Elevator, The by Angela Hunt Read Free Book Online Page A

down on a mat of old towels and tossed his aluminum lawn chairs into the pool. He and Sadie have bottled water, a battery-powered radio, canned foods, a manual can opener, a stash of cash and a full gas can—enough supplies to get them through a couple of weeks, if necessary.
    Satisfied with his preparations, he steps into the utility room and locks the door, securing the dead bolt, as well. The dead bolt would stop a human intruder, but he’s not sure it will hold against a category-four wind.
    A year ago, when he left Alabama to escape an emotional storm, he never dreamed he’d be exchanging one kind of disaster for another. All things considered, though, the literal storms are easier to handle.
    “God, help us,” he murmurs, one hand on the doorknob. Then he turns and whistles for the dog.
     
    Because a man on the radio keeps insisting the police have blocked the downtown exits off I-275, Gina avoids the interstate and drives toward Sonny’s office along a less-traveled route. Several ominous clouds have swept in from the bay by the time she reaches the edge of the downtown district; a gray curtain of rain hangs beneath them, obscuring her view of the river.
    On her approach to the Platt Street Bridge, she spots a policeman sitting in his cruiser. The brim of his hat shifts toward the rearview mirror, so he’s seen her.
    Well…Sonny always says it’s easier to beg forgiveness than permission. She could almost believe he was counting on her forgiveness for the affair…if she hadn’t found the bankbook.
    Rage rises in her cheeks as she stomps on the gas and steers around the police officer.
    On the far side of the bridge, she looks in her mirror and sees the cop stepping out of his car. He might be frustrated, but he won’t stop her. He’s needed at his post.
    Sonny is needed at home, but where has he been lately? With his mistress. With a young, pretty trophy tartlet.
    She turns north and heads up Ashley Drive, then brakes at an intersection. No one else moves on this riverside street, not even the police. She glances at the wet road, where the traffic light shivers in red reflection beside her car, then turns the asphalt green.
    She drives on. The haze of gasoline and diesel fumes that usually hovers over the downtown streets has been replaced by a thick humidity. She can almost feel the skin of the storm swelling like an overripe grapefruit. Soon it will burst.
    Just as she will burst if she fails to act.
    She is overcome with a memory, unshakable and vivid, of a character in a Flannery O’Connor short story. The woman’s thin skin is described as “tight as the skin on an onion” and her gray eyes are “sharp like the points of two ice picks.”
    Today Tampa wears the look of O. E. Parker’s coldhearted wife.
    After passing the light at Jackson, she spots the flashing bubble of another police vehicle. To avoid it, she heads the wrong direction down Kennedy, a one-way street, then breaks the law again as she drives north on southbound Tampa. After a quick turn, she pulls into the whitewashed entrance of the Lark Tower’s parking garage and guides her car up the slanted driveway.
    At the entry gate, she presses the red button, then takes a ticket. She looks to her left, where the parking attendant’s booth stands empty. The garage, in fact, is as quiet as a ghost town.
    The black-and-white striped arm lifts, allowing her to enter. She turns and glances in the rearview mirror. No lights flash behind her; no siren breaks the stillness. She glories briefly in her accomplishment, then follows the curving arrows past the visitors’ parking to the third level, reserved for tenants.
    She smiles after rounding the corner. Her instincts about her husband were spot-on, as usual: Sonny’s silver BMW is snuggled into its reserved space. He must have been in a hurry when he arrived, for he pulled in at an angle, carelessly trespassing on another tenant’s parking place.
    “How rude, darling.” Purposely