People were converging on them from all directions.
Art could hear the footsteps behind him growing louder, and the woman in the light brown jacket was closing the distance fast.
“Run!” he yelled again.
The boy and girl made it to the base of the stairs leading to the entrance to the hotel and started climbing. Their pursuers, however, had closed the gap to within a few yards. Camille’s short legs could cover only one step at a time, and Art knew it would be only a matter of seconds before their pursuers would be on them.
Camille’s heart was pounding in her chest. Art had moved quickly ahead of her and was now standing at the entrance to the hotel, urging her to hurry. She had almost made it to the top of the stairs when she felt a tug on the back of her coat. She tipped backwards on her heels.
“Gotcha!” a man’s voice exclaimed from behind her.
But she did not intend to be caught that easily. Camille threw her arms backwards and slipped from her coat. She glanced behind her just in time to see the man stumble back down the steps, her coat still in his grip. Camille bounded up the last two steps to the entrance to the hotel.
Art and Camille burst through the doors of the hotel and into the lobby.
The smell of cloves, pine needles, and oranges filled the room. Thick strands of evergreen garland strung with white twinkling lights hung everywhere, and a massive Christmas tree adorned with purple and gold ornaments stood in the middle of the lobby.
“Run!” Art yelled at Camille, and pointed to a wide set of stairs to their right.
But Camille did not run.
Next to the lobby doors was a tall brass umbrella stand. Camille grabbed an umbrella from the holder and thrust it through the handles of the lobby doors, like a makeshift dead bolt.
Art was impressed. The umbrella wouldn’t hold their pursuers back for long, but it might buy them just enough time to get away.
James Appleton was a small, fussy man, which made him the perfect person to run the Hotel Monaco. He expected everything to be perfect. He expected all employees to be at their posts. He expected all guests to have a perfect experience at his hotel. But right now things were not as he expected, and Appleton was in crisis mode.
A massive SUV had crashed into the east side of his hotel just twenty minutes ago. A large crowd—including many of his employees—had gathered by the windows on the east side of the lobby and were watching the scene unfold outside. As of now, the valet stand, concierge desk, and bell stand were unmanned. One floor up, in one of the hotel’s ballrooms, the American Font Association’s Christmas ball had just gotten under way. Appleton grimaced at the thought of the flashing lights and sirens right outside the windows of the ballroom. A party at the Hotel Monaco was not a cheap endeavor, and Appleton knew that the American Font Association, a notoriously fastidious group, expected everything—everything—to be perfect. Appleton decided that he had better head outside to make sure the police handled the accident as quickly as possible.
Heading toward the front door of the hotel, Appleton noticed two kids sprinting from the entrance toward the grand staircase. He was starting to yell at them when he noticed the front door: the two juvenile delinquents had barred the doors to his hotel with an umbrella. Outraged, Appleton yelled for security, realizing almost immediately that his entire security team was standing next to the window on the far side of the room watching the action outside.
I’ll take care of this myself, Appleton fumed as he headed across the lobby toward the front doors.
Regina Cash managed to grab McClain before he could tumble down the stairs to the sidewalk below.
“I’m starting to hate these kids,” he growled.
He threw the girl’s coat to the ground and sprinted up the stairs to the entrance to the hotel. He pushed on the doors, but they didn’t budge.
He pulled. The doors still didn’t budge.
McClain looked through the glass on the front of the entrances. Someone had inserted an umbrella through the door handles.
There was no time to waste.
“Stand back,” McClain said to Cash. “I’m going to bust through.”
He backed up as far as he could on the small landing, took a deep breath, and sprinted toward the double front doors.
James Appleton reached the front doors of the hotel, grabbed the umbrella, and pulled it from the handles.
Appleton went to throw open the doors. He had a few choice words for the police officers at the scene of the accident outside.
Eric McClain braced for the impact with the double doors.
But instead of hitting the hard brass frames, he found only air.
As soon as Appleton had flung the doors wide open, a man flew past him and into the lobby of the hotel. Off balance, the man tripped down a small set of marble steps, stumbled uncontrollably across the lobby, and crashed into the bottom of the hotel’s massive Christmas tree.
Appleton gasped.
The tree teetered ever so slightly, and for a moment, Appleton thought it might remain upright.
But the tree fell—slowly and majestically. The evergreen hit the marble floor with a thud and a whoosh. Tinsel, strings of lights, and pine needles flew everywhere. Glass ornaments exploded throughout the lobby.
The large crowd that had gathered to watch the accident scene through the windows now turned in unison toward the events unfolding in the middle of the hotel.
One man held up a drink and yelled: “Timber!”
The crowd erupted in laughter.