Andrew held his hands up in the air to indicate he wasn’t going to cause trouble. The GM smiled wryly. His guards had managed to get everything back under control.

“You were a fool to defy me.” The GM hated it when people didn’t listen to him. Suddenly, with lightning speed, he viciously socked the gambler in the solar plexus, causing him to fall to his knees, the wind knocked out of him.

“Andrew!” Meliza exclaimed. A guard grabbed her upper arms to prevent her from closing the six-foot distance between them.

“Hey, hey, where do you think you’re going?” the guard asked her gleefully. He yanked her against him.

Meliza turned and hit his mouth and jaw. The guard scowled feeling blood on his lip.

Andrew coughed, desperately trying to catch his breath, his eyes widening in horror as the guard clamped an arm around Meliza’s upper chest, tucking a pistol against her head.

“You b*tch!” the guard screeched. “Nobody hurts me, you got that?!”

“Meliza!” Tina cried out in worry.

“Calm down,” the GM said. “It’s not as if your face was any better before it got bloody…” His eyes turned onto Andrew with hatred. “Take the pretty boy away…I don’t want him causing trouble. Show him what we do to people who disobey me…”

The guard grinned and shoved Meliza aside, causing her to fall on the floor. Tina quickly ran up to her.

As Andrew was hauled away, the GM stared at the crowd. “Anyone else plan to follow his example?”

“What’s your problem?” somebody demanded. “Why hold this place hostage?”

The GM laughed. “Why not? I’m in a little need of financial security, so I figured I might as well use my very own workplace to hold all of you hostage.”

“He’s twisted in the head,” someone murmured.

Tina and Meliza glanced at each other before turning to the GM.

“We have to do something,” Meliza whispered.

Her sidekick looked at her with wide eyes. “What can we do?”

“We need to get out of here and get help.”

“How? Anyone trying to escape will be shot on sight…” Tina’s lower lip trembled.

“I have an idea…” Meliza cautiously reached behind an overturned table, placing her hand on the roulette wheel.

“What are you doing?” Tina hissed.

Meliza grasped her arm. “Move to the back of the crowd…and slowly…”

“For what reason?”

Within several minutes of the GM’s rant on how he needed money, and that’s why he was holding them hostage, the roulette wheel exploded.

People screamed and scurried in different directions. Meliza quickly yanked Tina away and they dashed out of the casino. After the smoke cleared, the GM scowled as his guards gathered the hostages.

“D*mn that boy for setting that off…”

Luckily for Meliza, the GM thought that Andrew had left a token before his departure.

The two women rushed towards the front lobby, which consisted of leather furniture in front of the front desk, a front desk, doors to an office behind the desk, and wide glass doors fifty feet in front of the desk. Seeing guards at the front door, they jumped behind the front desk, and ducked to avoid being seen.

“What are we going to do now?” Tina whispered.

Meliza poked her head over the edge of the desk and promptly ducked. “We need to get help…” She peered over the edge again, grasping the handset of the phone, bringing it to her ear. “Phone’s dead.”

“How do we get out of here without being caught?”

“I don’t know…” Meliza blew out a breath, her mind working quickly.

“What about Andrew?” Tina asked. “We have to find him.”

“This hotel is nine stories high. Who knows what that madman plans to do with the tourists…”

“But Meliza…” Tina protested.

“I know. I want to find Andrew, too…” Meliza took a deep breath. Suddenly, they heard a beep.

Alarmed, the two women saw that a flat tiny white box sitting on the front desk had gone off with a red light. The box was numbered one through twenty-three, with a light bulb next to each.

“What is that?” Tina whispered.

“It’s a security system,” Meliza responded. “The hotel is split up into twenty-three different zones, each containing certain windows and doors that should not be opened. Like emergency exits.”

It beeped again.

“Come on,” Meliza whispered. “We need to find out what’s in zone three.”

“Why?”

“Because if my guess is right…finding out what zone three is will make it easier to track down Andrew…”

The two women slipped into the back office, looking at the reservation and catering department. Their desks were organized, papers folded neatly, tucked in bins.

“Go into PBX,” Meliza said.

“Into what?”

“The hotel operator’s office,” Meliza explained as she opened several drawers. “I need to look for a map of the hotel…” She pointed to a tiny square office at the back of the reservation department. “Go in there and see if you can find a list of the zones here…”

“You got it.” Tina turned around and headed to the office known as PBX department.

“I know there has to be a floor plan somewhere…” Meliza muttered. Her eyes focused on the desk of the Revenue Manager. She quickly began filing through his cabinet, finding folders of reservations, group parties, conferences, etc.

Minutes later, Tina showed up with several pieces of paper all stapled together.

“Find anything?” Tina asked.

“Not yet…what about you?”

“I found a list of zones. It says here that zone three is the fourth floor south and east side of the hotel.”

Meliza’s eyes gleamed. “Perfect…”

“Hey, how do you know so much about hotels?” Tina asked.

“I grew up in one,” Meliza responded. “My parents run a hotel in Vegas. I spent a lot of time at the hotel. I even worked in it. A lot of hotels pretty much have the same system of running…”

“Cool.”

Meliza finally pulled out a floorplan of the hotel. She rifled through the contents to reveal the fourth floor. Skimming the blueprints, she pointed to the east and south side. “The floor looks like it’s equipped with emergency exit windows for each room and two extra doors.”

Tina pointed to an extra object on the prints. “This indicates that the elevators are in the center, and the rooms are around it?”

Meliza nodded. “Looks like it. We’ll have to take the stairs…here…enter through this passageway…then go onto the main part of the floor. The stairs are on the far northwest corner…I just hope nobody sees us…”

“Let’s go.”

With all the stealth they could muster, the two women slipped out of the front office, past the guards, and up the stairs. After one flight, Tina paused for breath.

“I hate stairs…” she breathed. “I hate wearing heels and climbing up stairs…”

Meliza sighed. “We don’t have much time…”

“I know…” Tina smiled weakly. “Let’s go find Andrew…”

Meliza hurried up the stairs while the brunette trudged after her.