The Hotel - 5

"Not quite what I expected," Kirby said.

"I know. Me neither," I agreed. "It's pretty damned imposing."

"And dark, like out of a horror movie," Jenn said, shivering.

I chuckled. "It's not that bad. With the chandeliers in the main rooms, and the windows, it's kind of cheerful."

"If you say so," she muttered, smiling when Kirby whispered something to her that made her grin in reply.

When Ramsey eyed the pastry counter again, Caitlin said, "Dinner's in less than an hour at this point, so restrain yourself."

Ramsey winked at her. "If you insist." Then he licked his finger to get the last of the scone crumbs off the plate. "Now what do we do?"

"If we let Felicia know first, so they hold dinner until we get back—" I grinned at Ramsey, "—we can take a walk down by the lake before it gets too dark."

Everyone agreed that sounded like a good plan, so after informing Felicia where we were going, we went to get our jackets, in deference to the fact it was already mid-October.

Since the sun was going down the air was definitely chilly when we got outside, but pleasantly so thanks to our outerwear.

"A month later and we'd be knee-deep in snow," Phil said.

"Let's hope it holds off that long," I replied, eying the already snow-capped peaks in the distance. "This is a nice place, but we don't want to be stuck here. We committed to giving our first two Halloween shows as soon as we get back."

"Technically, this is the first one," Noah pointed out. "Just without the sets."

"Can you see us dragging them up here?" I shook his head. "We can borrow some furniture from the hotel for the major set-pieces and leave it at that, which was Mr. Delaney's suggestion to begin with."

"The atmosphere's right for 'Dracula'," Jenn said. "Why did he want us to do that one instead of, well, whatever?"

"Think, Jenn," Ramsey replied. "October, Halloween, spooky mountain villa. Well, mansion and not really spooky, but…"

By then we were down at the lake. It shimmered gold and orange from the rays of the lowering sun.  

"Gorgeous," Caitlin murmured. "Too bad we don't have a camera."

"Silly woman, we do," Marsh replied, taking out his phone. Soon all of us were snapping pictures of the lake and its surroundings.

A few moments later, Caitlin let out a small gasp. Because I was right beside her, she grabbed my arm and pointed.