The man startled and looked back at me. He didn’t remove his hand from the machine. “This is none of your business.”

“You stuck? I can call someone.” Also, why did you stick your hand up the ice machine? But I figured that question wasn’t getting answered by this guy.

“Mind your business.”

“I work here. This is my business. That machine has been broken all day. You’ll notice it’s unplugged. We have ice machines on other floors if you are desperate for ice.”

To be fair, the hallway was warm. The owners were cheap in some ways, but they didn’t stint on heat for the guests. Comfortable guests were happy guests who returned often. But I didn’t think the guy with his hand stuck in the machine was actually looking for ice at this stage. And now I really wanted to know what had gotten stuck in the machine, that the repair guy hadn’t seen.

“You’re in pajamas.”

“Your point?”

“You can’t work here.”

“We have a flexible dress code for employees. You appear to be stuck. I’ll call the front desk.”

Before I could pull my cellphone out of my pajama pocket, the man pulled something from his pocket with his free hand and pointed it at me. A gun.

I hated guns.

We also had a very strict policy about guns in the hotel. But I didn’t figure this was the sort of person who paid much attention to policies and regulations.

Heart thumping, I raised my hands, leaving my cellphone in my pocket.

“Here’s what’s going to happen,” the man said. “I’m going to get my hand out of this machine. Then you’re going to walk me out of the building through whatever back entrance the employees use. And you’re going to forget everything you’ve seen here. If anything happens, I know where you work. Don’t think I won’t come for you.”

This would all be pretty terrifying—and honestly, it was pretty scary. I wasn’t used to having guns pointed at me—but I was pretty sure this guy’s hand was actually stuck. He hadn’t pulled it out while pointing his gun at me. And he looked to still be tugging at that stuck hand, trying to make it look like he wasn’t stuck.

He was inside a cubby. And guns didn’t fire around corners.

I did a quick calculation. There was no one in the room across the hall, so no chance of a bullet going through the door and accidentally hitting a guest if he actually fired.

Heart pounding, pulse racing, and adrenaline giving me new life, I dove to the floor outside of the cubby.

Five

Throwing myself onto the floor far enough from the cubby the gunman wouldn’t be able to see me, I scrambled along the floor toward the elevators, a very undignified move, but I could hear my own pulse in my ears, so how I looked at that moment wasn’t top of my priority list.

No gunshot followed but a lot of cursing and banging came from the ice machine cubby.

I pulled my cellphone from my pajamas pocket when I reached the elevator bank, hiding in the small foyer outside the elevators, watching back down the hall. The guy was making so much noise now, he was about to wake up the rest of the floor and that was going to open the possibility of hostages or something.

Dan answered downstairs within a single ring.

“Percy?”

“We got a guy with a gun on Three. He’s got his hand stuck in the ice machine, not sure how long that’ll last.”

“Calling the cops now. You okay?”

“Fine. He’s making a lot of noise. People are gonna start coming out.”

Dan was quiet for a moment. Then, “ETA for police is five minutes.”

I scanned the hallway. A door, opposite side of the hall from the machine cracked open and an older man looked out. That was Mr. Amir, here visiting his daughter at college. I waved a frantic hand at him. “Please go back into your room. Don’t come out. There’s a situation but it’s being taken care of.”

Mr. Amir’s eyes widened, but he ducked back into his room, slamming the door shut. And even over all the cussing down the hall, I heard his lock click and the bar lock slam into place. Mr. Amir obviously had good self-preservation instincts.

Another door opened. This time Dr. Yergunson poked her head out, frowning. She was closer to where I was hiding by the elevators. I waved her back inside.

“Please stay in your room,” I said. “The police are on their way.”

Her eyes widened, just like Mr. Amir’s. But instead of moving back into her room, she came out into the hall.

Panicked, I nearly moved out from cover too, to hurry her back to safety. But then she looked down the hall and hissed, “What are you doing?”

She wasn’t talking to me. But the cursing and banging was still happening without stop, so if she was talking to the gunman, he wasn’t going to hear her. And why would she be doing that anyway.

I turned to see if he’d managed to free himself—didn’t sound like it—and saw…

Dr. Yergunson standing outside the ice machine cubby.

I’m embarrassed to admit it took a few seconds to realize what I was seeing. A few seconds of precious time where I stood there looking like an idiot, my head swinging back and forth as I took in the fact that there were two Dr. Yergunsons.

Twins. I should have realized that. The subtle differences I’d written off to my own exhaustion were real difference, because I’d been talking to two different women. It was embarrassing that I hadn’t noticed.

Seeing them both at the exact same time, it was still hard to tell them apart. The woman by the ice machine cubby had her hair up, and it was a very slightly darker shade than her twin. The woman who’d just come out of the room had a sharper chin, and a very slightly different shape to her eyes. But otherwise, they were identical. And if I hadn’t been looking at them at the exact same time, I wouldn’t have been able to pinpoint those differences.

“What’s going on?” the twin from the room hissed at her sister, stalking toward her, ignoring me. “This was supposed to be done already?”

“Tell that to him.” The twin at the ice machine cubby nodded toward the machine.

“I’m gonna kill both of you for this,” the man inside said.

Since he was holding a gun, I started waving to the two women. “Take cover. Please. He’s got a gun!”

They ignored me. I started to creep out from my cover to urge them into cover, but I finally noticed the twin by the ice machine was holding something. A gun of her own.

There were way too many guns in that hallway, and the owners were definitely not going to be happy about this. I wasn’t happy about it either.

Behind me, I heard the elevator moving. I had to hope that was the cops, because I had no idea what to do here. Two guns was two too many and well above my pay grade.

“He got stuck,” the twin with the gun said. “The drop-off guy left the package too high.”

“The cops are on the way,” the gunman said. “Get me out of here.”

The twin without the gun turned slowly to face me. “You called the police?”