I wanted nothing more to do with the hotel, the murders, or the ghosts. I really just wanted to go home. Gil and Heath knocked on my door, ready to discuss that very topic, and noticed my suitcase on the bed. “Packing?” said Heath.

“Yeah,” I replied. “I’m antsy to get this job over with, and I want to be ready to leave the moment we wrap it up.”

“Me too,” said Gilley.

“Me three,” said Heath with a sigh. “That last encounter with Oruç nearly did me in.”

“Imagine it from my side,” I said, then instantly regretted it, especially when I caught Heath wince. “Hey,” I said, setting my packed suitcase on the floor. “I’m sorry. That was rude.”

There was an uncomfortable silence until Gilley said, “At least you’ve got luggage to pack.”

“Did you hear from the airline?” I asked, thinking it had been a while since Gilley had complained about his lost sweatshirt.

“Not since they told me it had been rerouted back to Boston,” he moaned. “I’m waiting for them to call and let me know when it should arrive here.”

Just then my room phone rang. I looked at Gilley with raised eyebrows. “Maybe that’s them now.”

“It’s me,” said MacDonald when I picked it up.

“Are you through with Beckworth?”

“Not quite,” he said. “Can you come down here and talk with us for a little while?”

Heath and Gilley were both looking at me expectantly. “Sure,” I said. “But I’m bringing the gang with me.”

“That’s fine,” said MacDonald. “Bring them along. We’re in Beckworth’s office.”

I hung up and told Gil and Heath that we were expected in Beckworth’s office.

“What’s that about?” said Gil.

“I don’t have a clue,” I admitted. “But MacDonald sounded serious, so I don’t think we should keep him.”

We took the stairs, crossed the mezzanine, and passed the front desk. The manager on duty wasn’t at his usual post, which made me happy that I didn’t have to explain our business to him as we entered the back hallway leading to Beckworth’s office.

I gave a knock, heard a “Come in,” and we went in.

Beckworth was sitting in his large wing chair looking stately but concerned, and MacDonald was on the sofa with his notebook open, talking on his cell phone. Beckworth nodded for us to be seated, and we sat down and waited to be addressed.

MacDonald clicked off a moment later and looked at Beckworth. “Your alibi checks out, sir. Thank you.”

One of Beckworth’s eyebrows lifted. “Of course it does, Detective. I told you I had nothing to do with the tragedies that have befallen my hotel guests of late.”

MacDonald turned to us. “Mr. Beckworth has provided me with a confirmed alibi during the time of both Sophie’s and Tracy’s murders.”

“Good to know,” said Gilley, flashing Beckworth a smile as though he’d known it all along.

“Mr. Beckworth has also told me that he had absolutely no idea that the mirrors he bought at auction were so valuable.” MacDonald lifted a paper receipt off the coffee table in front of him and handed it to me. “This is the bill of sale for the mirrors,” he said.

I took the receipt and studied it. It appeared Beckworth had purchased all four mirrors for about ten thousand euros. I knew that if I was right and those frames were solid gold, their real value was about a hundred times that, if not more.

When I looked up at MacDonald again, he said, “Mr. Beckworth has also stated that he was never told that the mirrors might be haunted by a woman named Odolina, and that he never gave the order to have them dismantled and/or disposed of.”

My jaw dropped. “But you told Anton earlier that you were going to get rid of them!”

Mr. Beckworth sighed as if he were very tired. “I have had no such discussion with anyone regarding those mirrors,” he said. “Nor would I have ever suggested the idea of getting rid of four beautiful mirrors that I had paid almost fifteen thousand dollars for.”

“Then why would Anton . . . ?” I stopped myself as a dead silence fell upon the room.

“M.J.?” Gil said. “Why would Anton what?”

I stood up and looked at MacDonald. “Ohmigod! It was him all along!” I exclaimed. “I can’t believe I missed it! It was Anton, Detective! Of course it was him!” I then swiveled over to Heath and said, “And you even came up with the initial A when you were tuning in on Sophie’s murder! It all makes sense!”

I looked back to MacDonald, who was staring at me as if I’d grown three heads. “I’m not following,” he said.

“Anton comes from Europe! He even speaks with a French accent! He must have been Faline’s partner! That’s why Sophie was here in San Francisco! She wasn’t following the mirrors; she was following Anton!”

