Page 52

Well, she was not the heroine in a movie, Grade B or otherwise. She might be foolish when it came to men, to one man, but she wasn’t foolish when it came to weighing the facts and making a logical choice.

Quickly, she turned away from the elevator and headed for the fire stairs. Nine flights down was nothing. She worked out on a treadmill. Not every day, but so what? She could run, never mind walk, and walking down the stairs was what she’d be doing. It helped that she had on comfortable shoes. Black nubuck flats. Not sneakers, but almost as good as sneakers.

The door was directly ahead. Fire Stairs, the sign said. To Be Used in Case of Emergency.

Bianca grasped the doorknob, pulled the door open…

And the lights went out.

All of them.

The ones in the hall. In the stairwell. Even the always-on, always-dim nighttime lights that were lit 24/7 in all the offices.

The first slimy whisper of panic danced along her spine.

Easy.

She had to stay calm. She wasn’t a child. She didn’t believe in monsters or bogeymen. She wasn’t afraid of being alone in a place where she couldn’t see anything, not even the floor or the walls, not even her hand when she held it in front of her eyes.

She wasn’t afraid…

But she was as good as blind.

And she was alone.

Wasn’t she?

What if her patient, her former patient…

“Stupid,” she said briskly.

She was stuck in a power failure. For all she knew, the power wasn’t just down here, it was down in the entire city. Hadn’t something like that happened to one of her half-sisters? Yes. To Jaimie. And Jaimie had gotten through it intact.

But, of course, Jamie hadn’t been alone. She’d been with a strong, powerful man who’d been able to protect her…

Enough.

Light. She needed light. And… Bianca caught her breath. And she had light. Her smartphone. She’d downloaded an app that provided a steady beam of light if you needed it, and she surely needed it now.

She dug into the tote bag. Laptop. Keys. Kindle. Notebook. Pens. Comb. Why on earth did she carry so much garbage? Where was the…

There!

Her hand closed around the phone. She pulled it free of the tote. Felt for the Home button. Found it. She knew where the light app was. She’d read an article in the Times.

Place vital icons where you’ll be able to locate them easily.

Yes. She’d done that. The light icon was the top left one on the screen.

Bianca pressed her thumb to the screen. Moved it around a little. And then, yes, the light came on. She pointed the beam at the stairs. Its field of illumination was narrow, but it was bright, more than adequate to get her down nine flights to the lobby.

The thing was to stay calm. She took a breath, exhaled, took another. Then she started down the stairs.

It seemed to take a long time until she reached the eighth floor, but that was okay. All she needed was steady progress—and for the light on her phone to hold out.

Seventh-floor landing. Good.

Sixth. Excellent.