garden wall. "Relax, Elaine," Winter cooed. "Just relax and let yourself breathe easy. We're all safe and help will be here in a minute. Your brace stay saved the day!"

I watched her comfort Elaine as I tried to calm my racing heartbeat. Winter was in a white, cotton knit sports bra, and I allowed a smile of appreciation to touch my lips. Her breasts were perfect. She was perfect. And we were alive.

"Your glasses," I mentioned to Winter, not sure what to say.

"I have another pair," she replied as she fussed with Elaine's shirt to set it straight. "I always carry backups."

The next thing I knew, Winter flung herself into my arms. I hugged her with fierce emotion, secure and tight against my chest, our bodies humming and quivering from the near-death ordeal. My nostrils were still full of smoke, but my delirious mind overflowed with the scent of Winter. We clung to each other like vines to a tree, neither willing to let go. I felt the beat of her heart and the rhythm of her breath line up with mine until our bodies were in perfect sync with each other. I liked how she felt in my embrace and reveled in the sensations she aroused in me. Her nearness made me feel safe, and holding her made me feel strong. It was a moment I'll never forget.

Nestling her face into my neck, she said, "Thank you for saving us, Aspen."

The shock of hearing that thrust me back a few inches, pushing away so I could look her in the eyes. Still gripping her shoulders, unable to take my hands off her, I searched her face with incredulity. "I didn't save us—you did. The hinges were your idea, and you did the MacGyver thing. All I did was follow your instructions. Besides, it's my fault you and Elaine were in danger to begin with."

A sour pill dissolved in my gut at the thought and my expression must have laid my guilt and regret bare. Winter moved gentle hands to my blistered cheeks, brushing them with a tender touch, and peered straight through my plain, brown eyes into my soul. "This was not your fault."

She touched her lips to mine with affection and assurance, like sealing a vow she would never break. My eyes closed as I savored the moment, still trembling—or maybe trembling again for a different reason. For an instant, nothing and no one else existed in the whole world, and I felt truly cherished.

"We insisted on coming," Elaine added from her seat nearby, reminding me the world still existed and we weren't the only ones in it. Hearing her voice sound more normal made my heart leap with joy anew.

Winter's lips eased away from mine, and a zealous desire to have them back overcame me. "Yes, we insisted," she seconded.

"I wished you'd stayed safely behind," I began, "although, if you had, I'd probably be dead by now. You saved us, Winter."

"We saved each other."

"Fire department, call out!" The shout resounded through the open doorway to the burning corridor.

"Out here!" I yelled as loudly as my scratchy throat would allow.

A fireman in his bulky suit wearing a mask and air tank swaggered onto the terrace with an extinguisher in one hand. "There you are!" he called and flipped up his face shield. "We'll have this out in a jiffy. I'm sending the paramedics through."

"Elaine has asthma," I replied. "She needs an inhaler."

"The medics will check you out. Was there anyone else?"

"No," Winter answered, letting her hands slide away from me. "Just us."

The fireman nodded and ducked back in to finish quenching the flames, and a man and woman in blue uniforms carrying bags and kits emerged to see to us. I exchanged a look with Winter as we both seemed to convey the same message— later .