As I looked around at all the wide eyes, I realized I was going to have to explain my theory a little more slowly. “There was no sign of forced entry into Sophie’s room when she was murdered. As a manager, Anton had access to any room in the hotel. He could have easily entered her room when her back was turned. He was also on duty the night Heath and I were first attacked by that serpent and when Tracy was killed, and he would have had access to the security cameras! He could have corrupted the tapes before the police had a chance to review them! And I’ll bet you that whole incident with him getting hit on the head and being taken to the hospital was his way of throwing suspicion off himself! I mean, how else could he explain his absence from the front desk for so long?

“If Anton set up the auction for the mirrors to be sold and taken out of Europe, he could easily have followed them here and waited for a time when he could steal them again. I’m sure he thought he was really lucky when he learned you all were looking for a new night manager!

“And when I talked to him yesterday about wanting to inspect the mirrors, he knew he had to fake going in to talk to Mr. Beckworth in order to get me to back off, and while we were out at dinner, he was the one who dismantled them and removed them from their mountings! The only one he didn’t have easy access to was the one in the ladies’ room because it’d been sealed and padlocked!”

MacDonald’s face went ashen. “Oh, shit,” he said quietly.

“What?” Heath said.

“The padlock,” said MacDonald. “I forgot to relock the door!”

There was a collective gasp, and then everyone was in motion as we all scrambled out the door and ran back down the corridor and over to the ladies’ room. MacDonald got there first, and he pushed the door open and flipped on the light. I knew what’d happened before I ever saw inside based solely on the look on his face.

“Damn it!” he yelled. “Son of a bitch! That son of a bitch!”

The mirror was gone. Behind us I heard Beckworth’s cane tapping the marble floor. He didn’t look happy.

MacDonald had his hands on the sides of his head. “I’m in so much shit!” he was mumbling. “The lieutenant is going to demote me down to traffic cop.”

“Hold on, now; let’s not panic yet,” I said, feeling really bad about asking him to break the seal so that I could get inside to look at the mirror. “Maybe they’re still on the property.”

“What do you mean?” Beckworth demanded.

“Well,” I said reasonably, “they’re heavy, right? And they’re big and bulky, right? It’d be pretty obvious if Anton were to just walk out the door with them. Maybe he’s hidden them until it’s safe to move all of them out.”

“Where would they be?” asked Gil. “I mean, M.J., they could be anywhere, and this is a big hotel.”

I looked at him with conviction and said, “I know exactly where they are, Gil.”

“Where?”

“Room three-twenty-one.”

“What?” MacDonald gasped. “Sophie’s room?”

“Yes,” I said, feeling I was on right on target. Turning to Heath I said, “Do you remember what Carol said to us when she wanted time to think?”

Heath cocked his head to the side. “That she wanted to be alone?”

“No,” I said. “She said to you, ‘keep the staff out of my room.’ ”

“Okay . . . ?”

“The staff! She meant Anton! He’s probably been going in and out of there with the mirrors all day! And where else besides a crime scene would you be certain things weren’t going to be disturbed?”

“That means he’d have to break the seal up there and remove the padlock,” MacDonald told us.

“Come on,” I said, already moving toward the Twilight Room to retrieve my tool belt. “I’m not going back up there unarmed.”

“I’ve got a gun,” said MacDonald.

I looked over my shoulder at him. “Which won’t do us any good against a demon. Nope, Detective, for this we’ll need grenades.”

MacDonald asked him, “Can you believe all this?”

Beckworth replied calmly, “I come from England. You can’t swing a dead cat without hitting a ghost there.”

Gilley stifled a giggle, and I had a new appreciation for the billionaire. The bell at the top of the elevator dinged, and the doors opened slowly. The hallway was now well lit, and I spotted my cell phone at the end of the corridor. Everyone held back to see who would be the first brave soul through the doors, and I finally stepped out and held the spikes up defensively. “I think we’re all right,” I coaxed. “Come on out.”

The boys all stepped out and waited as I trotted down the hall to retrieve my cell. The battery appeared to have died, but otherwise it looked okay. After going back to the group I walked next to MacDonald, Gilley was with Beckworth, and Heath brought up the rear.

He and I had already discussed keeping our sixth sense wide open, just in case. We got to room 321, and MacDonald inspected the seal on the door. “It’s intact. My initials cover the seam.” I squinted and saw that between the door and the seam on the piece of paper sealing the crime scene were the initials A.M.

