Chapter 16
Erin truly didn’t know what to think – or do.
Having quickly explained to Molly last night that her late mother’s usual room had been accidentally assigned to another guest who’d checked in a few days before, now she tried to figure out how best to help.
Assuming that the room in question had been reassigned to Shay Brady at Lily’s request when the reservation system went offline that time, now she struggled with how best to handle that.
Erin couldn’t realistically ask the jilted groom to swap accommodations yet again, nor could they even dream of sneaking Molly into another guest’s suite to check for potential hiding places.
The best thing to do was to wait until Brady checked out, but according to the system he was here for ten days.
Though maybe not, if his wedding was cancelled?
She’d ask Lily; the events manager would surely know and, if it came to it, Erin figured she could potentially confide in her regarding the other issue too, since any threat to The Palms’ future involved her also.
Though what to make of Eugenie Cooke’s troubling claim about someone looking to discredit the hotel?
It made sense that an older property on such a prime site and idyllic location would be targeted by a bigger consortium looking to install more modern accommodation or even real estate for sale; that happened all the time back home, but would they go as far as to outwardly sabotage the resort?
But where money and big business were involved, anything was possible.
Especially when, according to Eugenie, the existing shareholders had been holding out for some time.
Plus, the island tourist trade in general was still trying to get back on its feet after sustained visitor bans and shutdowns, so it made sense that if the big guns were to try and kill off a struggling smaller business altogether, now would be the time.
And what of the staunch supporter the older woman had mentioned too, the one who was ‘recently lost’?
Could she be referring to the retirement of Roger, Erin’s predecessor?
She didn’t know the man well enough to ask, to say nothing of the fact that she had no idea where Roger lived or whether he’d chosen to take a well-earned post-retirement vacation elsewhere, but she supposed she could find out.
Until then, Erin had no idea what to do other than reassure poor Molly that she’d taken her concerns seriously and would do her best to help her out.
In more ways than one.
‘I really don’t know how to do what she’s asking me to do,’ Molly had confessed tearfully last night, once Erin had finished reading the letter. ‘I don’t know how to live every moment. My mother was all I had in the world, and now she’s gone.’
‘I know it all seems daunting, but if you’d let me, I’d like to help. First, let me try to figure things out with the key, and together we can work from there.’
‘Really? You would help me with all that? I don’t have the first idea where to start. Coming here in the first place already felt like a huge mountain to climb, let alone try to grapple with all the other business stuff.’
Looking back at the shy heartbroken woman, Erin smiled. ‘Let me handle that.’
She might have failed at her own mountain, but perhaps she could help Molly conquer hers.
As things stood, it wasn’t as if things at the hotel had been running smoothly since Erin had taken over.
What with all the teething problems she’d encountered so far – plus the Mack issue – she had honestly been half-wondering herself whether someone was out to thwart her.
Then she stopped short, as the thought struck her. Could he be somehow involved in any of this? He’d appeared this week pretty much out of nowhere, plus had shot her business suggestions down so quickly that time. And taken with his rather childish refusal to speak with her ever since …
But that hardly amounted to sabotage, did it? Besides, Daniel MacKenzie was a respected ecologist and, according to Grant, a bona fide nature lover and businessman, so why would he be involved in some plot to discredit the hotel to raze it to the ground?
Then again, what did Erin know about him really, other than what Grant had told her?
She guessed she should tell her superior about any such claims too, but she wanted to chew it all over a little more before she went running to him with Eugenie’s concerns, especially when Grant was having doubts about hiring her as it was.
No, best to wait until she had a better sense of whether the older woman’s suspicions were, in fact, valid. A stubborn corporate client and a few guest hiccups over the last few days were hardly tantamount to …
Before Erin could finish her train of thought, the sound of frantic cries filled the lobby as a selection of guests dressed in swimwear, some still dripping wet, swarmed through the double doors from the pool area.
They looked for all the world like a wild stampede of animals as they all ran to safety, and she looked aghast at the frightened face of an older woman running with one hand on her head to keep her sunhat from flying off.
What the hell?
Erin took off herself through the lobby in the direction the guests were fleeing from.
Despite her urgency, she needed to move carefully going against the crowd given her heels on the wet floor, and so she wouldn’t get trampled in their hurry to get away from whatever it was that had them all so terrified.