MacDonald then moved his attention to the padlock. “The lock hasn’t been tampered with either, and I’m the only one with the keys.”

“Okay,” I said. “Can you get us in there?”

“No,” he said.

I looked at him in shock. “Why not? You got us into the restroom downstairs.”

“Yes, and that was obviously a mistake.” He gave me a pointed look that said it would be useless to argue. “There’s no way I’m breaking a sealed crime scene again without a much better reason than a hunch.”

“But—” I began to argue.

“No buts,” MacDonald insisted. “I mean it, M.J.: You’re not going to get me to break this seal, especially when it’s clear to me that it hasn’t been breached. The mirrors aren’t in there. They’re probably not even in this hotel. Anton or whoever could have taken them to the loading dock out back and driven off hours ago.”

I opened my mouth to say something but decided against it. MacDonald had a solid point, and I figured I’d already landed him in enough trouble. “Okay,” I said, giving in.

“This is most distressing,” said Beckworth. “I’m off to call my insurance agency, but without at least one mirror here there’s no way to prove their value. Detective, I’m afraid I’ve little choice but to have a word with your lieutenant.”

MacDonald blanched. “I understand, sir, but the mirrors in question were likely stolen property, which meant you were out the cash either way.”

Beckworth scowled. It was obvious he didn’t like being reminded of that, and he turned his frustration on us. “And I would appreciate it if the three of you packed your things and departed first thing in the morning. I will pay you for the time you’ve spent here so far—I’m assuming you were able to get rid of at least a few of the poltergeists haunting this hotel?”

“If you give us until the morning, sir,” I said, “we’ll clean out all the grounded spirits for you.” Gilley gave me a look as if he didn’t approve, but I figured it was the minimum we could do for things turning out so badly for the old man.

“I’m in,” Heath whispered to me, and I nudged his shoulder and smiled.

“Very well,” said Beckworth. “You’ll have until eight a.m.”

I glanced at my watch. It was currently eight p.m.—we had twelve hours.

“In the meantime, sir,” MacDonald said before Beckworth could shuffle away, “would you mind giving me the address and contact information you have on this Anton character?”

“Of course,” said Beckworth. “Come with me, Detective, and I’ll have the assistant manager look that up for you.”

As MacDonald and Beckworth left to go track down Anton, Gilley rounded on me. “Have you lost all your marbles?”

“It was the right thing to do, Gil.”

Gilley crossed his arms and worked himself into a nice little huff. “The man gave us the perfect exit, M.J., and you practically beg him to hang out here in Hotel Hell for another night of fun and laughs while we run for our lives!”

I leveled a look at my partner—the drama queen. “Gil,” I said, adding a rather exasperated sigh. “We can do this, and it doesn’t mean putting ourselves at further risk. The only thing we’ll have to remember is to stick together in groups, and at all times one of us should have our hands on the grenade caps. If anything even remotely demonish shows up, either Heath or Gopher or I will pull the plug and it’s bombs away.”

Gilley continued to glare at me. “You’re up to something,” he said to me.

I forced myself to laugh heartily, but the truth was that Gil was absolutely right. I knew the mirrors were still here, but I also felt just as strongly that if they weren’t discovered soon, they’d disappear. I couldn’t help but worry what would happen then.

I had little doubt they’d be destroyed and their frames melted down, and what would that mean for Odolina? She was so attached to the mirrors, wanting to get them to her beloved fiancé and all. I felt that she would suffer even more if the mirrors came to a bad end, and there would be little I could do for her once they disappeared.

Odolina had affected me more than I was willing to admit. It was just such a tragic thing that happened to her, and more than anything I wanted to stall for time and hope that we got lucky and, in ridding the hotel of its otherworldly residents, maybe, just maybe, we’d find the mirrors.

“Come on,” I said, glancing at my watch and wanting to put an end to the argument. “We’ve got eleven hours and fifty minutes to cross as many of these guys over as we can.”

Without another word I walked purposefully toward the elevators and smiled when I heard both Heath and Gil following close behind.

“Close your eyes,” I said to Gopher.

“Why?”

I sighed. “Because I asked you to. Come on, Gopher, play along for a minute, will ya?”

The producer closed his eyes, but the frown he’d been wearing for the past twenty minutes held firm. “Okay, they’re closed,” he said.

“Great, now tell me how you feel.”

“Nauseous,” he said. “I can’t believe I’m agreeing to go on another one of these busts.”

“You’re the one who wanted to turn us into movie stars,” I reminded him.

It was Gopher’s turn to sigh. “We all know I don’t make great decisions,” he said.

I smiled. “Besides the nausea,” I said, “tell me how the rest of you feels.”

Gopher took a moment to answer, but eventually he said, “I don’t know, kind of heavy. Like I’m weighed down.”

My smile broadened and I plucked the crystal from his palm. Immediately Gopher said, “Whoa!”

“Lemme guess,” I said. “You’re feeling lighter?”

Gopher nodded. “That is freaky!”

I placed the crystal back in his hand and closed his fingers over it. “Now, keep that in your pocket at all times, okay? As long as you’re carrying it your energy will be too dense for Oruç to enter you. He won’t be able to take you over at all.”

“Got it,” he said, opening his eyes and tucking the sphalerite into his pocket. “But why aren’t you guys going to be carrying some of it?”

“Because we’ll need to keep our energies nice and light to communicate with the ghosties.”

“Doesn’t that mean that Baba can enter you, though?”

Heath and I shared a look. “It does,” I said. “And that’s why you’ve got to carry a few of these too.” I handed Gopher three grenades. “Don’t take the cap off until something scary happens,” I warned. “Otherwise, you’ll ruin our chances of crossing someone over.”

“I’m supposed to carry these and film you two?”

“We’ll all be carrying them, and we’ll all be filming. Gilley brought along a set of cameras we use in our regular busts too. We’ll give you full access to the film from those cameras to use in your show if you want.”

“Okay,” said Gopher, and I could tell he was trying to work up his nerve.

“What’s the plan?” asked Heath when Gopher was armed and ready.

“We’ll start in the old dining hall,” I said, “and work our way up to the fifth floor. Then we’ll give our friend Carol one more college try before we call it a night.”

“Why did she have to be on the third floor?” moaned Gilley. “M.J., I vote for you to skip Carol.”

“If we keep standing around arguing we’ll have no choice but to skip her,” I said impatiently, making a point of looking at my watch. Gilley rolled his eyes and went back to his monitors.

“I have good reception on all three electrostatic meters, and I’ve got clear pictures on cameras one and two,” he told us, indicating on the bar the small digital recorders that Heath and I would carry.

I picked up the nearest one and handed it to Heath. “This switch converts the picture from normal view to night vision,” I said, showing him the switch. “The rest of it is pretty straightforward.”

“Too cool,” he said, turning the camera over in his hand. “And I’m locked, loaded, and ready to go.”

“Great,” I said, stuffing several grenades, my electrostatic meter, and a bottle of water into it my tool belt. I then donned my headphones and microphone and said, “Let’s roll.”

I’d taken a few steps when I heard Gilley call my name. I turned and he said, “Please be careful?”

I gave him a winning smile and a thumbs-up and led the other two to the dining hall.

We entered the darkened room and flipped our cameras to night vision. I took a moment to record the massive room where the hotel held its wedding receptions, and as I scanned the tables and chairs, something appeared to flutter across my screen, then faded by a table and chairs.

“Over there,” said Heath, pointing in the exact spot where I’d seen something.

“Yeah,” I said. “I just caught an orb. Come on, Heath, let’s check it out.”

We crossed the room to the far corner near the stage, and immediately I felt the presence of a young woman who was telling me she wanted to sing me a song.

“Hi, there,” I said happily. The woman’s energy didn’t feel upset or troubled at all; in fact, she felt as if she were a bundle of fun.

“I like her,” said Heath. “She’s a hugger.”

I laughed. Sometimes in my line of work we come across folks who just loved life on this plane so much that they want to continue to engage in it. They resist crossing over because they were having so much fun here. “It’s the wedding receptions,” I said. “She loves the energy of them.”

“I feel like she’s a big romantic,” Heath said, then looked at the stage. “And a performer.”

In my head I heard the name Molly, and from somewhere toward the back of the stage we heard what sounded like a woman singing.

“Whoa,” whispered Gopher. “Do you guys hear that?”

“Can I get a status?” said Gilley in my ear. “Over.”

“We’ve made contact, Gil,” I said. “Heath and I are getting ready to talk her into crossing.”