Once she was able to make her way through the doors and out to the pool terrace, she found the typically packed area now empty, save for a couple of attendants.
‘What’s going on?’ she asked a younger staff member heading in her direction.
His expression was grim. ‘Snakes.’
What? Erin shivered involuntarily as she glanced around.
She hated snakes. They had them in Nevada too, of course, but typically such creatures wouldn’t be found within an ass’s roar of Vegas Boulevard.
But since they also were run-of-the-mill inhabitants of the tropics, she kinda knew she couldn’t avoid running into them for ever. And neither could guests.
The main pool terrace’s surrounding tropical planting and native flora meant that snakes and lizards had plenty of places to hide too. Erin had almost stepped on an iguana when doing the rounds through there on her first day.
‘In the water. There’s like … ten of them,’ the attendant continued.
Erin gulped. OK, that was a different prospect. The image of multiple snakes slithering around in the resort’s pristine pool was enough to galvanise her interest.
‘Ten?’ she repeated in a shaky voice.
‘At least. They seemed to appear out of nowhere,’ the guy continued, scratching his head, though typically he also seemed unfazed in that laid-back island way.
‘We tried to get everyone to stay calm, but once a guest that was swimming caught sight of one in the shallows …’ He nodded toward a couple of upturned sunloungers and spilled drinks as if to illustrate the resultant mayhem.
‘Don’t we have a net or something we can use to scoop them out of there – like with the frog in the Jacuzzi that time?
’ Erin did her best to focus her mind on finding a solution, though taken along with what she’d learned last night from Molly, this whole scenario now seemed suspiciously out of whack.
‘We are trying, but they’re sort of … tricky to get a hold of.’
She shivered afresh as he then pointed to the pool behind them, but she didn’t want to look.
As much as the thought of snakes in the resort’s pool made her feel ill, Erin knew she needed to focus her mind on what this would mean for any other guests who happened upon the scene.
Clearly, everyone who was already by the pool terrace this morning was afraid for their lives.
She had to make sure this was handled quickly.
The sight of multiple creatures wriggling around in the pristine waters was surely enough to scare anyone from getting into the water ever again. Now, she felt a bit like Sheriff Brody in Jaws.
‘OK, let me radio the front desk first and foremost to ensure everyone knows the pool area is temporarily closed. Quick, put up as many caution signs around the perimeter as you can find.’
Closing off the pool area was one problem solved, Erin reassured herself once she’d radioed Makellah. Now for the much more terrifying one: figuring out how best to remove the damn creatures.
‘OK, about those nets …’ she reminded the attendant.
Instead of answering, he pointed to the pool again and now Erin knew she had no choice but to look closer. When her gaze landed on the scene, her stomach clenched so violently that she thought for a minute she was going to lose that morning’s breakfast.
At first, it looked as though someone had left a dark garden hose in there. Until she saw a couple of long black creatures scurry along the water’s surface.
Two larger snakes darted across the top of the water and began hurtling themselves along the side of the pool, as if frantically looking for an exit.
It seemed they were as happy about being in the water as everyone else was to see them there, and Erin couldn’t help but feel a little sympathy for them as they struggled to make their way up and over the sides to freedom.
Until the largest of the snakes turned and hissed at her, angrily flicking out his tongue, once again causing her to shudder.
‘Seriously, can’t we just scoop them out?’ she repeated in a trembling voice, stepping back quickly.
‘That’s what we’re trying to do. But we have to call animal services to check they aren’t an endangered species,’ her colleague informed her.
‘Endangered?’ She gulped. Surely they were the ones doing the endangering.
‘If they are a protected species, we can’t do anything that might cause harm to them.’
Erin forced herself to look at the pool once again.
One snake flapped its tail forcefully along the edge, causing the surface to ripple like an ocean wave.
It was pretty obvious that they didn’t want to be in the water.
So leaving them trapped in there hardly seemed in their best interest either.
And it made her wonder what the heck they were doing there in the first place.
‘OK, so go ahead and call them quickly. Meantime, maybe we could find something for them to crawl on, so they can get out of the water?’
She tried to rid her brain of the image of the snakes crawling out and back onto land, since, once they were free, they could go anywhere they wished.
Or take their anger out on someone nearby.
Erin truly hoped the blasted creatures would get as far away from this area and her as possible, so she would never have to see them again.
Talk about a baptism of fire …