“Now we know why people feel like they’re being touched in here by unseen hands,” said Heath, and in my viewfinder I watched the orb appear onstage and move from the center over to the left and down the steps to weave in and out of the tables.

“It’s like she thinks she’s in Vegas,” I said with a laugh. “Man, I really like her.”

“So let’s get her where she belongs,” Heath suggested, “to perform in front of an audience that can appreciate her.”

“Cool,” I agreed. “Do you want to take this one?”

“Can I?”

“By all means!” I backed up to give Heath some space and record him through the viewfinder.

It took Heath and me about a half hour to convince Molly to cross over. The lovely woman wasn’t easily convinced that leaving a gig like this was in her best interest, but eventually, with Heath and me each taking turns, we were able to talk her into going by telling her a little white lie. We implied that we’d booked her a special show with a nice big audience. Of course, we’d had to pull some major strings to get her the exclusive gig, we’d said, but we’d heard how amazing she was onstage, and that she didn’t have much time before the show was to start. We told her that the elevator was about to go up if she was willing to take the ride. “You can always come back if it doesn’t work out,” I said—which was a bit of a fib. Soon after that, Molly was on the joyride of her life, and Heath and I were slapping high fives with each other.

“Status, please?” said Gil as we were leaving the dining hall. “Over.”

“We’re on our way to the fifth floor,” I said. “We’ll be coming through your area in a few seconds.”

We came out of the hallway and passed by the front desk. I was surprised to see Knollenberg seated there at this late hour. “Hello, sir,” I said as he looked up at us.

“How is the ghostbusting coming along?”

“Two down, two to go,” I said with a big smile, then noticed how worn-out and exhausted he looked. “What are you doing here so late?”

“I’m down a manager, so I’m helping by rotating in a shift,” he said. “Your Detective MacDonald was unable to confirm the home address that Anton gave us—apparently it’s an empty lot. And Anton’s passport and visa are fakes.”

“So he’s our guy,” I said, feeling it in my bones.

“It appears,” Knollenberg said moodily. “I really should have done more of a background check on him. But I’d been so busy with the construction and hotel affairs and he came so highly recommended that I didn’t vet him properly. Mr. Beckworth is quite displeased.”

“Sorry,” I said, then felt Heath nudge my elbow and make a point of lifting his watch up. “Okay, I’m coming,” I said, then left Knollenberg with, “We’ll be up on the fifth floor taking care of Gus.”

“Do you need me to power down the lights in the hallway up there?” he asked.

“No,” I said. “We’re going to want to keep the lights on for now.”

“Splendid,” he said. “Good luck to you.”

We didn’t pause to speak to Gilley, but continued on our way to the elevators. We piled in, and Heath and I took point position at the front of the elevator with our hands on our grenades. The doors opened and I took a cautious step forward. Immediately I heard running footsteps down the hall and I froze.

“What is it?” Heath said behind me.

I held up a finger and said, “Shhh,” while I listened intently. The footsteps had gone out of hearing range, so I motioned to the others to follow, but quietly.

We walked slowly down the corridor, Heath and I each holding tightly to a grenade while Gopher filmed over our shoulders. As we rounded the corner I gasped. I had seen a shadow, quick as a flash, dart through a doorway. Behind me I heard Gopher squeak in surprise.

“Did you see that?” he said in a hissy whisper.

“I did.” I relaxed a bit now that I knew the source of the shadow. “That’s Gus.”

“Hopefully you can convince him to leave this time,” said Heath. “He didn’t want to listen to me.”

“What if he wins?” Heath argued.

I frowned. “You’re right. I hadn’t thought of that. I’ll admit that my plan is slightly flawed.”

“So what do we do?” he asked.

“We don’t lose.”

Heath smiled. “You’re a blast to work with, you know?”

“I have my moments,” I replied with a smirk.

When Gopher returned Heath and I made ourselves comfortable at the table in room 518 and made a big show of having a great time playing a game of poker. At first Gus was intent on peeking over our shoulders and offering us advice, but we staunchly ignored him, and every time we did, the one of us he was advising lost the hand. This frustrated our ghostie to no end, so when I offered to deal him in he took the bait easily and barely blanched when we told him that the bet was that the loser of the next hand had to do as the winner instructed, down to the letter. That left Heath and me with a little better than a thirty percent chance each that we’d be able to get Gus across.

Heath ended up winning the hand, and not even ten minutes later the score was three down, one to go.

“That was awesome!” said Gopher as he followed us down the hallway. I figured he was referring to the point during his filming when Gus lost his hand and the table had begun to rock back and forth without anyone touching it. Gus was a bit of a sore loser.

I glanced at my watch as we got to the elevator. “That leaves us with four hours to tackle Carol,” I said, yawning.

Heath looked at me in surprise. “Is it four a.m. already?”

“It is.”

“Okay,” he said, as the doors to the elevator opened and we got in. “But I say we work on her for no more than an hour, then take a break. I could really use a cup of coffee.”

Heath and I took up our point positions as the doors to the third floor opened. “Keep your eyes and ears open, boys,” I whispered as we stepped cautiously off the elevator.

We hovered next to the double doors for a few long seconds, listening intently for anything that might indicate we were in danger. When nothing happened, I waved everyone forward.

With great care we proceeded down the hallway. This was the floor where so much crazy stuff had gone down that it made me more than a little nervous. We rounded the corner and walked to room 321. Standing in front of the crime-scene tape, Heath and I pocketed our grenades and concentrated both of our sixth senses on calling out to Carol.

After a few minutes I said, “I’ve got her . . . and boy, is she pissy! Something’s got her rattled—can you feel that?”

Heath didn’t answer me, so I opened my eyes and glanced at him. He wore a deep frown, and my fingers immediately closed on my grenade, ready to pop the top if he so much as flinched. “Heath?” I said, keeping my tone even.

“Status, please?” Gilley said into my ear. “Over.”

“Not now!” I snapped softly.

Gilley’s voice lowered to a whisper. “M.J.,” he said, “I’ve got electrostatic energy spiking all around you. Over.”

“I’m aware,” I whispered back, growing annoyed. “Now please shut up for a few, will you?”

“Okay, okay,” he said, and finished with a tiny, “Over.”

Heath turned toward me then and whispered, “Someone’s in there.”

My eyes widened.

“Who?” asked Gopher.

Heath shook his head and shrugged his shoulders. “Feels male.”

I grabbed him by the shirtsleeve and pulled him away from the door as I ordered quietly, “Let’s back out of here slowly. Keep your grenades close, guys.”

We took one step, two steps, three steps back down the hallway when all of a sudden Carol Mustgrove came out of room 319 and practically jumped me.

“Holy crap!” I squealed as I felt the full weight of her energy cling to mine.

“What’s going on?” said Heath as I struggled to push off the intense feelings of being tackled by her.

“It’s Carol!” I whispered. “She’s all over me!”

Heath stepped in front of me and put the grenade up close to my head. He eased the cap open just a fraction and Carol let go, but I could still feel her spitting and reeling and fighting to get to me.

I placed a hand on Heath’s grenade, pushing the cap back down over the opening. “Thanks,” I said, “but I think she’s trying to tell me something.” With my heart hammering hard in my chest I said, “I’m going to give her exactly ten seconds—if anything weird happens, pull that cap back off, okay?”

Heath nodded, and I closed my eyes. Carol? I asked her in my mind. What’s the matter?

I saw it! I saw it all! she said. He came in with that awful dagger! The poor man didn’t have a chance!

I opened my eyes, and both Heath and Gopher were staring at me intently. I felt Carol tug me really hard toward the door of room 319, and I wavered between getting the freak out of there or trusting my instinct to investigate.

“M.J.?” I heard Gilley whisper. “Electrostatic is spiking off the charts! I want you guys to get the hell out of there! Over.”

Heath asked, “What are we doing here, M.J.?”

I pressed my lips together, trying to find a few extra ounces of courage. “I need to go in there,” I said, pointing to room 319. “And I’d appreciate it if you two had my back.”

Heath’s eyes widened, and Gopher gasped. Meanwhile Gilley hissed in our ears, “Heath! Don’t let her do it! Drag her out of that hallway if you have to! I insist that you guys get out of there, now! Over.”

I reached up and clicked off the volume on my headpiece. “Are you coming?” I asked, reaching for the door.

Heath gulped but said, “I’ve got your back.”

I used my master key card to swipe the lock. The small light on the handle turned from red to green, and, taking a deep, slow breath, I pushed the door open.